This article was published on September 11, 2015

Friday business roundup: Apple event, BlaBlaCar raises $160M, Nintendo goes mobile with Pokémon Go


Friday business roundup: Apple event, BlaBlaCar raises $160M, Nintendo goes mobile with Pokémon Go

Much of the week’s news has been overshadowed by coverage on industry juggernaut Apple’s “Hey Siri” event. Should you need a recap of that, we’ve got you covered.

Despite all eyes being focused on Tim Cook et al. for two hours on Wednesday, the rest of the tech world kept on turning.

Before you leave work for the weekend, let us quickly recap the week’s events. We picked out the need-to-knows from the stories that made the top of Index’s algorithms for you.

This week in numbers

Index recorded 146 funding events and 40 acquisitions this week. The median amount raised by tech companies was $1.9 million, 24 percent less than last week. The largest investment round was raked in by Chinese Uber rival Didi Kauidi, which received $1 billion in private equity just one week after Uber China received an equally sizeable investment of $1.2 billion.

Funding events

Five breakout funding rounds

Location data analysis and mapping platform CartoDB picked up a $23 million Series B led by Accel Partners.

European rideshare platform BlaBlaCar snatched a $160 million Series D round, bringing its latest valuation up to $1.2 billion.

Zomato, a Mumbai based restaurant search and discovery app, raised a fresh $60 million Series D led by Singapore’s Temasek.

DevOps Automation service Chef hooked a $40 million Series E led by DFJ Growth, after several investors jumped aboard a $32 million round started in April.

Secondhand clothing marketplace ThredUp hauled in a $81 million Series E round from led by Goldman Sachs. The company has raised $131.1 million to date.

Headline highlights

With Pokémon Go, Nintendo is showing that it takes mobile seriously [The Verge]

Everything Apple announced at its September 2015 event [The Next Web]

SpaceX releases first interior photos of crew capsule [Re/Code]

Airbnb hosted nearly 17 million guests this summer [TechCrunch]

Tinder now lets you swipe up to ‘Super Like’ that special someone [The Next Web]

Periscope finally lets you view and broadcast in landscape [The Next Web]

Elon Musk says we need to drop nuclear bombs on Mars to make it livable [Business Insider]

Hungry for more?

Track what’s happening in tech throughout the week on Index, or sign up for our weekly digest of the biggest stories in tech.

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