Festival Of Code Winners May Be The Startups Of The Future

Screen Shot 2015-08-02 at 16.02.37 Startups start with talent, and the talent, as we all know, seems to get younger every year. But it wouldn’t happen if children themselves were not introduced to the word of technology and engineering early, and shown that it can be a fun, creative environment. For the last 6 years, a pioneer of this in the UK has been Young Rewired State, a non-profit founded by Emma Mulqueeny, which… Read More

December’s Disrupt London To Feature Delivery Hero And Wallapop

disruptLONDON2015_466x269 We’re continuing to announce speakers for our TechCrunch Disrupt London conference on December 7-8, 2015. The conference will feature an amazing slate of global startups, investors, influential speakers, VIP guests and more. Niklas Östberg, Delivery Hero Niklas Östberg is the Co-Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Delivery Hero. Niklas has been involved in the start-up scene since… Read More

SMB Lending Platform Iwoca Raises $20M To Expand In Europe

Iwoca, one of the booming cluster of FinTech startups coming out of London, has raised a $20m series B round from the VC arm of Germany’s CommerzVentures, Acton Capital Partners, the Munich-based private equity and VC firm Redline Capital and other existing investors, in order to grow the lending platform’s European business. Iwoca offers flexible financing to Europe’s 20… Read More

Crowd Equity Platform Crowdcube Raises $9.3M From Numis, Draper And Balderton

UK-based crowd equity platform Crowdcube has raised £6m ($9.3m)from stockbroker Numis, Tim Draper, his London-based VC firm Draper Esprit and existing backer Balderton capital. As a result Crowdcube is now valued at £51m. The move will also now it to offer a way for investors to access companies which are about to go public, bringing IPO investment opportunities to the platform. IPOs will… Read More

Equity Crowd Funding Platform Seedrs Raises $15.6M To Launch In US

Equity crowd funding platform Seedrs has raised a $15.6 million (£10 million) Series A round led by Woodford Patient Capital Trust plc (WPCT) and Augmentum Capital, the money from which will be used to launch in the US market. Seedrs had previously raised $7.2 million from Faber Ventures and it’s own crowd-funding campaign. Furthermore, Seedrs is to launch a £2.5 million crowd… Read More

Vector Plans Developer Platform For It’s ‘Affordable Luxury’ Smart Watch

vector Back in March the Vector — a smart watch with an e-ink LCD screen — made its debut in a number of reviews in the tech press. Of note was the unusual 30 day battery life and a smartphone control app which worked across iOS, Android and Windows phones. What wasn’t elucidated in detail at the time was that the startup not only planned to release an API to developers, allowing… Read More

SaaS Startups Would Be Idiots Not To Know Notion Capital After $150M Fund Raise

The scale of the opportunity in Cloud computing and SaaS was underlined today with the news that Notion Capital has closed its third fund with a first round of $120m, with a final close of $150m expected. Funds under management will therefore be over $300m. Partners and brothers Ben and Jos White formed Notion in 2008 after selling MessageLabs to Symantec for $700m, one of Europe’s… Read More

Rocket’s Oliver Samwer And Citymapper’s Azmat Yusuf Join Disrupt London

disruptLONDON2015_466x269 We’re delighted today to announce the next round of speakers for our TechCrunch Disrupt London conference on December 7-8, 2015. The conference will feature an outstanding slate of global startups, influential speakers, guests and more. Oliver Samwer, Co-founder – Rocket Internet Oliver Samwer is one of the most successful Internet entrepreneurs ever, having built and exited… Read More

Stream It Like Beckham: Global Star Backs Periscope/Meerkat Rival MyEye

IMG_1367 Since live streaming from mobile phones came roaring back in the era of social media, major celebrities have been courted by platforms like Meerkat and Periscope for their crowd pulling power. Now another one of those stars is putting his money where his mouth is. David Beckham, the well known athlete and megabrand, has become a founding investor in a new British startup which plans to take… Read More

Mirakl Closes $20M Series B From VCs That Love Online Marketplaces

Screen Shot 2015-07-22 at 12.13.23 Who says France can’t produce startups? Online marketplace startup Mirakl has just closed a $20m Series B round of funding led by 83North with participation from new fund Felix Capital, and Dave Strohm, Partner at Greylock and a founding investor and advisor to 83North. The cash will be used to take its platform to more B2C and B2B retailers globally. Why? Well, Mirakl claims it… Read More