The Russian venture fund and incubator Impulse VC has announced an investment of “up to $300,000” in Moscow-based Contactless (in Russian: Beskontaknye Ustroistva), a startup that is developing a home and industrial automation platform called the Wiren Board. “The final investment amount will depend on company performance,” Valeria Zhigacheva of the fund’s press service told …
Impulse VC invests in smart home startup Contactless Read More
AmazingHiring, a Moscow-based service for finding IT professionals, has attracted $500,000 in a second seed round, with equal contributions brought in by SMRK, a Kiev-based venture fund, and Altair, the seed-stage fund backed by Russo-Austrian serial investor Igor Ryabenkiy. The startup is developing a search engine and browser plug-in for Chrome that recruiters can use to search …
Last week the Internet Initiatives Development Fund (IIDF, or FRII in Russian), the $200 million fund launched last year to support Russian Internet startups, announced the extension of its coverage to such new fields as big data, wearable devices and the Internet-of-Things. “We did quite a lot of research on technological trends across the world. Cloud, social and …
IIDF to support big data, wearable tech and Internet-of-things startups Read More
This past Wednesday Content Analytics, an analytics platform that recommends e-commerce catalog optimization strategies, announced it secured a $4 million Series A funding led by Almaz Capital. Geoffrey Baehr, a general partner at Almaz Capital, has joined the startup’s board of directors. Also participarting in the round is dunnhumby Ventures, the venture capital arm of a …
Almaz Capital leads $4 million funding round in US e-commerce solution provider Read More
Russian project Fairwaves has announced on its website that in August it joined US accelerator Techstars. According to Russian business publication RBC, Techstars has invested $118,000 in Fairwaves in exchange for a 6% stake. The company previously received $80,000 investment from the Dutch fund NLnet, $260,000 from the New America Foundation Open Technology Institute, around $50,000 from the …
Russian mobile network solution provider Fairwaves joins US accelerator Techstars Read More
Last week the IIDF (FRII in Russian), the $200 million startup fund launched last year, and Microsoft announced that they were beginning an industrial accelerator to support startups developing IT solutions for education, healthcare, commerce, industry, the service sector, the financial sector and municipal services. The project will receive support from Microsoft Ventures, the international subdivision …
Microsoft teams up with IIDF to support industrial startups Read More
Earlier this month Russia Partners, the Moscow-based private equity affiliate of global alternative investment firm Siguler Guff & Company, announced that Rakuten acquired Slice, a portfolio company in its technology fund. The details of the deal have not been revealed. Over the past few years, the Japanese online retail company has invested several billion dollars in …
Russia Partners sells US startup with Ukraine-based IT team to Japan’s Rakuten Read More
Runa Capital, a venture firm operating globally from its offices in Moscow and San Francisco, has led a $2.2 million funding round in SchoolMint, a leading provider of mobile and online enrollment systems for US public, charter and private schools. Several US funds and business angels have also participated in the round: among them are …
Runa Capital leads $2.2 million round in US school admission startup Read More
Earlier this month TMT Investments, a UK-headquartered venture fund backed by Russian businessmen, announced an investment in Israeli startup Twtrland. The size of the investment has not been disclosed. Twtrland analyses social network content to help users find new contacts based on social media output, interests, age, location etc. It also provides graphics to help users visualise their …
Early last year, Russian travel booking site Ostrovok.ru raised $28 million in a Series B round led by General Catalyst Partners, to much fanfare. By the end of the year, however, both General Catalyst and another investor, Accel Partners, had quietly divested their holdings, as Dow Jones VentureWire reported this morning. General Catalyst Managing Director and Co-Founder Joel Cutler confirmed that …
Twelve months ago at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco, Russia had its very own ‘pavilion’ on Startup Alley featuring some of Skolkovo’s best projects. How times have changed… This year Stanislav Sazhin, CEO of social network for health professionals, “Doctor at Work”, commented that “last year there was a whole crowd from Russia. This year it …
TC Disrupt winners – “pale imitations of Russian startups?” Read More
Dmitry Filatov, co-founder of dating service Topface, has launched a new venture fund targeting “Internet companies with problems”. The fund, named Restart Capital, aims to buy into companies facing financial difficulties and turn them around through restructuring and an effective marketing strategy. Restart Capital will principally target social networks, mobile services (but not those that rely …
New Russian fund aims to restart struggling startups Read More
