It’s Friday! No column today — we’ve been busy with interviews at TC’s temporary Davos studio today. (We’ll link to them Monday; the founders we talked with — Zach Sims of Codecademy, Zac Bookman of OpenGov, and Ted Bailey of Dataminr — are each running extremely interesting companies.)

Hope you have a great weekend, everyone. We’ll be sending especially good juju to those of you on the East Coast.

See you Monday when we’re back in San Francisco.

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Top News in the A.M.

Google‘s Android operating system has generated revenue of $31 billion and $22 billion in profit, a lawyer for Oracle Corp. said in court while disclosing figures Google says shouldn’t have been made public. Bloomberg has the story here.

During that same court proceeding, it was revealed that Google is paying Apple richly to keep its search bar on the iPhone. According to Bloomberg, Apple received $1 billion from Google in 2014. (That’s a percentage of the revenue that Google generated through the device, apparently.) More here.

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New Fundings

BaubleBar, a four-year-old, New York-based fashion jewelry e-commerce startup, has raised $20 million in Series C funding led by earlier backer Accel Partners. Hubert Burda Media, shoe retailer DSW, Simon Venture Group, and earlier backers Aspect Ventures, Burch Creative Capital and Greycroft Partners.

Canvs, a five-year-old, New York-based startup that measures emotion on social media, has raised $5.6 million in Series A funding led by KEC Ventures. Other investors in the Series A include Rubicon Venture Capital, Gary Vaynerchuk’s BRaVe Ventures, Social Starts, and Milestone Venture Partners. TechCrunch has more here.

FiveStars, a five-year-old, San Francisco-based startup that has built a platform and app to run loyalty programs and shopping analytics for small brick-and-mortar retailers, has raised $50 million in Series C funding led by HarbourVest Partners. Earlier backers Lightspeed Venture Partners, Menlo Ventures, and DCM Ventures also joined the round, which brings the company’s total funding to $92 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Ice.com, a 1.5-year-old, Austin, Tex.-based online jewelry marketplace that also aims to educate its customers on their potential purchases, has $2 million in seed funding Maveron, Rivet, Quest, Uj Ventures, and numerous angel investors. TechCrunch has more here.

Iterable, a 2.5-year-old, San Francisco-based growth marketing and user engagement platform that passed through the AngelPad accelerator in 2013, has raised $8 million in Series A funding led by CRV, with participation from previous investors. VentureBeat has more here.

Jugnoo, a 1.5-year-old, Chandigarh, India-based rickshaw-on-demand service, has raised $5.5 million in Series B funding, including from earlier backers Paytm, the Alibaba-backed billion-dollar mobile payments firm, and Snow Leopard. TechCrunch has more here.

LendUp, a three-year-old, San Francisco-based “socially responsible” financial tech company, has raised $150 million in funding from investors, including Susa Ventures, Data Collective, GV, QED, Kapor Capital, Victory Park Capital and SV Angel. More here.

LoanHero, a 1.5-year-old, San Diego, Ca.-based online-lender, has raised $2.5 million in new funding, led by Alsop Louie Partners and Mucker Capital. The company has now raised $4.2 million altogether. The San Diego Union-Tribune has more here.

Mucosis, a nine-year-old, Groningen, Netherlands-based clinical-stage biotechnology company at work on a vaccine for RSV, a virus that theatens newborns and elderly adults, has raised 3.7 million euros ($4 million) from Wellcome Trust. More here.<
Nubo, a 4.5-year-old, Israel-based company whose software enables employees to access company files on their own mobile devices, has raised $7 million in Series A funding led by Magma Venture Partners and Motorola Solutions Venture Capital. TechCrunch has more here.

OpenDoor, the two-year-old, San Francisco-based online home-selling service, quietly raised $80 million at a roughly $580 million valuation back in October, led by billionaire Len Blavatnik’s Access Industries. The WSJ has the story here.

Roger, a year-old, New York-based walkie-talkie-style voice messaging app created by two former Spotify engineers, has raised $1 million in seed funding led by Social Capital. TechCrunch has more here.

Waldo Photos, a new Austin, Tex.-based startup that works with professional photographers to zap photos of you at events, concerts and other events directly to your phone, has raised $5 million in seed funding from Upfront Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

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New Funds

Abingworth, the London-based venture capital firm focused on life sciences, has closed its eleventh fund with $105 million fund. More here.

Israeli-American Dovi Frances announced earlier this week that he has raised $50 million for his second fund, SGVC II. Frances previously cofounded a fund with Russian-American billionaire Sergey Grishin that the two called SGVC. According to GeekTime, Frances will be running the new fund alone; he has also bought Grishin out of his position in that first fund. More here.

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IPOs

Just three IPOs are slated next week, according to Renaissance Capital. Only one of them is a tech play: 19-year-old, Cherry Hill, N.J.-based Ameriquest, which sells a suite of cloud-based B2B services to the transportation industry.

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Exits

Shareable Ink, a six-year-old, Nashville, Tn.-based health-care technology provider, has been acquired for undisclosed terms by Digital Reasoning Systems, a 15-year-old, Arlington, Va.-based cognitive-computing company. Shareable Ink had raised roughly $25 million from investors, including Founder Collective and New Enterprise Associates. Digital Reason has raised about $34 million from its backers, including In-Q-Tel and Goldman Sachs.

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People

Business Insider grabbed time with famed venture capitalist Jim Breyer here at the World Economic Forum in Davos and asked for his take on the current market. Breyer told the outlet there’s “blood in the water” and that he expects fully 90 percent of the privately held companies which are valued at a billion dollars or more to either be repriced or die.

Scott Weiss won’t be a part of Andreessen Horowitz’s next fund. Weiss had joined the firm as its fourth general partner. He was previously the CEO of IronPort Systems. More here.

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Jobs

Sands Capital Ventures is looking for a life sciences venture associate. The job is in Washington, D.C.

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Essential Reads

Human driver, taking over from computer, crashes autonomous car.

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Detours

Overheard in a retirement community, 2070 AD.

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Retail Therapy

Darth Vader Macbook decals.

Hi, happy Thursday, everyone. Great afternoon here in sunny, if freezing-cold, Davos. Among other highlights, our TC colleague Mike Butcher sat down with the very canny actor and investor Kevin Spacey, who also talked with CNBC (we’re sharing a space with them right now). Our favorite Spacey quote of the day: “Sometimes, a teacher, a parent, an adult, can say just the right thing at just the right time, and it can be life changing.” (So true, no?)

You can check out some of TC’s Davos coverage here.

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Top News in the A.M.

Facebook just built its own game hub. Recode has the story here.

Uber says its expanding its meal-delivery service, positioning it to more directly compete with the likes of Postmates and DoorDash. The WSJ has more here.

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Scale Venture Partners Raises New, $335 Million Fund

This morning, the Bay Area venture firm Scale Venture Partners is announcing the close of its newest fund,  Scale Venture Partners V, L.P., with $335 million, up from the $300 million fund it closed in May 2013.

Scale, once the venture arm of Bank of America (it split off from the bank 10 years ago), says its capital came from a wide array of pension funds, foundations, funds of funds, financial investors and family offices worldwide, including previous and new investors. (BofA is no longer an LP.)

The firm, which focuses primarily on enterprise investments, is run by longtime colleagues Stacey Bishop, Kate Mitchell, Rory O’Driscoll, and Andy Vitus, along with their newest partner, Ariel Tseitlin, a former director of cloud solutions at Netflix who was promoted from venture partner in 2014. It also recently announced the promotion of former tech banker Susan Liu to vice president from senior associate.

Like a lot of other firms able to raise funds right now, Scale has had a string of exits in recent years, including the IPOs of the online storage provider Box. We talked via email with several partners of the firm earlier this week to get a better handle on where it might be shopping next (among other things).

More here.

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New Fundings

Botify, a 3.5-year-old, London- and Paris-based search analytics platform for digital marketers, has raised $7.2 million in Series A funding from Idinvest and Ventech.

Citymapper, a four-year-old, London-based app that helps users navigate their way around a growing number of cities, has raised $40 million in Series B funding, including from Index Ventures, Benchmark, Yuri Milner, Tom Stafford, and Michael Lynto. The company raised a $10 million Series A round led by Balderton Capital in April 2014. TechCrunch has more here.

CREO, a five-year-old, Bangalore, India-based company that wants to create a new Android-based operating system as well as produce its own smartphones, has raised $3 million from Sequoia India, Beenext Ventures, and India Quotient. TechCrunch has more here.

ForeScout, a security company that helps firms detect devices on their networks they might not know about, announced a $76 million investment led by Wellington Management. The company has now raised $121 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

Jopwell, a 1.5-year-old, New York-based diversity and hiring recruiting platform dedicated to helping blacks, Hispanics and Native Americans get jobs in tech, has raised a $3.25 million seed round from Magic Johnson Enterprises, Andreessen Horowitz, Kapor Capital, Omidyar Network, Valar Ventures and others. The company has now raised $4.22 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

Malwarebytes, an eight-year-old, Santa Clara, Ca.-based cybersecurity company that helps safeguard its business customers from computer viruses, worms, trojan horses and more, has raised $50 million from Fidelity Management and Research Company. TechCrunch has more here.

MariaDB Corporation, a five-year-old, Espoo, Finland-based software vendor specializing in MariaDB and MySQL, has raised $9 million in funding from earlier investors Intel Capital and California Technology Ventures. The company has now raised just more than $40 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

Olo, a 10-year-old, New York-based digital ordering engine for restaurant brands, has raised $40 million in funding from The Raine Group. TechCrunch has more here.

PieSync, a three-year-old, Belgium-based startup that creates deep integrations between web applications focused on business users, has raised $1.6 million in new funding led by Ark Angels Activator Fund and SOFI. TechCrunch has more here.

Qubole, a four-year-old, Mountain View, Ca.-based big data-as-a-service company, has raised $30 million in a Series C round that brings its total funding to $50 million. Institutional Venture Partners led the financing, with earlier backers CRV,  Lightspeed Venture Partners and Norwest Venture Partners participating.

QuizUp, a 2.5-year-old, Reykjavik, Iceland-based social trivia platform, is raising up to $7.5 million in funding from Glu Mobile. The company had previously raised $27 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Sentenai, a year-old, Boston-based developer of cloud infrastructure that applies machine learning techniques to automate data engineering, has raised $1.8 million in seed funding from Flybridge Capital Partners, Founder Collective, Project 11 Ventures, and Hyperplane Venture Capital.

WeLab, a three-year-old, Beijing- and Hong Kong-based online lending platform, has raised a whopping $160 million in Series B funding led by Khazanah Nasional Berhad, Malaysia’s strategic investment fund, with participation from ING Bank and Guangdong Technology Financial Group, which is run by the Chinese government. TechCrunch has more here.

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New Funds

iNovia Capital, the nine-year old, Canada-based early stage venture firm, has raised its third fund with $175 million Canadian dollars (roughly $120 million). The WSJ has more here.

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IPOs

Delivery Hero, the online food delivery startup partly owned by Rocket Internet, has picked three banks including Citigroup and Goldman Sachs to advise it on an IPO this year, reports Bloomberg. More here.

Online lender Elevate Credit has postponed its IPO, which would have been the first this year, due to difficult market conditions, reports the WSJ. More here.

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Exits

FireEye, a now-public company that makes appliances that protect computer networks, is spending $200 million to buy the nine-year-old, Dallas, Tex.-based threat intelligence company iSight Partners. According to CrunchBase, iSight has raised roughly $40 million from investors over the years. Boston Business Journal has more here.

Gawker Media plans to sell a minority stake to the investment company Columbus Nova Technology Partners, a move its founder, Nick Denton, said was driven by the need for funding for growth initiatives. The New York Times has more here.

IBM is reportedly considering a $130 million buyout of the nine-year-old, San Francisco-based company Ustream, which sells a live cloud-hosted video service. According to CrunchBase, Ustream has raised $60.3 million from its investors. Fortune has more here.

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People

Honor, an elder-care startup, has just turned its contract workers into full-time employees with equity.

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Essential Reads

Fortune examines Silicon Valley’s $585 billion problem.

The New York Times looks at Jack Dorsey’s battle to steer two companies that have been caught in the downdraft.

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Detours

How “Making a Murderer” went wrong.

What are your odds of becoming a millionaire?

Millennial think-piece bingo.

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Retail Therapy

ButterOnce corn buttering knife, where have you been all our life?

Hi, everyone! We arrived a little late in Davos last night, immediately had a couple of beers with our colleagues at TechCrunch, and forgot that you were waiting on the newsletter. We blame lack of sleep en route. Sorry to miss you yesterday; hope you have a wonderful Wednesday!

(P.S.: We’re here for a few more days so a reminder that the SVC may arrive at unexpected times.)

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Top News in the A.M.

Global stocks are on the brink of a bear market. Bloomberg has more here.

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Norwest Venture Partners Raises $1.2 Billion for the Third Time

Norwest Venture Partners, the 55-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca-based venture firm, has closed its third consecutive $1.2 billion fund. The group, which employs 20 investors altogether, raised the same amount in 2014, as well as in 2010.

If Norwest’s sole limited partner – the banking giant Wells Fargo – likes what it sees, it’s easy to see why.

According to one of Norwest’s three managing partners, Jeff Crowe, Norwest has seen 22 of its portfolio companies exit in a liquidity event over the past 18 months. Some of those that went public include the cyber protection company FireEye; the credit marketplace Lending Club; the health care equipment company Intersect ENT; and SolarEdge, which provides solar power harvesting and photovoltaic monitoring software.

Among those of its bets that have been acquired are the satellite imaging company Skybox, which sold to Google for $500 million last year; and the data discovery and sharing platform 1010data, which sold last August to Conde Nast parent Advance for $500 million.

Indeed, despite not having to actively fundraise, Norwest appears to be hustling right alongside other traditional venture firms that have gotten out of their offices in recent years to more aggressively pursue the companies they want to fund.

More here.

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New Fundings

Adestra, a 10-year-old London-based marketing technology company,  has raised $7.2 million from the Business Growth Fund (BGF). TechCrunch has more here.

ALICE, a four-year-old, Seoul, Korea-based mobile platform for guests to engage with hotel services and staff, has raised $9.5 million in Series A funding led by Expedia, with participation from Laconia Ventures, 645 Ventures and the founders of NeueHouse.

Big Switch Networks, a five-year-old, Santa Clara, Ca.-based open networking software startup, has raised $48.5 million in Series C funding from Morgenthaler Ventures, Silver Lake Waterman, Accton, CID Group, MSD Capital, and earlier backers Index Ventures, Khosla Ventures, Intel Capital and Redpoint Ventures. More here.

BlueVine, a 2.5-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based startup that provides credit lines to small businesses, has raised $40 million in funding led by Menlo Ventures, with participation from Rakuten, Lightspeed Venture Partners, and 83North. TechCrunch has more here.

BookDoc, a months-old, Kuala Lumpur-based startup that connects patients to a network of doctors in Southeast Asia (a la ZocDoc), has raised a seed round that includes a $2 million investment from Prince Abdul Qawi, a member of The House of Bolkiah, the ruling family of Brunei. TechCrunch has more here.

ChatWork, a four-year-old, Sunnyvale, Ca.-based business chat platform that’s taken off in Asia, has raised $12.5 million in Series B funding from JAFCO and other, unnamed investors to spur additional use in the U.S., Europe and Latin America.

Deezer, a nine-year-old,  Paris-based streaming audio service with 6.3 million users that cancelled an IPO last year, has raised another €100 million ($109 million) in funding led by Warner Music Group owner Access Industries, with participation from the French carrier Orange. TechCrunch has more here.

EiQ Networks, a 15-year-old, Boston-based company behind an online platform that provides security, risk, and compliance solutions to its customers, has raised $9.55 million in Series C funding led by Arrowroot Capital.

Grain, a 1.5-year-old, Singapore-based food tech startup with a  “full-stack” approach to food deliveries in the Southeast Asian city-state, has raised around $1.7 million in Series a funding led by NSI Ventures, with participation from Ivan Lee (who founded and sold Thai Express in Singapore ), 500 Startups, and Digital Media Partners.

Greatist, a 4.5-year-old, New York-based site promising “real facts and doable steps for your happiest life,” has raised $4.5 million in Series A funding led by Floodgate, with participation from earlier backers RiverPark Ventures, Vayner/RSE, and Facebook cofounder Chris Hughes, among others. The company has now raised $8 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

Indus OS, a 1.5-year-old, Mumbai, India-based startup that has altered the Android operating system to make it more palatable to first-time users in rural India, has raised $5 million in Series A funding led by Omidyar Network. TechCrunch has more here.

Instart Logic, a five-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based application delivery platform, has raised $45 million in Series D funding led by Geodesic Capital. Other participants in this round include earlier backers Hermes Growth Partners, Andreessen Horowitz, Four Rivers Group, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and Tenaya Capital. Telstra Ventures, the venture arm of the Australian telecom firm, also announced a strategic investment in the company. TechCrunch has more here.

IronScales, a two-year-old, Ra’anana, Israel-based company whose automated security assessment and training platform is designed to provide corporate information security officers with the tools they need to stop phishing attempts, has raised $1.5 million in seed funding led by RDSeed, an investment arm of Rafael Development Corporation. More here.

JFrog, a nine-year-old, Netanya, Israel-based developer of open source software distribution tools, has raised $50 million in new funding from Scale Venture Partners, Sapphire Ventures, Battery Ventures, Vintage Investment Partners, Qumra Capital, and earlier backers Gemini Israel Ventures and VMware. TechCrunch has more here.

Kumu Networks, a 3.5-year-old, Santa Clara, Ca.-based startup whose technology helps its customers make better use of the spectrum they already own, has raised $25 millionin funding led by Verizon and Deutsche Telekom, with participation from Cisco, Swisscom, and earlier backers New Enterprise Associates, Third Point Ventures, and Khosla Ventures. Recode has more here.

Meituan-Dianping, a 13-year-old, Shanghai,China- based group deals site, has closed a colossal $3.3 billion round at a valuation of $18 billion. The company claims that this is the largest single funding round ever raised by a venture-backed Internet startup in China. Backers include returning investor Tencent, DST Global, TBP Capital, Canada Pension Plan Investment Board, Baillie Gifford, CDB Kai Yuan Capital Management, Capital Today, and Temasek Holdings. TechCrunch has more here.

MVPindex, a three-year-old, Dallas, Tex.-based social media index and measurement platform for sports and entertainment, has raised $7 million in Series A funding, including from KB Partners. More here.

Neura, a two-year-old, Sunnyvale, Ca.-based platform that helps users personalize connected devices while guarding their data, has raised $11 million in Series A funding led by AXA Strategic Partners and Pitango Venture Capital, with participation from Liberty Israel Venture Fund and Lenovo Group. TechCrunch has more here.

Opentest, a five-month-old,  San Mateo, Ca.-based startup that provides remote user testing carried out over video by experienced product managers, UX designers and engineers, has raised an undisclosed amount of pre-seed funding from Bay Area investors. We talked with the company for TechCrunch.

Patreon, a two-year-old, San Francisco-based platform that enables fans and sponsors to support artists and creators, has raised $30 million in Series B funding led by Thrive Capital, with participation from Allen & Co., CRV, Index Ventures, Accomplice and Freestyle Capital. The company has now raised $47.1 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

Puppet Labs, a 10-year-old Portland, Ore.-based company that develops IT automation software, has secured a $22 million credit facility from Silicon Valley Bank. TechCrunch has more here.

Second Home, a year-old,  East London-based office space for entrepreneurs and other creatives, has raised £7.5 million ($10.7 million) from a host of investors, including Yuri Milner, Tencent chairman Martin Lau, and Index Ventures. Business Insider has more here.

Send Anywhere, a four-year-old, Korea-based free peer-to-peer file sharing system, has raised $6 million in fresh funding from Rakuten Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Solovis, a 2.5-year-old, Birmingham, Al.-based software platform that allows investment managers to construct and visualize their investments, has raised $3.25 million in new funding led by Edison Partners, with participation from MissionOG, OCA Ventures, Timberline Venture Partners, Northwestern University and Jeremie Bacon.

Swiggy, a 1.5-year-old, Bangalore, India-based restaurant delivery startup that claims to be the largest in India, has raised $35 million in Series C funding from SAIF Partners, Norwest Venture Partners, Accel Partners, Harmony Partners, RB investments and an “undisclosed global investment entity.” TechCrunch has more here.

Telensa, a 10-year-old, London-based developer of “smart city” applications like LED-based street lighting, has raised $18 million in new equity and debt funding from Environmental Technologies Fund and Silicon Valley Bank. TechCrunch has more here.

Theracos, a 15-year-old, Marlborough, Ma.-based developer of drugs to treat Type II diabetes, has raised $25 million in new equity and debt funding from undisclosed backers. Fierce Biotech has more here.

Winnow, a two-year-old, London-based food waste smart meter maker, has raised $3.3 million in Series A funding from earlier investor Mustard Seed, Axel Johnson’s digital venture capital fund D:Ax, and numerous unnamed individual investors. TechCrunch has more here.

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New Funds

Cocoon Networks, a new group backed by China Equity Group and Hanxin Capital, is setting up a £500 million ($713 million) fund in London with plans to invest in U.K. and European startups in areas like fintech, the creative industries, and biotechnology. TechCrunch talked with Cocoon Networks John Zai for more details.

Danhua Ventures, a 2.5-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based early-stage venture firm, is targeting $200 million for its second fund, according to an SEC filing. Danhua’s cofounders are Stanford University Physics Professor Shoucheng Zhang and Stanford alum Anjia Andrew Gu, who worked previously at the IBM Almaden Research Center.

Norwest Venture Partners, the 55-year-old venture firm backed by Wells Fargo, has raised $1.2 billion for third time in the last five years. We sat down with the firm late last week to talk about it.

Publicis Groupe, the French advertising agency holding group, is setting aside €10 million ($10.9 million) for a new project called Publicis90 project that will see it invest between €10,000 and €500,000 in each of  90 startups. Business Insider has more here.

The German company Rocket Internet has raised a $420 million Internet-focused fund called Rocket Internet Capital Partners. Rocket Internet contributed $50 million to the vehicle. Tech.eu has more here.

SoftTech VC, the 11-year-old, San Francisco and Palo Alto, Ca.-based seed-stage venture firm, is targeting up to $130 million across two new funds, we reported yesterday morning. SoftTech also promoted two of its investors to partner: Stephanie Palmeri and Andy McLoughlin. Details here.

University College London said earlier this week that it plans to invest £50 million in what it hopes will be the next generation of university spin-out companies over the next five years. Its LPs are the European Investment Fund, one of the largest providers of venture investment in Europe, and Imperial Innovations, a public technology commercialization company. Business Insider has more here.

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IPOs

Practice Fusion, an electronic health records start-up, hired JPMorgan Chase last year to explore an initial public offering in 2017, according to Dealbook, whose sources say discussions are now in flux because of market volatility. More here.

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Exits

Microsoft, which  acquired the creator of the game Minecraft in 2014, has now acquired MinecraftEdu, a modified version of Minecraft tailored for use in schools. The New York Times has more here.

Following its $500 million investment in transportation startup Lyft, General Motors has acquired select assets of Sidecar, a would-be Uber and Lyft competitor that went belly up in December. The price of the transaction wasn’t disclosed, although Bloomberg is reporting that it was less than the $39 million that Sidecar had raised from investors. More here.

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People

Former Twitter CEO Dick Costolo has a new health and fitness platform startup in the works, he disclosed yesterday on Twitter. Costolo has also joined Index Ventures as a venture partner, he said. TechCrunch has more here.

Steve Murray, a 20-year veteran of Softbank, has joined the Washington, D.C.-based investment firm Revolution Growth as a partner.

Santi Subotovsky has been promoted to to general partner at Emergence Capital in San Mateo, Ca. Subotovsky had joined the firm in 2010; before that, he founded his own company, AXG Tecnonexo, a e-learning vendor in Latin America.

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Jobs

FundersClub is looking to hire a venture associate. The job is in San Francisco.

—–

Essential Reads

Apple, Samsung and Microsoft are among a host of tech companies and carmakers implicated in a new report that sheds light on apparent child labor practices in the sourcing of minerals used to create batteries. TechCrunch has more here.

—–

Detours

What happens inside the brain when we flip our proverbial lids.

Is it still possible to get away with a heist?

How “no worries” infected American English.

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Retail Therapy

Going, going . . . a 1990 Riva Ferrari 32 Speedboat, one of just 30 built.

Hi, everyone!

Great news: When we announced our upcoming event last Friday, we mentioned that we might have one more surprise, and now we can announce it. In addition to our all-star speaker line-up of DFJ’s Heidi Roizen, GV CEO Bill Maris, and Autodesk CEO Carl Bass, we’re excited to let you know that Peter Szulczewski, cofounder and CEO of Wish, will be appearing in conversation with early investor Hans Tung of GGV Capital. (As many of you will know, Wish is one of the most interesting e-commerce startups out there right now. It’s also a nominee for the year’s best mobile app at next month’s “Crunchies” awards show.)

It’s going to be a pretty terrific program, so don’t miss it.

Much thanks to AutoDesk for hosting us and to our friends at Bolt for their ongoing support. If you’re also interested in partnering with us on this next INSIDER gathering as a sponsor, please let us know.

Have a great Friday, everyone. We aren’t publishing Monday in observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day, but we’ll write you from Davos sometime on Tuesday.

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Top News in the A.M.

Stocks fell around the world this morning, with U.S. equities headed for their lowest point since August.

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In Q4, Investors Turned to Seed-Stage Startups

Call it the Fidelity effect.

According to a new MoneyTree Report from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association, there appears to have been a chill in late-stage funding in the fourth quarter of last year, while investors continued stuffing money into seed- and early-stage investments.

According to PWC and NVCA data, investors poured $375 million in 52 seed deals in the fourth quarter, and the average seed deal rose from $4.1 million in the third quarter to $7.2 million in the fourth (which is a lot of money for a seed-stage company!).

Early-stage deals also rose slightly, garnering an average of $10 million per deal, up from $9 million in the third quarter.

For all of 2015, the average amount invested for both seed and early stage deals was up 23 percent higher than it was in 2014.

Expansion-stage investments — likely impacted by the very public markdowns made by investors like Fidelity — were meanwhile down 53 percent in dollars and 10 percent in number of deals from the previous quarter, with $3 billion going into 247 deals.

More here.

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New Fundings

20/20 Gene Systems, a 15-year-old Rockville, Md.-based cancer diagnostics startup, has raised $4.5 million in Series A funding from Ping An Ventures, family offices, and individual investors. FinSMEs has more here.

Appthority, a 4.5-year-old, San Francisco-based company that makes mobile application risk management software, has raised $10 million in Series B funding led by Blue Coat Systems and Knollwood Investment Advisory, with participation from earlier backers U.S. Venture Partners and Venrock. More here.

CourseHorse, a 4.5-year-old, New York-based online platform for finding and enrolling in classes, has raised $4 million in funding from Red Ventures, with participation from earlier investors, including Learn Capital and L.A-based angel Paige Craig. More here.

Estimote, a three-year-old, New York-based beacon company whose small, wireless sensors and accompanying software provide indoor location technology to large retailers, has raised $10.7 million in Series A funding led by Javelin Venture Partners, with participation from new investors Homebrew, Box Group, Digital Garage, Commerce Ventures, and numerous angel investors. TechCrunch has more here.

Euclid Analytics, a five-year-old, San Francisco-based location analytics company that helps companies track customer behavior in their retail stores, has raised $20 million in Series C funding led by media conglomerate Cox Enterprises. Groupe Arnault and Gold Sky Capital also participated, along with earlier investors Benchmark, New Enterprise Associates, and Harrison Metal. The comapany has so far raised $44 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Foursquare, the six-year-old, New York-based geo-technology platform, has raised $45 million in Series E funding led by Union Square Ventures, with Morgan Stanley and earlier backers including DFJ Growth, Andreessen Horowitz and Spark Capital participating. In related, very big news, co-founder and CEO Dennis Crowley has transitioned to executive chairman, while COO Jeff Glueck has been appointed Foursquare’s new CEO. TechCrunch looks at what’s going on here.

Inturn, a 2.5-year-old New York-based platform that helps brands and retailers sell and purchase off-price inventory, has raised $9.7 million in Series A funding led by Novel TMT Ventures, with participation from Benvolio Group, Shuco, Bam Ventures and earlier investors Forerunner Ventures, Lerer Hippeau Ventures and T5 Capital.

KeyMe, a three-year-old, New York-based startup that enables users to store, share and duplicate their physical keys based on a digital scan that’s securely stored in the cloud, has raised $20 million in Series B funding led by Comcast Ventures, with additional investment from Battery Ventures, White Star Capital, 7-Ventures (the venture arm of 7-Eleven), and individual investors. TechCrunch has more here.

Limelight Platform, a 1.5-year-old, Toronto, Canada-based marketing automation startup, has raised $3.1 million in seed funding led by Rowanwood Ventures, with participation from Sandhill Angels, Hyde Park Ventures and Acceleprise Ventures, among others. More here.

Mubi, a nine-year-old, London-based alternative movie streaming service, has raised $50 million in funding from Huanxi Media, Mubi’s partner in China. TechCrunch has more here.

PlaceIQ, a five-year-old, Boulder, Co.-based company that makes hyper-local ad targeting software, has raised $25 million in Series D funding led by Harmony Partners, with participation from earlier backers Iris Capital, IA Venture Partners, U.S. Venture Partners and Valhalla Partners.

PolicyGenius, a 1.5-year-old, Brooklyn, N.Y.-based online insurance broker, has raised $15 million in Series B funding led by Revolution Ventures, with participation from earlier backers firm  Karlin Ventures, Susa Ventures, AXA Strategic Ventures, Transamerica Ventures and MassMutual Ventures. The company had raised $5.3 million in Series A funding just last June. TechCrunch has more here.

RedDoorz, a year-old, Singapore-based platform that offers budget accommodations across Southeast Asia, has raised $1.4 million in seed funding from undisclosed investors. TechCrunch has more here.

Taulia, a 6.5-year-old, San Francisco-based company that makes cloud-based invoice, payment and discount management software for large buying organizations, has raised $46 million in Series E funding led by Zouk Capital. Earlier backers DAG Ventures, Harbor Pacific Capital, Matrix Partners, QuestMark Partners and Trinity Ventures also joined the round.

VeloCloud Networks, a three-year-old, Mountain View, Ca.-based cloud networking services company, has raised $27 million in Series C funding led by March Capital Partners and Cisco Systems, with participation from earlier backers, including Venrock and New Enterprise Associates. More here.

Unmute, a year-old, L.A.-based open platform where users can host and share interactive phone calls, has raised $2.2 million in seed funding led by Greycroft Partners, with participation from Comcast Ventures, Crosscut Ventures, Betaworks, Greylock Partners, former NBA commissioner David Stern and Walking Dead creator Robert Kirkman. More here.

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IPOs

A friendly reminder from Renaissance Capital: No IPOs have priced so far this year.

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Exits

Today IBM purchased IRIS Analytics, an eight-year-old, Urbar, Germany-based company that helps banks detect fraudulent use of credit cards using machine intelligence. Terms of the deal aren’t being disclosed. TechCrunch has more here.

—–

People

Elon Musk faces a fresh challenge from a newcomer with a reusable spacecraft after NASA split a cargo pact valued at as much as $14 billion between his company SpaceX, Orbital ATK, and lesser-known Sierra Nevada Corp. Bloomberg has the story here.

Outspoken VC Chamath Palihapitiya thinks it was a mistake for Twitter to re-install Jack Dorsey as CEO. Here’s why.

Zoosk, an eight-year-old, San Francisco-based dating startup, is laying off 40 people, a huge chunk of its staff. (You might recall that it staged a sizable layoff last year, too.) TechCrunch has more here.

—–

Jobs

BBG Ventures is looking to hire an associate. The job is in New York.

Norwest Venture Partners is looking to add a partner to both its early-stage consumer and early-stage enterprise investing teams. The jobs are in San Francisco and Menlo Park, Ca. We don’t have an email for you (yet), so work those networks!

—–

Essential Reads

The government wants Silicon Valley to build terrorist-spotting algorithms. But is it possible?

The California Public Utilities Commission agreed yesterday with a judge’s recommendation to fine Uber $7.6 million for failing to meet data reporting requirements in 2014. The L.A. Times has more here.

—–

Detours

Twelve science-backed tricks for appearing smarter than you are.

Sean Penn’s one “terrible regret” about his conversation with El Chapo.

—–

Retail Therapy

A standing desk, for just $25.

It’s Thursday! That came fast.

Two quick mentions: One-third of the tickets for StrictlyVC’s February 25th evening event at the Autodesk Gallery have sold. You might nab yours sooner than later as these things always sell out. (The gallery only lets in so many people.)

Also, a reminder that we’ll be in Davos next week. We’re excited about the trip; we’re also not sure how or when we’ll be writing the newsletter, so it may be on the short side and arrive at random times. Steel yourselves!

Have a great day, everyone.:)

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Top News in the A.M.

Wealthy clients of Morgan Stanley and Bank of America just got dibs on shares of the unlisted Uber, but that doesn’t mean they’re getting a chance to see the ride-sharing company’s financials, according to an offering document seen by Bloomberg News. More here.

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Call9 Lands $10 Million in Series A Funding Led by Index

Call9, a nine-month-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based telemedicine startup that came together last spring as a Y Combinator company, has raised $10 million in Series A funding led by Index Ventures, whose cofounder, Neil Rimer, is joining the board.

Other investors in the round include Ali Rowghani, who leads the Y Combinator Continuity Fund; Joe Lonsdale, the VC and co-founder of Palantir Technologies; and Anne Wojcicki, co-founder of 23andMe.

It’s easy to appreciate the young company’s appeal. While there’s no shortage of startups connecting patients to doctors on demand, Call9 specializes in specifically reducing unnecessary visits to emergency rooms by those who call 911 most frequently, which is people in nursing homes.

The company is the brainchild of two physicians: Celina Tenev, a radiology postdoctoral fellow from Stanford, and Timothy Peck, who worked previously as an emergency medicine physician and faculty at Harvard Medical School. The two met while working part-time for a now-defunct startup and shared a joint disbelief that the patient experience still typically includes spending several hours in an emergency room.

More here.

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(Other) New Fundings

Anaplan, a nine-year-old, San Francisco-based company that sells financial planning as a service to large organizations, has raised $90 million in new funding at a post-money valuation of $1.09 billion, reports TechCrunch. The round was led by the Indian firm Premji Invest, with participation from the Scottish firm Baillie Gifford, Founders Circle Capital, Harmony Partners, and earlier backers Brookside Capital, Coatue Management, DFJ Growth,Granite Ventures, Meritech Capital Partners, Salesforce, Sands Capital Management and Shasta Ventures. The company has now raised more than $234 million altogether. More here.

App Annie, the nearly six-year-old, San Francisco-based app analytics firm that long ago became the first stop for developers, investors, and journalists looking to better understand app rankings and trends, has raised $63 million in Series E funding in “mostly equity” and debt, says cofounder and CEO Bertrand Schmitt. The round was led by Greenspring Associates, with participation from earlier backers e.Ventures, Greycroft Partners, Institutional Venture Partners, and Sequoia Capital. The debt — raised to avoid diluting stakeholders unnecessarily, says Schmitt — was provided to the company by Silicon Valley Bank. We talked with Schmitt about the round here.

Boomerang Commerce, a three-year-old, Mountain View, Ca.-based startup that helps retailers optimize their pricing strategies has raised $12 million in Series B funding led by Shasta Ventures. Previous investors Madrona Venture Group and Trinity Ventures also participated in this round. TechCrunch has more here.

Care24, a 14-month-old, Mumbai, India-base home healthcare startup, has raised $4 million in Series A funding from SAIF Partners. TechCrunch has more here.

Carwow, the five-year-old, London-based site that claims to offer a better way to buy a new car, has raised a £12.5 million (roughly $18 million) in Series B funding led by Accel Partners. Earlier investors Balderton Capital, Samos Investments and Episode 1 Ventures also participated. TechCrunch has more here.

Everlaw, a five-year-old, Berkeley, Ca.-based advanced litigation and e-discovery company that was bootstrapped with $1.5 million from friends and family, has raised $8.1 million in Series A funding led by Andreessen Horowitz. We talked with founder and CEO AJ Shankar about the deal here.

Looker, a four-year-old, Santa Cruz, Ca.-based business intelligence startup, has raised $48 million in Series C funding led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. Previous investors Redpoint Ventures, Meritech Capital Partners and Sapphire Ventures also participated. The company has raised roughly $96 million to date. TechCrunch has more here.

MiMedia, a six-year-old, Brooklyn, N.Y.-based personal cloud storage service for all of your photos, videos, music and other files, has raised $15 million in Series C funding from numerous global family offices, along with Indian smartphone maker Micromax Informatics. The company has now banked a total of $35 million in funding. TechCrunch has more here.

MindTouch, an 11-year-old, San Diego, Ca.-based cloud service that helps customers find answers to product questions using the company’s existing documentation, training materials and customer service documents, has raised $12 million in its first outside funding led by PeakSpan Capital. SK Ventures and SAP SE also joined the round. TechCrunch has more here.

MoveWith, a 1.5-year-old, San Francisco-based social networking startup that allows people to follow instructors of particular workout types, has raised $3 million in seed funding led by Forerunner Ventures, with participation fromAccomplice and Founder Collective. Venture Capital Dispatch has more here.

Picwell, a three-year-old, Philadelphia, Pa.-based predictive recommendation engine for healthcare plan selection, has raised $3 million in Series A funding from BlueCross BlueShield Venture Partners and the Sandbox Advantage Fund. The money brings the round, which held an earlier close led byMassMutual Ventures, to $7 million. More here.

ResiModel, a two-year-old, New York-based platform for aggregating, standardizing and analyzing financial data for multifamily transactions, has raised new funding led by Symmetrical Ventures. The company has now garnered $4 million to date. FinSMEs has more here.

Savioke, a two-year-old, Sunnyvale, Ca.-based company that makes autonomous robots for the services industry, has raised $15 million in Series A funding led by Intel Capital. Other participants in the round include Northern Light Venture Capital and EDBI, which invests for Singapore’s economic development agency. Venture Capital Dispatch has more here.

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New Funds

Canadian oil companies Cenovus Energy and Suncor Energy are funding a new outfit called Evok Innovations that will invest in startups offering cleaner oil and gas technologies. The companies have committed to plugging $100 million into the venture. More here.

—–

Exits

Distil Networks, a four-year-old, Arlington, Va.-based company that makes bot detection and mitigation software, is buying 17-year-old, Stockholm, Sweden-based rival ScrapeSentry for an undisclosed amount of cash and stock. Distil has raised $33 million in funding from investors, including Bessemer Venture Partners, Foundry Group, and TechStars, shows CrunchBase. If ScrapeSentry raised venture funding, it doesn’t appear to have reported it. TechCrunch has more here.

Pivotal, the EMC and VMWare spinout, has agreed to acquire Slice of Lime, a 15-year-old, Boulder, Co.-based startup that specializes in making web pages, mobile applications, and other products more attractive. No financial terms were disclosed. Slice of Lime doesn’t appear to have raised venture funding.

—–

People

PayPal is positioning itself for the future of money and currency, adding seasoned fintech figure and bitcoin entrepreneur Wences Casares to its board. TechCrunch has more here.

Entertainer, investor, and former Xbox Live fan Snoop Dogg would like Bill Gates to “fix” his “sh_t.”

Ludlow Ventures talks with Twitter personality “Startup L. Jackson” in the firm’s newest episode of Carpool VC. (Spoiler alert: He doesn’t reveal his identity. He does confirm, however, that he’s alive and well.)

Zander Lurie has left GoPro, where he headed its entertainment efforts, to become CEO of survey startup SurveyMonkey. He will replace former Hewlett-Packard exec Bill Veghte, who is leaving due to “differences of opinion on strategy” with investors. Recode has the story here.

Twenty-six people who are helping to spearhead change in tech investing.

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Essential Reads

A neat look behind the scenes at Google’s autonomous car testing center.

The Nest glitch and the broader ramifications of connected devices.

Soon, your Uber driver may be a non-violent criminal (probably not so unlike some of your cab drivers over the years).

—–

Detours

The Stanford professor who pioneered praising kids for effort says we’ve totally missed the point.

United’s quest to be less awful.

Carpool karaoke with Adele.

—–

Retail Therapy

If we were not so lazy, we might just buy this Rok espresso maker.

Hi, good morning, everyone!  The newsletter is a little abbreviated today; we were working on today’s story and are now running out the door. See you back here tomorrow!

—–

Top News in the A.M.

Big deal: Google just opened a Virtual Reality Division.

—–

The Unicorns Hiring, and Losing Employees, the Fastest

Every day, we in the media are starting to hear about startups laying off employees – sizable percentages of them, too. Last week, it was Mixpanel, Maker Media, and SOLS.

A recruiter who asked not to be named separately tells us that Instacart has parted ways with numerous recruiters in anticipation of a hiring slowdown.

Instacart’s VP of People, Matt Caldwell, confirms that the company is no longer using contract recruiters and is slowing down its total number of full-time hires, but says that’s a reflection of the company’s earlier and aggressive growth plans. He notes that company grew from 91 full-time employees in January 2015 to 300 full-time employees today.

Either way, not everyone sees major changes up ahead. Josh Withers, cofounder of the nationwide startup search firm True, tells us that it’s business as usual as far as he can tell. “Burn rates are being closely scrutinized. We haven’t seen a pull back in terms of hiring, though.” Though Withers half expected to return to work after the holiday to find companies wanting to do more with less, he says that instead, “We came back from break and got a ton of inbounds from private equity firms, VCs looking for help with their startups, and other companies of all stages.”It could be that companies have “already raised the money and need to put it to work,” he observes. “Maybe [what we’re seeing] lags the macro markets because the way the money was raised. But it doesn’t feel at all like 2009.”

Because it’s so hard to know what’s really going on right now, we worked earlier this week with a set of data scientists with fancy degrees, poring over publicly available data to come up with a list of which U.S.-based, privately held, non-biotech-related “unicorn” companies are hiring the fastest, and which are seeing the most employees leave.

More here.

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New Fundings

CarTrade, a six-year-old, Mumbai, India-based classified site for car dealers in India, has raised $145 million in new funding led by the Singapore-based investment firm Temasek and March Capital, with participation from returning investor Warburg Pincus.

Envelop VR, a 1.5-year-old, Bellevue, Wa.-based virtual reality software company that aims to bring businesses and consumers to immersive computing, has raised Series A funding from GV that brings its total round to $5.5 million. The company had raised earlier Series A funding, back in October, from Madrona Venture Group.

Moltin, a 2.5-year-old, Mountain View, Ca.-based company that helps developers build customizable e-commerce solutions using its API, has raised $2 million in seed funding from Frontline Ventures, venture capitalist Gil Dibner’s AngelList Syndicate, Y Combinator, and Funders Club. VentureBeat has more here.

Moneybox, a seven-month-old, U.K.-based, yet-to-launch startup that wants to encourage millennials to save and invest, has raised $3 million in funding from Samos Investments and numerous unnamed angel investors. TechCrunch has more here.

mParticle, a two-year-old, New York-based startup that helps mobile app-makers consolidate their data, has raised $15 million in Series A funding led by Social + Capital, with participation from earlier backers Bowery Capital, Eniac Ventures and Golden Ventures. TechCrunch has more here.

Shape Security, a four-year-old, Mountain View, Ca.-based company whose technology defend websites against attacks from malware, botnets, and scripts, has raised $25 million in Series D funding led by Baseline Ventures. Beijing-based Northern Light Venture Capital also joined the round, alongside earlier investors GV, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Norwest Venture Partners, Eric Schmidt’s Tomorrow Ventures and others. The company has raised $91 million in funding to date. Venture Capital Dispatch has more here.

SmashFly, an eight-year-old, Concord, Ma.-based startup that manages inbound interest from potential recruits and keeps them engaged with a company with the aim of converting them to an employee, has raised $22 million in Series B funding led by Bessemer Venture Partners. TechCrunch has more here.

Zerto, a 6.5-year-old, Boston-based maker of disaster recovery software, has raised $50 million in Series E funding led by Institutional Venture Partners. Other investors in the deal include Access Industries and earlier backers 83North, Battery Ventures, Harmony Partners, RTP Ventures,U.S. Venture Partners, and Mark Leslie.

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New Funds

Leaders Fund, a new venture firm with offices in Toronto and Atlanta, Ga., has taken the wraps off a $100 million evergreen fund that it intends to invest in enterprise startups. We talked with the founders yesterday.

Netflix CEO Reed Hastings took to Facebook yesteday to announce that he would be personally funding a new $100 million philanthropic fund, focusing exclusively on education-related projects and organizations. TechCrunch has more here.

TrueBridge Capital Partners, the Chapel Hill, N.C.-based investment firm, has closed its fourth venture capital fund-of-funds, TrueBridge-Kauffman Fellows Endowment Fund IV, L.P., with $400 million in commitments. It says it had targeted $325 million. More here.

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Exits

Threadflip, an online consignment marketplace for women’s clothing, is no more; it announced to users yesterday that it’s shutting down operations and rolling into the clothing rental startup, Le Tote as of midnight tonight. Threadflip had raised more than $20 million in funding, including from Norwest Venture Partners, Shasta Ventures and Lowercase Capital. TechCrunch has more here.

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Essential Reads

Udacity, the massive open online course pioneer led by former Google executive Sebastian Thrun, announced today that it will refund students who don’t find employment within six months of completing one of four so-called Nanodegrees. USA Today has the story here.

Google‘s self-driving cars aren’t as good as humans (yet). Wired on why not.

—–

Detours

The best way for committed couples to argue.

How well do you handle uncertainty?

—–

Retail Therapy

Buy your own Banksy. (It comes with a house in Cheltenham.)

Hi, everyone, happy Tuesday!

We’ve been juggling a few calls this a.m., so no column today.

—–

Top News in the A.M.

Uber says its China division has raised funding that values that part of the ride-hailing company’s operation at $7 billion. Bloomberg has more here.

Like GIFs and Vines before it, Periscope streams will now show up and play directly in the Twitter timeline on iOS. Engadget has more here.

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New Fundings

AiCure, a five-year-old, New York-based company whose artificial intelligence technology visually confirms medication ingestion on smartphones, has raised $12.3 million in Series A funding led by New Leaf Venture Partners, with additional participation from Pritzker Group Venture Capital, Tribeca Venture Partners, and Biomatics Capital. More here.

Datadog, a five-year-old, New York-based monitoring service that helps customers bring together data from a variety of infrastructure and software, has raised $94.5 million in Series D funding led by ICONIQ Capital. Earlier investors Index Ventures, OpenView Ventures, Amplify Partners, Contour Ventures and other unnamed investors also participated. The company has now raised just less than $148 million altogether. TechCrunch has more here.

Diablo Technologies, a 16-year-old, Quebec, Canada-based flash memory maker, has raised $19 million in new funding led by ICV Partners, with participation from earlier backers Battery Ventures, BDC Capital, Celtic House and Hasso Plattner Ventures. More here.

Evergage, a 5.5-year-old, Somerville, Ma.-based startup that uses behavioral data to personalize web surfers’ engagement, has raised $10 million in Series B funding led by Arrowroot Capital, with participation from earlier backers G20 Ventures and Point Judith Capital. VentureBeat has more here.

The Big Know, a Minneapolis-based digital learning platform whose content is created by brands that are looking to better engage with their customers, has raised $3 million in Series A funding led by LFE Capital. More here.

FinanceFox, a 1.5-year-old, Berlin, Germany-based startup whose mobile app helps users manage of all their existing insurance, as well a provides advice regarding gaps in their coverage, has raised $5.5 million in funding led by Salesforce Ventures, with participation from AngelList, Idinvest, Seedcamp and Speedinvest. TechCrunch has more here.

Grindr, the six-year-old, L.A.-based all-male social network, has sold a 60 percent stake in its business to the Chinese gaming company Beijing Kunlun Tech for $93 million. The deal, which values Grindr at $155 million, represents the first outside investment for the company. TechCrunch has more here.

Hubba, a 3.5-year-old, Toronto, Canada-based online product-information platform, is raising $45 million in new venture funding from VCs in Silicon Valley, New York and the U.K, as well as some of its earlier backers, including Canada’s Canso Investment Counsel, Brightspark Ventures, Real Ventures and Kensington Capital Partners. Venture Capital Dispatch hasmore here.

Import.io, a 3.5-year-old, London-based web data extraction platform, raised $13 million in Series A funding led by London’s Imperial Innovations, with participation from Wellington Partners, Oxford Capital, Delin Capital and AME Cloud Ventures. Th round brings the company’s total funding to $17.5 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Lodo Therapeutics, a new, New York-based small molecule discovery platform spun out of the Seattle-based development company Accelerator Corp., has raised $17 million in Series A funding from Accelerator New York’s investment syndicate partners: ARCH Venture Partners, Eli Lilly and Company, Harris & Harris Group, Innovate NY Fund, Johnson & Johnson Development Corp., The Partnership Fund for New York City, Pfizer Venture Investments, Watson Fund and WuXi PharmaTech. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation also participated. Xconomy has more here.

Original Stitch, a 1.5-year-old, San Francisco-based company that works with Japanese tailors and factories to make custom shirts for about $75 each, has raised $1.1 million from Inspire Ventures, NTT Docomo, and private investor Bill Lohse.  TechCrunch has more here.

Shopclues, a four-year-old, Gurgaon, India-based e-commerce marketplace, has raised an undisclosed amount of Series E funding that the company claims has boosted its valuation to $1.1 billion. The round was led by GIC, the Singaporean government’s sovereign wealth fund, with participation from returning investors Tiger Global and Nexus Venture Partners. TechCrunch has more here.

Skyscanner, a 13-year-old, Edinburgh, Scotland-based travel search engine, has raised £128 million (about $192 million) from Khazanah Nasional Berhad, the Malaysian government’s strategic investment fund, and Yahoo! Japan, which was already one of Skyscanner’s venture partners. Fund manager Artemis, independent investment manager Baillie Gifford, and the private equity firm Vitruvian Partners also participated. According to the Financial Times, the company is now worth $1.6 billion. TechCrunch has more here.

Syapse, a seven-year-old, Palo Alto, Ca.-based data platform that integrates genomic and clinical data with care pathways and other medical knowledge to give healthcare workers actionable insights, has raised $25 million in Series C funding led by Ascension Ventures, the investment arm of nonprofit Catholic health system Ascension. Earlier backers Social+Capital Partnership and Safeguard Scientifics also joined the round. MedCity News has more here.

Vivino, a six-year-old, San Francisco-based mobile app for wine reviews and shopping, has raised $25 million in Series B funding led by SCP Neptune International, an investment vehicle of Moet Hennessy CEO Christophe Navarre. Other investors in the round included Balderton Capital and Melo7 Tech Partners. The company has now raised $37 million altogether. VentureBeat has more here.

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The New Funds

The global venture capital firm 500 Startups may have put on hold plans for an India fund, according to The Economic Times, which reports that conversations with LPs around an India fund have slowed down considerably. More here.

—–

People

Dr. Ezekiel “Zeke” Emanuel, who helped shape the Affordable Care Act (and has some famous brothers in Rahm and Ari Emanuel), is entering the private sector. Yesterday, he announced that he has joined Oak HC/FT, the Greenwich, Conn.-base venture growth-equity firm. Fortune talked with him about the move here.

Chris Hughes, the Facebook cofounder who bought a majority stake in political mag The New Republic in 2012, is putting the magazine back up for sale, says the WSJ. (Dealbooks’ Andrew Ross Sorkin notes Hughes isn’t the only “restless billionaire” to “trip” on his newest “toy.”)

23andMe CEO Anne Wojcicki was shushed yesterday during her own company’s presentation at the J.P Morgan Healthcare conference in San Francisco.

—–

Jobs

Greylock Partners is looking to add someone to its consumer investment team. Much more here.

—–

Data

U.S. venture capital firms raised $5 billion across 46 funds in the fourth quarter of last year, according to new data from Thomson Reuters and the National Venture Capital Association. Overall, VCs raised $28.2 million in 2015, and roughly one-third of the funds raised were first-time efforts. More here.

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Essential Reads

Amazon is expected to acquire French shipping company Colis Privé, as part of a plan to take on FedEx and UPS, says The Seattle Times.

An eye-opening new survey of more than 200 women in the tech industry finds that an astonishing 60 percent have received unwanted advances and one in three have feared for their personal safety in the workplace. More here.

—–

Detours

The 40,000-mile volcano.

Please. No. Anti-grooming is reportedly the biggest trend of 2016.

Illustrated tributes to David Bowie.

—–

Retail Therapy

Buick pays tribute to Tesla’s Model S.