Keep an eye on Korea.

Altos Ventures, an early-stage venture firm with an office on Sand Hill Road and in Seoul, has just raised an oversubscribed fund of $110M to invest exclusively in Korean startups – nearly double the size its first Korea-focused fund of $60M. It makes sense: More than a dozen unicorns have come out of Korea over the last decade, including the web search giant Naver (now publicly traded and valued at $17B), web search company Daum Kakao (now valued at $5.5B), and mobile apps business Yello Mobile (valued at $4B as of last month).

Another round of layoffs for LivingSocial.

Online deal marketplace LivingSocial announced yesterday that it’s laying off 280 people, or over 50% of its staff, in the company’s 3rd round of layoffs in just 18 months. The nine-year-old company joined the unicorn list in December of 2010, at a time when there were only 6 unicorns, and was valued at over $6B less than a year later when Groupon went public. That valuation has since plummeted by 75% to $1.5B.

Is quantum computing the next “moonshot” for VC?

Andrew Schoen and Harry Weller of NEA discuss VC investment in the quantum computing field. For the average investor, they write, it’s probably still too early. But for a firm with technical aptitude, a deep capital base, risk tolerence, and realistic expectations, an investment in quantum computing could be a moonshot worth the financial risk.

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Recent Activity on CrunchBase

512

Funding Rounds Added

125

Acquisitions Recorded

$5.4B

Fundings
Captured

20,125

Entities
Updated

Recent Investments

Ring

$61M / Series C

Ring makes a smart doorbell that alerts users when someone is at their front door, even when they’re away from home. Founded in 2012 and based in Santa Monica, the company has raised $100M in total funding to date.

Categories:

Communities · Hardware · Home Automation · Consumer Electronics · Software · Security

Founders:

James Siminoff

Investors:

Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers (Lead), Richard Branson

FloQast

$6.5M / Series A

FloQast provides accounting software to assign tasks, maintain supporting documentation, and automate reconciliations. The new capital will go towards product development and sales and marketing efforts.

Categories:

Los Angeles · SaaS · B2B · Enterprise Software · Accounting

Founders:

Mike Whitmire, Cullen Zandstra

Investors:

Toba Capital (Lead), Polaris Partners (Lead), Wavemaker Partners, + 2 more

Trusted

$2.1M / Seed

Trusted provides families with on-demand babysitting services. The company also announced the launch of a Tuition Reimbursement Program for its employees who are enrolled in an accredited university.

Categories:

San Francisco · Apps · Child Care

Founders:

Anand Iyer, Vivian Chan

Investors:

Metamorphic Ventures, CrunchFund, Semil Shah, + 5 more

More Investments
Company Amount / Round Lead Investor
douyutv $100M / Venture Tencent Holdings
Momo.vn $28M / Series B
Usermind $14M / Series B Menlo Ventures
Prenetics $10M / Series A Ping An
eeGeo $5.0M / Venture NetSol Technologies
WithMe(Tripbaaz Technologies) $250K / Angel
Polarsteps 500K EUR / Seed
All Recent Funding Activity

Recent Acquisitions

Volicon

Acquired by Verizon Communications

The Starter League

Acquired by Fullstack Academy

More Acquisitions
Company Acquired by Amount
Funatics Software InnoGames
LIA Showpad
SkyePharma Vectura $621M
All Recent Acquisition Activity
 

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