July 15, 2015 | The social loan platform Blender announced that it raised $5 million from Blumberg Capital. Previously, Blender raised $3.5 million. Blender began operations eight months ago and was founded by Dr. Gal Aviv, Boaz Aviv and Barak Gur. The service connects between people looking for a return on their money at a zero interest rate and entities that are in need of financing.
News Briefs
July 15, 2015
Blender Raises $5M From Blumberg Capital
July 15, 2015
FanZone Raises $5M In Series A Funding
July 15, 2015 | The social networking platform for sports and music fans, FanZone announced that it raised $5 million in Series A funding. The funding round was led by Olive Tree Capital Ventures. So far, soccer teams in Israel and England have begun using the platform. FanZone was founded in 2014 by CEO Ori Shilo and Tomer Kazaz.
July 15, 2015
Philadelphia Mayor Scouts Startups In Tel Aviv
July 15, 2015 | The mayor of the City of Philadelphia, Michael Nutter hopes to finalize his global commerce policy for the city in a trip to Israel this week. While in Tel Aviv, Nutter will meet with a number of Israeli high-tech companies to encourage them to move their US offices to Philadelphia. Nutter hopes to meet with Israeli startups Pango, Simlat, PhysiMax, Pico and WeWork. This will be Nutters second visit to Tel Aviv in his capacity as Philadelphia’s mayor.
July 15, 2015
Report: HTC To Partner With Replay Technologies
July 15, 2015 | According to reports made by “Focus Taiwan”, the Taiwanese cell phone maker HTC is looking to partner with Israeli virtual reality startup Replay Technologies. HTC Chairwoman and CEO Cher Wang was set to visit Replay Technologies offices in early June, but had to cancel her trip due to difficulties with the company. Reportedly, Replay Technologies’ technology will be used in HTC’s virtual reality headset called the HTC Vive, which is being developed together with US video game company Valve. Replay Technologies was founded in 2011 by Aviv Shapira and Matteo Shapira.
July 14, 2015
OurCrowd Opens Office In Canada
July 14, 2015 | Israeli crowd-funding firm OurCrowd has opened an office in Canada, targeting a $1 million investment in Canadian advocate marketing firm Influitive. OurCrowd’s new office will be headed by David Shore, a Canadian technology venture capital executive. Headquartered in Jerusalem, OurCrowd was founded in 2012 by Jon Medved.
July 14, 2015
2 Israeli Startups Picked For Intel’s Accelerator
July 14 | Two Israeli startups have been chosen to participate in Challenge Up, a startup incubator owned by Intel, Cisco and Deutsche Telecom: Hi-Park, which uses crowd-sourced data and images to provide information on parking vacancy; and n-Join, which leverages the Internet of Things to make production facilities more flexible, maximize their output and reduce their environmental signature. Overall, 12 companies from around the world will participate in the four-month program.
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July 14, 2015
UpWest’s Portfolio Reaches $100M
July 14, 2015 | UpWest Labs, a Silicon Valley seed fund that brings Israeli startups to the US, has announced that its portfolio companies have raised a total of $100 million over the past three years. Now, the startup accelerator will also nurture mature startups, beyond the seed stage. Founded in 2012 by Shuly Galili, Gil Ben-Artzy and Liron Petrushka, UpWest provides a four-month program in Palo Alto.
July 14, 2015
Israeli Startup AnyClip Media Raises $21M
July 14, 2015 | Israeli startup AnyClip Media has raised $21 million in a private financing round led by Ervington Investments, representing the interests of Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich, and Limelight Networks. Current shareholder Israeli VC Jerusalem Venture Partners also participated in this round. Founded in 2008 by Erel Margalit (now a member of the Israeli parliament), Michael Schulhof, Nate Westheimer and Aaron Cohen, AnyClip Media provides a content marketing platform for video.
July 13, 2015
UK Israel Tech Hub Receives Innovation Award
July 13, 2015 | The UK Israel Tech Hub, which promotes economic cooperation between the two countries in the areas of technology, business and medicine, has won the 2014-2015 Foreign Office Staff Award for Excellence, in the Encouraging Innovation category. The award, signed by Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond, was recently announced in a ceremony in London attended by Prime Minister David Cameron. The UK Israel Tech Hub, launched by Chancellor George Osborne in 2011, is part of the British Embassy in Tel Aviv. Since its foundation, the Hub has facilitated 80 partnerships between the two countries.
July 13, 2015
Market Tech Raises $311M In AIM Offering
July 13, 2015 | Teddy Sagi’s company Market Tech Holdings raised £200 million ($311 million) on London’s secondary market. This marks the third time that Market Holdings has raised money on the exchange in the past six months. As part of the offering, Sagi’s stake in the company decreased from 85.6 percent to 71.3 percent, which keeps him a controlling shareholder. Market Tech is involved in ecommerce and real estate.
July 13, 2015
Israel-US To Cooperate On Cybersecurity
July 13, 2015 | The Deputy Secretary of the US Department of Homeland Security, Alejandro Mayorkas announced that he will work to promote the US-Israeli cybersecurity relationship. At a signing ceremony in Tel Aviv this week, Mayorkas will sign a new agreement to expand cooperation, research and development between the two countries in the area of cybersecurity. In addition, law enforcement cooperation and aviation security measures will also be discussed between the parties.
July 13, 2015
Magnolia To Issue AIM IPO
July 13, 2015 | The Israeli jewelry company Magnolia Silver Jewelry is set to launch a stock market listing in the UK next month. According to a report in “The Independent”, Magnolia is set to be valued at £30 million ($46.7 million) when it debuts its offering next month on the AIM market. Magnolia hopes to raise £5 million ($7.79 million) in the launch of its ecommerce website and to accelerate its international growth. Founded in Tel Aviv, Magnolia has 150 stores in 5 countries including Israel, Canada, Portugal, Australia and the UK.
July 12, 2015
Israeli Startup Imperson Enters Disney’s Accelerator
July 12, 2015 | Israeli startup Imperson, which develops virtual avatars of celebrities using artificial intelligence, has been accepted to Walt Disney’s startup accelerator. Founded in 2014 by Yaki Dunietz, Eyal Pfeifel, Seth Greenfield and Erez Baum, Imperson is one of 10 startups that have been chosen for Disney’s class of 2015.
July 12, 2015
TrapX Raises $9M From Intel Capital
July 12, 2015 | Israeli startup TrapX has raised $9 million in a private financing round led by Intel Capital and Liberty Venture Capital. Founded in 2010 by Moshe Ben-Simon and Yuval Malachi, cyber-security startup TrapX has so far raised $14 million.
July 12, 2015
Former Pitango Partners To Raise $100M For New VC
July 12, 2015 | TLV Partners, a new Israeli venture capital firm, has applied for a limited partnership status with the US Securities and Exchange Commission. Founded by former Pitango Venture Capital partners Rona Segev and Eitan Bek, TLV plans to raise $100 million.
