– Travel startup Headout raised $12m in funding.
– The round was led by Glade Brook Capital and included participation from returning investors Version One Ventures, Nexus Venture Partners, FJ Labs, 500 Startups, Haystack and Ludlow Ventures, and new investors Espresso Capital and Practical VC.
– The company plans to expand into 300 cities, product development and its product, business, marketing and operations teams.
– It plans to hire more than 150 employees around the world and is also looking for opportunities to acqui-hire travel and entertainment startups.

– Flat.mx, a real estate marketplace, raised $20m in Series A funding.
– The round was led by Anthemis and 500 Startups, and joined by ALLVP and Expa.
– Other investors include Opendoor CEO and co-founder Eric Wu, Flyhomes’ co-founder and CEO Tushar Garg, and Divvy Homes’ co-founder Brian Ma.
– The company plans to use the funding to expand its operations in Mexico and Latin America.

– Odiggo, an auto tech startup, secured a $2.2m seed round.
– The round was led by Y Combinator, 500 Startups, and Plug and Play Ventures.
– Regional VCs like Seedra Ventures, LoftyInc Capital, and Essa Al-Saleh (CEO of Volta-Tucks) also took part.

– RaRa Delivery, a logistics company, raised $3.25m in seed funding.
– The round was led by Sequoia Capital India’s Surge program and East Ventures.
– Other participants included 500 Startups, Angel Central, GK Plug and Play and angel investors Royston Tay and Yang Bin Kwok.
– RaRa Delivery is a logistics company that relies on a proprietary engine that batches orders and optimizes delivery routes based on data like real-time traffic information.
– It currently operates in Greater Jakarta and is getting ready to expand into five other Indonesian cities this year.
– RaRa Delivery’s goal is to integrate with all major marketplaces in Indonesia, so sellers can offer it as a delivery option to customers.
– It also partners with brands, small e-commerce businesses and seller aggregators.

– Cybavo, a Singapore-based blockchain security solution provider, raised $4m in Pre-A funding round.
– The round was co-led by 500 Startups, H&D Asset Management Company and New Economy Ventures.
– Other companies and investors from Taiwan, Silicon Valley, Singapore, Hong Kong and Japan also participated in the round.
– The company intends to use the funding to accelerate expansion in the East Asian, European, and North American markets, invest in the research and development of cybersecurity and blockchain technology, and to further raise the level of customer and product satisfaction it delivers.

– Lumanu, an Oakland, CA-based company that provides creators with tools for invoicing, payments, and collaboration, raised $12m in Series A funding.
– The round was led by Origin Ventures with participation from Alumni Venture Group, Gaingles and 500 Startups.
– The company intends to use the funds to continue to expand its business reach.

– Butlr Technologies from Burlingam develops an anonymous, wireless and real-time people sensing platform.
– The company raised $7.9M in seed funding.
– The round was led by Hyperplane with participation from Founder Collective, Union Labs, 500 Startups, SOSV, E14 Fund, Tectonic Ventures, Scott Belsky, Chad Laurans and Sunny Vu.
– The new investment will be used to for continued market expansion and technology innovation.

– Jasper Card, a NYC-based financial services company, raised $34M in Series A funding.
– The round was led by Benslie International Fund, with participation from 500 Startups, Gauss Ventures, Off The Grid Ventures, OurCrowd, and SIBF.
– The new funding will be used to grow its AI technology to further develop its underwriting model and introduce a new line of financial services.

– Smile Identity from Lagos, Nigeria provides ID verification and KYC compliance through Artificial Intelligence.
– The company raised $7M in Series A Funding.
– The round was led by Costanoa Ventures with participation from CRE Venture Capital, Local Globe, Intercept Ventures, Future Africa Ventures, Khosla Impact ValueStream Ventures, Beta Ventures, 500 Startups and Story Ventures.
– The company plans to use the new funding to improve its services, expand across more markets, add support for more ID types and hire more engineers and support staff across Africa.

– Infina, a Vietnamese fintech startup, raised $2m in seed funding.
– The round was led by Saison Capital and joined by Venturra Discovery, 1982 Ventures, 500 Startups, Nextrans, and angel investors like executives at Google and Netflix.
– The company plans to use the funding to expand its team and develop new features.

– Chipper Cash is a San Francisco, CA-based cross-border payments services company.
– The company raised $100m in Series C funding.
– The round was led by SVB Capital and attracted new investor – Deciens Capital as well as existing backers – Ribbit Capital, Bezos Expeditions, One Way Ventures, 500 Startups, Tribe Capital and Brue2 Ventures.
– The new investment will be used to expand operations and business reach.

– Avatour, the remote collaboration platform for site meetings, announced a $2.9 million seed round led by Ulu Ventures.
– The funding will enable Avatour to scale its category-defining technology and expand into new markets internationally.
– Other participants in the round include Merus Capital, NTT Docomo Ventures, Plug & Play Ventures, and 500 Startups.
– The Avatour platform combines real-world 360-degree capture, real-time communication, and optional VR/AR technology to immerse remote users in a location as if actually present.
– This combination of visual realism and effortless conversation results in a superior means of collaboration between remote users and on-site personnel, saving money while increasing productivity.

– AI MLOps startup InfuseAI raised $4.3m in Series A funding.
– The round was led by Wistron Corporation, with participation from Hive Ventures, Top Taiwan Venture Capital Group, Silicon Valley Taiwan Investments and 500 Startups.
– The company helps companies deploy and manage machine learning models with turnkey solutions like PrimeHub, a platform that includes a model training environment, cloud or on-premise cluster computing (including container orchestration with Kubernetes) and collaboration tools for teams.
– Another product, called PrimeHub Deploy, lets clients train, deploy, update and monitor AI models.

– Ugandan fintech startup Numida is announcing the close of its $2.3m seed round.
– The round was led by Africa-based VC firm Savannah Fund, and joined by other investors including 500 Startups, and angel investors including Y Combinator’s Adora Cheung, and others.
– Numida is tackling the challenge of financial inclusion in East Africa.
– The company offers a digital platform that enables semi-formal micro and small businesses to access credit.

– Ryu Games, a startup that helps developers add cash tournaments to their mobile games, announced this morning it has raised $2.3 million in a seed round.
– The funds came from a number of investors, including Side Door Ventures, MGV Capital, Velo Partners and Citta Ventures.
– In addition, 500 Startups participated in the round.
– TechCrunch first caught wind of Ryu during its participation in the most recent 500 Startups demo day.
– At the time, we were enthused by the idea of gamers wagering money to go head-to-head with other players on mobile devices.
– Investors appear to back our first impression of the company.

– Bankly, a Nigerian fintech startup digitizing cash for the unbanked, announced that it has closed a $2m seed round.
– The round was led by 500 Startups and joined by other investors including the co-founder of Transferwise.
– The company is digitizing the informal thrift collections system known with different names such as esusu or ajo in Nigeria.

– Rising Team, a platform that combines tools and training to help managers motivate, organize and ultimately effectively lead their team, raised $3m in seed funding.
– The round was led by Female Founders Fund and joined by Peterson Ventures, Burst Capital, Xoogler Ventures, 500 Startups, Roble Ventures, Supernode Ventures and several angels.
– The company plans to add AI-based custom training tips that are powered by data from the assessments.

– Briza is a commercial insurance-as-a-service API.
– Company raised $8m in Series A funding.
– The round was led by Investment Group of Santa Barbara, with participation from existing investors including 500 Startups.
– The new investment will be used to double the size of its engineering team and increase the supply of insurance markets available to insurance retailers, wholesalers, and developers through its platform.