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Bessemer Venture Partners leads funding round for Ada SupportToronto-based Ada Support, a chatbot creation platform provider, has raised $2.5 million in funding. Bessemer Venture Partners led the round with participation from Version One Ventures.
Chat platform Ada Support raises $2.5 mln in Bessemer-led roundAda Support Inc has emerged from stealth to launch its automated chat platform and raise $2.5 million in initial funding. The round was led by U.S. venture capital firm Bessemer Venture Partners and joined by Canadian firm Version One Ventures. Led by Co-Founders Mike Murchison and David Hariri, Toronto-based Ada provides customer support automation software that enables companies to leverage machine learning to give instant answers to questions in chat. The platform has been growing 30 percent and answering 2 million questions on a monthly basis, the company said. Ada will use the funds raised for growth and product development.
Kensington Capital leads Figure 1's $13.2 mln Series B roundFigure 1, a Toronto-based knowledge-sharing platform for healthcare professionals, has secured about $13.2 million (US$10 million) in a Series B financing. Canadian alternative assets investor Kensington Capital Partners led the round. It was joined by Samsung NEXT Ventures, Manulife Financial's U.S. insurance subsidiary, Hedgewood and WTI. Existing investors Union Square Ventures, Rho Canada Ventures and Version One Ventures also participated. Founded in 2012, Figure 1 has developed crowd-sourced medical technology that allows healthcare professionals in more than 190 countries to communicate and collaborate. It is led by CEO Gregory Levey.
- Figure 1 snags $10 mln Series B
Toronto-based Figure 1, a knowledge-sharing platform for healthcare professionals, has raised $10 million in Series B funding. Kensington Capital Partners led the round with investors that included Samsung NEXT, John Hancock/Manulife Financial, Union Square Ventures, Rho Canada Ventures and Version One Ventures.
Version One leads seed funding of Ethereum platform Citizen HexCitizen Hex Inc, a Toronto-based Ethereum liquidity company, has raised an undisclosed seed-stage financing. The round was led by Version One Ventures and joined by OMERS Ventures, Purpose Investments, League CEO Mike Serbinis and Morgan Stanley Managing Director Laura Adams, among others. Citizen Hex, founded last year by CEO Benjamin Roberts and CTO Brett Bergmann, will focus on acquiring, securing and trading ERC-20 tokens and helping accelerate the ecosystem for Ethereum, a successor to Bitcoin, by increasing liquidity. Version One's Boris Wertz, who sits on the company's board, discusses Citizen Hex here http://versionone.vc/meet-latest-investment-citizen-hex-ethereum-liquidity-company/
Real Ventures' Janet Bannister joins VarageSale's boardToronto online marketplace VarageSale has appointed Janet Bannister, a partner at Canadian venture capital firm Real Ventures, to its board of directors. Bannister, who joined Real Ventures in 2014, is a Kijiji founder. VarageSale said she will help it scale across North America and support its monetization strategy. VarageSale, which provides an app to buy and sell used items locally, also reported a doubling of its user base in 2016. Founded in 2012, the company is backed by Real Ventures, iNovia Capital, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital, Version One Ventures and others.
- Canadian VC begins 2017 strongly as top Q1 deals take $400 mln
Canada’s top 10 first-quarter venture-capital financings drew close to $400 million from investors. While that’s down 19 percent from the $490 million raised by the top 10 deals a year earlier, it far exceeds the first-quarter results of other recent years. The estimate is based on PE Hub Canada’s list of the largest financings announced from January through March, supplemented by Thomson Reuters data. The list is headed by PointClickCare, which accounted for 2017’s first deal sized above $100 million, Visier, Inocucor Technologies and Fusion Pharma.
- Top Hat rakes in $22.5 mln Series C
Top Hat, an interactive, cloud-based teaching platform provider, has raised $22.5 million in Series C financing. Top Hat's investors include Union Square Ventures, Emergence Capital, Georgian Partners, iNovia Capital, Golden Venture Partners, Version One Ventures and SoftTech VC. In addition to the funding, Albert Wenger, a partner at Union Square Ventures, has been added to Top Hat’s board of directors.
Top Hat raises $30 mln Series C round to disrupt textbook industryToronto education technology company Top Hat has secured about $30 million (US$22.5 million) in a Series C financing. The round was backed by Union Square Ventures, a new investor, which joined Georgian Partners, Emergence Capital, iNovia Capital, Golden Venture Partners, Version One Ventures and SoftTech VC, all of them investors in Top Hat's $10 million Series B /canada/2014/5/georgian-partners-fund-ii-debuts-with-lead-of-top-hats-10-mln-series-b/ in 2014. Founded in 2009, Top Hat is the developer of a cloud-based student engagement and interactive teaching platform. CEO Mike Silagadze said https://blog.tophat.com/textbook-solutions-series-c-funding/ the funds raised will help expand its solutions, currently used at 750 post-secondary institutions, to transform the US$10-billion U.S. textbook industry.