VENTURE CAPITAL POST

Jessica Alba’s Honest Company is facing allegations of using harsh chemicals it claimed to never use. Two test labs initiated by the Wall Street Journal showed a significant amount of the chemical SLS, but the company strongly denied using the chemical in manufacturing.

Atlanta, Georgia-based e-commerce lending firm Kabbage Inc landed $50 million in its Series D financing led by SoftBank Capital to provide $500 million worth of loans for small online businesses by the end of 2014.

Kaohsiung, Taiwan-based business conglomerate Formosa Plastics Group agreed to acquire a 95% stake in Taiwanese cable network Gala Television Corp (Gala TV) from Swedish private equity firm EQT Partners for an undisclosed amount.

London, UK-based venture capital firm Amadeus Capital picked up an undisclosed stake in Sao Paulo, Brazil-based online insurance broker Bidu.com for $4.5 million to take advantage of the growth in emerging markets.

Palo Alto, US-based software-focused venture capital firm Merus Capital formed a special Merus Capital Opporunity Fund just after it closed its second fund at $43 million to support the late-stage development of San Francisco-based ad-tech firm AdRoll.

Detroit, US-based charity fundraising platform CrowdRise bagged $23 million in a funding round with Union Square Ventures as the lead investor to back its growth campaigns and platform expansion initiatives.

Although Google reportedly considered San Francisco, US-based mobile payments system Square Inc as a potential acquisition or merger candidate, the latter denied reports that it has entered acquisition talks with search giant.

San Francisco, US-based online food delivery startup Munchery raised $28 million in a Series B funding round led by Sherpa Ventures to bring its service to Seattle and other places in the US.

US-based electronics giant Apple Inc acquired British automatic speech recognition startup Novauris Technologies for an undisclosed amount more than a year ago to gain traction over Google Now and Microsoft Cortana.

American e-commerce giant Amazon.com rumors that it was planning to launch a free and ad-supported TV and music streaming service, after rumors about the supposed free service spread ahead of a scheduled New York conference.

Silicon Valley, US-based venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz closed its fourth fund at $1.5 billion to invest in a varied range of sectors including 3D printing, consumer mobile, and bitcoin.

San Francisco, US-based real estate equity crowdfunding startup RealCrowd Inc nabbed $1.6 million in a seed funding round from Data Collective, Y Combinator's Garry Tan, and some real estate managers.

Saint Helier, Jersey-based gold mining and minerals exploration Lydian International pocketed C$4.7 million in a private share sale to its shareholders International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (ERBD) to fund its operations in Armenia.

Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg, Hollywood actor Ashton Kutcher, and Tesla founder Elon Musk invested $40 million in the second funding round of secretive artificial intelligence (AI) startup Vicarious.

San Jose, California-based LEGO rental startup Pley closed $6.75 million in its Series A funding round led by Allegro Venture Partners to fuel its product, workforce, and international expansion efforts.