VENTURE CAPITAL POST

American software company PressFriendly built a platform that works like a virtual PR team for startups and orient them on what they should do before sending a sales pitch to potential customers.

San Francisco, US-based online real-time restaurant reservation platform OpenTable acquired Palo Alto, California-based personalized recommendations app maker Ness Computing in a deal valued at $17.3 million.

Glassdoor, the leading jobs and career community, today announced it has strengthened its executive leadership team with the appointment of Adam C. Spiegel as chief financial officer.

Facebook launched an individualized and automated "Look Back" video feature in time for its 10th anniversary, but a source said the social networking giant will be releasing an edit tool to allow users to customize the photos included in the clip.

Google advertising executive Susan Wojcicki is reportedly being promoted to chief position at YouTube to improve the latter's video ad revenue, according to The Information.

Secret British spy unit Joint Threat Research Intelligent Group (JTRIG) launched a distributed denial of service (DDOS) attack on US-based hacktivist group Anonymous' Internet chat rooms, according to leaked NSA documents obtained by NBC News.

Learning Shelter, a program founded by a former homeless man who now has his own laser-cutting business, launched a crowdfunding campaign on Indiegogo to raise $60,000 to teach hardware skills to homeless people in San Francisco and help them find jobs.

Apartment List, an online rental marketplace, was able to raise an additional $6 million in financing in a follow-on round led by Glynn Capital and Passport Capital, TechCrunch reported.

Tokyo, Japan-based incubator and investment firm Netprice.com Inc is planning to invest $500,000 to $4 million in three or four mobile and web startups in India this year, according to The Economic Times.

US tech giant Microsoft selected five African tech startups to receive innovation grants, technical support, and mentorship from Microsoft under its venture arm extension, the Microsoft 4Afrika Initiative.

San Mateo, California-based Internet startup AVOS Systems is laying off 80% of its workforce because of the lack of traction, according to sources familiar with the situation.

Toronto, Canada-based games creator Big Viking Games seeks to buy back Yoville from Zynga in a bid to avoid the game's early death, since the latter announced it would shut the game down on March.

TechCrunch looked more closely into the compensation package of Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella submitted by the company in a filing to the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Tech giant Microsoft invested $15 million in location-based social networking app Foursquare and inked a licensing deal to use the latter's places database in their products and services.

Hollywood, US-based digital media firm SpinMedia Group acquired SpinMedia LLC for an undisclosed amount, and poured in $10 million in funding to deal with the company's debts.