VENTURE CAPITAL POST

Melbourne, Australia-based payments startup Aston Club took home $1.5 million in its seed funding round led by Chris Morris of Computershare to launch a mobile app that helps users pay their bar and restaurant bills.

Two coincidental events took place as Weibo executives rejoiced the warm welcome it received from the international financial markets after its IPO on the NASDAQ and the release of venture capitalist and Weibo user Charles Xue.

Tencent Holdings would launch the Chinese version of Candy Crush Saga through a partnership with King Digital Entertainment.

Just over a week after blocking Twitter, Turkey is now moving to shut down access to YouTube in a bid to stem off the source of corruption scandal and reputation-damaging leaks related to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

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.

Austin, Texas-based startup CitySprout is raising $2 million in its second financing round to help consumers establish a link with the local farmers who produce their food.

Sydney, Australia-based e-commerce startup Bigcommerce is expanding to the US with a new office in San Francisco and will go on a two-month hiring spree in search of 40 new engineers.

Santa Monica, US-based events planning mobile app Klutch scored $1.5 million in a funding round led by LaunchpadLA to help people plan get-togethers and socialize offline.

New York, US-based news website Business Insider raised $12 million in a funding round led by Amazon chief Jeff Bezos for the expansion of its workforce and subscription service.

Townsville, Australia-based startup Friends For Hire is launching on March 22 to allow lonely people to hire other people to be their platonic friend for an hourly fee of $60.

Jerusalem, Israel-based venture capital funding platform OurCrowd is looking to invest in Australia-based startups amid a 4% drop in the country's pool of venture capital.

In a bid to attract more startups, Walldorf, Germany-based sofware giant SAP planned to open a cafe in Palo Alto, California, where startups companies can hang out, collaborate, and connect to over 1,000 companies worldwide.

Illinois, US-based book retailing giant Barnes & Noble confirmed that it eliminated jobs across the company, but denied eliminating their Nook hardware engineering division, contrary to a report from Business Insider.

After saying no to an informal acquisition bid worth $100 million from AOL last year, Business Insider is likely set to raise new funds from its existing backers, re/code reported.

Yahoo Chief Operating Officer (COO) Henrique De Castro is leaving the company tomorrow, January 16, according to a regulatory filing, but the exact reason for the departure is unclear.