Hyderabad-based digital marketer Ybrant Digital took a break from its international shopping spree last year, but it says its looking to buy again. The company has raised $48 million in debt and equity to help further its international presence. In addition to acquisitions, Ybrant wants to use the proceeds to…

Mountain View, Calif.-based MobileIron has raised $16 million in a third round of funding to help develop a platform that manages everything from iPads to smartphones in the enterprise. The round was led by Foundation Capital, reports peHUB. Also participating was its existing investors Storm Ventures, Sequoia Capital, Norwest Venture…

Ustream, the popular online live broadcasting service, just announced it has raised $75 million in a second round of funding led by Softbank. Updated: The actual funding is only $20 million, for now, with an option for Softbank to purchase more of Ustream by July 2011, by putting in another…

SMS GupShup has raised $12 million to help build out its texting-based mobile-phone communities in India. The company, which has operations in both Santa Clara, Calif. and Mumbai, India, claims to serve 26 million users in roughly two million topics, ranging from religious groups to sports teams. The fourth round…

Rediff.com (NSDQ: REDF) India Ltd has invested in Bangalore-headquartered location sensing technology startup Imere Technologies Pvt. Ltd, the Nasdaq-listed firm said on Friday, without disclosing the quantum of investment. Imere is a software platform that enables mobile and Internet applications to sense the location of their users and optimize services…

Matrix Partners India today said it has invested Rs20 crore in Bangalore-based mobile classifieds company Ver Se Innovation Pvt. Ltd. Ver Se focuses on mobile classifieds in verticals such as jobs, matrimonials and real estate. The company had received seed capital from OnMobile Global Ltd and also has an international…

Nokia (NYSE: NOK) Growth Partners, an investment fund owned by Finnish mobile handset maker Nokia Oyj, has invested $10 million (Rs48 crore) in Web18 Holdings, the Internet arm of Television Eighteen India Ltd. TV18, part of the Network18 Group, is the sole shareholder in Web18. Other details of the deal…

Venture capital firm Matrix Partners India today said it has invested Rs100 crore in IIT test prep firm FIIT JEE Ltd. This is the first round of funding for the Dinesh Kumar Goel-headed firm and Matrix is the sole investor. FIITJEE provides training for competitive exams such as IIT-JEE (Indian…

British media conglomerate Pearson (NYSE: PSO) Plc. today said it has invested $30 million in India’s education sector. It has formed a 50:50 joint venture with Educomp Solutions Ltd, a leading education services provider, to support vocational learning in India. Pearson will pick up a 50% stake in Educomp’s existing…

Aroon Purie (pictured, right), chairman and editor-in-chief at The India Today Group, India’s largest magazine publisher by revenue, spoke today at the 37th World Magazine Congress in London. At a panel discussion on Global Economic and Media Trends: Riding the Storm with William T. Kerr, chairman of the board, Meredith…

Early stage venture capital firm Ojas Venture Partners has invested an undisclosed amount in Delhi-based CoCubes, a mangement consulting firm. The firm is an online platform which aims to bring college and companies together for campus recruitment. Gautam Balijepalli, Principal at Ojas, confirmed the investment to VCCircle. He refused to…

Sequoia Capital and Nexus India Capital backed What’s On India Media Ltd (WOIML) is in the process of getting a licence to uplink non news and current affairs television channel in the country. Mumbai-based WOIML has an electronic programme guide (EPG) which aggregates programming information from hundreds of TV channels.…

Its existing backers - KPCB, Sherpalo Ventures and Nexus India Capital - have also participated in this round. Qualcomm (NSDQ: QCOM) Ventures, the venture capital arm of wireless technologies and data solutions firm Qualcomm Inc, has invested $9 million in CE Infosystems, reports PTI (Via Economic Times). For Delhi-based CE…

Rx HealthCare Magic, which runs the portal HealthcareMagic.com, has raised its first round of funding of $2.5 million from Accel India, VCCircle has learned. Kunal Sinha, founder and CEO of Rx HealthCare Magic, has confirmed the investment. The funding will be released in tranches as company meets its milestones. Bangalore-based…

ValueFirst raised its first round of $250k in 2006 from Rajesh Jain’s personal investment firm Emergic Ventures. ValueFirst Messaging, a Delhi-based mobile messaging services provider, has raised series B funding of $6 million from venture capital firm New Enterprise Associates (NEA). In 2006, the company raised its first round of…

In what could be the beginning of the consolidation of mobile value added services companies, Mobile2Win, a leading VAS player, has been acquired by another VAS player, Chandigarh-based Altruist Group. As part of the all-stock deal, the venture capital investors and promoters in Mobile2Win will pick up a 10% stake…

Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) has taken an undisclosed 20 percent minority stake in Singapore-based mobile marketing company Affle in its second round of funding, reports India’s Economic Times. Affle said that the partnership would help it quickly scale up its business globally and expand into the U.S., Europe and Australia. The…

Web18’s chief technology officer Varun Singh has confirmed what we reported last week. “I have put in my papers at Web18 and i’m leaving to start my own company,” Singh said. Singh, 27, has set up ScalArc Inc., a Delaware, US-incorporated consulting firm that will help web companies optimize infrastructure…

The local classifieds space in India continues to attract investment. Venture fund Helion Venture Partners has announced an investment of Rs 20 crore (about $4.2 million) in GETIT Infoservices. Delhi-based GETIT is a producer of yellow pages and directories in India, and has also ventured into digital offerings in the…