<div>
  <ul>
    <li>
      <p>
        Curio Research, an on-chain Web3 game developer, secured USD 2.9 million in a seed-funding round led by Bain Capital Crypto, with participation from TCG Crypto, Formless Capital, and various other angel investors.
      </p>
    </li>
    <li>
      <p>
        It aims to funnel the fresh funds to create new Web3-based games and expand its development and design teams.
      </p>
    </li>
    <li>
      <p>
        The company launched its first game, Treaty, in January this year, and allows players to write and deploy smart contracts called &ldquo;Treaties.&rdquo; These allow players to draft rules around how they interact with other players, and to freely build any tooling, infrastructure, or application such as custom asset marketplaces within the game.
      </p>
    </li>
    <li>
      <p>
        Founded in 2022, Curio Research is developing games powered entirely by smart contracts. It is also building an in-house custom infrastructure to improve the performance of on-chain games and make them accessible to non-crypto native users.
      </p>
    </li>
  </ul>
  <p>
  </p>
</div>


<div>
  <p>
    <a href="https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20230221005164/en/Curio-Raises-2.9-Million-Seed-Round-to-Build-Composable-Gaming-Ecosystem">
      Company press release
    </a>
  </p>
  <p>
    <a href="https://www.finsmes.com/2023/02/curio-raises-2-9m-in-seed-funding.html">
      FinSMEs
    </a>
  </p>
  <p>
  </p>
</div>


Web3 Ecosystem

Curio Research raises USD 2.9 million in seed funding

Property owners and real estate companies are able to handle larger portfolios while offering faster and cheaper services.

Residential PropTech

ANALYST_QUICK_TAKE

<div>
 
 <p>DoorLoop, a residential rental management platform, has secured USD 100 million in a Series B funding round, solely funded by American investment fund JMI Equity. With this investment, DoorLoop's valuation now stands at around USD 500 million, increasing its overall funds to USD 130 million.</p>
 <p>The investment will mainly be used to bolster Israel's workforce, aiming to augment the current employee count from 160 to 400 in the forthcoming three years.</p>
 
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> DoorLoop's previous funding round took place in September 2022, raising USD 20 million in a <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/13195"> Series A </a> round. The funds were allocated to platform development, marketing initiatives, team expansion, and international growth.</p>

DoorLoop raises USD 100 million in Series B funding at USD 500 million valuation

Democratizing financial technology with a suite of API-based solutions

FinTech Infrastructure

PROMINENT_CATEGORY

<div>
 <p>Marqeta, a platform specializing in card issuing for embedded finance solutions, has entered into a partnership with Klarna, Affirm, and Branch to introduce a new Buy Now, Pay Later (BNPL) solution named Marqeta Flex. This service can be conveniently incorporated into payment applications and wallets.</p>
 <p>The new Marqeta Flex provides consumers with easy, uninterrupted access to BNPL options within their existing payment methods. In addition, it personalizes the BNPL experience by directing users towards customized options within their payment applications, and it also allows card issuers to incorporate multiple BNPL services.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> Marqeta is strategically expanding into the BNPL sector to diversify its payment technology offerings and operations. The company is also active in the FinTech infrastructure and business expense management industries.</p>

Marqeta launches Marqeta Flex with Klarna, Affirm, and Branch (1)

Exploring the limitless possibilities of AI

Generative AI Applications

INCUMBENTS_PRESENT

<div>
 <p>Universal Music Group (UMG), a global music entertainment company, has formed a partnership with Klay Vision, an AI music technology company developing a music model named "KLayMM."</p>
 <p>This collaboration aims to develop a morally sound basic model for AI-created music that safeguards copyright and name and likeness rights. Klay's platform will offer AI-powered experiences which accurately attribute without compete with artists' works on conventional music services.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> ​​This partnership reflects a broader trend where major music studios are increasingly seeking to integrate GenAI in a manner that respects artistic integrity and copyright laws. For example, Warner’s Spinnin’ Records <a href="https:<br>
//sonomusic.co/news/warners-spinnin-records-partners-with-generative-ai-startup-endel-to-create-50-ai-generated-wellness-albums/"> partnered </a> with GenAI music creator Endel to create AI-generated wellness music and AI-enabled music creation platform <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/24618"> Boomy </a> partnered with ADA Worldwide to distribute and promote Boomy's artists and their music.</p>

Universal Music Group partners with Klay Vision to develop ethical AI music-generation model

<div>
 <p>OneAIChat, an Indian GenAI aggregator platform, has formed a partnership with Haiper AI, a UK company that specializes in creating visual content. This collaboration allows OneAIChat to provide text-to-video generation features using its own technology and open-sourced diffusion models. This allows subscribers to produce realistic videos from text prompts without having to manually film anything. This added feature is available to subscribers without limit for native and partner models.</p>
 <p>In its future plans, OneAIChat aims to acquire 50,000 subscribers by the first quarter of 2025. The company also intends to roll out more tools to further improve this new feature's capabilities.</p>
 
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> Haiper has been quite active in the video generation domain this year, with several model launches, including <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/31601"> Haiper 1.5 </a> and <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/35093"> Haiper 2.0. </a> In March this year, the company also raised USD <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/27319"> 13.8 million </a> in seed funding to further develop its products .</p>

OneAIChat partners with Haiper AI to launch text-to-video generation feature

Buy Now, Pay Later

<div>
 <p>Zilch, a UK-based BNPL (Buy Now Pay Later) provider, has broadened its securitization facility by an additional GBP 50 million (approx. USD 65 million) in a debt funding round. This round was organized by Deutsche Bank and saw the contribution of two notable global credit funds. This funding is an extension to the GBP 100 million (or around USD 125 million) debt financing that Zilch had previously secured in <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/30636"> June 2024 </a> .</p>
 <p>Zilch intends to use this financial boost to bolster its growth and support its yearly commerce of GBP 10 billion (roughly USD 13 billion).</p>
</div>

Zilch raises additional GBP 50 million in debt funding from Deutsche Bank

<div>
 <p>Marqeta, a platform for embedded finance solutions, has launched a new Buy Now Pay Later (BNPL) solution, Marqeta Flex, in partnership with Klarna, Affirm, and Branch. Marqeta Flex can be incorporated into payment apps and wallets for consumer convenience. It offers personalized BNPL experiences by directing users to bespoke options within their payment apps and allowing card issuers to add multiple BNPL services.</p>
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> Marqeta is strategically expanding into the BNPL sector to diversify its payment technology offerings and operations. The company is also active in the FinTech infrastructure and business expense management industries.</p>

Marqeta launches Marqeta Flex with Klarna, Affirm, and Branch

AI-based solutions for evolving digital threats

Next-gen Cybersecurity

<div>
 
 <p>Cybersecurity company Armis has received a financial backing worth USD 200 million in Series D funding. The co-leaders for the round were General Catalyst and Alkeon Capital accompanied by existing investors Brookfield Growth and Georgian. The latest funding has catapulted the company's valuation to USD 4.2 billion.</p>
 <p>The funds are earmarked for support towards a five-year strategy that has a focus on developing a multi-generational cybersecurity company. Added objectives include increasing organic product innovation, enlarging the scope of global go-to-market programs, and opening up to inorganic growth opportunities.</p>
 <p>The company recently reported an increase of USD 200 million in annual recurring revenue (ARR), rising by an additional USD 100 million in not more than 18 months. Their ongoing clientele includes market leaders such as United Airlines, Colgate-Palmolive, Mondelez, and Reckitt wherein the future target is to prepare for an IPO.</p>
 
</div>

Armis raises USD 200 million in Series D funding from General Catalyst and Alkeon Capital

<div>
 
 <p>Filigran, a software company specializing in open-source threat management, has successfully raised USD 35 million in a Series B funding round. Insight Partners spearheaded this round, along with contributions from existing investors Accel and Moonfire. This comes in quick succession to Filigran's <a href="https://sp-edge.com/updates/27148"> USD 16 million Series A </a> funding secured only a few months ago.</p>
 <p>The recently acquired funds will be directed towards global expansion, with a particular focus on markets in the US and Pacific region. A significant portion of the funds will also be dedicated to pushing the boundaries of product innovation, primarily focusing on applications in AI and data engineering use cases.</p>
 <p>Furthermore, Filigran plans on expanding their product range with innovative XTM solutions. These will be specifically tailored towards threat-driven risk assessment and deception capabilities.</p>
 
</div>

Filigran raises USD 35 million in Series B funding to drive global expansion

The tools that power remote work are define the next generation of enterprise software.

Remote Work Tools

<div>
 <p>Read AI, an AI meeting assistant, has successfully raised USD 50 million in Series B funding. The investment round was led by Smash Capital and included contributions from existing investors Madrona and Goodwater Capital.</p>
 <p>In light of the funding, the company aims to speed up product development and expand its workforce from 40 to 100 employees by Q1 2025. The invested capital will also be used to support the provision of free products. This includes a new Chrome extension that presents features such as schedule display, meeting report and insights generation, and a quick add-to-meeting option.</p>
 
</div> <p><b>Analyst QuickTake:<br>
 </b> This round comes six months after Read AI's USD 21 million Series A funding in <a href="https:<br>
//sp-edge.com/updates/28110"> April 2024 </a> . Since then, Read AI has experienced growth , adding over 100,000 new accounts across enterprises and individual users.</p>

Read AI raises USD 50 million in Series B funding to improve product offering and expand workforce

<div>
 <p>Unified communications provider AudioCodes has extended support for its Meeting Insights solution to include Zoom and Microsoft Teams. This version is accessible to both old and new customers. </p>
 <p>The AI-enabled Meeting Insights offers features such as meeting summaries, action item extraction, and speaker-identified real-time transcription. It also provides a searchable meeting repository compatible with both Teams and Zoom. The solution includes convenient integration via forwarded invitations and distribution of meeting reports through email. </p>
 <p>AudioCodes asserts that this solution allows institutions to centralize data from all meetings across platforms, thus avoiding data silos. It also claims that it offers high-level security measures like data encryption, role-based access control, and compliance with various regulations such as GDPR, CPRA, and CCPA.</p>
</div>

All Updates

Curio Research raises USD 2.9 million in seed funding

DoorLoop raises USD 100 million in Series B funding at USD 500 million valuation

Marqeta launches Marqeta Flex with Klarna, Affirm, and Branch (1)

Universal Music Group partners with Klay Vision to develop ethical AI music-generation model

OneAIChat partners with Haiper AI to launch text-to-video generation feature

Zilch raises additional GBP 50 million in debt funding from Deutsche Bank

Marqeta launches Marqeta Flex with Klarna, Affirm, and Branch

Armis raises USD 200 million in Series D funding from General Catalyst and Alkeon Capital

Filigran raises USD 35 million in Series B funding to drive global expansion

Read AI raises USD 50 million in Series B funding to improve product offering and expand workforce

AudioCodes Meeting Insights adds Zoom meeting support

Web3 Ecosystem

Curio Research raises USD 2.9 million in seed funding

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