Ola, an on-demand transportation app and competitor to Uber in India, has raised $500 million in funding led by Baillie Gifford, Falcon Edge, Tiger Global, SoftBank Group, DST Global and Didi Kuaidi. The financing reportedly values Ola at $4 billion, almost doubling its value from last year when it raised $400 million. Ola is the leading player in India’s transportation market, claiming 80% of business and operating in 102 cities, compared to Uber’s 22.
Joyable, an online program to help people overcome social anxiety, has raised $8 million in Series A funding led by Thrive Capital and Harrison Metal, both returning investors. The company will use the funds to develop a mobile application offering Cognitive Behavioral Therapy to people with social anxiety. “We live in a society where 116 million people–more than a third of the population of the U.S.–don’t have access to quality mental health care, largely due to location or expense,” said Pete Shalek, co-founder and CEO, Joyable. “This funding brings us exponentially closer to our goal of democratizing mental health with an effective, easy-to-access, and affordable solution for people struggling with social anxiety, with a vision towards offering a better life to all.”
Align Commerce, a global blockchain payments provider, has closed a $12.5 million Series A round of financing led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. “For far too long the cost and complications of existing payment systems have hindered startups and SMBs from fully capitalizing on global trade,” said Marwan Forzley, CEO of Align Commerce. “The Align Commerce platform cuts through time-consuming red tape and excessive fees that have unnecessarily burdened users. Existing systems have seen little innovation in the face of game-changing new technologies, and the entire experience is overdue for a radically different approach.”
Fitness apparel startup Athos has closed a $35.5 million investment round led by Social Capital. MAS Holdings, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Felix Capital all participated in the funding, as did existing investors DMC, True Ventures and Joe Lacob. The company will use the funds to grow its team and drive its innovation in the wearable fitness technology space. “Athos’ mission is to help people train more effectively to reach their fitness goals. We do this by bringing together the most relevant fitness data and cutting-edge exercise science to deliver simple, actionable insights that allow you to get the most out of every minute you spend working out. Whether you are trying to get stronger, lose weight or just feel healthy, we want to help you get the most out of your time and effort so that it’s easier to reach those goals,” Dhananja Jayalath, CEO and co-founder of Athos, said.