Welcome to The Week in Tech, your roundup of the week’s top technology news. This week, we have Cera’s £1.4m Seed top up, Appear Here’s US expansion, Nauta Capital’s $100m raise and much more.
Cera raises £1.4m
London-based HealthTech startup Cera has topped up its Seed funding round with an additional £1.4m.
The news comes after the London-based firm announced a £1.3m Seed in November last year.
Cera drew support from existing and lead investor Credo Ventures as well as new backer Kim Ventures.
Appear Here expands to the US
Online marketplace Appear Here announced its US expansion this week.
Founded in 2013, the marketplace for short-term retail space, confirmed it was opening an office in New York, where it will seek to employ up to eight employees.
The company has so far raised capital from prominent VCs including Balderton Capital, Forward Partners and MMC Ventures.
Nauta Capital tech fund
Early-stage VC firm Nauta Capital announced a $100m top up to its tech investment fund, bringing the total to $170m.
The firm, which now has $350m in assets under management, said it would continue to invest in UK technology firms.
Carles Ferrer, general partner, told Tech City News: “We are very committed to the UK and have a stable presence with a full investment team and also marketing functions and investor relations.
“We have been investing in the UK for many years and continue to be committed as we believe London and the UK continues to be the largest tech hub in Europe.”
So far, Nauta Capital has backed several UK firms including Brandwatch, CloudIQ and BeMyEye.
Facebook’s F8 conference
US social media giant Facebook wants to allow users to “type with their thoughts and hear with their skin”.
Mark Zuckerberg’s announcements, made at Facebook’s F8 developer conference, also included plans for AR and AI bots, which will see the company try to compete against the likes of Snapchat.
Download of the Week
Our download of the week is Hoop, the app created by parents to help parents become better parents.
The digital directory tool suggests kid-friendly events across London and lets parents filter based on their child’s age.
And finally
And finally, researchers at the University of Sheffield have created an ‘emotional’ robotic dog to help combat loneliness among the elderly.
Known as MiRo, the robotic pup is fitted with sensors, which allow it to ‘feel’ strokes and enable it to wag its tail when it’s feeling happy.
That’s all for this week’s roundup! Follow us on Twitter and Facebook for more tech updates.