This is your Week in Tech. We filmed this episode from Impact Hub Westminster, a co-working space for startups focusing on sustainability.
This week, investors behind LoveFilm, TransferWise and LinkedIn back FinTech firm DueCourse, Twitter gets sued, the UK produces the second highest number of tech exits and, finally, Amsterdam’s famous canals could see the ‘roboat’ taking up residence in the city.
Investments
This week, there’s been a bounty of investment news. Manchester-based FinTech startup DueCourse raised £6.25m in angel funding. The firm’s new backers include the founders and investors behind Zoopla, LoveFilm, TransferWise and LinkedIn.
Dating app Once closed a $5.5m Series A round. The funding included a second wave investment from VC firm Partech Ventures.
FinTech startup Curve raised £2m in seed funding, bringing its total raised to date to £3.5m.
Other investments this week include Bricklane.com’s £1.3m seed round, PropTech firm Nested’s £1.2m raise and the $1m seed round received by Airbnb management service Hostmaker.
Best of British
The UK was responsible for the second highest number of tech exits by country in the first half of 2016.
According to a new report from CB Insights, the US, unsurprisingly, led the ranking followed by the UK, India, Canada and Germany.
International story
Overseas, Twitter is being sued by one of its shareholders.
Doris Shenwick claims Twitter misled investors in 2014 by stating its monthly active users would soon increase to 550 million.
It also claimed it would reach more than a billion in the “longer term”, but is nowhere near achieving either of these goals.
Download
Our ‘Download of the Week’ is Orderella.
Available on Android and iOS, the app enables users to order and pay for drinks at participating pubs and bars.
The drinks are then brought straight to their table. With the service already working at more than 150 venues across the UK, queuing at the bar could soon become a thing of the past!
And finally…
And finally, Amsterdam researchers are planning to bring driverless boats to the city’s canals.
Driverless cars may not be ready for the roads just yet, but those working on the £21.4 m ‘roboat’ project hope to have a prototype on the water by 2017.
That’s all for this episode of The Week in Tech. For more technology news follow us on Twitter and LinkedIn. You can also like us on Facebook and subscribe to our YouTube channel.