Techmeme
March 20, 2014, 1:05 PM

Top News

Wall Street Journal:
Airbnb In Advanced Talks to Raise Funding at a $10 Billion Valuation  —  Private-Equity Firm TPG Likely to Lead Funding Round for the Online Home-Rental Marketplace  —  Airbnb Inc. is in advanced talks to raise funds that would value the online home-rental marketplace at more than $10 billion …
Mike Isaac / Re/code:
As Messaging Wars Escalate, Social App Tango Raises $280 Million  —  Social startup Tango announced Thursday that it had raised a massive $280 million Series D round of venture funding, the latest significant move among a handful of high-profile apps all vying to own the mobile messaging space.
Parmy Olson / Forbes:
Exclusive: Alibaba Sinks $215 Million Into Messaging App Tango, Valuing It At More Than $1 Billion  —  China's Alibaba is the latest Internet giant to make a bet on the messaging space, and it's a big one.  The company is spending $250 million for a minority stake in the messaging and free-calling app Tango, the startup revealed today.
Lorraine Luk / Wall Street Journal:
China Mobile Added About 1 Million New iPhone Users in February  —  HONG KONG— China Mobile Ltd added about one million new iPhone users last month after it started offering the popular smartphone in mid-January, Chief Executive Li Yue said Thursday.  —  The comment came hours …
James Niccolai / PC World:
HP plans 3D printer announcement for June  —  Hewlett-Packard claims to have solved the two biggest problems with today's 3D printers and will make its first big technology announcement in that area in June, CEO Meg Whitman said Wednesday.  —  There's a lot of “buzz and hype” around 3D printing …
Katherine Rosman / Wall Street Journal:
Fitbit Now Faces a Class-Action Suit in Rash Fallout  —  A month after Fitbit issued a recall of its fitness-tracking bracelet following complaints of blisters and rashes, the startup now faces its first lawsuit.  —  The suit, filed on Monday in the Superior Court of California in the County of San Diego …
Tom Cheredar / VentureBeat:
Ad platform Rubicon Project sets $108M IPO  —  Advertising platform Rubicon Project has announced terms for an initial public offering today that will have the company seeking to raise $108 million.  —  Rubicon Project operates an automated digital ad exchange that allows you to both buy and sell ads.
eMarketer:
Driven by Facebook and Google, Mobile Ad Market Soars 105% in 2013  —  Mobile ad spending on pace to reach $31.45 billion this year  —  Last year, global mobile ad spending increased 105.0% to total $17.96 billion, according to new figures from eMarketer.  In 2014, mobile is on pace …
David Pierce / The Verge:
The story of Motorola's smartwatch from the man who designed it  —  The Moto 360 is a breathtaking design — here's how it came to be  —  Eventually they just made a watch.  —  Motorola design chief Jim Wicks and his team had spent a year and a half designing the device that would ultimately become …
Leena Rao / TechCrunch:
Google-Backed Lending Club Brings Peer-To-Peer Lending To Business Loans  —  Peer-to-peer lending marketplace Lending Club is announcing a major expansion today into business loans.  —  Lending Club brings together lenders and borrowers who want to cut out banks in the process of investing among peers …
Kelly Conniff / TIME:
Twitter Launches Easy Tool That Finds Your First Tweet  —  Twitter has launched #FirstTweet, a tool that helps users find the very first message they sent out using the site-which, of course, means that you might end up seeing a tweet you'd rather not remember.
More: Guardian and The Twitter BlogThanks:@srikardr
Deborah Gage / Wall Street Journal:
Coupa Raises $40M For Cloud Procurement Software, Takes On SAP  —  Coupa Inc., which helps companies track spending on items like travel and office supplies that can quickly eat into corporate budgets, raised another $40 million, bringing total funding to $87 million.
Stacey Higginbotham / Gigaom:
Facebook unveils Hack, a new programming language for writing code faster  —  Facebook is at it again, introducing a new programming language designed to make the process of writing and testing code faster.  Called Hack, it has been in use for a year at the social networking company, and on Thursday Facebook released it as open source.
More: Facebook Code and Wired

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