BuzzFeed is raising another $200 million at the same valuation it had last yearBuzzFeed is raising another $200 million at a valuation of $1.5 billion, the same valuation it had last year, according to documents from CB Insights. Recode had previously reported that the investment would come from NBCUniversal, making the company's investment in BuzzFeed total $400 million. The flat valuation might signal that a report by the Financial Times earlier this year, which said BuzzFeed had missed revenue targets, bears some truth. [ Business Insider ] Press Release - CoverWallet is excited to announce today that we’ve receive $7.8 million in funding in a Series A round led by Union Square Ventures. To date, we’ve raised $9.5 million. In addition to Union Square Ventures, Index Ventures and previous investors Highland Capital Partners, Two Sigma Ventures, and Founder Collective participated in the Series A round. We’re also welcoming John Buttrick of Union Square Ventures to the board, who has previously led investments in startups reinventing financial services industries, such as Lending Club, SigFig, and RealtyShares. 500 Startups ditches the ‘accelerator’ brand as it looks to differentiateAs of today, founders have a lot of options as to what kinds of accelerator programs they might want to try to get in to. There’s Y Combinator, Techstars and 500 Startups, among many others. But with so many choices, it might be easy for an outside observer to not really directly distinguish between them. For Dave McClure — who wants to show that his firm 500 Startups can offer something more than the rest of those programs — that’s an issue. The accelerator program, which has been running for several years, is one in which the firm looks to put a lot of emphasis on growth. [ Tech Crunch ] Women Are Founding And Fundraising While Pregnant (Why Does It Freak Everyone Out?)A year and a half ago, I was an advisor for a new vitamin startup. The female CEO of that company told me that she was pregnant — while in the middle of raising her first round. My first thought was: “Can she possibly close before her bump starts showing?” A year later, I was trying to raise my first round of outside funding for my own startup, Parsley Health. Up until that point, I had 100% bootstrapped my company and earned over $1M in revenue, yet at least two of my investors—both VCs, one female and one male—questioned my long-term intentions for my company. Each of them hurled at me the dreaded term, “lifestyle business.” The woman said she feared that I, a woman in my mid-30s, didn’t actually intend to grow Parsley into a real healthcare company but rather intended to run a smaller business that spun off some cash while I raised a family. [ Forbes ] AIRBNB’S AMBITIOUS SECOND ACT WILL TAKE IT WAY BEYOND COUCH-SURFINGAirbnb shook up the hotel business by giving anyone with a spare bed and a mobile phone a way to start a business. Now, it wants to turn us all into tour guides. Later today at Airbnb Open, its annual “festival of hosting,” the company will announce a new product called Airbnb Trips, a portfolio of offbeat excursions developed by freelance hosts. Brian Chesky, the company’s 35-year-old co-founder and C.E.O., spoke exclusively to Vanity Fair about the new initiative, and his ambitions to move Airbnb beyond its couch-surfing origins. [ Vanity Fair ] VENTURE CAPITAL JOBS |