Top tech startup news for today, Wednesday, August 28, 2019

Good morning! Below are some of the top tech startup news for today, Wednesday, August 28, 2019.

Amazon is in preliminary discussions to partner with Indonesian ride-hailing startup Gojek. Amazon.com and Indonesian ride-hailing startup Gojek Group have held preliminary talks on a partnership, according to people familiar with the matter, which could expand the online retail giant’s services into a populous new market, according to Wall Street journal citing people familiar with the discussions. The discussion is centered on an arrangement by which Amazon would make a sizable investment in Gojek and tap into the Jakarta-based company’s delivery infrastructure in Indonesia. Founded in 2010, Gojek is Southeast Asia’s leading on-demand multi-service platform and digital payment technology group. Gojek connects consumers to courier delivery and two-wheeled ride-hailing services.

Fitness startup Peloton files for IPO with annual revenue of $915 million. Peloton, the indoor fitness startup, filed paperwork on Tuesday for an initial public offering. Founded in 2012 by a group of five people — John Foley, Tom Cortese, Hisao Kushi, Yony Feng, and Graham Stanton, Peloton provides internet-connected indoor bikes and subscription cycling classes that can be streamed live or on-demand into homes, said that it has more than 511,000 ”connected fitness” subscribers, which is double the year prior. It has over 1.4 million members, which includes anyone with a Peloton account.  Peloton CEO, Foley, previously served as president of Barnes & Noble’s e-commerce division. The company seeks to raise $500 million, according to the filing.

AR mapping startup 6D.ai is building 3D map of the world. 6D.ai, a seed-stage startup spun out from Oxford University’s world-renowned Active Vision Lab, is laying the foundation to build a 3D map of the world using real-time spatial recognition across XR head mounted displays (HMDs and smartphones. Using the 3D mesh generated by the 6D Reality Platform, developers can build world-scale apps where assets are persistent, responsive to occlusion, and synced between multiple users more efficiently. 6D.ai announced today its commercial availability for developers to begin shipping their applications. The company also released its Android solution rounding out its cross-platform offerings, which already includes iOS.

CodeCombat raises $6 million in Series A funding to launch new game. CodeCombat, a Silicon Valley-based company that makes computer science programs for students to learn JavaScript and Python while playing a real game, raised $6M in Series A funding to launch its new game, Ozaria, expand further in the US, and build partnerships in China, including with NetEase and Tarena. The round was led by Veronica Wu from Hone Capital with participation from Andreessen Horowitz, Extol Capital, and OceanOne Capital. Founded by co-founder and CEO, and Shubhangi Gupta, the senior software engineer who developed much of the CodeCombat and Ozaria software systems, CodeCombat makes computer science programs for students to learn JavaScript and Python while playing a real game. Over the last six years, over 12 million people have learned to write Python and JavaScript using the game.

Subscription management startup Chargebee lands $14 million Series D funding to expand its product offerings and build an end-to-end ecosystem. Chargebee announced it has raised $14 million Series D funding round to expand its product offerings and partnerships and build an end-to-end subscription ecosystem to automate revenue operations. The round, which was led by Steadview Capital, brings the total funds raised to date to $38.2 million. Founded in 2011 by KP Saravanan, Krish Subramanian, Rajaraman Santhanam, and Thiyagarajan T, Chargebee automates revenue operations of high-growth, subscription-based business. Its SaaS platform helps businesses manage and grow their revenue by automating subscriptions, billing, invoicing, payments and revenue recognition processes and it provides key reports, metrics and insights into their subscription business.

AI startup ThoughtSpot secures $248M at $1.95 billion valuation to transform enterprises with search & AI-driven analytics. ThoughtSpot, an artificial intelligence startup and business intelligence platform that helps anyone explore, analyze, and share real-time business analytics data easily, has raised $248 million in funding at at $1.95 billion valuation. ThoughtSpot will use the funds to continue to invest in its go-to-market teams in North America, EMEA, and APAC, expand R&D efforts, including hiring for its engineering and product teams, and invest in customer and thought leadership events. Backers included new investor Silver Lake Waterman, Silver Lake’s late-stage growth capital fund, and existing backers Lightspeed Venture Partners, Sapphire Ventures, and Geodesic Capital.