THE NEWS WRAP: Sprinklr now valued at more than $1 billion

A US startup that specialises in helping major brands handle their social media presence has closed a $US46 million ($A60m) funding round.

 

Sprinklr’s latest raise means the company is now valued at more than $US1 billion. The round was led by existing investors Batter Ventures, Intel Capital and Iconiq Capital.

 

Founder and chief executive Ragy Thomas said in a statement Sprinklr is helping large brands “deliver enhanced customer experiences” across social media channels.

 

“Global businesses are expanding from channel-centric and function-centric thinking in response to the increasingly connected customer,” he said.

 

“Neither point solutions nor disconnected cloud services will allow them to consistently deliver valuable customer experiences at every social touch point.”

 

To date the startup has raised $US123.5 million.

Twitter launches curation tool for publishers

Twitter has launched a new platform to allow publishers to search, filter and curate Twitter content.

 

Curator is free and aimed at news organisations, broadcasters, production companies and local governments.

 

“Curator enables publishers to create complex keyword and hashtag queries to easily uncover streams of high quality Tweets,” Twitter said in a statement.

 

“Queries can be further refined by follower counts, location, languages and more to create collections of the most relevant Tweets pertaining to that topic. Together with our partners, our goal is to make it easy and seamless for publishers to incorporate powerful conversations, interactivity and engagement into their programming.”

Etsy shares to sell from around $US14 a share at IPO

Online marketplace Etsy is planning to jump onto the NASDAQ with its IPO price expected to be between $US14 ($A18) and $US16 ($A21) a share, according to TechCrunch.

 

The company, which was launched in 2005 and specialises in selling handmade and vintage products and shipping them around the world, hopes to raise $US100 million from the float.

 

The startup will begin a roadshow to woo potential stock buyers tomorrow.

Overnight

The Dow Jones Industrial Average is down 200.19 points, falling 1.11% to 17,776.12. The Aussie dollar is currently trading at around 76 US cents.

 

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