Investment Round is our weekly update on which firms have secured new funding, which areas are seeing the most financing, and who is putting up the cash that enables these companies to keep pushing the capabilities of mobile marketing further.

CloudIQ picks up £4m with PayPal investment

eCommerce optimisation platform Cloud IQ has raised a £4m round of funding, its second round of the same value in the past six months – and with the addition of PayPal as an investor, alongside returning investors Nauta Capital, Juno and Finance Wales.

Cloud IQ’s platform – which counts among its clients Samsung, EE and TUI – combining machine learning with behavioural and inventory data to tailor the customer experience to each individual.

PayPal’s investment is part of a larger partnership between the two firms, which will make it possible to track all PayPal transactions through Cloud IQ.

“Through our recent partnership with Cloud IQ it is clear we share a common vision to improve the consumer journey,” said Jeremy Jonker, VP, Head of Global Corporate Development at PayPal. “Today, AI-powered technology is finally able to deliver individualised consumer experiences at scale. PayPal is excited to support Cloud IQ as they bring to market solutions that improve the overall shopping experience on both web and mobile.”

Latest investment values Slack at $5bn

Slack has reportedly raised around $250m, in a funding round co-led by Japan’s SoftBank Group and Accel Partners.

First reported by Bloomberg, the round values the workplace messaging app at over $5bn.

As part of the deal, Slack employees and other shareholders will be able to sell equity to investors.

£1m rains down on Brolly

Brolly, an insurance tech startup which offers a single umbrella app for a customer’s entire insurance portfolio, has has closed a £1m seed round.

The round was led by Valar Ventures, Pi Labs and Entrepreneur First, along with angel investors.

Founded in 2016 by Phoebe Hugh, previously an underwriter and product manager at Aviva, and former Microsoft engineering manager Mykhailo Loginov, Brolly manages current plans, advises on which products a customer should buy based on their existing portfolio, and – when the app is finished – will advise on whether they should switch to other providers to get a better deal.

The funds will be used to develop the app further, and scale up its team, which currently stands at 10 staff.

Carspring

Carspring, an online used car dealership platform, has landed £5m in Series B funding.

It’s worth noting that not all of this sum is cash – £1.3m comes from Channel 4’s Commercial Growth Fund, which offers TV ad space in exchange for equity.

Leading the round is Rocket Internet, the German tech investor and incubator which built up Carspring in the first place.