Funding and Acquisitions Roundup: ‘Elite’ online university The Minerva Project raises a whopping $25 million in Seed funding

Today’s technology early-stage funding and acquisitions news roundup:

Education

New online university The Minerva Project has raised a record $25 million in Seed funding from Benchmark Capital. (full story via VentureBeat)

Ecommerce

Chicago-based online loyalty platform Belly has secured more than $2.8 million in funding, the company has announced. (full story via Chicago Tribune)

Cloud

Pertino Networks gets $8.85 million to bring enterprise-class IT networking capabilities for small companies. Investors are Norwest Venture Partners (NVP) and Lightspeed Venture Partners.

Andreessen Horowitz gives Skout an infusion of $22 million for its location-based flirting app. (full story via VentureBeat)

Mobile

RR Donnelly bets big on mobile catalogs app CoffeeTable with a $2.5 million Series A investment. (full story via TechCrunch)

Gaming/Mobile

The Tap Lab lands $550K from Harmonix co-founders Alex Rigopulos and Eran Egozy, Google’s Don Dodge, Mike Dornbrook of Common Angels and other Angels for location-based mobile games. (full story via VentureBeat)

Enterprise

Small business social network and directory Manta has closed a $44 million initial funding round. The round was led by Norwest Venture Partners. (full story via VentureBeat)