Funding and Acquisitions Roundup: Google buys natural language processor Wavii for $30M+; Pearson acquires yet another edtech startup

Today’s early-stage startup funding and acquisitions news:

Web/Content

Google has acquired natural language processing startup Wavii for more than $30 million, according to TechCrunch. Apparently, Google and Apple were engaged in a protracted bidding war for the Seattle-based startup. All young companies should be so lucky. Wavii has developed proprietary aggregation technology and natural summarization algorithms (sort of like Summly, which Yahoo! recently acquired). The team previously raised $2 million in Seed funding.

Education

Pearson has acquired another edtech startup—Learning Catalytics, learning analytics and assessment platform that’s based in the cloud. The startup was founded by Eric Mazur, Brian Lukoff and Gary King of Harvard in the summer of 2011. Terms of the deal have not been disclosed. Pearson has been on an edtech buying spree lately, with its recent acquisitions of digital literacy products maker Certiport last May, and online learning services company EmbanetCompass in October. More on the buy, via Pearson’s press release.

Enterprise

Sushi.io, which offers businesses platform that helps them track their online and SaaS (software-as-a-service) spending, has raised $325K in Seed funding. Investors include Kima Ventures, 50 Partners and Mediastay co-founder Jonathan Zisermann. The startup has not yet officially launched. More about the funding, from Techcrunch.

Greentech

Singapore-based Gcorelab has powered up with $482K in Seed funding for its lithium-ion battery cooling technology. The funds came from Red Dot Ventures, Singapore government appointed early-stage incubator. The startup was founded in 2011. Further details on the funding, from ExtremeTech.

More funding news…

More Money For Utah & Other Mountain-Area Startups: Kickstart Raises $26M Second Fund, Invests In RackWare, Its First Non-Utah Company (via TechCrunch)

Ad Tech Startup Nanigans Raises $5.8 Million Led by Avalon Ventures (press release, via PEHub)

DailyWorth Raises Additional $1 Million For Series A (via TechCrunch)

Infer takes $10M to find the sales leads most likely to pay off (via GigaOm)

Hadoop startup Qubole raises $7M for Hive as a Service (via GigaOm)

Zooz’s people-first payments platform zooms off with $2M (via VentureBeat)

Nativo Receives Series A Funding Led by Greycroft Partners to Support Growth of Advanced Native Advertising Platform for Publishers (press release)

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