Best printers for Home

Best Mixer Grinder

Best wired Earphones

Best 43 Inch TV in India

Best Wi Fi Routers

Best Home Theatre in India

Smart Watch under 5000

Best Laptops for Education

Best Laptop for Students

<br /> France-headquartered ride-sharing platform <keyword id="2401770" type="UNKNOWN" weightage="100" keywordseo="BlaBlaCar">BlaBlaCar</keyword>, which entered the Indian market last year, has announced that it would now verify the government IDs for all its members, so that it can improve the safety and security for its rides. <br />
 <br />
Out of the 22 countries in which the company operates, India is the first market to have such feature introduced for verification of its riders, which was brought in a few weeks ago, based on member feedback. <br />
 <br />
"India is the first country where we have begun verification of government ID documents, such as the Aadhar card," Raghav Gupta, BlaBlaCar’s India country manager, told <a href="http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/small-biz/startups/in-a-first-blablacar-introduces-verification-in-india-to-ensure-safer-rides/articleshow/53091990.cms">ET</a>. "We took the decision after our members suggested it. The idea is to create a trusted community." <br />
 <br />
The verification would be a two-step process wherein the company would be verifying the scanned document that users would upload, and the details will be matched with government database using API integration. Verified member profiles will also boost the member's profile, so that they get more requests for individuals looking to travel on the same route as them. <br />
 <br />
As of now, BlaBlaCar is not making any money in India, but is looking to monetise by the first half of 2017, for which it would charge commissions from co-travellers for the rides. <br />
<br />
<a href="https://i.ytimg.com/vi/j3SN5kw9z5U/maxresdefault.jpg"><em>Image source</em></a><br />

BlaBlaCar introduces government ID verification for better safety

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/leweb3/">Flickr/leweb3</a></span></p><p class="caption">Blablacar CEO Frédéric Mazzella.</p></div><p></p></div></div>French ridesharing company BlaBlaCar, which lets people <span>book trips between cities and destinations in advance with drivers who already traveling the route, </span>has just raised another $200 million<span> (£127 million) in funding. </span></p><p><span><span>That brings its valuation to $1.6 billion (£780 million), which is quite a lot for a company that has just 2 million monthly active users. </span></span></p><p>But when we did the math with what we considered to be some conservative estimates, we found that the company could already be seeing some solid revenues.<span> BlaBlaCar takes a 12% cut from the fee drivers charge their passengers. Last year the company said that fee averaged out at around $25 (£16) per ride. Assuming each of its 2 million monthly users take one trip a month, <span>the company </span><a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/how-much-money-blablacar-could-be-making-2015-9">could already be generating </a><span><a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/how-much-money-blablacar-could-be-making-2015-9">$72 million</a> (£46.8 million) every year.</span></span></p><p><span>These four charts from <a href="http://www.similarweb.com/?utm_source=ppc&amp;utm_campaign=gs_sch_brand_similar_uk&amp;utm_lpurl=http://www.similarweb.com/%3Futm_campaign%3Dgs_sch_brand_similar_uk&amp;utm_keyword=similarweb&amp;utm_matchtype=e&amp;utm_target=&amp;utm_placement=&amp;utm_adposition=1t1&amp;gclid=COC9vKqG6scCFRGeGwodWt4Cuw">digital analytics firm SimilarWeb</a> - which doesn't have BlaBlaCar as a client - show that the app is seeing steady growth in downloads and active users in its native France, as well as Russia, Poland, Germany and Spain. </span></p><p><em>SimilarWeb tracked percentages of app metrics like current installs for Android devices only, over a 6 month period from March through August 2015. </em></p>

These 4 charts show why ridesharing startup BlaBlacar could be worth $1.6 billion

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Flickr/TechCrunch</span></p><p class="caption">BlaBlaCar CEO Frederic Mazzella</p></div><p></p></div></div>French ridesharing startup BlaBlaCar<a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/blablacar-has-raised-160-million-report-2015-9"> has reportedly raised $160 million</a> (£104 million) in new funding, which brings its valuation to $1.2 billion (£780 million). </p><p>How could a hitchhiking app be worth so much? Hardly anyone uses it. It has only 2 million monthly active users. For comparison, Whatsapp has 900 million.</p><p>But some back-of-the-envelope calculations show that BlaBlaCar could actually already be generating surprisingly robust revenues.</p><p>The model that BlaBlaCar follows is similar to Uber and other ridesharing services, but the way the service works is slightly different.</p><p>BlaBlaCar riders pay their driver a fee, and <a href="http://tech.eu/features/481/ride-sharing-europe-carpooling-blablacar/">the company takes around a 12% cut</a> from that amount (which is similar to how Uber works). But what's different about the service is that BlaBlaCar doesn't operate within cities - instead it's all about travel between long-distance destinations. Need a ride from Paris to Brussels, but don't want to pay the expensive train or plane fare? BlaBlaCar is your solution.</p><p>Let's take a look at some of BlaBlaCar's numbers to figure out how much money it's bringing in. </p><p>BlaBlaCar COO and cofounder Nicolas Brusson<a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4260cd4e-7c75-11e4-9a86-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3l3e0RfFw"> told The Financial Times in December</a> that the company has 2 million people who use its services every month. And the company said earlier last year that <a href="https://pando.com/2014/07/01/europes-blablacar-raises-100m-to-take-ride-sharing-long-distance/">the average ride charge was around $25 </a>(£16). Factor in BlaBlaCar's 12% cut and it's bringing in around $72 million (£46.8 million) every year, assuming that its users take one trip every month.</p><p><strong>Here's the sum:</strong></p><ul><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">2 million rides</span></li><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">x $25 each</span></li><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">x 12 months of the year</span></li><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">x 12% cut for BlaBlaCar</span></li><li><strong><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">= $72 million in revenues </span></strong></li></ul><p>We used old, conservative numbers to generate that estimate.</p><p>An annual revenue of $72 million is no small figure, but if it were recurring annual revenue it would make a one-time investment of $160 million look reasonable. </p><p>It pales in comparison to <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/uber-revenue-projection-in-2015-2014-11">Uber's predicted revenue figures</a>. Uber is expected to hit an annual revenue run rate of $10 billion (£6.5 billion) by the end of 2015. Uber takes a larger cut than BlaBlaCar, keeping 20% instead of 12%, so it's expected to keep $2 billion (£1.3 billion) of that total. It also does many more rides.</p><p>BlaBlaCar doesn't yet operate in the US, and doesn't appear to have any plans to head there and compete with Uber. <a href="http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/4260cd4e-7c75-11e4-9a86-00144feabdc0.html#axzz3l3e0RfFw">COO Nicolas Brusson told The Financial Times</a> in a December 2014 interview that "the US is not the best market for us in many ways." Instead, BlaBlaCar is focusing on other international markets like India, Turkey, Brazil, and Russia.</p><p>It can be tricky for European ridesharing companies to expand to the US and attempt to take on the bigger players. British ridesharing company Hailo expanded to New York in 2013, <a href="http://www.wsj.com/articles/hailo-hangs-up-on-u-s-app-driven-taxi-service-1413335668">but ended its operations there in 2014</a>. Hailo's CEO, Jay Bregman,<a href="http://fortune.com/2014/10/14/hailo-taxi-app-funding-failure/"> also departed the company</a> shortly afterwards. </p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/us-earths-ice-melted-animated-map-climate-change-2015-7">Here's what the US would look like if all the Earth's ice melted</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="Z4dGwzdDrnZunZUB10-CqEUToYnAvsHw" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

We figured out how much money new European unicorn BlaBlaCar could be making

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="BlaBlaCar" title_caption="Nicolas Brusson" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/563a00bcdd0895b8608b47b6-960/maxresdefault.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span><a href="https://www.blablacar.co.uk/blog/nicolas-brusson-about">BlaBlaCar</a></span></p><p class="caption">Nicolas Brusson</p></div><p></p></div></div>BlaBlaCar, the $1.5 billion French ride-sharing app that lets people split the cost of fuel on journeys between cities, is one of the most exciting tech startups in Europe. It is growing like crazy on the continent and currently has 40 million members doing 4 million journeys each month.</p><p>But it is struggling to go mainstream in Britain, according to CEO Nicolas Brusson.</p><p>"Britain is very slow for us," Brusson told Business Insider at Web Summit in Lisbon. "Something is puzzling here." The company has "defocused" its efforts in the <keyword id="6354868" type="COUNTRY" weightage="60" keywordseo="UK">UK</keyword> although the app and its service remains available for anyone who wants it.</p><p>On paper, Britain is perfect BlaBlaCar territory. Petrol is expensive. The trains are expensive, crowded, and service is often patchy. The roads are good. And millions of people need to make routine journeys between the major cities.</p><p>But for some reason, British people remain suspicious of the idea of sharing a long car journey with a stranger. It is, Brusson speculates, perhaps an extension of the famous British distaste for talking to strangers on public transport.</p><p>When BlaBlaCar took off in France, people said "it's a French thing, it's a socialist thing," and that is why sharing a car and the cost of a journey felt natural. When it took off in Spain, people said, "it's a Southern European thing."</p><p>"We become this trust broker [between strangers] in a peer-to-peer community, that's where we create value," Brusson says.</p><p>Not in Britain. A review of UK Facebook comments about BlaBlaCar found fear of legal issues, trust and issues to do with strangers were posted 10 to 20 times more frequently than in other countries - suggesting a deeper level of anxiety about car-sharing in the UK than elsewhere. This, after all, is the land that thoroughly <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/sep/29/tube-chat-campaign-provokes-horror-among-london-commuters">rejected the "Tube chat" badges</a> that encouraged people on the London Underground to talk to each other.</p><p>BlaBlaCar is doing well elsewhere, though. It now has 550 employees in 22 countries. The company has taken $300 million in investment funding and was worth $1.5 billion at the last valuation, Brusson says. He declined to give us a revenue number but did say that the cut per ride average is <span>€</span>15-20. (The US dollar and the euro are close to parity, currently.) In newer countries, BlaBlaCar takes no cut.</p><p>We can estimate that:</p><ul><li>4 million journeys per month</li><li>multiplied by €15 each</li><li>= €60 million per month</li><li>= €720 million annually, assuming all journeys are monetised (which they are not).</li></ul><p>That's up from last year, when <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/blablacar-hobbled-by-lack-of-public-transport-in-the-us-2015-11?redirect=/blablacar-hobbled-by-lack-of-public-transport-in-the-us-2015-11">Brusson told Business Insider that BlaBlaCar had 20 million members</a>, and 10 million people traveling every quarter. We estimated revenues at <span>€96 million annually at that time.</span></p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/xiaomi-new-mi-mix-better-than-iphone-2016-10">The 'Apple of China' just unveiled a phone that's more powerful and better looking than the iPhone</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="5tamMwNzE6XQnLV5ixV8UUd-PSbdYX4A" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

There is something wrong with British culture that prevents one of Europe's biggest startups from flourishing here

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right click-to-enlarge"><div><div class="image on-image"><a title_source="BlaBlaCar" title_caption="Nicolas Brusson" class="zoomin" href="https://static-ssl.businessinsider.com/image/563a00bcdd0895b8608b47b6-960/maxresdefault.jpg"><span class="sprites click-to-enlarge-icon" title="Click to enlarge"></span></a><p class="source"><span>BlaBlaCar</span></p><p class="caption">Nicolas Brusson</p></div><p></p></div></div>One of the most exciting European tech startups is BlaBlaCar, the French ride-sharing app that lets people split the cost of fuel on journeys between cities: The company recently raised <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/4-charts-blablacar-android-app-2015-9">a $200 million (£127 million) round of investment that values BlaBlaCar at $1.6 billion (£780 million)</a>. Yet the company has no presence in the US and no plans to launch there soon, COO Nicolas Brusson told Business Insider at Web Summit in Dublin today.</p><p>On its face, this seems weird: America is a massive market that loves ride-sharing apps like Uber; it has terrible train links between its major cities; short flights between nearby cities can be expensive and inconvenient (think of the airport wait-time); and Americans think nothing of casually driving 200 miles a day - which is the kind of distance that is a sweet spot for BlaBlaCar drivers and passengers. BlaBlaCar also replaces hitchhiking by making it safer and easier, in the much the same way Airbnb and Uber do in their sectors - by reassuring both sides of a transaction that the other person they're dealing with has been checked out and peer-rated. </p><p>And, BlaBlaCar has the kind of global ambitions that Uber does. </p><p>So why don't Americans want to get between cities cheaply by sharing a ride on BlaBlaCar, when they're seemingly so willing to do the same for a short trip inside a city on Uber?</p><p>It turns out that the US's lack of public transport infrastructure in most cities hobbles BlaBlaCar from developing there while giving an artificial boost to Uber, Brusson says. </p><p>On a typical BlaBlaCar trip, the driver might say, "I am leaving from this location in London and will drop people at Picadilly Station in Manchester. Show up at this place in London if you want to share the ride and the cost." The start and end location don't matter because both London and Manchester have great bus, train and underground links, so it is easy for someone without a car to get to the driver, and to get to their final destination after they've been dropped off. Public transport means that the driver doesn't have to ferry passengers around a traffic-choked city, dropping each one off, like a taxi. "So you need good public transport within cities to take care of the first part and the last part" of the journey, Brusson says.</p><p>But in the US, "If I tell you I'll drop you off in Sunnyvale and you actually live in Palo Alto, what are you going to do? Good luck," Brusson says. "So that's an issue we have in the US, the fabric of the city, the fabric of the network is not ideal. It's also why Uber is so popular because Uber is replacing a lack of public transport" in the US, he says.</p><p>This is fascinating because it shows how government public spending and infrastructure decisions can either encourage new businesses or prevent them. BlaBlaCar is huge in Germany because it's easy to get around without a car in most German cities. And while train links between German cities are good too, BlaBlaCar opens up a new market of riders who want to make those same journeys at a fraction of the train cost.</p><p>And while American cities, with their lousy bus networks and mostly non-existent subway and light rail systems, are perfect for a service like Uber, they militate against BlaBlaCar's long-journey app service.</p><p>In the rest of the world, however, BlaBlaCar is growing like crazy. Here are the company's latest metrics, per Brusson:</p><ul><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">10 million people traveling every quarter.</span></li><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">The traveler count is doubling year on year.</span></li><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">20 million people signed up in total.</span></li><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">Average trip cost is 20 euros ($20).</span></li><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">BlaBlaCar takes a 10-15% cut of each journey cost, except in new markets where it waives the cut while the service is being introduced and ramped up.</span></li><li><span style="line-height: 1.5em;">400 employees in 19 countries and 13 locations, including Moscow Sao Paulo, Mexico City, London and Paris.</span></li></ul><p>Those numbers imply that <strong>BlaBlaCar's revenues could currently be something like $96 million annually</strong> (10 million travellers per quarter x $20 per trip x four quarters x 12% cut = $96 million). That's <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/how-much-money-blablacar-could-be-making-2015-9">up from our previous estimate in September of $72 million</a>. Brusson declined to discuss revenues but invited us to do the math ourselves.</p><p> </p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/nasa-impact-commercial-airplanes-aeronautics-travel-transportation-plane-2015-8">NASA is the reason airplane wings bend up at the end</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="J2bDM3eDqfzyqiiXLbpR1YJF7eUR_h9d" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Why America may never see one of Europe's hottest tech startups

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Kevork Djansezian/Getty</span></p><p class="caption">Former Twitter CEO Dick Costolo is now a venture partner at Index.</p></div><p></p></div></div>Index Ventures - the venture capital fund that has backed the likes of Facebook, Dropbox and Deliveroo - has raised $550 million (£376 million) to invest in US, European, and Israeli technology startups.</p><p>The latest fund (Index's eighth) builds on the $700 million (£478 million) fund that Index raised in 2015. Index, which is co-headquartered in London and San Francisco, said it now has a total of $1.25 billion (£855 million) at its disposal, which it will use to back seed, venture and growth stage companies.</p><p>The latest funding round comes less than a month after <a href="http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/01/19/dick-costolo-former-twitter-c-e-o-embarks-on-next-chapter/?_r=0" target="_blank">Index appointed former Twitter CEO Dick Costolo</a> as venture partner.</p><p>Index claims that businesses in its portfolio generated combined revenues of $9.2 billion (£6.2 billion) in 2015 and employ 35,000 people. They're also recruiting for <a href="https://indexventures.com/engage#tab:jobs">2,700 new positions</a>.</p><p>In the last two years, eight companies in Index's portfolio went public, including Pure Storage, King, Just Eat, and Hortonworks. Index has also invested in well-known startups such as BlaBlaCar, Funding Circle, Blaze, Citymapper, Slack, and SoundCloud.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/be-like-bill-facebook-meme-blobla-privacy-risk-stealing-personal-information-2016-1">The 'Be Like Bill' Facebook memes driving everyone crazy have a darker side no one is talking about</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="lyamlpMDE6LxYBJUge6BRt76OXL15rxJ" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Index has raised an additional $550 million to invest in US, European, and Israeli tech startups

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span><keyword id="6354868" type="COUNTRY" weightage="60" keywordseo="UK">UK</keyword> Parliament</span></p><p class="caption">Uber's UK head of public policy, Andrew Byrne.</p></div><p></p></div></div>Uber will steer Londoners towards carpooling in future, even though the bulk of passengers prefer travelling individually or with people they know.</p><p>The company's UK head of public policy, Andrew Byrne, hinted at the company's shift in direction in a meeting with MPs this week. Parliament's Transport Committee is examining how to reduce traffic in cities, calling on Byrne to represent Uber and answer questions about the company's impact on congestion.</p><p>Although Uber <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/uber-not-making-nyc-traffic-worse-2016-1">has consistently claimed</a> it doesn't make traffic worse by adding thousands of cars to the roads, Byrne said the company hoped more of its London customers would use carpooling.</p><p>"One of the key things we think about cities, given rising population, given rising demand for mobility and given the fact public transport will never quite get from door to door, we want to use the only extra capacity in system, which is most often spare seats next to someone in a vehicle when they are driving," Byrne told MPs.</p><p>He added that UberPool was only a year old in London, but has accounted for 2 million journeys so far. Elsewhere, UberPool accounts for almost half of all Uber journeys in San Francisco and LA, he said, with the company setting a similar goal for London.</p><p>"We'd like to get to 30%, 40% or 50% as we have elsewhere, but I think it will take time in London to develop the use case and loyal users in London," he said. "That may change as you have driverless vehicles, but that's something we don't know."</p><p>As Byrne noted, UberPool is not popular in London though neither he nor an Uber spokesman would share exact figures. Sharing a car is still uncommon in the UK, <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/blablacar-ceo-nicolas-brusson-uk-market-2016-11" target="_blank">as French ridesharing app BlaBlaCar has discovered.</a></p><p>Apart from helping to reduce congestion, Uber might have other reasons for getting more people into fewer cars, as more economists and transport experts <a href="https://ftalphaville.ft.com/2016/10/04/2176562/ride-hailing-apps-are-creating-an-inefficient-and-unfair-transit-system/">claim its current model is inefficient.</a> Uber's service relies on the constant availability of drivers, something not sustainable for their livelihoods or for the company's bottom line, especially if <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/uber-faces-huge-uk-tax-bill-if-drivers-employees-not-self-employeed-vat-nic-2016-11" target="_blank">drivers are to be considered employees</a>.</p><p>This might be why Uber has taken steps to diversify its sources of revenue. It is partnering with public transit networks in the US and <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/uber-wants-uk-subsidies-car-pooling-in-suburbs-2017-1">wants to replicate those partnerships in the UK.</a> During the committee session, Byrne also referenced a move towards driverless cars, and the company has <a href="http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect2=PTO1&amp;Sect2=HITOFF&amp;p=1&amp;u=/netahtml/PTO/search-bool.html&amp;r=1&amp;f=G&amp;l=50&amp;d=PALL&amp;RefSrch=yes&amp;Query=PN/9557183" target="_blank">just filed yet another patent</a> relating to autonomous vehicles.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/hidden-iphone-tricks-tips-power-users-2017-1">7 hidden iPhone tricks that only power users know about</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="JxeDRxMzE6QOApykiTB7RQoHlnNbIwwI" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Uber wants half of all London rides to be shared

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Rick Wilking / Reuters</span></p><p class="caption">Mark Zuckerberg is  an Iconiq client...</p></div><p></p></div></div>Iconiq Capital - a Silicon Valley fund backed by an incredible line-up of billionaire investors like Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey - has just invested an unknown sum in Dutch payments company Adyen.</p><p>The investment has brought Adyen's valuation up to $2.3 billion (£1.5 billion).</p><p>Iconiq is a venture capital firm like no other. <a href="http://www.forbes.com/sites/briansolomon/2014/12/01/the-spider-of-silicon-valley-inside-zuck-friends-secret-billionaire-fund/">A December 2014 Forbes article by Brian Solomon</a> described it as "'Zuck &amp; Friends' secret billionaire fund." As well as Zuckerberg and Dorsey, clients include Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskovitz and early employee Sean Parker, COO Sheryl Sandberg, LinkedIn's Reid Hoffman, Dropbox's Drew Houston, and a number of other billionaire investors that don't work in tech.</p><p>The fund is headed by Divesh Makan, a former Goldman Sachs broker, and it invested in <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/zuckerberg-vc-fund-iconiq-capital-customer-service-startup-intercom-2015-8">customer service startup Intercom</a> at the end of August. <a href="https://www.crunchbase.com/organization/iconiq-capital/investments">Other investments</a> include <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/a-group-of-investors-is-buying-gofundme-2015-6">GoFundMe,</a> <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/flipkart-raising-600-million-2015-3">Flipkart</a> and Jessica Alba's <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/jessica-alba-honest-co-raises-70-million-at-a-nearly-1-billion-valuation-2014-8?IR=T">Honest Co.</a></p><p>When Business Insider <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/adyen-fintech-unicorn-payments-facebook-airbnb-spotify-wired-money-2015-7">spoke to Adyen in July,</a> CCO Roeland Prins said that the company wasn't planning on raising any more funding in the near future. In December, the payment processing platform, which counts Facebook, AirBnB, and Spotify as clients, announced it had raised $250 million (£161 million) at a $1.5 billion (£970 million) valuation.</p><p>Adyen combines all the pieces of the payments puzzle - payment gateway, risk assessment, and acquiring technology- into one platform that lets companies take any number of payment methods worldwide: credit and debit cards, Apple Pay, and even bitcoin.</p><p>Adyen currently processes $35 billion (£22.5 billion) in payments annually for its merchants, about 2-3 million payments a day, and is on track to more than double its revenues this year to over $300 million (£198 million).</p><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Getty / Scott Olson </span></p><p class="caption">As is Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg.</p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>But when Iconiq comes calling, you're not going to say no.</p><p>"When we did our round last November we were already talking to Iconiq - we've been speaking to them for a few years," Prins told Business Insider. "Things didn't come together, but <span>you continue to talk and stay connected. And over the past nine months they kept showing interest. We weren't looking for extra funding, but we realised it would fill a bit of a gap. We've had the best investors so far, but look at the geographical spread of those."</span></p><p>"We've got Europe and London really well covered through Index Ventures and we had Temasek in Asia join us last year, as well as General Lending who are on the East Coast. We never really had strong connections in the Valley. From that point of view the connection is really worthwhile to us."</p><p>"If Iconiq really wants to invest in you, it's really hard to say no," he added. "Were we really actively looking out for funding? No. But then hey, if it's Iconiq and everything they can bring, that's really attractive. A key reason for us to do this round is not <span>about the money, but more about the relationship and the </span>network<span> that Iconiq has in Silicon Valley. For us it's a very important region where we have a lot of our existing customers, and there's a lot of growth opportunity there too."</span></p><p>Since its last round at the end of last year, Adyen has started to work with Netflix, Survey Monkey, Eventbrite and DropBox in the US, and EasyJet and BlaBlaCar in Europe.</p><p>The company plans to use the somewhat unexpected windfall to keep chasing licenses in new markets so it can do more local card processing in countries like Brazil, Australia and Hong Kong and Singapore. It is also opening up offices in Australia and Shanghai.</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/shade-balls-california-drought-shadeballs-los-angeles-2015-8">'Shade balls' are being used across California to combat the drought </a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="x1dm55djq96zgcI3eC5Fl7nCEzdjY2Hf" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey's 'secret billionaire fund' just backed a huge European startup

<p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table float_right"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Reuters</span></p><p class="caption">Bubble talk.</p></div><p></p></div></div>Are we in a bubble?</p><p>It's the question on everyone's lips in the tech world. Startups are closing ever-larger rounds of funding at ever-higher valuations, often with no real revenue to speak off. It's prompted some to speculate that the current state of affairs is unsustainable, and a crunch point or correction is imminent.</p><p>Many tech companies are playing a "high-stakes game," Fred Destin, a European-based investor at the top-tier venture capital firm Accel Partners, tells Business Insider. "A number of companies are taking a chance on the fact the capital markets will remain open." They can take VC money and remain wildly unprofitable - promising to solve the money question later down the line.</p><p>But if the access to funding dries up - <em>pop!</em></p><p>So, <em>are</em> the capital markets going to stay open?</p><p>Destin is cautious: He doesn't believe the end of the world is imminent, nor will there be a Dotcom-style crash. But he predicts a tightening of belts - and there will be casualties.</p><p>Right now, there are two things to take into account, Destin says. First: "The fact it is an unprecedented era of opportunity, because of ads, mobile, the ability to scale internationally ... [It's] a perfect storm that allows companies to scale very fast that we've never seen in history.</p><p>"So the rate of adoption of the services is phenomenal." But second: "You've got to balance that age of unprecedented opportunity with the fact that the markets can be exuberant or irrational ... we're seeing the growth stage of the market. Later stage round are looking overly butchy, and we are sometimes scratching our heads over the valuation levels being achieved."</p><p>It's a "capital frenzy" - and startups need to try to avoid being drawn in and spending unsustainably.</p><h2>2015: "We're a little bit in overdrive"</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>REUTERS/Kai Pfaffenbach</span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>Bill Gurley - a respected venture capitalist at Benchmark Ventures - is one of the loudest bubble advocates. <a href="http://uk.businessinsider.com/bill-gurley-sxsw-talk-on-dead-unicorns-2015-3">He says there's a</a> "complete absence of fear" in Silicon Valley, and that we should expect to see some dead "unicorns" soon - a term for startups valued at more than $1 billion.</p><p>"Bill Gurley and others have been trying to call the peak and been wrong" for eighteen months now, Destin says. But he thinks we're finally there. "I don't see the markets going higher than they are today, in terms of speed and valuations. So in that sense I think we're a little bit in overdrive, and [have] certainly reached some sort of plateau in terms of how fast capital gets deployed and at what valuations."</p><p>In Europe, we've seen a number of high-profile startups postpone IPOs planned for 2015 - notably Deezer and HelloFresh. Destin argues that public markets have been "very jittery and nervous. And whenever markets are nervous people stop making decisions, and investments don't go through."</p><p class="p1">There's worry in the public markets, and exuberance in the public ones - plus a rising tide of bubble chatter. "You bring together a sense of overheating in the public markets, [and] a relative jitteriness in the public markets, together with the sentiment changing ... If enough people talk about a downturn, it ends up being a downturn."</p><p>Destin says: "I think we might see at the very least, a softening - and possibly a real correction."</p><h2>2016: "I think we're going to see some high profile companies go bust"</h2><p><div class="KonaFilter image-container display-table"><div><div class="image on-image"><p class="source"><span>Martin Hunter/Getty Images</span></p></div><p></p></div></div></p><p>How does Destin imagine this "cooling off" will look?</p><p>"In 2016, I'm certainly expecting that the rubber will meet the road for a number of companies," the VC argues. "They'll have to demonstrate that the amount of money they raised and the valuation they raised it at is justified. Whether that's through profitability, or sustainable user acquisition is a secondary problem."</p><p>"But I definitely think there will be a lot of businesses that are in question today that will have to prove what they can do."</p><p>Such as? "So for example, Bill Gurley at Benchmark I think has been quite public in attacking [delivery service] Postmates. I think it's gonna have to real questions to answer in '16. There are a number of people that are waiting to see whether these business models are going to work.</p><p>"So yeah, I think we're going to see some high-profile companies go bust, but I think it's as it should be."</p><p>Here's how it will work in practice, Destin says. "What will happen first is the rounds will take longer to close, so the pace at which capital is invested will be slower. There'll be more of a bifurction between the best founders, who basically do what they want, and the rest of the market [in] which will probably get tough to get these companies financed.</p><p>"Like we've seen in every cycle, for sure there's going to be layoffs, and there's going to be some people needing to tone down their ambitions." It'll be fine for the companies at the very top, the Belgian investor says - like Deliveroo, and BlaBlaCar. But "it's going to be tougher for the companies that are not exceptional ... I think if you're not in the position of being a market leader it's going to be tougher."</p>    <div class="margin-top">        <h3>NOW WATCH: <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/iphones-medical-id-could-save-your-life-2015-12">How to setup the hidden iPhone feature that could literally save your life in an emergency</a></h3>        <div>            <div>        <div class="ooyala-video-player" data-video-autoplay="false" data-video-id="M4dWlieTozkNoJjJ7hhgq7W3sVs0yHoA" data-player-variable="ooyalapopvideo" id="ooyalaplayer_popvideo" style="width:1280px;height:720px"></div>        </div>        </div>            </div>

You Searched For "BlaBlaCar revenue" and got 11 results

BlaBlaCar introduces government ID verification for better safety

BI India Bureau

These 4 charts show why ridesharing startup BlaBlacar could be worth $1.6 billion

Lucy England

We figured out how much money new European unicorn BlaBlaCar could be making

James Cook

There is something wrong with British culture that prevents one of Europe's biggest startups from flourishing here

Jim Edwards

Why America may never see one of Europe's hottest tech startups

Jim Edwards

Index has raised an additional $550 million to invest in US, European, and Israeli tech startups

Sam Shead

Uber wants half of all London rides to be shared

Shona Ghosh

Mark Zuckerberg and Jack Dorsey's 'secret billionaire fund' just backed a huge European startup

Lucy England

An influential European investor thinks 'we're going to see some high-profile companies go bust' in 2016

Rob Price

Some of the UK's most powerful tech entrepreneurs have warned David Cameron against clamping down on immigration

Sam Shead

This Is Facebook's New Plan For Europe

James Cook

Popular Keywords

Buying Guides