This September, Shazam announced users had deployed their app’s name-that-tune/media discovery function more than 10 billion times to peg down different songs, television shows and advertisements. Each month, ten million more people jump on the platform to listen and engage with all kinds of media; and according to Rich Riley, the best is yet to come. After 14 years at Yahoo, the 40-year-old head honcho at Shazam has embarked on a positive journey and, between meetings with his clients, answered Red Herring’s questions.

Red Herring: What is the situation at the company?

Rich Riley: We are in a phase of accelerated growth. It took us ten years to get to the first billion transactions. Then 10 months for the second billion. [And two months to go from the ninth to the tenth billion.] And we can anticipate that it will go faster in the near future.

RH: How are you expanding the company’s mission?

RR: Shazam’s core value and roots remain in mobile. Consumers decide to engage in music and they expect Shazam to provide a magical experience. Recently we have added dimensions that make it richer by providing historical perspectives, graphs and other elements which make it unique, and a leadership position for our company.

RR: Where we are extending the franchise? TV has become the next frontier and we are making TV “Shazamable.” [As U.S. programming already integrates Shazam,] over time, we anticipate that every show, every program [outside the U.S.] will integrate Shazam and we are currently holding talks with major networks to convert this new step into a reality. We are also working with advertisers to transform their 30 second experience into a deeper engagement. We are continuously adding to our capabilities by so doing.

RH: What drives this explosive growth?

RR: At its core, Shazam is a technology company. Our engineers create new releases of our apps and update them every month, at a faster rate than ever. This allows us to reach customers better with the latest version.

Also we have [a] new set of opportunities: we are in constant conversations to facilitate the mobile strategy of our partners, in programming or in advertising. [We are now working with] a larger variety of applications or verticals, making their ads clickable since we can produce anything on a HTML canvas [and that makes it easier].

 And we are spending our time evangelizing our [capabilities, so] the next frontier is expanding all the time.

RH: What is your mandate as a CEO?

RR: Since I joined, I have to [achieve] the optimal balance and make sure we have the right people [to lead] the 200 Shazam employees in the right direction. My second task is to spend time with all our stakeholders, media companies, networks, advertisers, with whom we have partnerships. Those are high level partnerships. We work closely with Apple, Amazon, Audio, Spotify among others. For example, Shazam sells [$300M each year, which translates into 500,000 songs per day on all platforms,] so you can imagine what it means in terms of relationship for all parties involved. But it goes beyond, since we deal with record labels, events, etc.

RH: Any gap between your perception prior to joining and what you eventually learned during the first 100 days?

RR: Sometimes CEOs are disappointed but in this case I did perform my due diligence beforehand and I spent a lot of time with Andrew Fisher who was CEO for over eight years and [is] now Chairman. I spoke to longtime board members like Nenad Marovac and investor Kevin Murphy from Kleiner Perkins to get their perspective. I realized three positive things: that I could develop an invaluable partnership with Andy; that customers loved Shazam’s experience much more even than what I thought; and that the opportunity is larger than we planned.

RH: If everything is rosy, why change the CEO?

RR: The company may have needed someone to grow rapidly from the current stage and someone who had operated in a more complex environment on a larger scale. Also the U.S. is a real focus on our current development.

For me, this represents a fantastic opportunity after 14 years at Yahoo! to work with 200 people, well beyond the five-people startups in a garage, yet to move at a fast pace. It is quite rare to have such a market impact with a strong team in different functions in a company of Shazam’s size.

RH: So what is the roadmap?

RR: We have one of the top ten apps in the world. Shazam is the fundamental way to connect media and content [with people via their smart devices. And it has the potential to be integrated with an innumerable set of verticals such as the retail environment and radio.] It is increasingly relevant to billions of people and we [plan] to execute towards their sharing a magical experience. And the IPO is a fundamental milestone to focus on.

RH: Compared to Google and Facebook, is Shazam too green for an IPO at this stage? Is the business model predictable enough?

RR: Public market investors aspire to growth and momentum. They want to see consumer engagement and progress (more people and more use of Shazam). They want to see technology and category leadership. Since I came on board, we have met with well known bankers and experts and I think the key word is predictability and not really an absolute revenue level. At least that’s what I have understood from these briefings.

Consequently, our job is to put the team, the controls, the accounting and more importantly to continue getting more customers. We put the company in an IPO readiness state first and decide later when it is right. By the way, IPOs are highly dependent upon the overall environment which we do not control so the best we can do is to solidify the prerequisites. Maybe a year or two from now, we will find ourselves in a position to decide on an IPO. Our investors have been patient and backed us up and it has taken a long time.

We are well-financed after Carlos Slim and other firms invested [more than $80 million] in Shazam at a far higher valuation than Series A players such as DN Capital and Nenad Marovac. We have a solid balance sheet so we should focus on our knitting, to develop Shazam around the world.

Dubbed TV+, the company’s first smart TV will be produced by TCL Multimedia Technology Holdings Ltd, with a 48-inch screen costing 4,567 yuan ($746). Sales launched with the company’s announcement. A more competitively priced model will launch in November at a price of 2,999 yuan. The TVs will offer over 200,000 selected high-definition videos, movies and drama series for free.

“With the cooperation with iQIYI and Baidu, we have become the first Chinese TV maker to have incorporated the Internet business model into the conventional TV business,” said Hao Yi, Chief Executive Officer of TCL Multimedia, in a press release. “The launch of TV+ has not just reinforced our leading product strengths, but has strengthened the application of information technologies in our operations. This has established a firm footing in consolidating the Group’s presence in the league of world-class TV brands and has significantly accelerated its incorporation of information technologies in the conventional TV business.”

The smart TVs will offer content from Baidu’s IQiyi.com, which it acquired last year. The sale, which was combined with Baidu’s June acquisition of PPStream Inc, the Internet video company, gave Baidu the largest online video platform in China.

With this latest release, Baidu will compete against Alibaba, the Chinese ecommerce engine that released a set-top box TV last July. The device uses Alibaba’s ecommerce and online payment systems such as Tmall, Taobao and Alipay, which allow users to shop and pay bills from a television. Alibaba’s TV also features an app store for video game purchases and music streaming services. Both Baidu and Alibaba will also compete against Samsung’s and Apple’s smart TVs.

IResearch, the consultancy company, has estimated that the Chinese online video market will be worth 16.2 billion yuan next year, Bloomberg noted.

Both sites share a lot in common, mainly by offering searchable listings that can be narrowed down through a variety of filters, such as neighborhood, school district, access to public transportation, and price.

Founded in 2006, StreetEasy is a small company at 34 employees. Though it launched with an original focus on New York City, its biggest market, it has since expanded into a number of other areas such as Washington D.C. and Philadelphia.

“Simply put, StreetEasy has cracked the code in New York,” said Zillow CEO Spencer Rascoff . “They now have a local network effect where nearly every New York broker is active on StreetEasy because of the site’s large audience and comprehensive data.”

Though a press release on the deal did not detail how the acquisition will be structured, it appears the company will continue StreetEasy in its present form, which makes sense considering the website’s sizable presence already established on the real estate market.

“At StreetEasy, we pride ourselves on bringing much-needed transparency to the New York City real estate marketplace, and being the primary reference site for consumers and real estate professionals,” said Michael Smith, co-founder and CEO of StreetEasy. “We’re very excited to be joining forces with Zillow, the largest national brand in mobile and online real estate, as we continue our commitment to data integrity, innovation and collaboration with the local real estate community.”

The deal provides the real estate giant with a solid foothold in a valuable market, but came with an expensive price tag for an audience of just over a million monthly unique visitors. Yet it further solidifies Zillow’s hold on the real estate market as the real estate giant faces rising competition as the US market rebounds. Its competitor Trulia, an online residential real estate listing site covering markets across the country, applied last March for its own $150 million follow-on offering to be used for growth and acquisitions.

The deal will likely be the first of several, as Zillow announced plans to file for a similar follow-on of public stock just as the deal with StreetEasy was announced. The company will seek to sell 2.5 million shares of Class A common stock, equivalent to around $228 million based on Friday’s closing share price of $91.22.

Just a few weeks ago, Zillow reported record second quarter revenue of $46.9 million, a 69 percent increase over the same quarter last year. It also reported a loss of $10.2 million, mostly due to marketing and acquisition expenses.

“Digital businesses are powered by APIs and Apigee’s platform helps companies turn their digital assets into an engine for ongoing innovation and growth,” said Jin Lee, senior managing director, Accenture Mobility.  ”We are teaming with a market leader like Apigee because the application economy is creating unprecedented new opportunities in mobility and cloud, and our clients in every industry are aggressively deploying digital strategies to fuel their revenue growth and expand market share.”

The company will use the financing to expand globally as well continue to evolve its platform. The round brings the company’s total funding to $106 million.

Founded in 2005 originally as Sonoa Systems, Apigee specializes in a platform that simplifies APIs, the foundations for software applications. It takes its name from the name of its API management platform. Apigee’s software make it easier for companies to build their own apps, as well as provide the tools to measure the effectiveness and use of those apps. The products allow any company to link applications and relevant data to gain better control over the development and marketing of their apps.

“Mobile changes everything, and every business must have a comprehensive digital strategy that includes reaching customers and expanding through mobile apps,” said Chet Kapoor, Apigee CEO. “Apigee helps companies of all sizes deliver and manage the core elements of a connected mobile world: apps, data and APIs. We are in a market sweet spot, and this additional funding will help us quickly expand our product portfolio and international sales and marketing.”

Based in Palo Alto, Apigee features three product offerings: Apigee Enterprise, an API management platform; Apigee Insights, which provides data analytics; and Apigee API Exchange, an app ecosystem provider.

The company serves over 400 customers, including AT&T, Dell, Shell, Bechtel, OnStar and Marks & Spencer. Its products are used by 20 percent of the Fortune 100 and over 10 percent of the Global 100.

“Apigee helps even the largest organizations evolve their businesses to act more like agile Web companies,” commented Promod Haque, senior managing partner of NVP. “The company has impressive momentum, and we are confident that Apigee will continue its trajectory as our world becomes increasingly driven by data-rich apps as part of the ‘Internet of things.’”

RH: Tell me about GCON.

TS: GCON started out late 2011 when we had the idea of having a girls’ gaming convention in Saudi. The gaming conventions here are usually male-only, and we’re not allowed access, so we’re kind of left out from that community. And there’s a huge female gamer community here, [and] us being gamers we definitely wanted to be part of these events, so we decided to host our own event…We came up with the idea and went through with it and somehow, we actually pulled off the first girls-only gamers convention here.

RH: What challenges did you encounter, planning GCON?

TS: We had around 3,000 people attend the event last year. Actually, the numbers are a bit messy because there was a storm that day, and we kind of had to shut down for the first day. [Laughs] That was one of the challenges we faced. But it was around 3,000 female gamers. We had very little marketing budget, of course…but if I have to go back probably the main challenge was convincing the companies that there actually is a female gamer community. I remember sitting in meetings with Sony, Microsoft and just saying ‘Really, we’re here, we exist, this is a good idea. We invite you to participate, please take place in this event.’ That was probably the first obstacle we faced.

RH: If companies didn’t know you’re out there, do you feel the separation of female gamers is an awareness issue, or one more embedded in social and cultural pressures around girl gaming?

TS: I would say it’s a little bit of both. It’s not exactly very ladylike to be a gamer. For a lot of people it is like that, not for the new generation, but for older generations that’s one thing. Another thing is, it’s like you said…they don’t know that these gamers exist because they don’t see them at events, because the events are male-dominant. So they assume that they don’t exist.

RH: Was GCON a way for girl gamers to announce their presence?

TS: Yes, we basically wanted to say ‘We’re here, we exist, and we would like to be paid attention to.’ That was our main point from last year’s event. Everything in the event last year was free. It was just about saying you know, there is a society, it’s right there, and we’re just putting it on the map.

RH: Right off the bat, you were sponsored by some of the biggest names in tech: Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo. How did you get their attention?

TS: Access was not easy at all. I used to work in telecom, so I have some contacts in that area. But literally, we had to go knocking on doors and emailing info emails, and emailing someone who knows someone who might know someone who can connect us to that person that we need to talk to; in order to actually get their access was a bit difficult. Especially that we were females and…wasn’t really taken seriously at the beginning. And having actually achieved the fact that we’d managed to get them, all three companies, under one roof was huge for us. Even though it was varying participations––some of them went really big, like Sony, they went all in; other companies were a bit more shy––still, the fact that they were all there under one roof was a huge achievement for us.

RH: Did you feel like acquiring those sponsors validated your idea?

TS: Yes actually. Following the first event, especially Sony, they’ve been a huge supporter for us…last year, with our help actually, they created the ladies gamers day, and that was the first time ever they’ve done that. And this year they went all in with us, collaborating and making us an official event for them. Instead of just having GCON and ladies gamers day, we’re now officially partners with Sony for the event. So that was a milestone for us. Other companies…well, some of them basically don’t have females on their agenda, yes? In terms of the demographic that they want to serve. But there has been some attention. We’ve definitely gotten the media attention and at least now that they actually acknowledge the community. And it’s not just the gamers community by the way, we’re heavily focused on the developers’ community as well.

RH: So GCON’s also an opportunity to network.

TS: That’s what we’re trying to do, but our objective is mainly to get them working in the industry professionally. We don’t just want them to have this as a hobby. We don’t just want them to be gamers who occasionally do fan art. We actually want them to take those talents and put them to good use and get them in the industry.

RH: Have you seen progress?

TS: So far, we’ve noticed that there’s an abundance of talent when it comes to art, and many of those are now being requested. We get requests from companies that, if we know any artists who’d be interested to work on projects…once they’ve actually started putting their art out there, through GCON, through other channels, they have been getting offers to actually start doing this professionally. That’s on the art side. On the development side the community is still pretty new. We’ve had the competition with Verso, Verso is a local business incubator for educational projects. We approached them since our theme for the development competition this year was education. So we approached them and they were very supportive actually. And they offered incubation for the winning projects to help them get the games going and publish them and so on.

RH: What drives you, personally, to pursue this passion?

TS: I wanted to have these opportunities presented for me, and now that I found myself in a place where I had the ability to make them available for myself and for others––I’m a developer as well. I began developing last year. I used to be a CS student and really didn’t know what to do with a CS degree, at some point. It’s like, do I work as a programmer or do I just get into marketing like everyone else does? So having these opportunities available for me would have been a great help at that time. So I feel that if I can make them available for me and other people as well, then, yeah, it’s worth it.

RH: What future developments do you hope to see in your region and sector?

TS: Right now, what we’re working towards is seeing the first game developed by a woman published locally. We haven’t had that yet, so that’s our mission. Whether it’s someone from our team or ourselves personally or one of the developers that we’ve been working with––we need a success story, and that’s what we’re focusing on for the next year. Hopefully after that we would be able to expand a little bit around the Middle East. We’re focused on Saudi Arabia for now as we’re based here, but we’re hoping to expand a little bit and maybe take the Saudi experience and customize it and share it around and, different countries where we see this pattern could actually work.

RH: In a far-off future, do you see GCON going co-ed?

TS: I don’t see that happening in Arabia. I mean we see them around, you’ve seen them in Dubai, you’ve seen them in Jordan, and the fact that the community––it’s not really about having an all-female event, it’s just more about having a more specialized event that focuses on women. That’s it, really. But I don’t see it happening in Arabia any time soon.

RH: Is that something coming from GCON, or do you see that as specific to the Saudi Arabian culture around tech and gaming?

TS: No, it’s very cultural, not just gaming. It’s a matter of, it’s what the general preference here. And honestly, it’s working for our advantage.

For folks in the Western Hemisphere who might not know, Redmart’s a Singaporean e-commerce portal where users shop for everyday goods of the nonperishable variety. They’ve partnered with monster brands like Coca-Cola, Unilever and L’Oreal to put 5,000 products on digital shelves; that number will grow to 7,000 soon. While not profitable yet, they draw 4,000 active monthly users and bring home around $500,000 SGD a month.

Redmart’s Series A funding last week saw a substantial (and undisclosed) investment by Garena founder and CEO Forrest Li. The round, now closed, brought total funding behind Redmart to $4.6 million USD.

For Singaporean companies, later funding rounds prove crucial to viability. Through grants and incubator programs, Singapore’s government goes out of its way to incentivize entrepreneurship. If a company’s idea is sound, getting seed money’s easy––but finding backers for later rounds is not. With the venture capital scene less developed and firms more risk-averse, fledgling companies turn instead to angel and individual investors for support.

“You get to Series A where you need a couple  million dollars and that’s where it becomes difficult. I’d say roughly speaking they, the VCs in the immediate area aren’t as experienced,” says Roger Egan, CEO and founder of Redmart. “What we ended up doing is going to an entrepreneur because a lot of the VCs here lack operational experience with founding their own companies.”

Big names jump out from Redmart’s list of backers, including Skype co-founder Toivo Annus (who has invested three times) and Southeast Asian gaming giant Forrest Li. “[Annus] introduced us to Forrest Li [of Garena], which is the largest online gaming company––one of the largest Internet companies, period, in Southeast Asia,” Egan says. “He said, ‘Forrest, you should take a look at this deal.’”

For Redmart, though, big names don’t necessarily mean big numbers. Instead, Egan preaches financial restraint, which extends to his philosophy on fundraising. “We’re careful to raise only the capital we need in each round. While that may be a little risky––because what if the fundraising environment changes––we feel that when you have more money you spend more money,” he says. “We try to put ourselves under a little more pressure, which sounds insane. We think that helps us come up with the most efficient way of operating.”

Streamlining costs means perfecting logistics, which make or break e-commerce ventures. Redmart’s entire concept rides or dies on coordination. They offer free delivery on orders exceeding $75 SGD, and 95 percent do. To keep their market advantage and position as the convenient alternative to grocery shopping, their product deliveries much be cheap, quick, reliable, and accurate. To ensure this, Redmart must know its market, with its particular whims and obstacles, like the back of its hand––which takes a while.

“The last thing you want to do is, before you’ve developed your system and processes and your internal operations and technology, go and try to do that and build it from scratch again in another country, diverting your attention from getting it right here and possibly risking both,” says Egan.

Redmart’s business model practically demands they test and perfect it on small markets first. And while some would argue Redmart could take their platform and plant it in anywhere, there are particular reasons it’s succeeding in Singapore, making the island city the perfect place for Redmart to spend its early years. And right now, there’s no real rush to expand past its borders.

As an insulated market, Singapore’s ideal for application of what Egan calls the Blue Ocean Strategy. “We see Singapore as a blue ocean,” says Egan. “Because people think it’s small and they have bigger cities to go after, especially big guys, it actually creates an opportunity that’s pretty unique for a startup to develop.” Promoted by two INSEAD professors, the strategy sings the praises of open markets where businesses can grow undisputed by competitors.

Specifically, though, Singapore has a great reputation for being pro-business, as well as a population suited to Redmart’s goals. According to World Bank’s “Doing Business,” it’s 2013’s easiest place to do business (a title they’ve held for a few years now). “There’s a lot of reasons why this city is the perfect place to get started and test and get your service right,” says Egan. “It’s small, it’s densely populated, it has great infrastructure, it’s very business-friendly, very easy to start a company, [the] government supports startups in so many ways.”

Plus, small is a relative term. “For our market, it’s not that small,” Egan says. “We always tell people that groceries and everyday essentials, everyone’s a potential buyer. It’s a $5.2 billion market.”

“[You can build a] couple-hundred million dollar business pretty easily here, and you don’t have to face Amazon and people like Fresh Direct and Tesco. It’s much more of a wide open playing field,” he continues. “So thats why we think there’s plenty of potential here, another reason why we’re not so keen on going out too quickly.”

Soon, though, Redmart will expand. They’ll head to new cities where Egan says they’ll try to find leaders that double as locals. They’re also contemplating next frontier: fresh food delivery.

“[We believe] you’re only going to be as good as your greatest challenges,” Egan says. “Other product categories are one thing, and geographical expansion, for sure we see a lot of opportunity. It’s still kind of like the Wild West here in South Asia.”

It’s a sign of the search giant’s push towards mobility as it struggles to transcend the shift from desktops to mobile devices. Baidu’s mobile app was used by only 9 percent of China’s mobile users as of last April, according to Bloomberg data.

Baidu is used for 82 percent of the searches in China, but competes against up and coming web players such as Alibaba and Tencent for Internet dominance. Launched last August, new competitor QiHoo quickly became the second largest search engine after Baidu, and is rumored to be considering acquiring Sogou, China’s third most popular search engine. Baidu needs to diversify its product line beyond simple search.

Baidu plans to purchase the majority stake from NetDragon Websoft, which owns about 57 percent of the company. It then hopes to purchase the remaining shares from third parties under the same terms.

The deal would give Baidu control over China’s most popular app stores as it strives for a greater mobile presence.

“Baidu is not as well established in the mobile Internet space as the desktop Internet space,” Andy Yeung, an analyst at Oppenheimer & Co Inc., told Bloomberg. “It’s a complementary strategy to enhance Baidu’s status in the mobile ecosystem.”

On an analyst call last year, Baidu CEO Robin Li h expressed plans to pursue acquisitions that increase the company’s valuation. This latest deal is in step with other recent major purchases of the company.  Two months ago, Baidu announced plans to acquire PPS Video for $370 million. Last November, the search engine purchased a majority stake in the video company iQiyi. The two deals made Baidu China’s largest video provider.

The size of the deal speaks to the value of China’s alternative app market. Its growth has been spurred considerably by Google’s absence in China, as Android has gain dominance in the country that has become the world’s second largest smartphone market.

Founded in 2007, 91 Wireless had been planned for an IPO on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange. Obviously, $1.9 billion makes a great reason to pull it off the auction block.

Amid reports of 10 percent employee layoffs and financial losses, Australian online retailer THE ICONIC has received $26 million in funding.

The fashion site, a venture by German-born incubator Rocket Internet, lined its pockets with capital from Verlinvest and previous-round investors Summit Partners and Kinnevik earlier this week. With $46 million already in hand, reports are calling Iconic’s new funding total Australia’s largest investment in an e-commerce site, ever.

ICONIC competes for consumers who prioritize convenience. Their clothes aren’t cheap but delivery is; when shoppers spend $50 AUD, shipping’s free. Plus, depending where you live, your order could land on your doorstep in three or four hours.

Yet its rise to prominence from founding in 2011 has yet to translate into profits. And emerging reports that the company’s deep in the red aren’t encouraging for a financially viable future. Site co-founder Adam Jacobs, however, insists that its losses in the millions are typical of a startup experiencing growing pains.

Rocket Internet, run by the Samwer brothers, is famous for both its successful ventures and infamously aggressive business tactics. Company correspondences from 2011 got brother Oliver in trouble when it was leaked he used the term “Blitzkrieg” in an e-mail in reference to sales strategy.

In 2012, ICONIC experienced tremendous growth (30 percent month-on-month) as it showed shoppers an alternative to traditional clothing stores existed in an emergent online retail space. Jacobs claims the site receives 4 million visits a month and has acceded the number one spot in Australia’s fashion e-commerce industry. ICONIC rep LJ Loch had this to say in an e-mail on the subject of funding:

“Key points from our end are that this is the conclusion of a round of funding that has been underway for some time; that the funding is a massive vote of confidence on THE ICONIC’s business strategy (which has seen an aggressive and highly successful market entry phase and which now involves a transition to a focus on profitability); and to reinforce the fact that typically ecommerce start ups take several years to reach profitability (and that we’re looking to accelerate that process).”

Time will tell if sinking more money into ICONIC will create a market champion or a company that could have been a contender.

The Series B round was led by GSV Capital Corp. (GSVC), Learn Capital, Laureate Education Inc. and International Finance Corp., the investment arm of the World Bank, with participation from Yuri Milner, . the Russian investor who manages DST Global.

“Demand for education in developing countries is growing rapidly due to population growth and the rising share of students seeking university education,” said Elena Sterlin, IFC Senior Manager for Health, Education and Services. “Coursera’s innovative model is a breakthrough in delivering low-cost university and continuing education to students through online courses.”

Coursera hosts free online classes taught by professors. Universities partner with the service to license the courses with their own students in exchange for a fee, saving valuable classroom time for discussion rather than a rote lecture. The company began offering the classes as a supplement to higher education, but then achieved ACE approval to offer accredited education. Antioch University, for example, offers credit for a Coursera web class taught by University of Pennsylvania faculty.

“We created Coursera in response to real and pressing demands for quality, accessible education around the world, and today we are proud to be part of a growing movement that is making a tangible impact on this global challenge,” said Andrew Ng, Co-Founder of Coursera.

The investment brings Coursera’s total funding to $65 million, an impressive sum considering the company is barely a year old. The brainchild of two computer science professors, Andrew Ng and Daphne Koller, the company collaborates with 83 educational institutions on four continents to offer about 400 college level courses for free online. The company has an enrollment of more than 4 million students.

Coursera will use the funding to double its staff to 100 over the next several months, as well as expand its mobile apps and Signature Track offerings, which charges students a fee to provide certification of the education. It also plans to invest in international expansion and multi-lingual platforms.

Education investments have been a rising trend, and this investment is the latest example. Venture investments in education grew 41 percent in 2012 to $632.3 million, the highest since the Dot.com peak in 2000, according to the National Venture Capital Association.

The company competes against Udacity, which also launched out of Sanford. Udacity has so far raised $15 million in October from investors including Andreessen Horowitz and Charles River Ventures.

“Coursera is on the forefront of transforming the $4.5 trillion dollar learning industry,” said Michael Moe, Chairman and CEO of GSV Capital. “In the global marketplace, knowledge is the currency that provides people the opportunity to participate in the future. Coursera is democratizing access to the best universities and professors in the world.”

KakaoTalk has made great strides in the battle against other Asian messaging heavyweights Line and WeChat for the hearts of users, gaining 50 million in the past year and bringing its total active user base up to 100 million, as of July 2013.

Already ubiquitous in South Korea, it seems Kakao’s gaining momentum to go global. And as Western markets lose patience with cluttered Facebook Newsfeeds, Eastern apps like those of Kakao, with their straightforward, integrated chat and sharing platforms, will have the chance to to seize shares of the social media pie.

Many are optimistic KakaoTalk will succeed in capturing the attention of America’s masses of smartphone users. The app brings to Western messaging markets two things currently missing: an alternative commercial model and a way to house multiple social platforms under one roof. Where U.S. users have Facebooks, Instagrams, Vines and Bellys, South Koreans have Kakao accounts.

Born in 2010, KakaoTalk was bred for mobile. Series A investments by firms like Maverick Capital and Cyberagent, with later funding by TenCent Holdings, Ltd. and WeMade Entertainment (who plugged $81 million into the company in April 2012) brought total funding to $103 million by May 2012, according to a Kakao Rep. Through KakaoTalk, users can make free international calls, share photos and video, send and buy brand products, and compete to beat friends at popular mobile games. Within the app, shortcuts to KakaoStory (similar to Instagram) make jumping from interface to interface to share and connect across multiple platforms simple.

Digital content sales and the incorporation of ads into game-playing are integral to monetizing Kakao’s model. The company also gets paid to lead users to sponsored content––content those same users often seek out themselves by adding brands as friends.

KakaoTalk’s 2012 numbers showed $45 million in revenue and $7 million in profits, while Kakao the company was valued at $454 million as of May 2012. Yet while fully ninety-five percent of South Korean smartphone users have KakaoTalk, many of those in Western markets are unaware the umbrella platform even exists.

This may soon change, however, as KakaoTalk has ventured boldly where Facebook has gone, and failed, before. Their attempt to integrate KakaoTalk with Android smartphones’ DNA, KakaoHome, attracted 1 million downloads in two weeks. While the innovation remains confined to its South Korean base for now, its potential for global growth is generating buzz. Together with KakaoTalk’s desktop launch, this step will help to heighten the company’s international profile and to solidify its reputation as a global tech powerhouse.

When asked by Red Herring about future plans, KakaoTalk rep Sonia Im talks about their vision for a far off future. “In the long run, we hope to expand not just our messenger application KakaoTalk, but also our entire platform,” says Im of the Kakao communication team in an e-mail. “Through continued effort, Kakao intends to grow into a platform that helps users from all around the globe discover and enjoy quality content, thereby securing position as a favorite mobile social platform provider at a global level.”

For now, though, the company itself has no designs to go west.

“As for Kakao’s plans in western markets, as a small company with limited resources, we have not been able to make an aggressive entrance into any western markets including the US,” Im says. “Consequently, we don’t have anything to share in terms of specific strategies for the western market.”

KakaoTalk is a 2012 Red Herring Asia award-winning company.