Cubie gets USD1.1M in Series A funding from investors in Taiwan, Japan, and US

Cubie has secured USD1.1M in Series A funding from B Dash Ventures, NTT Investment Partners, BIGLOBE Capital, Gumi Ventures, Pinehurst, 500 Startups and Andrew Chen, reported TheNextWeb. The funds will be used for expansion into the United States and Japan. Within the syndicate, B Dash Ventures, NTT Investment Partners, BIGLOBE Capital, and Gumi Ventures are from Japan, while Pinehurst is from Taiwan and 500 Startups is from the US. Andrew Chen is a Bay Area based investor.

Taiwan’s Cubie and Japan’s Cinemacraft among 33 companies to join fifth batch of 500 Startups

US seed fund and startup accelerator 500 Startups has announced its latest batch of incubatees. Among the 33 are representatives from Asia that include Taiwan’s Cubie and Japan’s Cinemacraft. This fifth batch is notable for being one of the most diverse in the incubator’s history. Seven companies have at least one woman founder, while 19 of the startups are from outside the United States. The application process for this batch was more open. Startups simply needed to fill up the application and they could supplement it with data from AngelList.

6 months in, mobile messenger app Cubie hits 4 million downloads

Since launching in March 2012, Cubie has become one of the most talked about mobile messenger apps from Asia. Six months in, it is still going strong, accumulating 4 million downloads.

Available on the iPhone and Android, Cubie resembles a cross between Whatsapp and Draw Something. Its ‘Space’ feature lets users share their drawings in a public gallery.

The latest milestone, along with some other numbers, were announced on Cubie’s blog today. Combined with the numbers from SGE’s previous article about them, the overall picture looks rosy for the startup and its founder, Cjin Cheng. Read more

Mobile messaging apps from Asia you must know about: KakaoTalk, WeChat, Cubie

Updated: 8 October 2012

Among the pack of instant messaging apps in the market, Whatsapp is probably the alpha wolf, with a user base that’s estimated to be in the tens of millions. It also announced that it was sending one billion messages in a single day in end October last year.

But all top dogs will be dethroned or removed, and in a wide open market, the challenger can come from anywhere. Asia is one of those places.

Here, we feature three of the apps arising out of the continent that have proven user traction, and have a shot at being numero uno. For all we know, they might already be on top. Read more