Clubhouse Raises Fresh Funds, Valuation Hits $4 Billion

Invite-only audio chat app Clubhouse has reportedly raised fresh funding in Series C round, taking its valuation to $4 billion. This comes on the heels of tech giants like Twitter, Spotify, Facebook, Telegram, Discord and LinkedIn strongly supporting the startup.

The new round of financing was led by Andrew Chen of Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from DST Global, Tiger Global and Elad Gil. "This round means Clubhouse has tripled the valuation it attained in January when Andreessen Horowitz led its Series B funding round," TechCrunch reported.

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What is Clubhouse?

Clubhouse is an invitation-only social media app for iOS that facilitates auditory communication through rooms that can accommodate groups of up to 5,000 people. The audio-only app hosts virtual rooms for live discussions, with opportunities for individuals to participate through speaking and listening.

10 Million Weekly Active Users

Clubhouse which has which has reported 10 million weekly active users said in a blog post that fresh funding will support the next round of growth for the app.

"While we've quadrupled the size of our team this year, stabilised our infrastructure, launched Payments in beta to help creators monetise, and readied Android for launch, there is so much more to do as we work to bring Clubhouse to more people around the world," the company said.

"It's no secret that our servers have struggled a bit these past few months, and that our growth has outpaced the early discovery algorithms our small team originally built," it added.

After Facebook, online discussion forum Reddit has also launched Reddit Talk, a new feature that will let users host live audio conversations in their communities.

"Currently, you can use text threads, images, videos, chats, and live streams to have conversations and hang out with people in your communities," Reddit said in a statement.

"We're testing ways for hosts to customise the look and feel of Reddit Talk through emojis and background colours. Redditors can change their avatar's appearance to fit the talk as well," it added.

(With IANS inputs)

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