These were the 10 biggest European tech stories this week

Happy Friday! This week, tech.eu tracked 11 technology M&A transactions and 64 funding deals (totalling €137 million) in Europe and Israel.

Like every week, we listed every single one of them in our free weekly newsletter, along with interesting news regarding fledgling European startups, tech investors old and new, a number of good reads published elsewhere, government and policy news, as well as an overview of interesting lists, facts and figures from a wide variety of sources.

You can subscribe to our newsletter below to receive all this information in your inbox every Friday afternoon for free, but here’s an overview of the 10 biggest European tech news items for this week:

**1)** Europe has a new unicorn: Swiss neural virtual reality platform, MindMaze, just raised $100 million at a $1 billion valuation.

**2)** Spotify is rumoured to be closing in on 30 million paid subscribers and could become a potential buyer of US-based radio service Pandora.

**3)** A slew of investors announced the launch of new European firms and/or funds: Israel Secondary Fund ($100 million), Isomer Capital (€150 million), Lifeline Ventures (€60 million) and Titanium VC ($50 million). Target Global is also opening a new office in Berlin.

**4)** Serbian/American biomedical data analysis startup Seven Bridges raised $45 million, the second largest round of the week in Europe.

**5)** Rocket Internet used up to €150 million for the buyback of convertible bonds with the goal to support the company’s (falling) stock price.

**6)** UK's app-only bank Mondo picked up £6 million in funding at a £30 million valuation.

**7)** Scottish travel juggernaut Skyscanner grew its revenues to £120 million in 2015 (+28% YoY). The company recently raised $192 million at a $1.6 billion valuation.

**8)** Berlin-based language learning app maker Babbel hit 1 million paying customers.

**9)** Italian printed circuit manufacturer Somacis Group was acquired for €100 million.

**10)** UK's tech unicorn Powa is struggling to pay staff wages and has just $250,000 in the bank.

**Bonus link**:

The superhero of artificial intelligence: can DeepMind's founder, Demis Hassabis, keep it in check?