Welcome to Wamda's weekly startup news ticker, which will offer quick announcements and stories relevant to the region. If you have a quick news release to share about your startup, let us know at editor@wamda.com 

Thursday, September 26th 

Baidu partners with Cooliris app to boost mobile penetration in China

Silicon-based Cooliris, a gallery app that helps you organize all your social media pictures in one place, has recently partnered with China’s biggest search engine, Baidu to boost mobile penetration in China.

With the new partnership, users of Baidu’s MyCloud, a cloud storage service with over 100 million users, will be able to “enjoy all their stored photos on-the-go with Cooliris’ mobile application," as the press release mentioned. “Chinese users can easily connect photos from their device, social networks and now
cloud storage services all in one place."

Monday, September 23rd, 2013

Blackberry stops BBM on Android and iOS

After it confirmed massive layoffs, Blackberry revealed yesterday that it stopped its BlackBerry Messenger BBM service on Android and iOS temporarily, after a leaked unofficial version was causing issues for users.

“Our teams continue to work around the clock to bring BBM to Android and iPhone, but only when it’s ready and we know it will live up to your expectations of BBM,” the BlackBerry blog stated. BBM’s features should include group chats up to 30 people, photo and file sharing, a unique PIN so users don’t have to give out their email or phone number to a new contact.

Yamsafer expands regional after a recent investment

After receiving a $1 million investment last year from Sadara Ventures,  Yamsafer, an online travel website based in Ramallah, is expanding to other markets in the region.

Yamsafer, which launched in September 2011, allows travelers to reserve hotels online and buy travel tickets with discounted prices. Recently, tech-wd announced, the company signed partnerships with many hotels in Bahrain, Jordan and the UAE to build a bigger presence in those markets, especially that the travel sector is the most lucrative sector in the region, according to report released by PayPal today.