Payment startup Square valued at $3.25 billion

The mobile payment startup founded by Twitter founder Jack Dorsey has raised more than $200 million and doubled its valuation from a year ago.

FORTUNE -- After a fundraising process that lasted several months, Square, the fast growing mobile payments startup, said on Monday that it has raised more than $200 million in a new round of financing. The investment values the company at approximately $3.25 billion, according to a person with MORE

Microsoft to Google: Proof our search is better

Microsoft tries a digital version of the Pepsi challenge to prove that users prefer its Bing search service to Google.

FORTUNE -- Since Microsoft released the Bing search engine in 2009, it has struggled to compete with Google. Most reviewers, and more importantly, most users, have consistently said that on average Google delivers superior results. While Bing's market share in the U.S. has nearly doubled to 15.4%, according to comScore, the MORE

Square's new pricing: A bold move

With a new pricing structure, Jack Dorsey's mobile payments company Square is upending things -- again.

FORTUNE -- The heated battle for mobile payments just got more heated. On Thursday, Square, the pioneer in mobile point of sale systems, announced a new pricing model that gives merchants the option to pay a monthly fee of $275 instead of the current 2.75% fee on every transaction. Merchants who make more than $10,000 MORE

Pop went the social media bubble. Now what?

Yes, there was a social media bubble. And, yes, it popped. The question now is, what happens next?

FORTUNE -- There's no doubt as to when the dot-com bubble popped: it was on March 10, 2000, the day the Nasdaq peaked at 5,132.52. But when exactly did the social media bubble pop? Was it Nov. 23, when Groupon shares fell below their $20 IPO price or this week, when they neared MORE

Ex-Google exec brings Kickstarter model to careers of new grads

Upstart wants to offer students the chance to start their own companies.

FORTUNE -- In his 8 years at Google, where he was president of the company's enterprise business, Dave Girouard hired new college grads in droves. While the Google gigs might have made their classmates envious, it turns out that many of them would have forged different, more independent paths, had they been given the chance.

Now Girouard hopes to offer MORE

Funding a better parking meter

QuickPay, which brings mobile payments to parking facilities, is raising cash and named a CEO.

FORTUNE -- The crowded mobile payments marketplace is getting, well, more crowded.

On Thursday, QuickPay, a two-year-old San Francisco startup whose app lets people pay for parking at lots in various cities, said it has raised $3.5 million in seed financing and named Barney Pell as its CEO. Pell, a co-founder of QuickPay, is a serial entrepreneur MORE

Facebook: No superpowers

As one analyst put it, the social network's results were good, but there were no longer many superheroes to be seen. In other words, life at Facebook is changing.

FORTUNE -- Now you know why Zuck never wanted to take Facebook public.

Running Facebook (FB) not too long ago, say before February, must have been tons of fun. The it Silicon Valley company was experiencing runaway growth, attracting the best talent and MORE

JC Penney CEO: It may get worse before it gets better

JC Penney CEO Ron Johnson addressed his naysayers at Fortune Brainstorm Tech. The transformation of the embattled retailer has only just begun.

FORTUNE -- Ron Johnson's experience building and running Apple's (AAPL) formidable retail operation was formative. It taught him to think differently and to stick to his convictions even in the face of adversity.

Now Johnson is applying these lessons to the challenging task of turning around JC Penney (JCP), the MORE

Thiel vs. Schmidt: The fireworks fly

There wasn't much two of Silicon Valley's brightest luminaries could agree on.

FORTUNE -- Has technology improved our lives over the past 30 years? It depends who you ask -- and some of Silicon Valley's biggest luminaries couldn't disagree more.

According to Eric Schmidt, the executive chairman of Google (GOOG), technology has had an overwhelmingly positive role, lifting some 2 billion people out of poverty and spreading access to vital information from MORE

DocuSign raises $47.5 million, adds Mary Meeker to board

The 8-year-old electronic signature provider will have raised a total of $117 million.

FORTUNE -- DocuSign, the electronic signature provider, said has raised $47.5 million in a round of financing led by Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. As part of the deal, which also includes investments from Accel Partners, SAP Ventures (SAP) and Comcast Ventures (CMCSA), Kleiner partner Mary Meeker will join DocuSign's board of directors.

With the new financing, the 8-year-old MORE