January 18, 2007
Smart Ball Startup From MyOrigo Founder
We just learned that Ball-IT Oy has raised funding from Finland's Aura Capital for its smart ball business. The deal actually closed a while ago but we only learned about it when we asked Johannes Vaananen, co-founder of the 15 month old company, to tell us a bit about his new startup earlier this month.
With an undisclosed amount of capital, Finland-based Ball-IT has developed a pingpong ball-sized Bluetooth-enabled remote control device for Windows and Mac applications.
Support for smartphone applications is next.
The Ball-IT device is not a direct desktop mouse replacement. "Rather it is a multi-purpose device," said Vaananen. Indeed, he sees consumers using it for motion-controlled gaming, interacting with 3D applications, surfing Internet and menus on Home Theater Personal Computers, and as a logging pedometer. It contains newfangled silicon accelerometers, magnetometers and pressure sensors (MEMS devices).
More details than these about the product were not provided as Vaananen said he is under NDAs with first customers. But products from an OEM should be available in the first half of the year, if it goes according to plan.
Readers familiar with the mobilephone market will know Vaananen as the founder and CTO of MyOrigo, a company that hit trade press headlines three or four years ago with its pioneering smartphone designs that enabled zooming, panning, and scrolling without a mouse, and simpler interactivity in general (see image left).
But innovative UI features have seen slow uptake by the world’s cellphone manufacturing companies -- just ask Tao Group, Surfkitchen and their peers how long it takes to win a contract -- and MyOrigo was acquired by US-based F-Origin, where Vaananen stayed unitl September 2005 when he left and teamed up Juha Rytky (CEO) to create Ball-IT.
The firm's business model involves both licensing the technology and its software to original equipment manufacturers (OEM), as well as manufacturing in partnership with an EMS partner for OEM's that in turn will handle sales channel logistics.
The Finnish startup has come quite far in a short time but making it big is going to be a challenge. We've seen companies like Anoto, also from the Nordic region, come to market with new ways to interact with computer applications, but it has struggled to get growth.
But unlike Anoto, Ball-IT is going beyond the PC. And there European startups have a better chance. The reportedly fast market uptake of France’s Nabaztag (also known as the WiFi bunny) from Violet SA (See Neteco link below), as well as the growth of TomTom on the back of GPS navigation gadgets, and Bluetooth gadget innovators, such as Parrot SA, has us thinking this way.
For techie a:c readers, you can get a software development kit that includes a Smart Ball to work with sometime in the first quarter from Ball-IT.
Read - Nabaztag doit montrer qu'il y a une vie après le PC (neteco)
Posted at 10:44 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
October 17, 2006
One-Year Old Gnutek Acquired By SimpleTech
US-based SimpleTech says it has acquired Cranleigh, England-based Gnutek in an all-cash transaction for its Flash memory storage devices. No disclosure on the amount paid.
Founded in June 2005, according to regulatory filings in the UK, Gnutek does not seem to have been venture-funded, which is surpirsing given how cool its Maracite boxes are (they're are targeted at the enterprise data storage market), and how much venture money is flowing in the UK, as well as the comparative ease of access to investors compared to other regions of Europe.
The company's HQ isn't that far from London's Mayfair district but still this venture managed to escape the clutches of VCs and a chance for a quick flip.
Read - >SimpleTech Acquires Gnutek Ltd., a Technology Innovator in Solid State Flash Drives (press rel.)
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July 19, 2006
Newnham Connects With VCs To Push Into Mass Market
Fabless semiconductor company, Newnham Technology, has raised $13.25M Series B (extension) round of venture capital financing, bringing in new investors Esprit Capital (recently formed by combining Prelude Ventures and Cazenove Private Equity).
It joins early backers Atlas Venture and Benchmark Capital.
To-date the firm has raised $21.75M.
Esprit/Prelude invested $3.5 M to buy a 13.5 percent stake in the company. It sees the deal as a later stage investment. Accordingly, the capital is targeted at expanding operations, accelerating development of Newnham's networking technology, and to position for what it describes as "major new high volume markets".
Regular a:c euro readers will know Newnham as the startup that we say Bill Gates would love because its silicon makes it easy to hook up several displays to a PC or laptop via a USB hub for example.
Another famous techie, David Mooring, former president and long-time executive at chip design company Rambus, is apparently a fan already. He has invested in the startup and joined its board.
Newnham chips are found in universal docking stations being sold by Kensington, a computer peripherals company.
The startup is headquartered in Palo Alto now and was founded in Cambridge where its main R&D and product development remain.
Read - Newnham Technology Raises $13.25 Million Series B (press rel.)
Read - VC Backed Newnham (a:c euro)
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April 27, 2006
Digital Pen Firm Taps US VCs
Pegasus Technologies, which develops digital handwriting input solutions, has closed a $4.8 million financing round from US venture capital firm Cedar Fund Cedar Fund and two existing Japanese investors, Nippon Venture Capital and the NFP fund, reports Globes.
It's not a down round, similar valuation to last round, according to the online journal, but the early Israel-based investors did not participate in the latest round. Founded in 1992, Pegasus has raised a total of $14 million.
There are only a handful of companies making a go of the digital pen business. In addition to Pegasus, Sweden's Anoto is doing it, as is Taiwann's UC Logics with its LaPazz products. Each has its own quirks, some requiring special paper, while others require special hardware or communications support.
Read - Graphics co Pegasus raises $4.8m
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March 02, 2006
Xange invests in another French Anoto partner
Last year Xange invested in handwriting software developer Vision Objects. This year it is investing in Kayentis. According to Unquote News today, the French venture firm has invested €2M in Kayentis, which is a systems and software integrator.
Both are partners of Stockholm-based Anoto, the developer of so-called pentop computing. Both Logitech SA and Hewlett Packard Co. have licensed Anoto’s technology for creating applications that enable hand-written text on paper (specially printed paper) to immediately be stored for processing on a computer.
Read- Kayentis raises EUR 2m from XAnge (unquote)
Read - Vision Objects raises (vision objects )
Posted at 02:22 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
February 01, 2006
Wearable electronics startup zips up new round of VC
UK-based Eleksen, a developer of a new fabric that acts as an electronic sensor, is seeing early adoption of its technology in new iPod jackets and backpacks from brand-name manufacturers. With controls on the sleeve or straps, users don’t have to pull it out to turn it on.
As a result of achieving several design-in wins, it closed a £4M round of financing in a deal that pulled in three new investors, led by MTI Partners (which is raising a new fund and recently opened a US office in Waltham, MA).
It is not apparent how much VC has raised to-date. Eleksen was founded in 2001 and announced raising £4m in 2003, but that was not its first round.
Clothing manufacturer, Kyono says that Eleksen’s product is the next zipper.
We think the Eleksen fabric control technology opens up a vast array of possibilities for how we can effortlessly integrate with our technology. We are looking at how we can use this innovation in all our designs. We consider ElekTex smart fabrics to be the next zipper. Jeff Yoo, CEO Koyono
It has taken the UK-based venture-backed company a few years to find a market for its conductive fabrics
Eleksen had to not only figure out a business model for licensing and distribution, it had to figure out who needs its tech. In one year, it developed more than a hundred prototypes for interested partners (which gives a hint of the potential) without generating a penny in sales, according to press reports. Looks like it has found its niche now.
Read – £4M for Eleksen (GrowthBusiness)
Read – Kyono unveils next
Read – Engadget review of Eleksen keyboard
Posted at 06:23 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
January 25, 2006
Iqua= Bluetooth headsets + Former Nokians + Non-Borg designs
If you’re tired of looking like a Borg when sporting a mobilephone headset, then the colorful and small ones from Iqua will be of interest. At least that is what Eqvitec, a major Scandinavian private equity firm, which just invested Euro 2 mln in the startup's first financing round is hoping.
Iqua Ltd was founded in 2004 by a team of marketing managers that left their comfy cubicles at mobilephone manufacturer Nokia to start the company. It was the management team’s experience that attracted the capital. That and the fact that Bluetooth chipsets are becoming standard in cellphones. The theory goes is that it will create “vast market” opportunity for companies selling wireless headset, handsfree phones, and other accessories.
“They’ve got some new concepts and innovative designs that we think will be popular,” Jukka Jokinen, Investment Director, Eqvitec Partners told the a:c euro.
Its Bluetooth-enabled accessories have a Scandinavian design vibe going for them.
It looks like Nokia may have dropped the ball on growing its accessory business as co-founder and CEO, Juha Reima, was the vice president of accessories at Nokia Mobile Phones and worked there since 1988. Another founder, Jouko Häyrynen, Iqua director of business development, also worked at Nokia for two decades before leaving to act as a business angel and startup consultant and then found Iqua.
The two have managed to fill the startup's key management positions by recruiting from their former employer.
But Iqua enters a competitive market. Its products will compete against those from the major brandname phone-makers, as well as Plantronics and Jabra, another young company that is part of the Danish-based technology group, GN Great Nordic. It will be hard to keep ahead of deep pocketed competitors.
Having said that, often the teams that spin out of these European electronics giants create companies that exploit some good ideas that were languishing in the larger organization, and they appreciate in value rather quickly.
For example, this week Spirent acquired five year old SwissQual for $70 mln this week, whose founding team left Swiss telco equipment manufacturer Ascom to bootstrap the company to profitability.
And there was Microcell, an original development manufacturer created by a large team of ex-Nokians, which was acquired by Flextronics for USD200 mln (it paid $80 mln in cash and assumed $120 mln in debt with the purchase).
We are sure these deals did not go un-noticed by Iqua’s investors.
Iqua is trying to sell smart badge gear to companies for office workers. It is a combo-device that include ID badge, headphone, and wireless access to several phones. It can handle 40 hours of talk time.
Read- Iqua raises first round (Eqvitec)
Posted at 01:19 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
January 09, 2006
Swiss Give iPod High-end Sound And A Luxury Look
Some startups are getting a hard time from Apple’s iPod trademark lawyers, but others are poised to grow on the back of iPod sales. Take G-Lab and its Geneva Sound System for example. It is a single cabinet speaker system for docking the iPod, promising to deliver an "incredibly broad audio sweet spot" for iPods, as well as CDs and radio.
A little research by your reporter reveals that G-Lab, they use Geneva Lab in press releases, is located in Teufen, Aargau.
It is a town nowhere near Geneva but who can blame the founders for choosing the name Geneva for their product - Teufen Sound? nah.
Switzerland probably has more than its fair share of high-end audio companies, where the focus is on precision engineering and quality components. They survive as niche players, targeting the high-end and are able to charge high prices for their gear.
For example, Orpheus Media, recently spun out of Anagram Technologies. Anagram is now concentrating on its growing chip business. Banexi Ventures of Paris recently invested in Anagram and there is sonicemotion, which designs flat panel sound systems.
