« December 2007 | Main | February 2008 »
January 31, 2008
Cornerworld To Pay $30M For Online Marketing Analytics Firm Sway
Dallas-based Cornerworld (OTC Bulletin Board: CWRL) says it has signed a letter of intent to purchase Sway Online, a social media marketing company that sells tools to advertisers to market and measure their products across various Net channels: HTML e-mail, podcasts, video syndication, RSS, and SMS. Sway's product, which it calls Shoutlet has been sold to a client list that includes eBay, Sara Lee, and Remington.
Cornerworld says it will pay $30M in a combination of cash and stock. Middleton, WI-based Sway says it did about $2M in revenues last year. CornerWorld is a social media platform that it explains merges MySpace + iTunes + eVite + free email and some other bells like live broadcasting to help people control their image and get paid. Cornerworld currently enjoys a $1.3M market cap.
This seems like an odd duck as Cornerworld gets almost no traffic and given that its model is in advertising that's not good. The company is run by a hedge fund manager so we imagine he is able to prop up the stock price to buy a company like Sway which actually has revenues. But given the emphasis on the stock deal we are scared for the Sway folks.
View - site
Posted at 06:56 PM | Posted to Social Networking | TrackBack
This Week in Euro Tech Ventures
Investments
+ Cachelogic, which has been sniffing packets and moving content for five years now, has raised a $25M internal round.
+ Angels back German Woot clone Preisbock.
News & Analysis
+ Scottish startup Crisp Documents makes 10X Smaller PDFs.
+ Top 10 VC-backed IPOs and M&A in tech in Europe.
+ Why two early mobile social startups are heading to the US.
+ 
The a:c Euro Puzzler
+ We asked readers to send in three examples of tech M&A or IPOs over €100M. The winner is Chris Grew, a partner at HellerEhrman Venture Law Group. His answers were: Last.fm (backed by Index) sold to CBS for $280M, Apertio (backed by Add Partners, Eden Ventures, etc.) sold to Nokia Seimens for $200M+, and the IPO of Blinkx
Posted at 01:11 PM | Posted to Euro Ventures | TrackBack
Hoover's Officially Launches Business Network With Buyout of Visible Path
D&B's Hoover's is buying Visible Path for an undisclosed amount. Foster City-based Visible Path sells social networking software for corporations to mine their connections for sales leads, recruiting and the like. Founded in 2004, Visible Path has raised just over $20M from Kleiner Perkins, Menlo Ventures, Silicon Valley Bank and Integral Capital.
The deal coincides with the official launch of Hoover’s Connect – a rebranding of Visible Path. If Hoover's doesn't F#*% this up, Hoover's Connect could be a viable alternative to LinkedIn. A number of reviewers say they liked Visible Path better than LinkedIn. A glaring weakness of LinkedIn is that you may have dozens of people on your list that your barely know or do business with but they sit next to your closest work mates. Visible Path by contrast includes an outlook plug-in that monitors who you email and then displays that they are indeed important to you.
VisiblePath connects with SugarCRM
View - Hoover's Connect
January 30, 2008 09:00 AM Eastern Time
Hoover’s Redefines Social Networking for the Professional Market with Official Launch of Hoover’s Connect
Launch Coincides with Hoover’s Acquisition of Visible Path
AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Hoover’s, Inc. (http://www.hoovers.com) today announced the official launch of Hoover’s Connect – a powerful business networking tool that helps users get introduced to and establish relationships with targeted prospects. This launch coincides with Hoover’s agreement to acquire Visible Path, the company that had been powering Hoover's Connect Beta for the past year. The financial terms of the deal are not disclosed.
Hoover’s Connect has only been available in Beta on Hoover’s free site until today, and will now give Hoover’s subscribers comprehensive business insight along with professional social networking, to provide the fastest path to business. Unlike other social networking services, Hoover’s Connect provides an effective, non-intrusive way for its users to connect to a person through someone the prospect may already have a strong relationship with, and who is therefore best suited to make that introduction.
Hoover’s Connect is easy to use. When the user goes to a particular Hoover’s company record and clicks the “Connect” button, various referral paths appear that highlight the strongest path within that user’s network. The service allows users to build their networks actively by inviting colleagues to join, as well as passively, through an Outlook plug-in that applies unique social networking algorithms to automatically rate relationship strength.
What distinguishes Hoover’s Connect from other professional business networking tools is its ability to identify users’ strongest relationships by evaluating their Outlook systems such as e-mail and calendars. The service then assesses the strength of those connections and rates them accordingly, all while maintaining customer privacy. Hoover’s Connect lets users evaluate in advance the potential of a particular networking opportunity and tailor communications accordingly, ultimately enhancing the success of online relationship building.
“Hoover’s Connect keeps me in touch with past and current colleagues and allows me to build a network of new relationships that are relevant to my industry and experiences,” said Andy Sweis, senior business intelligence analyst for PepsiCo, Inc. “The technology searches both my information and that of my colleagues to establish new relationships based on appropriate matches. Hoover’s Connect saves me time and effort by eliminating the need to search manually for connections that might help form new, beneficial business relationships.”
Because of Hoover’s Connect’s premium privacy settings, the user has full control over what is and is not searched; a user’s e-mail content is never viewed or scanned. This level of privacy is essential and means that users have full control over who to invite into their network and to whom they want to grant others access within their network. Users have the option to either stay cloaked or identify themselves.
“The combination of the underlying technology with the weighting mechanisms and privacy considerations make Hoover’s Connect a leap beyond anything currently offered by either social networking or other business information services,” said Hoover’s president David Mather. “It is the first offering to integrate insight about who to contact with the tools to act on that insight, all from one location, without interrupting workflow, and while still protecting and preserving the privacy of users and end targets.”
Research from the University of Chicago and University of North Carolina business schools has shown that an introduction made through a trusted source is up to 16 times more likely to yield a response than a cold call. With individuals’ professional networks growing at breakneck speeds through online tools and services, Hoover’s sees the potential for leveraging those expanding networks and creating a business tool for unlocking the potential that exists in their employees’ personal and professional networks.
“This is a coming-of-age announcement for B2B social networking that helps move it from a novelty to an everyday revenue-building sidekick,” according to Chuck Richard, Outsell, Inc. Vice President and Lead Analyst. "This sales companion finally unites the tasks of discovering ‘who's crucial to your sale’ with ‘how to get them to answer your call’. What's especially interesting is how Hoover's Connect taps such rich company insights and interlocking webs of network connections while also protecting your privacy with extensive controls on who gets access to what.”
For a demonstration of how Hoover’s Connect works, click here (http://www.hooversconnect.com).
Hoover's Connect incorporates professional social networking technology developed with the intent to provide large enterprises with the automated data gathering, privacy and analysis that they require. While Hoover’s Connect is specifically designed for individuals, it includes Visible Path’s enterprise-tested features as well as new features that let individuals sign up for free online, download an Outlook plug-in and start building their networks within the context of Hoover’s.
About Hoover's, Inc.
Hoover’s, a D&B company, provides its customers the fastest path to business with insightful information about companies, industries and key decision makers, along with the powerful tools to find and connect to the right people to get business done. Hoover’s provides this information for sales, marketing, business development, and other professionals who need intelligence on U.S. and global companies, industries, and the people who lead them. Hoover’s unique combination of editorial expertise and one-of-a-kind data collection with user-generated and company-supplied content gives customers a 360-degree view and competitive edge. This information, along with powerful tools to search, sort, download and integrate the content, is available through Hoover’s (http://www.hoovers.com), the company’s premier online service. Hoover’s is headquartered in Austin, Texas.
Contacts
Hoover’s, Inc., Austin
Lisa Glass, 512-374-4662
lglass@hoovers.com
Posted at 11:27 AM | Posted to Social Networking | TrackBack
Hipster eCommerce Biz Etsy Raises $27M
Famed Accel Partners VC Jim Breyer has led a $27M round in Etsy. Many including us had wondered if Breyer had over-paid at what seemed like a late stage for Facebook. We won't second guess Breyer here. We have thought that Brooklyn-based Etsy is on to something. Etsy provides a way to buy and sell handmade items. The site follows in the tradition of open craft fairs, giving sellers personal storefronts where they list their goods for a fee. You go anywhere in this country and you'll find farmer's markets and other venues for people to sell hand-made goods. These folks use to be on eBay but the goliath has lost touch with these people who are gravitating to Etsy.
Etsy makes money by charging a listing fee of 20 cents for each item and getting 3.5% of every sale, with the average sale about $15 or $20.
In December 2007, Etsy its two-millionth sale. In November 2007, buyers spent $4.3M purchasing 300K items for sale on Etsy, an increase of 43% from October 2007 and it now claims to be profitable.
In addition to Accel, two existing Etsy investors, Union Square Ventures and Hubert Burda Media, joined the round.
As you can see from this video, Etsy is run by a young man while most of its users are women
View - site
Posted at 01:14 AM | Posted to eCommerce | TrackBack
Mercurial TV Exec Launches WonderHowTo With VC Backing
WonderHowTo has closed a Series A investment led by General Catalyst Partners and signed an ad sales deal with Scripps Network. WonderHowTo is late to the HowTo Instructional video party as there are several other funded startups that have been ongoing concerns for a year or more that we have covered including Expert Village, eHow, Videojug5min, and others.
But WonderHowTo has a solid URL and it is run by a former Hollywood exec, Stephen Chao, who has proven that he knows how to put out popular video fare. Chao is the force behind the Fox TV show Cops as well as America’s Most Wanted. These success stories catapulted him to the rank of President of Fox TV. Unfortunately for Chao he was fired by Fox after he orchestrated an nude streaker stunt that personally embarrassed Lord Rupert Murdoch. Chao was trying to be creative and make a point but it backfired big time.
WonderHowTo says it has put together 90K videos in more than 400 categories over the last few months. WonderHowTo.com says it will begin accepting community submissions of new videos and soliciting user ratings of videos featured on the site.
View - site
Read - NY Times profile
Press Release Source: WonderHowTo.com
WonderHowTo.com Launches Web's Biggest How-To Video Site
Wednesday January 30, 9:00 am ET
New Community-Fueled Site Features More Than 90,000 Free Instructional Videos
General Catalyst Partners Leads Series "A" Funding; Scripps Networks Powers Ad Sales
SANTA MONICA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--WonderHowTo.com, the video guide for a curious world, has unveiled the world’s biggest free how-to video index, cataloging and linking to more than 90,000 curated video clips at launch. The company has also closed a Series “A” investment led by General Catalyst Partners and ad sales will be powered by Scripps Networks. The announcements were made today by Stephen Chao, co-founder and CEO, WonderHowTo. Financial terms of the investment were not disclosed.
“At WonderHowTo.com, our passion is to search, curate and organize the fascinating but fragmented category of free and informative video that has recently become widely available on the web,” said Chao. “There is a quiet yet thrilling revolution happening in the how-to video world. Historically, people have spent around a billion dollars a year in the U.S. buying instructional videos about fitness, self-help, dancing, languages, auto repair, gardening and all kinds of other things. But the market forces of the internet are swiftly liberating the realm of video just as they liberated text a few years ago. As our community grows, WonderHowTo will become the free video guide for a curious world.”
WonderHowTo.com’s team of pre-launch video curators has amassed an impressive collection of free, high-quality how-to video features from the farthest reaches of the Internet, classifying and ranking more than 90,000 videos in more than 400 categories over the last few months. With today’s public launch, WonderHowTo.com will also begin accepting community submissions of new videos and soliciting user ratings of videos featured on the site.
During his successful career as a television executive, Chao left an imprint on the primetime landscape that persists today. As a young programmer at Fox, he commissioned Cops, created America’s Most Wanted, and earned a reputation for creating commercial success by pushing boundaries and questioning conventional wisdom. Chao rose to president of Fox Television, and later held the same position at USA Cable where he launched Monk.
“WonderHowTo’s content and community-centric approach to the web how-to video sector makes it a very attractive investment for us,” said George Bell, special venture partner, General Catalyst Partners. “Add to that the opportunity to work with Stephen, one of the great explorers in the media business, and it’s easy to see why we became enamored with this company.”
WonderHowTo.com aggregates community-submitted links and reviews of how-to video from across the Internet. From mainstream queries such as how to tie a tie, to the eye-opening presentation of how to perform a Balducci levitation, to the long-tail eccentricity of how to train your cat to use the toilet, WonderHowTo embraces the ever expanding visual imagination of the collective web to provide the most comprehensive and revelatory results in the instructional video space.
Ad sales for the site are managed by Scripps Networks. Because videos on WonderHowTo are organized into extremely targeted categories, the site offers outstanding opportunities for contextually relevant advertising placements. On the content side, Scripps Networks has provided WonderHowTo with thousands of video assets from its library.
"Scripps Networks is already a leading web content publisher in this space and WonderHowTo dovetails perfectly with our distribution strategy of continuing to make our videos even more widely and easily accessible to do-it-yourself enthusiasts," said Doug Hurst, senior vice president and general manager of non-linear distribution for Scripps Networks. "We felt right away that WonderHowTo’s vision of community-powered universal search for online instructional video would be a good fit for us and have been working together since April 2007 to index thousands of the best video clips from our networks - HGTV, Food Network, DIY Network and Fine Living - at WonderHowTo."
"With more than 400 categories of how-to video and continually expanding coverage of the long-tail curiosities of the web, WonderHowTo offers marketers a tremendously flexible ad targeting framework," said Jeff Meyer, senior vice president of interactive ad sales for Scripps Networks. "We are excited to add this site to the multi-dimensional solutions that the Scripps Networks Ad Sales team presents to advertisers. Marketers realize that those actively seeking how-to content are also actively seeking purchasing advice and information."
Kip Kay, the all-time top video publisher and earner on short-form online video site Metacafe said, “It was easy to submit my library of instructional videos to WonderHowTo, and the site does a great job of organizing and spotlighting my material. Every video view on WonderHowTo registers directly on my Metacafe channel, which results in more money in my pocket. I am excited to see such an outstanding community-powered search tool begin to centralize the how-to video search experience.”
By pointing to how-to video around the web, rather than hosting the videos, the ad-supported site sidesteps the cost structure issues that face many other online video communities. In addition, the company’s approach enhances the monetization strategies deployed by pioneering content owners by increasing traffic and video views for publishers. WonderHowTo’s dynamic user feedback and continuous web spidering keep the site’s video index current by organizing new material and suspending any expired, broken, or otherwise misleading links.
In head-to-head tests, WonderHowTo’s human-powered indexing and ranking mechanism consistently provides how-to video search results of significantly better quality and accuracy than existing general purpose web search engines.
Analysis of available data suggests that U.S. special interest instructional videos approach $1 billion in retail and direct-to-consumer sales annually. Additionally, the tremendous growth of special interest cable networks and the larger do-it-yourself movement suggest a very robust marketplace for informational content. Meanwhile, in the web search arena, Hitwise.com, the online competitive intelligence service, reported recently that “how-to” queries on the web have risen nearly 20% since the start of 2007, confirming that the consumer appetite for how-to knowledge continues to spill over from traditional media to the web.
About WonderHowTo.com
WonderHowTo.com is the video guide for a curious world. The privately-held company was founded in 2007 by Stephen Chao and Mike Goedecke, and is backed by Cambridge, MA-based General Catalyst Partners. Chao is a media industry veteran, and Goedecke is the founder of Belief, an award-winning broadcast design firm. WonderHowTo.com is headquartered in Santa Monica, CA. For more information, visit www.wonderhowto.com.
About General Catalyst Partners
General Catalyst Partners is a venture capital firm that invests in exceptional entrepreneurs who are building the technology-based companies that will lead innovation and transform industries. Founded in 2000, General Catalyst Partners leverages its principals' extensive operational, business development and technological expertise to provide portfolio companies with a catalyst for success through business-building and partnership development assistance. General Catalyst has approximately $1 billion under management and is headquartered in Cambridge, MA. For more information, visit www.generalcatalyst.com.
Contact:
Beck Media & Marketing (for WonderHowTo.com)
Todd Beck, 310-689-7363
todd@beckmedia.com
or
General Catalyst Partners
Michelle C. Daubar, 617-234-7028
Posted at 12:36 AM | Posted to Media | TrackBack
January 30, 2008
Report: Batanga Buying HispanoClick
VC-backed, latin American portal Batanga is close to buying online advertising network HispanoClick, reports Portada. HispanoClick competes with DirectaClick.Fox (bought by Fox International) and Univision.
Batanga raised a$30M series C round last fall led by Tudor Ventures and HIG Capital. This is its first foray into online advertising - we understand that it was a user of ads from HispanoClick.
View - Hispanoclick site
Read - Portada.com
Posted at 04:40 PM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
January 29, 2008
SocNet Mania: Votigo, Shozu Mig33, Naseeb, BigSwerve, Anywhere.fm, Hi5
With MySpace and Facebook reigning as the social network monsters and prospering also-rans like LinkedIn, Hi5, Bebo and others on their tails, the latest funded social networks are gunning for channels like mobile and geographies on down to Turkey and Pakistan.
Starting with Hi5, we see that the monsters of social networking traffic have an easy time raising funds. Hi5 Networks, which has more than 70M registered users, has raised $15M in debt financing from Hercules Technology Growth Capital. So the company didn't have to give up any equity to get a big $15M check.
View - site
Votigo is not a true social network but actually an online social media platform that helps marketers get in the face of their customers through the use of user-generated content, branded social-networking communities, contests, and promotions. The firms sells to ad agencies, PR firms and marketers. Clients include: Victoria's Secret PINK, Gardenburger, ConocoPhillips, Epic, Pandora, Motley Fool, Gibson, Capitol Records.
Oakland-based Votigo has raised $1.26M in funding from hedge fund Headwaters Holdings and individual angels. The company is led by Mike La Rotonda who was Sr. Product Manager, Yahoo! 360 at Yahoo!
View - site
Burlingame-based mobile social network Mig33 has raised $13.5M in Series B funding led by DCM led the round with return backers Accel Partners, Redpoint Ventures and Technology Venture Partners. The company had raised a $10M in a Series A round in May.
View - site
Also in mobile social networking, London-based ShoZu has raised $12M in a Series C funding from SEB Venture Capital, Atlas Ventures, Crescendo Ventures, and TTP Ventures.
View - site
Proving that it will go anywhere on Earth to close a deal Draper, Fisher, Jurvetson joined ePlanet Ventures in investing an undisclosed amount in Pakistan's Naseeb Networks.
Naseeb runs online recruitment, social networking, classifieds and related services in Pakistan.
Naseeb Networks owns many websites out of which one is ROZEE.PK, which claims to be Pakistan’s No. 1 job website. ROZEE.PK has offices is Lahore, Karachi, Islamabad and in the US.
The company's flagship Internet property, Naseeb.com, offers matchmaking and social networking services for the Pakistani and Arab diaspora communities. Naseeb Networks has 42 employees across its offices in Lahore, Karachi, Islamabad and San Jose.
Naseeb Networks was founded by Monis Rahman who was GM West Coast & VP Technology at ParentWatch.com and CTO & VP Products (Co-Founder) at eDaycare.com.
View - site
In a micro M&A deal, Lijit has big BigSwerve. Founded nearly 2 years back, Boston-based BigSwerve is a blog indexer that analyzes and sorts blog comments. Terms of the transaction were not disclosed. Lijit Networks is a utility that gives readers the ability to search blog posts, bookmarks and blogrolls. BigSwerve indexes blog and analyzes and sorts blog comments.
View - site
San Francisco-based musical social network Imeem has acquired fellow San Francisco firm Anywhere.FM. Anywhere.FM operates an online digital music player and Internet radio service. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. Anywhere.FM was founded last year, and has received funding from Y Combinator. Larger Imeem meanwhile has raised venture funding led by Morgenthaler Ventures.
View - site
Posted at 07:22 PM | Posted to Social Networking | TrackBack
Used Gadget Trade-In Site Second Rotation Raises $4.4M
Second Rotation is an eCommerce destination site for selling consumer electronics from iPods to digital cameras. The company’s patent-pending dynamic pricing calculator and gadget portfolio help users determine the value of their gadgets and to sell them. Most people will use eBay or CraigsList for this, but Second Rotation wants to syphon off their users by giving people an instant price quote for their gadgets.
Waltham, MA-based Second Rotation has now raised $4.4M in first-round funding. Venrock led the deal, with angels backers. Three of the angels became board members: Austin Ligon, co-founder and former CEO of CarMax; Ashton Peery, formerly a General Partner at Lucent Venture Partners; and Henry Vogel, former Chief Revenue Officer at Quigo.
If you can stand to watch these CNET idiots, you can get a tour of the product.
Visit - site
Posted at 05:41 PM | Posted to eCommerce | TrackBack
Facebook Personal-Shopping App StyleFeeder Raises $2M. Competitor ThisNext Ups Ante W/$5M Round
Cambridge, MA's StyleFeeder has raised $2M in Series A funding from Highland Capital Partners and Schooner Capital. It had announced that it had raised $1M last October.
StyleFeeder allows users to shop across web sites and create wish lists of items they want. Users can then rate each other's items, leave comments for each other and receive personalized recommendations based on how they rate items. StyleFeeder was spun out of Top10 Media in May, 2007.
StyleFeeder boasts that it is the largest shopping app on Facebook with 500K downloads. We take such numbers with a grain of salt. The growing price for a Facebook app install is just $0.50 so the company could easily buy its user base with its funding. The key metric will be how much to the use the app. StyleFeeder has tapped celebs like the Olsen twins to make it seem cool.
Stylefeeder competes with Stylepath, ThisNext, StyleHive and several others.
Speaking of ThisNext there is breaking news that the Santa Monica-based startup has raised $5M in a 2nd-round funding, reports peHUB. Return backers included Anthem Venture Partners and Clearstone Venture Partners. ThisNext had raised a $2.5M Series A round in early 2006 plus an undisclosed amount of venture debt.
Posted at 12:01 PM | Posted to eCommerce | TrackBack
Turkish SocNet Yonja Raises $12.5M
Turkish social network Yonja has raised $12.5M in Series A funding says PeWire. Backers include Greywolf Capital Partners and Tiger Global Management. The firm is led by founder and CEO Kerim Baran, who was educated at Harvard Biz and Siebel before launching Yonja.
Founded in 2003, Yonja.com is by all accounts the leading Turkish online social networking service It currently lays claim to over 1B page views per month and nearly 5M members.
Interestingly, Yonja has its HQ in San Francisco. The parent company, Yonja Media Group team, also launched MetroListe.com (a craigslist for Turkey) and 7inci.com (a DailyCandy for Turkey) and Nolyo.com (a Twitter for Turkey).
View - site
Read - CEO interview
Posted at 02:31 AM | Posted to Social Networking | TrackBack
While E*Trade Sucks Wind, Former CEO Raises $29.6M For SocNet MOLI
Former E*Trade CEO Christos Cotsakos left the company under a cloud but he's living large in West Palm Beach, FL and his latest startup has raised $29.6M. Mainstream Holdings did the deal with Home Depot co-founders Bernard Marcus and Kenneth Langone, and Vantis Capital Management's Steven Holzman. A local paper reports that the startup raised an initial $20M from Cotsakos and $6M from other investors.
Opening the kimono today at the Demo event, Mainstream Holdings was conceived in 2004 but is just now launching a social network called MOLI. MOLI is led by some E*Trade refugees including COO Judy Balint who was Chief International Officer at E*trade. At launch, the firm already employees 50 heads in Palm Beach, plus others off-shore.
GigaOm has a long, thoughtful review but in our summary judgment, Moli has whiffed at launch. Maybe they will get their act together later on. The site needs to be more clear about who should use it (creative types who want to make money) and why this would be time well spent (something about creating multiple profiles for your professional and personal selves.)
It's going to be painful for the E*Trade gang to justify their valuation to investors if they can't get a handful more people to check it out soon. Call us jaded, but this is an obvious failure in the making that the rich dudes hanging out on the golf links in Palm Beach think will work just by throwing money at a trend.
Moli explains it this way.
View - site
Posted at 12:20 AM | Posted to Social Networking | TrackBack
January 28, 2008
PayPal To Pay $169M For Fraud Sciences
PayPal will pay $169M in cash to acquire Fraud Sciences, an Israeli company that develops online risk and security tools.
PayPal, a unit of eBay (NSDQ: EBAY), will use Fraud Sciences' technology to enhance the fraud management systems of both PayPal and eBay.
FraudScience has raised $7M from BRM Capital (which holds a 40% stake), angel investor Guy Gamzu, and Redpoint Ventures.
Founded by former Israeli intelligence experts, Fraud ciences set itself up to sort out legitimate bidders from suspicious bidders. The company was founded in 2001 but didn't launch until the end of 2006.
View - site
Posted at 12:56 PM | Posted to Security | TrackBack
LiveStrong Folded Into Demand Media. Lance Armstrong Takes A Stake In Demand
With the 80M+ yellow LiveStrong bracelets sold over the past few years to benefit Lance Armstrong's cancer foundation, the brand is a fast rising star. But do date, LiveStrong.com has been parked. We learn now that heavily financed Demand Media will run the site and that Lance Armstrong has taken a stake in Demand Media, which at it latest round commanded a $1B+ valuation having raised $320M.
The Wall Street Journal broke the story but neither Demand Media nor Armstrong would confirm the size of the equity stakes, although Demand Media chief Richard Rosenblatt said the deal is significant.
The to be launched LiveStrong Web site is intended for people who want to count calories, track workouts or connect with other people trying to keep fit. Rosenblatt and Armstrong became buddies having both served on the board of VC-backed sports-drink company FRS Co.
View - LiveStrong site
Posted at 02:07 AM | Posted to Media | TrackBack
Report: Online/Offline's HealthCentral Network Raises $50M
Arlington, VA-based HealthCentral Network has raised $50M led by IAC with return backers Sequoia Capital, Carlyle Venture Partners and Polaris Venture Partners, reports PaidContent.
For a minority stake, this is an staggering valuation for a company that says it gets 7M unique visitors monthly (30M page views monthly).
HealthCentral was founded as Choice Media but changed its name to HealthCentral in 2006. It has a network of 30 sites on vertical health topics such Alzheimer’s, Cholesterol, Chronic Pain, Depression, Diabetes, Migraine, Sleep, etc. It also owns the DrKoop.com site as well as Healthsquare.com, www.drkoop.com, and Healthscout.com.
Growing interest in HealthCentral may be because it is the 2nd largest health business on the Web after WebMD and it is executing on a plan to move from the Web to also do TV. HealthCentral has launched a series of TV health specials, hosted by Dr. Dean Edell and now syndicated on over 70 TV stations including major market stations like WCBS-New York, KABC-Los Angeles, and WLS-Chicago) with a potential viewership of over 60M Households.
View - site
Posted at 01:42 AM | Posted to Media | TrackBack
Treedia Labs (Podcast.com + Videocast.com) Raising $5M
Cambridge, MA's Treedia Labs, which operates destination sites podcast.com and Videocast.com, is looking to close a $5M Series B round, the firm told Mass High Tech.
Treedia Labs is building web services platforms to deliver audio and video via RSS feeds. The destination sites have not gotten much of a lift despite would would seem to be search engine bait (podcast.com comes up first when you type 'podcast' in Google. We suspect that if these guys get the $5M they are going to need to have a better business model than what they have been going after the past few years.
View - site
Posted at 01:25 AM | Posted to Video | TrackBack
January 25, 2008
Ceaseless Ad Startup Funding Orgy Goes On With Ooyala
Count 'em 11 online ad startups funded just this week and two were bought: IMMI, Covario, EVO Landing (some might not count this as online advertising but part of the biz is in ads), Germany's Adscale, AdInfuse, GoldSpot Media, Smaato, Quantcast, IGA Worldwide, Adchemy, Plus AdOn Network and Prime Visibility were acquired.
The latest funding announced is Ooyala. We had previously reported on Ooyala when it was in stealth made. It was noteworthy as its founders are Bismarck Lepe and Sean Knapp, who came from Google. Google employees who leave the company enjoy a halo effect as it is assumed that they are smarter and better connected than some jerks who left Yahoo. It will interesting to see how many failures will go down before former Googlers lose their privileged status.
Now that has disclosed that is has raised $8.5M in 2nd-round funding led by Sierra Ventures, the curtain over the company has been lifted a bit. (BTW - Ooyala says its total funding is now at $10M. Moreover Ooyala won first place in Amazon Web Services Start-Up Challenge last month, taking home $100K in cash and services as well as a golden hammer symbolic of the breaking of server boxes.
Ooyala has launched a product called Backlot which allows users to measure, manage, syndicate, and monetize videos across video players. It also tracks over 20 different viewing metrics that detail the performance of online videos and syndication channels. For this Ooyala charges $0.08/hour per video served.
View - site
Read - VentureBeat
Posted at 06:46 PM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
Ad Effectiveness Firm IMMI Raises $25M
This sounds like a nutty idea but it seems to be working. Integrated Media Measurement hands over specialzed cellphones to a panel of everyday folks that measure which TV and radio ads they see and hear. Integrated Media Measurement Inc. Any ads that the panel hear are recorded and then analyzed. That data is then sold to media buyers to provide some layer of metrics to their work - no matter how thin it may be. For most media buyers radio's Arbitron ratings and TV's Nielsen ratings make them feel that they are skating on thin ice so another source of data may be welcome.
Sample report
IMMI has been able to provide results that its predecessors likely could not match. For example, panelists who watched a Burger King commercial with a tie-in to “The Simpsons Movie” were 40% more likely to see the film than those who saw only TV, radio and theater trailers for the movie. IMMI also determined that 10% of the audience of NBC's “Heroes” watched it over the Internet.
San Mateo's Integrated Media Measurement (IMMI) has raised $25M in Series C funding led by WPP's Kantar Media Research with return backers Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Advanced Technology Ventures. The company had raised around $15M in another round.
IMMI is led by Tom Zito, an interesting character who got his start as a rock critic but has since made a nice career as a tech entrepreneur. In 1986, Zito took public AXLON, a high-tech toy company. He then founded Isix which was acquired by Hasbro. He also cofounded game developer Digital Pictures as well as digital record label Garageband.
View - site
Posted at 05:35 PM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
Search Automation's SEMDirector Becomes Covario. Raises $16M
San Diego-based Covario (fka SEMDirector) announced at its annual event, INFLECTIONPoint that FTVentures has led a $16M Series B investment in the company, along with existing investors Dubilier & Company and Voyager Capital. It also changed its name to Cavario reflecting the fact that it is branching out beyond search engine marketing (SEM).
Covario's platform enables global brands to manage search advertising but other interactive media, including display advertising. Covario enables advertisers to understand the relative effectiveness of paid search advertising, natural search optimization, and interactive advertising in a single dashboard. Covario plans to broadening its focus to include performance management technologies beyond search advertising to additional forms of interactive media.
View - site
Posted at 02:59 AM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
Marquiss Wind Power Turns First Funding
Folsom, CA's wind turbine firm Marquiss Wind Power has closed its first financing round with $1.3M.
The company manufactures roof-top wind turbines. It claims to provide a sub 5-year ROI for the owner/operator.
Velocity Venture Capital led the Series A round with Strategis Early Ventures. Founder/CEO Paul Misso doesn't have much experience in alt energy. He was Sr. Director - IT at Flextronics.
View - site
Posted at 02:29 AM | Posted to Alternative Energy | TrackBack
EVO Landing Launches Domain Management Platform With Funding From Monster
Seattle's EVO Landing has launched its platform which claims to give domain speculators the ability to buy domains then create dynamic associated websites that come with media-rich and relevant content based on the value of the domain. We think of firms like Demand Media that have bought-up sweet domains, then thrown content onto those domains so that visitors think they are actually hitting a real site. EVO Platform wants to give any domain speculator the chance to be like Demand Media.
The Company received initial funding from Seattle angel investors in November 2007 and then closed its Series A round in December 2007 from Rob Monster's Monster Venture Partners. Monster is a partner at domain giant the Internet Real Estate Group. The startup is led by CEO
Geoffrey Nuval who was an analyst at Lehman Brothers VC.
Sample site
EVO says that within its two and-a-half months in beta, it has grown its network to over 10K sites and it is accepting less than 15% of submitted names onto the system.
View - site
Domain Monetization 2.0 -- EVO Landing Announces Public Launch and Series A
Thursday January 24, 3:59 pm ET
SEATTLE--(BUSINESS WIRE)--(Announced at DomainFest Hollywood)
Have you ever registered a domain name from GoDaddy or Register.com with the intent on building a website? Chances are that you never found the time or money to actually make that website a reality. A new company out of Seattle is looking to change what you do with your registered domain. EVO Landing (‘EVO’) has announced the release of its domain development platform, which aims to create value and traffic for your domain while making you money.
Source: EVO Landing
· Sample site on the EVO Landing platform. (Graphic: Business Wire). View Multimedia Gallery
With the EVO platform, domain owners are now able to instantly create dynamic websites comprised of media-rich, relevant content based on the value of the domain name. Whereas traditional parked pages generally rely on transient traffic typed into a browser’s URL bar, sites on the EVO platform grow organically as web users can find the sites via search engines, recommend the site to friends, engage with the site’s content, and return daily to find fresh content.
“The Internet has evolved, but the domain industry has yet to really make the leap to Web 2.0,” says CEO, Geoffrey Nuval. “A domain like Stocktrades.com would be more appropriate as an informational website whereas ChefGrill.com would probably make more sense as a storefront,” explains Geoffrey. “To create the depth in content for each module, we have inked special partnerships with various niche sites, including Shopping.com, Epinions, Software.com, Podcast.com, PredictAd, Shareapic, and Wishpot, ... even more deals are in the works as we expand across the long tail.”
Rather than employ a one-size-fits-all template, EVO’s modular-based approach enables sites to be directly tailored to a specific domain name.
According to CTO Daniel Rust, “The EVO platform bridges the gap by bringing together advanced integration and analytics technologies and boiling it down into a simple to use system. Our technology semantically analyzes the domain name to determine what type of site it should be, as well as identifies new niche markets to insure optimal monetization and relevance of all the sites.”
The Company received initial funding from Seattle angel investors in November 2007 and then closed its Series A round in December 2007 with Monster Venture Partners (‘MVP’). “My investment in EVO Landing weighed heavily upon the fact that they were able to prove out the revenue model,” says Robert Monster, Managing Director of MVP and Partner at the Internet Real Estate Group (‘IREG’). “For my own due diligence, I moved a number of domains from a reputable traditional parking solution onto their system and within forty-five days I saw a 5x increase in traffic and 3x increase in revenues. I have since moved my entire portfolio onto their system.”
The Company has already achieved considerable growth during its beta phase. “Within our two and-a-half months in beta, we have grown our network to over 10,000 sites with no two sites alike,” says SVP Sales & Strategic Marketing, Mark Michael, “Our admissions analytics system is pretty strict because we want to keep the quality of the websites on our network high -- less than 15% of submitted names have been accepted onto the system.”
About EVO Landing
EVO Landing (‘EVO’) is a next-generation domain monetization platform built around its ability to instantly generate topic-relevant, media-rich websites. EVO is a limited liability corporation (LLC) based in Seattle, WA and was founded in October 2007 after months of dedicated research and years of Internet site design and search engine optimization experience.
EVO’s proprietary technology is a web-based software and methodology that harnesses the power of the semantic web. Using a modular-based architecture, every site managed through EVO Landing is updated dynamically, daily, and automatically with relevant, rich-media (articles, listings, products, photos, videos, downloads). Domain names can now be truly regarded as online investments as they enjoy the added monetary benefits of multiple ad-network integration, multiple affiliate program integration, and exclusive partnerships.
For more information, please visit www.evolanding.com or read the Company blog at www.landingevo.com.
About Monster Venture Partners
Monster Venture Partners (‘MVP’) is a new breed of early-stage venture capital firm based in Seattle. MVP’s investment philosophy is to engage in a genuine hands-on partnership with founders to jointly create value for all stakeholders. For larger opportunities, MVP co-invests with leading investors from around the world, selecting from a universe of like-minded investors who are able to add strategic value. MVP is focused on three primary verticals: marketing technology, consumer healthcare, and global consumer Internet.
EVO Contact Information
Representatives of the Company will be available at DomainFest Hollywood, January 21-23 and at TRAFFIC Las Vegas, February 18-21.
(206) 441-4399
info@evolanding.com
2101 4th Ave Seattle, WA 98121
MULTIMEDIA AVAILABLE: http://www.businesswire.com/cgi-bin/mmg.cgi?eid=5593750
Contact:
EVO Landing
Mark A. Michael, 206-441-4399 (SVP Sales & Marketing)
Source: EVO Landing
Posted at 02:14 AM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
Lead Gen's Adchemy Raised $19M
Redwood City's Adchemy has raised $19M in Series C led by Mayfield Fund with the deal PE firm Hellman & Friedman and return backer August Capital. Adchemy's angel investors include Georges Harik, co-developer of Google AdSense and Josh Kopelman, co-founder of Half.com. Adchemy has grown big thanks to CPA lead gen deals in financial services and education. Its top clients are include Charter One, The Art Institute Online of Pittsburgh Online Division, Capella University, Saint Leo University and South University.
Adchemy is led by Murthy Nukala who was SVP at Shopping.com. Nukula plans to release a second major product next spring.
View - site
Posted at 02:00 AM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
PE Firm Buys Two Online Marketing Firms - AdOn Network and Prime Visibility
A roll-up called Prime Visibility Media Group has been formed through the buyout of online ad firm AdOn Network, and Prime Visibility, a search engine marketing firm. Financial terms of the deals were not announced. Chicago-based private equity firm Bridge Investments made it happen. Universal Domestic Television president Steve Rosenberg will run the show.
Founded in 1999 as MyGeek, AdOn Networks has about 45 employees. The Phoenix-based AdOn networks was listed by Entrepreneur Magazine as number 72 on the magazine’s annual “Hot 500 list.” The magazine says that AdOn's 2002 Sales were $713K and on up to 2006 Sales of $16M. The company targets medium size advertisers and has a footprint on 400 web sites. AdOn is not without controversy. One site reports: "They are one of the worst deadbeats. I have heard from readers that the company reports 1/10 to 1/8 of the impressions that it actually serves on a publishers website."
View - site
Posted at 01:40 AM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
January 24, 2008
This Week in Euro Tech Ventures
Features
+ Index Ventures gets major growth money.
Investments
+ VC money piles into UK web ventures: W7 and TouchLocal.
+ AdScale, a Germany-centric online ads service provider (based on auction-model) has raised new capital from early investors Holtzbrinck and European Founders Fund.
+ A Swiss angel group is backing an early investment in Cupertino-based gBox, a digital music shopping enabler.
+ Cisco Backs UK-based small-sized basestation firm ip.access.
+ Momail a mobile email platform provider has raised a first round of funding at $5.4M.
+ Germany's XING AG acquires cember.net, Turkey’s leading online business Network.
News & analysis
Tiny speaker, powered by MP3 devices from Austrian startup >Plastic Electronic
Posted at 11:49 PM | Posted to Euro Ventures | TrackBack
Inform Technologies Raises $15M For Big Media Site Tools
New York's Inform Technologies structures and organizes unstructured content for the Web sites of big media. Launched in August 2006. Inform provides contextual in-line links to news, relevant related articles, and user-customizable topic pages. Each of these capabilities can include all types of aggregated news from the Web, including video, audio, and blogs. The idea is to create more engaging, longer lasting user visits, drive additional page views and advertising opportunities, and establish clients' sites as news hubs for their users.
Inform has now received a $15M investment from Spark Capital. The company is led by James Satloff who was CEO of ski maker Liberty Skis and before that was CEO and President at C.E. Unterberg, Towbin.
View - site
Posted at 11:21 AM | Posted to Search | TrackBack
Ciena To Pay $290M For World Wide Packets
Ciena (Nasdaq: CIEN) says it will pay about $290M in cash and stock for World Wide Packets. World Wide Packets sells Carrier Ethernet solutions that allow broadband service providers and telcos to deploy revenue generating Ethernet services. World Wide Packets has raised around $150M from Craig McCaw, Azure Capital Partners, Northwest Venture Associates, Madrona Venture Group, Telesystem-Argo Global Capital and Entrepia Ventures.
WWP almost died when the telco equipment market convulsed at the start of the decade. VCs led a $22M recapitalization in World Wide Packets in 2003, followed by $25.5M in 2005 from Craig McCaw and Rally Capital, and then a further $20M led by insiders closed last year.
As a sweetener, Ciena says as part of the acquisition, it has received a multi-year contract for World Wide Packet services from AT&T. It did not disclose the value of the contract.
View - site
Posted at 11:00 AM | Posted to Networking | TrackBack
January 23, 2008
Mobile Ads' AdInfuse Takes On $12M
In announcing that is has just raised $12M, AdInfuse boasts that it is now serving 500M ad impressions per month. That's nothing. This pace may make AdInfuse something special in the mobile advertising game but ad servers for the Web spit that out in a New York minute.
The San Francisco-based startup raised $12M from SoftBank Capital, ComVentures, and Storm Ventures. It had raised $6M previously. AdInfuse is led by CEO Michael Cowley who was VP of Mobile Advertising at Infospace.
Mobile advertising is bound for a shakeout. There are just too many competitors here for a limited number of potential exits. AdMob has also raised $18M in funding; Millennial Media has raised $6.3M, Quattro raised $12.3M, Smaato just raised $3.5M. For exits, Nokia bought Enpocket, while Vodafone Group and Telefonica took minority stakes in Amobee Media Systems, Microsoft bought Tonic and AOL acquired Third Screen Media.
View - site
Posted at 08:23 PM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
Gold Spot Media Does Ad Insertion For Mobile Video
Sunnyvale's GoldSpot Media has raised $3M in Series A funding from Exa Ventures. This seems like very early market timing so the company would be wise to stretch out that cash. The mobile ad marketing is not huge and the mobile video market is a sliver of that. The company is led by CEO Srini Dharmaji who was a consultant at Virgin Mobile.
Goldspot competes with Mobixell which today just launched its product.
View - site
Posted at 08:03 PM | Posted to Advertising | TrackBack
Enterprise Deals: IBM Buys AptSoft. MSFT Gets Calists
IBM is acquiring AptSoft out of Burlington, MA. Financial details were not disclosed. AptSoft competes in the business event processing software arena. It claims to help customers identify patterns and establish connections between events and then initiates a trigger when a trend emerges.
So AptSoft can be used by retailers, for example, to provide real-time analysis of sales trends and alert them to situations where goods may need to be restocked.
Aptsoft had raised funding from Egan-Managed Capital, Portage Venture Partners and Lazard Technology Partners.
View - site
Clearly unhappy with the state of affairs in the virtualization market and the beating it has taken at the hands of VMware., Microsoft is getting agro here. It has just bought a virtualization start-up called Calista Technologies while also expanded its alliance with Citrix Systems in virtualization.
Microsoft acquired Calista for an undisclosed sum. Calista designs technology that helps compress and deliver virtualized desktops running on a remote computer server. Calista Virtual Desktop – which remotes the complete Windows Vista Desktop experience, including aero-glass, 3D graphics, and full multimedia, to a remote desktop protocol (RDP) client, with what the company claims as the look, feel (and performance) of the “real” desktop.
Microsoft plans to release Windows Server 2008 in February. Some time later in the year, Microsoft plans to introduce Hyper-V, an extra software layer that sits between the hardware and operating system that will compete with VMware's main product.
Calista was founded in April 2006 and has its HQ in San Jose. Greylock and Lightspeed invested in Calista.
View - site
Posted at 07:11 PM | Posted to Enterprise Software | TrackBack
WordPress' Automattic Clears $29.5M Round With NY Times
Matt Mullenweg, Toni Schneider and their small band of coders at Automattic are an impressive bunch. They took on Google, Six Apart and others in building the world's best Web publishing platform and so far have prevailed.
Automattic, which brought the WordPress blog platform to the world, has now raised $29.5M in Series B funding. The New York Times Co. joined the round which was led by return backer Polaris Venture Partners (which put in $20M in the round) as well as Radar Ventures and True Ventures. Automattic received $1.1M in financing about two years ago. The New York Times says that in the latest round it invested the smallest amount.
The Wall Street Journal reports that Automattic got a bid late last year from a potential buyer but declined to name the larger Internet company that made the buyout bid. That offer valued Automattic at $150M-$200M and helped prompt the new round of financing. The Journal also reports that some of the $29M will be used to help company founders and others cash out some of their holdings.
View - site