May 07, 2008
PlayPhone Merges With Pitch Entertainment Group
UPDATE: Playphone gets in touch to say that no company bought another company in this deal but rather it was a merger. In our experience, there is always one company that is more powerful than another in mergers and such deals are usually labeled mergers to deal with the egos of the company that is being bought. But at this point there is no information on how much or how money changed hands.
San Jose, CA-based mobile phone content provider PlayPhone has been bought by London-based Pitch Entertainment for an undisclosed amount. PlayPhone's main line of business is distributing mobile games, ring tones, wallpaper, videos and other personalized content for mobile phones. PlayPhone also provides subscription-based mobile portals for some of the world's top entertainment companies.
PlayPhone users can purchase PlayPhone stored value at retail, on the web or through their mobile phone using Premium SMS. Content can then be downloaded directly from PlayPhone's WAP deck or web portal. You can find its products in Target, WalMart, and other mass market retailers. PlayPhone powers WalMart, Sega Mobile, Bandai Wireless, Real Arcade Mobile, ABC Mobile, Cartoon Network, Adult Swim, I-play, Skyzone Mobile, and Macrovision/Trymedia.
During the two most recent quarters, PlayPhone was one of the top 10 most visited mobile phone entertainment web sites.
Last year PlayPhone raised almost $20M from Scale Venture Partners, Cardinal Venture Partners and Menlo Ventures.
Interview with PlayPhone's VP at Adtech
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May 02, 2008
Plusmo First-Rounded For Mobile Widgets
Santa Clara-based Plusmo has raised $4.41M in Series A funding led by New Enterprise Associates, says PEhub. Plusmo launched in June 2006 with funding from the founders, several ex-Googlers including Felicis Investors' Aydin Senkut.
Last summer, Plusmo launched 20K widgets for the iPhone.
By Web widget standards, Plusmo is still not terribly big. Plusmo says they average about 10M mobile page views monthly. But they do have less competition so they should be well positioned in a couple of years. Plusmo has been successful at getting publishers to create widgets.
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Posted at 08:10 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
April 17, 2008
UK Mobile VoIP Operator Truphone Raises $32.7M
London's Truphone has raised $32.7M in Series B funding led by undisclosed investors, who were backed by by return backers Burda Digital Ventures, Independent News & Media, Eden Ventures and Wellington Partners Venture Capital.
Truphone is a mobile operator whereby you can get free or low-cost mobile phone calls via the internet.
Truphone recently bought SIM4travel, which it says will enable it to offer low-cost GSM calls worldwide via a travel SIM.
In December 2006, Truphone raised $24.5M in Series A funding, which was the largest Series A venture funding of 2006 for the tech sector.
Truphone has some very well funded competitors including Jajah and Gizmo.
See a demo of VoIP on the iPhone via Truphone
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April 02, 2008
Vlingo Wins Product and Financial Backing From Yahoo!
The hot heat might be on Yahoo! but that hasn't stopped the company from doing deals with startups. Today Yahoo! announced that it would join a $20M series B round in Cambridge, MA-based mobile voice software maker Vlingo. The round included existing investors Charles River Venturesand Sigma Partners. The funding brings the company's total venture capital raised to $26.5M since it was founded in 2006.
Vlingo was founded by its CTO Michael Phillips who was a research scientist at MIT and also founded a speech company that was bought by Nuance for $220M. Its CEO is Dave Grannan who was GM of Mobile Email at Nokia.
As demonstrated in this video, Vlingo makes voice-enabled applications for cell phones that allow users to activate enabled text fields using only voice prompts, including notes to self, text messaging and e-mail.
At the CTIA Wireless conference in Las Vegas Yahoo! Connected Life announced a new voice-activated version of Yahoo’s oneSearch mobile search engine powered by Vlingo’s speech-recognition technology.
The catch is that it can currently owned by used on the Blackberry. Try it here if you have the right hardware.
We like the application - a lot. It's getting scary trying to key in phone numbers when driving in traffic. It's only a matter of time before it's curtains. So we are looking forward to upgrading to the blackberry and using this.
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March 27, 2008
Panasonic Backs Smart Remote Control's Zen-sys
As homes get bigger and get more electronic gear and as people get used to managing everything with a mouse, remote controls need to get better damn it.
Panasonic has invested an undisclosed sum in Z-Wave developer Zensys. Z-Wave is an RF-wireless home-control standard that competes with directional IR in standard TV and home theater remote controls.
The two-way, low-power mesh-network technology is currently used in more than 170 products sold by partners in lighting, appliances, HVAC, entertainment centers and security systems.
Promotional video from one of Zensys users - Hawking Technology
Fremont, CA-based Zensys has raised funding from raised over $44M from Intel Capital, Cisco, Bessemer Venture Partners, Palamon Capital Partners and Sunstone Capital.
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March 24, 2008
Israeli Zoolander Handset Maker Modu Raises $100M
We get ribbed a fair amount for the smallness of our cell phone. We keep it on hand because we don't like sitting all day on a large piece of metal and glass. And if you have ever seen the Ben Stiller movie Zoolander you know that tiny phones are sheik.
We like the idea behind Israel's Modu, a handset maker that has created a catalog of phones that let you go out at night with a smallish phone but slap on a additional component so that you can get and receive email and surf the Web by day. Modu seems to have hired a gang of product designers to build an infinate number of skins or shells that you insert your core phone into. The company plans to sell the shells for cheap so that you can give them to mates or go through them as fashion statements.
Modu has just closed a $100M round of funding to take its products to market according to Globes, at a Pre-money $150M valuation. Modu was founded eighteen months ago by Dov Moran, who founded msystems which he sold to SanDisk for $1.6B (he's now moran). Modu has raised $20M from Genesis Partners, Gemini Israel Funds, SanDisk and from Moran.
Modu announced it had signed a collaboration agreement with Universal Music Group (UMG) for the development of specialized jackets.
Read - Globes
Posted at 02:46 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
March 03, 2008
Tmobile Joins Google in Backing Of UK Femtocell Startup Ubiquisys
We have reported on the UK's Ubiquisys as it is one of the hotter startups in Europe, having raised funding from Google at an early stage for its femtocells business. Now at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona we learn that T-Mobile is investing in Ubiquisys, plus T-Mobile is trialling Ubiquisys.
UbiquiSys' "ZoneGate" delivers cellular coverage in the home at landline/VOIP rates, enabling mobile operators to compete with fixed line and VOIP providers. The company's pitch is that its femtocell technology will reduce costs for mobile operators, foster new revenue streams, improve user experience and will drive a culture of usage for next generation services. The Femtocell business is exciting to end users because we believe that most people want a single mobile phone for all their telephony needs. They want to be reached at one number, anytime and anywhere.
Recent interview with the firm's VP of marketing (fountain noise in the background makes it tough to make-out)
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February 11, 2008
Rebuffed By Yahoo!, MSFT Buys Danger Inc.
Danger Inc. recently filed for an IPO, but Microsoft has stepped in to snatch the Palo Alto-based wireless handset hardware+software maker. No financial terms have yet been disclosed.
What does this say about Microsoft and the M&A environment? The Yahoo! deal is important but it's just of may M&A balls that MSFT has in the air. Also, given the lousy market environment, selling to MSFT at a fair price is not a bad option for most.
Danger has raised around $142M in total VC funding since 2000, including a Series E round in late 2006 at a post-money valuation of around $187M (PeWire number). Top shareholders are Mobius Venture Capital, Redpoint Ventures, T-Mobile, Softbank Capital, Motorola, Meritech Capital Partners and VSP Capital.
Danger and its partners have done a nice job partnering with celebs like NBA Phenom Dwayne Wade who has his own line of Sidekick.
BTW - we have owned several of Danger's Sidekick's and found them to be sound, if fragile devices. They don't have the brands of Blackberry or iPhone but Microsoft seems to have made a strong purchase here. Also interesting is that Andy Rubin, one of the founders of Danger Inc. is now running the show on Google's wireless world.
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February 07, 2008
Yet Another MVNO - Voce - Says Its Last Goodbye
Has there been any more troubled venture concept over the past couple of years than the MVNO? Answer: no.
We would have bet that Voce would go out of business and it has. Voce was a wireless plan that targets the Paris Hiltons of the world. It had rolled out in LA with plans for New York and SF.
The promise was:
- Unlimited local and long distance calls.
- Trained personal assistants to make restaurant recommendations and reservations, book travel plans, and generally provide 4 Seasons concierge type research.
- Free annual hardware upgrades.
- Luggage delivery service, private jet service, and more.
For this you paid a$500 initiation fee. Monthly usage fees for unlimited calls and a 24/7 personal concierge service were $200 per month. It was only able to sign 2000 customers.
The company was not backed by VCs but rather fund managers. Faith Communications recently sold it to Chicago's SunCal Midwest, a property of SunCal Funds.
Engadget has the painful story that Voce's COO learned of his own company's demise when his own cell phone service ceased to work.
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Posted at 02:09 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
Benchmark Puts $4.5M Into Dumb>Smart Phones' Numobiq
Numobiq has won a $4.5M Series A round of funding from Benchmark Capital for its concept to make your crummy cell phone more like a Blackberry. Numobiq was founded by three entrepreneurs who spent their careers at Sun Microsystems. What's the summary judgement? There is no product to judge yet. The company's marketing and messaging is primitive man. This looks like a 2009 deal if that.
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February 06, 2008
XinLab Raises $8.1M For Mobile Server
Fremont's XinLab has raised $8.1M in Series A funding led by New Enterprise Associates. The startup has developed a multimedia server for wireless content. Founded in 2000, that strikes us as a lon, long time between founding and its first funding round.
The firm's marketing is rough but its promise is to search over 10M clips and pictures from around the Internet on your mobile and share with your friends via SMS. It seems that they will either have to get much better at marketing or partner with people who can do it.
You can demo the firm's product here.
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February 05, 2008
Blue Frog Media Croaks
Having raised $16M from Canaan Partners and MK Capital, Seattle's Blue Frog Mobile has filed for bankruptcy protection and counts liabilities up to $1M. The Seattle PI tries to document the ugliness of the situation and finds that those who should be working 24/7 to unwind the company have jumped ship. Board member Maha Ibrahim of Canaan Partners resigned as did its last CEO Victor Siegel who moved on. The paper gets this ugly quote: "No one really knows who is running the company," said the shareholder, who asked that his name not be used. "The venture capitalists deserted the company and kind of left it adrift." If true, we find it stunning that the bankruptcy filing was made by an IT admin at the firm, who we assume was compelled to do so as he was facing pressure from creditors and couldn't find anyone else to man up.
What is odd about Blue Frog is that it competed in the ringtone business, which we believe most competent companies could make a living at. How on Earth could they have blown through so much funding so fast? It seems they really wanted to be in interactive TV and that's where much of their capital was blown.
In December, Blue Frog Media said it had cut about 55 employees and shut down its Hispanic music channel called BullaTV. About 75% of the headcount cut came in Mexico and the Philippines. At the time, it still employed 235 worldwide.
Posted at 11:37 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
January 10, 2008
Aruba Pays $37M For Airwave Wireless
Aruba Networks (Nasdaq: ARUN) is buying San Mateo-based Airwave Wireless and will pay $37M. Airwave makes WLAN management software. Airwave had raised funding from Ignition Partners, Idealab and Westbury Equity Partners.
Says Ovum Research: "The two companies have largely disjointed customer bases and so this merger will give both a substantial expansion of their addressable market. Airwave has some very large customers, and gives the capability to manage 50,000 devices. Many of its users choose it even if they have a single vendor wireless network because of its superior management interface, reporting and diagnostic capabilities; according to Aruba most Airwave users are Cisco customers, who choose to use the Airwave management software in preference to Cisco's own. Its other big selling point is that it allows enterprises to migrate gradually to newer technology and avoid the need for disruptive 'big bang' changes."
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January 09, 2008
Kleiner's Bad Hand Continues With Frontline Fiasco
2007 was a rough year for Kleiner Perkins. The firm has some great PR coups thanks to the addition of Al Gore to its staff and its green tech investments but most of these deals appear that they will not pay off for some time. In the meantime, Kleiner has not participated in many of the deals that paid rewards last year.
Kleiner is off to a rocky start with word that one of its most ambitious wireless deals - Frontline - has been forced to shutter after the startup failed to come up with the cash necessary to buy spectrum licenses. To get into the game, Frontline was required to put up $128M that last Thursday but it didn't have that kind of money in the bank.
Frontline was founded by Reed Hundt, who was chairman of the FCC, along with veteran wireless executives and a group of elite Silicon Valley venture capitalists. John Doerr was on the board along with James Barksdale and Ram Shriram.
Read - RCR Wireless
Posted at 02:15 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
January 04, 2008
Meraki Fills In For Failed Google/Earthlink Project By Provding Free Wireless To SF
San Francisco's population is around 800K and 40K of them are getting free Internet access from a Mountain View startup called Meraki. San Franciscans were set to enjoy free access from a partnership formed by Google, Earthlink and the city government but that failed due to civic infighting. The beauty of Meraki is that it doesn't rely on city funds rather the company asks volunteers to place repeaters on their windows and rooftops to provide the signal to the neighborhood. So far the project has a 2 mile by 2 mile footprint - the compact city is only 7 miles by 7 miles so Meraki doesn't have far to go to cover the place. Meraki hopes to finish the job by the end of the year.
So how is Meraki financing the venture? Well it just raised $20M in funding from Sequoia Capital DAG Venture, Northgate Capital and existing investor. It has raised $5M from Sequoia and Google. It also makes some money from ads served to users. Merakis core business is to sell equipment.
It may not sounds like there is much sophisticated technology here but in fact Meraki has created inexpensive routers and a back-end networking service that balances available bandwidth between the routers and users which makes for more efficient bandwidth.
Meraki's To Be Launched Solar Unit
Meraki How To Video
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December 21, 2007
Qualcomm Buys Noise Cancellation's Softmax
Qualcomm has acquired SoftMax. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. San Diego-based SoftMax makes voice algorithms for signal separation, echo cancellation, and signal processing, enabling mobile devices to separate a person's voice from background noises. It runs on cell phones, VoIP phones, and laptops. Broadcom recently began offering SoftMax's noise reduction technology on its Bluetooth headset platform.
SoftMax was spunout of The Salk Institute and the University of California, San Diego in 1989 and is headed by founder Te-Won Lee.
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Posted at 11:32 AM | Permalink
Zeetoo Funded For CellPhone Joystick
Spanish VC firm Nauta, together with Commonwealth Ventures and Egan Capital have invested in Boston's Zeetoo. The total transaction amount is 4.7M Euros. Zeetoo is a technology licensing company focused on harnessing the abilities of the human hand to make text entry faster and easier on hand held devices including cell phones. Zeetoo’s first commercial product is a wireless joystick for mobile gaming that is designed to improve the user experience for next generation mobile games.
Zeetoo is led by Dr. Beth Marcus who says she has been involved in 9 start-ups in a variety of fields as a founder, investor, or advisor. She has raised private equity several times and has also done angel investments. Three of these ventures have been acquired by public companies - including Exos which was bought by Microsoft in 1996. The resulting product was the SideWinder Force Feedback Pro joystick.
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Posted at 11:16 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
December 20, 2007
iPhone Competitor Danger Inc. Files IPO
Is Wall Street ready to back a company with the threatening name Danger. Inc.? We'll see. Founded in 200, the Palo Alto-based startup has filed for an IPO.
The Danger Hiptop, also sold as the T-Mobile Sidekick, is a GPRS/EDGE mobile phone with wireless Internet capabilities and some functionality similar to a PDA. Danger provides the Hiptop OS software and back-end services for the device. These include downloadable software applications, email hosting, instant messaging and web proxies. Danger's key partners are Sharp and Motorola which manufacture the devices and Tmobile which markets and distributes them.
For the year ended September 30, Danger reported a loss of $28.1M, compared with a loss of $21M the previous year. Revenue rose 14% to $56.4 million from $49.3M in the prior year. Danger had a slew of investors, including Redpoint, Mobius Tmobile's Tventures, Sharp, Motorola, and Orange Ventures. The latest round was Series D in 2003 when it raised $35M which brought total funding to $77M.
The Hiptop is on its 5th version.
Posted at 12:03 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
December 07, 2007
Catcher Buys Outdoor WiFi's Vivato
We are here in Las Vegas where getting WiFi seems to be always on our minds. At the convention center people are forking over big dollars to get area coverage from some vendor that nobody has ever heard of. So it strikes us that outdoor WiFi might be a nice niche market, at least until city wide wireless systems come into view. But such plans have led networking hardware startups to the graveyard.
Spokane, WA-based Vivato says today that it has been bought by the Catcher Holdings (OTC Bulletin Board: CTHH). Catcher is paying 2.5M shares of Catcher's common stock (they are currently trading at around $0.75 per share). Vivato makes boxes that will provide you with WiFi base stations which provide up to 2.5 miles of coverage outdoors as well as Micro and Pico Cells used to fill coverage gaps.
Vivato has been a big disappointment. It has been one of the largest investment vehicles in the Wi-Fi space with well over $60M raised. In June 2006, investors bought out the assets for the former Vivato.
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Catcher Holdings, Inc. Acquires Vivato Networks, Inc.
Combination Creates Best in Class Mobile Platforms for Ruggedized Computing
and Communications with Infrastructure Supporting Wireless Mobility
LEESBURG, Va., Dec. 5 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Catcher Holdings, Inc.,
(OTC Bulletin Board: CTHH), (http://www.catcherinc.com), a leader in
ruggedized, portable handheld computing platforms for security
applications, first responders, and field personnel, completed its
acquisition of Vivato Networks, Inc. (http://www.vivato.net). Catcher
acquired 100% of the common stock of Vivato for 2,500,000 shares of
Catcher's common stock
The new company is delivering extended range, wireless network
infrastructure and multi-functional client platforms combined with
standards-based solutions to the global mobile workforce. Combining the
capabilities of both companies is providing synergies, yielding a systems
level approach, addressing multiple market segments with mobile computing,
communications and application solutions. Customers in a wide range of
markets including military, homeland security, integrated public safety,
municipal, transportation and logistics will benefit from true systems
level solutions, addressing the harshest and most demanding mobile
application environments.
"We are excited about the powerful combination of Catcher's advanced
biometric-driven application platform with Vivato's wireless infrastructure
solutions in addressing global security applications," says Hal Turner,
Chief Executive Officer, Catcher Holdings, Inc. "It's all about increasing
functionality and delivering a solutions-approach, independent of the
network, equipment or underlying technology."
Vivato provides a wireless infrastructure capability for both fixed and
portable network solutions combining Vivato's patented packet steering,
phased array technology with an FCC approved enhanced signal output that
enables high performance wireless connectivity in emergency situations
where traditional wireless products fail to meet the demanding
requirements. The technology allows for an increased ability to penetrate
into structures and provides greater coverage for large outdoor areas. This
is especially important during emergency situations when existing networks
are down or non existent. When combining Vivato's patented technology with
the Catcher platform, clients will benefit from an end-to-end
standards-based mobile platform for communication, regardless of the
environment, linking field personnel and command centers through streams of
biometric, GPS, video and audio data.
"Vivato has developed unique and compelling technology to deploy
wireless mobility where it is needed, and is an ideal complement to the
Catcher platforms," said Gary Haycox, Chief Executive Officer, Vivato
Networks. "Combining the technologies of both companies creates a strong
business synergy enabling Catcher to deliver new and exciting capabilities
for customers requiring mobility in the harshest and most demanding
environments. Customers will have the ability to deploy mobile solutions
with far greater flexibility, reach and functionality than ever before."
About Catcher Holdings, Inc.
Catcher Holdings, Inc.'s wholly owned subsidiary, Catcher, Inc., is the
developer of the CATCHER(TM). The CATCHER is the culmination of new
technology breakthroughs, extensive research and product development that
the Company believes will meet the needs of many government agencies and
commercial entities for a ruggedized, portable, handheld computer,
communications and telemetry control device. The unit was designed and
engineered to provide field personnel and "First Responders" access to
mission-critical information in the form of wireless or wired, real-time
bi-directional voice, video, text, telemetry and data-enabling command
center personnel to remotely view an incident or job site. The device
weighs just 5.8 lbs. when equipped with two batteries that can last up to 8
hours, and, without the batteries, weighs 3.8 lbs. The CATCHER is 10 inches
wide, 7.25 inches tall, 2.25 inches deep, with a sunlight-viewable 6.4-inch
diagonal VGA LCD backlit touch screen. Photographs and detailed
descriptions of the new CATCHER device are available on the company's
website at http://www.catcherinc.com.
About Vivato Networks, Inc.
Vivato Networks, Inc. is a wireless systems infrastructure and services
company with technology that is based upon an innovative signal processing
and antenna design. Vivato's unique patented system architecture enables
cost-effective, large-scale outdoor and indoor wireless deployments for
metros, rural communities, government (defense, homeland security,
emergency management), integrated public safety, airports, seaports,
railroads, construction sites, warehouses and universities. Vivato
Networks' Professional Services division, GSE, provides wireless network
design and integration, and develops aggregated, standards-based solutions
and applications for various industry segments. Vivato is headquartered in
Portland, Oregon and has research and manufacturing facilities in Spokane,
WA. Additional information about Vivato Networks is available at
http://www.vivato.com.
Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements: This press release
contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private
Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 involving known and unknown risks,
delays, and uncertainties that may cause the Company's actual results or
performance to differ materially from those expressed or implied by these
forward-looking statements. These risks, delays, and uncertainties include,
but are not limited to: the risks associated with the integration of
Vivato's business and products with the Company's business and products,
the risk that the combined company's products may not be accepted in the
market at or near anticipated levels and other risks which are discussed in
the Company's filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission. The
Company undertakes no obligation to update any forward-looking statements.
Contact information
-------------------
Investor Relations:
Jeff Salzwedel
jeff@sfcinc.com
503.722.7300
Company:
Denis McCarthy
Chief Financial Officer
dmccarthy@catcherinc.com
925.949.8309
Posted at 01:43 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
December 05, 2007
Nokia Buys PC To Cell Phone's Avvenu
The idea with Avvenu is that mobile business people often need to access files from their work PC or their Mac at home from their Blackberry at the airport. Using Avvenu you can get these files even if your PC is shut down. Nokia has acquired Palo Alto's Avvenu. No financial terms were disclosed. Avvenu had raised around $10M since 2005 from Charles River Ventures, Motorola and Worldview Technology Partners.
Avvenu used its technology to launch a music player which retrieves music files from your remote PC to your phone.
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Posted at 11:49 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
Buzzwire Funded For Multimedia Streaming To Cell Phones
Buzzwire sounds cool enough. The site streams online audio, video and radio to mobile phones. And unlike competitors like MobiTV, Buzzwire doesn't require that you download a player. Buzzwire also enjoys what could be a rather non-competitive field at the moment. The trouble is that from what we have seen Buzzwire hasn't figured out how to market itself as consumer uptake is not strong. Its plan it so partner with carriers and have them figure out how to market it.
Buzziwre has just raised $8M in Series B funding. Sequel Venture Partners led the round, and was joined by return backers Matrix Partners and Spark Capital. Buzzwire is jointly headquartered in Denver and Boston. CEO Andrew MacFarlane was a co-founder of Software.com which did an IPO in 1999. He stayed on when it merged with Phone.com to create Openwave. With the new cash, Buzzwire's plan is to take the Buzzwire to other countries where wireless tech is a further down the road.
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Posted at 11:07 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
November 25, 2007
Advasense Wants To Make Your Cell Phone Cam Less Crap
Israel's Advasense has raised another $6M. We have been tracking Advasense for the past year and we don't detect much progress in terms of deals to get their cell phone cameras chips into people's hands. But investors must believe that the deals are at hand.
Advasense says that its chips will make the quality of your cell phone camera 's pics the equivalent of the pics that your digital camera spits out. Sounds great and we can't wait to see it in action.
This latest round comes from Taiwanese VC firm CIDC Consultants. Advasense had raised $14M this year from Genesis Partners, Giza Venture Capital, BlueRun Ventures and Venture Tech Alliance.
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Posted at 11:31 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
November 19, 2007
Motorola Invests in Israel's Mobimate
Israel's Mobimate has createed a useful tool called Mobimate that helps Blackberry users with better information than they can get from customer support people at the airport. So when your flight is delayed or canceled, you are notified and get a list of alternative flights. Upon arrival, you get your itinerary, local time and weather, and directions to your next destination. All of this data you could piece together yourself by using something like Expedia, Mapquest, etc. But Mobimate has brought this together for you and pushes it to you so you don't have to surf the web to get when you are in a time crunch.
Mobimate has been funded by a group of big shot angel investors. They include John Sculley, Richard Rosenblatt, Michael Price (Evercore Partners founder) and Michael Targoff (Loral Space's CEO). Today the company announced it had raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Motorola.
If you are interested, you can download for free. It has some functions for free but the core service will cost you he extended functionality and more on-the-ball Internet-to-phone alert services have raised the yearly rate from $75 to $100.
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Posted at 11:28 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
November 12, 2007
Motorola Invests In Payment By Cell Phone's Vivotech
We are fairly impressed with the variety of wireless eCommerce that Vivotech deploys. Vivotech has units that can interact with your cell phone whether you are at movie theaters, restaurants, stores, gas stations, in taxis, or using a vending machines. And Vivotech has a different unit for each situation.
The startup says it has more than 330K units deployed in 27 countries.
The idea her is that rather than whip out your wallet and credit card, a consumer will use his mobile phones to make payments and redeem coupons. They just download credit, debit, or gift card and data into their cell phones.
Today VivOTech announced that Motorola had made an investment of an undisclosed amount. This may be delayed news as VivOTech has been saying for sometime that an un-named Fortune 500 company was part of its investment group. Other VivOtech investors include First Data Corporation, NCR, Nokia, Alloy Ventures, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, DFJ Gotham Ventures, and Miven Venture Partners. Last August, it raised $22.5M in series C.
Press Release Source: Motorola, Inc.
Motorola Makes Strategic Investment in ViVOtech
Monday November 12, 11:37 am ET
SCHAUMBURG, Ill. and SANTA CLARA, Calif., Nov. 12 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Motorola, Inc. (NYSE: MOT - News) through its Motorola Ventures strategic venture capital arm, today announced that it has made an equity investment in ViVOtech Inc., an acknowledged leader in contactless and mobile phone payment technologies. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
Unlike other contactless technology offerings available on the mobile application market today, ViVOtech's platform is designed for easy collaboration among issuers, mobile operators and technology providers to deliver the most intuitive and integrated consumer experience across a range of new customer services.
"Motorola continues to invest in new technologies that enable consumers to expand the value and functionality of the mobile phone," says Reese Schroeder, managing director, Motorola Ventures. "This investment reflects Motorola's commitment to building and participating in a world class mobile commerce ecosystem."
"ViVOtech creates more value for financial institutions and retailers by enabling the electronic payment transaction process," said Michael Mullagh, ViVOtech's chief executive officer. "Our platform is transforming the way consumers spend money, make payments and purchases -- making it so simple that any mobile phone user can securely and easily buy items with a simple wave of the mobile device at one of our NFC-powered contactless readers."
Today's on-the-go consumers are looking for simplified and more secure ways to pay for goods and services. Near Field Communication (NFC) technology is broadening the usefulness of mobile devices through short-range wireless connectivity which enables the phone to interact with payment systems for a wide variety of transactions, including those at the point-of-sale, ATMs and kiosks. Additionally, this connectivity allows for location-based personalized loyalty, coupon and promotion programs, and user authentication for check-in at airline and hotel self-service stations. ViVOtech's comprehensive NFC technology offerings enable these new mobile features to provide best-in-class payment transactions at merchant locations all over the world.
About ViVOtech
ViVOtech is the market leader in Near Field Communication (NFC) mobile payments, promotions, and over the air (OTA) provisioning infrastructure software, transaction management software, NFC smart posters, and Contactless terminals. These innovative solutions allow millions of consumers to make Contactless payments with radio frequency-enabled credit/debit cards, fobs, and NFC mobile phones. ViVOtech's products are used by the most prominent retailers all over the world. With more than 330,000 units deployed in 27 countries, ViVOtech products are used at movie theaters, fast food restaurants (QSR), casual dining establishments, convenience stores, gas stations, drug stores, grocery stores, buses, taxicabs, kiosks and vending machines, enabling a wide variety of businesses to accept Contactless/NFC payments and promotions. In addition to Motorola, ViVOtech's investors include First Data Corporation, NCR, Nokia, Alloy Ventures, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, DFJ Gotham Ventures, Miven Venture Partners, and an undisclosed Fortune 500 company. For more information about ViVOtech's innovative solutions please visit http://www.vivotech.com.
Posted at 04:52 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
November 08, 2007
Allen & Co Backs GPShopper
Media investment bank Allen & Co. has made an investment of an undisclosed amount in mobile product-search company GPShopper. The startup's CEO and founder Alex Muller says that almost a million shoppers use his firm's downloadable application or mobile Web site each month.
NYC-based GPShopper has launched a service, dubbed Slifter, that lets consumers use their cellphones to find local stores that have a specific product in stock. Slifter claims data on more than 100M products that are sold in more than 100K store locations, including Best Buy and Toys "R" Us. In June Sprint Nextel began offering the Slifter application for download to its customers. Then in September, Nokia started offering Slifter on its phones that are GPS enabled.
Slifter is a sweet application. The only hitch is is that a download costs $1.99 per month but that's the wireless world.
Allen & Co. Invests In Mobile Product-Search Startup
Dow Jones
November 08, 2007: 03:30 PM EST
NEW YORK -(Dow Jones)- Allen & Co. LLC, the secretive New York boutique investment bank, has made an investment of an undisclosed size in closely held mobile product-search company GPShopper LLC.
While the influential bank declined to discuss the terms of the deal, Executive Vice President Paul Gould said Allen & Co. does not intend to take an active role in GPShopper's operations and has not stipulated how the funds should be used.
"We have a lot of faith in them being able to implement the business," Gould said.
GPShopper, also of New York, offers a service, dubbed Slifter, that lets consumers use their cellphones to find local stores that have a specific product in stock. Slifter has information on more than 100 million products, from digital cameras to baby strollers, that are sold in more than 100,000 store locations, including major retailers like Best Buy Co. (BBY) and Toys "R" Us Inc.
Nearly a million shoppers use Slifter's downloadable application or mobile Web site each month, Chief Executive and founder Alex Muller said. Retailers provide inventory data to the company and pay it a fee whenever shoppers click on a link to a product listing, much as advertisers pay search engines like Google for clicks on text advertisements.
Gould said online shopping and shopping through mobile devices are growth areas that interest Allen & Co., which has relationships with companies such as Google Inc. (GOOG), Viacom Inc. (VIA) and News Corp. (NWS). (The firm advised News Corp. in its pending acquisition of Dow Jones & Co. (DJ), publisher of this newswire.)
Allen & Co., founded in 1922 by brothers Herbert and Charles Allen, rarely discusses its investments or business dealings. Yet, it is highly influential, attracting the biggest names in the industry to its exclusive annual retreat in Sun Valley, Idaho.
The firm's attention - and connections - should give a shot in the arm to GPShopper, which got its big break in June when Sprint Nextel Corp. (S) began offering the Slifter application for download to its customers. Sprint lets subscribers use their phones' global-positioning system, or GPS, capabilities to make searching for local stores easier. Absent GPS technology, Slifter users must type in a city and state or zip code, along with their product search terms, to find items in local stores.
At the end of September, Nokia Corp. (NOK) began offering the Slifter application to users of its N95 mobile devices and other N series and E series phones, which are GPS enabled. Nokia is GPShopper's first big handset partner. The handset maker's devices can be used on any GSM carrier's network, which in the U.S. is primarily AT&T Corp. (T).
"Our application is seeing some pretty good acceptance in the marketplace," Muller said. "Carriers and handset makers have started to notice," and more deals are in the pipeline, he said, though he declined to name potential new partners.
-By Riva Richmond, Dow Jones Newswires; 201-938-5670; riva.richmond@ dowjones.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
11-08-07 1530ET
Copyright (c) 2007 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
Posted at 07:59 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
November 06, 2007
Thank You: Anchorfree Launches Free WiFi Network
We're staying at a hotel next month that apparently charges $20 a night for wifi access. We've seen worse but that sucks. So we are pulling for Anchorfree which launched today at Ad:tech. The startup is offering free, ad-supported Wi-fi.
In May 2006, Anchorfree raised $6M for the venture. Investors included Bert Roberts, former chairman and CEO of MCI; RENN Capital Group, and others. Part of the funding went to buy MetroFreeFi. As a result of that deal, Anchorfree says it acquired 10,000 hotspots.
Anchorfree's chief selling point to advertisers is that they can geo-target their ad campaigns as hotspots know exactly where ad viewers are sitting. It says it has signed on as advertisers: American Express, AirTran, Circuit City, Clorox, Ford, Harrah's, Kaiser Permanente, Major League Baseball, McDonald's, Princess Cruises, Prudential, Qwest and Toyota.
AnchorFree says it has also signed with seven hotspot operators, including Deep Blue Wireless, Lodgenet, and WiFi Guys. If you run hotspots, Anchorfree will throw in free wireless hardware on top of an ad rev share.
View - site
Posted at 02:12 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
November 01, 2007
NBC Invests In Text Messaging's 4Info
NBC's Peacock Equity has taken an undisclosed stake in 4Info, which offers ad-supported sports scores, weather info, and gossip to subscribers via mobile phone text messages. Adweek speculates that Peacock put in around $10M.
Founded in 2004, San Mateo-based 4INfo had raised funding from US Venture Partners, Draper Fisher Jurvetson, and Gannett.
Key to the deal is the NBC properties will begin to use 4Info. For, example Deal or No Deal, which allows viewers to vote by text message and those messages will be ad-supported. As if that is not big enough, 4INFO-produced fantasy-sports content, along with ads, will be integrated into nbcsports.com and NBC Sunday Night Football.
Read - Hollywood reporter
Posted at 01:41 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
October 23, 2007
Wimax's Navini Goes For $330M To Cisco
It wasn't that long ago that Cisco was dis'ing Wimax. But the rumors were true - Cisco is now buying a WiMax startup, paying $330M in cash an stock for Texas-based Navini. Candidates were Candidates are: Alvarion (Nasdaq: ALVR), Aperto Networks, and Redline Communications.
Navini has been so well funded that its hard to imagine that many investors made out in grand style. It last raised $50M in series F. The company has raised a total of about $203M in venture backing since 2000. Investors in Navini included Arcapita Ventures, Austin Ventures, Granite Ventures, Intel Capital, Investor AB, Lehman Brothers, Sequoia Capital and Sternhill Partners, among others.
Read - CNET
Posted at 10:55 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
ADC Courts LGC Wireless With $169M Buyout
San Jose's LGC Wireless has been acquired by ADC Telecommunications for $169M in cash. LGC sells wireless hardware for indoor cellular coverage in offices. Founded in 1996, LGC says it did roughly $83M in revenues in the past 12 months. It goes head to head with Andrew Corp. and Cisco.
In 2005, LGC raised $11M in a late-stage mezzanine financing. The round was led by Rembrandt Venture Partners, along with nearly all existing investors. LGC Wireless had raised $91M to date.
Read - announcement
Posted at 01:57 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
October 17, 2007
Motricity Finalizes $135M Deal To Buy Infospace Mobile
Motricity has closed its long rumored buyout of the mobile unit owned by InfoSpace. Motricity will pay $135M in cash. This is a huge deal for a private company, even though Motricity has raised more than $180M from Carl Icahn, Technology Crossover Ventures, New Enterprise Associates, and others. CEO Ryan Wuerch said that the company is in the process of raising a round worth about $185M to finance the InfoSpace deal.
Infospace Mobile provides mobile search, storefronts, and messaging services.Because InfoSpace is public, we know that InfoSpace Mobile narrowed its loss to $3.6M in the quarter ended June 30 from $7.7M in the same period a year ago. Revenue for the latest quarter were $30.7M which is down about !45M from the prior year's quarter.
Read - announcement
Posted at 01:14 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
October 11, 2007
Mobivox Raises $11M For Free/Cheap VoIP Calling Service
Montreal's MobiVox promotes free and cut-rate International phone calling from any mobile or landline phone has raised $11M. The startup is led by Stephane Marceau who was VP of VoIp at Bell Canada.
Mobivox is straightforward. You get a local access number from their Web site and call it. Your call is answered by a robot voice who asks who you want to reach then you get put through. There are some roadblocks in calling to and from certain countries and those are more frequent on mobile phones but the list of countries is large. It charges for International calls, though the cost is typically cents per minute.
Mobivox has too many competitors to count but Skype is the best known. Mobivox's take on Skype is that it lacks to ability to make calls on mobile phones and requires users to download software. Other competitors include EQO and iSkoot.
Mobivox's Series A was led byIDG Ventures Boston led with IDG Ventures China, IDG Ventures Vietnam and seed funders Brightspark Ventures and Skypoint Capital. It had raised $3M in its seed round.
View - site
Read - announcement
Posted at 11:28 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
October 10, 2007
SendMe Buys Mobile SocNet Mbuzzy
San Francisco-based SendMe has acquired Mbuzzy. Mbuzzy was founded by Ryan Nobrega in June 2003. Mbuzzy isn't saying how many users they have, just that it does over 1/4 of a million downloads per month. It is a mobile sharing site where users can post photos, videos, ringtones, etc.
SendMeMobile.com and its other site SoLow.com have raised funding from True Ventures, Amicus and Spark Capital. The amount of the deal was not disclosed.
Posted at 06:34 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
Catalyst Mobile Funded To Power Cell Phone Music Schemes
Catalyst Mobile out of Emervyille has raised $10M in Series B led by Sofinnova Ventures with DCM. Catalyst has created music distribution services. It flagship to date is the deployment of a joint service in Japan with Warner Music Group for brands such as Garfield, The First which publishes the official magazine of the Beijing Olympic Organizing Committee, and Dorling Kindersley in China.
Catalyst feels more on the drawing more than ready for prime time at this point. It says it is providing the tech to give it partners and their users access to music recommendations, streaming music, play-lists, music identification, custom music vault, search and community.
Read - announcement
Posted at 01:50 AM | TrackBack | Permalink
September 28, 2007
Cisco Closing Deal To Buy Wimax Station Maker
A deal where Cisco is buying a Wimax base station maker has proceeded to legal before an announcement in the next couple of weeks reports Light Reading. Candidates are: Alvarion (Nasdaq: ALVR), Aperto Networks , Navini Networks, and Redline Communications. If Cisco goes with Alviron it would be an Earth shaker as the Israel-based public company has market cap of $867M+.
As recently as 2 years ago, Cisco had been dismissive of the WiFi market and now it might have t pay a price for that assessment. Light Reading also cites speculation that Cisco is interested in a buying femtocell maker and a WiMax Access Services Network Gateway vendor.
Posted at 04:50 PM | TrackBack | Permalink
September 27, 2007
Google Buys Mobile Apps' Zingku & Its Ripple9 Site
Boston-based Zingku is the brainchild of MIT-educated Sami Shalabi who launched the startup in May 2006. Before that he was with IBM for half a decade. His co-CEOs are Mussie Shore, who was CTO at McKinsey, and Marty Fahey, who was CEO of publicly traded Webhire.
Zingku is a tool to supercharge txt messaging. Zingku also powers another site owned by Shalabi called Ripple9, which is really just a vertical application of Zingku, where musicians are encouraged to promote themselves. Ripple9 explains that "Ultimately we'll be offering the service to anyone who makes creative works, but initially we are focusing purely on musicians."
Ripple9 enables musicians and bands to use the web and mobile phones to send mobile fliers, text messages, ring tones, wallpapers, gig alerts, etc. to their fan base.
Today, Google announced that it had bought Zingku assets. No price was released. Flagship Ventures invested in Zingku in May 2006. Accounts on Zingku and Ripple9 are both frozen to new users. This is another case of Google buying a relatively obscure software company and likely not paying much for it. We know Google like to hire and buy highly educated folks