More funding for mobile ads: AdMob raises $12.5M
Mobile ad network AdMob has raised a $12.5 million addition to its latest round of venture funding, bringing its third round to $28.2 million in all.
In a blog post announcing the funding, chief executive Omar Hamoui says the new cash will help AdMob “cement our leadership position by making the investments that will help us to come out of this challenging economic environment even stronger than when we went in.” The San Mateo, Calif.-based … Continue Reading
TechForward lets you sell back your used electronics at guaranteed prices
Buyers remorse is common when it comes to buying consumer electronics. Within six months, your beloved gadget may become obsolete. That’s where TechForward comes in with its guaranteed buyback plans that you can purchase at the time you buy your products.
When you buy goods at TigerDirect or CompUSA, you can purchase a plan for something like $20. If you return the product within six months, the store will buy it back from you for … Continue Reading
Taking on giants, GamesCampus and Cybersports move into online sports
Taking on giants is part of what it means to be a startup. Today, two young game companies are launching online sports leagues — something, for the most part, that gaming goliaths like EA have yet to come around to.
These ones will stand out from the pack because they’re trying to build high-quality virtual worlds that can support large sports fan communities.
GamesCampus of San Jose, Calif. has adapted an online baseball game created … Continue Reading
Roundup: Dean's game conference, Google's ISP measuring, and more
Here’s the latest action:
VentureBeat game guru Dean Takahashi’s announces his new games conference — GamesBeat 09, taking place in March, will bring together a wide range of industry leaders to look at how games are evolving and becoming more central to our lives. Coincidentally, Dean’s alma mater, UC Berkeley, began offering a full-credit course on the computer game Starcraft today.
Google, researchers, release internet connection measurement tool — In a shot across certain internet … Continue Reading
Flash and AIR: Record downloads, winning platform race
Adobe Flash, the company’s platform for web applications and video, is already on virtually every computer everywhere, but the latest version is on an even faster track to world domination. Flash Player 10 and AIR have been downloaded a record number of times, the company announced today.
During the two months after Flash Player 10 was officially released in October, it was installed on 55 percent of Internet-connected computers, and is on track to be … Continue Reading
Hollywood stars pass studios, go directly to YouTube?
Google still hasn’t figured out a way to make money from YouTube, but that isn’t stopping the insanely popular online video service from signing interesting deals left and right. The latest involves the William Morris Agency, one of Hollywood’s top talent agencies. And it could alter the way artists get paid for content — and the web’s role in providing it.
Specifically, the deal would allow William Morris clients to bypass movie studios and television … Continue Reading
VirtuOz raises $11.4M for virtual agents that learn
VirtuOz, which creates virtual agents to help companies automate sales and support, has raised $11.4 million in a second round of venture funding.
A virtual agent is a chatbot that answers customers’ questions — basically, it’s a middle ground between visiting a static web page and getting a human agent on the line. There are other virtual agent providers out there (such as Jellyvision), but chief executive Alexandre Lebrun says the competing products just identify … Continue Reading
A new iPhone lurking in the shadows?
Digging into code reveals a lot of things. It’s usually pretty good for predicting upcoming software changes, but it’s also good for upcoming hardware changes as well. And the latter may have been uncovered by MacRumors tonight about the iPhone.
Specifically, the site notes that in the iPhone’s current firmware there exists a reference to the “iPhone 2,1.” Don’t mistake that for the iPhone software version 2.1, it’s a hardware number designation. For example, the … Continue Reading
Are profits in video games shifting from the West to the East?
The worldwide video game industry is experiencing healthy revenue growth. In the U.S., sales grew 19 percent to $22 billion in 2008, according to market researcher NPD. That has been a cause for much celebration as games outrun the recession.
But market researcher DFC Intelligence in La Jolla, Calif., has a different take. In a report today, the company asked whether revenue gains are coming at the expense of profits. And while U.S. companies have … Continue Reading
Glam buys AdaptiveAds to improve targeting for display ads
Glam Media, a fast-growing advertising and publishing network for women, has acquired a Silicon Valley start-ups AdaptiveAds for an undisclosed price to help it better target ads.
Glam is one of the more controversial companies in Silicon Valley right now. It has witnessed rocketing growth over the past two years, by signing deals with publishers who agreed to place their content on Glam’s network and receive advertising for it. It recently emerged as a top-ten … Continue Reading
Samsung builds a super-dense memory chip
These chips don’t look like much. The black things are individual dynamic random access memory chips that are attached to modules that snap into the main circuit board of a computer.
But these chips from Samsung Electronics are made with one of the most advanced manufacturing processes in the world. The company said it has made the world’s first four-gigabit DDR3 DRAM chips using a 50-nanometer manufacturing technology. The 50 nanometers, or 50 billionths of … Continue Reading
Netflix, why aren't you streaming new movies?
Netflix chief executive Reed Hastings was clear on Monday’s earning call: When it comes to new releases, the DVD-by-mail company is keeping things disc-based.
“There’s a lot of top and bottom line growth left in online DVD rental,” Hasting told investors. And with the Los Gatos, Calif. company’s recession-busting 45 percent profit boost, I don’t doubt that.
But as a Netflix subscriber wading through the “Very Long Wait” for new releases, I can’t help but … Continue Reading
Push, the movie, coming soon. Push, Apple's notification system, not.
At last year’s Worldwide Developer’s Conference (WWDC) where Apple showed off the iPhone 3G and the App Store for the first time, the company noted that third-party applications would not be able to run in the background on the iPhone, but said that a solution for that would be coming. That solution, called Push Notification, was due to launch in September, just a few months after the iPhone 3G and App Store’s July launch — … Continue Reading
comScore says U.S. online gaming audience grew 27 percent in 2008
Free online games had a big surge in 2008, thanks to the ailing economy. Market researcher comScore reported today that the U.S. audience for online gaming sites grew to 86 million visitors in December, compared with 67 million a year ago.
The total time spent playing online games has jumped 42 percent. The total share of Americans’ Internet time spent playing online games grew from 3.7 percent in December 2007 to 4.9 percent in December … Continue Reading
Registration now open for GamesBeat 2009 Conference
Tickets are now on sale for VentureBeat’s GamesBeat 2009, our first annual conference for executives, entrepreneurs and investors in the gaming, media, hardware and entertainment industries. Today, tickets are officially on sale.
The day-long event, which takes place on March 24 from 8:30am-8:00pm at the Mission Bay Conference Center (1675 Owen St.) in San Francisco, aims to fufill the need for business-oriented discussion about the future of gaming.
The conference theme and tagline, “All The … Continue Reading
Techmeme's newest human contributor: You
New aggregator Techmeme made headlines last month when it revealed that a human editor would help the site’s algorithm pick the best links to highlight. Today, it’s adding a powerful new source to that process: You.
Techmeme will now scour the micro-messaging service Twitter looking for tweets (Twitter messages) that start with “Tip @Techmeme” or “Tip @TechmemeFH” (Techmeme’s two Twitter accounts) and include a link to the news story you think should be a Techmeme … Continue Reading
News flash: Nobody gives a damn about global warming
An overlooked item from the world of cleantech reporting: The ever-fickle light of public attention is fading from the problem of global warming, in favor of, well, everything else. A Pew Center report from last week suggests that there are few things people care about less than whether the sea comes creeping over their doorstep in a few decades.
The report isn’t an anomaly, either. Despite plenty of media attention, a growing number of data … Continue Reading
Bebo, the centerpiece of AOL's "People Network," looking for tech VP
Is AOL looking to sell off $850-million acquisition Bebo as a report yesterday indicated might be in the works? Then its recent recruiting efforts must be an “elaborate smoke screen,” as a source quipped to us when they sent in the following recruiter email from a Time Warner headhunter. The letter details the requirements for a new “Vice President, Technology — People Networks.” Basically, it seems to indicate that AOL is indeed making Bebo the … Continue Reading
Acer dances its way into smartphones. Yes, Acer.
Once again, Apple has kick-started a trend. Companies that formerly made computers are now apparently going to start making mobile phones, with Acer being the latest, according to a report from Pocket-Link.
An invitation has gone out that asks members of the media and mobile communities to meet in Barcelona, Spain for a press conference on February 16 at the World Mobile Congress. The invitation promises “the rhythm of your life” and features a picture … Continue Reading
PopCap Games' retail revenues up 85 percent in 2008 as PC game sales dive
PopCap Games said its U.S. retail revenues for PC games were up 85 percent in 2008. The Seattle-based maker of casual games managed to pull that off in a year when U.S. PC retail game market fell 14 percent to $701.4 million (see below).
The private company doesn’t release sales figures. The results were reported by market research NPD. The biggest part of the growth happened in the fourth quarter thanks to the launch of … Continue Reading
