MobileBeat2009 Top Startup Competition: Deadline extended to July 1
We’ve extended the deadline for the MobileBeat2009 Top Startup Competition by one day, until July 1.
We’ve gotten scores of great submissions, but we’d like to make sure we shake out as many as possible because of all the exciting action going on in the mobile industry right now.
We’ll try to fast-track the notification process as quickly as possible, starting now for the best submissions we’ve already received, but we’ll be sure to notify … Continue Reading
iPhone gives new life to old HP calculators
Hewlett Packard has just released iPhone versions of two of its classic calculators from the 1980s — the 12C financial calculator and the 15C scientific calculator — with a third, the 12C Platinum, planned for August.
These apps are pretty much identical replicas, according to MacWorld, with all the old buttons and features available when you view them in the iPhone’s wider landscape view. (When you change to the vertical portrait view, buttons for some … Continue Reading
Apple PR confirms: Hottest Girls app was removed
On Thursday morning, developer Allen Leung’s Hottest Girls iPhone app, a $1.99 download that showed pictures of Asian women in lingerie, began displaying topless models. I’m from California, so whatever, but the app seemed to fly in the face of Apple’s stated no-porn policy.
Within a few hours, Hottest Girls was disabled from being searched or downloaded. You could look at the app’s entry if you had its iTunes URL, but you couldn’t have it.… Continue Reading
Nokia plans Android netbook for 2010
“We have confirmed that Nokia is planning to enter the netbook market,” wrote Lazard Capital Markets analyst Daniel Amir in a research note published Friday morning.
Amir says Nokia’s laptop will be “a Google Android, ARM-based notebook that would be sold at carriers.” That means it’ll be about the same size and shape as the Asus netbook shown above. Nokia’s netbook will be sold as a trade-up for customers who find their smartphone keyboard and … Continue Reading
Sony names a deputy chief for its games business
Sony has named Kunimasa Suzuki, a veteran of its Vaio computer business, as the deputy president of its video game business.
Suzuki will report to Kazuo Hirai, president and group chief executive of Sony Computer Entertainment, which is the Japan-based game business that includes the PlayStation products.
The appointment is effective July 1 and Suzuki will assist Hirai in handling day-to-day operations of the game business, including areas of strategy and product planning.
Sony is … Continue Reading
Hollywood's appetite for game-based movies continues with "Uncharted"
The appetite for game-based movies isn’t slowing down as Columbia Pictures plans to produce a movie adaptation of Sony’s hit game Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune.
The Uncharted game is a very Tomb Raider-like experience, except it has a guy in the lead role (Nathan Drake) instead of Lara Croft.
Set in lush jungles, the 2007 game was one of the prettiest games around, and it helped the PlayStation 3 grow its audience. It sold more than … Continue Reading
Sense Networks gets $6M in hotly contested deal for "tribe" advertising
Sense Networks, a company that can track “tribes” of people — such as those who like the same bars and same movies — to better target them with instant advertising, has raised $6 million in new venture financing in a hotly contested deal.
Semiconductor giant Intel led the deal, after beating out Sequoia Capital, the well-known Silicon Valley venture capital firm, we’ve learned from a source very close to the deal. The negotiations got tense … Continue Reading
Want to get funding? It's all about research
Video interview: Wendy Lea has worked as a bootstrap entrepreneur, corporate executive, and angel investor over the last 25 years. She joined GetSatisfaction.com as CEO in February. Lea is also the founder of The Chatham Group and an angel investor. Of particular interest to entrepreneurs are her thoughts on what she looks for when deciding where to invest and her advice for entrepreneurs who are looking for start-up capital (about 2 minutes into the clip).… Continue Reading
Betfair puts its money on online horse racing in the U.S.
Betfair is wagering that the U.S. will see a surge in online gambling on horse races. The British firm is backing up that belief by expanding in Silicon Valley and refashioning its web property here as more of a gambler’s social network.
If it’s right, it could see a pretty payday.
The opportunity is ripe in part because of the quirks of U.S. laws governing gambling. Poker is having its day in the sun, thanks … Continue Reading
Digital Chocolate rolls out three iPhone games in a day
It may have been late to the iPhone, but video game company Digital Chocolate is trying to make up for lost time. Today, it’s launching three new titles for the Apple iPhone and iPod Touch.
The games include 3D Rollercoaster Rush, California Gold Rush, and Crazy Penguin Catapult 2.
3D Rollercoaster Rush sells for $4.99 and represents the company’s first major push into a game with 3-D graphics. It’s a sequel to the company’s original … Continue Reading
Who uses cloud computing? Startups do, VCs don't
Cloud computing is a trendy term right now, but how widely is it actually used? During the venture capital panel at today’s Structure 09 conference in San Francisco, VCs offered two pieces of anecdotal data that create a nice contrast between who is and isn’t on the cloud.
First up were the VCs. Moderator Paul Kedrosky (a former VC himself) asked the panelists if their firms use cloud computing — i.e., if they run their … Continue Reading
Roundup: RIP Farrah Fawcett, Palm's not-so-big loss, PC sales looking up
Palm’s fourth-quarter performance beat Wall Street expectations, and that’s before the Pre’s arrival kicked sales into high gear. The company’s Q4 loss was $53.4 million, or 40 cents per share, on sales of $113.2 million, excluding one-time items. Wall Street had been expecting a 62-cent loss on revenue of $80.64 million. Palm’s fiscal 2009 loss adds up to $241.1 million, or $2.08 per share excluding items.
“She will be remembered as the modern Mona … Continue Reading
Internet lets bad spellers grieve for "Micheal Jackson"
One of the pleasures of Internet culture none of the eggheads talk about at conferences is that the Internet lets you be dumb.
This afternoon, the trending topics list on Twitter is a rotating set of call-outs to the late King of Pop. At first it was shocking to see how many people are capable of operating Twitter, but not spelling “Michael” correctly. Then I realized this is part of why we like Internet technology. … Continue Reading
Michael Jackson is a test. He is only a test of the emergency broadcast system
The Internet was built to withstand nuclear attack. That was why it was built in the ’60s in the first place, as a communications system with redundancy built in so that the military could communicate even if one of the nodes went down.
We saw some of that happen today, as news of Michael Jackson’s death spread like wildfire through the Internet. TMZ.com got the scoop about Jackson being sent to the hospital. But the … Continue Reading
Signet Solar applies for federal funds to fuel thin-film strategy
Signet Solar, a Menlo Park, Calif.-based maker of thin-film solar panels, has applied for federal loan guarantees in addition to capital-raising efforts to aggressively expand its operations in the United States in the next three years.
The company’s plan is to install four production lines with the capacity to manufacture 65 to 80 megawatts-worth of solar panels a year in New Mexico. Each of these lines is predicted to cost $200 million to build and … Continue Reading
Ozmo takes $750K for personal Wi-Fi networks
Ozmo Devices, maker of software that generates “personal area” Wi-Fi networks around individual computers, has brought in $750,000 in debt, right and securities, reports VentureWire. In the past, the Palo Alto, Calif., company has been backed by Granite Ventures, Intel Capital and Tallwood Venture Capital — bringing in $12.5 million in 2005.
The company emerged from stealth last June to wirelessly connect mice, keyboards, headphones and game consoles. It says it can save companies money … Continue Reading
DEMO-VentureBeat heads to Boston — goodbye Santa Monica!
Chris Shipley and I are coming to Boston — the next step in our extended road trip to scout out the best companies and products to launch at the DEMOfall conference in September.
We’re headed there after having a great time in LA, with the highlight last night at the Parlor in Santa Monica, where more than 50 entrepreneurs showed up during the evening (a few photos below). We’re hearing some great pitches on the … Continue Reading
The timeline of Michael Jackson's death, as reported in near real-time
Pop star Michael Jackson is dead. We know that because the media is reporting developments in the case by the minute. At 3:24 pm Pacific time today, the LA Times reported that Jackson was dead. The New York Times already has a minute-by-minute account of what happened, starting with a 12:21 pm PST call to the parademics. The NYT didn’t mention that TMZ was the first to report the hospitalization; then again, TMZ’s web site … Continue Reading
Salesforce.com's Marc Benioff: The future of computing looks like Twitter
Marc Benioff, co-founder and chief executive of Salesforce.com, told attendees at today’s Structure 09 conference in San Francisco that the world of business software and infrastructure is starting to see the same craze for real-time results that’s taking over web search. And he extolled the virtues of the pioneer of the real-time web — microblogging service Twitter.
Customers of Salesforce’s sales and and customer service web applications, as well as its Force.com platform for business … Continue Reading
Twitter's long-term traffic still growing
Twitter users, most of whom signed up for the site and then apparently stopped visiting, are actually coming back, new data from comScore suggests. There’s been a lot of evidence that Twitter’s growth is tapering off by several measurements: monthly unique visitors, searches, and mentions in the media. But as VentureBeat guest columnist Jesse Farmer postulated in May after crunching a lot of Twitter data, the mass of people who aren’t early adopters could just … Continue Reading
