Brilliant Telecom dials up $7.6M to sync wireless carriers
Brilliant Telecom, a company that designs, develops and distributes network timing solutions for telecommunications equipment, has brought in $7.6 million in convertible debt from Onset Ventures, NovAtel, Asset Management, Draper Associates, Draper Richards, Xilinx and a handful of individual investors, reports Dow Jones VentureWire. Based in Campbell, Calif., says its technology offerings ensure smoother operation of streaming voice and video applications.… Continue Reading
IBM: Skip Windows 7, use IBM Client for Smart Work
Two days before Microsoft launches its latest operating system, Windows 7, IBM is trying to poach a few customers by launching a cheaper, Linux-based alternative.
IBM Client for Smart Work mixes open source productivity software with online tools and Canonical’s Ubuntu operating system. It was developed for sale in Africa and other emerging markets, but it seemed like there was an audience in the United States, too, IBM says.
It sounds like IBM’s challenge to … Continue Reading
Demo '10 begins in Boston — calling all awesome startups
It’s been a few weeks since Demo took San Diego by storm, and I posted a few days ago about a few of the cool things that happened to some of the demonstrating companies.
More on that in a sec. But here’s a reminder that we’re gearing up to do it all over again with DEMO ’10, March 21st-23rd in Palm Desert, CA.
The applications are already rolling in, which means it’s time for myself … Continue Reading
Pinc culls $3.1M for RFID solutions
Pinc Solutions, provider of RFID technology for various applications, has brought in $3.1 million of an expected $5.8 million round of equity, according to a filing with the SEC. Based in Berkeley, Calif., the company is financed by Horizon Ventures and Sutter Hill Ventures.… Continue Reading
Holiday forecasts say consumers plan to spend more on gadgets
Consumers plan to spend more on electronics this holiday, according to a forecast by the Consumer Electronics Association.
Consumers plan to spend an average of $222 on consumer electronics this holiday season, up 8 percent from a year ago. Consumer electronics devices comprise four of the top 10 items on adults’ holiday gift wish list, with computers and video games ranking No. 2 and No. 3 behind clothing. The trade group announced the forecast at … Continue Reading
Are you creating or stealing customers?
(Editor’s note: Michael Greenberg is COO of Loyalty Lab. He submitted this story to VentureBeat.)
It’s easy to think that your start-up is centered in a green field or blue ocean, but typically, that’s not the case. Only the lucky few are truly creating new customers out of thin air. Most have to steal them from someone else.
This is a fact that few entrepreneurs want to hear. But smart start-up owners know when to … Continue Reading
Meez teen virtual playground integrated into MySpace
Meez has built a virtual playground for 13 million teens in the past couple of years. Now that playground is going to get a lot bigger and more crowded as Meez integrates its Meez Nation virtual world into MySpace.
Meez users will be able to log into their virtual world directly from within the MySpace social network, almost as if the virtual world is a widget on a MySpace page that lets you dive into … Continue Reading
Scoreloop will help iPhone developers make their games social
Scoreloop is announcing today that it will make it easier than ever for iPhone game makers to put social networking features in their games.
This so-called CoreSocial technology, described as a white label social gaming platform, lets developers insert features into their games such as score leaderboards, achievement medals, cross promotions and virtual currency. Those features get gamers to brag to their friends and stay connected with each other. That makes them stick with the … Continue Reading
Zynga's FarmVille gamers donate to Haiti's poor via virtual goods
The capacity to do good with a video game is a fledgling concept. It has been around for a while, but has never been executed in an outstanding way. Zynga, the hot developer of social games on Facebook, is the latest to give it a shot. And the company thinks it has found a way to do a lot of good in a short amount of time with the idea.
The 56 million users of … Continue Reading
MoneyTree report: Venture capital still rebounding
Updated
Contrary to what you may have heard elsewhere, venture capital investment is still growing, at least according to the latest MoneyTree report from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association.
Yes, that’s pretty much the exact opposite of what Dow Jones VentureSource concluded last week — that a potential VC rebound had stalled. It looks like the disagreement has less to do with the Q3 numbers, where MoneyTree shows a total of $4.8 billion … Continue Reading
AMD to launch eight new consumer-oriented processors
Chip designer Advanced Micro Devices is announcing eight new additions to its consumer-focused Athlon II desktop microprocessors today.
The new desktop chips include chips with two, three and four computing brains on a single chip. They’re targeted at mainstream computer users looking for bargains on new PCs during the holiday season. Since the new chips are more power efficient, they’re aimed at desktop computers in the smallest cases.
Web sites and system builders will begin … Continue Reading
Realtime search opens new doors in knowledge sharing
Editor’s note: This story is part of our Microsoft-sponsored series on cutting-edge innovation.
When you search a traditional search engine, like Google, Yahoo or Bing, you are getting a picture of the web as it was yesterday, last week or last month. Nowadays that’s called static search. The search engine crawls the web by following links between websites, indexes those pages, creates a graph of the web, and then let’s you search that graph. Among … Continue Reading
Yahoo apologizes for lap dancers at Taiwan Hack Day
Yahoo apologized for bringing scantily clad dancers onstage at its most recent Hack Day in Taiwan over the weekend.
Chris Yeh, who is head of Yahoo’s Developer Network, wrote:
As many folks have rightly pointed out, the “Hack Girls” aspect of our Taiwan Hack Day is not reflective of that spirit or purpose. And it’s certainly not the message we want to send about our values here at Yahoo!. Hack Days are about making everyone … Continue Reading
Did the Beatles bomb with the video game generation?
The Fab Four did not set the video game world on fire with the launch of The Beatles Rock Band. The game was one of the most overhyped in game history, with a buildup that was similar to last year’s Spore, which sold millions of units but was still a disappointment.
The Beatles Rock Band sold just 595,000 units across the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii, according to market researcher NPD Group. That … Continue Reading
Friendfeed lives! Co-founder says it's in "chrysalis stage"
When Facebook bought pioneering social sharing site FriendFeed in August, the fate of the service seemed uncertain. FriendFeed never captured the same kind of traction its competitors did, but it win deep loyalty from its limited user base.
Today, Paul Buchheit, who is also the creator of Gmail, said, “FriendFeed isn’t dead. It’s just getting started.”
He wrote in FriendFeed today:
There was a lot of chatter about the future of FriendFeed this weekend. The … Continue Reading
5 O'Clock Roundup: Perp walk for Raj, breakthroughs at Microsoft, still no jobs
Intel CEO Paul Otellini says he had no idea one of his employees was being investigated for fraud — At least that’s what he told the Wall Street Journal. “It is not clear whether these people were just bragging or whether they were in it for the money,” Otellini said of Intel treasury department executive Rajiv Goel, now facing conspiracy and securities fraud charges for allegedly providing inside info to hedge fund manager Raj Rajaratnam … Continue Reading
Google needs a new name for its wicked Holodeck
When Google showed off a way of navigating Street View in a fully immersive room of flat-panel screens at the I/O conference in May, there was a collective web cry of — uh, awesome!
Informally dubbed the “Holodeck,” the room had a chair in the center and a joystick that let you “drive” around. (See the video below applied to Google Earth.)
But alas, the name “Holodeck” is not meant to be.
Paramount Pictures filed … Continue Reading
Overtone raises $2.5 million to look at brand resonance
Overtone, a San Francisco-based company that keeps tabs on brand recognition and penetration, as well as customer experiences, for companies, has brought in $2.5 million of an expected $5.3 million round of equity, according to a filing with the SEC. Formerly called Island Data, the company is backed by Dolphin Equity Partners, Encinal Capital Management (now Whelan Capital Management) and ABS Ventures. It previously raised $11 million.… Continue Reading
Ad network Ecast raises funds to the tune of $17M
Ecast Network, a San Francisco-based company that disseminates advertising through digital juke boxes, has brought in $17 million in a round of equity, according to a filing with the SEC. It is backed by Crosslink Capital, DCM, El Dorado Ventures, LG Electronics, Foundry Group, Focus Ventures and Mobius Venture Capital. It raised $12.3 million last May, and $20 million in 2006.… Continue Reading
iPhone app marketing and monetization meetup this Thursday
Editor’s note: This post is sponsored by VSC & AppLaunchPR.
Mobile apps are hot right now. Developers spend a good amount of time in development and through the Apple process but still could use a few tips and tricks on better ways to marketing and monetize their wares. This is why VentureBeat is co-sponsoring the Love and Appiness iPhone Developer’s Meetup taking place at Roe Bar in San Francisco this Thursday, October 22, 2009 from … Continue Reading
