Glam hits $100M revenue, plans to file IPO as early as fall

Glam Media, the media and advertising company focused on women, has hit a run rate of $100 million in annual revenue and plans to file to go public as early as this fall, according to a well-placed source who requested anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter.

Glam is said to be in the early process of hiring bankers to help it with the IPO, but won’t file to go public until after the … Continue Reading

Apple and Google steal market share from video game systems

Apple and Google have taken about 8 percent of the overall video game market, according to an analysis by Flurry. And when it comes to portable games, Apple and Google now have about 34 percent of the market revenue.

That’s a big change in just a few years, and one that is bound to have an impact on video game console makers such as Nintendo, Sony and Microsoft. And for the first time, sales of … Continue Reading

Moolah Media aims to fix “broken” mobile ads

People are doing more and more Web browsing on smartphones, and that’s a problem for online advertisers, according to mobile ad network Moolah Media — a problem that the company is tackling with its new “mobile redirect” advertising.

The San Francisco startup estimates that 10 to 18 percent of clicks on email advertising, as well as 2 to 8 percent of clicks on display ads, come from mobile devices. However, many of those ads point … Continue Reading

Deals & More: Instructure gets $8M for web-based school tool

Today’s funding announcements include a learning management system, private car sales and marketing investments:

Instructure brings in $8M for online education system: The developer of Canvas, a cloud-based learning management system used by more than 30 educational institutions as an alternative to Blackboard, has raised a second round of funding from OpenView Venture Partners, EPIC Ventures, TomorrowVentures and Tim Draper of Draper Fisher Jurvetson, peHUB reports. Infrastructure was founded in 2008 at Brigham Young University.… Continue Reading

Screw you. Pay me.

Most entrepreneurs – especially those in the b-to-b space – have found themselves saddled with a client who decides at the end of a project that they want to either renegotiate the terms of the deal or not pay at all.

Excuses vary – from “We ended up not using the work” to “it’s really not what we were after”. Mike Monteiro, co-founder and design director at Mule Design, replies to all of them the … Continue Reading

A Clockwork Orange? EmSense can monitor your emotional reactions to media

Market researchers would love to read your mind as you sit in your home and watch on your PC or TV. With EmSense, they can do just that.

EmSense has come up with something called “quantitative neurometrics.” That means they give you a headband that senses your brain waves as you watch something and then they record the data for researchers. The hope is to reinvent behavioral research and get much better feedback about what … Continue Reading

mSpot offers Netflix-like movie club for new streaming movies

Netflix has made a big splash with its library of movies for low, fixed monthly subscription fees. Now mSpot, which provides streaming movie services for a bunch of big carriers, is offering similar monthly deals with its low-priced mSpot Movies Club for streaming movies. But mSpot’s interesting trick is that it plans to offer more recent movies than Netflix does at similar prices.

The strategy is interesting. If it works, mSpot’s many partners could become … Continue Reading

Sony's milestones: 50M PlayStation 3s sold, 8M PlayStation Moves shipped

Sony said today it has sold more than 50 million PlayStation 3 consoles to date and shipped more than 8 million PlayStation Move motion-sensing controllers.

Those are astounding numbers for any consumer electronics products. But in the video game business, they still mean that Sony is in third place among the Big Three. The good news is that all three major console makers are enjoying a robust and profitable business in this generation of consoles.… Continue Reading

Facebook ‘Likes’ journalists; seeks to build relationship with reporters

Facebook has hired former Mashable Community Manager Vadim Lavrusik for the new position of Journalist Program Manager that will be charged with building relationships with news organizations.

The new position is the latest step by the social media giant to improve the quality of professional news on its website by advocating the use of Facebook as a reporting and promotional tool for journalists.

Lavrusik will manage the new Facebook Journalists page created last week as … Continue Reading

Did Twitter turn down a $10B offer from Google and force Ev Williams out?

An intense look at the dynamics of the team that built and is currently running white-hot blogging startup Twitter shone new light on the company today, after Fortune magazine penned a lengthy article suggesting former CEO and co-founder Ev Williams was forced out rather than leaving voluntarily in October and that the company once turned down a $10 billion buyout from Google.

It also detailed how the company has experienced continual failure as it tries … Continue Reading

MoneyTree Report: Clean tech investments top $1 billion

Clean technology investments top $1 billion, according to the latest MoneyTree report from PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association.

The Clean Technology sector, which crosses traditional MoneyTree industries and comprises alternative energy, pollution and recycling, power supplies and conservation, saw a 26 percent increase in dollars over the fourth quarter to $1 billion.

The report attributes the increase being driven by several large rounds, including five of the top 10 deals.

Last year’s report … Continue Reading

VC deal size grows in first quarter despite fewer deals made

Venture capitalists invested the most in deals worth $50 million or more since the third quarter of 2001, pumping $5.9 billion into 736 deals in the first quarter of 2011, according to a MoneyTree Report released today by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association.

Using data from Thomson Reuters, the study showed a spike of 5 percent in dollars invested and a 54 percent surge in later stage deals over the prior quarter, with … Continue Reading

FCC boss says wireless spectrum allocation is key to making mobile broadband competitive

Federal Communications Commission chairman Julius Genachowski said today he is hopeful that the government will be able to reallocate spectrum to satisfy the insatiable appetite for mobile broadband capacity.

But rather than seize the spectrum outright, Genachowski wants Congress to approve a plan that would allow the current owners of the spectrum to share in the proceeds as the government auctions it off to infrastructure companies. Once that spectrum is in the right hands, Genachowski … Continue Reading

FCC chairman gets heckled by smart meter protesters (video)

Julius Genachowski, chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, got heckled by smart meter protesters today as he was giving a talk in Silicon Valley.

Genachowski was answering questions from Fortune writer Adam Lashinsky about the pending AT&T merger with T-Mobile when a few protesters walked up and shouted at the FCC chairman. They were upset about the installation of smart meters using wireless spectrum as well as the government’s failure to fully investigate whether cell … Continue Reading

Groupon advancing towards a $15B IPO?

Group-buying titan Groupon has taken further steps towards an initial public offering by selecting Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to underwrite the offering, according to an article in the Wall Street Journal citing “people familiar with the matter.”

It’s been pretty clear for the past few months that an IPO is in Groupon’s sights, especially after the company walked away from a $6 billion acquisition offer from Google last year then raised a whopping $950 … Continue Reading

Nintendo sells 400,000 3DS units in first week in U.S.

Nintendo said today that it sold just shy of 400,000 3DS handheld gaming system units in its first seven days of sales in the U.S.

That’s not bad, but the high sticker price of $249 for the 3DS may have held consumers back. It’s a sign that the new 3DS may not be as big a blockbuster as the original Nintendo DS, particularly in an age of smartphone and tablet competition.

Meanwhile, Nintendo said it … Continue Reading

Google hits 3 billion Android app installs

Google announced today that its Android platform has now hit 3 billion installations of mobile apps, just two months after hitting 2 billion installations.

That shows Google is getting good traction for Android and that users are becoming more adept at installing apps to use with their smartphones and tablets.

By comparison, Apple reported that it hit its 10 billionth download for iOS (iPhone, iPad, and iPod Touch) apps in January, compared to hitting its … Continue Reading

Zipcar's stock price zooms upward after IPO

Car-sharing startup Zipcar went public on Thursday and saw its shares rise 56 percent in the latest example of a strong recovery for the initial public offering market.

The shares started at $18 and closed at $28 today. In after-hours trading, the stock is up another 19 cents. The company raised more than $174 million by issuing 9.68 million shares in the IPO. The underwriters were Goldman Sachs Group and J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. … Continue Reading

Video game sales weaken in March despite 3DS launch

Overall video game sales in U.S. retail stores weakened in March despite the launch of Nintendo’s new handheld 3DS system at the end of the month.

Market researcher NPD reported total March sales of console, portable and PC game software and hardware fell 4 percent to $1.53 billion from $1.58 billion a year ago. Total console and handheld game software and hardware sales were $1.47 billion, down 4 percent from $1.53 billion a year ago. … Continue Reading