As social games boom, Spark Capital hires former Zynga exec as first venture partner

Zynga’s rise to a social gaming juggernaut traded on the public markets—which now boasts a market cap roughly equal to long-established companies like Electronic Arts—highlights the rapid transformation of the gaming industry.

Boston’s Spark Capital, eager to tap the next wave of startups in that space, has added Nabeel Hyatt, a general manager who helped founded Zynga Boston, as their first venture partner.

Hyatt has a long history as a tech entrepreneur. He trained as … Continue Reading

Online photo editor Aviary hopes to take Picnik’s place

Sad that Google’s online photo editor Picnik is meeting its demise this year? Well, veteran photo editing service Aviary is plotting to take its place. On Monday the company announced it’s bringing its photo editing services to the Web with a new Facebook app.

“We took the best pieces of our original software, made it lightweight, and launched into Facebook. We were founded to try to bring creativity to the masses,” Alexander Taub, Aviary’s lead … Continue Reading

RunKeeper scores $10M round to expand its fitness platform

RunKeeper, a small startup that makes a run- and workout-tracking platform, has raised an impressive $10 million second round of funding.

The money will give the company a shot at its greatest ambition: Becoming a widely-used platform for measuring, tracking and reporting a variety of health and fitness data, including exercise, nutrition, sleep and other factors.

The company started out making an iPhone app that tracks runs, using the GPS built into the phone to … Continue Reading

Check-in cha-ching: Foursquare raises $50M with a $600M valuation

Location-based social network Foursquare closed a new $50 million round of funding, the company reported today.

Foursquare said it will use the new funding to hire additional engineers, grow its merchant platform and expand internationally.

“The opportunity to build something meaningful in the location space is HUGE, and we feel well-positioned to capitalize on it,” co-founders Dennis Crowley and Naveen Selvadurai wrote on the company’s blog.

TechCrunch is reporting Foursquare’s valuation at $600 million — … Continue Reading