LinkedIn lands in your Microsoft Outlook inbox
LinkedIn became the second of Silicon Valley’s biggest social networks to make a compelling distribution move this week. It’s landed in your inbox — quite literally if you have Microsoft Outlook.
They’ve partnered with Microsoft to launch the Outlook Social Connector, which will deliver LinkedIn updates directly to your inbox and give you better social context when you reach out to business contacts. When you write an e-mail, you’ll be able to tell what the other… Continue Reading
Twitter, LinkedIn sync status updates to hone in on the professional market
Twitter and LinkedIn are syncing status updates as the microblogging network looks to serve a growing number of users who are tweeting for business purposes. In many ways, Twitter has become like a living resume — people use it to promote their ideas, to build relationships or to do research by asking their followers questions.
Sending status updates to LinkedIn also fits in with Twitter’s distribution strategy. Rather than trying to keep status updates within their… Continue Reading
WhoDoYouKnowAt: A more exclusive, private LinkedIn
When LinkedIn first launched, it touted itself as the premiere site for networking and personnel discovery on the web. Since then, it has grown massively, with people joining at all ranks and across all sectors. This has put a strain on arguably the most important component of the site: the ability to contact others who could help you further your career. As more users join, top-tier executives are becoming less and less inclined to provide… Continue Reading
The battle for your address book: Will souped up contact apps monetize the data explosion?
[Editor's Note: Below, MobileBeat advisory board member Jason Devitt explains why we should care about new innovative address books. Not only are they key to a much better user experience, but they may greatly impact the way we pay to use our phones. He also looks at how different parties, from carriers to mobile startups, are approaching new address book services from opposing angles.]
There’s a battle brewing for control of your mobile phone’s address book…. Continue Reading
Path 101: Matching you to a new career by way of data
Right now is an especially tricky time to be looking for a job. And with more layoffs in just about every industry being announced daily, it can be terrifying to even think about. So it’s an opportune time for Path 101, a career guidance service, to be launching.
Let’s be clear: This is not another job posting service. Instead, Path 101 takes an analytical approach to provide users with guidance for a career path. It does… Continue Reading
Roundup: Ashton’s new show, Woz’s new company and more
Here’s the latest action:
Pansonic lays off 15,000: The consumer electronics giant shed 5 percent of its work force. It joins NEC, Sony, Hitachi and other Japanese companies in announcing major layoffs.
Ashton Kutcher’s Katalyst Media teams up with Slide on new series — The show, called KatalystHQ, is the first sponsored web series to premiere on Facebook.
Steve Wozniak takes a job at storage startup Fusion-io — The Apple co-founder already sat on the Salt Lake City company’s advisory… Continue Reading
LinkedIn’s CEO departs, executive shuffle ensues
A familiar face is returning to the top spot at professional networking site LinkedIn. Chief executive Dan Nye is leaving the company, while founder Reid Hoffman (pictured) is taking his place.
The official line, according to the Los Angeles Times, is that the shuffle was brought on by hiring Google executive Dipchand “Deep” Nishar to take over product strategy, a role previously held by Hoffman. It’s hard to believe that’s the full story — why the… Continue Reading
Google exec Deep Nishar leaves for LinkedIn
Longtime Google executive Dipchand “Deep” Nishar is leaving the search giant for professional networking site LinkedIn, the Wall Street Journal reports.
Nishar, who is Google’s Asia-Pacific director of product management, will become LinkedIn’s vice president of product strategy. He’s taking over the lead product role previously handled by LinkedIn founder and chairman Reid Hoffman, who will focus on long-term planning.
The last year has seen a number of high-profile Googlers depart for startups, most notably Sheryl Sandberg… Continue Reading
Roundup: RPX takes on patent trolls, Facebook revamping Marketplace, and more
Here’s the latest action:
RPX Corp takes on patent trolls — The company is buying patents to keep them from so-called “troll” companies that use patents for lawsuits or to collect licensing payments. Companies that pay a fixed yearly fee to RPX get licenses it holds; RPX pledges never to assert the patents. IBM and Cisco are already partners.
Is Microsoft Live Search getting a new name? — Maybe it will be changed to Kumo, Japanese for “cloud” or… Continue Reading
LinkedIn launches event service to help you schmooze in person
Business networking site LinkedIn launched its developer platform last week with apps built by eight partner companies, but not including any sort of events listing service. The reason why is now clear: The company has introduced its own event service today, which relies on a database culled from third-party event companies including EventBrite and Techweb.
When you log in to LinkedIn, the site shows you recommended events based on your job description and other information you… Continue Reading
LinkedIn lays off 10 percent of staff
Business networking site LinkedIn is joining the long list of companies that have announced cuts in the last few weeks — it has laid off 36 employees, or about 10 percent of its total staff.
Kay Luo, the Mountain View, Calif. company’s senior director of communications, told Reuters that the cuts are a preemptive measure to make sure LinkedIn remains cash-flow positive. And the decision comes from company executives, not investors, she said. Still, it’s worth… Continue Reading
LinkedIn’s platform opens for business
LinkedIn, the professional networking web site, has publicly launched its platform to third-party developers, with an emphasis on supporting business and “productivity” applications that have failed to gain traction on other social networks.
Called InApps, it looks pretty promising.
LinkedIn officially launched its application platform last December. But it stayed in private beta until today’s more advanced version.
The Mountain View, Calif. company has only let established companies on board. One app, built by Amazon, shows you what… Continue Reading
Business network LinkedIn starts improving its search interface
LinkedIn, a professional networking site, is starting to roll out a greatly revamped set of search features. Most significantly, the company is simplifying its interface so you can enter one search term and find the most relevant people from any network in LinkedIn. In the old version, you have to switch tabs in order to search for people in different networks.
The company has also refined its search algorithm so that search results are made more… Continue Reading
LinkedIn raises $22.7M from SAP, other strategic investors
Updated
Professional networking site LinkedIn has raised another $22.7 million, bringing its total backing to slightly more than $100 million. The new funding is an addition to the round that LinkedIn raised in April at a valuation of more than $1 billion.
Interestingly, the money came from strategic backers SAP Ventures, Goldman Sachs and McGraw-Hill, rather than the venture firms that previously backed the Mountain View, Calif. company. [Update: A company spokesperson says one of LinkedIn’s venture… Continue Reading
Shaky economy drives users to LinkedIn
When it comes to the current financial crisis, not everyone is suffering equally. In fact, professional networking site LinkedIn has gotten a boost from the bad times — unemployment, or the threat of unemployment, is sending many new users to the site.
Not surprisingly, a lot of that boost comes from the financial sector, where many venerable institutions recently collapsed. LinkedIn says new member sign-ups from the investment banking industry have more than doubled in the… Continue Reading
Roundup: MySpace to launch music service, Wall Street firms crumble and more
MySpace to launch free digital music service – MySpace Music sounds interesting, but it may not quite live up to Fortune’s declaration that it “promises to be the most significant roll-out of a digital music service since Apple’s iTunes.” Since you have to purchase songs from another service like iTunes if you want to download them, this doesn’t actually sound much more useful than existing service imeem. Meanwhile, the Los Angeles Times has some speculation about… Continue Reading
Roundup: Intel launching six-core chip, Miasole raising big round, the making of Google’s Chrome and more
Here’s the latest action:
Intel to launch six-core microprocessor – A chip code-named Dunnington is expected to debut on Sept. 15. Intel will put six cores, or computing brains, on a single chip. But this is really no big deal. I’ve got a 666-core chip of my own in the works. I used a cookie-cutter to make it.
Linkedin gets linked to CNBC – The popular business social network will integrate its community and networking functionality into… Continue Reading
LinkedIn launches an iPhone app, it’s simple but it means business
If the iPhone wants to be taken serious as a business device it’s going to have to have applications other than More Cowbell (the app that lets you simulate playing a cowbell). A definite must-have for business users is LinkedIn, the professional online network. Today, it launched through the App Store.
The application itself is very simple. You won’t find all the bells and whistles that social network Facebook included in its app (and is likely… Continue Reading
More on the Facebook employee stock sale: “Dozens” selling, “investment firms” buying
At least nine Facebook employees are selling company stock — that private-company stock broker Laurence Albukerk personally knows of. In a recent BusinessWeek article, he estimates there are “dozens” of employees already going through various brokers. Facebook has previously confirmed that it’s letting employees sell some of their company stock. Buyers include “two investment firms,” the article says, although it’s not clear if this includes venture firms, private equity firms or other investors.
What’s more, two… Continue Reading
Confirmed: Facebook to let employees sell some stock
Facebook has confirmed that its letting its employees sell some stock, specifically to provide a “financial cushion” as the company stays private and continues to grow. Here’s the text of what the company sent over.
“Facebook is committed to achieving its mission – to give people the power to share and make the world more open and connected – over the long-term. To provide employees with a financial cushion while we continue to build the company,… Continue Reading