Roundup: IPOs slow to a crawl, China gets music sales, Facebook competition kicks off and more
July was slowest for IPOs in five years — A measly 56 companies went public last month, raising $5.6 billion. Pretty depressing, compared to last year’s figure of 190 companies and $31.7 billion. This month is expected to be similarly slow, with a pickup coming late in the year or early next.
From free to 3 cents for music in China — Chinese startup Wawawa has a great idea: Actually charging for music in China, where the notion… Continue Reading
Shawn Fanning negotiating to sell social gaming company Rupture for $30M
Shawn Fanning, who gained fame after launching early music file sharing company Napster, is in advanced stages of talks to sell his most recent social gaming start-up, Rupture, for $30 million.
The buyer would be Electronic Arts, but unlike first reported by Techcrunch, the deal hasn’t gone through. I reached someone very close to the deal but who requested anonymity, who said “nothing has been signed, but it’s getting close.”
“Is it likely to go through?,” the… Continue Reading
Roundup: OpenID, Rupture, Startupping, Confabb, Trulia and more
Here’s the latest action:
OpenID is gaining ground — OpenID is a service that lets you use your URL as your username anytime you have to login to a site that requires username and password. Until now, it has been slow to catch on — Web sites have taken their time to allow it. But an increasing number of sites are doing so, because it’s convenient for users. Here’s how it works: You use the URL as… Continue Reading
Next generation game start-ups, Bigdog Games and Areae, raise millions
D2C Games (also known as Bigdog Games) and Areae are two of the latest game start-ups boasting “next generation” technology, and they’ve just raised millions of dollars in venture capital.
D2C, of San Mateo, has raised $1.5 million in a first round of funding (Dan Primack broke the news), but there’s no sign it is moving in the direction of the more recent start-ups, Red 5 (see our story here) and the just-announced Areae. Both… Continue Reading
Fanning to launch Rupture, a social network for games
Shawn Fanning, founder of the popular music file sharing company Napster, is back in the game with a new start-up.
This time, Fanning wants to bring social networking to popular online games like World of Warcraft, as BusinessWeek first reported.
Experts say this is a promising area, because millions of gamers have formed communities with each other through playing, but their interactions have been limited by the confines of proprietary software. Why not open up… Continue Reading