Tioga Energy captures $1M to broker solar power purchase agreements
Tioga Energy, a San Mateo, Calif. company that facilitates affordable power purchase agreements between solar energy generators and commercial, government and non-profit consumers, has raised $1 million in debt and rights, according to a filing with the SEC.
This type of power purchase agreement allows energy providers and consumers to agree to a rate that is compatible with or less than market rates. Tioga goes as far as to install and maintain rooftop solar panel systems… Continue Reading
SynapSense gets $7M to make data centers more energy efficient
SynapSense, a Folsom, Calif. company that uses wireless sensors to track thermal, pressure and humidity conditions in corporate data centers, has tacked $7 million onto its second round of financing.
Its customers include the New York Stock Exchange and Verizon, among others.
Data centers are where companies store their servers and other networking and power gear. As the recession pinches capital budgets, companies are looking to get more out of the data center capacity they already have…. Continue Reading
United Sample brings in $3M to gather market survey samples
United Sample, a firm that offers a web-based service for creating representative sample groups for market research companies, just bagged $3 million in a second round of funding for product and sales development. Based in Encino, Calif., the company recruits millions of panelists who can be grouped very broadly or specifically for demographic and geographic tests, allowing clients to customize their own samples based on what they hope to find out. The service also organizes… Continue Reading
Mogreet rakes in $5M for mobile video messaging
Mogreet, developer of a platform that allows cell phone users to send videos to one another, announced today that it brought in $5 million in second-round funding. Its software compresses video files — up to 20-second clips — so that they can be sent through what is called MMS (multimedia message service — like SMS only for video instead of text messaging).
A “Mogreet” is shorthand for the type of video message the company distributes. The… Continue Reading
AudioMicro lands funds for stock music, sounds
AudioMicro, an online library of stock music and sound effects that can be downloaded for a small fee, announced today that it brought in an undisclosed amount in a first round of funding led by DFJ Frontier.
The Los Angeles-based website borrows the concept behind stock photo sites like Fotolia Images and Shutterstock. Basically, content providers — in this case musicians or sound effect technicians — upload files to the site that can then be downloaded… Continue Reading
Global Lost & Found closes round for tracking lost electronics
Global Lost & Found has raised a first round of funding for its business of tracking lost portable electronics. The amount was not disclosed.
DFJ Frontier led the round and Sand Hill Angels participated. The San Bruno, Calif.,-based company has an asset tracking and recovery service. You purchase a $10 E-Tracker I.D. for any kind of device ($25 for a laptop) and affix the I.D. to the device. If it is lost or stolen, the label… Continue Reading
Boom! Studios, an online marketplace for comics, raises round
Boom! Studios is an online marketplace for original comic books and graphic novels that uses social networks like MySpace to promote its artists’ works. The company’s big plan is to be an alternate way for the most promising graphic storytellers to create hits that eventually make it to lucrative mediums like movies and video games.
It wants to give independent creators a chance to see a larger upside than they might with traditionally dominant comic book… Continue Reading
Pluggd raises $6M for audio-video word search
Pluggd, a Seattle company that lets you search audio and video files for words or themes, has raised just under $6 million in financing.
Pluggd is a hot company because it does something well that few others have been able to match. You can search for “iPhone,” and Pluggd will give you a heat map showing all the places in the video file where iPhone is mentioned or even themes related to the iPhone. Click on… Continue Reading
Funding roundup: Announcements that got away
Although I try to stay on top of events in the life sciences, announcements do sometimes manage to slip through the cracks. Some days, in fact, I end up triaging. Because the roots of this site — not to mention many of its readers — are in Silicon Valley, Bay Area events are a priority. Then come announcements from the rest of the U.S., then Asia, then Europe. Also, smaller or partial fundings tend to… Continue Reading
Lipomics raises $2.8M for metabolic diagnostics
Lipomics, a West Sacramento, Calif., biotech, raised $2.8 million in a fourth funding round, VentureWire reports (subscription required). Among the investors was DFJ Frontier.
Lipomics is developing diagnostic tests for important measures of metabolic function that may be useful in managing and treating conditions such as diabetes, obesity, and heart disease.
Tioga Energy gets $10M to offer more solar power
Updated
Tioga Energy, a Sunnyvale, Calif. company that wants to makes solar power financing easier for mid-sized businesses, has raised $10 million in a first round of venture financing.
It is just the latest of several players entering the hot solar market to make it easier for companies to buy solar power. Chief executive Paul Detering says the market is so robust that new players focusing on a niche should have no problem attracting customers. Tioga’s niche… Continue Reading