Web traffic measurement company Quantcast raises $20M more
Quantcast, the company that places a piece of code on Web sites so that it can track traffic and other data directly, has raised $20 million more in financing.
The round was led by the Founders Fund and included Polaris Venture Partners. It follows $6 million in previous funding from Founders Fund, Revolution Ventures, Allen & Co., and the company’s founders.
Some 20,000 publishers have already agreed to place Quantcast’s code on their sites, which allows them… Continue Reading
Widget-maker Slide raises $50 million at $550 million valuation
Updated
Widget-maker Slide has raised nearly $50 million at a $550 million valuation from two private equity funds, Fidelity and T-Rowe Price, according to the New York Times, with the two firms buying a total of around a nine percent stake in the company.
San Francisco-based Slide has more than 144 million users of its widgets on Myspace and other social networks, and another more than 50 million total (not necessarily active) users of its Facebook applications,… Continue Reading
Parker’s Project Agape = Friendster + Facebook?
Entrepreneur Sean Parker’s latest undertaking is Project Agape, a secretive start-up working to empower people to further their political or social cause using the Internet.
Parker, 27, isn’t sharing much publicly about the company yet, but it’s worth noting because Parker tends to make waves when he gets serious about something.
There was controversial music-sharing site Napster, where he was co-founder; the contact updating service, Plaxo, where he was also co-founder, and which rubbed lots of… Continue Reading
Quantcast, traffic measuring company, raises about $5.7M
Quantcast, a San Francisco start-up that measures the traffic on other sites, has raised around $5.7 million in Series A funding, according to a regulatory filing cited by PE Week. Investors included the Founders Fund and Revolution Capital, chief executive Konrad Feldman confirmed with VentureBeat several days ago, though at the time he did not confirm the amount.
Ooma, home communications co., raises $12M
Updated
Ooma, a secretive Palo Alto, Calif. company that has labored for more than two years to produce a telecommunications product for the home, has raised $12M of an $18M Series B round, according to a regulatory filing cited by PE Week. Return backers include Worldview Technology Partners and Draper Fisher Jurvetson, the report said
Not mentioned, however, is the investment by Sean Parker, partner at the Founders Fund. Parker invested last year, a source tells VentureBeat.
The… Continue Reading
Geni aims to build family tree for whole world
Geni, a new start-up in Los Angeles, wants to do for families what LinkedIn does for business contacts: Create one giant tree that shows you who is connected to who.
The world may be getting smaller; Geni, if successful, will make it tinier still.
Geni has just launched, and we found it easy to use. The company is led by co-founder David Sacks, a former chief operating officer at PayPal, who more recently started Room 9 Entertainment,… Continue Reading
Facebook “definitely” not for sale
Facebook, the social-networking Web site courted by Yahoo, isn’t for sale, board member Peter Thiel tells Bloomberg.
“It’s going to remain an independent company,” Thiel said in an interview last week. “The plan is to actually build it, maybe at some point take it public, but definitely not to sell it.”
Thiel said the site is actually worth $8 billion or more, citing the site’s college-aged users, according to Bloomberg. He said the company is… Continue Reading
The “FF class” of stock, for founders who want cash early
(Updated with more details on how FF works)
A form venture capital funding in Silicon Valley is getting increased interest from founders of start-ups.
It is called the “FF class” of stock, for founders who want to cash out a small percentage of their stake in a company so they don’t have to wait until the company is sold or goes public.
This practice is not entirely new. Many founders through the decades, including at Intuit years ago… Continue Reading
Jaxtr, an easy way to phone, launches service — with at least $1M in funding after all
See our story here. Initially, Jaxtr’s chief executive told VentureBeat he hadn’t raised any money, saying it was self-funded. However, comments on our story yesterday helped ferret out that he had indeed raised angel money, apparently just over $1 million in convertible. We’ve updated story.
Founders Fund hires Sean Parker as partner, to launch second fund
The Founders Fund, the venture firm led by former PayPal chief executive Peter Thiel, has hired Sean Parker, the controversial entrepreneur, who has just turned 27, as a managing partner.
Parker somehow attracts attention wherever he goes. He has already launched three well-known companies. At 19, he co-founded Napster, and his cheekiness drew anger from the recording labels, which eventually shut down Napster with lawsuits. Parker told VentureBeat last week, in an interview, that his… Continue Reading
Slide gets big VC round for its slideshow product
Slide, the San Francisco start-up that lets you create slide shows from your photos or other content, has raised a large third round of funding from Khosla Ventures and Mayfield Fund.
The amount remains undisclosed, but we’ve heard it is more than the company got for its second round, which was $8 million. That gives the company near or north of $20 million in total funding, putting it comfortably on the list of best-funded Web 2.0… Continue Reading