Mercantila takes in $500K for retail site network

Mercantila, a San Francisco-based portal of related specialty retail web sites, has tacked $500,000 onto a now $2.5 million in convertible promissory notes and warrants, according to a filing with the SEC. The company is backed by Lightspeed Venture Partners, among others.

Kosmix issues $238K more in stock after CruxLux buy

Kosmix, a search engine that provides comprehensive pages of information in response to queries, has brought in $238,000 from a new stock issuance related to its recent acquisition of CruxLux, a startup that determines connections between people, places and things. Based in Mountain View, Calif., Kosmix is backed by Accel Partners, DAG Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Time Warner. It raised $20 million last December.

This post corrects an earlier one published today reporting that Kosmix… Continue Reading

Evolv morphs with $8.25M for call center recruitment

Evolv On-Demand, provider of online tools for call centers to find and hire employees, has brought in $8.25 million in a round of equity, according to a filing with the SEC. Based in Daly City, Calif., the company is backed by Lightspeed Venture Partners, among undisclosed others.

Link_A_Media takes $18M for data recovery

Link_A_Media Devices, maker of technology used to recover and transmit data on storage devices, has brought in $18 million in a first round of funding. The Santa Clara, Calif. company is backed by Lightspeed Venture Partners, Keynote Ventures, SunAmerica Ventures, and Itochu Technology Ventures.

Navy taps Solazyme to make jet fuel out of algae

Navy taps Solazyme to make jet fuel out of algae

The Pentagon announced today that it has chosen San Francisco-based biofuel company Solazyme to supply the Navy with jet fuel made entirely of algae derivatives. This isn’t the first time it has worked with the military, having already had its research and development funded by the Navy in exchange for 20,000 gallons of fuel for its ships.

The oils produced by Solazyme’s algae act as a full replacement for petroleum-based fuel, not simply an additive. Some… Continue Reading

Chevron chips in $25M for biofuel company LS9

Chevron chips in $25M for biofuel company LS9

LS9, perhaps the company to watch synthesizing biofuels and chemicals from organic feedstocks like switchgrass, has brought in $25 million in a new round of capital from Chevron Technology Ventures, Khosla Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Flagship Ventures.

This is the second big win, the South San Francisco company has had recently. In May, it also landed a deal with corporate giant Procter & Gamble to make consumer chemicals from renewable and sustainable sources. Right now, its… Continue Reading

Skyfire raises $5M more for better mobile browsing

Skyfire raises $5M more for better mobile browsing

Skyfire, make web browsing on your mobile phone as fast and easy as it is on your desktop computer, has raised $5 million in new funding.

The Mountain View, Calif. company said it had more than 1 million users when it lest beta testing a few months ago. The browser’s main strength is its ability to load and help you navigate complex or media-heavy websites — like, say, social network Facebook. Skyfire recently announced a new… Continue Reading

Lofty valuations aren’t over for everyone — Ning raises $15M, valued at $750M

Lofty valuations aren’t over for everyone — Ning raises $15M, valued at $750M

Ning, a startup that lets users create their own social networks, has raised $15 million in a fifth round of venture funding. The news was first reported in BoomTown, and a Ning spokeswoman confirmed the story.

The round, which comes from Lightspeed Venture Partners, doesn’t seem that big, compared to the $119 million that Ning has raised in all. On the other hand, Ning’s new $750 million valuation is very substantial indeed and runs counter to… Continue Reading

Mercantila lands $1M for retail site network

Mercantila, a San Francisco-based portal of related specialty retail web sites, has brought in $1 million in convertible notes from an undisclosed source. By “specialty” the company means niche — offering a springboard for e-commerce sites selling items like dog beds, massage tables, recumbent bikes, espresso machines and the like. All of these stores fall into four categories: home & kitchen, patio & garden, fitness & sports, and kids & baby — hardly everything you… Continue Reading

Solazyme wins big with $57M for renewable oil

Solazyme wins big with $57M for renewable oil

Solazyme, producer of renewable oil derived from algae, just raised $57 million in third-round funding to bring its total capital to more than $76 million. In addition to producing so-called green fuels, the San Bruno, Calif., company is expanding its eco-friendly chemicals business — an increasingly common move for companies in the biofuel space. It is also exploring nutritional and cosmetics opportunities.

The bulk of the funding came from VantagePoint Venture Partners, which has made a… Continue Reading

MyBuys scores $7M for retail recommendation engine

MyBuys, provider of a software service that allows e-commerce sites to make recommendations to customers based on their past purchasing and browsing behavior, has landed $7 million in additional funding.

Based in Redwood City, Calif., the company had previously raised $10 million in 2007 from Lightspeed Venture Partners and Palomar Ventures. Mybuys is already being used by online retail sites for Restoration Hardware, Wine Enthusiast and Armani Exchange.

Outbrain, the news story recommendation service, gets $12M

Outbrain, the news story recommendation service, gets $12M

Outbrain, a company that gives blog readers a way to rate and recommend news stories (see its widget at the bottom of this story), has raised another $12 million in a second round of funding.

VentureBeat first covered Outbrain in detail last year. It uses a recommendation technology similar to Amazon’s feature that offers up other items people like you have already enjoyed. While there are several such “collaborative filtering” recommendation engines on the market, few… Continue Reading

Delphix raises $8M for database management

Stealthy database management startup Delphix has raised $8 million in a first round of funding, according to Private Equity Hub. The Palo Alto, Calif. company’s website doesn’t offer many specifics, but boasts “the enterprise database ecosystem is about to change” and says Delphix’s databases reduce costs, power, and footprint while increasing manageability, accessibility, and flexibility.

The funding comes from Greylock Partners and Lightspeed Venture Partners.

Interview with Peter Nieh on using the government to bridge cleantech financing gaps

Interview with Peter Nieh on using the government to bridge cleantech financing gaps

Peter Nieh is a founder of Lightspeed Venture Partners. The venture capital firm manages over $2 billion in capital and just closed its most recent fund, Lightspeed VIII, worth $800 million, earlier this year. Some of Lightspeed’s hits include Brocade, Ciena, Informatica and Riverbed Technology. Nieh began focusing on cleantech investments three years ago, and the company has made five investments in the field to date. He recently made a bunch of predictions about where… Continue Reading

Kosmix’s new approach to search gets $20M

Kosmix’s new approach to search gets $20M

Kosmix, a search startup that automatically builds pages about any topic, has raised a $20 million in new funding led by Time Warner. That brings the Mountain View, Calif. startup’s total backing to $55 million — pretty impressive, especially for an ad-driven company. It’s also launching a redesigned version of the Kosmix site into beta testing.

Initially, the idea of yet another search engine seemed silly, but the concept has grown on me. Kosmix basically hits… Continue Reading

Aprius lands $20M for high-speed server interconnects

Aprius, a developer of high-speed bandwidth interconnect systems, brought in $20 million in second-round funding from Menlo Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners and New Enterprise Associates. Previously, the Sunnyvale, Calif. company had raised $11 million. Its technology lets companies pool their server resources for fast, communal use.

Casual Collective aims to develop addictive casual games

Casual Collective aims to develop addictive casual games

You can credit Paul Preece and David Scott for wasting a lot of your time. They’re the creators of the hit games Desktop Tower Defense and Flash Element TD, two Flash-based games that have been played more than 210 million times.

Hobbyists no longer, the two men have now created their own company, Casual Collective, and lined up $1 million in seed funding from Lightspeed Venture Partners. They are releasing four casual games today on their… Continue Reading

Shufflebrain launches Photograb game on Facebook to train your brain

Shufflebrain launches Photograb game on Facebook to train your brain

I’m not a game designer. But imagine a game creation tool so simple and easy that even I can’t mess it up. Shufflebrain has created this tool as part of a game that transforms photo viewing into a fun experience. Within a few minutes, I created a pattern-recognition game using a template.

The game, called Photograb and available for now only on Facebook (You can link to my game if you have a Facebook account) is… Continue Reading

Skyfire opens up its browser for a vastly improved web experience on Windows Mobile and Symbian devices

Skyfire opens up its browser for a vastly improved web experience on Windows Mobile and Symbian devices

I’ve been spoiled by the iPhone. When I was using a Windows Mobile device today browsing the web with the mobile version of Internet Explorer, I was just about ready to throw the phone out the window. The experience was horrible. Then I opened the new version of Skyfire, version 0.8, which is being released today. Boy, what a difference a browser makes.

Skyfire is a third-party web browser made for Windows Mobile and more recently,… Continue Reading

Somo Enterprises raises first round for mobile apps

Somo Enterprises has raised $1.55 million in a first round of funding, according to PEHub. The company is based in Palo Alto, Calif. and is working on mobile applications. Backers include The Hit Forge and Lightspeed Venture Partners. It isn’t clear what the company is working on from its web site, and it has not yet responded for comment.