Algal biofuel firm Solazyme scores $45M
Solazyme, a South San Francisco, Calif. company that makes biofuels and other products from algae, has raised $45 million or more toward its latest funding, according to VentureWire.
Early this year, Solazyme entered into a partnership with Chevron to develop its fuels. The company has also tested its biodiesel on the road in a standard diesel car, and has plans for product lines outside of the fuels, including nutrition.
Also having taken funding to create fuel from… Continue Reading
Identity management startup SailPoint Technologies raises $6.5M
SailPoint Technologies, a company that helps corporations manage issues around identity, user access and regulatory compliance, has raised $6.5 million in a third round of funding. All of the company’s existing investors, including Austin Ventures, Lightspeed Venture Partners, Origin Partners and Silverton Partners, participated.
Austin, Tex.-based SailPoint licenses its software to corporations, and says its customers include five of the world’s top 12 banks and three of the largest insurance companies. The startup has now raised… Continue Reading
Mobile browser Skyfire comes to Symbian devices. We have 100 private beta invites
The iPhone’s Safari web browser has ignited interest in browsing the “real web” on mobile devices, but it’s not the only mobile browser out there. Skyfire lets you see the web just as you would on your home computer but on a number of Windows Mobile-based devices. Today, it’s launching the beta version of its software for the Symbian platform as well.
Specifically, this version is built for the Symbian Series 60 (S60) platform, which is… Continue Reading
PSS Systems gets another $18M for legal document software
PSS Systems, which dubs itself as “the standard for legal hold and management software” (basically document policy software), has closed a fourth round of funding
The plan is to use the money to expand PSS Systems’ legal governance product portfolio and its presence in the US and European markets. The company is not yet profitable, but expects to be this year.
PSS Systems’ retention and prevention software packages are used by several large corporations including Citigroup, Merrill… Continue Reading
Skyfire raises $13M to improve mobile web browsing
Skyfire has raised a $13 million second round of funding as it ramps up its campaign in the mobile browser wars.
The Mountain View, Calif. startup’s goal, says chief executive Nitin Bhandari, is to make a browser that makes the mobile web experience as close to the PC-browsing experience as possible, rather than settling for the simplified web presented on most mobile browsers like Opera Mini. Some of that comes down to the interface: Like the… Continue Reading
Lightspeed Venture Partners raises fresh $800M global fund, looking to China and India
Some venture firms are having difficulty raising new funds, but top firms are still getting money with ease — in part to invest in fast-growing places like China and India.
In the past month we’ve seen Foundation Capital take $750 million, Kleiner Perkins grab $700 million, plus its $500 million “Green Growth” fund, and now Lightspeed Venture Partners is announcing its own fresh $800 million fund, oversubscribed from a $675 million target.
The fresh Lightspeed fund is… Continue Reading
Friends For Sale creators raise financing, not for sale
In the often silly world of third-party Facebook applications, Friends For Sale is especially silly — and smart.
It’s a game where you and your Facebook friends compete to buy and sell each other as “pets,” with each person receiving a market-based virtual valuation.
The San Francisco-based company says it is not for sale, even though other social game developers have recently been acquired by market leaders Zynga and SGN.
The company has just raised $4 million from… Continue Reading
ScaleMP debuts aggregate virtualization with $8M funding
A new sort of virtualization is appearing in companies like ScaleMP, which turns the conventional notion of splitting one server into multiple virtual systems on its head.
ScaleMP instead aggregates together multiple low-end systems to create a more powerful one. The technique can help with systems requiring large amounts of memory, and ScaleMP says it can actually make several single-core machines more efficient than a single multi-core machine.
The Cupertino, Calif. company is aiming its software at… Continue Reading
Outbrain, a news recommendation widget, raises $5M
Outbrain is a new start-up that gives blog readers a way to rate and recommend news items, by using a recommendation engine that is similar to Amazon’s feature that offers up other items that people like you have already enjoyed.
While there are several such “collaborative filtering” recommendation engines such as Amazon’s on the market (there’s Last.fm for music, for example), there are few services that focus solely on news. There’s a competing service Spotback, but… Continue Reading
TZero raises $20M for ultrawideband chips
TZero Technologies, a Sunnyvale, Calif. wireless ultrawideband developer and chipmaker, is raising up to $20 million in a third round of funding, according to a financing documents sent to VentureBeat.
Ultrawideband is a wireless transmission technology with much higher speeds than WiFi, but it has not yet been significantly adopted by the market.
We reported in July of last year that the company was looking to take on $25 million more, so it appears that they’ve since… Continue Reading
Pliant Technology raises $8 million for solid state storage
Pliant Technology, a Milpitas, Calif. maker of solid state drives for the enterprise computing market, wants to make them a mainstream storage solution.
The company is aiming for a first product release in the fourth quarter of this year, and should offer increased performance over standard hard drives, according to its own literature. It also claims cost savings and reduced power consumption for customers using its enterprise flash drives (EFDs).
Lightspeed Venture Partners led the $8 million… Continue Reading
Aquantia, a 10GB ethernet developer, raises $26M
Aquantia is developing 10 gigabit per second ethernet product for use in datacenters, like a number of other companies we’ve recently reported fundings for, including Tehuti Networks, Chelsio Communications and BridgeWave (here, here and here).
The Milpitas, Calif. company has not yet released any products, and has so far only stated publicly that it is working with the 10GBASE-T standard, which uses copper twisted pair cables. The standard is a newer one, with products only slated… Continue Reading
Vestopia helps you invest by watching the pros
If you’re looking to invest online, you’ve got the choice of everything from “fantasy portfolios” to social networks. But what amateur investors really need, says San Francisco company Vestopia, is to look over the shoulders of the professionals.
Like famed Watergate journalists Woodward and Bernstein, Vestopia hopes to make a name for itself by following the money. In this case, the money belongs to professional money managers – Vestopia has struck deals with a handful of… Continue Reading
Neoscale, storage security company shuts down after eating through $44M
NeoScale Systems, a Silicon valley provider of data storage security products that ate through $44 million in venture backing, has shuttered.
NCipher, a “management specialist” company, has acquired the Milpitas, Calif.’ company’s assets for $1.95 million. The assets include NeoScale’s CryptoStor tape encryption product and KeyVault key management technology, but did not include the company’s disk encryption technology.
VentureBeat first heard about the closure of NeoScale from a source three weeks ago, and had been trying to… Continue Reading
Roundup: “Bubble video” taken down, but singer gets $3M, Bahu, RivalMap, more
Here’s the latest action:
1. Bubble Video singer gets $3M
2. Bahu, a social network for European high schoolers
3. Vinod Khosla upset with California regulations
4. Technorati revises its front page yet again
5. Smilebox, a software download for sharing photos, videos and other media, raises $7 million
6. Microsoft announces display advertising on MSN Mobile
7. Competitious relaunches as RivalMap, gives you dashboard to track your competitors
8. Worst case scenario: The next Great Depression
9. Verizon to take over all your… Continue Reading
Kosmix riases $10M more for search sites in health, autos, more
Kosmix, the Silicon Valley search engine company that focuses on specific topics, such as health, has raised $10 million more in backing.
Kosmix is run by co-founders (including Venky Harinarayan, pictured left) who came close to buying Google in 1999 when they represented Amazon. Google was still a small company, but Google co-founder Sergey Brin responded to their offer saying he’d settle nothing short of single-digit billions; they passed. See our coverage of that history, here.
Needless… Continue Reading
MyBuys, behavioral targeting for online retailers, raises $10M
In case you haven’t noticed, one of the frothiest areas in start-up world lately is behavioral targeting.
With hordes of advertising money moving online, entrepreneurs can make a killing by analyzing user behavior, and hooking that user up with the right ads and products.
MyBuys, which tracks user behavior to help online retailers make better recommendations, has raised $10 million.
The Redwood Shores, Calif., company is one of many trying to improve online shopping. We covered StyleFeeder last… Continue Reading
LS9 takes $15M to synthesize petroleum alternative
LS9, a Silicon Valley startup that hopes its technology may one day help replace petroleum, has taken $15 million more in funding.
The San Carlos, Calif. company uses synthetic biology to modify microorganisms in order to produce high-energy fuels, including to power cars (see our previous coverage).
According to the company’s own projections, it is two to three years from commercializing and selling a synthetic fuel. LS9 recently recruited president Robert Walsh, who brings several decades of… Continue Reading
Roundup: Forterra, Appfuel, AOL’s plans? and more
Here’s a summary of the latest action. See below for more:
1) In-Q-Tel invests in Forterra Systems, a private virtual world creator
2) Appfuel, another Facebook ad network, but with better ad targeting
3) AOL to spin out advertising arm?
4) Project Playlist, for sharing music playlists on other sites, raises $3 million
5) Four Interactive, a local business review site, gets $10 million from Valley VC’s
In-Q-Tel invests in Forterra Systems, a private virtual world creator – San Mateo-based Forterra’s software… Continue Reading
Acquantia, IC maker, raises $19.17M of planned $25M round
Aquantia Corp, a Milpitas, Calif. developer of physical-layer transceiver ICs, has secured $19.17 million of a $25 million second round of financing, according to a regulatory filing cited by PE Wire. Pinnacle Ventures was joined by return backers Lightspeed Venture Partners and Greylock Partners. The company raised its first round in 2005 with more than $12 million.