Maskless Lithography takes $1M for circuit boards
Maskless Lithography, a company that prints circuit boards and surfaces for semiconductors, brought in $1 million of a targeted $1.5 million round of convertible promissory notes, according to a filing with the SEC. While the San Jose, Calif. company did not list investors in this round, it was previously backed by TL Ventures and U.S. Venture Partners. It has raised about $38 million to date.
Spire.com: Where the rich share tips, and I get jealous
Spire.com, a social networking site for the rich, has just raised $9 million in a first round of funding. Through articles and member recommendations, the site does a pretty good job of packaging “the good life.” Heck, I signed-up this afternoon, and I’m already feeling vicariously wealthy — golf, anyone?
The Boston-based company isn’t the first social networking company to target the rich — last September, Robert Frank of the Wall Street Journal wrote about two… 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
Kleer raises $28M for wireless audio transmission
Kleer, a Cupertino, Calif. company that says it can provide better audio quality with less power consumed for wireless short-range transmission, has raised a large $28 million funding, its second.
Portable media like MP3 players as well as in-home broadcasting are the markets that Kleer is targeting, and the company is also considering international expansion for its devices.
The round was led by TL Ventures and BDC Venture Capital, along with previous investors. The company took $10.5… Continue Reading
Airwalk latest company to pitch femtocell technology
updated
Airwalk Communications is part of a wave of companies developing “femtocell” technology, which lets your cell phone run on your home WiFi networks (update: the company only works on CDMA networks, not WiFi), and allows you to route calls over your land-line too. The Richardson, Texas company has just finished raising $25 million in a second round of financing.
Deploying femtocell access points is expected to be a major trend this year and next. Airwalk faces… Continue Reading
Life sciences briefing: Thursday, Dec. 20, 2007
TODAY’S HEADLINES:
Acorn Cardio raises $22M for heart-failure device (bizjournals.com)
Agile Therapeutics raises $5.6M for women’s health (release)
Polyheal draws $1M for wound healing (Globes)
MatrixBio receives seed funding for cancer diagnostics (release)
Pacira Pharma names David Stack as CEO (release)
VivoMetrics appoints Howard Baker as CEO (release)
Acorn Cardio raises $22M for heart-failure device – St. Paul, Minn.-based Acorn Cardiovascular, a device maker investigating a device that would restrain the expansion of failing hearts, raised $22 million in a new funding round…. Continue Reading
NorthStar Systems takes a further $18M for wealth management
NorthStar Systems International is a San Francisco, Calif. company that makes wealth management software for the financial services industry.
The $18 million financing wasn’t broken down by investor, but members of three firms did join the company’s board: Ropart Asset Management, TL Ventures and Trinad Capital.
The funding is its fourth. The last round, $11.5 million in 2004, was co-led by Benchmark Capital and HIG Ventures. The company’s other listed venture backer is Chess Ventures, and there… Continue Reading
Optichron, a communications distortion removing co., raises $12M
Optichron, a Fremont, Calif. chip company that removes “nonlinear” distortion from signaling systems in wireless telephony, WiMax and GPS, said it has raised $12 million more in financing.
It also appointed Thomas E. Carlson as chief financial officer. See the company’s full statement here.
Investors included US Venture Partners, TL Ventures, Battery Ventures, and VentureTech Alliance.
Total funding to date is $38 million.
Celator: Combining chemo drugs for fun and profit
(UPDATED: See below.)
Is there a better way to combine drugs in cancer chemotherapy? Celator Pharmaceuticals, a Princeton, N.J., venture drug maker that just raised $10 million, aims to find out.
Like Horizon Therapeutics, which we wrote about here, Celator is convinced that combining two existing drugs in a single formulation at the right proportions can yield better results than current treatments. Although many chemo drugs are already used in combination, the drugs that can be used this… Continue Reading