Solexant plans 100 MW assembly line for solar-ink panels, looks for $50M
Solexant, maker of photovoltaic panels with solar cells so thin that they are literally printed onto the panels’ surfaces, announced plans today for a 100-megawatt, commercial-scale panel assembly line — enough to provide power for as many as 800,000 homes. It says it will try to raise $50 million in a third round of funding to finance the project.
Right now, the San Jose, Calif. company is working on a much smaller 3-megawatt assembly line in… Continue Reading
Host Analytics gets funds for financial management software
Host Analytics, a Redwood City, Calif.-based maker of financial performance management software, has raised an undisclosed second round of funding to expand its product portfolio and to strengthen its marketing efforts. Advanced Technology Partners, Trident Capital and StarVest Partners participated in the round.
The company says it already has 8,000 paying customers. Its current products are designed to help executives streamline their budgeting, forecasting and financial reporting processes. They also help companies measure employee performance.
Virtualization startup HyTrust launches with $5M backing
HyTrust, a startup that’s developed an appliance to provide a single point of control and oversight for virtual data centers, is launching its flagship product today. The Mountain View, Calif. company says its HyTrust Appliance will make companies more comfortable using virtualization to deploy their most critical applications because it will ensure the same security and compliance assurances as is possible with physical infrastructure.
The company’s launch partners include VMWare, Symantec, Cisco, and Citrix, and it… Continue Reading
Business intelligence company PivotLink raises $10M
PivotLink, which delivers business intelligence via online subscription, has raised $10 million in a third round of financing. The San Francisco company says its sales bookings increased 100 percent in 2008 and that it has more than 6,000 business users. It has raised a total of $25 million.
The new round was led by StarVest Partners, with participation from existing backers Trident Capital and Emergence Capital Partners.
TriCipher raises $12M for secure logins
TriCipher, maker of software that assures the identity of users logging into online applications, just brought in $12 million in a fourth round of funding for further expansion. The San Mateo, Calif. company says it has already added 100 new clients in the past nine months. It also recently launched its myOneLogin product, a single sign-on authentication system for companies looking to prevent fraud and identity theft.
The investment round was provided by ArrowPath Venture Capital,… Continue Reading
ViOptix snags $7.4M to measure tissue oxygen
Biotech firm ViOptix just tacked $4.4 million onto an already $12.2 million fourth round of funding and landed $3 million in debt financing to break even, reports VentureWire. The Fremont, Calif. company says this will be its last round of venture capital.
Around since 1999, ViOptix has pioneered a device that allows doctors to detect how much oxygen exists in human tissues through a non-invasive procedure. No plans for the new money, beyond self-sufficiency, have been… Continue Reading
Xunlight raises another $11M for thin-film solar modules
Xunlight is on a roll: Only a few weeks after disclosing that it had raised $4.97 million from Ohio’s Third Frontier Projects, the Toledo-based developer of flexible, low cost thin-film silicon modules has secured another $11 million in third round funding from a group of institutional investors, led by Rabo Ventures. Returning investors included Trident Capital and Emerald Technology Ventures.
The company plans on using the funds to expand its manufacturing operations; it currently operates a… Continue Reading
Royalty software company RoyaltyShare gets backing from Hollywood agency William Morris
RoyaltyShare’s software helps record companies manage sales, distribution, royalty calculations, and reports for online and offline media. It has a strategic investment from Hollywood talent agency William Morris, part of a $9 million second round of funding that Trident Capital and Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments have already participated in.
Sojern gives airlines a new way to make money — your boarding pass
Thanks to a startup called Sojern, customers of some of the nation’s biggest airlines will soon see ads on the boarding passes that they print at home.
Is this just another way for consumers to get spammed? Joshua Goldman, a venture partner at Norwest Venture Partners (one of Sojern’s investors), says it’s not, because the boarding pass allows the ads to be carefully targeted, so it should be relevant and useful. For example, your boarding pass… Continue Reading
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
ECO2 Plastics raises $6.5 million to recycle plastic
ECO2 Plastics, a San Francisco-based recycling firm, has just raised $6.5 million in new funding from Trident Capital and a group of small investors led by Thompson Hutton. The company sells a product analogous to recycled plastic, which is used for a variety of industry applications, that it says is produced in a more efficient, environmentally-conscious way.
In addition to recycling conventional PET plastic, ECO2 is working on new processes that will allow it to also… Continue Reading
Musical chairs in Silicon Valley’s venture world: Theis, Brown, Lisbonne, Marshall, Ringo
updated
Four venture capital personnel moves:
Robert Theis, a venture capitalist who left Silicon Valley firm DCM last year after serving for eight years, has joined Scale Venture Partners, also in Silicon Valley, as managing director. Thies will focus on investment in “technology infrastructure and applications.” At DCM, Theis invested in companies PGP, Roamware, NeoPath (acquired by Cisco) and the now-public VanceInfo. We’re not certain why things didn’t work out at DCM (all sides say something different),… Continue Reading
Xunlight raises $22M for thin-film solar modules
Who said academic egg-heads can’t craft compelling business plans? Xunlight, a developer of cheap, flexible thin-film silicon solar modules, has capped off a $22 million second round of funding, led by Trident Capital, Emerald Technology Ventures and NGP Energy Technology Partners.
Emerald Technology Ventures led the first $7 million round last year, which enabled Xunlight to build a roll-to-roll pilot production facility. The company was founded as a spin-off from the University of Toledo, its academic… Continue Reading
Tiandi Energy raises $2.5M for specialized outsourcing
When people think of outsourcing they generally imagine manufacturing or call centers taking place somewhere far away. However, some startups are tapping into more highly educated workforces overseas.
Tiandi Energy locates people with advanced geotechnical knowledge from China, bringing them into the lucrative — but understaffed — Western oil and gas industry.
As technical jobs markets continue to boom in the United States and other affluent countries, similar staffing gaps are likely to develop in quite a… Continue Reading
Data archiver eGistics socks away $7.6M
eGistics, a Dallas, Tex., provider of data archiving and management services, raised $7.6 million in a fifth funding round. Trident Capital was an investor in the round. eGistics digitizes and archives paper-based records for corporate customers, and had previously raised under $15 million in venture funding, according to VentureWire.
Desi Hits gets $5M more for South Asia entertainment portal
Desi Hits, a company that delivers online entertainment in South Asia featuring celebrity interviews, music videos, podcasts and blogs, said it has raised $5 million in its second round of financing, from Draper Fisher Jurvetson, Trident Capital and D.E. Shaw Group.
The two-year-old company is based in San Francisco, but targets the South Asian (India) or “Desi” youth culture, and says it has more than 10 million hits per month.
“In one short year we have also… Continue Reading
Travel sites Kayak and Sidestep merge, aim to become market leader
Updated
Travel search engine Kayak has taken on $196 million in additional funding from a prominent group of investors.
It has separately purchased main rival SideStep for $180 million, as well as $20 million in the company’s bank account for a total of $200, Techcrunch first reported. [Update: We now hear from a source that the total sale was for slightly less: $175 million plus $18 million in cash, for a total of $193 million.]
Together, the companies… Continue Reading
Voltage raises $12M more for encryption technology
Voltage Security, a Palo Alto, Calif. company that offers encryption technology to large companies to protect their data, said it has raised $ 12 million fourth round of financing.
Trident Capital led the round with participation from existing investors including Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, Morgenthaler Ventures, Menlo Ventures, Cipio Partners and JAFCO Ventures. Peter T. Meekin, Managing Director at Trident Capital, joins the Voltage Board of Directors.
The company recently said it saw record financial performance for… Continue Reading
Turn raises $8M more to push ad targeting
Turn, a San Mateo, Calif. company that delivers advertising tailored for Web sites, depending on their readership and other variables, said it has raised $8 million in second round financing.
Turn was launched by Jim Barnett, the former chief executive of once-popular search engine Altavista. We wrote about Turn last year after it rose $18 million. Since Turn launched, other ad network companies have emerged to bring about more targeted ads for Web sites, while others… Continue Reading
Solexant raises $4.3M for new thin film solar cell
Solexant, a secretive solar cell developer in Sunnyvale, Calif, has raised $4.3 million in a first round of capital to develop a prototype of its technology.
The funding came to light in a regulatory filing, and chief executive Damoder Reddy tells VentureBeat he didn’t want to provide many details.
X/Seed Capital led the round, which included Firelake Capital, Medley Partners and Trident Capital. The company earlier raised a seed round, and will like look for a second… Continue Reading