socalTECH
FEBRUARY 19, 2009
SOMARK Innovations , a firm which is developing chipless, RFID tattoo technology used for animal identification, is setting up shop in San Diego, the firm disclosed earlier this month. The company--which also landed a venture capital round from Finistere Ventures and T2 Venture Capital--said the new location will be based at the Center for Emerging Technologies.
SoCal CTO
FEBRUARY 4, 2009
Last month we Launched Los Angeles Tech and in the announcement we provide the Hot List for the first half of January 2009. This hot list is based on various social signals of what people are writing about, reading, bookmarking, searching, etc. You can go to the Hot List post to see what was hot then. But, in running it now for the second half of January, the keyword that popped to the top was: Layoffs And this is definitely a sign of the times.
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SoCal Tech Calendar
FEBRUARY 27, 2009
Thursday, March 5, 2009 -- Getting Real About Revenue. Dealmaker. Monetization strategies for web companies, from the startups to tycoons, has proven to be hard.really freakin' hard. Let's face it - it's put up or shut up time when it comes to turning eyeballs into dollars. See [link] (more).
SoCal CTO
FEBRUARY 25, 2009
Fantastic post by Christian Gammill - Startup Delta Force… From a competitive perspective (e.g. all the other folks out there that will try to enter the same market) the barriers have been dropping over the last few years. Customer Acquisition – social media, SEO, SEM, etc Economies of Scale – not as big a barrier in web world Investment – little to none required to get started Pricing – free or freemium makes trial simple Distribution – syndication and APIs make partnering easier IP – in genera
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Office leases are one of companies’ largest expenses, and if your whole team is working from home with no clear end in sight, you may be wondering what to do about your lease.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 19, 2009
Hollywood-based Geni , the venture-backed firm which has developed an online, Web 2.0-style genealogy and social networking web sites for families, has connected the company's service with the popular Facebook social networking web site. Geni said that users can now connect their Facebook account to Geni, allowing users to use Facebook's standard invite tools to invite relatives to join Geni's family tree serviecs.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 3, 2009
San Diego-based My Web Lockers is launching a new file sharing service today--targeted at K-12 schools. The site said that the new service will make it "easier and more affordable" for schools to use the Internet to store projects such as homework and class assignments. My Web Lockers is charging $5 per user per year for the service, which is an extension of educational web collaboration and storage service School Web Lockers, a school-wide and district-wide service for storing school data.
Southern California Tech Central brings together the best content for technical professionals in Southern California from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Agoura Hills-based DTS , a developer of audio technology for the home theater, car audio, and personal computer market, disclosed Thursday that the firm is in a strategic co-marketing agreement with computer chip giant Intel. DTS did not detail the terms of the agreement, but said it would "significantly expand" the firm's presence in the PC space. DTS said it will bring a suite of its technologies to Intel's Mobile Platform.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Los Angeles-based ManiaTV has reportedly laid off 15 of the firm's 33 employees, according to a report in The Deal, as the firm prepares to sell the company. The Deal said Revision3 is rumored to be a possible buyer for the firm. ManiaTV is a producer of original online content, which it distributes entirely online. The firm moved here in 2007 from Denver.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 24, 2009
Los Angeles-based Internet Brands announced its fourth quarter and fiscal 2008 results, reporting that--despite the recession--the firm saw an increase in its fourth quarter revenues of 8%, or $27.0M versus $24.9M a year ago. The company also disclosed that it has acquired three more websites, as the firm continues to acquire web properties in various vertical markets.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 23, 2009
Thousand Oaks-based storage equipment provider Nexsan announced today that the firm has shipped its first iSCSI product, a new product targeted and small and medium sized companies. According to Nexsan, its new iSeries products provides up to 1 petabyte of storage, virtualized storage, and support for SAS and/or SATA disk drives. Nexsan is a developer of storage arrays used by companies for their data storage.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 23, 2009
San Diego-based Newsforce (www.newsforce.com) is a startup which is looking to take advantage of the hunger of the newspaper and media business for revenue, and has created a product which takes press releases and commercial content, and inserts them onto news sites in "sponsored content" blocks. We spoke with Vince Bianco , the firm's CEO, about the company and its services.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 17, 2009
Santa Ana-based Ingram Micro , an electronics distributor, has reportedly laid off about 8 percent of the firm's North American workforce, or 300 employees, according to a report from ChannelWeb. ChannelWeb quoted an executive at Ingram, who said that the layoff occurred Tuesday, with as many as 150 cuts in the firm's Orange County offices. Ingram Micro distributes technology products, including electronics, computer accessories, and other products.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 13, 2009
Yesterday, Google announced that it was shutting down its Google Audio efforts--the search engine giant's efforts to try to sell radio advertising. We happened to be talking at the time with Dave Newmark, CEO of Encino-based Bid4Spots (www.bid4spots.com), about how the firm's reverse auction service for remnant radio was going, and Dave us gave his insights into Google's moves, how it affects his company, as well as an update on how things are going for Bid4Spots.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 9, 2009
Monrovia, California-based AeroVironment , which develops unmanned aircraft systems for the military, disclosed Monday that the firm has raised $16.8M in a contract with the U.S. Army. AeroVironment said that the $16,758,776 order came for fifty of its Raven unmanned aircraft systems. The firm said the order also includes digital data retrofit kits for 206 existing Raven systems.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 5, 2009
Two UC Irvine Students, Kyle Good and Bryan Le, have scored $25,000 from the X PRIZE Foundation and Prize Capital, in a competition which invited ideas for green energy projects for the group. The X PRIZE Foundation reported today that it has given the two a $25,000 check for their idea for an "ultra capacitor" prize, which they submitted on YouTube.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Cerritos-based Connect3 , a developer of advertising, merchandising, and promotions software, is now officially part of DemandTec, a Bay area firm that develops promotional planning software. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. DemandTec originally announced the acquisition in January. Publicly held DemandTec said Connect3's product suite is being incorporated into its End-to-End Promotion Management suite.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 25, 2009
Westlake Village-based Move , which operates a number of real estate sites, including REALTOR.com , and Move.com , announced late Wednesday that the firm's President, Lorna Borenstein, is leaving the company. Move did not give a reason for Borenstein's departure, however, did say that new CEO Steven Berkowitz will take over Borenstein's duties. Berkowitz was appointed CEO in late January by Move's board of directors, replacing Michael Long, who retired from the firm.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 24, 2009
Irvine-based HireRight , a provider of online employment screening and job applicant tracking software, said today that the firm has inked a joint marketing agreement with software publisher SAP America. According to HireRight, the agreement calls for HireRight and SAP America to deliver HireRight's screening services through an integration with SAP's E-Recruiting software.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 19, 2009
Los Angeles-based Global Fitness Media , which is developing a number of fitness-related online web sites, has hired on a new Chief Technical Officer, according to the firm's search agency, NeoHire. According to the firms, Daniel Auld has been appointed to the position. Auld was most recently Senior Operations Architect at Yahoo, and has also served at IBM Corporation and Alchemy Communications.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 17, 2009
We've just released the results of our first non-scientific survey of our readers and others on the economy and business conditions, and found that the majority of our survey respondents believe that corporate spending--not the government stimulus--is what will drive a recovery in business conditions. Our survey--conducted from January 19th to January 30th for us by the David James Agency--had 150 respondents, 40 percent of whom thought that it will take longer than on year for business to impro
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 17, 2009
Thousand Oaks-based Xirrus , a developer of Wi-Fi networking hardware, said today that it has released a new, free Wi-Fi software which will allow users to search for and locate Wi-Fi networks, and manage their Wi-Fi connections. According to Xirrus, its new Xirrus Wi-Fi Inspector tool runs on Windows Vista and XP and requires a Wi-Fi adapter, but does not require Xirrus hardware to run.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 17, 2009
Santa Monica-based CampusExplorer.com is announcing this morning that the firm has raised $2.25M in a Series B funding round, for the firm's online service for searching for colleges. The firm said the new round was led by OCA Ventures, and also included Origin Ventures and Rincon Venture Partners. CampusExplorer.com said the funding will go towards product and technology development at the firm.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 16, 2009
The Los Angeles technology crowd turned out in full for last week's Twiistup 5 event--a showcase for startups looking for exposure and funding--with over 1,000 attendees at a private aircraft hangar at the Santa Monica airport. The winner of the judge's choice award was Cogi , a Santa Barbara-based firm which develops a service for transcribing conference calls and meetings; TotSpot , which operates a social networking site that allows families to create private sites for their children, was awa
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 11, 2009
Encino-based SodaHead.com , the venture backed, online questions-and-answers site, has swizzled its web site, saying this week that it has redesigned its site to make it easier for its users to find topics. Among updates to the site are new category links to make it easier to find questions and answers, and a way to link and share news articles on the site.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 27, 2009
A number of Southern California firms are on the list for DEMO 09, the technology conference which has been one of the traditional launching ground for new products and startup firms. DEMO disclosed Friday that San Diego-based Avaak , Goleta-based Citrix Online , Huntington Beach-based HowSimple , San Diego's Qualcomm MEMS Technologies , and Santa Monica-based Vokle are among the list of firms who will be presenting at the event.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 27, 2009
Carlsbad-based Verdezyne, which was formerly known as CODA Genomics, said Thursday it has named Damien Perriman as Vice President of Business Development. Verdezyne said that Perriman joins the firm from The Dow Chemical Company, and has previously served as Deputy Trade Commissioner to the Americas for the Queensland Government of Australia, along with working at Miritone.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 27, 2009
Carlsbad-based Helixis, which develops tools for nucleic acid analysis, said Thursday that it has added Illumnia CEO Jay Flatley to the firm's board of directors. The company, which is venture backed by Domain Associates and Okapi Venture Capital, was founded out of technology developed by Nobel Prize winner David Baltimore and Axel Scherer, both at the California Institute of Technology.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 27, 2009
This morning's interview is with San Diego-based Kadonk (www.kadonk.com), a startup which is creating project management tools that work with Microsoft Project. We spoke with Dipanshu Sharma, Chairman of the firm, to learn more about the company and its products. Sharma is also one of the founders of V-Enable. Thanks for sitting down with us. For our readers who aren't familiar with Kadonk, what's the story behind the site?
SoCal Tech Calendar
FEBRUARY 27, 2009
Thursday, March 5, 2009 -- TCVN invites you to attend its Marketing Idea Clinic/Workshop. Bring real-world issues and your own business problems before experts and watch in real-time as they slay your marketing challenges. See [link] (more).
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Security software vendor Symantec said this week that it has selected three students for a fellowship program, including one UC Santa Barbara graduate student. According to Symantec, it has selected Marco Cova, a doctoral candidate in computer science at the University of California, Santa Barbara, for a fellowship with its Symantec Research Labs. The firm is giving Cova one full year of fellowships, which covers 100 percent of Cova's tuition and fees, plus a research stipend.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Santa Barbara-based Citrix Online is expanding into the audio conferencing business, the firm said, and has launched a new service called HiDef Conferencing , focused on allowing customers to manage audio conferences for up to 500 participants. According to Citrix, the new service will be offered on a monthly plan, and includes web-based features for managing calls, along with connections to voice over IP users using Skype and Gizmo.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Chatsworth-based MRV Communications , a developer of optical networking components, said Wednesday that it has hired on a new Vice President and General Counsel, Jennifer Hankes Painter. According to MRV, Painter joins the firm on recommendation of a Special Committee formed by its board to examine accounting issues. Painter joins the company from The Ryland Group, and has also served at Cadiz, Sullivan & Cromwell, and the U.S.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Los Angeles- and New York-based PlaceVine , which operates a web-based service to connect brands and agencies to product placement opportunities in film, television, and new media, said Wednesday that it has scored a round of seed financing from a New York-based angel fund, NYCSeed. Amount of the investment was not disclosed. According to PlaceVine, financing will be used to expand its web service.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Westlake Village-based Row 44 has racked up another win for its in-flight, wireless Internet services today, as Alaska Airlines announced that it will launch a consumer trial of a Wi-Fi internet services on its planes. Financial impact of the deal was not disclosed. Alaska Airlines announced the trial today, saying the new service--the Alaska Airlines Inflight Wi-Fi service--will be installed on planes in a 60 day trial.
socalTECH
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Huntington Beach-based BridgeCo , a developer of semiconductors for the home media market, announced this morning that it has raised another $6M in financing. The new funding came from the firm's existing investors. BridgeCo is a maker of semiconductors used for media processing in stereos and other audio equipment. BridgeCo's investors include Advent Venture Partners, Balderton Capital, Cipio Partners, Earlybird Venture Capital, ETV Capital, Fidelity Ventures, Intel Capital and Wellington Partn
SoCal Tech Calendar
FEBRUARY 26, 2009
Wednesday, March 4, 2009 -- Mergers and Acquisitions. CONNECT. If you are considering merging with, acquiring or selling a company ? either in the near future or as an eventual exit strategy ? it is critical that you anticipate areas of concern well in advance of the MandA process, and be adequately prepared to address questions and issues throughout the transaction.
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