socalTECH
DECEMBER 19, 2018
Elon Musk and The Boring Company have finally opened up their first, demonstration tunnel underneath the streets of Los Angeles, showing off a system which transports Tesla vehicles on guided rails under the city. The prototype system takes a Tesla vehicle down an elevator, sends it jetting through the tunnel at high speed, and back onto another elevator.
TechCrunch LA
DECEMBER 16, 2018
Maggie Lane. Contributor. Share on Twitter. Maggie Lane is a writer and producer of virtual reality experiences and covers the industry for various publications. More posts by this contributor. Inside Nickelodeon’s Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles VR Interview Experience. Does Ready Player One reveal the future of VR? You need to stop procrastinating.
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Berkonomics
DECEMBER 20, 2018
This week we contacted royalty licensing expert, the well-respected Arthur Lipper, asking the magic question. Why are you so strongly sold on royalty licensing as the most effective way to finance a tech-based early stage company? I asked him five important questions, which he answered, and I’ve summarized below. Since I am a proponent of using equity as a tool and he is so much opposed, this week it is his turn to make the case.
L.A. Business Journal
DECEMBER 19, 2018
AvantStay, a West Hollywood-based hospitality firm that provides short-term vacation rentals to groups, announced Dec. 19 it received $5 million in a round led by Menlo park investment firm Bullpen Capital.
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socalTECH
DECEMBER 20, 2018
NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory , in Pasadena, as well as dozens of technology companies--at least one managed service provider (MSP)--have been hacked by Chinese spies, according to an indictment by the Justice Department filed on Thursday. The indictment , filed in the United States District Court Southern District of New York, accuses a state-backed hacking group of hacking into companies from at least 2006 until 2018.
TechCrunch LA
DECEMBER 19, 2018
Elementary Robotics has raised $3.6 million in seed funding to begin building a manufacturing facility and expand its presence in Los Angeles as the city continues to grow as a hub for robotics and automation. . Earlier this year, Embodied announced a $22 million round for its personal robotics platform focused on healthcare and wellness, while InVia Robotics collected $20 million for its own take on the robotics industry.
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L.A. Business Journal
DECEMBER 20, 2018
Car leasing and financing provider Fair announced Dec. 20 it completed a $385 million Series B round, led by SoftBank Group Corp. Following this round, Fair now has access to nearly a $1 billion in debt capital since its 2016 founding and has raised over $500 million in equity to date.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 21, 2018
Two, Los Angeles-area nonprofits aimed at the "maker" and technology education market-- LA Makerspace and Imagination.org , said late Thursday that they have merged with the Two Bit Circus Foundation , the nonprofit created by Two Bit Circus to promote STEAM education. The three said that by combining their efforts, they will be able to "increase efficiency and greatly broaden their program offerings" and also provide services to an expanded range of communities.
Startup Professionals Musings
DECEMBER 16, 2018
I still know some entrepreneurs who boast of simply following their gut instincts, rather than listen to anyone or any data, to make strategic decisions. We’ve all worked with autocratic leaders in large companies who seem to thrive in this mode. They all forget or ignore the high-profile failures that have resulted from some single-handed business decisions.
Xconomy
DECEMBER 18, 2018
Seismic, an enterprise software company with ambitious growth plans, has raised $100 million in a Series E financing and added Microsoft chairman John W. Thompson to its board of directors. The venture investment, which the San Diego startup announced Tuesday, is one of only a few so-called mega-rounds—$100 million or more—recorded this year in the region.
L.A. Business Journal
DECEMBER 19, 2018
Pasadena-headquartered Elementary Robotics Inc. announced a $3.6 million seed raise Dec. 19, led by Fika Ventures and Fathom Capital. Additional investors participating in the round included Toyota AI Ventures, Ubiquity Ventures, and Osage University Partners. Elementary’s prior funding consisted of a $1.2 million pre-seed round in October 2017.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 17, 2018
Richard Wolpert is a well known investor in the Los Angeles technology community, through his own fund, Chance Technologies; as a Venture Partner at Amplify.LA and Venture Advisor at Accel Partners; and has a long history in the tech community, having been Chief Strategy Officer at RealNetworks and President of Disney Online. Richard recently published a new book, The Soul Of A Deal , talking about his experience with deal making and interviewing such others as J.J.Abrams, Deepak Chopra, Peter G
Startup Professionals Musings
DECEMBER 19, 2018
Entrepreneurs seem more quickly frustrated these days when their “million-dollar idea” doesn’t turn into a sustainable business overnight. They don’t realize that it takes many skills to build a business under the best of circumstances, and today’s world of instant gratification doesn’t leave room for the patience and practice to develop these skills.
Xconomy
DECEMBER 19, 2018
RiverVest Venture Partners, a St. Louis, MO-based venture capital firm with additional offices in San Diego, CA, and Cleveland, OH, has raised $184.4 million for its fourth fund dedicated to investing in healthcare companies. Since its launch, RiverVest has invested in 47 companies working to develop new drugs and medical devices. Nearly half of the businesses in its portfolio have either been acquired or gone public, according to RiverVest.
L.A. Business Journal
DECEMBER 18, 2018
OSI Systems Inc., an electronic security company based in Hawthorne, has been awarded a federal contract worth up to $450 million to monitor health care patients for the U.S. military.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 19, 2018
San Diego-based EDF Renewables North America , which develops renewable energy projects such as solar and wind farms and Shell New Energies US LLC (Shell), said late Wednesday that the two are in a 50/50 joint venture to develop wind farms off the shore of New Jersey. According to the two, the area has the potential to produce approximately 2,500 megawatts of offshore wind energy.
Startup Professionals Musings
DECEMBER 21, 2018
In my career in business, I’ve found that the people you work with make all the difference. If everyone works well together, you all feel a sense of job satisfaction. If some people on the team are irritating to you and others, the whole environment becomes toxic, killing your motivation and the productivity of the team. Everyone thinks this is a management or the other person’s problem.
Xconomy
DECEMBER 17, 2018
It can take decades and billions of dollars to develop a drug, and its fate—and often that of its developer—rests in the outcome of clinical trials. Just look at some of 2018’s biggest biotech stories. The failure of a closely-watched cancer immunotherapy combination sent ripples through the sector and led several companies to change development strategies.
L.A. Business Journal
DECEMBER 21, 2018
Cryptocurrency company ParagonCoin announces settlement with SEC.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 19, 2018
Los Angeles-based Elementary Robotics , which is developing robotics technology for "intelligent robot assistants", said on Wednesday it has raised $3.6M in a Series A funding. The funding was led by Fika Ventures and Fathom Capital, and also included Toyota AI Ventures, Ubiquity Ventures, Riot.vc, Osage University Partners, and Stage Venture Partners.
Startup Professionals Musings
DECEMBER 15, 2018
One of the biggest impediments to starting a new venture is the “ terror barrier ,” as popularized by Bob Proctor, a 75-year-old millionaire and world renowned entrepreneur. This is the imaginary barrier that always seems to appear at the critical point where we would step out ahead of peers or competitors, but fear causes us to stop short. Everyone has a comfort zone, or level of risk, where they feel in control.
Xconomy
DECEMBER 17, 2018
[ Editor’s note: This is part of a series of posts sharing thoughts from technology leaders about 2018 trends and 2019 forecasts. ] Today’s artificial intelligence technologies have demonstrated they’re capable of handling specific tasks, such as identifying pictures of cats or spotting cancer in CT scans. Researchers are hopeful the industry’s next breakthroughs will enable A.I. to move beyond answering narrow queries to handling broader assignments.
L.A. Business Journal
DECEMBER 20, 2018
Jet propulsion lab hacked; NASA InSight lander listens for ‘Marsquakes’; $500 million for Musk’s net; Popdog launches, gains $9 million.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 19, 2018
Fountain Valley-based gaming accessory maker HyperX , which is part of Kingston Technology, says it has acquired the naming rights to the HyperX Esports Truck , in a deal with e-sports company Allied Esports. The truck, formerly known as the Esports Arena DRIVE , is an 80-foot long 18-wheeler which contains a "self-contained" mobile arena for e-sports.
Startup Professionals Musings
DECEMBER 17, 2018
Most of the entrepreneurs I advise today are ready to declare success when they get that first surge of traction with a real customer. This is a good sign, but they have no idea that the hard work of scaling the business is still ahead of them. It’s a bit like the heady first days after you’ve fallen in love, when you can’t imagine anything will ever kill that passion or commitment.
Xconomy
DECEMBER 15, 2018
Will “CBUS” and “SI” join “THOR” and “RMED”? It’s next week or never (until 2019, that is) for two San Diego companies that have filed documents with securities regulators indicating plans to go public. Agtech company Cibus, which uses “precision” gene editing to alter crops , has applied for a listing on the Nasdaq exchange under the stock symbol “CBUS.
L.A. Business Journal
DECEMBER 21, 2018
Semtech files lawsuit against Spark Connected; SpaceX preps for Dragon launch; Telltale lead writer joins Insomniac Games
socalTECH
DECEMBER 18, 2018
In a big exit for Southern California, Carlsbad-based Luxtera , a developer of optical semiconductors used in the high speed networking market, has been acquired by Cisco , in a deal worth $660M in cash and assumed equity options. According to Cisco, it will incorporate Luxtera's technology into its "intent-based" networking portfolio. Luxtera's semiconductors are used in optical transceivers, including 100GbE and 400GbE networks.
Inverted Software
DECEMBER 20, 2018
At Inverted Software we pride ourselves in our unparalleled success rate, and while, according to the Standish Chaos Report 68 percent of technology projects is “improbable” meaning it failed, time and time again we keep delivering successful projects to our happy customers. If you are struggling to understand how to measure success or if you are trying to demonstrate your software project was successful, the four questions below are internally used at Inverted Software at the end of
Xconomy
DECEMBER 18, 2018
A year after steering cancer drug developer Ignyta into a $1.7 billion sale to Roche , Jonathan Lim is back at it again. Ignyta’s former co-founder and head executive has co-founded another biotech in San Diego, Erasca, which also wants to make new cancer therapies. Erasca on Tuesday closed a $42 million Series A round led by Lim’s own investment firm, City Hill Ventures , and Boston-based Cormorant Asset Management.
L.A. Business Journal
DECEMBER 18, 2018
SpaceX plans Air Force satellite launch; Maple Media publishes “Skate Jam;” $8 million raised by TicketGuardian
socalTECH
DECEMBER 18, 2018
EvoNexus , the non-profit startup technology incubator operator which has locations in both Irvine and San Diego, said today that it has added Bob Genthert, the co-founder of ecoATM, as a Managing Director at EvoNexus in Irvine. Genthert was a co-foudner of ecoATM, which was sold to Outerwall in 2013 for $350M. Genthert also has served at such companies as The Walt Disney Company, Disney Publishing Group, ESPN Magazine, The New Release, and Sky Mobilemedia.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 18, 2018
UK-based augmented reality technology developer Blippar , which had been backed by Qualcomm Ventures, has gone into administration in the UK--their equivalent of bankruptcy--after failing to obtain new funding for the company. According to Blippar, it had been attempting to gain a "small amount of funding" as it was making a shift into the B2B market, but an un-named, existing investor "voted against the additional funding, effectively blocking the investment even if they were not asked to parti
socalTECH
DECEMBER 18, 2018
Newport Beach-based live events software and insurance products developer TicketGuardian has raised $8M in a Series A funding, according to the company, in a round led by American Family Ventures and IA Capital Group. The company said the new funding brings its total raised to $13M. TicketGuardian, led by CEO and founder Bryan Derbyshire, said the new funds will go towards its technology, products, and services it provides to event organizers.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 18, 2018
Santa Monica-based movie ticketing site Atom Tickets has rolled out its own Amazon Alexa skill, letting Alexa users purchase tickets using Amazon's popular voice assistant. According to Atom Tickets, the new skill lets consumers hear what new movies are playing near them, and also allows users to purchase tickets through integration with Amazon Pay.
socalTECH
DECEMBER 21, 2018
Irvine-based property information provider CoreLogic said late Thursday that it has launched an effort to exit "certain legacy non-core software units" at the company. According to the firm, it is looking to exit its loan origination software unit and its "legacy default management" related platforms over the next 24 months. The company did not identify all of those businesses, but said they generated approximately $40M in revenues in the first nine months of 2018.
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