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JULY 13, 2021

Carlsbad-based Smart Earth Technologies (SET), a developer of LTE and 5G products for the water utility market, has been acquired by San Francisco-based CrescoNet. Financial terms of the acquisition were not announced. According to the companies, SET sells battery-operated, cellular endpoint transceivers and valves, installation tools, LTE network infrastructure, and software for meter and customer management.

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MAY 24, 2021

Santa Barbara-based Invoca, which provides software for call and sales tracking, said on Monday that it has acquired DialogTech, a developer of an artificial intelligence (AI)-powered call tracking and analytics product. Financial details of the acquisition were not announced. Invoca said the combined company will have more than 300 employees and 2,000 customers.

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MAY 5, 2021

Los Angeles-based Flowspace, a startup developing fulfillment software for e-commerce companies, said this week that it has named Piranavan Selvanandan as its new Vice President of Engineering. Selvanandan most recently was at Salesforce, in software engineering, and also served at HP. Flowspace said Selvanandan spent nearly a decade at Salesforce. The new exec comes following a $31M, Series B funding round for Flowspace in March.

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MAY 5, 2021

Santa Monica-based NXCR ,the subscription vehicle startup led by auto- and startup-veteran Scott Painter, and auto analytics company J.D. Power announced on Wednesday that the two companies are in a strategic alliance, which will link J.D. Power's data solutions, vehicle valuations, and "consumer insights" into NXCR's vehicle subscription service. Financial details of the strategic alliance were not annouced.

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FEBRUARY 4, 2021

Startup accelerator network operator Techstars has named Matt Kozlov as Managing Director of Techstars LA, the company's Los Angeles startup accelerator program, the accelerator said on Wednesday. Kozlov previously was Managing Director of the Techstars Starburst Space Accelerator, in addition to serving as Director of the Techstars Healthcare Accelerator in partnership with Cedars-Sinai, two of Techstars' other programs which have been run in the Los Angeles area.

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FEBRUARY 4, 2021

Los Angeles-based Halogen Ventures, the venture capital firm led by Jesse Draper, has raised $21M in its second fund, the firm said on Wednesday. According to Halogen Ventures, the fund will continue to invest in women and diversity. Halogen Ventures was founded in 2015, and so far has invested in over 60 female founded companies, and says it now has ten exits out of its portfolio.

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JANUARY 25, 2021

Los Angeles-based Perch, a startup which operates a service that lets users build their credit by paying for Netflix, Spotify, Hulu, and other services on credit, has scored an investment from financial giant Citi, via Citi's new Citi Impact Fund. Size of the investment was not announced. Citi announced the investment this morning. Citi also announced funding in six other companies, including Clerkie, KETOS, MedHaul, Shift, Superpedestrian, and Vyv.

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OCTOBER 26, 2020

Irvine-based property information provider CoreLogic says it has contributed $250,000 to local food banks, and also provided additional, volunteer paid time-off for its employees, as a result of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic. The company said the contributions, made through its Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) program, went to such organizations as Second Harvest Food Bank of Orange County, The Pantry, Foodlink, San Diego Food Bank, and others.

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OCTOBER 16, 2020

Santa Monica-based Cornerstone OnDemand , which develops cloud-based employee development software, says it has integrated its products with ServiceNow. According to the two, the integration allows organizations that use Cornerstone to train their employees to directly integrate with ServiceNow's HR delivery products. Cornerstone OnDemand explained that with this integration, employees can access trainings and tasks that were assigned to them in Cornerstone Learning directly in ServiceNow, witho

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OCTOBER 16, 2020

Irvine-based property information provider CoreLogic said this morning that it will discontinue its reseller business, as part of a previously announced "strategic plan". The company said by divesting the business--which offers up tenant screening, credit, and borrower verification services--it will "signnificantly enhance" its revenue profile and increase its margins.

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OCTOBER 16, 2020

Los Angeles-based construction giant AECOM announced this morning that it is selling off its Power construction business, to affiliates of CriticalPoint Capital, LLC. Financial details of the deal were not announced. The company said the sale is part of an effort to transform itself into a "higher-margin, lower-risk" professional services business. AECOM said it was advised by Wachtell, Lipton, Rosen & Katz along with DBO Partners LLC in the transaction.

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OCTOBER 16, 2020

Los Angeles-based electric vehicle designer Fisker Inc. said on Thursday that it has reached a deal with auto supplier Magna International , where Magna will provide the vehicle platform and build Fisker's upcoming Ocean SUV. According to Fisker, it expects Magna to manufacture the Ocean SUV at its European vehicle assembly facility, starting in Q4 of 2022.

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AUGUST 25, 2020

A new California bill is threatening shared, micro-mobility companies like Santa Monica-based Bird and Los Angeles-based Wheels , by threatening to eliminate their ability to force their users to sign away their rights to sue those companies in the case of an injury or accident. According to the proposed law, agreements from those micro-mobility companies "shall not contain a provision by which the user waives, releases, or in any way limits their legal rights or remedies under the agreement.

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AUGUST 25, 2020

Irvine-based hardware maker Movandi , a developer of millimeter wave, wireless technology used for 5G networks, has upped its recently announced funding round to a total of $29.6M, according to a regulatory filing from the firm on Monday, and still hopes to raise as much as $35.8M in the round. Movandi had announced its Series C in April, saying it had raised $27M from WRVI Capital, and also included Cota Capital and DNX Ventures.

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AUGUST 26, 2020

RateMyAgent , an online service for rating real estate agents which has its U.S. headquarters in San Diego, said it has raised $7M in funding. Source of the funding was not announced. According to the Australian company, the funding will go towards its growth efforts in the U.S. real estate market. The company said the new funds will go out to build out its U.S. sales and support team.

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AUGUST 26, 2020

Irvine-based financial wellness program operator Acorns , which operates a program that encourages Americans to save and invest, says it has received a strategic investment from Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Dany Garcia, the co-founders of Seven Bucks Companies. Size of the investment was not announced. Johnson is best known for his acting roles, but now runs Seven Bucks Companies with his ex-wife, Dany Garcia.

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AUGUST 26, 2020

Santa Monica-based movie ticketing app Atom Tickets is launching its app as a third-party, branded experience on Snapchat , the company announced on Wednesday. According to Atom Tickets, its new experience, Movie Ticekts By Atom, will let users on Snapchat watch movie trailers, buy movie tickets, and share their movie plans with friends all within Snapchat's Mini feature.

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AUGUST 26, 2020

Los Angeles-based Bingie , a new startup, debuted a new, social recommendations app that helps users get movie recommendations from their friends on Thursday. The startup--led by Matt Knox--says the app helps users with movie recommendations across such services as Netflix, Disney+, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu and more. According to Bingie, the new app lets users find content across streaming services and networks; share recommendations with friends; create internal group chats on a show or movie;

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AUGUST 27, 2020

Los Angeles-based Oblong , the developer of collaboration and remote meeting technology, reported a win with an an-named S&P 500 big box retailer this morning. According to the company, it was selected by that retailer for its corporate meeting spaces, to help with effective team collaboration at company headquarters while maintaining social distancing guidelines.

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AUGUST 27, 2020

Irvine-based property data provider b> ATTOM Data Solutions reports that even more properties in the United States have fallen into what it calls the "zombie foreclosure realm" in Q3, as the U.S. housing market continues to slide due to the economic aftermath of the coronavirus pandemic. According to ATTOM Data, it tracked 1.5 million (1,570,265) residential properties in the United States vacant, representing 1.6 percent of all homes, with about 216,000 of those homes in the process of foreclos

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AUGUST 27, 2020

Los Angeles-based micro-mobility and scooter provider Bird said this morning that it will be offering up free rides to teachers to start off the school year, providing them with up to two, free, 30-minute rides per day until the end of September. According to Bird, the Free Rides for Teachers program is valid both in the US and Europe, and is part of a "thank you" to teachers facing an unusual year with academic challenges posed by COVID-19.

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AUGUST 27, 2020

Los Angeles-based Signal Sciences , a developer of web application security software, has been acquired for $775M by San Francisco-based Fastly , Fastly annoucned this morning. According to Fastly, the cash and stock deal will expand its security portfolio, and form the basis of a new, upcoming security offering called Secure@Edge. Fastly said that new produt will provide a web application and API protection solution.

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AUGUST 27, 2020

Los Angeles-based Harbor , a startup that is gamifying disaster preparedness through an app, has raised $5M in a seed funding round, the company disclosed on Thursday. The funding came from 25madison. Harbor is led by CEO Dan Kessler, who previously served at LA's Headspace. Harbor says it plans to launch its product in October. Kessler was previously VP of Global Business Development, and most recently had been Entrepreneur-in-Residence at 25madison, which is based out of New York.

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AUGUST 27, 2020

Amazon is getting set to open up a brand new, high-tech grocery store-- Amazon Fresh --in Woodland Hills, the first in what the e-commerce giant hopes will be a new segment of the grocery industry. The store, roughly the same size as Whole Foods, will feature "Dash Carts", which will allow shoppers to check out without waiting in line, and also will include Echo Show smart displays, kiosks with Amazon's Alexa activated, and an entire are for picking up Amazon.com orders.

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JULY 20, 2020

Venice, California-based Snapchat has debuted the new meditation features that it developed with Los Angeles-based Headspace this morning, the new meditation-with-friends feature that the company announced at its Partner Summit in June. The new "Snapchat mini" feature lets friends simultaneously access the "Headspace Mini" feature, which are three to four minute meditation exercises.

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JULY 20, 2020

Los Angeles-based Gemist , a consumer startup which lets users "try and buy" jewelry, has raised a round of funding, the company said today. The funding came from De Beers Group Ventures, Legendary Ventures, Lightspeed Scout, and Luma Launch. Size of the funding was not announced. As part of the funding, Stephen Lussier, Executive Vice President, Consumer and Brands for De Beers Group, has joined the company's board.

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JULY 20, 2020

Los Angeles-based Ready, Set, Food! , which develops products that parents add to breast milk or formula to help prevent infants from developing severe food allergies to peanut, egg, and milk, has raised $3M in a funding round. According to the company, the second round of funding for the company was led by Danone Manifesto Ventures, the corporate venturing arm of Danone, and also included Mark Cuban and AF Ventures.

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MARCH 12, 2020

Irvine-based Mica Energies announced Wednesday afternoon that it has received a seed funding, and says it is working on a "proof of concept" for ite technology, focused on harvesting radio frequencies from the environment. Source and amount of that seed funding was not announced. The company claimed that the seed funding values the company at $39M. Mica Energies claims that it is working on technology that will allow for the charging of a smartphone battery while it is in a pocket or inside a bu

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MARCH 12, 2020

The Overwatch League , the e-sports league run by Santa Monica-based Activision Blizzard , says it is cancelling all of its Homestands events scheduled for March and April. The league said that the health and safety of employees, fans, players, teams, and partners is "paramount" to Activision Blizzard Esports, and after careful review and collaboration with teams, it has cancelled all Overwatch League Homestands events for those months.

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DECEMBER 30, 2019

Venice-based Snapchat is planning to launch a new feature in February, which will feature users' Bitmoji avatars as the main characters in a custom cartoon. The new feature--called Bitmoji TV , is expected to include users' Bitmoji avatars included in "secret agent missions", piloting a spaceship, and much more. A number of users have posted the teaser for Bitmoji TV that Snapchat apparently sent out over the last couple of days.

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DECEMBER 30, 2019

Amazon and Ring , the Santa Monica company now owned by Amazon, are the targets of a new class action lawsuit filed in Alabama by a man who claims Amazon and Ring have filed to do enough to secure their systems against hacking. The lawsuit still needs to be approved for class action status. The legal filing comes after a long list of high profile, security-camera hacking incidents that have occurred in the last month, many linked to a group of hackers which were streaming hacked cameras live on

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DECEMBER 30, 2019

Every year, at the end of the year, we share some reflections on the past year from our readers, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, sponsors, and others in the local technology community. Today, we share the thoughts of Andy Wilson , Managing Director of the Alliance for SoCal Innovation (www.alliancesocal.org). We'll be featuring contributions all through the holiday season.

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DECEMBER 30, 2019

Every year, at the end of the year, we share some reflections on the past year from our readers, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, sponsors, and others in the local technology community. Today, we share the thoughts of Michele Ruiz , the Co-Founder and CEO of BiasSync (www.biassync.com), a startup which develops products that helps help organizations more effectively assess and manage unconscious bias in the work environment.

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DECEMBER 30, 2019

Every year, at the end of the year, we share some reflections on the past year from our readers, entrepreneurs, venture capitalists, sponsors, and others in the local technology community. Today, we share the thoughts of Mike Jones , Co-founder and CEO of Science, Inc. (www.science-inc.com), which has been behind such companies as Dollar Shave Club, August Home, DogVacay, Hello Society, Playhaven, and many others.

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DECEMBER 16, 2019

San Diego-based Citadel Defense , which develops counter-drone technology to help detect and identify unauthorized drones, claims it has deployed its technology for three, undisclosed U.S. government agencies. According to the company, it has been working over the past six months to deploy its counter-drone technology, both domestically and abroad. The company said those deployments were all through a pilot program.

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DECEMBER 16, 2019

San Diego-based biopharmaceuticals developer Qpex Biopharma READ MORE>>.

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DECEMBER 16, 2019

Huntington Beach-based Rocket Lab , the provider of small satellite rocket launches, has just put a "Gold Mission Success Coin" on its e-commerce website for a mere $7.5M, in what clearly is a bit of spaceflight humor. According to Rocket Lab, the "Gold Mission Success Coin" can either be purchased on its e-commerce website, or it is included free with the purchase of dedicated launch on Rocket Labs Electron vehicle.

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