Sat.Jun 22, 2013 - Fri.Jun 28, 2013

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GRP Announces $200 Million Fund. Rebrands as Upfront Ventures

Both Sides of the Table

'I am super excited to announce that today is a day of lots of new things for my partners & me: A new fund, a new office and a new brand. Let’s start with the fund. We have previously raised funds in 1996 ($200 million), 2000 ($400 million) and 2008/9 ($200 million). This month we closed our 4th fund of $200 million. If you’ve been following the press about VC funds you’ll know this is no small feat.

Funding 343
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Los Angeles Targets Uber, Lyft, Sidecar, Orders Them To Leave

socalTECH

'The City of Los Angeles--despite a successful, recent mayoral campaign focused on the city''s tech-friendly new major has just issued a cease and desist to Uber , Lyft , and Sidecar , three smartphone driven ride services who have been serving the area''s high tech savvy residents. According to letters from Thomas M. Drischler, taxicab administrator for the Los Angeles City Department of Transportation, all three services lack proper licenses to operate, and were ordered to "cease and desist" f

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Corporate whistle-blowers fulfill a function.

Berkonomics

'Assuming first that a corporate whistle-blower is not tooting about you individually, such a class of people have been granted protections under the law and serve a function that needs to be acknowledged. First, the assumption is that such a person is not making his or her gesture for personal profit, but to give proper notice that there is something illegal going on within the company that the person cannot accept and must tell someone about.

Report 176
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Do You Know Your Professional Brand? How Your Brand Influences Your Success

Technology Council

'By Charles J. Curto, Managing Principal of Tech Coast Equity Group At a meeting of the Technology Council’s Entrepreneur Society, Susan Howington, CEO of the outplacement firm Power Connections, presented Do You Know Your Professional Brand? How Your Brand Influences Your Success. Below are key take-aways from her presentation. Susan defined your professional brand as […].

Equity 166
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Can You Ask for Office Rent Relief? How to Manage Your Lease During COVID-19

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.

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The Biggest Reason Most Sales Campaigns Don’t Close

Both Sides of the Table

'Every sales organization with more than a handful of reps or that is across multiple offices or time zones would benefit from having a sales methodology. There are many out there and many books have been written on the topic. I’ve been writing a series on a simple methodology that we used at my first enterprise software company. It was useful because I was new to sales and as the CEO it gave me some comfort to feel more informed about how our leads where going and to know the likelihood of our

Sales 328
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Yardi Adds Social Media Marketing Features

socalTECH

'Santa Barbara-based apartment leasing software suite developer Yardi has expanded its software to handle social media marketing, according to the firm. Yardi said it has expanded its Yardi Marketing Suite to now handle social media marketing, including a Facebook application and links to Twitter. Yardi said the tools allow possible renters to check availability and lease apartments directly from Facebook.

More Trending

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Do You Know Your Professional Brand? How Your Brand Influences Your Success

Technology Council

By Charles J. Curto, Managing Principal of Tech Coast Equity Group At a meeting of the Technology Council’s Entrepreneur Society, Susan Howington, CEO of the outplacement firm Power Connections, presented Do You Know Your Professional Brand? How Your Brand Influences Your Success. Below are key take-aways from her presentation. Susan defined your professional brand as […].

Equity 100
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Indiegogo Expands in Canada And TechZulu Will Bring It To You Live!

Tech Zulu Event

'Indiegogo announced the launch of Indiegogo City Sessions, two workshop-style events to be held this summer in Toronto and Montreal. Both events will feature crowdfunding insights from Indiegogo co-founder Danae Ringelmann, first-hand tips from successful Canadian campaigns and practical guidance on running a successful campaign—everything from how to market a campaign to common mistakes that campaign owners make.

Tips 109
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Tongal Hits $1M In Rewards Pool For User Generated Video

socalTECH

'Los Angeles-based Tongal , which operates a crowdsourced site for creating commercials, reported today that it has hit $1 million in current projects in its reward pool. The company--whose crowdsourced videos are widely viewed online and on television commercials, including the Super Bowl--said the projects include campaigns for six Procter & Gamble brands (Gillette, Iams, Oral B, Secret, Era and Gain), LEGO, Ford, L''Oreal, Verizon, plus a project beteen Pringles and Star Wars.

Hollywood 223
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6 Reasons Why Focus is Job One for Every Startup

Startup Professionals Musings

'It’s great to dream big, but your startup needs a laser focus in the beginning to get market and investor attention. Google did it with search engines, Apple did it with a personal computer, and even Wal-Mart did it through low prices. A business plan I saw a while back to combine all the good features of several popular social networks on one site does not do it.

Startup 102
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Innovate Pasadena Launch Party 6/27

Steve Reich

'Innovate Pasadena is throwing a Launch Party–the whole Pas tech community will be there, and you should, too! You can get tickets while they last by joining the Innovate Pasadena group on LinkedIn. The Pasadena Angels will be there, in addition to representatives of CalTech, the City of Pasadena, IdeaLab, and more. Don’t miss it!

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WESAWIT | Experience Events Through The Eyes of The Crowd

Tech Zulu Event

'Morgan Rostagnat, Christopher Elwell, and Thibault Mathieu are the brains behind WESAWIT. The mobile app and website that allows people to capture and share images and videos of events through social media. TechZulu catches up with the three to talk about WESAWIT, startups, and the LA scene. TechZulu: So where did WESAWIT originate from? Thibault Mathieu: Morgan and I were both in film school at UCLA.

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Consumers Protest LA's Attempt To Shutdown Uber, Lyft, Sidecar

socalTECH

'A move by the City of Los Angeles to shut down ridesharing and transportation services Uber , Lyft , and Sidecar has spurred some consumer backlash, with a new campaign on Change.org to get LA to repeal the cease and desist order from its tax administration bureau. Change.org is an online service which seeks to give citizens a voice in issues affecting them in government, business, school, or elsewhere.

Legalzoom 221
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The 10 Worst Traits of Even the Great Entrepreneurs

Startup Professionals Musings

'Does it really take a few flaws to make a great entrepreneur, or are the rest of us just confused about what a perfect business person is all about? In the past I’ve written about the positive attributes of great entrepreneurs, so this time I thought I would focus on the negatives that I see often, and I challenge you to find someone that has all the positives and none of the negatives.

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How To Make a Better Phone Calls in Business

Both Sides of the Table

'Phone calls. We all have important ones and want to maximize the impact, which can be hard to do when you aren’t face-to-face. Many first-time entrepreneurs have grown up digital natives so have a really good intuitive feel for technology & design but don’t yet have the business basics down. . This shows itself when people try to do an elevator pitch, send concise, actionable emails or have a quick phone call with you to ask for help. .

Startup 364
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Adults Disconnect Technology To Reconnect At ‘Camp Grounded’

Tech Zulu Event

'The concept was simple; rent out an old boy scout campsite deep in the redwood forest of Northern California and give adults the chance to play and connect like kids again, sans technology. It was catchy and immediately went viral complete with a tweet from Arianna Huffington herself, coverage from CNN and Canada’s national news service. Tech bloggers spread the story with glee, and the website was tweeted and shared so much that camp sold out minutes after tickets were released.

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TheBouqs.com: An Online Flower Service For The Next Generation?

socalTECH

'The online flower delivery market is now an old and established market. However, is there an opening for a new way of reaching consumers with flower delivery? Los Angeles-based TheBouqs (www.thebouqs.com) thinks so, with its new, cut-to-order online flower delivery service for the iPad generation. We spoke with CEO and co-founder John Tabis about how TheBouqs believes there''s an opening for a modern online flower delivery service, because none of the existing players are catering to the new ge

Services 215
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How to Make Sure Your Startup is Built on Values

Startup Professionals Musings

'I’m seeing a renewed appreciation of culture and values in business these days. Maybe it’s just another example of nature abhorring a vacuum, but I prefer to think it’s a natural evolution of the pervasive social networking communities, where people relate to and expect to interact with businesses and products they like. They drive the market, rather than the other way around.

Startup 100
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The Power Of Mouth To Mouth Marketing

InfoChachkie

'A version of this article previously appeared on Forbes. The CEO of Expertcity (creator of GoToMyPC and GoToMeeting, acquired by Citrix) was born in Germany and grew up in South Africa. Although his English was impeccable, he was occasionally tripped up by colloquialisms. One that he particularly struggled with was "word-of-mouth marketing,”which he consistently referred to as "mouth-to-mouth marketing.

Marketing 239
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The @TechZulu Crew tries some delish Pull Pork Poutine on our last night in #toronto. Great times with @indiegogo [Flickr]

Tech Zulu Event

'techzulu posted a photo: via Instagram bit.ly/18hz3hi.

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CampaignEQ's William Belk On Ads, Algorithms, and Attribution

socalTECH

'William Belk and Dirk McGregor were both early employees at Beachmint, who saw how difficult it was to track the lifetime value and marketing attribution of their advertising spend. To figure that out, they started building tools to help them sort out Beachmint''s advertising efforts. They decided to take what they learned there, to create CampaignEQ (www.campaigneq.com).

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Many Entrepreneurs Pick the Wrong Advisors for Help

Startup Professionals Musings

'If you are an entrepreneur for the first time, or entering a new business area, it’s usually worth your time to assemble an Advisory Board of two or three executives who have travelled that road before. But if you select the wrong people, or use them incorrectly, the impact will not be positive for your company or your image. For perspective, you need to remember that boards of advisors, unlike directors, have no formal power or fiduciary duties, but rather serve at the pleasure of you the busi

Help 96
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The Power Of Mouth To Mouth Marketing

InfoChachkie

'A version of this article previously appeared on Forbes. The CEO of Expertcity (creator of GoToMyPC and GoToMeeting, acquired by Citrix) was born in Germany and grew up in South Africa. Although his English was impeccable, he was occasionally tripped up by colloquialisms. One that he particularly struggled with was "word-of-mouth marketing,”which he consistently referred to as "mouth-to-mouth marketing.

Marketing 133
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It kicks off here in #toronto for the @indiegogo city sessions brunch. Panels and talks later tonight at 5pm est [Flickr]

Tech Zulu Event

'techzulu posted a photo: via Instagram bit.ly/120rvXH.

56
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Fans.lu Powers E-Commerce Store For Stan Lee Title

socalTECH

'Fans.lu , the Los Angeles- and Detroit-based startup providing e-commerce stores for brands, said this week that it has launched a new e-commerce store for the videogame Verticus, in partnership with Los Angeles mobile entertainment publisher Moonshark. Financial details of the deal were not disclosed. Verticus is based on the comic book of the same name from Stan Lee.

Commerce 193
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Many Entrepreneurs Over-Think or Under-Think Issues

Startup Professionals Musings

'Startups and entrepreneurs are drowning in the information overload, where the volume of data created is like a new Library of Congress every 15 minutes. That creates a huge gap between data and meaning, and makes quick decisions and action ever more difficult. We all need to take a little more time to think. On the other end of the spectrum, some people “over-think” things to the point of inaction.

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Demand Media Launches Subscription Fitness Program, Stronger

socalTECH

'Santa Monica-based Demand Media has made an interesting move this morning, launching a brand new, subscription fitness and nutrition program. Demand Media said it new Stronger program is part of a "key initiative" to expand its paid content porfolio. Demand Media recently acquired subscriptoin-based video workshop and instruction site Creativebug. Stronger is an offshoot of Demand Media''s LIVESTRONG.COM site.

Demand 187
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MetaCloud Raises $10M For Private Cloud Service

socalTECH

'Metacloud , a provider of managed, Openstack-based private cloud services, announced this morning that it has raised $10M in a Series A funding round. The round was led by Canaan Partners, and also included Storm Ventures and AME Cloud. The startup, which is led by Sean Lynch and Steve Curry, offers up on-premise, OpenStack-based private clouds to companies, who want to deploy cloud service but do not want to have to manage the infrastructure and maintenance of those cloud deployments.

Services 187
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Amazon Studios Seeks Short Video Submissions

socalTECH

'Amazon Studios , the content production arm of Amazon.com, which has a heavy presence in Los Angeles, has launched a new effort to accept submissions of "shorts"--the short videos that filmmakers have traditionally pitched to gain deals with local studios. According to Amazon, it has invited filmmakers to submit their short "concept videos", 2-15 minutes in length, which will be reviewed by its staff to consider for an option.

Hollywood 180
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Lyft Co-founder: We'd Love To Work With Sidecar, Uber On LA Issue

socalTECH

'The move this week by Los Angeles to ban the very popular, smartphone-driven ride services Sidecar , Uber , and Lyft , might just spur the three companies to work closer together. In a chat on Reddit, Lyft co-founder John Zimmer said that his company would "love to work together" on fighting to promote and defend ride sharing as a legal alternative to taxi monopolies.

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The Design Accelerator Launches Incubator At Idealab

socalTECH

'A new, startup incubator-created by the Art Center College of Design and the California Insitute of Technology --said this morning that it has launched a brand new, design-focused incubator, housed at Idealab. According to The Design Accelerator , it will help startups by selecting promising early stage, design-driven technology companies from the Art Center and Caltech communities for an intensive three-month program. >.

Incubator 178
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Ranker Takes $2M For Expansion Efforts

socalTECH

'Los Angeles-based Ranker , the online site which lets users rank, view, vote, and share their opinions on a wide range of topics, announced today that it has raised $2M in a follow on investment round. The starup, led by Clark Benson , said the funding came from Lowercase Capital , BullPen Ventures, Data Collective , as well as prior investors Draper Associates , Rincon Venture Partners , Siemer Ventures , TenOneTen, Tech Coast Angels and Pasadena Angels.

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Bitcoin Foundation Gets Warning From California

socalTECH

'The Bitcoin Foundation , the nonprofit group which helps maintain the Bitcoin standard, the protocol behind the open, electronic currency which is not tied to any country or governing authority, has received a warning from the State of California''s Department of Financial Institutions. The letter-- widely released to the media--warns the nonprofit group that it has "engaged in the business of money transmission" without obtaining a license from California, and that it must cease and desist fro

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SpaceX Adds Satellite For Turkmenistan

socalTECH

'Hawthorne-based SpaceX , the commercial rocket and spacecraft firm headed by Elon Musk, said over the weekend that it has signed a deal with Thales Alenia Space, to launch a satellite for Turkmenistan. Financial impact of the win was not announced. SpaceX said the geostationary transfer orbit satellite will be Turkmenistan''s first, and will be used for communications.

SpaceX 173
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Innovate Pasadena Seeks To Focus Pasadena's Innovation, Tech Efforts

socalTECH

'For all of the activity in Silicon Beach which seems to be crystallizing in Santa Monica, there are many other parts of Los Angeles which have a long history of involvement in the technology industry. One of those areas is Pasadena, home to Idealab, Caltech, and a large number of technology companies, big and small. To help bring some focus to the area, a new group, Innovate Pasadena , said this morning that it has launched to promote Pasadenas a leading center for innovation for technology and

Pasadena 171
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Dollar Shave's TV Push Powered By Convertro

socalTECH

'Fans of Los Angeles subscription razor firm Dollar Shave Club might have noticed a lot of the firm recently on television. The reason why, is the firm has been running ads since January to help get the word out about its service and products. Apparently, that push comes thanks to another, local startup-- Convertro , which said today that Dollar Shave Club has been using its platform to measure its ad campaign effectiveness, including the effectiveness of those TV ads for Dollar Shave Club.