Both Sides of the Table
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
I’ve often wanted to let people see what a VC pitch is like to help new entrepreneurs have a better sense of what it’s like to present. Obviously having a camera on will add a small bit of an artificial result because I don’t want to ask as much confidential information and with the camera on people are obviously a bit nicer. But this interview is fairly authentic.
InfoChachkie
NOVEMBER 7, 2011
Nearly one year ago, I published my first infoChachkie interview, with Kevin O’Connor , Co-Founder of FindTheBest. At that time, I was not utilizing video. Thus, I was very excited when Kevin graciously agreed to make an encore appearance via Skype. If you care to review my prior discussion with Kevin, you can do so HERE. Before starting FindTheBest, Kevin was the Co-Founder and CEO DoubleClick (sold to Google, $3.1B and a seed investor ISS (sold to IBM, $1.3B).
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socalTECH
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
Los Angeles-based Yowie , the online video chat site headed by Jay Snider, which allows Internet users to interact with celebrities, bands, and others, looks to be playing a bigger role in the campaign of U.S. presidential candidate Gary Johnson. Yowie said today that, due to the success of a "town hall" with Johnson last week, Johnson is holding another town hall on the service, this time with FairTax.org's Phil Hinson.
SoCal Tech Calendar
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
Tuesday, November 15, 2011 -- The Startup Conference. The Startup Conference is one of the largest entrepreneur conferences in Silicon Valley, and is coming to LA. on Nov 15th. Join 300+ entrepreneurs to discuss fundraising, launching your startup to the press and more. See [link].
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Both Sides of the Table
NOVEMBER 8, 2011
Launchpad LA today announces it will accept applications for its third class of Los Angeles-based tech startups. We have significant VC commitments (listed below) – every entering company will get $50,000 in funding, mentorship from top VCs and successful entrepreneurs plus free office space. For any company interested in applying please visit the website.
InfoChachkie
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
“Contrariwise,” continued Tweedledee, “If it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic.”. Lewis Carroll, from Through The Looking Glass. Entrepreneurs often must take counter-intuitive, contrarian positions in order to succeed. As noted in Entrepreneurship Is A Compulsion , entrepreneurs often view the world from a slightly different vantage point, rejecting the oxymoronic term Conventional Wisdom. .
Southern California Tech Central brings together the best content for technical professionals in Southern California from the widest variety of industry thought leaders.
SoCal Tech Calendar
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
Tuesday, November 15, 2011 -- Medical Device and Investor Forum. The OCTANe Medical Device and Investor Forum has become the top opportunity for medical device start-up companies that are seeking investment capital to make investment presentations to leading venture capitalists and investors. This year we've added growth, expansion, and later stage companies to the Investor Forum.
Both Sides of the Table
NOVEMBER 8, 2011
The tech market is filled with many stories of early-stage funding. It’s even more exciting when you can report an exit of a company that is a major win. That’s why I’m proud to announce today that HealthDataInsights (founded by Victor Chaltiel), where GRP Partners was a 30% owner, has been acquired for $400 million. It maps to several themes about “solving bigger problems,” “taking more meaningful ownership positions” and “women in entrepreneurs
Startup Professionals Musings
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
By definition, most entrepreneurs are thought leaders. They have the ability to recognize a market need, the skills to design and implement a solution, and the drive to start a business from that solution. It all comes from within themselves. A business leader does the same thing and more through the people around them. Most entrepreneurs are not both.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
It looks like Los Angeles is set to get access to peer-to-peer car sharing service Zipcar , as it plans to open an office in Hollywood tomorrow. Zipcar has been inviting the press to an event tomorrow with L.A. City Council President Eric Garcetti, to mark its entry into Los Angeles, the 16th market covered by the company. The introduction of Zipcar to the Los Angeles market would be a first for the mainline, peer-to-peer car sharing movement, which allows car owners to rent out their cars on an
SoCal Tech Calendar
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
Tuesday, November 15, 2011 -- Poker Startups #9. We need able bodies in the startup space to come play some texas hold-em with other entrepreneurs and VCs.
Tech Zulu Event
NOVEMBER 11, 2011
Go Viral without becoming a Virus. In this article you’ll discover how to start a blog that makes money. There are four types of blogs; written blogs, video blogs, photo blogs and a combination of these. We’ll primarily be discussing written blogs. There are two different components to make money blogging. One is traffic and the other is a monetization strategy.
Startup Professionals Musings
NOVEMBER 7, 2011
New product startups rightfully begin with a heads-down focus on creating the ultimate product – whether it’s a new technology, a new look and ease of use, or a new low-cost delivery approach. Most then add customer service at the rollout, but very few really understand what it means to be truly customer centric, and even fewer really achieve it. Customer centricity is far more than providing excellent customer service, although that’s a step in the right direction.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Woodland Hills-based ReachLocal , the provider of services to help small and medium sized businesses advertise online, said Thursday that it has opened up a new office in Amsterdam, Netherlands. The firm said the new office will serve as its European headquarters. ReachLocal said it now has over 800 consultants in North America, Australia and Europe serving over 18,000 advertisers.
SoCal Tech Calendar
NOVEMBER 11, 2011
Thursday, November 17, 2011 -- Business Plan Competition and Dinner Be a VC! Join SDVG at the annual PitchFest Business Plan Competition to take part in funding promising Southern California companies. Hear their business plans and visions to determine which is most likely to go the distance. Based on your vote, SDVG will present the winners with a check that night!
Tech Zulu Event
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
Today marks another great day for the LA startup community as one of the city’s prominent mentoring programs , Launchpad LA, received VC funding – for each startup. Every startup selected and entering into the program will be awarded $50,000 in VC funding, mentoring, and free office space in Santa Monica area within walking distance of the Third Street Promenade.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 7, 2011
As automotive web sites go, there are lots of review and information sites giving you information about new and used cars, magazines and information sites for auto enthusiasts, and discussion sites and groups for all kinds of cars. But, it turns out, there are not any automotive sites specifically geared towards women. That's something which Los Angeles-based VroomGirls (www.vroomgirls.com) is looking to change--with the backing of sponsors like Toyota, Ferrari, and Lamborghini.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Los Angeles- and Austin-based GameSalad , the developer of mobile game development software, has expanded from the iOS world into Android, the company said this morning. According to GameSalad, its latest version of its software--GameSalad 0.9.85 Beta--now supports publishing apps to the Android market. GameSalad is best known for the many games developed on the iPhone using its tools, which do not require complex programming skills to develop.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
Los Angeles-based Phorus , a new startup headed by former Phatnoise co-founder Dannie Lau, said today that it has raised $2M in a Series A funding round, and launched its efforts to bring wireless home audio products to market. Source of the new funding was not announced. Phorus said it has developed PlayCast, a wireless home audio solution which connects into Android mobile devices, tablets, and PCs.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 9, 2011
The latest numbers out of comScore , which measures e-commerce spending and Internet traffic, find that U.S. retail e-commerce spending rose 13 percent, year-over-year, to $36.3 billion in Q3 of 2011. comScore said the growth is the eighth, consecutive quarter of positive, year-over-year growth for the industry. E-commerce spending has been rising since Q4 of 2009, after stalling out over issues with the economy in 2008 and early 2009. comScore said the best performing segments online were digit
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 7, 2011
Santa Monica-based Demand Media , the online publishing firm headed by Richard Rosenblatt, announced its third quarter 2011 financial results on Monday, saying that it had a loss from operations of $3.3M, with a rise in revenues to $81.5M. Revenues were up 25 percent compared with Q3 of last year, when it had revenues of $65.4M. The firm saw increases in revenues in both its content & media segment, as well as its domain registration business, reporting 27 percent increase in content and med
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 7, 2011
Santa Barbara-based cloud computing software developer Eucalyptus said Monday that it has named Greg DeKoenigsberg as Vice President of Commuinty. DeKoenigsberg was previously at Red Hat, heading up that the Fedora open source project, including serving as the first Fedora Board, chair of the the Fedora Engineering Steering Committee and Fedora Ambassadors Steering Committee, and founding the Fedora Cloud SIG, according to Eucalyptus.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Huntington Beach-based Anymeeting , the free web conferencing and webinar service headed by Costin Tuculescu, and backed by the Tech Coast Angels, Pasadena Angels and Maverick Angels, reports today that it has added a new, ad-free version of the software aimed at small business users. The firm said the new, paid feature will cost $17.99 per month for webinars with up to 25 attendees, and $69.99 per month for up to 200 attendees.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 11, 2011
Los Angeles-based CODA Holdings , the developer of electric vehicles and electric vehicle battery technology, formally opened up a new headquarters Thursday on Fairfax Avenue. CODA held a grand opening of its 100,000 square foot headquarters with California Governor Jerry BRown and Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa yesterday. CODA says it has 220 engineers, technicians, and corporate staff at the headquarters location, with plans to add another 100 empoloyees over the next year; the company
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Santa Monica-based venture capital firm Clearstone Ventures has scored an acquisition in its portfolio today, with the acquisition of Apture by Google. Apture announced the acquisition on its website Thursday, but did not disclose any financial details of the buy. Apture had been backed by Clearstone Venture Partners, Beau Vrolyk, Paul Maritz, and Steve Taylor.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Santa Monica-based BetterWorks , the provider of a system for managing employee benefits and perks programs headed by Paige Craig, said this morning that it has updated its product, and added a new Personal Services category to its offerings. BetterWorks--which makes it easy for companies to offer employees access to perks like ordering lunch from local restaurants, handling dry cleaning, and other services--said it has added Personal Services to cover things like house cleaning services.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 7, 2011
Glendale-based Disney Interactive Media and online video sharing site YouTube , which is part of Google, announced today that they are spending up to $15M on developing original videos series. The content will be produced by Disney and distributed via YouTube and Disney.com. The companies said that the content will be made available on both Disney.com and YouTube in early 2012, and that Disney Interactive will produce and program the co-branded video destinations for both Disney.com and YouTube.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 11, 2011
Santa Monica-based Activision reported Friday that it had an estimated sell through of more than $400M on its new title, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, in the first 24 hours of its release. The firm said it sold more than 6.5 million units in North America and the United Kingdom alone with the release. The sales figures surpassed last year's release of Call of Duty: Black Ops, which had $360M in first day sell-through, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, released in 2009, which had estimated fi
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Car sharing service ZipCar announced today that it is in a "significant expansion" of its car sharing network in the Los Angeles area, and has opened up a regional office in the city, the 16th for the firm. ZipCar said that it now has over 125 vehicles throughout the city, including those in Hollywood and vehicles on the campuses of Loyola Marymount University, Occidental College, the University of Southern California (USC), the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), University of Califor
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 11, 2011
Hulu Plus , the premium subscription service from Los Angeles-based Hulu will be included on the upcoming Kindle Fire, the Android-based tablet from Amazon.com, Amazon said this morning. Hulu Plus is one of a number of Android apps which will be included as part of the new Kindle Fire tablet. The tablet already includes apps for streaming TV shows and movies from Netflix, plus access to Amazon.com's own Prime Instant Video.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 7, 2011
Encino-based Cyber-Rain , the developer of Internet-connected, smart irrigation controllers, said over the weekend that it has extended its control systems with new features. The firm said its controllers--which automatically adjust watering schedules based on local weather information--now supports Blackberry mobile devices, odd-even water scheduling, GPS information, and more.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
Santa Monica-based Activisoin , which launched its latest title, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3 on Tuesday, updated its users today, saying that it is continuing to have issues with its Call of Duty Elite social gaming service. The firm said it is "having trouble scaling the service to meet demand", even though users are still able to plus Modern Warfare 3 online with other users.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 10, 2011
San Diego-based Active Network , the operator of online software for sports groups, events, community activities registration, and other organizations, said Thursday afternoon that it has acquired RTP , a provider of technology for managing ski resorts and ticketing. Financial terms of the buy were not announced. RTP's technology is used by ski resorts to sell tickets, activities, and manage rentals; the firm's product was developed in 1998 for Vail and several other Rocky Mountain ski resorts.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 8, 2011
If you are Twitter , the popular messaging service, where do you go to find startups you might want to work with? In Twitter's case, at least for Thursday, that's Los Angeles. Twitter is looking to spur interest in its platform from developers, by holding an event Thursday in Los Angeles aimed at techies, part of a worldwide tour by the firm to promote development on its platform.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 7, 2011
Irvine-based YouMail , the personalized voicemail service firm headed by Alex Quilici, has raised around $355,000 in new funding, adding CrunchFund--the investment fund run by TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington--as a backer. Details of the funding were leaked by TechCrunch, which also said that the Tech Coast Angels ACE Fund participated. YouMail raised a round of funding in July from VantagePoint Capital Partners, Siemer Ventures, and the Tech Coast Angels.
socalTECH
NOVEMBER 8, 2011
Los Angeles-based Mentoin Mobile , a developer of social gaming apps, said this morning that it has scored $250,000 in funding from Dallas Mavericks owner Mark Cuban. Mention Mobile said that Cuban gains a minority equity stake in the firm. Mention Mobile is a developer of a number of iPhone and Android applications, including Trivia Friends and Get To The Nest.
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