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alarm:clock (10 unread)

January 01, 1970
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Sequoia India's Travel Guru Bought By Expedia
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Expedia is buying a majority stake in a VC-backed Indian rival called TravelGuru, reports ContentSutra which suggests that the deal values TravelGuru at $75M. In its own words, Travelguru was modeled on the basis of Expedia as the company aims to bring cheaper flight and hotel options to the growing base of Indian travelers. The company was in fact founded in the US by business school students. Travelguru has been backed by Sequoia Capital India and Battery Ventures and has raised about $25M. What's the reason for the sell-out? Well it could be the stiff competition. Yatra Online, MakeMyTrip, and Cleartrip.com are worthy adversaries with strong financial backing. Quick TravelGuru Commercial View - site...
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SocNet Giant Hi5 Buys PixVerse Chat App
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San Francisco-based social networking outfit Hi5 has paid an undisclosed amount for a smaller startup in the city called PixVerse. Pixverse was founded in August 2006. It has created a couple of Flash-based chat apps has branched out into social networking applications such as Pix Chat and Pix Wall created for Hi5 and OpenSocial. PixVerse was funded by Venrock. Its founder Charles Ying was CTO of FilmLoop. Hi5 claims around 100M registered members, many of whom are outside the US. With PixVerse they get a nice small set of apps to run ads on and to differentiate, moreover, they get a small band of developers who can continue to push the gas on more apps. Google dude interviews PixVerse founder Charles Ying at the Hi5 Hackathon View - site...
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Tech:stocker -Amkor Technology: A Good Bet, Like The Celtics
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Enter Amkor Technology (AMKR:NASDAQ), a leader in outsourced semiconductor assembly and testing. After watching our stock portfolio drop last week like a James Posey three-point shot in the finals (and we know we're not a lone. If your portfolio isn't looking like Kobe Bryant after the game 6 press conference its because you are a liar or you haven't had the guts to look), we at tech:stocker decided that we needed to start the week with a company that could help even the most ravaged portfolios. Founded back in 1968 when my dad was still debating whether or not computers would play an important role in the future, this Chandler, Arizona company (at least we know it is not overpaying for employees because of competing technology companies in the area) is doing something that we at tech:stocker enjoy – making a solid profit. With a P/E ratio of 8.42, we think Amkor has some value in everyone's portfolio. Being able to throw out names like IBM, Toshiba, and Sony Ericsson as key customers and suppliers, Amkor has a strong pipeline of work that shouldn't run dry anytime in the near future. While most analysts in the technology industry see...
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The IPO Well Is Dry For VCs
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In the second quarter of this year not a single company backed by VCs has gone public. It is the first time that has happened since 1978. The New York Times runs with a story to get at why it is so bleak for VCs. They quote blogger and CNBC regular Paul Kedrosky: “There is nothing that the industry is producing that investors want. The stuff they’re investing in is idiosyncratic — it’s fun and appealing to them but Wall Street doesn’t care. The Valley is operating in its own little world, and the capital markets don’t care about the things that are getting the Valley excited.” While we enjoy Kodrosky's blog, he comes off sounding like a know-it-all here. What would he have invested in that that entire VC sector missed that would have enjoyed an IPO? Our coverage of the VC sector shows a wide array of investments from clean tech to yes Chinese YouTube clones as well as food and consumer product startups. Nobody is getting any IPO love, so it makes no sense for Kodrosky to piss on VCs. If anything, the VCs got the timing of their clean tech investments right. They went in early,...
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UK Online Jeweler AstleyClarke.com Raises £2.75M From Index Ventures
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London-based online jeweler AstleyClarke.com has secured £2.75M in Series A financing from Index Ventures. There are a number of strong online Jewelers in North America including Ice.com and Blue Nile. It seems that Index sees AstleyClarke.com as a viable UK entrant. The startup is led by its name-sake Bek Astley Clark who was Head of Strategy at Tesco.com. AstleyClarke sells from smaller designers like Jade Jagger and has a contest for up-and-coming designers. View - site...
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London's Wahanda Funded As Online Spa Network
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Wahanda is a health and wellness community plus e-commerce marketplace where local spa and wellness businesses, pros and consumers mix. The company has raised a seed round of funding from the former engineering founders who built Skype, the investors behind last.fm and a former top exec at Four Seasons Hotels & Resorts. We got in touch with Ambient Sound Investments to confirm that it was indeed them who invested in Wahanda but they say they have yet to make a formal announcement. Wahanda is led by Salim Mitha who was Senior European Director - Search & Social Search at Yahoo! and Lopo Champalimaud who was Managing Director European Lifestyle at lastminute.com. Via Wahanda, we learned of a trendy man-spa in Covent Garden where we can get a botox treatment. Useful. View - site...
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Tech:stocker - Rack 'Em Up With Rackable Systems
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With many investors deciding that their mattress is a better haven for their money than the stock market, we at tech:stocker decided to close the week with a stock we believe has a product line that is ahead of the curve. "Safe" recommendations in this economic environment would be companies that provide every day staples to consumers in the U.S. And while we at tech:stocker are making conservative recommendations as of late, people may wonder why we are giving a buy recommendation to Rackable Systems (RACK:NASDAQ), a micro cap that has failed to deliver profits on a consistent basis. When talking to our friends on the street, the companies they seem to mention most frequently are ones that produce some form of energy or ones that are introducing products that use less energy. This brings us to Rackable and their introduction of their new extreme-efficiency, high-density server solutions. This new product line may not sound exciting to anyone who doesn't religiously read Network Computing but trust us, this is interesting. While the public relations buzz has been underwhelming for this launch, industry analysts feel this new product line is far superior to anything being made by Dell (DELL:NASDAQ) or any...
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Moxsie Raises $1M+ For Fashion Socnet
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Palo Alto's Moxsie has raised $1M+ in Series A funding led by Alloy Ventures, says PeWire. His co-founder and Fashionista in Chief is Catalina Girald, a Stanford MBA who was an associate at Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom. In conjunction with the financing Moxsie acquired a company called Media Lasso and Hrishi Kamat became CEO. Kamat was a VP at Kanisa and at Netscape/AOL. The concept here is a social network for fashion designers, buyers and retailers. We don't know enough about the fashion world to know if there is a play here, but for sure other socnets like deviantArt have worked by focusing on a creative process. View - site...
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MSFT Buys Portugal's MobiComp
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Microsoft is buying Portugal's MobiComp for an undisclosed amount. Mobicomp is an interesting startup that wrote software to allow backup and restoration of mobile data and mobile posting of content to Web Facebook and other socnets. MobiComp was founded in 2000 and is based in the city of Braga. View - site...

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alarm:clock (10 unread)