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  • Chip Manufacturer Quantace Raises $12 Million In Second Round

    Semiconductor manufacturer Quantance has raised $12 million in a second round of funding. The San Mateo, Calif.-based company develops technology that it says can improve the data speed and battery life of mobile devices using third- and fourth-generation cellular technology. It plans to use this latest cash infusion to make its patented technology commercially available for 3G devices, which is where the company is focusing its business interests. The latest round of funding was led by new investors TD Fund and DOCOMO Capital contributed as well. Original investors Granite Ventures and InterWest Partners also participated in the round. The company expects to begin shipping its first commercial chipset in the second quarter of 2009. Release . Mark Logic Digital Publishing Summit, Thursday November 6, Westin Times Square. Insight and perspective from Outsell, Gilbane, Simon & Schuster, BusinessWeek.com, more. Evening cocktail reception. Cost is complimentary. Register now!
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  • Chinese Mobile Search And Ad Firm Easou Technology Raises Third Round Of $12 Million

    Easou Technology, the Chinese mobile search and advertising firm, has raised $12 million in a third round of funding led by iD Tech Ventures and AXA Private Equity, reports ChinaVenture (via Pacific Epoch ). The three-year old company, which employs 500 staff, is using the investment for product research and development as well as customer service and marketing. Founder Wang Xi reported that in September the company broke even, with its key word and advertising business generating 5 million remminbi ($732,000) in revenue. The company raised $5 million in a second round of funding in August 2006, and an unidentified amount in January of the same year. Social Media Deals Report: This 199-page report, filled with charts and data, examines the categories, number and size of VC and M&A deal in social media from 2007 through 2008. Visit the ContentNext Reports page
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  • Apptera Raises $10.5 Million To Expand Advertising Platform

    San Bruno, Calif.-based Apptera said it has raised $10.5 million in an undisclosed round of venture funding. Investors in the round include: Lightspeed Venture Partners, Alloy Ventures, and Walden International. The money will go towards investing in the company's audio and visual mobile advertising network. Advertisers can use the company's ad platform and technology to insert audio advertisements within a call, and then follow-up with a visual ad. For instance, a person may call in to a movie phone service to hear when the latest movie is playing. An audio ad for a nearby restaurant may play, and if a person is interested, they can request a coupon or driving directions by text message. The company can also add an audio component to a text ad, which allows a person to click to call from an SMS. Henry Vogel, Apptera's president and CEO: "A lot of people are thinking about mobile advertising as the ability to send a SMS, or a WAP banner, but you are constrained in the richness and whether people have a data plan, but every device absolutely has a phone." Founded in 2001, Apptera already has customers such as AT&T's 1-800-YellowPages, AOL's Moviefone, MovieTickets.com, Bank of America's ATM locator, SaveMart supermarkets, MLB.com, RadioShack, GSI Commerce and SayNow's social music service. The company declined to say how much money it previously raised, and said it had fewer than 100 employees. Our streamlined mobile application for the BlackBerry and other smart devices brings you the latest headlines quickly on the go. Click here to download .
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  • China Unicom And China Netcom Merger Expected To Close Soon

    The merger of state-owned China Unicom and China Netcom is expected to go through in early January, Dow Jones ( NYSE: NWS ) reports . The new China Unicom plans to enhance management efficiency and integrate the wireless and wireline networks to create a better portfolio of services. The merger, which is valued at $56.3 billion in stock, was initiated by a government-backed plan first announced in late May. Related China Unicom Buys China Netcom In $56.3 Billion Stock-Swap; China Telecom Buys Unicom CDMA Unit Mark Logic Digital Publishing Summit, Thursday November 6, Westin Times Square. Insight and perspective from Outsell, Gilbane, Simon & Schuster, BusinessWeek.com, more. Evening cocktail reception. Cost is complimentary. Register now!
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  • Rave Wireless Raises $7 Million For Mobile Safety Services

    Rave Wireless , which recently relocated to Framingham, Mass. from New York, confirmed today it has raised a fourth round of funding worth $7 million. PEHub reported that investors include Bain Capital Ventures, Sigma Partners and RRE Ventures. To date, the company has raised a total of $42 million, including an $18 million round last year that was led by Trilogy Equity Partners. A spokeswoman said Rave has expanded its market focus and today provides mobile safety products to not only higher education institutions, but also to companies. Check out the best business jobs in digital media. Go here for paidContent.org Job Board.
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  • MoJiva Raises First Round Of Funding; Appoints CEO

    MoJiva, a mobile advertising platform provider, has raised an undisclosed first round of funding from Bertelsmann's VC arm Bertelsmann Digital Media Investments (BDMI). The New York City-based start-up, which launched in May 2008, has also appointed David Gwozdz CEO. Gwozdz, an original member of the team that founded online ad company DoubleClick, was most recently an SVP at behavioral ad company Phorm. MoJiva plans to use the investment to develop new products and to expand its sales and marketing staff. The company's main product, its "Self Service Ad Delivery Tooklit" is targeted at advertisers who want to create and manage their own mobile campaigns, and publishers who want to monetize their mobile content through ads. Mojiva also provides white label versions of its toolkit to ad agencies. The company claims that it has served over half a billion ads since its launch ( release ). Mark Logic Digital Publishing Summit, Thursday November 6, Westin Times Square. Insight and perspective from Outsell, Gilbane, Simon & Schuster, BusinessWeek.com, more. Evening cocktail reception. Cost is complimentary. Register now!
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  • Mobile Video Platform Transpera Closes $8.25 Million In Second Round

    Transpera, the Santa Monica, Calif.-based mobile video platform company, has closed a second round of funding worth $8.25 million. Labrador Ventures and all previous investors, including Flybridge Capital Partners, Intel ( NSDQ: INTC ) Capital and First Round Capital participated. The mobile video platform, which allows for an ad-supported model, has attracted interest from MTV, Discovery ( NSDQ: DISAB ), CBS ( NYSE: CBS ) and many others. The capital, which includes debt financing from Silicon Valley Bank, will help the company expand the product line and serve customers. In addition to the round, the company announced it has appointed Brian Monnin to the position of chief product officer. Previously, Monnin worked at Brightcove, where he was VP of Publishing Products and led the development of online media editing tools for publishers. Related Fox Reality Channel Takes Programming Mobile On iPhone Mobile Video Sharing Startup Transpera Gets First Round Funding Mark Logic Digital Publishing Summit, Thursday November 6, Westin Times Square. Insight and perspective from Outsell, Gilbane, Simon & Schuster, BusinessWeek.com, more. Evening cocktail reception. Cost is complimentary. Register now!
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  • DoCoMo Takes 26 Percent Stake in India's Tata Teleservices

    In a major move and a first by a Japanese telco into India, NTT DoCoMo ( NYSE: DCM ) is taking a 26 percent stake in local telco giant Tata Teleservices, for a price of $2.7 billion. This is surely to spur more rivalry with other local giants like Reliance, Vodafone ( NYSE: VOD ) and Airtel, and help DoCoMo expand beyond its sluggish home market as well as try and redo its disastrous forays in Europe and Asia earlier. PTI : DoCoMo has been trying to enter the Indian market for some time. Tata Teleservices has also been trying to sell part of its stake for a while and it was in talks with South Korea Telecom two years ago, but the talks failed due to disagreement over price. Tata Teleservices has 30 million subscribers, making it the sixth-largest telecom company in India on that parameter. FT : Analysts said that DoCoMo was paying a high price to get into India, however. "We're very bearish on this. Tata has been on the block for years and nearly everyone has kicked the tyres and walked away," said one, who asked not to be named in the story. He added that, at around $350 per subscriber before debt, DoCoMo was paying a substantial premium relative to IDEA Cellular, a comparable Indian network . DoCoMo defended the deal, saying that because of Tata's rapid growth, it expected to make a 15 percent return on investment over the next five to ten years. Mark Logic Digital Publishing Summit, Thursday November 6, Westin Times Square. Insight and perspective from Outsell, Gilbane, Simon & Schuster, BusinessWeek.com, more. Evening cocktail reception. Cost is complimentary. Register now!
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  • Twitter Gets Message To Find Ways To Make Money In Tough Economic Times

    Twitter is considering charging companies for access to its users as a way to make money, and delay having to raise another round of capital in these tough economic times, reports Bloomberg , which talked to Twitter's CEO Evan Williams. The San Francisco-based company, which has already raised $22 million, has been able to count a number of successes, from playing an important role in the election, to hitting one billion "tweets," but making money is not one of them. Williams: "I want to manage things so I don't have to raise money in 2009." The options range from charging companies to reach its users, such as sending out coupons or promotions to charging companies that want to use the site to gather feedback on their products, or display ads on its search engine. Recently, the company turned off the ability to conduct people searches on its site , saying that it was being abused "in ways that were detrimental to the overall stability of the service." That may create an opportunity since the only way to currently identify users is by uploading your email contact list. Twitter also will likely leverage its reach—globally, the number of visitors to Twitter rose almost fivefold to 5.57 million in September from a year earlier, according to ComScore. If Twitter fails to find a business model, it could cost them. Bloomberg reports that in the past year valuations for start-ups have fallen at least 20 percent, which has forced companies to be more conservative with their cash. Otherwise, they would have to sell a larger percentage of the company to raise more money. When Twitter raised money this summer, it had a "really good" valuation. "Everybody's worth less. The ecosystem takes a hit as a whole," said Williams, who sold his previous venture, Blogger, to Google ( NSDQ: GOOG ) in 2003. Related Twitter's #VoteReport Registered 11,000 Updates During Election Voters Use Twitter To Track Election Day By Mobile...
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  • Oberon Media Cuts Back On Spending To Reach Profitability Next Year, Says Memo

    Casual gaming publisher Oberon Media is freezing wages and new hiring, cutting back on travel budgets and reducing non-essential costs with the goal of reaching profitability by the second quarter 2009, according to a memo that was sent to the company's employees by CEO Tomer Ben-Kiki. In a copy leaked to us by an employee, Ben-Kiki explains that consumer spending and the casual-games industry is beginning to feel the impact of the financial crisis. "While Oberon Media is still, and will continue to be, a strong leader in the casual gaming community, we are experiencing the same pressures as every other business in the marketplace." The company declined to comment on the memo. The New York-based company, which operates under brand i-Play, develops casual games for mobile, PC and TV. Over the past several months, the company restructured its organization and raised $20 million from Infinity I-China. Despite this funding, Ben-Kiki wrote: "We need to make sure that we optimize both our short- and long-term strategies to ensure that we are well positioned currently and over time. As a result, after a couple of years of significant investments we made to grow our business, we will now be focusing on achieving sustained profitability no later than Q2 of 2009." To achieve profitability, the memo outlines "Project Green," a plan that includes curtailing travel and entertainment, eliminating outsourcing and consulting costs, and freezing both new hires as well as salary increases company wide. Founded in 2003, Oberon Media is backed by some big money from Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Oak Investment Partners and Lehman Brothers. As of a year ago, the company had 500 employees. With this latest news, the cuts in the gaming industry are really starting to add up. In the past week, Electronic Arts ( NSDQ: ERTS ) said it plans to shed 540 employees and THQ ( NSDQ: THQI ) said it will layoff about 250 . Although the memo doesn't mention layoffs...
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  • 10-Q Watch: Stuff Still Left To be Sold At Verisign; Chairs Anyone?

    Verisign, which recently sold off its Jamba mobile content division to News Corp ( NYSE: NWS ) for $200 million, still has a number of divisions that are up for sale, including some in mobile/telecom sector. A list of them is detailed in its 10-Q for Q308, filed late last week. They include: -- Messaging and Mobile Media : The Company's Messaging and Mobile Media ("MMM") business is an industry leading global provider of short-messaging, multimedia messaging, and mobile content application services. MMM enables messages and multimedia content to be sent globally across any wireless operator and mobile device. MMM offers the global connectivity, network reliability, and scalability necessary to capitalize on the fast growing global messaging and media content markets. -- Content Portal Services : The Company's Content Portal Services ("CPS") business enables a seamless end-to-end solutions business focused on providing best-in-class digital content storefront services. CPS can be used as a content delivery platform for games, ringtones, and other content services. CPS provides its services to mobile carriers and media companies primarily located in Canada. -- EMEA Mobile Media : The Company's EMEA Mobile Media ("EMM") business offers mobile application services which includes interactive messaging applications, content portal services, and messaging gateway services. EMM provides its services to mobile carriers and media companies primarily located in Europe. -- Post-pay : The Company's Post-pay business enables advanced billing and customer care services to wireless telecommunications carriers. More details here . Related VeriSign Exits Mobile Content; Sells Remaining Stake In JV To News Corp For $200 Million Our streamlined mobile application for the BlackBerry and other smart devices brings you the latest headlines quickly on the go. Click here to download .
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  • VMware Brings Virtualization To Smartphones

    Demonstrating the power of mobile phones today, VMware announced plans today to bring its virtualization capabilities to the mobile phone. Virtualization allows one computer to access others by tapping into their operating system. VMware said to accomplish this it will use technology from Trango Virtual Processors, a company it acquired in October. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. VMware said the technology will benefit handset vendors by reducing development time and getting mobile phones with additional services to market faster. In addition, end users will be able to run multiple profiles – for example, one for personal use and one for work use – on the same phone. VMware expects the technology to be ready as soon as next year. Release . Eweek reported that only a handful of companies are creating virtual platforms for smart phones, including OK Labs and VirtualLogix, and although the market has great potential, it's still very early. A Gartner report estimated that about 10 million smart phones will ship with the technology by the end of 2008. Social Media Deals Report: This 199-page report, filled with charts and data, examines the categories, number and size of VC and M&A deal in social media from 2007 through 2008. Visit the ContentNext Reports page
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