funding

Foursquare poised to get new VC funding

According to numerous sources close to the situation, Foursquare is in the final stages of striking a funding deal with the very venture firm--Andreessen Horowitz--that had publicly dissed the hot social-location site and walked away from earlier talks.

The deal is likely to be completed and announced by early next week, at a valuation of about $80 million, barring unusual hiccups.

"Light at the end of a very long and very twisty tunnel," joked one source familiar with the situation.

Indeed, the wrapping-up of what has been a very convoluted funding process comes after a series of missteps … Read more

Has AOL finally unloaded Bebo?

AOL CEO Tim Armstrong may finally have made good on his promise to figure out what to do with Bebo, the company's pricey digital albatross, by the end of the spring.

Mashable reported on Wednesday morning that Bebo had been sold; The Wall Street Journal followed up later in the day by saying that the deal is "close" but not complete and that the buyer is Criterion Capital Partners, a hedge fund based in Studio City, Calif. An AOL representative did not respond to a request for comment; a price isn't yet clear, but the Journal … Read more

Novell: 20 chances to reinvent itself

Most companies struggle to reinvent themselves, so shackled by their pasts that they can't reorient themselves toward the future.

Novell, once the king of the software world, is like that. Over the years it has built up a broad portfolio of software (with associated revenue streams) in repeated attempts to regain its glory days. That portfolio now stifles its ability to focus on other areas with the most promise.

But Novell's management may be about to get a lifeline. Twenty of them, actually.

According to Thursday's Wall Street Journal, up to 20 bidders, most of them private … Read more

Diaspora about to hit $100,000 in donations

Perhaps the most damning critique of Facebook's recent controversial moves has been that a group of programmers have been raising money to create an alternative--and people are donating.

Diaspora, a social-networking project hatched by four New York University programming students in their early 20s, is set to hit $100,000 on Thursday in its quest to raise enough funding from the public to spend the summer building "an open source personal web server that will put individuals in control of their data," using a fundraising platform start-up called Kickstarter. Their original goal was to raise $10,000 … Read more

Andreessen Horowitz drops out of funding race for Foursquare

In an unusual move for a venture firm chasing a hot start-up, Andreessen Horowitz said it has dropped out of the race to be an investor in social location company Foursquare.

In an interview Monday night, Ben Horowitz, partner in the high-profile VC outfit he helms with Marc Andreessen, said enough was enough related to the intense press and other machinations around the deal, which has included talks to be acquired by Yahoo.

"We withdrew our funding offer to Foursquare and we are out," said Horowitz in an interview with BoomTown. "This is playing out too much … Read more

Personal finance reporter

Personal finance and investment management software is becoming more powerful and capable yet easier to use than ever. Case in point is Believ's flagship product, Fund Manager Personal, a comprehensive portfolio manager designed to give investors powerful reporting and graphing features that are also easy to learn, understand, and apply. Its customizable financial analysis and reporting tools make it suitable for individual investors and family finances as well as active traders and market professionals.

Fund Manager's clean, elegant, businesslike interface is anchored by a full-featured menu bar, including an excellent Help file as well as controls for the … Read more

Online-video guide snags $11 million in VC funding

Clicker, an online TV Guide-like service for Web videos, announced Thursday that it has secured $11 million in venture funding.

The series B round was led by Jafco Ventures. Benchmark Capital and Redpoint Ventures also participated. The company has now raised approximately $19 million since its launch in January 2009.

According to the company, it plans to use the money to invest in engineering and supporting partnerships.

Clicker, whose service went live in November, doesn't attempt to be a Hulu killer or YouTube competitor. Instead, the company provides a comprehensive guide to Web television. Its catalog includes more than … Read more

Google donates $2 million to Wikimedia

Google has made a $2 million donation to the Wikimedia Foundation, the group behind the widely used Wikipedia reference site.

Jimmy Wales, a member of the board who helped create Wikipedia, announced the donation in a tweet on Tuesday. He said a formal announcement would come Wednesday.

Google and Wikimedia did indeed make a formal announcement of the grant, saying the funds will support technical infrastructure to support growing traffic and to help make Wikipedia "easier to use and more accessible."

"Wikipedia is one of the greatest triumphs of the Internet. This vast repository of community-generated content … Read more

Optics start-up LensVector raises $30 million

LensVector, a start-up in Mountain View, Calif., that hopes its optical components using solid-state electronics will replace moving parts in consumer camera technology, said Thursday that it's raised $30 million in a third round of funding.

Institutional Venture Partners led the funding round, joining existing investors Menlo Ventures, Samsung, Silicon Valley Bank, Mitsui, and Kodak. IVP general partner Norm Fogelsong has joined the LensVector board, the company said.

"This financing will allow us to scale our manufacturing capacity and better serve this growing demand from our customers," Chief Executive Derek Proudian said in a statement. LensVector now … Read more