Monday, April 30, 2012

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Australian Price Gouging Inquiry Targets Apple, Microsoft And Others Top
Apple Retail Store - SydneyGetting a new laptop or buying a new license for an operating system is often cheaper in the U.S. than in most other countries. Europeans, for example, are used to paying a hefty premium for Apple products and the situation is similar in Australia, where the cheapest MacBook Air currently costs about 15% more than in the United States. Now, however, the Australian government is starting a parliamentary inquiry into these pricing schemes. According to Australia's Sydney Morning Herald, the politicians behind this inquiry hope that calling these companies out publicly will result in prices dropping.
 
Marketplace For Customized Goods CustomMade Raises $4M From Google Ventures And Others Top
screen-shot-2011-11-17-at-6-56-28-pm1CustomMade , an online marketplace that connects shoppers with artisans to make customized goods, has raised $4 million in funding co-led by Google Ventures and Schooner Capital. Existing investors Launch Capital, Nextview Ventures, Andrew McCollum and First Round Capital all participated in the round. This brings CustomMade's total funding to $8 million. CustomMade allows customers who want to make custom products like jewelry and furniture post project proposals. The startup has built a community of makers that can browse through customer project requests and assign themselves to ones they are suited to. Makers can sign up for and build profiles on the site, which allows customers to browse through their portfolios.
 
Brit Morin Engages $1.25M From Marissa Mayer, Aileen Lee, Founders Fund And More To Launch Her First App, Weduary Top
Screen Shot 2012-04-30 at 7.08.05 AMBrit Morin, the Martha Stewart of tech, is today announcing a $1.25 million seed round for her technology and content company Brit. The list of investors is actually pretty sympatico with "the next generation of lifestyle" branding of Brit & Co, with fashion-heavy Index Ventures, tech fashionista Marissa Mayer, KCPB's Aileen Lee, Tina Sharkey and Seth Goldstein, Kevin Colleran, Annabel Teal, General Catalyst Partners, Founders Fund Angel and DMGT all going in. In addition to the funding the company is also launching its first app, Weduary, which lets tech-savvy couples build their own attractive and dynamic wedding websites. The Facebook app, which users can try for free, lets prospective brides and grooms build a custom wedding website in four steps, leveraging the Facebook social graph to make it easy to import photos from Facebook, invite guests, coordinate registry details and other event RSVPs.
 
EA's PopCap Heads Into Merchandise With Plants Vs. Zombies Toys, Underwear (!) & More Top
popcap-toysWant a zombie on your underwear? Good, because soon, you will have that opportunity. Today, there comes more proof that mobile gaming is the entertainment franchise opp of the future as EA-owned PopCap, makers of Plants vs. Zombies and the Bejeweled series of games, announced a number of new partnership deals that will see its game brands turned into merchandise - much like Rovio's Angry Birds has already done to great success. The company has six new partnerships on tap which will see its properties featured as everything from plush toys to branded headphones. And yeah, boxers, too.
 
Internet Identity System MiiCard Raises $2.5M To Help You Prove You Are Who You Say You Are Online Top
miicard_logoWith the rise of startups building on top of the collaborative consumption model - that is, where users are buying from and selling directly to other users - there's a growing need for some sort of system to help verify user identities. Although there are others quietly working in this space, today the U.K.-based startup Miicard, which is building an identity verification service, has moved a step ahead. The company has just completed its second seed funding round, raising $2.5 million from New Wave Ventures, IQ Capital and Par Equity. MiiCard had previously raised $.75 million back in September, also from IQ and Par Equity. The company says it aims to use the additional funding to move into the U.S. market.
 
Rovio: Angry Birds Space Downloaded 50 Million Times In 35 Days Top
screen-shot-2012-02-17-at-1-36-16-pmRovio to Houston. The Mighty Eagle as landed. Big time. Rovio just took to Twitter to announce that its latest Angry Birds installment, Angry Birds Space, was downloaded 50 million times in 35 days. As the company brags, that makes Angry Birds Space the fastest growing mobile game in history. People clearly cannot get enough of flinging upset birds at moderately evil (or perhaps, misunderstood) pigs.
 
Research: $1.5 Trillion In Mobile Revenues In 2012, U.S. Accounting For 40% Of All Smartphone Sales Top
mobile pileThe mobile industry will reel in more than $1.5 trillion in revenues in 2012, with 28 percent of that, $400 billion, attributable to mobile data, according to new research out from analyst Chetan Sharma. He notes that within the revenues expected for mobile data, non-messaging revenues led by apps, mobile web browsing and streaming media have finally overtaken those of traditional messaging like SMS as smartphone usage continues to grow. Non-messaging, he says, will account for 53 percent of the total: in other words, some $212 billion will come from apps, music and video streaming, games and mobile web browsing.
 
Ski Lift Retailer Liftopia Goes White Label, Lets Resorts Add E-Commerce To Their Own Sites Top
mobile_cloud_MRG[1]Liftopia, the startup offering consumers discounts on ski tickets and other snow-related activities, is today launching a new e-commerce platform for the ticket sellers themselves called "Cloud Store by Liftopia." The service will be offered for free to any mountain resort for use on their own websites (including mobile), starting first in North America, then followed by resorts in Europe. Once up-and-running, Cloud Store allows the resort to sell tickets using variable pricing - similar to how airline tickets, hotel stays and car rentals are sold today.
 
I, For One, Welcome Our Remote-Controlled Robotic Fire-Breathing Dragon Overlords Top
A bit of silly for your Monday morning: this is a flying, RC-controlled robotic dragon that actually breathes fire and sounds like a monstrous squeal demon as it takes off. The Dragon took a year to build and won Best In Show at the Toledo RC event, Weak Signals.
 
Nokia Considering Selling Fancy-Pants Vertu Line Top
Vertu-Constellation-Quest-FCCReuters is reporting that Nokia is exploring selling the Vertu phone line to holding company Permira for $264.26 million, freeing itself from the difficult process of selling phones no one wants to people who should know better. Nokia called Vertu a "non-core asset."
 
LG To Pull Away From Windows Phone's Loving Embrace, Refocus On Android Top
LG-logoSure, Windows Phone is still but a baby alongside Android and iOS, but the platform shows promise. Woz likes it. And the fact that it's backed by hardware partners like Samsung and Nokia says good things, as well. But it would seem that LG, coming off of a few quarters in the red, has decided to back away from the platform. LG reportedly told the Korea Herald that the company would be focusing on Android handsets going forward, since "the total unit of Windows Phone sold in the global market is not a meaningful figure."
 
Pepsi Puts A Pop Culture "Cheat Sheet" At The Heart Of Its New Campaign Top
pepsi nowPepsi is launching a big rebranding campaign today, and the company says social media is going to play a crucial role. Specifically, PepsiCo Global Head of Digital Shiv Singh tells me that the biggest online piece of the campaign is a "social media cheat sheet" called the #NOW board — it has, in fact, taken over the Pepsi website. The board is built on top of Pulse, the social media visualization platform that Pepsi launched last fall. Looking at the RSS feeds from across the Web, as well as the firehose of wants being shared through Twitter and bit.ly (with help from startup SocialFlow), Singh says the #NOW board presents the pop culture stories that are hottest in social media at any given moment, presented in easily-digestible form.
 
Microsoft Makes $300M Investment In New Barnes & Noble Subsidiary To Battle With Amazon And Apple In E-books Top
barnes_and_noble_nook_tablet_1161200_g2Barnes & Noble has found a new, major partner in its fight to get an edge over Amazon and Apple in the market for e-books and the devices being used to consume them: it is teaming up with Microsoft in what the two are calling a strategic partnership, name yet to be determined. It will come in the form of a new subsidiary of B&N that will include all of its Nook business as well as its educational College business. Microsoft is making a $300 million investment in the subsidiary, valuing the company at $1.7 billion in exchange for around 17.6 percent equity in the subsidiary. The news leaves the door open for B&N to eventually spin these off into a separate business altogether -- or even sell them to Microsoft. And it leaves a load of questions about what B&N will do next with the Nook, which is currently built on a forked version of Google's Android platform.
 
Just-Eat Just Raised Another $64M From Vitruvian, Index, Greylock For Online Food Ordering Top
just eat logoThe UK may have just entered a double-dip recession but that doesn't seem to have trickled down to how consumers are spending money on take-out food -- and the companies that are building businesses around that. The UK-based online food ordering site Just-Eat has picked up a third round of funding totaling $64 million, its biggest yet, to further build out its online food ordering service. The round was led by private equity firm Vitruvian Partners, with participation from existing investors Index Ventures, Greylock Partners and Redpoint Ventures. The investment comes only a year after the company raised a venture round of $48 million, and a Series A of $17.4 million in 2009, and brings the total funding in the company up to a whopping $129.4 million in the last three years.
 
Greylock Deepens Enterprise Experience, Adds Former BladeLogic CEO And BMC President As Venture Partner Top
devGreylock Partners has been long focused on two distinct areas when it comes to venture investments—consumer and enterprise. The last consumer partner hire the firm made was former CEO of Mozilla, John Lilly. And today, the firm is deepening its experience in its enterprise practice with the addition of Dev Ittycheria as Venture Partner in Greylock's Silicon Valley office. At Greylock, Ittycheria will be focusing on investing in enterprise software companies, with a focus on cloud-based services and enabling IT infrastructure. Ittycheria is a long-time enterprise veteran with a history of not only founding successful startups, but also helping lead established companies towards revenue growth. He co-founded BladeLogic, which he led through a successful IPO and eventually a sale to BMC Software in 2008 for $900 million.
 
Opera Mini Now Has 169 Million Users, 56% Of Them Only Use The Mobile Web Top
Opera-logo-JPGOn the desktop, Opera's browser is only a minor player compared to Internet Explorer, Firefox, Chrome and Safari, but as a mobile browser, Opera competes head-to-head with Apple and Google. Worldwide, depending on which statistics you believe, it is either just ahead of the competition or a close runner-up. In developing countries, Opera is generally far ahead of the competition. According to an interesting new white paper by Opera, in which the company took a look at how its users around the world actually use the browser, it's hard to underestimate the importance of mobile browsing in developing countries.
 
McCann Invests $4M In Israeli Incubator 'thetime' Top
thetimeWith a $4M investment, McCann Worldgroup has bought a 15% stake in Israeli incubator 'thetime'. This move isn't a particularly surprising considering 'thetime' was founded by Ilan Shiloah, who for the past 10 years has been chairman of McCann Erickson Israel. 'thetime' was also co-founded by angel investor, Nir Tarlovsky. Uri Weinheber, previously of Lab One, acts as the incubator's CEO.
 
Zillow, Mum On $45M RentJuice Rumor, Launches First Dedicated Rental App, On Android Top
zillow rentalsZillow, according to one report, may be closing in on a deal to buy rental marketing software maker RentJuice for $45 million, but in the meantime the online property portal is focusing on the rental market in another way: by launching its first dedicated rentals app -- a free app for Android devices. Zillow Rentals is the latest development in Zillow's strategy for mobile, which -- now numbering at 10 apps -- has become a huge part of its business: on weekends, a full 40 percent of all of Zillow's traffic -- 32 million uniques in March -- comes from mobile devices, and in the same month 155 million homes on Zillow were viewed from mobile devices: that works out to 57 homes per second, the company tells me. And although users are able to view some rental information on the original app, the new, dedicated app gives a speedier and more streamlined experience for the fast, high-volume property viewing that characterizes the average would-be renter, says Jeremy Wacksman, VP of marketing at Zillow.
 
Wrapp Brings Social, Mobile Gifting Service To The U.S.; Partners With The Gap, H&M And Others Top
wrappWrapp, a social gifting service backed by Greylock Partners and Atomico, is crossing the pond with the U.S. launch of its mobile gift card and retail app. Wrapp, which was available previously only in the UK, Norway, Sweden and Japan, Wrapp is actually launching today with a number of U.S. retailers including Fab, Gap, H&M, Sephora, The Wall Street Journal, Wayfair, and others. As we've reported in the past, Wrapp was co-founded by Rebtel and SendIt founder Hjalmar Winbladh, Spotify founding CTO Andreas Ehn, and lets friends give, receive and redeem digital gift cards using mobile devices, and allows friends to contribute to gifts given by mutual friends. With Wrapp, which offers iPhone, Android and web apps, you sign in via your Facebook account, and you can then tap the Celebration tab on the app, browse your friends or major events, and select the person you want to send a gift card to. All available gift card offers for that friend are automatically listed.
 
Disillusionment of an Entrepreneur Top
Lopez_4When I became an entrepreneur at the age of twenty-three, I began in earnest, as do all entrepreneurs, chasing a dream. My dream was clear. I would build a consumer technology company that reached ten million people and sell the company for millions of dollars, before the age of thirty. Then, as the dream went, I would retire to an oceanfront house on a warm Pacific beach and learn how to surf. I recently had the fortune of celebrating a year in which I saw that lofty goal fulfilled. My company's iPhone apps had over ten million downloads, and a competitor paid a large sum of money to acquire what we had built, just a week before my thirtieth birthday. Dream had become reality.
 

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