Wednesday, October 17, 2007


Vitesse Loses Board Member
Embattled, Camarillo-based chip firm Vitesse Semiconductor said late Wednesday afternoon that Alex Daly has resigned from the firm's board of directors. The company, which has been under pressure from investors to remove Daly, said that it has retained an executive search firm to find directors for the company. Daly had been a director of the firm since 1998. Vitesse, which develops chips used in storage networking and communications systems, has been struggling since early 2006 due to an accoun (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 17, 2007(Full story)

Interview with Alex Quilici, YouMail
Today's interview with with Alex Quilici, CEO of YouMail (www.youmail.com), an Aliso Viejo-based firm which has created a personalized cell phone and voicemail service. Quilici was a co-founder at Quack.com, a company which was acquired in 2000 by AOL. Alex spoke with Ben Kuo, and told us a little bit more about the company, it's funding, and the service. What's the story behind YouMail--what's the idea behind your service? Alex Quilici: The basic story behind YouMail, is that we provide fre (More info...)
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MySpace, Skype Link Up
Los Angeles-based social networking website MySpace and Voice-over-IP provider Skype said today that the two companies are in a partnership to create a new, integrated instant messaging client which combines MySpace with Skype. The two said they will ship the client, which allows users to link to MySpace profiles and photos with their Skype accounts, in November. The firms said that the MySpaceIM with Skype product will be launched on MySpace's localized web sites in 20 countries. Financial term (More info...)
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Userplane Expands APIs
Los Angeles-based Userplane said today that it has rolled out a collection of application programming interfaces (APIs) geared at website developers and publishers. The firm, which is a subsidiary of AOL, said that the new APIs will allow web developers to add content and function to their websites, and will include access to AOL's Truveo video search tool, MapQuest, and real time news from Relegence. The firm also said that it is working on offering message interoperability with AOL's popular i (More info...)
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Gemstar-TV Guide Files Patent Suit Against Toshiba
Los Angeles-based Gemstar-TV Guide International said this morning that its subsidiary, StarSight Telecast Inc., has filed a patent infringement lawsuit against Toshiba Corporation. According to Gemstar, StarSight Telecast is alleging that Toshiba infringes on one of its Japanese patents covering interactive program guides. The firm said that the lawsuit comes after failing to negotiate a license with Toshiba. Gemstar-TV Guide owns a patent portfolio covering interactive programming guides, and (More info...)
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Astute Networks Taps Sun For CEO
San Diego-based Astute Networks, a developer of high performance network storage systems, said Tuesday that it has named Clark Masters as President and CEO of the firm. Masters joins the firm from Sun Microsystems Federal, where he was Chairman and President. Masters has also served as VP and GM of Cray Research Business Systems, and also served at FloatingPoint Systems and Celerity Computing. Astute Networks is venture backed by Tallwood Venture Capital, Sevin Rosen Funds, Scale Venture Partner (More info...)
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EI Solutions Gets Win
EI Solutions, the solar integrator backed by Idealab, said Tuesday that the firm has been chosen to build a 1 megawatt solar electricity system for the Richmond, California-based West County Wastewater District. EI Solutions said the deal was part of a deal with Solar Power Partners, which will own and operate the system. Financial terms of the win were not disclosed. EI Solutions is owned by Pasadena-based Energy Innovations, which is backed by Idealab, the business incubator headed by Bill Gro (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 17, 2007(Full story)