Thursday, March 4, 2010Buy.com Sees Marketplace GrowthAliso Viejo-based Buy.com said Thursday that the firm is seeing what it calls "exponential" year-over-year growth in its retail marketplace. The e-commerce retailer said it saw 146 percent, year-over-year sales growth from its marketplace, which lists products from third party retailers. Buy.com said 46 percent of its orders in Q4, and more than 50 percent of its Q1 2010 site orders came from the Buy.com Marketplace, and that the sales were behind its strong Q4 2009.
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Insights and Opinions: Twitter has Jumped the SharkFor our Insights and Opinions section today, we have this opinion piece by Scott Fox, author of Internet Riches, the best-selling guide to starting a business online, and also e-Riches 2.0: Next Generation Online Marketing Strategies, a new guide to Web 2.0 online marketing strategies. He is a former Southern California high tech executive, and recently penned this post on his blog, which he gave us permission to reprint here.
Is Twitter still "the future of online marketing"? Or is it just (More info...)
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Maverick Angels Eyes Utah For New ChaptersMaverick Angels, the angel investment group headed here by John Dilts, told its members today that it is launching two new chapters in the state of Utah. The group said its will open a chapter in Provo and Salt Lake City, Utah, to be headed by Brent Israelson. The launch of the chapter follows an expansion of the group into Italy in November. In addition to the new chapters, the group said it is joining up its Westlake Village, Palos Verdes, and Santa Barbara chapters as a single "Maverick Angel (More info...)
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Cornerstone OnDemand Trumpets GrowthSanta Monica-based Cornerstone OnDemand reported strong 2009 performance, saying Thursday afternoon that the firm had a 64 percent growth in its client base in 2009, and an 83 percent increase in users from December 2008. The firm said it now has 3.3 million users of its service, which is used for learning and talent management in companies. No actual financials were disclosed by the company, which is privately held. The firm also said it had a strong Q4, with client booking up 66 percent from Q (More info...)
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Glendale Gets Smart Grid GrantThe City of Glendale's utility, Glendale Water & Power reported today that it is the first city in the nation to get funding from the U.S. Department of Energy for its smart grid efforts. The city said it has signed a $20M, federal Smart Grid Investment Grant under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, which will go towards a demonstration to install smart grid meters in the city. The utility said the project includes a data management system, 1,000 electric meters, 500 water meters and 30 (More info...)
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RotoHog Launches Game With US WeeklyLos Angeles-based RotoHog, the online fantasy game developer run by Kelly Perdew, said this week that it is in a strategic partnership with US Weekly. The firm said it is launching a "Celebrity Fantasy League" game on US Weekly's web site. Financial impact of the win was not disclosed. Rotohog said the game will allow users to select a team of celebrities, and earn points based on the appearance of those celebrities in Us Weekly and on UsMagazine.com. RotoHog is powering fantasy sports and other (More info...)
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Cornerstone OnDemand Wins UK CustomerSanta Monica-based Cornerstone OnDemand said today that the firm has scored a customer in UK. The firm said that LV=, a mutual financial services provider in the UK, is using Cornerstone's training and learning tools to track learning and development across its organization. LV= has around 4,000 employees selling life insurance, pensions, general insurance, and asset management. Financial impact of the win was not disclosed. Cornerstone OnDemand's software-as-a-service is used for human resource (More info...)
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DivX Certs Sony HDTVSan Diego-based DivX this week said it has certified another line of HDTV products, this time Sony's new BRAVIA LCD HDTV products, to support its DivX video format. The firm said the BRAVIA EX, BX3/BX4, HX, and NX5 series TVs--available in Europe--now support the firm digital video decoding format. DivX licenses its coding and decoding format to consumer electronics and other manufacturers.
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M86 Security: Big Holes In Other Anti-Virus, URL Filtering ToolsOrange-based M86 Security, a developer of web filtering gateways, is claiming this week that it has tested a number of anti-virus and URL filtering products, and found that around 60 percent of malicious URLs are passing through those tools un-noticed. The firm claimed that it tested more than 30,000 live malicious URL samples against third party URL lists and anti-virus scanners. The firm did not name the tools it tested, all of which are competitors to the firm's products. M86 claims all of th (More info...)
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Docstoc's Jason Nazar Talks About DocStoreRecently, Santa Monica-based Docstoc (www.docstoc.com) launched a new marketplace on its site, for anyone interested in selling professional documents. We thought we'd get the background on the new effort directly from Jason Nazar, CEO and founder of Docstoc, to learn more about the new service. Jason is also behind the popular "Startups Uncensored" events in Los Angeles, so we also pinged him on how those events have been going.
For those who haven't heard yet, tell us about DocStore and what (More info...)
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Enigma Diagnostics Sets Up Shop In San DiegoOxford, England-based Enigma Diagnostics, a molecular diagnostics firm, said today that it has opened up a new, regional headquarters in San Diego. Enigma said the new, 17,000 sq. ft. office is in the Sorrento Valley, where it will house sales and marketing, assay development, regulatory and manufacturing activity. As part of the new office, the firm said it has named Joel Centeno as its VP Regulatory & Quality. Centeno has previously served at Hologic. Enigma said it hopes to tap the "deep reso (More info...)
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Qualcomm Names Mobile Commerce HeadSan Diego-based Qualcomm announced this morning that it has named Rocco Fabiano as new head of its mobile commerce subsidiary, Firethorn Holdings LLC. Qualcomm said that Fabiano will act as President of Firethorn, heading up strategic direction and market expansion for the unit. Qualcomm said that Fabiano has more than 25 years of experience in the financial services industry, including overseeing a private label credit card business, a retail bank, and for Household International. Firehorn repl (More info...)
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MySpace Founders Head North In Casual Gaming DealMySpace founders Chris DeWolfe, Colin Digiaro, and Aber Whitcomb are taking the reins at a casual and social gaming venture called MindJolt, which announced its funding Wednesday. The new firm, based out of San Francisco, is being funded by Austin Ventures. The three said they acquired MindJolt, a developer of games for Facebook and other social networking sites, as part of the effort, but did not disclose financial terms of the deal. The new firm will be headed by former MySpace CEO Chris DeWol (More info...)
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Activision Sued By Jason West, Vince ZampellaJason West and Vince Zampella, the deposed heads of Activision's Infinity Ward studio, have filed a lawsuit against Activision, according to law firm O'Melveny & Myers LLP. According to the law firm, the suit includes claims for breach of contract, breach of the implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing, wrong termination in violation of public policy, and declaratory relief. West and Zampella are behind Call of Duty and Modern Warfare, two of Activision's most popular games. O'Melveny cla (More info...)
posted on Thursday, March 4, 2010(Full story)