Wednesday, June 15, 2011


Hulu Plus Gets South Park
South Park, the animated TV series created by Trek Parker and Matt Stone, has inked a deal with Los Angeles-based streaming video site Hulu, to feature nearly every episode of South Park on Hulu Plus. According to Hulu, Hulu Plus subscribers will get access to both the current season of South Park -- 21 days after they air--plus all fifteen seasons of shows of the series. The episodes will be available on all of the devices supported by the premium, Hulu Plus service. Hulu also will include a fe (More info...)
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Pandora IPO Benefits Socal Investors
Champagne glasses must be clinking for a few, lucky Southern California investors and executives this morning, as the IPO of Oakland-based Pandora Media had a rousing welcome on Wall Street. Pandora was trading as high as $26.00 Wednesday during morning trading, after pricing at $16.00 per share last night, well above the $10.00 to $12.00 estimated pricing range from last week. The firm was trading around $19.00 at the time of this article. The Southern California linked-investors with connectio (More info...)
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Gigi Hill Gets $3M For Handbags
Yorba Linda-based Gigi Hill, a manufacturer of handbags and totes distributed through in-home parties, has raised $3M in a Series A funding. The funding came from Maveron, the venture capital firm founded by Starbucks founder Howard Schultz and Dan Levitan. Other investors in the round included Trinity Ventures and Mark Vadon, who co-founded Blue Nile and Zulily. Jason Stoffer and Clayton Lewis of Maveron have joined Gigi Hill's board as part of the funding. Gigi Hill was founded by Gabrielle De (More info...)
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Local.com Launches Krillion, Rovion Products
Irvine-based Local.com, the local directory and advertising firm, said today that it has rolled out its first advertising product from its Krillion and Rovion acquisitions. Local.com acquired Krillion in May, and Rovion in February. Local.com said it is providing dynamic, geo-targeted rich media ad units from Rovion, using real-time data from Krillion, across its network of 1,400 regional media publisher websites. That information provides information on discounts, pricing, product details, stor (More info...)
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King.com Snags VP From Bebo
Los Angeles-based social and casual games firm King.com said today that it has bolstered its executive team, adding Mark Charkin as Executive Vice President of Global Business Development and Ad Sales. Charkin is based in King.com's London offices. Charkin was most recently Global Vice President of Sales at Bebo, and also served at Endemol, BrightRoll, Moviepilot and Habit Industries. King.com provides casual games on its web site, Facebook, and game portals.
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Gaikai Appoints VP
Los Angeles-based game streaming technology firm Gaikai announced today that it has named K. Wayne Peacock as its Senior VP, Business Intelligence. Peacock has previously served at such firms as Teradata, Netflix, and Capital one. Gaikai develops an instant game streaming service, which allows game players to play games from their web browser, rather than having to download and install games. The company is venture backed by Benchmark Capital, TriplePoint Capital, Rustic Canyon Partners, Limelig (More info...)
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Interview with Eric Frankel, StarGreetz
Last week, Los Angeles-based StarGreetz (www.stargreetz.com) debuted its celebrity-powered, personalized message service to the public, allowing both brands and artists to send highly personalized messages to their fans. We caught up with CEO Eric Frankel this week to talk about the firm, his decision to go from the comfortable world of Hollywood as President of Warner Bros Domestic Television Distribution, to a startup, how the firm is using the cloud to power it service, as well as where the f (More info...)
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WildBlue Launches Low-Cost, Rural Broadband Plan
Carlsbad-based ViaSat, the developer of wireless and satellite communications products, said today that its WildBlue satellite Internet subsidiary will begin offering up a low price, high speed Internet service to serve rural markets. The firm said the new, low cost service is being funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, and will allows eligible customers to connect to high speed internet for $39.95 per month. WildBlue said the new plan will provide lifetime pricing, and bega (More info...)
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Savings.com Expands Travel Efforts
Santa Monica-based Savings.com, the online coupon and coupon code site headed by Loren Bendele, is expanding its promotion of its travel savings, the firm said today. Savings.com said it will begin offering up special deals on summer travel starting next week, on June 21st, including deals on hotels, rental cars, flights, and attractions. Savings.com said the deals will include exclusives from Travelocity and Orbitz. The firm is kicking off the promotion with a $2500 vacation giveaway from Trave (More info...)
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StarGreetz Powers Syracuse University
Los Angeles-based StarGreetz, the personalized, celebrity video messaging startup headed by Eric Frankel, said this morning that it has signed on the S. I. Newhouse School of Public Communications at Syracuse University. According to the school, SarGreetz is powering an effort which will welcome its incoming, 2011 freshman class with personalized welcome videos from high-profile alumni from the school. The personalized messages will come from Newhouse School alumni Contessa Brewer, anchor at MSN (More info...)
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Networkfleet Integrates With Garmin
San Diego-based Networkfleet, the developer of wireless fleet management services, reported today that it has released a new product called Networkfleet CONNECT which integrates the firm's services with Garmin navigation devices. The new connection allows fleet managers to assign jobs, dispatch drivers, communicate with drivers in real time, and provide turn-by-turn directions via Garmin devices. Networkfleet is a subsidiary of Hughes Telematics.
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Continuous Computing Gets Overseas Wins
San Diego-based Continuous Computing, which develops telecom protocol software, said today that it has added nine, overseas customers for its Trillium Femtocell protocol software. The firm said the original design manufacturers are using its software for 3G and Long Term Evolution (LTE) access point devices. Financial impact of the wins was not disclosed. The new customers include Ablaze Wireless, Arcadyan Technology, Askey, Foxconn, Gemtek and MitraStar. Continuous Computing's software stack is (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, June 15, 2011(Full story)