Tuesday, June 25, 2013DoubleBeam Scores $5,000, Grand Prize From SBF Startup Showcase
Pasadena-based DoubleBeam, which develops mobile shopping and payment systems for retailers, has scored $5,000 and the top prize in the Silicon Beach Fest Startup Showcase Competition. DoubleBeam said it won over the 40 companies selected to give 3-minute pitches at the Silicon Beach Fest on Friday.
DoubleBeam, which is led by Ted Tekippe, lets merchants collect payments using electronic checks--rather than credit cards--which helps retailers save a significant amount of money on very expen (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)
Consumers Protest LA's Attempt To Shutdown Uber, Lyft, SidecarA move by the City of Los Angeles to shut down ridesharing and transportation services Uber, Lyft, and Sidecar has spurred some consumer backlash, with a new campaign on Change.org to get LA to repeal the cease and desist order from its tax administration bureau. Change.org is an online service which seeks to give citizens a voice in issues affecting them in government, business, school, or elsewhere. The City of Los Angeles sent out cease and desist letters to the three services, which all prov (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)
Los Angeles Targets Uber, Lyft, Sidecar, Orders Them To LeaveThe City of Los Angeles--despite a successful, recent mayoral campaign focused on the city's tech-friendly new major---has just issued a cease and desist to Uber, Lyft, and Sidecar, three smartphone driven ride services who have been serving the area's high tech savvy residents.
According to letters from Thomas M. Drischler, taxicab administrator for the Los Angeles City Department of Transportation, all three services lack proper licenses to operate, and were ordered to "cease and desist" fr (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)
Dollar Shave's TV Push Powered By Convertro
Fans of Los Angeles subscription razor firm Dollar Shave Club might have noticed a lot of the firm recently on television. The reason why, is the firm has been running ads since January to help get the word out about its service and products. Apparently, that push comes thanks to another, local startup--Convertro, which said today that Dollar Shave Club has been using its platform to measure its ad campaign effectiveness, including the effectiveness of those TV ads for Dollar Shave Club. Conve (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)
Roambi Debuts New Cloud Platform
Roambi, the developer of business data visualization apps,
has debuted a new cloud-based platform, the company said this morning. The San Diego firm said that its new Roambi Business lets companies load their data onto a cloud-based platform to serve up data visualization via its apps. The move makes it so that users do not have to implement their own infrastructure to serve up data for Roambi's various visualization tools. Roambi's apps let users view and manipulate business data in a highly (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)
TheBouqs.com: An Online Flower Service For The Next Generation?
The online flower delivery market is now an old and established market. However, is there an opening for a new way of reaching consumers with flower delivery? Los Angeles-based TheBouqs (www.thebouqs.com) thinks so, with its new, cut-to-order online flower delivery service for the iPad generation. We spoke with CEO and co-founder John Tabis about how TheBouqs believes there's an opening for a modern online flower delivery service, because none of the existing players are catering to the new ge (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)
Green Dot's Mobile Bank, GoBank, Goes Live
GoBank, the mobile-only banking service started by Monrovia's Green Dot, has gone live, exiting a beta and hitting general availability, Green Dot said today. The service--a real, FDIC insured bank which forgoes physical branches and is entirely available via mobile apps only--has apps that run on iOS, and will soon be available on Android. Green Dot said its GoBank accounts were specifically "built for the smartphone generation."
GoBank's service lets users sign up via a mobile app, provid (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)
TheBouqs Gets $1.1M To Fix Online Flower DeliveryTired of not getting what you expect--and paying more than you want--for online flower delivery?The Bouqs Company thinks that online flower delivery is broken, and that it has what it takes to reshape what consumers expect from online flower delivery services. And, it now has $1.1M in seed funding to make it happen. The Venice-based startup said today that it has raised $1.1M in a seed funding round, from Quest Venture Partners, Siemer Ventures, and angel investors, including Mich Mathews (forme (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013 (More)(Full story)
Lastline Finds $10M For Malware Defense Software
Santa Barbara-based Lastline has raised $10M in a funding round, to go towards the development of its malware defense software, the firm announced this morning. The new funding round was led by Redpoint Ventures and e.ventures, with Redpoint's John Walecka joining the firm's board.
Lastline develops malware analysis software which was originally developed by a team of computer science professors at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and Northeastern University. According to the fi (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013 (More)(Full story)
Tongal Hits $1M In Rewards Pool For User Generated VideoLos Angeles-based Tongal, which operates a crowdsourced site for creating commercials, reported today that it has hit $1 million in current projects in its reward pool. The company--whose crowdsourced videos are widely viewed online and on television commercials, including the Super Bowl--said the projects include campaigns for six Procter & Gamble brands (Gillette, Iams, Oral B, Secret, Era and Gain), LEGO, Ford, L'Oreal, Verizon, plus a project beteen Pringles and Star Wars.
Tongal's online (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)
Acutus Medical Gets $21M For 3D Medical ImagingSan Diego-based Acutus Medical, a developer of medical devices used for 3D, cardiac chamber imaging, has raised $21M as part of a Series B financing, the firm announced this morning. The firm said the funding was led by OrbiMed, and also included its prior investors. Acutus Medical, which is led by Randy Werneth, is developing a catheter-based, minimally invasive medical device used for creating 3D images of the heart, in order to diagnose cardiac issues.
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013 (More)(Full story)
Interneer Selected By Credit UnionInterneer, a developer of business process management (BPM) software which is based in Los Angeles, reported a win today with the Los Angeles Firemen's Credit Union (LAFCU). Interneer said that the LAFCU has selected the firm's software to streamline and automate its member services and online banking. Financial details of the win were not disclosed. Interneer said that LAFCU has over $847M in current assets and serves over 30,000 members. Interneer's software is being used to reduce errors from (More info...)
posted on Tuesday, June 25, 2013(Full story)