Tuesday, December 10, 2013


StoryBots Launches Christmas Videos, Apps
Los Angeles-based StoryBots, the unit of JibJab which develops children's content and apps, has launched a new set of videos and apps specifically for the holiday season. According to JibJab, the new personalized video app includes The Christmas List and Starring You Christmas Book which inserts your head into a funny Christmas themed video, app. Storybots also released a number of free, Christmas-themed activity sheets for kids during the holidays.
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ValueClick Sells Investopedia, PriceRunner To IAC
Westlake Village-based ValueClick has sold its "owned and operated" websites -- Investopedia, PriceRunner, as well as others -- to IAC, according to the company. ValueClick said that 100 percent of its Owned and Operated Websites segment will become part of IAC, in an all-cash transaction. Size of the deal was not announced. ValueClick said in November that it was looking to divest that segment of its business, which is based in Monrovia, California. ValueClick said the business unit will contin (More info...)
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Indi Molecular Picks Up $300K More In $1.8M Seed Funding
Culver City-based Indi Molecular, a developer of synthetic replacements for antibodies, announced Tuesday that it has raised $300,000 more in its seed funding, bringing the total raised in the round to $1.8M. The new funding was led by InterWest Partners, and also included several un-named, angel investors. The company said the funding will go towards further developing its technology, which its says can product synthetic peptide molecules that are equivalent or superior to molecular antibodies. (More info...)
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Science Names Social Marketing VP
Los Angeles-based technology incubator and studio Science said today that it has hired on Matt Monahan as its new Vice President of Social Media Marketing. Monahan was most recently at AlphaBoost, a startup which was building Facebook advertising reporting software. Monahan also co-founded The Comotion Group (acquired by Sharethrough) and was also an advisor to Wildfire (acquired by Google). Science said that Monahan will head up social customer acquisition for its portfolio firms. Science is be (More info...)
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Sapphire Energy In Major Commercialization Deal With Phillips 66
San Diego-based biofuels developer Sapphire Energy is in a big commercialization deal this morning with Phillips 66, the two announced this morning. According to the two, they are in a strategic, joint development which will go towards commercializing algae-based crude oil. The companies said they will collect and analyze data from co-processing of algae and conventional crude oil into fuels, as part of a move to move algae crude oil into production and wide scale oil refining. Financial details (More info...)
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Family Archival Solutions Launches To Solve Legal Issues After Loss
One of the biggest issues that families have after the loss of a loved one, is the sticky mess of unraveling piles of bills, bank accounts, wills, and whatnot. Los Angeles-based Family Archival Solutions is hoping that its new, online service will help address those issues, by letting users manage both their digital--and physical--documents. The startup said its service lets users store passwords for email services, photo sites, Facebook, Twitter and more; helps users track their physical assets (More info...)
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SHIFT Gets $6M For Real Time Marketing Tools
Santa Monica-based SHIFT, which develops real time, online advertising and marketing tools, announced this morning that it has raised $6M in a Series B funding round. The company said the funding came from DN Capital, and will go towards international expansion in Europe. SHIFT said it has now raised $14M in funding. SHIFT is led by James Borow. SHIFT's flagship product is the SHIFT Open Marketing Cloud, which it says offers up "best-in-class" marketing apps to marketers, to help them reach cust (More info...)
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socalTECH 50: Who are Southern California's Tech Up and Comers?
A couple of weeks ago, we announced the socalTECH 50--our attempt to identify Southern California's technology industry up-and-comers, the people most likely to create the next big thing, produce the next big exit or to influence the industry in a significant way. In fact, just yesterday, two of our list (Alex Kazerani and James Segil, who shared a position on the 50) produced the first exit out of our list--a big one--selling their company, EdgeCast, to Verizon for a reported $390M. We're goi (More info...)
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PaeDae Wins $11.6M
Los Angeles-based PaeDae said this morning that it has raised $11.6M in a venture capital funding, in a combination of both equity and debt. The startup said the funding came from Ed Ojdana, 3G Capital, Grind Games, Silicon Valley Bank, as well as other strategic and angel investors. PaeDae said the new funds will go towards the company's expansion beyond a premium rewards network to an advertising and monetization platform aimed at brands and mobile app developers. PaeDae said its clients have (More info...)
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Saatchi Online Taps Sean Moriarty As CEO
Los Angeles-based online art gallery and e-commerce provider Saatchi Online has tapped one of LA's technology and business veterans as its new CEO today, tapping Sean Moriarty for the position. Moriarty is an active investor and advisor to many of LA's startup companies and headed up Ticketmaster Entertainment from 2000 to 2008, including heading up that company's spinout from IAC/InterActiveCorp and its IPO. Moriarty's investments include TuneIn.com, Eventbrite, and Metacloud, and Triton Digita (More info...)
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FOCUS, Backed By Launchpad LA, Launches Fitness Tracking App
Los Angeles-based startup FOCUS said today that it has raised pre-seed investment from Launchpad LA, Kima Ventures, and various angels, and launched its first product--a new app which turns the Samsung Galaxy Gear into a personal fitness trainer. The startup was founded by Cavan Canavan and Grant Hughes. According to FOCUS, its fitness app--TRAINR--uses the Samsung Galaxy Gear to provide custom training programs, tracking exercises, repetitions, sets, and rest periods. The company said its app a (More info...)
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RFaxis Spins New Chip
Irvine-based RF semiconductor developer RFaxis has rolled out a new chip, aimed at boosting the efficiency of smartphones. According to the company, its new envelope tracker (RFeTTM) is a CMOS-based, envelope tracking modulator which is designed to boost the system efficiency of CMOS Power Amplifiers in smartphones. The company said the new device supports standards such as GSM, GPRS, EDGE, WCDMA, HSPA+, and LTE, as well as CDMA, EVDO and TD-SCDMA. RFaxis develops a range of CMOS-based RF compon (More info...)
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