New Fundings:
- Fabless chip startup Entropic Communications has raised an additional $29 million in Series B financing. Entropic has now raised $46 million from strategic and venture investors since its founding in 2001. It is developing chips that enable broadband multimedia networking over existing cable television outlets. Investors in Entropic include Cisco Systems, Comcast Interactive Capital, Motorola, Time Warner, Panasonic, Anthem Venture Partners, China Development Industrial Bank, MissionVentures, Redpoint Ventures and YAS Broadband Ventures.
- Corrigo, Redwood City, CA; provider of Web-, call center and wireless-based enterprise management software applications; $6.7m, round undisclosed; Sycamore Ventures, Amicus, Asset Management Company.
- LVL7 Systems, Morrisville, NC; provider of networking software that accelerates the development of turnkey systems of Ethernet switches, routers, access and networking appliance devices; $15.8m, Series B; Carlyle Venture Partners, Gabriel Ventures Partners, H.I.G. Ventures, Research Triangle Ventures.
- PLEJ, Boston, MA; provider of payment and marketing software for affinity groups and retailers; $2.5m, Series A; Draper Fisher Jurvetson New England, Navigator Technology Fund, CommonAngels.
- Qovia, Frederick, MD; provider of monitoring and management of enterprise Voice over IP phone systems; $5.5m, round undisclosed; Nokia Venture Partners, Anthem Capital Management, Maryland Department of Business and Economic Development Fund.
- IronPort Systems, a provider of email infrastructure products and services company, announced today the closing of their $29M Series C financing. $14M of new capital came from strategic investors and $15M came from existing investors (announced in July 2003). IronPort Systems’ strategic investors include General Motors Asset Management, Chevron Technology Ventures, LLC (a unit of ChevronTexaco Corporation) and NTT Leasing Co., Ltd. At first I thought "that's a lot of money" but then I remembered that Ironport's product is a hardware appliance, in addition to software. Hardware companies eat a lot of cash...
Liquidity:
- Internet security software maker Symantec Corp. of Cupertino says it's buying Waltham, Mass.-based software maker ON Technology Corp. in an all-cash deal worth about $100 million.
- Docent (Nasdaq:DCNT), a provider of integrated software solutions to drive business performance through learning, merged with Click2learn (Nasdaq:CLKS), a provider of enterprise productivity solutions.
- InfoSpace (Nasdaq:INSP), a provider of wireless and Internet software and application services, acquired Moviso, a provider of mobile media products and services in North America, for $25m.
- Infowave Software (TSX:IW), a developer of wireless software solutions, acquired the intellectual property assets of Sproqit Technologies, a wireless software company, for an undisclosed amount.
Main Dish:
- Gartner Group says that utility and grid computing are just new ways for vendors to lock in customers
http://www.computerweekly.com/articles/article.asp?liArticleID=125913&liFlavourID=1&sp=1
- who wins in offshoring? Read on to find out who...
http://news.com.com/2030-7341_3-5096283.html?tag=techdirt
- California's new anti-spam law has been used for the first time to fine a SoCal couple $2 million
http://sanjose.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2003/10/20/daily72.html
- 6 VoIP firms are doing battle with California regulators who want to tax them like telcos
http://news.com.com/2100-7352_3-5096966.html?tag=nefd_top
- jobless top level executives propelling startups, study finds.
http://sanjose.bizjournals.com/sanjose/stories/2003/10/27/daily6.html?jst=b_ln_hl
- the move by Mass to go open source has closed source software companies like M$oft, Autodesk, and Adobe up in arms. I have to say that despite my enthusiasm for open source, IT groups should go with the software that meets theirs needs at the best price point, irrespective of the development methodology employed to build it.
http://www.washingtontechnology.com/news/18_15/statelocal/22000-1.html
- Veritas and SuSe are getting a lot closer on the Linux front.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,4149,1364365,00.asp
- M$oft's Web services color of choice is Indigo... the new framework that picks up where .Net stopped.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,4149,1364236,00.asp
- yeah cool, hehehehe. Extreme pumpkin carving using a giant robotic arm and a drywall saw.
http://www.extremepumpkins.com/detsciencen.html
- flyblogging invading the blogsphere... more and more spam comments are showing up in blogs. I've had some issues with deleting these comments out, it takes time to monitor and remove them.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/3210623.stm
- really cool file sharing project out of MIT that treats music as library items that can be checked out of the schools cable TV network. I heard about it on NPR this morning.
http://lamp.mit.edu/
- yeah, who is behind SCO's attacks on Open Source and Linux? I'm going with the M$oft and Sun theory.
http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,4149,1358809,00.asp
- it will cost $18 quadrillion to stabilize and improve global environmental conditions. Read on, it's really a fascinating article.
http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,60981,00.html?tw=wn_tophead_5
- a review of 11 DVD burners
http://www.tomshardware.com/storage/20031027/index.html
- the DOJ released a report on workplace diversity in response to a Freedom of Information Act request. Before releasing it, Justice blacked out sensitive parts using Word and then distilled the doc with Acrobat... guess what, a group dedicated to preserving documents "unmasked" the blacked out parts and re-released the full version.
http://www.securityfocus.com/news/7272