Santa Monica-based Demand Media saw a big switchup in its executive staff Thursday, as the company said that Joanne Bradford, the firm's Chief Revenue & Marketing Officer, has stepped down to pursue another opportunity. Bradford has been replaced by Jeff Dossett, who was previously EVP Revenue. Dossett also has experience at Yahoo! and Microsoft. The company said Bradford is stepping down to pursue an opportunity with one of its largest publishing partners....Continue →

The USC Viterbi SChool of Engineering said this week that it is launching a new, Master's program in Cyber Security, focusing on preparing students for administering environments with a requirement for a high level of information security. According to the school, the new Master's will be available both traditionally, as well as through Viterbi's online education efforts....Continue →

San Diego-based Givit is powering the Mozilla Firefox Flicks competition, the companies said this morning, with Givit providing its iPhone capturing, editing, and sharing tools to Mozilla's contest. Financial details of the deals were not disclosed. Givit said it will be the exclusive mobile video app for the competition, which encourages people to submit videos on how web-enabled mobile devices have changed our human experience....Continue →

San Diego-based green technology firm Sapphire Energy, which is developing algae-to-crude oil production technology, has named Dr. Matthew Croughan as its new Chief Technology Officer. Sapphire has raised more than $300M in funding from such investors as Arrowpoint Partners and Monsanto. According to Sapphire, Croughan was most recently the George B. and Joy Rathmann Professor and Director of the Amgen Bioprocessing Center at Keck Graduate Institute at the Claremont Colleges....Continue →

Struggling electric car maker Fisker Automotive has received a bid from a group of investors, to purchase the company for a mere $20M, according to a report today. Reuters reported that a group led by former General Motors exec Bob Lutz has offered to buy Fisker Automotive for only $20M, which is a mere fraction of both the company's recent valuation--not to mention the amount invested in the company, which totals more than $1.2 billion in a combination of equity and Department of Energy funds....Continue →

UberMedia, the Idealab-backed startup best known for its Twitter client software, has recast itself as a mobile advertising firm, saying yesterday that it has launched a new mobile advertising product called UberAds. According to UberMedia, its new UberAds product analyzes social media signals to figure out consumer intent, and combines that with geo-location and dynamic ads to increase ad performance....Continue →

Calabasas-based surround sound and audio technology firm DTS has scored a design win with Chinese auto manufacturer BYD, the company said this morning. According to DTS, BYD will implement its DTS Digital Surround into four models of its vehicles. The four models of vehicles will launch in China in Q2. Financial impact of the win was not announced.Continue →

San Diego-based music service Slacker has hired on a new, Chief Product Officer, according to the streaming music company. Slacker said that John Hayase, who was most recently at ElasticPath, has joined the firm in the position, to oversee development of its digital music service. Hayase also served at EA, including heading up development of EA's Origin digital download service, and serving as General Manager of EA China....Continue →

San Diego-based electronics protective case and accessory maker LifeProof (TreeFrog Development Inc.) has been acquired by protective case maker Otterbox, the two companies announced late Wednesday. Financial terms of the buy were not announced by the companies. According to the two companies, OtterBox will incorporate LifeProof's brand into OtterBox's family of products, and will also add the approximately 250 employees of LifeProof to the company....Continue →

Los Angeles-based YouTube network Fullscreen has bolstered its team--and media credibility--with a new hire, the company said Wednesday. Fullscreen said it has hired Tim Mohn, the co-creator of the HBO GO app, and former Vice President of Technology for NBCUniversal/Comcast as its new Senior Vice President of Engineering. Fullscreen, which is headed by George Strompolos, said that the move will help it push Fullscreen's technological innovation to the "next level"....Continue →

Search engine technology provider SRCH2 has bolstered its enterprise search tools with the addition support for 40 languages, the company said today. The company, which is headed by Dev Bhatia and backed by such investors as TenOneTen Ventures, Data Collective, and others, said its latest release even supports both simplified and traditional Chinese....Continue →