Wednesday, October 26, 2016Report: Snapchat Looking To Raise $4 Billion In IPOVenice-based Snapchat is hoping to launch an IPO, which will raise the company an astounding $4 billion in capital--valuing the company at between $25 billion and $35 billion--according to a report on Wednesday from Bloomberg. The report cites "people familiar with the matter" for the information. Snapchat is in the midst of an IPO effort being led by Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs Group. The latest IPO big tech IPO of that size was for Facebook, which raised $16 billion in its IPO back in 201 (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)
MarketCast Acquired By Kohlberg & CompanyLos Angeles-based MarketCast, a market research company providing research services to the global entertainment industry, has been acquired by Kohlberg & Company, according to reports. Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed. MarketCast was owned by another, private equity investor--RLJ Equity Partners--which acquired MarketCast in November of 2014.
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)
Interview with Cody Simms, Techstars LA
This morning, Techstars (www.techstars.org), the startup accelerator which has had great success in spreading its approach to helping to get startups to the next stage of their life—usually, funding—announced it has opened up its third accelerator in Los Angeles, Techstars LA. We spoke earlier with Cody Simms, Executive Director of Techstars America and who leads the program in LA, to hear more about why the startup accelerator operator is opening up its third accelerator here, why Los Ang (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)
Techstars Launches New Accelerator In LA, Techstars LAStartup accelerator operator Techstars announced today that it is opening up yet another accelerator in Los Angeles--its third--called Techstars LA. The new startup accelerator, which will be horizontally focused on all types of companies, is currently being organized by Cody Simms, who is in the midst of hiring a Executive Director for the LA program. Simms said that Techstars is "tripling down" on startup accelerators in Los Angeles, on top of the just announced Techstars Music accelerator, as (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)
Google Fiber Paused In Los AngelesIn a move which may put off the addition of high speed fiber in Los Angeles from Google indefinitely, Google said it is "pausing" the addition of Los Angeles, and the rest of its current potential cities, to its Google Fiber service. According to Google Fiber's outgoing CEO, Google is looking towards "new technology and deployment methods" and "refine" its ability to bring super-fast Internet to cities. Google said "we're going to pause our operations and offices while we refine our approaches" (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)
Mobcrush Gets $20M More For Videogame StreamingSanta Monica-based Mobcrush, which operates a live streaming platform and community focused on mobile games, has raised $20M more, in a Series B funding round. The funding was led by Evolution Media, and also included Kleiner, Perkins, Caufield & Byers, Raine Ventures, Lowercase Capital, First Round Capital and others. The company, led by CEO Royce Disini, says it has now raised $35.9M. Mobcrush said the funding goes towards growing its community and platform, and in particular, to hiring more (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016 (More)(Full story)
CrowdStrike Names Two ExecutivesIrvine-based cybersecurity product developer CrowdStrike, the cloud-based endpoint security firm led by George Kurtz, has made two major executive appointments this morning. CrowdStrike said it has named Jerry Dixon as Chief Information Security Officer (CISO), and Rob Murchison as Vice President of Product Management. Dixon was previously Vice President, Cyber Threat Intelligence and Incident Response at American Express, and also served at the Department of Homeland Security National Cyber Sec (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)
Flatirons Solutions Acquires Software Line From TechPubsIrvine-based Flatirons Solutions, a developer of technical information management software for the aviation, shipping, rail, and other industries, has acquired the TechSuite software line from TechPubs Inc. Financial terms of the acquisition were not announced. TechPubs' TechSuite software is used for Flight Operations and company manuals in the aviation industry. Flatirons said the deal will extend its existing CORENA Suite of software to provide comprehensive coverage of aviation technical pub (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)
Zadara Wins Media CompanyIrvine-based Zadara Storage, which provides enterprise storage-as-a-service to customers via a hardware product combined with cloud-based storage, has scored media company The Impress Group. Zadara said it will support a VMware environment for The Impress Group, replacing aging storage arrays with its Zadara VPSA Storage Array. The financial impact of the win was not announced. Zadara's storage arrays look like traditional block and file storage, but taps into Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azur (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)
Soraa Wins Install At Crocker Art MuseumSoraa, the developer of Gallium Nitride (GaN) LED lighting technology based on research out of UC Santa Barbara, has won an install of its LED lamps at Sacramento's Crocker Art Museum. Soraa said the lighting at the "Glass for the New Millennium: Masterworks from the Kaplan-Ostergaard Collection" uses its full spectrum LED lighting technology. The financial impact of the win was not announced. The Crocker said it turned to Soraa's LED lamps due to their color rendering, which is at around 3000K, (More info...)
posted on Wednesday, October 26, 2016(Full story)