Thursday, February 10, 2011
LAVA Honors Richard Riordan, Local Technology Firms
The Los Angeles Venture Association (LAVA) held its annual awards event last night, honoring former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, as well as local, venture backed companies in a banquet last night at the Luxe hotel in Los Angeles. LAVA inducted Mayor Riordan--who had a long and involved career in venture capital and private equity before his efforts in politics--into its LAVA Hall of Fame. The group, which promotes the venture capital industry in the Los Angeles area, also honored local companies for their funding and exit activity. Top honors went to ShoeDazzle.com, EdgeCast, NanoH2O, Green Dot, WaveStream, and BeachMint in different categories.
ShoeDazzle.com, the online e-commerce startup headed by Brian Lee and whose co-founders include Kim Kardashian, scored top honors in the Best venture funding in digital media/e-commerce category. Other finalists were Clicker.com, Truecar, and Zumbox. In the Best venture funding in software/services, Edgecast, the content delivery network (CDN) provider, was the winner, with finalists including Eucalyptus Systems, Factual, and SV Network.
In Best venture funding for clean tech, NanoH2O, the firm developing reverse osmosis membranes for desalination and water purification based on research out of UCLA scored honors. Finalists were CODA Automotive, Fisker Automotive, and Amonix.
On the exit side, the Best IPO award went to Green Dot, the provider of pre-paid Mastercard and Visa cards. Other IPO finalists were RealD, ReachLocal, and Inphi. The Best M&A went to Wavestream, with only one other finalist, Integrien. Finally, the Hottest startup award went to Beachmint, the e-commerce startup of former MySpace founder Josh Berman. Other finalists included Ad.ly and ServiceMesh.