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Yahoo Rejects Joint Microsoft, Icahn Proposal
REUTERS
Yahoo Inc on Saturday rejected a proposal to sell its search business to Microsoft Corp and hand over the remainder of the company to activist investor Carl Icahn. Yahoo said in a statement it received the joint proposal from Microsoft and Icahn on Friday evening and was given less than 24 hours to accept. It said Microsoft and Icahn made clear they were unwilling to negotiate the fundamental terms, which include the immediate replacement of Yahoo’s board and removal of top management. The company said the “take it or leave it” deal that was offered would also preclude a potential sale of all of Yahoo “for a full and fair price, including a control premium.”
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Online Jobs Site Zhaopin.com Gets $110 Million Funding
PAIDCONTENT
Chinese online jobs site Zhaopin.com has received a big $110 million round of mezzanine funding. This is the largest ever investment in the online jobs sector in China in recent years. According to the company CEO Hao Liu, Zhaopin.com, this will be the company’s final round of financing before a planned IPO in 2010. The two lead investors participating in this round are both Australian companies: investment bank Macquarie Capital ($60 million out of the share), and Seek Limited, the Aussie recruitment firm ($45 million) which already held a 25 percent stake prior to this funding.
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eBay Signs Retail Deal with Buy.com
NEW YORK TIMES
eBay is partnering to let online retailer Buy.com sell DVDs, electronic devices and other items through the eBay marketplace at a fixed price. The agreement, which has reportedly added more than 5 million listings to eBay, is part of CEO John Donahoe’s plan to attract corporate customers as the site faces stiff competition from fixed-price online retailers such as Amazon. However, while favouring large traders, the strategy may alienate the small sellers, who constituted eBay’s primary user base when the site launched.
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Google Now Displaying Code Search Results
TECHCRUNCH
Starting today Google has integrated results from Code Search as snippets in the main search results page. Code Search was launched by Google in October of 2005 as a seperate vertical search property. As the name suggests, Code Search indexes and parses source code on the web and provides users a simple but flexible search and repository browsing interface.
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Verizon Unveils First Open Initiative Devic
MOCONEWS
Verizon Wireless said it has launched its first device through its Open Development Initiative-it’s not a new cellphone, MP3 player or other gadget- it’s a battery-powered modem that connects to sensors for large storage containers like diesel tanks. When a tank runs low, the modem sends a text message to SupplyNet, which tells the customer it needs to refill.
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RockYou Acquires Facebook Apps Pieces of Flair, Speed Racing
INSIDEFACEBOOK
RockYou has confirmed that it has acquired two major independent Facebook applications: Pieces of Flair and Speed Racing. With over 475,000 and 200,000 daily active users respectively, RockYou adds the #11 and #27 most active applications on the Facebook Platform to its portfolio. Financial details were not disclosed.
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Veoh Launches Behavioral Targeted Advertising
CENTERNETWORKS
Online video host Veoh has launched a new behavioral advertising program in beta today. Veoh’s program lets marketers match video and display ads with specific audiences based on their viewing habits. Veoh will offer targeting in a variety of categories including: digital youth; family-focused; information seekers; pop culturalists; socially conscious; sci-fi and anime fans; and upwardly mobile.
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NBC Sells 85% of Olympics Online Ad Inventory
MEDIAWEEK
NBC is 85 percent sold out of online ad inventory for its Summer Olympics coverage, which kicks off Aug. 8 in Beijing. The company has signed on McDonald’s, Johnson & Johnson, Hilton, Coca-Cola and Anheuser-Busch, among other brands. Much of these brands’ spending is earmarked for video, said officials, as NBC plans to deliver an unprecedented 2,200 hours of live footage on NBCOlympics.com-after streaming just a single hockey game during the winter games just two years ago.
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NYT: High Cost of Driving Ignites Online Classes Boom
NEW YORK TIMES
The vast majority of the nation’s 15 million college students – at least 79 percent – live off campus, and with gas prices above $4 a gallon, many are seeking to cut commuting costs by studying online. Colleges from Massachusetts and Florida to Texas to Oregon have reported significant online enrollment increases for summer sessions, with student numbers in some cases 50 percent or 100 percent higher than last year.
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Japanese Team Developing Palm-Held 3D Display
PHYSORG
Researchers in Japan are developing a gadget that could enable people to hold a three-dimensional image of someone in the palm of their hand. They hope the gCubik, which is still at the prototype stage, will later be developed to move in real time and appear to speak. “The ultimate image we have in mind is having a small person in your palm,” said Shunsuke Yoshida, one of the researchers involved in the study at Japan’s National Institute of Information and Communications Technology.
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Analyst Lowers Handset Growth Forecast
EE TIMES
Market research firm Gartner has cut its forecast for mobile handsets growth for the remainder of the year, citing the global economic slowdown as the reason for the downgrade. Gartner now predicts the market will grow by 10-11 percent in 2008, having forecast growth would be between the 10 and 15 percent range just two months ago. Last year, the handset market grew by 16 percent, according to the market research group.
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Samsung to Invest $1 Billion to Upgrade Memory Chips
REUTERS
Samsung Electronics the world’s largest maker of memory chips, said on Monday it would invest 1.05 trillion won ($1.05 billion) in 2008 to upgrade its memory lines. In a filing to the Korea exchange, the company said the investment was intended to upgrade lines and improve production processes in order to enhance capacity and price competitiveness.
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San Francisco to Use Wireless Sensors to Enable ‘Smart Parking’
NEW YORK TIMES
This fall, San Francisco will test 6,000 of its 24,000 metered parking spaces in the nation’s most ambitious trial of a wireless sensor network that will announce which of the spaces are free at any moment. Drivers will be alerted to empty parking places either by displays on street signs, or by looking at maps on screens of their smartphones. They may even be able to pay for parking by cellphone, and add to the parking meter from their phones without returning to the car.
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Jeff Bezos Backs Social Gaming Network
PAIDCONTENT
Social Gaming Network, a major distributor of games on Facebook and other social networks, has added Bezos Expeditions, Jeff Bezos’ investment vehicle, to its investor roles. The news comes just two months after the Palo Alto-based SGN announced its big, $15 million first round from investors Greylock Partners, the Founders Fund, Columbia Partners, and Novak Biddle Venture Partners. Terms of this investment were not disclosed.
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Xeround Raises $16 Million for Cloud Database
VENTUREBEAT
Xeround, the maker of a cloud-computing database dubbed the Intelligent Data Grid, has raised $16 million in a second round of funding. The Bellevue, Wash.-based company (which was founded in Israel) says the IDG stands out because it allows applications to work without knowing where data is stored, or in what format. The round was led by Ignition Partners and Trilogy Partnership, with participation from existing investors Benchmark Capital and Giza Venture Capital.
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Engine Yard Raises $15 Million Second Round for Rails Hosting
VENTUREBEAT
Engine Yard, a hosting and support company for the popular Ruby on Rails programming framework, has raised $15 million in a second round of financing. Chief Technology Officer and co-founder Tom Mornini says the San Francisco startup will soon expand its offerings with the release of Vertebra, its platform for managing Rails applications in the Internet cloud. The second round was led by New Enterprise Associates, with participation from Amazon.com and existing investor Benchmark Capital.
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Gaia Raises $11 Million for Teenage Virtual World
TECHCRUNCH
Gaia Online, an online world and social network aimed at teens, has raised $11 million in a Series C funding round led by Institutional Venture Partners. The site has a reported 5 million unique users monthly. Gaia Online is a self-described “teen hangout” that mixes elements of an avatar-based virtual world with mini-games, a social network, and a community forum.
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