In This Update:
• Facebook Raises $150 Million More to Cash Out Employees
• New Mood in Antitrust May Target Google
• AT&T to Offer Cloud-Based Storage as a Service
• Venture-Backed New Stocks Are Back
• App Revenue is Poised to Surpass Facebook Revenue
• Cisco Takes Aim at WiMax
• San Francisco Giants Testing Dynamic Ticket Sales System
• Scribd Launches E-Book Store
• Slacker Raises $9.6 Million for Player that Customizes Radio
• Financial Site Minyanville Raises $2.2 Million
• Ad Delivery Monitor DoubleVerify Launches with $3.5 Million First Round
• iPhone App Company Aha Mobile Raises $3 Million

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The law firm of new media. Major offices in New York, Boston, Newark, Stamford, and other cities. Advising new media companies from start-up to exit. Venture capital, IP protections and disputes, employment matters, outsourcing, joint ventures, acquisitions, to name just a few.

Facebook Raises $150 Million More to Cash Out Employees
VENTUREBEAT
Facebook has almost finished raising $150 million in capital, in an extraordinary move by the company to buy out shares of hundreds of regular employees. Because of the size of the round, Facebook’s existing investors – Accel, Greylock, Founders Fund and several others – found it a stretch to supply the full amount of capital. The the final part of the deal is being sold to new Asian investors.
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New Mood in Antitrust May Target Google
NEW YORK TIMES
For decades, the nation’s biggest antitrust cases have centered on technology companies. And they have all been efforts by the government to deal with powerful companies with far-reaching influence, like AT&T, the telephone monopoly; I.B.M., the mainframe computer giant; and Microsoft, the powerhouse of personal computer software. The new antitrust leadership, legal experts say, is likely to scrutinize networks – technology platforms that become so dominant that everyone feels the need to plug into them. The advantages to the companies that control such networks snowball as they attract more users, advertisers or software developers.
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AT&T to Offer Cloud-Based Storage as a Service
REUTERS
AT&T plans to offer Web-based data storage services for corporations using “cloud computing” technologies developed by data storage equipment maker EMC Corp. The telecommunications giant will join International Business Machines Corp, Amazon.com Inc, Symantec Corp, Iron Mountain Inc and others in offering storage as a service product, which allow companies to use the Internet to transfer information to remote storage facilities. AT&T said on Monday it will initially run the service from two data centers in the United states, although the company intends to expand overseas.
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Venture-Backed New Stocks Are Back
WALL STREET JOURNAL
The hopes of venture capitalists ride on two planned initial public offerings of stock this week, from software maker SolarWinds Inc. and online-reservation service OpenTable Inc. If they complete the share sales, the pair will be the first venture-backed IPOs in nine months, according to research firm VentureSource. The last such offering came from RackSpace Hosting Inc. in August 2008. It has been a long dry spell for the entire IPO market since then, but especially so for venture capital-backed deals, which are usually for earlier-stage companies that are more risky.
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App Revenue is Poised to Surpass Facebook Revenue
ADVERTISING AGE
More than a social phenomenon, Facebook harbors a lively and growing ecosystem of game and other application makers, ad networks and retailers of virtual goods. What happens when businesses running on Facebook become bigger than Facebook itself? That could very well be the case in 2009. Facebook, which just surpassed 200 million global users, is expected to bring in about $500 million in 2009 revenue, mostly from advertising. Tech blog Venturebeat estimated that Facebook developers make a combined $500 million on the platform. Ad Age estimates the collective revenue from Facebook of developers to be between $300 million and $500 million. All in all, numbers big enough that Facebook is looking to cash in.
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Cisco Takes Aim at WiMax
COMPUTER WORLD
Clearwire Corp. and Cisco Systems Inc. last week announced an alliance aimed at expanding high-speed WiMax wireless services nationwide using Cisco products as the core network infrastructure. The companies said that Clearwire is already testing and certifying an IP Next-Generation Network infrastructure based on Cisco 7600 routers and Cisco switches and firewalls. Financial terms of the deal weren’t revealed, but analysts noted that Cisco could earn millions of dollars by selling Clearwire its routers and optical networking gear for the WiMax network, which is slated to be rolled out in 80 U.S. cities by the end of 2010. The analysts did note that Cisco’s revenue from the deal will largely depend how well WiMax technology catches on in the U.S.
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San Francisco Giants Testing Dynamic Ticket Sales System
NEW YORK TIMES
Setting ticket prices to sports events requires that one hope for the best but prepare for the worst. Teams want prices high enough to cash in if they play well, but need them to be low enough to draw fans if they falter. The San Francisco Giants are experimenting with a possible solution – software that weighs ticket sales data, weather forecasts, upcoming pitching matchups and other variables to help decide whether the team should raise or lower prices right up until game day. The Giants are the first major league team to test the software, which some industry analysts say could transform the way teams adjust to the ebb and flow of the season, not unlike how airlines, hotels and rental car companies – which also use dynamic pricing – adjust to changes in the travel industry.
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Scribd Launches E-Book Store
SEARCH ENGINE JOURNAL
cribd, one of the largest social publishing site has began testing a new e-book store which it hopes to compete with the growing popularity of Amazon’s Kindle Store and the Kindle e-book reader. But aside from establishing the Internet’s largest online store of user-uploaded contents and publications, Scribd is also hoping to disprove the criticism that it might be perpetrating online piracy of printed books.
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Slacker Raises $9.6 Million for Player that Customizes Radio
VENTUREBEAT
Slacker, popular internet radio provider and maker of a customizable radio-listening device, has brought in $9.6 million of what it hopes will be a $10.2 million third round of funding. Based in San Diego, Calif., the company now offers the same radio stations and capabilities in the form of applications for the Blackberry and iPhone. The company has not disclosed who provided the recent, surprisingly large round of funding, but it has relied on investors Centennial Ventures, Rho Ventures, Austin Ventures, Mission Ventures and Sevin Rosen Funds in the past. The company has raised about $65 million to date, bringing in about $5 million of that at the end of last year.
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Financial Site Minyanville Raises $2.2 Million
PAIDCONTENT
Minyanville Media has raised $2.2 million in a first tranche of a round of funding, according to a filing with the SEC, via PEHub. Minyanville says in the filing that it may raise as much as $13 million, “depending on a investment by a specific potential strategic partner.” For now, the company-which runs financial infotainment site Minyanville.com- is not giving out details about its plans for the new funds or who the investors are.
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Ad Delivery Monitor DoubleVerify Launches with $3.5 Million First Round
PAIDCONTENT
DoubleVerify, a company that tracks online ad insertion orders, has raised a $3.5 million funding to support its launch this week, the company told paidContent. The round was led by Blumberg Capital, with additional backing from First Round Capital, Genacast Ventures and unidentified individual investors. The company, which is based in New York and has offices in Israel, has been testing its system for the past year. It claims its software can help agencies, marketers, publishers and ad networks reach a higher level of ROI by confirming that ads in an online campaign were delivered as promised.
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iPhone App Company Aha Mobile Raises $3 Million
TECHCRUNCH
Aha Mobile, a startup that is developing a car-friendly informational iPhone app, has secured $3 million in Series A financing from Venrock. Currently in development, Aha’s product is focused on safely connecting drivers to relevant information about the world around them via a mobile device. Aha’s vision is to create an iPhone app that gives drivers the information they need outside the car, such as what’s traffic like ahead? Where is the nearest bathroom? Where can I grab a cup of coffee before my next meeting?
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Tags: aha, Amazon.com, ATampT, Baseball, Clearwire, DoubleVerify, Facebook, iPhone, IPO, scribd, Slacker, ticketing, Venrock, Venture Capital