In This Update:
• Facebook has $200 Million Investment from Russian Firm
• Nintendo Looks Outside the Box
• More Mags Jump on the Premium App Bandwagon
• Advertising Growth Spreads in All Mobile Formats
• Report: In-Game Ad Spending to Hit $1 Billion by 2014
• Hot IPO with Rare Quality
• Another $10.5M Unloads on Peer39’s Dock
• Good Technology Buys Mobile Social Networking Aggregator Intercasting Corp.
• Auctus Private Equity Invests in Rising India
• Mark Logic Raises $12.5 Million
• Mobile Marketing Vendor Upstream Raises €11 Million VC
• Voxeo Acquires IMified to Add IM Agents to Voice Services
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Facebook has $200 Million Investment from Russian Firm
REUTERS
A Russian Internet investment firm has invested $200 million in Facebook, giving the social networking company a cash buffer during the recession and pegging its value at $10 billion. Digital Sky Technologies, which has invested in leading Russian web properties like Mail.ru and Vkontakte.ru, will take a nearly 2 percent stake in Facebook in exchange for preferred stock, the two companies said on Tuesday. The new valuation is $5 billion lower than when Microsoft Corp invested $240 million in Facebook, in return for a 1.6 percent stake, in 2007.
Nintendo Looks Outside the Box
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Nintendo Co., in a bid to keep up momentum for its Wii console, is pushing to increase the number of Wii videogames made by outside publishers, including combat and sports titles that target serious players. Reggie Fils-Aime, the company’s U.S. president, said in an interview Tuesday he hoped to increase the percentage of games made by outside publishers to about 70% of the Wii’s library of games, up from about 55% now. That would be about the same ratio as the split for its portable Nintendo DS device.
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More Mags Jump on the Premium App Bandwagon
PAIDCONTENT
Magazine publishers clearly have all that iPhone app store revenue on the brain. Just a week after People.com rolled out its $1.99 iPhone application, comes news that publishers like Time, Conde Nast and Hachette Filipacchi have plans to either release pay-for mobile apps or bundle subscription-based “premium” features to their existing free ones. It makes sense to try. While publishers continue to debate about whether people will pay for online editorial content and how to charge them for it, consumers are pumping millions of dollars into the app ecosystem through both subscriptions and micro-payments. Companies like Apple, Ning, Playfish, and individual developers are all getting people to pay for various types of “content” in snackable, interactive modules, so why shouldn’t magazines?
Advertising Growth Spreads in All Mobile Formats
MEDIAPOST
According to the quarterly Mobile Advertising Report by Brightkite and GfK Technology, 38% of US mobile phone owners recall seeing advertising on their cell phones in the first quarter of 2009, although for Smartphone (such as iPhone) users, 59% recalled seeing mobile advertising. For iPhone users, the number one format for seeing ads is mobile web advertising, while for other Smartpphone users, it is SMS. Overall awareness of mobile phone ads has risen in the twelve months, the survey of 1,000 users found, increasing from 6.8% of the user population in Q1 2008 to 10.8% a year later. The most striking finding of this report, says the summary, is the increased breadth of mobile advertising formats that consumers are noticing. 23% of Smartphone users recall seeing SMS advertising, but 20% saw ads in mobile social networks and 15% saw ads in mobile TV/video.
Report: In-Game Ad Spending to Hit $1 Billion by 2014
DIGITAL MEDIA WIRE
Spending on advertisements that appear within video games is expected to reach over $1 billion in 2014, when they will account for around 1.5% of global spending on digital advertising, according to a report from market research firm Screen Digest. The firm notes that, while conditions necessary for an acceleration of spending on in-game ads are in place, many of the world’s major brands have not yet taken to the nascent ad format. “Dynamic in-game advertising offers brands the same accountability as other digital platforms but in a more controlled environment than social display media and through a more standardized value chain than mobile advertising,” said Screen Digest senior analyst Vincent Letang.
Hot IPO with Rare Quality
WALL STREET JOURNAL
A hot new offering hits the tape, its shares soar 59% on it first day of trading, and champagne corks pop in Silicon Valley. Is this really May 2009, with the U.S. enmeshed in the worst recession since the Depression? Last week online restaurant reservation network OpenTable made its debut as a public company, and that is exactly what happened. Lead underwriters Merrill Lynch and Allen & Co. had already raised the offering price to $20. Suddenly it was as if venture capitalists and private equity firms could again contemplate profitable exit strategies. No wonder they were celebrating in Silicon Valley.
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Another $10.5M Unloads on Peer39’s Dock
TECHCRUNCH
Semantic ad technology provider Peer39 is announcing the closing of its Series C round to the tune of $10.5M, pushing the total amount of funding raised to over $22M. The round was led by Israeli VC Evergreen Venture Partners and was joined by the company’s existing investors Canaan Partners, Dawntreader Ventures, Silicon Valley Bank, and JP Morgan. Since taking an in-depth look at Peer39 nearly a year ago, the company has shifted its focus from developing its own ad network to leveraging its semantic ad platform to transform publishers’ remnant ad inventory into a premium one. The company claims that 70-80% of publisher impressions are sold today as remnant inventory, and that its technology is perfectly suited to analyze these pages so they can instead be used to serve top-tier advertising inventory.
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Good Technology Buys Mobile Social Networking Aggregator Intercasting Corp.
MOCO NEWS
Redwood City, Calif.-based Good Technology, which provides mobile email services, has acquired San Diego-based Intercasting Corp. to expand aggressively into mobile social networking. Intercasting aggregates social media services, such as Facebook, Twitter and MySpace, into one application that’s distributed by wireless carriers, including AT&T, Verizon Wireless and Sprint. Good declined to discuss the terms of the deal, but confirmed that Intercasting’s 25 employees will be joining the company, including Shawn Conahan, the founder, chairman and CEO, who will serve as a SVP. Intercasting has been plugging along in the space since 2004, and had raised a total of $17.5 million in capital from investors such as Venrock, Avalon Ventures and Masthead Venture Partners.
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Auctus Private Equity Invests in Rising India
PE HUB
Rising India, Inc., a digital special effects and 3D character animation business based in Omaha, Neb., agreed to take a $10 million equity investment form Auctus Private Equity Fund LLC, a Massachusetts fund. Rising India, Inc. is a United States based public company with an international market in the development and production of innovative digital special effects and 3D character animation for films and TV production. Rising India, Inc. has on-going business relationships with a number of European and Asian companies that provide extensive background and expertise in the animation field. As a result of its international scope and relationships, Rising India is involved in the development, creation and marketing of animation projects for the European, Asian and United States markets and anticipates significant growth in this expanding industry and technology.
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Mark Logic Raises $12.5 Million
PE HUB
Mark Logic, a San Carlos, Calif.-based information technology company, closed a $12.5 million round of financing led by Sequoia Capital and including participation from Tenaya Capital. Mark Logic® Corporation, a leading provider of software for information-centric applications, today announced that it has closed a $12.5 million round of financing, led by Sequoia Capital and including participation from Tenaya Capital. The capital will be used to fund the company’s continued growth in sales channels, international expansion, and new vertical market development. Mark Logic operates in both North America and Europe and has over 150 customers, 120 employees, and 60 partners. Over 450 people attended the company’s annual user conference held recently in San Francisco.
Mobile Marketing Vendor Upstream Raises €11 Million VC
MOCO NEWS
Upstream Systems, a London mobile marketing company used by BSkyB, Coke and others, has raised an €11 million ($15.3 million) VC round, led by the city’s TLcom and Greece’s Alpha Ventures. The outfit was founded in 2002 and now has business with over 100 broadcasters, plus brands and mobile networks themselves. If you like, then, it’s one of the bigger players in the mobile interactivity vendor space. Upstream manages SMS short codes and text-based interactivity for Sky and has run SMS-based competitions for Chevrolet.
Voxeo Acquires IMified to Add IM Agents to Voice Services
NEW YORK TIMES
The jury’s still out as to whether technology M&A activity will pick up in the coming weeks, but here’s one deal that’s just been completed: Interactive voice recognition systems developer Voxeo has acquired instant messaging agent platform developer IMified for an undisclosed amount. The deal allows Orlando, Fla.-based Voxeo to build more sophisticated automated instant messaging response systems into its platform, with which developers and enterprise customers can build their own communications applications for customer service operations and similar functions.
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Tags: Apple, Auctus, Facebook, Financing, Gaming, Intercasting Corp., Mark Logic, Mobile, Nintendo, Open Table, Peer39, Social Networking, Video
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