In This Update:
• Dell Looks to Ramp Up Acquisitions for Growth
• Shanghai Says to Let Foreign PE Firms Set Up Shop
• Ford’s Fiesta Movement Is Money Well-Spent
• Palm Names Rubinstein CEO Days After Pre Launch
• Crispin, Porter + Bogusky Ventures Into Europe
• USA Today Regrets Making iPhone App Free
• Microsoft to Unveil Free Anti-Virus Software
• Digital Downloads Spell End for Videogame Stores?
• Reports: 41 Percent Choosing Smart Phones as Next Device
• Betaworks, Accelerator Group Buy Majority Stake In Twitterfeed
• NY Times Hires Goldman Sachs to Sell The Boston Globe
• Redpoint Re-Ups with Answers.com
• Skype Co-founders Invest In European Pet Community Network
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Dell Looks to Ramp Up Acquisitions for Growth
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Dell Inc. is cranking up its mergers and acquisitions engine, just as competition for technology deals begins heating up again. While Dell officials have publicly said they want to do more deals, they have given few specifics. But Chief Executive Michael Dell expects his company to acquire a “significant-sized company” in coming months, according to a person who has spoken with the CEO. The computer maker wants to expand its data-storage and tech-services businesses, according to people who have recently spoken with its chief financial officer, Brian Gladden.
Shanghai Says to Let Foreign PE Firms Set Up Shop
REUTERS
Shanghai will soon allow foreign private equity firms to establish wholly owned subsidiaries or joint ventures in the city, a senior official said on Thursday. Fang Xinghai, director of the Shanghai Financial Services Office, said that the new rules, which would also apply to foreign venture capital firms, could be published within a month.
Ford’s Fiesta Movement Is Money Well-Spent
PAID CONTENT
When Ford gave 100 social media-savvy people a free Fiesta and told them to document their experiences on Twitter, Facebook and YouTube for the next six months, the company had to know that there would be some interesting (and possibly unfavorable) situations that would come up. —The good: In terms of exposure, the Fiesta Movement YouTube channel garnered over 9,000 views, with some individual clips getting well over 150,000 views each. Altogether, the company said the drivers created over 4.6 million worth of impressions (across YouTube, in their blogs and tweets) for the brand. Meanwhile, driver Natalie Neff got into a major accident—though she lived to rave about how the car’s construction had actually saved her life.
Palm Names Rubinstein CEO Days After Pre Launch
REUTERS
Palm Inc named Jon Rubinstein its CEO on Wednesday, hoping the former Apple executive will usher in a new era for a company seeking to revive its fortunes with a fresh smartphone launched last weekend. Rubinstein, who was brought in as Palm’s executive chairman when private equity firm Elevation Partners bought a stake in the company in 2007, played frontman for the new “Pre” phone, popping up at various industry conferences and touring retail outlets. Rubinstein, 52, takes the helm on Friday, succeeding Ed Colligan, a 16-year Palm veteran who will take some time off and then join Elevation, Palm said in a statement. Analysts said Rubinstein’s own elevation was no surprise.
Crispin, Porter + Bogusky Ventures Into Europe
WALL STREET JOURNAL
Crispin, Porter + Bogusky, one of the more-successful U.S. advertising agencies, said it is expanding abroad, launching CP+B Europe by acquiring Daddy, a digital-ad firm in Gothenburg, Sweden. Daddy, which has 50 employees, works on behalf of marketers including H.J. Heinz and the Scandinavian airline SAS. Terms of the purchase weren’t disclosed. The move into Europe is a reversal for Crispin, which is owned by MDC Partners. It has long said it didn’t need to have an office outside North America, even suggesting it could just keep its Miami and Colorado offices open around the clock to service business overseas.
USA Today Regrets Making iPhone App Free
MOCO NEWS
USA Today’s new publisher David Hunke regrets not charging for its iPhone application, even though mobile phones and portable electronic reading devices continue to be an opportunity for new revenue sources. “I’m not sure we realized what we had,” he told AP. “I think that’s a value readers will be willing to pay for.” USA Today is not only giving its content away on the iPhone, but also Google’s Android device. The plan was to make money through advertising, such as click-to-call, click-to-maps using the user’s GPS location, and video. But that must not be working out so well.
Microsoft to Unveil Free Anti-Virus Software
REUTERS
Microsoft Corp is getting ready to unveil a long-anticipated free anti-virus service for personal computers that will compete with products sold by Symantec Corp and McAfee Inc. A Microsoft spokesman said on Wednesday that the world’s biggest software maker is testing an early version of the product with its own employees. Microsoft would “soon” make a trial version, or product beta, available via its website, he added, but declined to provide a specific date. Symantec shares fell 0.5 percent on Nasdaq and McAfee fell 1.3 percent on the New York Stock Exchange, while Microsoft was up 2.1 percent. The Nasdaq composite index was down 0.47 percent.
Digital Downloads Spell End for Videogame Stores?
REUTERS
Will digital downloads kill the videogames store? That’s the multibillion dollar question facing retailers from Wal-Mart Stores Inc and Target Corp to GameStop Corp, as Internet distributors continue to grow. Retailers like Target splashed out on large booths at last week’s E3 Expo in Los Angeles, showcasing games like Activision’s “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen.” But gamers — especially on personal computers — are increasingly turning to alternative methods to play and buy games, such as downloading or “streaming” online games, rather than trekking to a store.
Reports: 41 Percent Choosing Smart Phones as Next Device
MOCO NEWS
Over the next few years, the handset industry will increasingly polarize between low-end feature phones and high-end smartphones, according to two separate reports released today by Yankee Group and Juniper Research. Yankee Group said that 41 percent of consumers in North America are likely to choose a phone with an advanced operating system for their next device. At that pick-up rate, smartphone volumes will make up about 38 percent of all handsets by 2013 in North America. In the U.S., the average consumer has had four phones, which increases their likelihood of wanting to have more sophisticated features for their fifth device.
Betaworks, Accelerator Group Buy Majority Stake In Twitterfeed
PAID CONTENT
Twitterfeed—which has become the de-facto way for publishers to distribute their RSS feeds over Twitter—has found two prominent investors to fund its rapid growth. New York City incubator Betaworks, along with London-based The Accelerator Group, have purchased a majority stake in the company, according to Accelerator Group partner Saul Klein. Both firms have invested together in the past in a number of high profile real-time web startups, including bit.ly and Tweetdeck.
NY Times Hires Goldman Sachs to Sell The Boston Globe
PE HUB
The New York Times Co has hired Goldman Sachs to manage the possible sale of The Boston Globe, and plans to request bids in the next couple of weeks, The Boston Globe reported on Wednesday. The report comes after the Globe’s largest union, the Boston Newspaper Guild, rejected a $10 million package of concessions aimed at cutting costs at the city’s largest daily newspaper. On Tuesday, the Guild petitioned the U.S. government’s National Labor Relations Board to block the Times Co’s plan to slash union members’ pay by 23 percent to get the savings the newspaper publisher says it needs. Media industry watchers have been expecting the Times Co to put the 137-year-old Globe up for sale, saying the cost-cuts were designed to streamline the newspaper and attract bidders. The Times has said the Globe is on track to post an $85 million operating loss this year.
PE HUB
Wimba Inc., a New York-based provider of collaborative education software, has raised $6 million in Series C funding led by ABS Ventures. The company previously raised around $13 million from firms like ABS, Ascend Venture Group, Gefinor Ventures and Tudor Ventures. This new funding will drive continued development of innovative collaborative technology and market expansion, leveraging the strength of the award-winning Wimba Collaboration Suite™ and its enthusiastic adoption amongst learning communities around the world.
Redpoint Re-Ups with Answers.com
PE HUB
Answers Corp. said that Redpoint Ventures exercised a $7 million second tranche warrant, issued by the company in conjunction with a $13 million financing last summer. Answers Corporation, creators of the leading answer engine offering Answers.com® and WikiAnswers.com™, today announced the exercise of the second tranche warrant, issued by the Company in connection with its June 2008 financing, by Redpoint Ventures, a Menlo Park, CA, based venture capital firm specializing in early stage and growth capital investments for the Internet and technology sectors, and the company’s largest stockholder.
Skype Co-founders Invest In European Pet Community Network
TECH CRUNCH
Estonia-based United Dogs and Cats, which operates two pet-specific community websites dubbed UnitedDogs.com and UnitedCats.com, has raised €480,000 in VC funding. The money comes from individual investor Raivo Hein, the state-owned Estonian Development Fund and Ambient Sound Investments, the investment group led by co-founders of Skype that had previously seeded the startup with €170,000 of funding back in April 2008.
Tags: Answers Corp., Apple, Boston, Dell, Europe, Microsoft, Mobile, New York Times, Redpoint Ventures, Reuters, Skype, Smartphone, Twitter, Venture Capital, Wal-Mart, WSJ
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