VC+M&A

Chinese Video Site Youku Raises $40 Million Fourth Round - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Mon 30 Jun 2008 08:53 AM PST

Concerns over online video limitations in China aren’t stopping the flow of money into the sector… Youku says it has raised a $40 million fourth round from past backers Brookside…

White Label Social Net Lithium Gets $12 Million Second Round - 1 Comment
Posted By Rafat Ali - Mon 30 Jun 2008 07:33 AM PST

Lithium Technologies, an Emeryville, CA-based provider of white-label social networking tools, has raised $12 million in its second round funding, led by Benchmark Capital. Benchmark joins Emergence Capital and Shasta…

Expedia Buys Majority Of India’s TravelGuru For $17 Million - 0 Comments
Posted By Robert Andrews - Mon 30 Jun 2008 02:12 AM PST

This story was written in conjunction with our content partner VCCircle... Expedia has acquired a majority stake in India’s top online hotels aggregator TravelGuru for $17 million. The deal values…

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News Corp Taking DRM Firm NDS Private In $3.6 Billion Deal - 0 Comments
Posted By Rafat Ali - Sat 28 Jun 2008 09:45 AM PST

NDS, the UK-based DRM and conditional access firm which is majority owned by News Corp, is now being taken private: News Corp (NYSE: NWS). is teaming up with Permira Advisers,…

Virgin-Helio: Interview: VMUSA’s CEO Dan Schulman: Merger A “Transformative Deal For The Company.” - 0 Comments
Posted By Tricia Duryee - Fri 27 Jun 2008 01:28 PM PST

Virgin Mobile USA (NYSE: VM) today announced that they will be acquiring Los Angeles-based Helio, a competitor backed by SK Telecom (NYSE: SKM) and EarthLink, for $39 million. The deal…

Social Gamer I’m In Like With You Raises $1.5 Million First Round - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Fri 27 Jun 2008 10:05 AM PST

I’m in Like With You, a NY-based social gaming startup, has raised $1.5 million led by Spark Capital, along with Baseline Ventures, Betaworks, Ron Conway, and Marc Andreesen. The news…

Online Video Firm JumpTV Rejects Rival Offer From Brad Greenspan; Goes Ahead With NeuLion Merger - 0 Comments
Posted By Rafat Ali - Fri 27 Jun 2008 07:57 AM PST

Canada-headquartered online video firm JumpTV (TSE: JTV) has received an unsolicited competing bid to buy the company from the professional troublemaker and MySpace co-founder Brad Greenspan, but the company has…

Virgin Mobile Acquiring MVNO Helio For A Paltry $39M In Equity; Gets $50M Cash Investment - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Fri 27 Jun 2008 06:37 AM PST

As we have been reporting since the start of these talks, Virgin Mobile (NYSE: VM) has announced the acquisition of troubled MVNO Helio. The acquisition will cost Virgin Mobile a…

Israeli Animation Site Aniboom Raises $10 Million Second Round - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Fri 27 Jun 2008 04:31 AM PST

Aniboom, an Israeli animation network, has raised a $10 million second round led by Draper Fisher Jurvetson and DFJ Tamir Fishman Ventures, along with past backer Evergreen Venture Partners. The…

Updated: Telstra Buys Majority in Two Chinese Online Media Sites For Total $73 Million - 0 Comments
Posted By Rafat Ali - Thu 26 Jun 2008 11:00 PM PST

Updated below: This is an interesting expansion move by the Australian telco giant Telstra: it has taken 55 percent stakes in Norstar Media and in Autohome/PCPop. Norstar operates IT information…

Concert Rec Engine Songkick Closes First Round - 0 Comments
Posted By Staci D. Kramer - Thu 26 Jun 2008 09:56 PM PST

Songkick, a US-UK concert recommendation engine, has closed its first round, estimated by VentureBeat at $1.1 million from the Accelerator Group’s Saul Klein. Based in Brooklyn and London, the company…

Microsoft Acquiring Semantic Searcher Powerset For $100 Million: Report - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Thu 26 Jun 2008 03:04 PM PST

Well if it can’t get Yahoo’s (NSDQ: YHOO) search business… Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) will acquire semantic search engine Powerset for more than $100 million, according to Matt Marshall at VentureBeat.…

Liberty Media Acquires Party Site Celebrate Express For $31 Million - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Thu 26 Jun 2008 02:03 PM PST

Another e-commerce buy for Liberty Media… this time it is buying out small, publicly traded Celebrate Express, a party supply retailer, for $31 million. At $3.90 per share, the deal…

Product Rater RateItAll Gets First Round - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Wed 25 Jun 2008 12:09 PM PST

RateItAll, a company whose platform provides online consumer ratings of products, has raised an unspecified first round. Investors include various funds and individuals including Accelerator Ventures, JAIC America, Pacific I&T…

Opinion Community SodaHead Gets $8.4 Million Second Round - 3 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Wed 25 Jun 2008 10:16 AM PST

SodaHead, a community site for the debate of serious topics, has raised an $8.4 million second round led by Mission Ventures, along with past backer Mohr Davidow. The Santa Clara,…

Online Radio Hosting Site BlogTalkRadio Gets $4.6 Million Funding - 0 Comments
Posted By Rafat Ali - Wed 25 Jun 2008 08:39 AM PST

BlogTalkRadio, a popular online radio hosting site which allows anyone to webcast a radio/live feed, has received $4.6 million in funding, led by The Kraft Group, the owners of the…

Amazon Acquires Fabric.com For, Well, Fabric - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Wed 25 Jun 2008 08:15 AM PST

A reminder of the many items on Amazon’s (NSDQ: AMZN) plate… The retailer is acquiring Fabric.com, expanding into an area where its currently pretty limited. Through the acquisition, Amazon will…

Social Media Ad Firm Vitrue Acquires UGENMedia - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Wed 25 Jun 2008 07:43 AM PST

Vitrue, a social media marketer that has Comcast (NSDQ: CMCSA) and Turner as investors, is acquiring UGENMedia, a NY-based firm in the same space. The company says the deal will…

SK Telecom-Helio-Virgin Mobile Deal Done; Helio To Be Injected Into VMUSA: Report - 0 Comments
Posted By Rafat Ali - Tue 24 Jun 2008 07:29 PM PST

So reports FT this evening, citing sources. We first broke the news on the deal talks last month, and after hiccups in valuation and other issues, the deal has been…

No, Not That One: Fairfax Buys Majority in Weather Company - 0 Comments
Posted By Rafat Ali - Tue 24 Jun 2008 06:34 PM PST

No, the Weather Channel deal hasn’t yet been finalized, but an almost-namesake has been sold in Australia: Fairfax Digital, the digital media arm of Fairfax Media, has acquired a 75…

Circuit City May Announce Deal Soon; Not Necessarily Blockbuster Though - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Tue 24 Jun 2008 02:43 PM PST

There hasn’t been much movement on the potential deal between Blockbuster (NYSE: BBI) and Circuit City since the electronics retailer agreed to open up its books to the movie rental…

Twitter Officially Announces Its Funding; Jeff Bezos Participates - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Tue 24 Jun 2008 01:11 PM PST

Finally Twitter announces its funding. The popular microblogging/messaging service says its newest investors are Spark Capital and Jeff Bezos, via his Bezos Expeditions fund. That Spark was participating was already…

Microsoft-Yahoo Deal Chatter Starts Up Again; YHOO Shares Volatile - 1 Comment
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Tue 24 Jun 2008 10:38 AM PST

Shares of Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO) were almost kissing $20 this morning, before perking up on fresh deal chatter. A report at TechCrunch, citing sources at both Yahoo and Microsoft (NSDQ:…

Ad Optimizer AdMeld Raises $5 Million First Round - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Tue 24 Jun 2008 10:30 AM PST

AdMeld, a provider of ad optimization technology, has raised $5 million of a planned $6 million first round according to peHUB, citing regulatory filings. Investors include Foundry Group and Spark…

OwnerIQ Raises $6 Million Second Round For Online Owner Manuals - 0 Comments
Posted By Joseph Weisenthal - Tue 24 Jun 2008 10:29 AM PST

OwnerIQ, a portal of owner manuals and product help forums, has raised a $6 million second round led by Egan-Managed Capital. Participants in its $2 million first round, Atlas Ventures,…