Less than one year after its launch, the .CO registry announced Thursday that it has reached the one millionth .CO domain milestone. Since the company’s launch in July 2010, individuals and organizations from over 200 countries have registered domains at .CO.
CodeGuard, which provides malware detection and repair services to small and mid-sized businesses, raised $500,000 in seed funding from Imlay Investments.
Google says it has discovered that a number of Gmail passwords have been stolen in what appears to be a phishing scam that the company has traced back to Jinan, China. China’s Foreign Ministry called the allegations a “fabrication out of thin air."
It’s happened! It’s finally happened! Groupon has officially filed for an IPO. After months of rampant rumors, Groupon is finally taking the plunge and gearing up to go public.
Juice in the City, the trusted community of moms and local businesses working together to grow local economies, raised $6 million in its latest funding round led by Tandem Entrepreneurs and HU Investments.
Tablet publishing platform Onswipe is announcing a $5 million round of funding led by Spark Capital with participation from Lightbank, Yuri Milner and others.
Open Ocean Capital, to celebrate the first closing of its Fund Three at €40 million (approximately $60 million), is holding a startup competition: the winning startup team will be treated with an all-inclusive summer visit to Finland, where they will not only gain insight from the Open Ocean partners, but also enjoy some leisurely activities.
Pandora has put a price tag on its shares: $9. With 5,000,682 shares of common stock up for grabs, the pricing gives Pandora a valuation of more than $1 billion.
The agency also published draft guidance on the use of AI in drug development
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Steven Loeb
The biggest focus areas for AI investing are healthcare and biotech
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Steven Loeb
It will complete and submit forms, and integrate with state benefit systems
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Steven Loeb
Startup/Business
Joined Vator on
Open Ocean Capital is the leading investor in Community and Open Source Business. With hands-on assistance and funding, the Open Ocean team uses its broad and deep experience from MySQL AB and similar highly successful business cases to help start-ups with established user bases build scalable global businesses.
We believe that a multi-stage investment model is best for developing the start-up to global success. Our typical initial investment is 0.5-1M€, with one or several follow-on investments tied to growth targets. The maximum investment is 6M€ per portfolio-company.
With this investment focus, Open Ocean launched Fund Three in May 2011 with 40 M€ in capital in the first closing. We are currently working on a second closing, targeting 60M€ in total for the fund.
Open Ocean was originally established in Luxemburg, as Open Ocean S.à.r.l. by the MySQL founders (Michael Widenius, David Axmark and Allan Larsson) as the holding company for their joint ownership in MySQL AB. Ralf Wahlsten and Berndt Karsten invested in Open Ocean S.à.r.l. and MySQL AB, while helping the MySQL founders with the initial growth phases of MySQL AB.
After the MySQL AB acquisition by Sun Microsystems in 2008, Open Ocean was transformed into a venture capital operation and moved to a Finland-based entity, owned by the Open Ocean Capital management team. The team launched the first fund in 2008, which has invested in six companies. The name of this investment fund was chosen to be Open Ocean Fund Two, to reflect the history of the company as one of the main owners in MySQL AB (Open Ocean “One”).
Startup/Business
Joined Vator on
Pandora, the leading internet radio service, gives people music they love
anytime, anywhere, through a wide variety of connected devices: laptop and
desktop computers, smartphones, connected BluRay players, connected TVs,
etc. Personalized stations launch instantly with the input of a single “seed” –
a favorite artist, song or genre. The Music Genome Project®, a deeply
detailed, hand-built musical taxonomy, powers the personalization or
Pandora. Using this musicological “DNA” and constant listener feedback
Pandora crafts personalized stations from the more than 800,000 songs that
have been analyzed since the project began in January 2000.
More than 75 million people throughout the United States listen to
personalized radio stations for free on Pandora through their PCs, mobile
phones and devices such as the iPad, and connected in-house devices
ranging from TVs to set-top boxes to Blu-Ray players. Mobile technology has
been a significant factor in the growth and popularity of Pandora, starting
with the introduction of the Apple app store for the iPhone in the summer of
2008. Pandora instantly became one of the most top downloaded apps and
today, according to Nielsen, is one of the top five most popular apps across
all smartphone platforms.
Pandora is free, simple and, thanks to connectivity, available everywhere
consumers are – at the office, at home, in the car and all points in between.
In 2009 the Company announced that Pandora would be incorporated into
the dashboard in Ford cars via SYNC technology; GM has already followed in
announcing plans to integrate Pandora into its vehicles and Mercedes-Benz
introduced their Media Interface Plus device that works with the
free Pandora iPhone app to provide direct control of Pandora from in-dash
stereo controls. This was all great news for the millions of Pandora listeners
who had been plugging their smartphones into car dashboards to listen to
personalized stations while driving. More than 50 percent of radio listening
happens in the car, making it a crucial arena for Pandora.
Today tens of millions of people have a deeply personal connection with
Pandora based on the delight of personalized radio listening and discovery.
These highly engaged listeners reinforce the value Pandora provides to: 1)
musicians, who have found in Pandora a level playing field on which their
music has a greater chance of being played than ever before; 2) advertisers,
who benefit from the multi-platform reach of Pandora, as well as its best
practices in targeting consumers for specific campaigns; 3) the music
industry, which has found in Pandora a highly effective distribution channel;
and 4) automobile and consumer electronics device manufacturers, who have
noted that incorporating Pandora into their product makes it more valuable
to consumers.
Pandora continues to focus on its business in the United States. The radio
arena has never been hotter, thanks to technology that enables radio to be
personalized to the individual and more accessible than ever before. Right
now millions of people listen to Pandora in the United States and we hope
someday to bring Pandora to billions of people around the world.
Timeline:
• 2000 – Tim Westergren’s Music Genome Project begins.
• 2005 – Pandora launches on the web.
• 2008 – Pandora app becomes one of the most consistently downloaded
apps in the Apple store.
• 2009 – Ford announces Pandora will be incorporated into car
dashboard. Alpine and Pioneer begin selling aftermarket radios that
connect to consumers’ iPhones and puts the control and command of
Pandora into the car dashboard.
• 2010 – Pandora is present on more than 200 connected consumer
electronics devices ranging from smartphones to TVs to set-top boxes
to Blu-ray players and is able to stream visual, audio, and interactive
advertising to computers, smartphones, iPads, and in-home connected
devices.
