THE BUSINESS OF TECHNOLOGY
Splunk began its first day on the stock market priced at $17 a share. By the end of the day, the unprofitable business startup was worth $35.08, a 108 percent jump in price that makes the company worth more than $3 billion. It was the best stock debut of the year, and earned its CEO Godfrey Sullivan $240 million from the 6.9 million shares he … [Read more...]
Early stage firm First Round Capital is raising $135 million for a new fund, according to a recent SEC filing. It will be the firm's fourth fund. Its third fund gathered $126 million in late 2010. The company has a history of making early seed investments in startups. Its roster includes Path, TaskRabbit, Mint.com, Path, Urban Airship, and … [Read more...]
By Matt Gallagher, Red Herring Using Internet and other technology, EveryoneCounts reinvents the cast of the ballot. The company strives to bring elections to any Internet device or phone to make voting as easy as Facebook. And it works. When the State of Oregon used Everyone Counts to make it possible to vote from an iPad, voter … [Read more...]
The Red Herring editorial team selected the Finalists for the 2012 Red Herring 100 Europe Award. This group of companies is the short list for the Top 100 Europe award. They are the most innovative and promising companies from a pool of hundreds from across Europe. The Finalists are evaluated on both quantitative and qualitative criteria, such as … [Read more...]
By Matt Gallagher, Red Herring Facebook has acquired Instagram for a jaw dropping billion dollars in cash and stock, impressive bones for a two year old startup that previously had little to no business plan. It's the largest acquisition in the social network's history, and as Wired points out, a mind boggling cash windfall for Instagram's … [Read more...]
Venture capital fundraising dipped 35 percent in the first quarter from a year before, raising $4.9 billion, according to Thompson Reuters and the National Venture Capital Association. Forty-two firms raised money, a nine percent decrease from the first quarter of 2011 when 46 funds raised $7.6 billion. The leading five funding made up 75 … [Read more...]
The first quarter of 2012 rang the bell like Wall St. was getting back to business. Dow Jones Venture Source recently released a report that showed Q1 of 2012 as the most active quarter for IPOs since the fourth quarter of 2007. That's thanks to 20 companies that went public that quarter, including the likes of Yelp, Brightcove, and others. Those … [Read more...]
Seed funding continues to sprout, but the growth is slow, according to a recent report from Fenwick & West, a Silicon Valley law firm. And while companies face significant hurdles in raising their next fund, once they land a check, it's usually fairly sizable. The 2011 Internet/Digital Media and Software Industries Seed Financing Survey … [Read more...]
Digital Sky Technologies, an early investor in Facebook, is currently cooking up a $1 billion tech fund, with plenty of incentives to get other investors to show up for the potluck, according to a recent tech presentation unearthed by Bloomberg. To start the fund, DST is throwing in $50 million in Facebook stock, meaning that investors too would … [Read more...]
One Click Detects Cancer Worried that glaring mole you spotted on your morning commute might be cancerous? With SkinScan's app and an iPhone, you could have a pretty good answer in one simple click. SkinScan's app uses fractals to map moles and detect anomalies, spotting irregularities in an instant. The app then delivers three shades of … [Read more...]