THE BUSINESS OF TECHNOLOGY
Oracle, the world's third largest software maker and top producer of high end business computers, will pay $1.7 billion to acquire Acme packet, a company that sells telecommunications VoIP hardware. “The addition of Acme Packet to Oracle’s leading communications portfolio will enable service providers and enterprises to deliver innovative … [Read more...]
by MATT GALLAGHER, Red Herring Streaming video across multiple devices is far from the easy breeze it looks. With the launch of its new Elastic Transcoder service, however, Amazon not only makes it a synch, but much more affordable than other options currently offered on the market. Launched this week, Amazon's Elastic Transcoder service is … [Read more...]
Ribbit Capital, a new Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm, has closed on a $100 million fund that will be focused solely on finance-based startups. The firm will focus on startups specializing in lending, payments, insurance, accounting, tax preparation, personal financial management, and other financial services. The firm will target … [Read more...]
Facebook rolled out its Graph Search, a functional search tool that provides results based on social connections. It's a big step for Facebook that evolves its social function to provide relevant knowledge based on relationships. Search for “friends of friends who are single women,” and you completely revamp the nature of dating. Search for … [Read more...]
Testing “extreme price points” in a potential paid messaging service, Facebook offered to send messages directly to CEO Mark Zuckerberg's inbox for $100, Mashable was the first to notice. The company is considering allowing users to pay to send messages to people who are not their friends that would go directly to the inbox, with the high fee … [Read more...]
Though there was an increase in number of Israeli startups that managed to raise money last year, there was less money raised. Last year, 575 Israeli high tech companies raised $1.92 billion from the investment community, a 10 percent decrease over 2011 when 545 raised $2.14 billion, according to a recent report from the IVC Research Center. VC … [Read more...]
LinkedIn has reached another milestone. The professional social network now has a user base of over 200 million users from over 200 countries. The site is used in 19 different languages. More than half of its users live outside the US. It's a ranking that Deep Nishar, LinkedIn's Senior Vice-president, described as “an important and exciting … [Read more...]
US venture firms raised $20.6 billion last year, a 10 percent increase over 2011, according to data from Thompson Reuters and the National Venture Capitalist Association. This marks the largest capital raised by US VCs since 2008, where 215 funds raised $25.6 billion. The number of funds that raised money in 2012 was 182 at a 3 percent decrease … [Read more...]
Avis Budget Group has announced plans to buy Zipcar for $491.2 million in order to expand its traditional car rentals to also include car sharing. Avis has agreed to purchase Zipcar for $12.25 in cash at a 49 percent premium over the company's closing price at the end of last year. However, it's a far cry from its opening price of $18 per share … [Read more...]
Despite all the talk about Google's Android gaining market share to dominate the mobile space, truth is Apple dominates the mobile market when it comes to actual advertising served, perhaps because people are actually using their devices more to interact with the Internet. Sales can measure only a small component of the puzzle. The real game is … [Read more...]