Playdom Raises $43 Million in Series A Funding

 

Playdom, a leading social gaming company, announced today that it has closed $43 million of financial investments as part of its Series A financing. The investment, led by New Enterprise Associates (NEA), along with Playdom chairman Rick Thompson, Lightspeed Venture Partners and Norwest Venture Partners (NVP), will be used to finance strategic acquisitions and expand the company’s pipeline of market-leading games.

“We are focused on growing Playdom into a world-class gaming company. A number of compelling games are in development for 2010, and we’re bullish about our future and the potential to bring people together through social gaming,” said John Pleasants, CEO of Playdom. “Social games appeal to everyone, everywhere. Our players range from ages 13 to 80 and come from more than 150 countries, so the opportunity for growth is tremendous.”

In conjunction with this financing, Playdom has added Scott Sandell, general partner at NEA, to its Board of Directors. Sandell joins Playdom’s existing board members CEO John Pleasants and founders Rick Thompson, Dan Yue and Chris Wang.

“We are thrilled to partner with such an exciting company and strong leadership team,” said Sandell. “We believe social gaming is a transformative industry and Playdom is playing a critical role in shaping its future and the future of online social entertainment.”

Playdom currently runs 13 games on leading social networking platforms including Facebook, MySpace and iPhone. The company is the largest game developer on MySpace and has two of the top five role-playing games on Facebook, including its popular titles Sorority Life and Mobsters 2: Vendetta.

Playdom has over 190 employees in offices in Mountain View and San Francisco, CA, as well as a game studio in Eugene, OR.

About NEA
New Enterprise Associates, Inc. (NEA) is a leading venture capital and growth equity firm focused on helping entrepreneurs create and build major new enterprises that use technology to improve the way we live, work and play. Since its founding in 1978, the firm has followed the same core principles: supporting its entrepreneurs, providing an excellent return to its limited partners, and practicing its profession with the highest standards and respect. Through its affiliated funds, NEA focuses on investments at all stages of a company’s development, from seed stage through IPO. With approximately $11 billion in committed capital, NEA’s experienced management team has invested in over 650 companies, of which more than 165 have gone public and more than 255 have been acquired. For additional information, visit www.nea.com.

About Lightspeed Venture Partners
Lightspeed Venture Partners is a leading global venture capital firm with over $2 billion of committed capital under management. Lightspeed’s investment professionals and advisors are located in Silicon Valley, China, India and Israel. Over the past two decades, the Lightspeed team has backed more than 150 companies, many of which have become leaders in their respective markets, including Blue Nile, Brocade, Calista, Ciena, DoubleClick, eHealth, Galileo Technology, Growth Networks, Informatica, Kiva Software, LightLogic, Maker Communications, Metasolv, Openwave, Quantum Effect Devices, Riverbed, Sirocco, Virsa Systems and Waveset. For more information, visit www.lightspeedvp.com.

About Norwest Venture Partners
Norwest Venture Partners (NVP) is a global, multi-stage investment firm that manages more than $2.5 billion in capital. It has offices in Palo Alto, California, Mumbai and Bangalore, India and Herzelia, Israel. NVP makes early to late stage venture and growth equity investments in U.S. and global companies across a wide range of sectors including: information technology, business services, financial services and consumer. NVP has actively partnered with entrepreneurs to build great businesses for more than 48 years and has funded over 450 companies since inception. For more information, please visit www.nvp.com.

About Playdom
Playdom is a leading social gaming company. As communicated in the tagline “Where players rule,” Playdom is committed to delivering the best possible player experience to its more than 28 million monthly active users on Facebook, MySpace, hi5, Tagged and iPhone. Playdom is headquartered in Mountain View, CA. Please visit www.playdom.com for more information

 

Editor- Michelle Rose

Sonasoft Announces Industry Leading SonaRAMBO For Microsoft Customers

New suite of customizable and integrated Replication, Archiving, Migration and Backup Offering for SMBs

Sonasoft Inc., an emerging leading provider of fully integrated and automated solutions for archiving, disaster recovery, and data backup/recovery solutions for the SMB market, is pleased to announce SonaRAMBO, the industry’s first, fully integrated Replication, Archiving, Migration and Backup Offering. This comprehensive suite harnesses the state-of-the-art features and functionality, unmatched from a single solutions provider. SMBs gain tremendous advantage by leveraging the integrated architecture of the Sonasoft SonaRAMBO solution to capitalize on its powerful features, full-featured functionality, and scalability. Effective immediately and available through December 31, 2009, the bundled price for this unique solution is $7,777 for up to 250 mailboxes.

“Sonasoft is always looking for new ways to help users utilize the full potential of their replication, archiving, migrating and backup solution,” commented Andy Khanna, President and CEO, Sonasoft. “With the new SonaRAMBO bundled offering, Sonasoft has carefully selected an integrated product suite that is unique to the industry which provides the full functionally and flexibility demanded by our customers.”

The SonaRAMBO bundled offering consists of elements from both its SonaExchange and SonaVault product offering.

SonaExchange – Replication, migration and backup – delivers unparalleled levels of backup / recovery and replication by incorporating flexible, state-of-the-art technology. This provides SMBs the ability to be up and running quickly in case of system failure or total disaster. SonaExchange delivers total protection of data ensuring mission-critical information is accessible at all times. Sonasoft’s patent-pending solution enables the rapid recovery of emails at the point-of-failure without losing a single email, calendar, contact and other important information.

Key features of SonaExchange include:

1. Backup and Recovery of Exchange Information Stores

With information store protection SonaExchange Protector can recover Exchange Server to a point-in-time or point-of-failure without loss of emails.

2. Email Recovery

SonaExchange Protector takes a pro-active role by performing the backup at the mailbox level and stores emails in Outlook PST format. When needed, single or multiple emails, contacts, calendar or any message item can be recovered with a simple and powerful SonaExchange Web Console. As the messages are stored in PST format, backup file can be opened with Outlook, providing an additional option to search and retrieve required emails.

3. Primary Exchange Server Replication

Sonasoft’s patent-pending, unique and extremely powerful technology provides replication of the Exchange Server at the mailbox level. SonaExchange Replicator, unlike competitive offerings keeps the Standby Exchange Server online and does not transfer physical corruptions. This is the result of replication taking place at the mailbox level by restoring emails to the Standby Exchange Server. Primary Exchange Server replication is an inherent, hardware agnostic, SonaExchange capability to seamlessly switch to a Standby Exchange Server, without loss of data protection capabilities.

4. Exchange Server Migration

SonaExchange Migrator replicates mailboxes from Primary Exchange Server to a new Exchange Server running a higher version of Exchange than the Primary Exchange. During the replication process, users still access the Primary Exchange Server. Once the replication is completed; fail-over can be initiated. This re-points all users to the mailboxes on the new migrated server. At that point, all emails can be sent and received through the new server.

SonaVault – Archiving and protection – delivers a new generation of email archiving solutions. SonaVault is a stand-alone, software based, powerful and comprehensive email archiving solution for Microsoft Exchange Server 2000, 2003, 2007 and 2010. It enables organizations to archive, search and retrieve emails to achieve regulatory compliance and operational excellence.

Key features of SonaVault include:

1. Storage Management

SonaVault for Email Archiving delivers a fully integrated portfolio of features and tools to lighten a data encumbered Exchange server. The resultant effect is an improved efficiency, performance, and better storage management solution.

SonaVault uses stub technology without any client side component installation to reduce the size of the Exchange Server. In this process, message contents including attachments are removed from the email and a pointer, namely “stub” is created in the email body which has a small footprint compared to the actual message size. This is transparent to the end-users who access emails through Outlook in the usual fashion. Stubbed emails when replied or forwarded, retrieve contents from the SonaVault Store instead of the Exchange Server, seamlessly to the end-user.

2. Continuous Email Archiving

When used in conjunction with Sonasoft’s Exchange Replication product, Continuous Email Archiving can be achieved without the loss of emails even after the Primary Exchange Server switches over to the Standby Exchange Server. This is due to the fact that the Standby Exchange Server is always online with a pre-configured archiving agent which will start archiving as soon as it assumes the primary – active – role.

3. Secure and Guaranteed Archiving

The SonaVault solution employs reliable safeguards including encryption to ensure that the email is tamper-proof without the possibility of being altered. SonaVault uses Microsoft’s Journaling mechanism to extract and archive messages. This ensures that every message which goes out and enters an Exchange Server is archived even if the message is deleted by the user from his or her mailbox.

4. Regulatory Compliance Requirements

SonaVault for Email Archiving solution helps meet a wide variety of regulatory compliance requirements such as Sarbanes Oxley, Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA), SEC requirements and many more worldwide governmental regulations.

Please visit www.Sonasoft.com to learn more about these products or to take advantage of this limited, price reduced program.

About Sonasoft®

Sonasoft, Inc. revolutionized the Disk to Disk backup and recovery process for MS Exchange MS SQL & Windows File Systems with its groundbreaking Point-Click Recovery™ solutions. Designed to simplify, automate, and eliminate human error in the backup and recovery process, Sonasoft solutions also centralize the management of multiple servers and provide a cost-effective turnkey disaster recovery strategy for companies of all sizes. Founded in 2003, the company is headquartered in San Jose, CA. For more information, please visit www.sonasoft.com.

Eventbrite Closes Series C Round of Funding From Sequoia Capital

Eventbrite announced that it has closed a Series C round of funding from Sequoia Capital, with partner Roelof Botha (previous backer of YouTube) joining as director. This brings the company’s total funding to over $8 million. Previous investors include Bebo co-founders Michael & Xochi Birch, Jeff Clavier, YouTube co-founder Jawed Karim, former PayPal founding executives, David Sacks and Keith Rabois, prolific Silicon Valley angel, Ron Conway, and Flixster co-founders Saran Chari and Joe Greenstein.

“Eventbrite exhibits many of the same traits that were present in many of the wonderful companies Sequoia Capital has been in business with: passionate and driven entrepreneurs, addressing a large underserved market, and organic growth driven by a laser-like focus on the customer experience,” said Roelof Botha, partner, Sequoia Capital. “Events are an enormous market where organizers are relegated to using mostly manual tools to promote and monitize their offerings. By providing them with a simpler, more economical model, Eventbrite makes the event experience more successful for planners and rewarding for attendees. This is an exciting time for the company and we’re thrilled to be involved in the growth of what we see as an industry-disrupting offering.”

Evenbrite is an event planning marketplace that optimizes the planning and hosting of events, giving organizers a simple, automated way to sell tickets, organize events and promote these gatherings through social media platforms.

“With Eventbrite, we’ve branched out from the ‘old world’ model of ticket registration and democratized it, empowering anyone with the ability to sell a ticket to an event and bring people together,” said Kevin Hartz, CEO and co-founder of Evenbrite. “We see a massive opportunity here in terms of the socialization and optimization of events and are excited to play an enabling role in making this happen.”

The company was founded in 2006 by Kevin, along with his wife Julia Hartz and Renaud Visage. Kevin was previously co-founder and CEO of Xoom Corporation, an international money transfer company that provides services to over 40 countries worldwide. He has also been an active early stage investor and advisor to startups including PayPal, Flexilis, Boku, Milo, Yammer, AdNectar, Flixster, Trulia, Tokbox, Geni, Tripit, iControl, Three Rings, and Friendster.

This round of funding validates significant company success to-date, highlighted by consistent triple-digit year over year growth, 3 million monthly uniques, and projected ticket sales of over $100 million in 2009. A vast number of different event types can leverage Eventbrite, from fairs and festivals, to fundraisers, workshops, reunions, conferences or special holiday events. Customers to date have included notable names such as TechCrunch, Craigslist Foundation, Kiva, PayPal, and LA Times.

About Eventbrite

Eventbrite is an online events marketplace where tens of thousands of individuals, businesses and organizations of all sizes manage, promote and sell out their events. With over five million registrations to date and over ten thousand new events published every month, Eventbrite is bringing explosive growth to the events industry by making it easy for anyone to host a successful event. With a suite of free and easy-to-use online tools, Eventbrite empowers event organizers with everything they need to create a professional online presence and to effectively promote their events on the Web. Eventbrite collects a fee only if you sell tickets, and free events are totally free. As the World’s Marketplace for Events, Eventbrite proudly serves event organizers from almost every industry, as well as thousands of non-profits, universities, libraries and faith-based organizations from all over the world. The company is headquartered in San Francisco, CA and additional information is available at www.eventbrite.com.

About Sequoia Capital

Sequoia Capital provides venture capital funding to founders of startups who want to turn business ideas into enduring companies. As the “Entrepreneurs Behind the Entrepreneurs,” Sequoia Capital’s Partners have worked with innovators such as Larry Page and Sergey Brin of Google, Larry Ellison of Oracle, Bob Swanson of Linear Technology, Sandy Lerner and Len Bozack of Cisco Systems, Dan Warmenhoven of Network Appliance, Jerry Yang and David Filo of Yahoo!, Jen-Hsun Huang of NVIDIA, Michael Marks of Flextronics, Chad Hurley and Steve Chen of YouTube, Dominic Orr and Keerti Melkote of Aruba Wireless Networks, Jonathan Kaplan of Pure Digital and Tony Hsieh and Alfred Lin of Zappos. To learn more about Sequoia Capital visit www.sequoiacap.com.

Metabolex Closes $8.6 Million Financing Round

Metabolex, Inc., a biopharmaceutical company focused on the discovery and development of proprietary new medicines for the treatment of metabolic diseases, today announced it had closed an additional $8.6 million in financing. Participating investors in this insider financing include: Alta Partners, Venrock, Versant Ventures, Bay City Capital, VantagePoint Venture Partners, Novo Ventures, Pictet, Next Chapter Holdings, Charter Ventures, Merlin Biomed, and Birchmere Ventures.

The company plans to use the funds to continue to advance development of its four clinical-stage candidates, including a Phase 2 study for MBX-2982. MBX-2982 is a potential first-in-class treatment for type 2 diabetes that targets G protein-coupled receptor 119 (GPR119), a receptor that interacts with bioactive lipids known to stimulate glucose-dependent insulin secretion. The company has completed three Phase 1 trials and has generated promising data for this potential first-in-class therapy.

“We are pleased by the continued consistent support Metabolex has received from our investors,” said President and CEO, Harold Van Wart, Ph.D. “These funds will enable us to continue to advance our product portfolio including the development of MBX-2982, a potential new therapy for treating type 2 diabetes.”

About Diabetes

Diabetes is a worldwide health problem and a rapidly growing source of illness, death and health care costs. According to the International Diabetes Federation, approximately 246 million adults, or 6 percent of the world’s adult population, had diabetes in 2007. The American Diabetes Association (ADA) estimates that there were approximately 23.5 million adults in the United States with diabetes in 2007, making up 10.7 percent of the adult population. According to estimates from the ADA, one in ten health care dollars is attributed to diabetes. Type 2 diabetes accounts for 90 to 95 percent of diabetic cases.

About Metabolex

Metabolex is a privately-held biopharmaceutical company focused on the discovery and development of proprietary new medicines for the treatment of metabolic diseases, with an emphasis on type 2 diabetes. The company has four clinical-stage compounds: MBX-102/JNJ 39659100, which has completed three Phase 2 trials; MBX-2044, which has completed a Phase 2a trial; MBX-8025, which recently completed a Phase 2 trial in patients with dyslipidemia; and MBX-2982, which recently completed its third Phase 1 trial. Ortho-McNeil, Inc. has the exclusive right to develop and commercialize MBX-102/JNJ 39659100.

For additional information about Metabolex and its development pipeline, visit www.metabolex.com.

The Quercus Trust Acquires the Assets of Applied Solar, Inc.

Applied Solar, Inc. (debtor-in-possession) (OTC Bulletin Board: APSO) (”we” or the “Company”) announced today that it has closed the previously-announced sale of its assets and operations to Quercus APSO, LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of The Quercus Trust. Quercus APSO, LLC intends to change its name and conduct business as Applied Solar, LLC.

With the consummation of the transaction, Applied Solar, LLC will have the benefit of a much stronger balance sheet and little or no long-term debt.

David Field, the Company’s President and Chief Executive Officer, commented, “We are pleased to announce the completion of this transaction, and look forward to continuing our efforts to develop new BIPV products, including an anticipated 2010 introduction of a product that will integrate with asphalt shingle roofing tiles, which represent approximately 80% of the U.S. residential roofing market. At the same time, we intend to further build upon our key strategic industry relationships that have enabled us to significantly penetrate the residential BIPV market and will soon lead our products into the European marketplace.” Mr. Field will continue in the same role as President and Chief Executive Officer of Applied Solar, LLC.

About The Quercus Trust

Based in Newport Beach, California, The Quercus Trust is recognized as one of the North America’s leading clean-tech venture funds, with strategic investments in the clean technology areas of solar, water, bio-fuels, wind and batteries. The Quercus Trust is known to provide more value than funding alone, and takes a long-term view of invested capital, leveraging its industry expertise and relationships for the benefit of its portfolio companies

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