Tech Trailblazers Awards (@techtrailblaze) early bird savings end Friday August 17th

Posted Mon, 08/13/2012 - 15:15 by TechTrailblazers

Tech Trailblazers Awards early bird ends Friday August 17th

Enterprise tech startup awards entry fee savings ends soon

LONDON, UK – August 13th 2012 – The Tech Trailblazers Awards early bird rates closes just shy of midnight Pacific time this Friday, leaving enterprise tech startups with just a few days to make savings on their awards submissions fee. The discounted rates of $250 for the first entry and just $100 for any subsequent submissions means that entrants make attractive savings especially when submitting multiple entries. With stacks of prizes from the $1million dollar prize fund up for grabs, a comprehensive promotion campaign by the organizers plus mentoring from the crème de la crème of the VC and Technology industry, the early bird means even better ROI for entrants.

Becoming a High-Performance Entrepreneur - Rich S. Pirrotta

Posted Thu, 08/02/2012 - 12:27 by richpirrotta

The intensity of the effort to bring a product or service to the market, or the demands of the first large customer, are so great that you notice at times you can’t form rational thoughts. You are the definition of the multi-tasking, dawn to dusk, whatever it takes approach in being single focused in delivering on the entrepreneurial dream. Those who care about you are concerned about whether you’ll end up the hospital, but your mind keeps racing with more great ideas and sleep is anything but routine.

Been there or are there now? Congratulations – you are following in the footsteps of the risk takers and innovators that transform society. It’s a noble calling when you have a passion to innovate in a unique way, but it’s not well understood. By the time your product or service is mainstream, normal people forget the level of sacrifice and effort. We can’t live without the light bulb, but forget that Edison slept most nights on his lab bench in Menlo Park. We are thankful to be living in the US, but forget that earlier generations boarded a ship for America with little knowledge of life across the ocean. Their stories are known – what is your story going to be as a risk-taker, innovator, and entrepreneur?

Pinfluencer Debuts Enterprise Analytics Engine for Pinterest Secures $1.4 Million in Seed Funding

Posted Tue, 07/31/2012 - 06:28 by Tonja Aldis

San Mateo, Calif. – July 31, 2012 – Pinfluencer, a robust big-data analytics and discovery marketing engine for the Pinterest platform, today emerged from private beta to announce its official debut. By connecting businesses to their most influential brand advocates, Pinfluencer changes the way products are distributed, merchandised and promoted. Pinfluencer’s scalable, cloud-based data engine allows retailers, brands and publishers to capture the most comprehensive data generated daily by ‘pins’ and ‘repins.’ With Pinfluencer, companies can now truly take advantage of the opportunities provided by social commerce and leverage Pinterest to drive massive circulation of their content, resulting in greater website traffic and sales.

Humor Website 9GAG Launches New App, Receives $2.8 Million Seed Funding

Posted Mon, 07/30/2012 - 06:14 by Tonja Aldis

Investment Will Allow Company to Increase Staffing, Expand Internationally and Deliver Continued Platform Enhancements to Meet Exploding User Engagement

SAN FRANCISCO and HONG KONG, July 30, 2012 – 9GAG, the world’s largest and fastest growing online comedy community, today announced a new mobile app for its wildly popular irreverent and hilariously funny content. 9GAG’s new mobile app – named “9GAG” makes it even easier for people to quickly discover, express and share visual entertainment through photos and videos by delivering seamless access from nearly any mobile device, including both iOS and Android platforms. The only official mobile app from the creators of “9GAG” is available immediately from http://9gag.com/mobile and through the Apple App Store.

Berkeley Entrepreneurs Forum: 2012-13 Angel & Venture Capital Financing Overview

Posted Thu, 07/26/2012 - 17:07 by kberzon

The beginning of 2012 saw continued strength in the early stage financing environment with valuations and the number of financings increasing. As the year has progressed, concerns about an over-heated investment market have been replaced with a perception of a weakening funding environment. 2011 was viewed by some as the year of the founder/entrepreneur and by others as the year of the “tech bubble” and excess valuations. However, in 2012 venture investment appears to have softened considerably and may be in a state of transition. Against this backdrop, the VC industry is undergoing profound changes. Please join our panel of expert angel and venture capital investors for a look at early stage investing during the past year and what the future investment environment holds.

New Crowdfunding Game Makes Startups the Stars

Posted Tue, 07/24/2012 - 20:19 by kevin

MicroVentures Launches First-Ever Facebook Game with a Venture Capital Theme, Allows Players to Back Real Startups, Compete Against Friends

Austin, TX – July 24, 2012 — MicroVentures, the nation’s leading equity crowdfunding platform, today announced the launch of MicroVentures Investor Challenge — a Facebook game in which real startups like AirBnB, Etsy, and Pinterest compete for a player’s virtual investment.

In Investor Challenge, real startups face off in six weekly rounds and players are in the role of venture capitalist, with $1,000,000 “microbucks” to invest in favorites like Foursquare and Taskrabbit. The startup that commands the most total investment from players advances to the next round where it faces off against a new opponent. At the end of the tournament, one startup emerges victorious, and one investor, too.

Lost in Translations Inc. acquires Chinese online learning service

Posted Tue, 07/10/2012 - 11:26 by lost_in_transl

Beijing, China - Lost in Translations Inc., a cloud based localization company, announced today that it acquired a Chinese online language learning service. The service, “Teach me Language”, has been developed over several years, and the founders saw the opportunity to commercialize the service. “We see vast demand in studying online and learning English, especially in Asia,” states Mika Jordman, Co-founder & CEO of Lost in Translations Inc. “We will launch with Chinese and English first, and more languages will follow soon after” he continues.