Latest Stories
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Encore & DFJ Esprit Announce New Appointees
Dublin's 365 Hosting Picked-up in SunGard's Acquisition Binge
Genticel Secures €13.1M for HPV Vaccine Platform
Israeli Mobile Ad Optimizer Todacell Raises $1M
VC Exit: Baxter Acquires Synthetic Bone Graft Company ApaTech
MOG Raises $9M: Will Launch All Access Service in UK
March 16, 2010
Encore & DFJ Esprit Announce New Appointees
Encore Ventures, a division of DFJ Esprit announced two new appointments: Richard Marsh as Partner and Jonathan Freuchet-Sibilia as a new addition to its investment management team. Moving from Investment Managing at Oxford Capital Partners Richard brings his expertise in early-stage and growth business. Johnathan a former Associate at Jeffries International will transition his M&A experience into his new function with Encore.
This news follows DFJ's recent appointed of Mikko Suonenlahti to focus investment strategy in the following areas: B2B and B2C software, med-tech, Bio-IT and energy efficiency. As a new Senior Advisor to the firm, Mikko brings 25 years of experience in global management and business building. The firm is excited about Mikko's investment banking background and regional expertise in Finland and the greater Nordic region.
For more information, click here.
By Hanif O'Neil
Posted to Venture Capital | Where are they now | TrackBack (0) | Permalink
March 15, 2010
Dublin's 365 Hosting Picked-up in SunGard's Acquisition Binge
Dublin, Ireland-based 365 Hosting Limited was recently acquired by SunGard (details of the deal were undisclosed). This is only one of the recent deals that SunGard has closed this year. In February, the firm announced its acquisition of Inmatrix, and Australian firm that provide credit risk and business forecasting solutions.
Hosting 365, a privately held hosting and data services company has been around since 2001. It now operates two major data centers in Ireland and, within the region, maintains a leading presence in IT and cloud computing services.
SunGard offers a portfolio of services products in the areas of IT, financial systems, and disaster recovery. This recent acquisition offers entry to Ireland with a solid operations infrastructure and a proven expertise in cloud computing.
By Hanif O'Neil
Posted to Internet infrastructure | Venture Capital | TrackBack (0) | Permalink
March 12, 2010
Genticel Secures €13.1M for HPV Vaccine Platform
French bio-pharmeceutical company Genticel raised €13.1M in funding in a round led by AGF Private Equity; additional investors included Institut Régional de Développement Industriel (IRDI), Amundi Private Equity Funds, CDC Enterprises and Edmond de Rothschild Investment Partners (EdRIP). Formally known as BT Pharma, Genticel has quite an interesting story. It currently develops immunotherapies to prevent cancers caused by human papilloma virus HPV, the leading cause for cervical cancer.
Originally BT Pharma was founded for bio-medical research. Yet, with success in developing antigen delivery technology the company has now transitioned to a clinical development company (hence its name change). New capital funding will support clinical trials for its leading (HPV) vaccine ProCervix as well as other products that complement current prophylactic vaccines (Cervarix and Gardasil).
Worldwide, 300 million women are carriers of HPV at any given time. Many of them are not eligible for current vaccines solutions because they are already infected by the two strands that cause 70% of cervical cancer (HPV16 and HPV18). Genticel sees an opportunity addressing infected women who are not eligible for preventive medication; a potential market of 90 million women.
By Hanif O'Neil
Posted to Disease/Clinical Diagnostics | Venture Capital | TrackBack (0) | Permalink
March 10, 2010
Israeli Mobile Ad Optimizer Todacell Raises $1M
Todacell has raised $1M in new VC funding from existing shareholder AfterDox. It had raised $1M in a round the company in June of 2009 from AfterDox and raised $350K in seed funding from the Fore Group. Todacell was founded in March 2007 by Moshe Vaknin, the founder and CEO who previously ran CheckM8 and Adwise.
Todacell clients include Fring, MobiLuck, Mocospace and TuneWiki. Todacell explains its technology examines and maps a publisher’s mobile ad inventory based on user data, location, time, and the performance of ad campaigns on that publisher’s mobile website or application.
While Todacell will get lumped in as a rival to AdMob, more specifically they compete with startups like Smaato. The company explains: "With strong targeting engines and automatic optimization we are able to achieve very high ROI to advertisers. Unlike others, who care only about CTR (click through rate), we measure the efficiency to advertisers. Not enough how many people click, but how many people actually bought the product? How many did the right search? Accuracy in the ad deliver process is our power."
You can find more information here:
Posted to Advertising | Online services | Venture Capital | TrackBack (0) | Permalink
