(VIDEO) Ayalon: Israel Regrets Loss Of Life

9:11 PM by Israel Muse
Danny Ayalon discusses the recent incident where the IDF boarded ships carrying aid to Gaza.

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My Opinion

This has never been a statement that Hamas, Al Qaida or any other related organization has ever said, Israel always regrets the loss of life and has never celebrated over the deaths of its enemies or own citizens...

(NEWS) Navy Escorts Flotilla Ships To Ashdod

7:18 PM by Israel Muse

"IDF: Soldiers were met by well-planned lynch, concealed handguns."



(NEWS) Ayalon: Flotilla Linked To Al Qaida

7:14 PM by Israel Muse
"Deputy FM makes 1st official Israeli response; PM updated in Canada."



(TECH) AR Gaming Startup Ogmento Raises $3.5 Million From Chart Venture Partners & CNF Investments

2:19 PM by 
"Augmented Reality (AR) gaming startup Ogmento has raised $3.5 million in first round of equity financing led by Chart Venture Partners with participation from CNF Investments.

Ogmento will use the funding to expand development of its AR game platform and operations in New York and Los Angeles. The company will also use the proceeds to expand the core features of its technology as it prepares the release of several game titles in the coming year.

Ogmento has already developed interactive Augmented Reality experiences for Penguin Publishing, SAP, Orange Telecom, and PBS. The company is currently producing games in collaboration with leading media, CPG, and sports enterprises and will continue to partner with game developers and augmented reality labs around the world.

“This investment allows us to expand our operations to support our growth while putting development resources into our own intellectual property,” said Ori Inbar, co-founder and CEO of Ogmento. “Chart and CNF bring a strong track record of identifying disruptive technologies early, and working with founders to build strong companies.”

Ogmento is developing the next generation of video games that let users directly interact with their surrounding environment. The company is currently developing AR content for a range of mobile devices and platforms including iPhone, Android, PC, and traditional game consoles. Global mobile gaming revenue is projected to reach $11.4 billion in 2014, from 2009 revenue of $4.7 billion, according to Gartner.

Ogmento (formerly Pookatak Games) was founded in 2009 by Inbar, Brad Foxhoven (CMO), Brian Selzer (President), Oriel Bergig (VP R&D) and Nate Hagbi (Chief Wizard). As part of the financing, Cole Van Nice, a partner with Chart, will join Ogmento’s management team directly as COO to help drive strategic planning. The company has offices in New York and Los Angeles." (source)

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(TECH) Brightsource Energy Raises $150 Million From Alstom, CalSTRS, VantagePoint, Morgan Stanley & DFJ

2:17 PM by 
"Solar thermal power plants developer BrightSource Energy has raised $150 million in a fourth financing round. New investors including Alstom and the California State Teachers Retirement System (CalSTRS) joined existing investors, VantagePoint Venture Partners, Morgan Stanley and Draper Fisher Jurvetson (DFJ).

The new round brings BrightSource’s total equity financing to more than $300 million and positions the company for significant growth. As part of the financing, global power-generation leader Alstom has committed to invest up to $55 million in its first move into the solar market.

The additional financing will be used to support BrightSource's 2,610 megawatts in contracts with Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) and Southern California Edison to build 14 solar power plants in the US southwest by 2016. The funds will also be used by BrightSource to further its international expansion plans.

“BrightSource Energy’s market-leading solar-tower thermal-power technology complements Alstom’s strong portfolio of renewable energy solutions, building on our strength in hydro, geothermal, wind, tidal power, biomass and waste-to-energy solutions. Following this investment, both companies intend to enter into an industrial relationship, which will enhance BrightSource’s leading position in this industry,” said Philippe Joubert, Alstom Power President.

In February 2010, BrightSource received a conditional commitment from the U.S. Department of Energy for $1.37 billion in loan guarantees to support the financing of BrightSource’s Ivanpah Solar Electric Generating System project – the first of its US-based power projects. Once constructed, Ivanpah will be the world’s largest solar energy project, nearly doubling the amount of solar thermal electricity produced in the US today.

BrightSource Energy provides clean, reliable and low cost solar energy for utility and industrial companies worldwide. BrightSource Energy’s solar plants are designed to minimize their impact on the environment and help customers reduce their dependence on fossil fuels.

Headquartered in Oakland, California, BrightSource Energy is a privately held company with operations in the United States, Israel, and Australia. BrightSource Industries (Israel), formerly known as Luz II, headquartered in Jerusalem, is a wholly-owned subsidiary of BrightSource Energy." (source)

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(TECH) Bitstream To Acquire The Business Flow Automation Systems Developer Press-Sense For $6.5 Million

2:14 PM by 
"Software development company Bitstream will acquire the developer of business flow automation systems Press-sense for $6.5 million. The Acquisition expands Bitstream's global presence and strengthens the Pageflex product line and sales channels to better serve multi-channel customers.

Press-sense is a developer and supplier of business flow automation solutions for the Print Industry. By applying process automation to the print service provider's business, the company's Press-sense iWay, and Press-sense manager solutions offer printers the tools to fully manage, control and automate their online and offline business operations.

The company's solutions provide commercial printing and digital service providers with business management tools that maximize production efficiency, monitor and reduce costs, and increase profit ratios. The comapny has an install base of more than 1,500 customers in North America, Europe and Asia Pacific.

"In the past few years we have seen a dramatic increase in the demand for automated processes in the document production space," said Anna Magliocco-Chagnon, Bitstream President and CEO. "Our Pageflex product line leads the industry in tackling the front-end of the process: order taking and document production. Press-sense provides the most extensive business management tools for the back-end of the process enabling companies to monitor and reduce their operating costs. Through this acquisition, Bitstream becomes the only entity able to offer the full complement of solutions required by document producers."

Press-sense is a privately-held company founded by Amir Karbyin 2001 and funded over the years by several venture capital firms. Bitstream goal is to retain the Press-sense staff worldwide and incorporate them into its team. Bitstream will maintain an office in Israel, which will include product development, sales, and customer support capabilities. The Israel office will allow Bitstream to expand its real-time support for existing customers in Europe, the Middle East, and Africa (EMEA).

Bitstream will also continue to support Press-senses' existing customers and OEM partners, including the Indigo division of Hewlett-Packard (HP), Oce, and Xerox, all of whom private label Press-sense software for distribution to their digital print customers and have expressed their support of the acquisition.

Bitstream develops software technologies and applications for the graphic art and mobile communications industries. The company total revenue increased by 4% to $5.2 million in the first quarter of 2010. Bitstream is traded on NASDAQ (BITS) with a market cap of $76 million." (source)

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(TECH) PHP Solutions Provider Zend Raises $9 Million From Greylock, Intel, SAP, Azure, Index & Walden

2:13 PM by 
"PHP solutions provider Zend Technologies has raised $9 million in venture funding led by Greylock Partners, with participation from all other Zend investors including Azure Capital Partners, Index Ventures, Intel Capital, SAP Ventures, and Walden.

The investment will supporte the Company's accelerated product development and market expansion. Zend is the leading provider of products and services for developing, deploying and managing business-critical PHP applications. PHP runs 35% of the world's Web sites.

In 2009, Zend added 4,000 new customers, achieved record sales, and expanded into key geographies such as the UK, the Netherlands and India. Zend now has more than 1,000,000 registered users.

"Technology cooperation with IBM, Adobe, Oracle, Microsoft and other industry leaders further enables us to deliver Zend PHP solutions broadly into corporate IT departments where simple yet powerful and scalable solutions for rapid application development are in high demand," said Andi Gutmans, CEO and co-founder of Zend.

Zend offers an end-to-end PHP solution for rapid development, deployment and management of web-based applications. Zend's integrated PHP web solutions include: Zend Framework, an enterprise framework for systematic PHP projects; Zend Studio, a PHP integrated development environment, and Zend Server, the Company's PHP Web application server, which was a primary driver of Zend’s business growth last year as a result of increasing demand.

Zend is headquartered in Cupertino, California, with worldwide operations in France, Germany, Ireland and Israel." (source)

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(TECH) CDN Service Provider Cotendo Raises $12 Million From Tenaya, Sequoia & Benchmark Capital

2:07 PM by 
"CDN (Content Delivery Network) and site acceleration services provider Cotendo has closed a $12 million investment round led by Tenaya Capital and joined by its current investors, Sequoia Capital and Benchmark Capital. The new funding will help Cotendo will to scale its domestic and international market expansion, as well as accelerate the development of innovative technology.

"We see Cotendo's technology as game-changing in this market, and we are excited to contribute to the company's advance to the next level with their site acceleration services," said Tom Banahan, Managing Director of Tenaya Capital.

The CDN market is crowded with about 50 vendors, but only four of them have revenues that exceed $50 million. The market leader is Akamai with market cap of $6.6 billion with revenue of $860 million and net income of $146 million for 2009. According to Jim Davis, Senior Analyst with Tier1 Research, “Dynamic site and application acceleration services will be a key growth driver for the CDN market through 2012 when it is expected to reach the $2 billion mark. Network performance will become increasingly important as enterprises continue to ramp up adoption of cloud-based applications during that time frame."

Cotendo provides CDN and site acceleration suite that significantly improves the ability of Internet content providers, including high-volume transactional enterprises, online retailers, financial services companies, advertising networks, professional news and social media sites, to offer fast, secure and reliable 'whole site' acceleration of both static and dynamic content to online customers and site visitors. Cotendo costumers include Web and social network sites such as Facebook, Digg, Meebo, Payoneer, Adbrite, Conduit and Seeking Alpha.

Cotendo was founded in 2008 by Ronni Zehavi (CEO), David Drai (CTO) and Udi Trugman (VP Research and Development). The company is headquartered in Sunnyvale, California with R&D based in Netanya, Israel. The company had recently opened a local presence in France and Germany." (source)

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(TECH) Google Acquires Web Apps Developer LabPixies For $25 Million

2:04 PM by 
"Google has acquired the developer of web applications LabPixies. This is the first time ever that Google buys an Israeli company. Google did not give any financial details of the deal, but Israeli financial news website TheMarker estimated that Google paid $25 million for LabPixies.

LabPixies is a provider of personalized gadget applications for iGoogle, Android and the iPhone. The widget apps range from handy tools such as calendars, news feeds and to-do lists to entertainment and games. LabPixies was one of the first developers to create gadgets for iGoogle, and Google and LabPixies teams have worked on many projects together including the launch of global OpenSocial based gadgets.

As part of the deal, the LabPixies team will be based in Google Tel Aviv office and will anchor the company's iGoogle efforts across Europe, the Middle East, and Africa.

LabPixies was founded in 2006 by Ran Ben-Yair (CEO), Oded Poncz (VP R&D), Udi Graff (Creative Director) and Nir Tzemah (VP Business Development). Prior to LabPixies, all the company founders worked at the Israeli branch of Samsung's Research and Development Center." (source)

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(TECH) Amdocs To Acquire Mobile Internet App Development Platform Provider Streamezzo

2:02 PM by 
"Customer experience systems provider Amdocs will acquire Streamezzo, a mobile internet application development platform, in order to broaden its solutions in digital services delivery. Amdocs did not give any financial details of the deal, which expect to close during the third quarter 2010.

Streamezzo is a provider of a development platform for the creation and the deployment of rich mobile Internet applications across multiple mobile operating systems and devices. In May 2009, the French startup company has raised €4 million in an investment round led by Innovacom, with participation by existing investors, Sofinnova Partners, Sofinnova Ventures, Qualcomm, NTEC and Telecom Valorisation.

Last month Amdocs acquired MX Telecom, a mobile payments and messaging aggregator with operations in Europe, United States and Australia, for approximately $104 million in cash. The move will aloo Amdocs to continue building its presence in mobile payments and expand the OpenMarket footprint outside of the US.

MX Telecom will become part of Amdocs’ OpenMarket, a leading mobile transaction hub in the United States. OpenMarket provides a comprehensive set of payment, messaging and emerging services to meet mobile business needs. The joint OpenMarket MX Telecom business will provide a hosted platform to extend mobile payment and messaging capabilities through an integrated network and product portfolio." (source)

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(TECH) Digital Video Solutions Provider Imagine Communications Raises $10 Million

2:00 PM by 
"Digital video solutions provider Imagine Communications has raised $10 million from existing investors: Court Square Ventures, Columbia Capital and Carmel Ventures. This round of financing is bringing total venture capital investment in Imagine Communications to more than $34 million.

The investment will be used to expand support to the company's leading MSO customers, while accelerating the commercial deployment of Imagine's solutions for MPEG-4 encoding and transcoding.

Imagine offers scalable digital video platform, enabling system operators to cost-effectively increase both the quality and quantity of digital video services over virtually any system. The Imagine ICE platform can enable up to 50% more streams over existing infrastructure, while Imagine ICE-Q video quality measurement algorithms ensure the highest video quality at any given bit rate.

"This new capital enables us to accelerate the development and deployment of our real-time h.264 encoding, transcoding and streaming solutions to support the growing demand for Internet and mobile video content delivered in multiple formats, including 3D. The core innovations of ICE and ICE-Q are directly applicable to the TV Anywhere challenge," said Imagine's President and CEO, Jamie Howard.

Imagine was founded in 2005 by Doron Segev, SVP Technology and Architecture at Imagine Communications, and Ron Gutman, the company CTO. Imagine is headquartered in San Diego with R&D and engineering in Netanya, Israel." (source)

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(TECH) Secure Email Solutions Provider PostalGuard Raised $4 Million

1:56 PM by 
"Secure email solutions provider PostalGuard had raised $4 million from Israeli venture capital fund Genesis Partners and a group of private investors.

PostalGuard develops a secure email distribution channel platform that allows banks and financial institutions to enhance their relationships with clients, by offering direct bi-directional email communication.

PostalGuard’s solutions allow banks to provide a variety of new services that complement their current interaction platforms, such as branches, website and call centers. These solutions offer significant cost savings, associated with distribution of statements and notifications, as well as the opportunity to increase the number of transactions and enhance customer satisfaction.

"Most banks in Israel and abroad operates large web sites for the benefit of their clients, but the majority of customers continues to use the services provided by the branch and phone,” said Aryeh Mergi, PostalGuard President and Founder. "PostalGuard solutions allow banks to improve the relationship with their clients, leverage marketing offering by using the net and save money on costs associated with paper and postal service.”

PostalGuard has already applied for 6 patents and provisional applications, and has more than 10 additional patents in development. The company's technology was uniquely developed for the banking environment and allows smooth integration with the banking systems, while ensuring reliability and scalability.

In the past year PostalGuard has entered into a strategic partnership with and Syntron following the roll-out of PostalGuard’s secure email solution at a bank in Switzerland. In addition, the First International Bank of Israel has selected PostalGuard as another channel for the transfer of information via encrypted e-mail between customers and bank staff.

PostalGuard was founded in 2007 by Mergi and Ram Cohen, the company’s chief software architect. Mergi was a co-founder of Msystems, which was sold to SanDisk for $1.6 billion on 2006. Prior to working at PostalGuard, Cohen has served the Development Manager of Aliroo, a developer of enterprise information security and management solutions including content assurance and secure messaging solutions." (source)

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(TECH) Social Video Sharing Platform Provider Qlipso Purchases Video Content Web Site Veoh

1:54 PM by 
"Social video sharing platform provider Qlipso has purchased Veoh, an Internet Television company delivering broadcast-quality video programming. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Veoh, founded in 2004, is an established media site with tens of millions of unique monthly visitors. It raised approximately $70 million from venture capital and media investments.

The Qlipso platform enables spontaneous socializing on any website with any type of rich media – video, music, games, PowerPoints, photo slideshows, streaming music and more. The purchase will enable Qlipso's synchronized media sharing and socially-interactive environment to tap into Veoh's library of more than one million videos, TV shows, online games and other interactive content, as well as Veoh's millions of active monthly users.

"By bringing together features of both Qlipso and Veoh, we are taking the best of social, multiplayer online gaming and applying that to mainstream digital content, such as videos and music, for a mainstream audience," said Jon Goldman, CEO of Qlipso. "This provides not only a terrific user experience, but also a vastly improved target audience for advertisers."

"We are thrilled to support Qlipso, a JVP Media Studio graduate, in this strategic move," said Erel Margalit, JVP founder and managing partner. "There has yet to be a significant mainstream social approach to online media sharing that parallels how people consume media in offline social settings. We believe this transaction answers that need, as it provides users with a means to socialize around their favorite media content in a relaxed and social setting."

Qlipso was found in 2007 by Goldman and Ishay Pnueli, the company current CTO. Located in Jerusalem, Qlipso is backed by Israeli venture-capital fund Jerusalem Venture Partners (JVP)." (source)

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