Connie Loizos

Nice that Warren Buffett has maintained his sense of humor, despite the drubbing his Berkshire Hathaway shares took last year. (For those who missed the news, they lost nearly one-third of their value in 2008.) For a June, Nebraska event that raises money for cancer research via a “Famous Boots Auction,” Buffett, one of the world’s […]

RocketLawyer, a San Francisco-based lead generation startup that provides free legal information and forms to attract visitors, is $2.09 million closer to a $3.09 million Series B round, according to an SEC filing. More interesting is the single backer named in the filing: LexisNexis, the major compiler of legal and consumer information (and division of the Reed […]

In mid-December, Dick Strayer — a Los Gatos, Calif., psychologist who’s been helping venture capital firms and their startups sort out their emotional and structural kinks for the last 26 years — told me to expect a consolidation wave in 2009. Strayer is seeing the wave form firsthand. With 20 venture firms clients right now, […]

Dave Morgan knows a thing or two about the online advertising market. In 2001, Morgan founded TACODA Systems, whose behavioral marketing technology not only attracted $32 million in venture financing but eventually the attention of America Online, which paid $275 million for it in 2007. Meanwhile, though Morgan’s first online ad company, Real Media, was […]

Rich media syndication startup Pictela launches in the next few weeks, and apparently it's compelling enough to lure Dave Morgan as a public supporter and investor. Those familiar with the ad industry will know that Morgan founded both ‘90s ad startup Real Media and behavioral targeting ad network TACODA, which was arguably the best behavioral targeting startup in the space before it was acquired in 2007 by America Online for an undisclosed amount. (Tacoda, founded in 2001, had raised $32 million, including from Union Square Ventures and Rho Ventures. Real Media, founded in 1995, raised $30 million and was sold after the bubble burst for $30 million.) Pictela isn’t responding to interview requests. La Jolla-based Avalon Ventures, which seeded the company along with Morgan (an SEC filing suggests it has raised $1.25 million), isn’t talking, either.

From the Wall Street Journal: Venture capitalists got squeezed by the financial crisis in 2008. That squeeze is likely to continue in 2009. Returns for these investors, who invest in start-ups with the aim of profiting when the companies go public or are sold, got crunched last year by a dearth of initial public offerings of stock and few mergers and acquisitions. The outlook isn't much brighter, as the recession is likely to continue to weigh on the IPO and M&A markets. Meanwhile, the venture industry's investors, such as pension funds or university endowments, were hurt by gyrating markets, crimping sources of funding. Some venture-capital firms are having a tough

Unless you spent 2008 in a cave, you saw at least a minute or two of video-game designer turned world traveler, Matt Harding, goofy-dance his way around the globe in one of 2008's most-watched YouTube videos. (It's been viewed more than 17 million times.) In recent weeks, you might also have caught wind of accusations that Harding's now famous trek was little more than a Photoshop-enabled hoax. Harding has finally addressed those allegations in this new video:

By the time children reach middle school, the socially-blessed ones rule the roost, while those who are shy, misanthropic, or otherwise deemed inferior get relegated to shabbier perches. Online social networks have successfully replicated these social hierarchies online. Now, SocialBomb, a startup out of NYU, is taking things a step further, leveraging both online and real-life relationships to develop mobile games that can amplify who's on top -- and who's not. “Runway Victim,” for example, awards or punishes players based on how their peers vote on the way they’ve dressed in their social network snapshots. According to an SEC filing, SocialBomb has already raised $240,000 of a $350,000 round. It's not clear if First Round Capital is an investor, but principal Kent Goldman (Yahoo's former director of corporate development at Yahoo) is named in the filing. The company also isn't unveiling its full slate of games yet; its site says they’re coming in the fall. But the very first game of SocialBomb -- which won NYU’s Stern Business Plan Competition last spring -- worked like this:

Draper Fisher Jurvetson has begun fundraising for its tenth fund just one year after closing its $650 million ninth fund. According to a regulatory filing, it’s shopping for $600 million. Alex broke news of the fund earlier this month, adding that the firm had committed more than $300 million to 118 companies in 2008, according to data […]

Looks like Guggenheim Partners, a 10-year-old money management firm with assets in fixed income, real estate, hedge fund, and commercial aircraft, has raised a new, early-stage venture capital fund, according to an SEC filing. Helped by the Zurich-based placement agent Moravia Capital, the fund, which had a $10 million first close in early summer, has […]