Friday, January 30, 2009
Friday roundup: More layoffs, venture roundup, growth at firms, and more
In our Friday Southern California technology news roundup: The economy continues to be in the news this week, as Broadcom is cutting 200 employees as it sees a glum Q1.
But, for some reason, a number of small, private SoCal firms are actually quite upbeat, including MaintenanceNet - reporting Q4 growth; Central Desktop with "a record quarter"; Skweezer saying the fourth quarter bumped it to profitability; mobileStorm also reporting a strong quarter; not to mention iRise, which says the bad economy is actually driving the firm's growth.
For more on the economy, Janine Davis, a guest contributor and recruiter in Los Angeles, talks about The State of Technical Recruiting in Los Angeles in our Insights and Opinions section. Andrew Warner of Mixergy also digs into the Dot Com archives for some advice on what you can learn from the (last) Internet Bubble. Finally, Jeff Cohn, a venture capital consultant, tell us 10 Ways President Obama Can Help Create Jobs.
Turning to venture capital, it looks like Southern California venture capitalists are mostly missing from the Forbes Midas List this year. That doesn't mean they're not working, however: mining the PricewaterhouseCoopers/NVCA MoneyTree report, we find that Luxtera has scored $26.75M in funding, Kaai, a stealth LED startup from LED experts Shuji Nakamura and Stephen DenBaars has pulled in another $5M, Siimpel raises $8.78M for its MEMS camera technology, and Aquea Scientific has quietly raised $10.95M for UVA/UVB sunscreen that you can just wash on in the shower.
In other funding new, Slacker has apparently raised a bridge financing worth $5M--no comment yet from the firm's investors. TheWrap--focused on Hollywood and entertainment news--announced funding from Maveron on Monday.And, on a sad note, Martin Schaedel -- well known to many in the Los Angeles technology community, and a contributor of photos to socalTECH-- has died in a plane crash at the Santa Monica airport.