Portalarium, the social and mobile game company founded by game pioneer Richard Garriott, has raised a second round of funding. Altogether, the Austin, Texas-based startup has raised $3.6 million to date.

The financing includes money from m8 Capital in the United Kingdom and Founders Fund (the investment fund which includes PayPal co-founder Peter Thiel) in San Francisco.

Garriott has vowed to create the same kind of fun games on Facebook as he did at earlier stages in his career. Earlier this year, Garriott said in an interview that Portalarium is aimed at exploiting the business opportunities in the “third age of video games.”

For those of you who didn’t grow up playing games, it may help to know that Garriott was present for the first age of video games, with the debut of great single-player games such as  Ultima, which was followed by many sequels. In 1997, under his alter ego Lord British, Garriott extended his role-playing fantasy world to the online multiplayer game Ultima Online. Garriott considers the rise of Internet-connected games to be the second age of video games. Garriott tried to exploit that age with Tabula Rasa, one of the most ambitious sci-fi online games, but that title met with an untimely death after six years of effort.

The third age began with the explosive growth of simple, quickly played social games like Zynga’s FarmVille on Facebook. In an interview at the Dice Summit game conference in Las Vegas, Garriott said he knows he is late and the gold rush into social games has happened without him so far. Portalarium launched two simple casino games on Facebook so far in order to test the company’s theories about player engagement, or the trick of getting gamers to play games for a long time.

“We are delighted to join Richard Garriott and the Portalarium team in creating the next great gaming company,” said Joseph Kim, general partner at London-based m8 Capital. “Richard is one of the giants of the industry. He’s a proven entrepreneur and has been a driving force at each of the industry’s major turning points.”

Kim said he liked Garriott’s vision for the future of mobile and social games. Ditto for Brian Singerman of the Founders Fund.

In the past year, Portalarium has released two games — Port Casino Poker and Port Casino Blackjack –  on Facebook and the hi5 social network. According to AppData, those games have just a small number of users. But Portalarium says that those are evergreen products that were created to quickly build out the company’s backend server technology and start interconnecting a player network across platforms and social networks. Port Casino Poker recently launched Apple’s iPad and both iPhone and Android versions are coming later this year.

Fred Schmidt, chief executive of Portalarium, said that the connection with m8 Capital will help the company shape its European strategy while the Founders Fund (which backed Facebook) connection is helping the company connect to the social media scene in Silicon Valley. Portalarium was founded in 2009 and has 12 employees.

We’ll be exploring the most disruptive game technologies and business models at our third annual GamesBeat 2011 conference, on July 12-13 at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco. It will focus on the disruptive trends in the mobile games market. GamesBeat is co-located with our MobileBeat 2011 conference this year. To register, click on this link. Sponsors can message us at sponsors@venturebeat.com. To participate in our Who’s Got Game? contest for the best game startup, click on this link.

Tags: Port Casino Blackjack, Port Casino Poker

Companies: Apple, Facebook, Founders Fund, M8 Capital, Portalarium

People: Richard Garriott

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

It’s official. Twitter has acquired internet advertising startup AdGrok, founder Matthew McEachen wrote in a blog post yesterday.

AdGrok’s advertising platform simplifies the process of running internet marketing campaigns for small businesses that aren’t very familiar with the web. And while those campaigns focus on Google Adwords, the new focus will be on developing Twitter’s “monetization platform”.

“When Twitter approached us and asked if we’d be interested in working on their monetization platform, we realized that this was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity that we just couldn’t pass up,” McEachen said.

At this point its unknown what shape that platform will take, but its a good bet that it will have many of the same features and statistics found in AdGrok’d “GrokBar”, except tailored to promoted and featured tweets.

As mentioned in a previous report, the purchase of AdGrok may signal that Twitter is ready to start formulating what kind of data is relevant to performance rather than rely on third-party services to do it. One thing that is very certain is that Twitter is looking to create a much more involved advertising platform for clients wishing to promote their messages through Twitter.

Effective immediately AdGrok is closing the service to new customers and will stop charging all current clients. The service will officially be taken offline June 30, and its existing databases will be deleted. Although the company does note that all past performance data and such will still be available to view through Google Analytics.

Twitter purchased the Y Combinator-backed startup for less than $10 million, according to rumors covered by TechCrunch.

Tags: acquisition

Companies: AdGrok, Twitter

People: Matthew McEachen

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

OpenX, an online advertising company whose customers include deals service Groupon and news site Business Insider, just announced that it has raised $20 million in a fourth round of funding.

The Los Angeles-based company bills itself as an open source alternative to ad serving products like Google-owned DoubleClick. In February, it launched its latest product, OpenX Enterprise, which includes both an ad server and an ad exchange. At the time, chief revenue officer Jason Fairchild described OpenX Enterprise as the company’s first product to really beat the competition on technology, not just price, for example by giving advertisers a more holistic view of their ad inventory.

OpenX says that revenue has grown nearly 600 percent in the past year, and it notes that it’s growing internationally thanks to partnerships with Dentsu-cci in Japan and Orange-France Telecom in Europe.

The company has now raised more than $50 million. The new round was led by SAP Ventures. Other new investors include AOL Ventures, Mitsui & Co. Global Investment, and the Sumitomo Corporation’s investment vehicle Presidio Ventures. Past investors Accel Partners and Index Ventures also participated.

In a press release, chief executive Tim Cadogan said:

Having new investors representing one of the world’s largest enterprise companies (SAP), one of the world’s largest internet pure-plays (AOL) and two of the most important global Asian trading firms (Mitsui and Sumitomo) all coming together to invest in the global technology platform company we are creating is — we believe — a compelling and powerful mix.

Tags: ad exchanges, ad servers

Companies: Accel Partners, AOL Ventures, Index Ventures, Mitsui & Co. Global Investment, Openx, Presidio Ventures, SAP Ventures, Sumitomo Corporation

People: Tim Cadogan

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

Mobile application discovery startup Appsfire closed a $3.6 million funding round from French investors Idinvest, according to a Gigaom report.

Helping consumers easily find new applications that interest them is increasingly important to developers and businesses looking to distinguish their product from competitors

And considering the multitude of apps emerging from Apple’s app store, the Android Marketplace and Amazon, there is a large opportunity to make money from an app discovery platform like Appsfire.

Appsfire, which is available for both iOS and Android devices, seeks to provide some clarity to the sea of new apps. It works by scanning a user’s catalog of downloaded applications and then generating lists of recommended, featured and hot apps based on their interests. The company’s first discovery app launched last year and now has over 2 million users.

The company’s new funding will likely go towards hiring additional employees (it currently has seven) and branching out onto other mobile platforms, according to the Giagom report.

Tags: app discovery, apps

Companies: Appsfire, Idinvest

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

Twitter may be in talks to acquire contextual keyword bidding platform AdGrok for less than $10 million, according to a TechCrunch report.

While AdGrok aims to simplify search engine marketing campaigns, the platform could be adapted and used by Twitter to help monetize promoted and trending tweets.

Purchasing AdGrok could alleviate some of the criticism many have had toward Twitter, which lags far behind the competition in developing a clear advertising strategy for the site.

However, buying AdGrok could also signal that Twitter is ready to start providing statistics and relevant data to its users, which has traditionally been handled by third-party services like Hoot Suit, bit.ly and several others. The company has already started to distance itself from third-party services by apparently developing its own photo sharing feature and improving notification support — so, adding its own statistics wouldn’t be a complete surprise.

The deal has yet to be confirmed by either company, but TechCrunch’s Alexia Tsotsis points out that the last person Twitter corporate development executive Jessica Verrilli followed on Twitter was AdGrok co-founder Argyris Zymnis.

Tags: acquisitions, advertising

Companies: AdGrok, Twitter

People: Argyris Zymnis, Jessica Verrilli

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

Twitter may be in talks to acquire contextual keyword bidding platform AdGrok for less than $10 million, according to a TechCrunch report.

While AdGrok aims to simplify search engine marketing campaigns, the platform could be adapted and used by Twitter to help monetize promoted and trending tweets.

Purchasing AdGrok could alleviate some of the criticism many have had toward Twitter, which lags far behind the competition in developing a clear advertising strategy for the site.

However, buying AdGrok could also signal that Twitter is ready to start providing statistics and relevant data to its users, which has traditionally been handled by third-party services like Hoot Suit, bit.ly and several others. The company has already started to distance itself from third-party services by apparently developing its own photo sharing feature and improving notification support — so, adding its own statistics wouldn’t be a complete surprise.

The deal has yet to be confirmed by either company, but TechCrunch’s Alexia Tsotsis points out that the last person Twitter corporate development executive Jessica Verrilli followed on Twitter was AdGrok co-founder Argyris Zymnis.

Tags: acquisitions, advertising

Companies: AdGrok, Twitter

People: Argyris Zymnis, Jessica Verrilli

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

Social bed and breakfast startup Airbnb is in the process of closing a $100 million round of funding led by venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz that would raise the company’s valuation to more than $1 billion, according to TechCrunch.

This is a significant investment for Airbnb, which has previously raised $7.8 million, and comes days after actor-turned-investor Ashton Kutcher invested a significant amount of money in the company.

Kutcher, who was an early investor in Foursquare and the deal to purchase Skype back from previous owner Ebay, is increasingly being looked at in the investment world as someone to watch when it comes to predicting the next hot startup company.

Airbnb offers a service in which travelers looking for a unique experience (similar in scope to a bed and breakfast) can rent a living space from locals for a fee.  The service has seen incredible growth of 800 percent in the last year and had over 1.6 million local homes booked since it launched in 2008.

An investment this large may seem drastic, but Airbnb looks to be fulfilling a need in the marketplace. And while business trips and conference attendees will likely stick to booking hotel rooms, Airbnb could make a real splash with recreational travelers .

Tags: funding

Companies: Airbnb, Andreessen Horowitz

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

Sean Maloney, Intel’s newly appointed president of Intel China, plans to deliver a keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taiwan next week where he will unveil a heavy-duty effort to steer Intel into the production of low-power microprocessors.

Maloney is expected to say that Intel will accelerate its efforts to make chips that are more appropriate for tablet computers, smartphones, laptops, and low-power desktops. Intel has been doing that for some time. But Maloney, a well-respected executive who recovered from a stroke that kept him sidelined last year, is expected to push that even farther, according to a source familiar with the matter.

This shift within Intel is similar to the shift that occurred when it launched its Centrino laptop processors in 2003 — which Intel referred to as a right-hand turn. This is another right-hand turn, since the current roadmap isn’t as ambitious when it comes to low power consumption.

Most of Intel’s mainstream desktop chips target power consumption of about 40 watts or so. That allows for very fast microprocessor performance, but such a chip generates enough heat that it can’t be so easily used in a laptop and has no chance of making it into a tablet or smartphone. Now, Intel plans to target mainstream chips that consume about 15 watts.

That’s a big difference, but it doesn’t mean Intel will cancel a bunch of chips in development. Rather, the company will modify the roadmap over the next couple of years so that the center of its efforts focuses on 15 watt or lower wattage chips.

The company has already been moving in this direction for a number of years. Intel recently announced a new manufacturing innovation dubbed Tri-Gate transistors that will allow it to use lower power and smaller circuits in its 22 nanometer microprocessors. (Intel’s current Sandy Bridge chips use 32-nanometer manufacturing; the smaller the number, the faster, lower power, and lower cost.)  At its recent annual investor meeting, Intel showed a working 22-nanometer microprocessor code-named Ivy Bridge that is one of the flagship chips for this new low-power strategy. The Tri-Gate transistors take advantage of three dimensions and allow for a 50 percent power reduction at a given level of performance with only a 2 to 3 percent increase in costs. Ivy Bridge will be followed by a chip code-named Haswell that will represent the fruition of Intel’s efforts to reduce the average wattage of its mainstream chips.

Intel is also accelerating development of its lowest-power Atom microprocessors, which are targeted at smartphones, tablets and ultrathin laptops. The Atom chips have been shipping for a number of years, but Intel will turn up the treadmill now. It will shift from 45 nanometer Atom chips this year to 32 nanometer chips and then 22-nanometer chips in 2012. With every manufacturing shift, Intel can make its chips cheaper, faster, smaller and lower power. That pace of innovation is faster than the pace of Moore’s Law (observed in 1965 by Intel chairman emeritus Gordon Moore), which says the number of transistors on a chip doubles every two years.

Intel is also designing a brand new Atom single-chip computer architecture, code-named Silvermont, from the ground up. Those chips are also going to be designed for low power, and the cadence for introducing new chips will become increasingly faster. The 22-nanometer Silvermont chips are expected to be introduced around 2013.

“Intel will completely focus a huge percentage of consumer microprocessors toward mainstream, low-power, ultra-thin, no-compromise computers,” said the source. “The center point of the roadmap will be all about ultra-mobility.”

By the end of 2012, a large percentage of consumer laptops will be in the ultrathin category — think MacBook Air laptops that cost a lot less than they do today and have a lot more performance and all-day battery life. That’s the kind of machine that will use the chips that Intel is placing at the center of its efforts.

Asia is a good place to make the announcement since China is expected to be the largest PC market in the world starting next year. Maloney’s assignment to that region is significant. Maloney was considered the heir apparent to Intel chief executive Paul Otellini. But a stroke threw him off that path. He returned to work in January and is regaining control of his motor skills.

Intel’s Atom processors are beginning to appear in tablet computers and about 10 of them will be shown off at the Computex show in Taiwan.

Tags: Atom, chips, Haswell, Ivy Bridge, low power consumption, microprocessors, Sandy Bridge

Companies: Intel

People: Paul Otellini, Sean Maloney

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

Sean Maloney, Intel’s newly appointed president of Intel China, plans to deliver a keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taiwan next week where he will unveil a heavy-duty effort to steer Intel into the production of low-power microprocessors.

Maloney is expected to say that Intel will accelerate its efforts to make chips that are more appropriate for tablet computers, smartphones, laptops, and low-power desktops. Intel has been doing that for some time. But Maloney, a well-respected executive who recovered from a stroke that kept him sidelined last year, is expected to push that even farther, according to a source familiar with the matter.

This shift within Intel is similar to the shift that occurred when it launched its Centrino laptop processors in 2003 — which Intel referred to as a right-hand turn. This is another right-hand turn, since the current roadmap isn’t as ambitious when it comes to low power consumption.

Most of Intel’s mainstream desktop chips target power consumption of about 40 watts or so. That allows for very fast microprocessor performance, but such a chip generates enough heat that it can’t be so easily used in a laptop and has no chance of making it into a tablet or smartphone. Now, Intel plans to target mainstream chips that consume about 15 watts.

That’s a big difference, but it doesn’t mean Intel will cancel a bunch of chips in development. Rather, the company will modify the roadmap over the next couple of years so that the center of its efforts focuses on 15 watt or lower wattage chips.

The company has already been moving in this direction for a number of years. Intel recently announced a new manufacturing innovation dubbed Tri-Gate transistors that will allow it to use lower power and smaller circuits in its 22 nanometer microprocessors. (Intel’s current Sandy Bridge chips use 32-nanometer manufacturing; the smaller the number, the faster, lower power, and lower cost.)  At its recent annual investor meeting, Intel showed a working 22-nanometer microprocessor code-named Ivy Bridge that is one of the flagship chips for this new low-power strategy. The Tri-Gate transistors take advantage of three dimensions and allow for a 50 percent power reduction at a given level of performance with only a 2 to 3 percent increase in costs. Ivy Bridge will be followed by a chip code-named Haswell that will represent the fruition of Intel’s efforts to reduce the average wattage of its mainstream chips.

Intel is also accelerating development of its lowest-power Atom microprocessors, which are targeted at smartphones, tablets and ultrathin laptops. The Atom chips have been shipping for a number of years, but Intel will turn up the treadmill now. It will shift from 45 nanometer Atom chips this year to 32 nanometer chips and then 22-nanometer chips in 2012. With every manufacturing shift, Intel can make its chips cheaper, faster, smaller and lower power. That pace of innovation is faster than the pace of Moore’s Law (observed in 1965 by Intel chairman emeritus Gordon Moore), which says the number of transistors on a chip doubles every two years.

Intel is also designing a brand new Atom single-chip computer architecture, code-named Silvermont, from the ground up. Those chips are also going to be designed for low power, and the cadence for introducing new chips will become increasingly faster. The 22-nanometer Silvermont chips are expected to be introduced around 2013.

“Intel will completely focus a huge percentage of consumer microprocessors toward mainstream, low-power, ultra-thin, no-compromise computers,” said the source. “The center point of the roadmap will be all about ultra-mobility.”

By the end of 2012, a large percentage of consumer laptops will be in the ultrathin category — think MacBook Air laptops that cost a lot less than they do today and have a lot more performance and all-day battery life. That’s the kind of machine that will use the chips that Intel is placing at the center of its efforts.

Asia is a good place to make the announcement since China is expected to be the largest PC market in the world starting next year. Maloney’s assignment to that region is significant. Maloney was considered the heir apparent to Intel chief executive Paul Otellini. But a stroke threw him off that path. He returned to work in January and is regaining control of his motor skills.

Intel’s Atom processors are beginning to appear in tablet computers and about 10 of them will be shown off at the Computex show in Taiwan.

Tags: Atom, chips, Haswell, Ivy Bridge, low power consumption, microprocessors, Sandy Bridge

Companies: Intel

People: Paul Otellini, Sean Maloney

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals

Reply.com on Thursday announced it had acquired fellow Bay Area firm MerchantCircle for $60 million cash and stock. The deal is expected to go through in Q3 of this year.

The deal makes good sense, as MerchantCircle acts as a business directory for more than a million small businesses and Reply.com is an ad firm that targets advertising for local businesses. MercantCircle’s incredible network will give Reply a huge roster of businesses to which they can potentially sell ads.

MercantCircle was founded in 2005 and has raised $14 million in funding to date. The company claims to have businesses listed in 95% of U.S. cities with a population over 200.

Reply says the combined company expects more than $100 million in revenue in 2012.

Tags: deals, online advertising

Companies: MerchantCircle, Reply

Article courtesy of VentureBeat » deals