The man who reads nothing at all is better educated than the man who reads nothing but newspapers.
Thomas Jefferson (1743 – 1826)
1. AOL buys Quigo for $340M. Yaron Galai and Oded Itzhak (featured on VC Cafe in the past) are probably happy to be part of AOL’s web advertising network. The deal adds about 100 employees to Time Warner’s AOL, and follows a series of acquisitions in the ad space including: ad network Advertising.com; Tacoda, which targets users based on their habits; wireless ad network Third Screen Media; video ads company Lightningcast; and ADTECH, a global ad-serving company. Is more Israeli M&A to follow? [via AP]
2. Life VideoPedia 5min, a ‘how to’ video sharing site, (previously covered here) raised a $5M round from Spark Capital. This round follows a pretty major dilution for the founders, following 5min’s initial angel round of $300K. Get a taste of the competition at Graspr.com. [via Techcrunch]
3.
Samsung Electronics made their first acquisition in ten years – Samsung paid $70M for none other than TransChip Israel Ltd (Tanschip’s old URL links to Samsung). Samsung spokeswoman Lee Eun-hee said TransChip would be renamed Samsung Semiconductor Israel R&D Center Ltd. and will become the Korean company’s 17th research and development centers around the world. [via IsraelPlug]
4. Refresh07 – IDC research has teamed up with Gemini Israel and Genesis Partners to throw the Refresh07, the ‘new media’ conference. It is taking place in Tel Aviv, Israel on November 21st. The conference will deal with the evolving business models online, their impact on distribution channels and traditional media and content value/ monetization. See the conference page and the Refresh07 Facebook group. [via Israel VC on SandHill Road]
I'm a former general partner at google ventures, head of Google for Entrepreneurs in Europe and founding head of Campus London, Google's first physical hub for startups.
I'm also the founder of Techbikers, a non-profit bringing together the startup ecosystem on cycling challenges in support of Room to Read. Since inception in 2012 we've built 11 schools and 50 libraries in the developing world.
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