Wednesday, December 9, 2015

Bay Area Tech Wire -- Dec. 9

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BAY AREA TECH WIRE -- Dec. 9, 2015
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To subscribe: www.bayareatechwire.com

o Sunnyvale-Based Yahoo Shelves Plans for Spinoff of Alibaba Stake
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San Francisco-Based Savonix Raises $1.5 Million in Seed Funding
o San Francisco-Based LifeSite Lands Another $500,000 to Close First Round
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S.F.-Based InsideView Names John Kelly as Chief Revenue Officer
o PAN Communications Acquires San Francisco-based Vantage PR
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Briefly Noted:
Move, Synopsys, Immersion
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o Sunnyvale-Based Yahoo Shelves Plans for Spinoff of Alibaba Stake

Sunnyvale, Calif. -- Yahoo said on Wednesday it has nixed plans to spin off its remaining $31 billion stake in Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba Group, citing concerns from investors that it may have to pay taxes on the deal. The Sunnyvale-based company, which first announced plans for the spinoff in January, said its board now will evaluate alternatives, including what it calls a "reverse spinoff," in which it would transfer assets and liabilities other than the Alibaba stake into a newly formed company. "Among other factors, we were concerned about the market's perception of tax risk, which would have impaired the value of [the spinoff]," said Maynard Webb, Yahoo's chairman. "The board remains committed to accomplishing the significant business purposes and shareholder benefits that can be realized by separating the Alibaba stake from the rest of Yahoo. To achieve this, we will now focus our efforts on the reverse spin off plan."
http://info.yahoo.com/press-center/article/yahoo-provides-planned-spin-off-120000730.html 
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o San Francisco-Based Savonix Raises $1.5 Million in Seed Funding

San Francisco -- Savonix, the San Francisco-based developer of a digital neuro-cognitive assessment and brain health platform, said on Wednesday it has raised $1.5 million in a new seed round of funding, led by RoundGlass Partners. Kickstart Seed Fund, BMNT Capital and angel investors Bandel Carano and Ed Glassmeyer also participated. Savonix said it will use the proceeds to hire key talent and to launch and scale its flagship assessment platform. The platform is designed to evaluate core domains of cognition in half an hour from a smart phone or mobile device. "We know these cognitive assessments work, they've simply been unavailable behind the walls of academia or trapped within decades old structures that are expensive, cumbersome and inaccessible," said founder and CEO Mylea Charvat. "Savonix is going to liberate these tools and make evidence-based cognitive testing available and affordable to anyone."
http://www.savonix.com 
http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/savonix-raises-15-million-in-seed-round-funding-led-by-roundglass-partners-300189989.html 
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o San Francisco-Based LifeSite Lands Another $500,000 to Close First Round

San Francisco -- A month after announcing its launch and initial funding, San Francisco-based LifeSite said on Wednesday it has landed an additional $500,000 to close its first round at $5 million. New investor Michael Dan, former chairman, president and CEO of The Brink's Company, joined the round, and also will serve as an advisor. The news comes just weeks after LifeSite introduced its flagship product, the LifeSite Vault, a web-based platform for storing vital information and documents, such as insurance policies and wills. The company also has released a companion mobile app, providing users with secure access to their information from any mobile device.
http://www.lifesite.co/ 
http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20151209005757/en/LifeSite-Closes-5M-Series 
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o S.F.-Based InsideView Names John Kelly as Chief Revenue Officer

San Francisco -- Four months after raising $32.5 million in a round of equity and debt funding, San Francisco-based InsideView, developer of a big data platform that triangulates data from more than 40,000 sources and feeds it into sales and marketing systems, has named John Kelly as the inaugural chief revenue officer. Kelly, most recently the chief revenue officer at Findly, will be responsible for all of the company's revenue-generating activities. Previously, he served as the senior vice president and COO of SAP's Business User/Intelligence and OnDemand Solutions divisions. InsideView is used by more than 20,000 companies to inform and increase the success of their sales and marketing teams.
http://www.insideview.com/ 
http://www.insideview.com/john-kelly-joins-insideview-as-chief-revenue-officer-to-drive-global-growth-and-client-success/ 
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o PAN Communications Acquires San Francisco-based Vantage PR

San Francisco -- PAN Communications, a Boston-based marketing communications firm, said on Wednesday it has acquired the San Francisco-based technology public relations agency Vantage PR. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. The acquisition adds 35 employees to PAN, which now has more than 100 employees and $13.5 million in annual revenue. It also adds offices in key growth markets such as San Francisco, Orlando and New York City. "As we looked at the next level for Vantage, we saw the need to expand our array of services for our clients," said Ilene Adler, the founder of Vantage. "As part of a midsized firm, we can now expand our PR and digital services to include more integrated marketing communications offerings, coupled with a sophisticated measurement and analytics methodology." PAN's customers include SAP, Carbonite, MediaMath, BlueCoat, Maestro Health and SamsungPay (LoopPay).
http://www.vantagepr.com/ 
http://www.pancommunications.com/news-item/pan-communications-acquires-award-winning-agency-vantage-pr-to-expand-national-presence/  
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o Briefly Noted:

(San Jose, Calif.) San Jose-based Move, a unit of News Corp that operates online real estate site realtor.com, on Wednesday named Marcy Greenberg as executive vice president of people, Suzanne Zinn Mueller as senior vice president of industry relations and Janice McDill as vice president of corporate communications. Greenberg most recently served as director of global leadership and talent development at NetApp, Mueller most recently was the CMO of Coldwell Banker Bain and McDill led internal and executive communications at Heidrick & Struggles.
http://news.move.com/2015-12-09-Realtor-com-Strengthens-Leadership-Team 

(Mountain View, Calif.) Mountain View-based Synopsys, a developer of electronic design automation (EDA) and semiconductor technology, said on Wednesday it has entered into accelerated share repurchase agreements with Wells Fargo Bank and HSBC. Under the deals, the company will buy back $200 million of its stock.
http://www.synopsys.com/Company/Pressroom/pages/default.aspx 

(San Jose, Calif.) San Jose-based Immersion, a developer and licensor of touch feedback technology, on Wednesday named Todd Whitaker as its vice president of marketing. Whitaker previously was the vice president of marketing at Maxim Integrated, and earlier served as the vice president of worldwide marketing at National Semiconductor.
http://ir.immersion.com/releasedetail.cfm?ReleaseID=946268

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