The first time I met Jeff was in the Seaport District on a rainy Monday night outside of Whiskey Priest. Soaking wet, he plopped his bike helmet down on a side table and introduced himself with a big old grin. I couldn’t believe this guy was coming from Cambridge. Did he seriously just bike here? That’s Jeff Fagnan for you. A Fixie-touting, adventure embracing, venture... Read more
Category: Atlas Venture, BostInno, Jeff FagnanBack in June at TechStars Demo Day, Kinvey kicked off their presentation with an introduction from Atlas Venture’s Fred Destin. As Destin introduced the mobile backend as a service company he announced that Atlas was investing $1 million in the startup. Today, we have learned that Kinvey has turned that $1 million into a $2 million seed round by... Read more
Category: Avalon Ventures, BostInno, Chris Lynch, Fred Destin, Jennifer Lum, Joe Caruso, Justin Siegel, Kinvey, Mike Baker, Nicole Stata, Sravish Sridhar, Ty DancoI weave my way through Boston’s North End to find my way to the CampusLIVE offices for a sit down with the company’s co-founder and CEO, Boris Revsin. When I get there and ring the bell, Boris himself answers, to my surprise. He greets me like we’re old friends, even though we’ve only met once before (and very briefly) at an event. Before I can say or do... Read more
Category: Boris Revsin, BostInno, CampusLiveWe’re sitting in Matt Lauzon’s Gemvara office, staring each other down from across his desk. He’s thinking and looks like he wants to say something, so I patiently wait. He’s got on his standard uniform of jeans and button down shirt (only second to his Lululemon performance tee), his sneakers propped up on his desk. All of a sudden, he quickly lowers his feet, leans intently... Read more
Category: BostInno, Gemvara, Matt LauzonA month has passed since HubSpot announced its acquisition of marketing automation company Performable and now it’s a waiting game until we see a release of integrated products for their newly combined customer base. Performable technology will help the HubSpot platform augment marketing functionality and turn site visitors into leads and eventually customers... Read more
Category: BostInno, HubSpotAccording to SCVNGR’s blog this morning, we were pretty spot on with our report yesterday around the company’s anticipated “leveling up” announcement. LevelUp is moving away from daily deals to attempt to be a player in the mobile payments space, targeting small merchants. Their solution, like sources hinted to us over the course of the last week... Read more
Category: BostInno, LevelUp, SCVNGRTwo weeks ago we broke the news of CSN Stores’ $165 million round of funding from Battery Ventures, Spark Capital, HarbourVest Partners and Great Hill Partners. The is the first institutional money CSN has raised in its nine-year history and will be used to expedite CSN’s expansion efforts and bolster the company’s brand new plan to consolidate its... Read more
Category: Battery Ventures, BostInno, CSN Stores, Great Hill Partners, HarbourVest Partners, Niraj Shah, Spark Capital, Steve ConineAn article in HarvardBusiness.org today examines inventor, innovator and entrepreneur — terms often used interchangeably, but which the article’s author puts forth are fundamentally different. The article suggests that each term refers to “different links in the total value-chain of progress.” Inventors: Idea-oriented who solve problems in a non-linear way... Read more
Category: BostInno, EntrepreneurshipCambridge based oneforty, once dubbed the Twitter app store, is announcing the launch of a new software as a service tool, SocialBase. SocialBase is a collaborative social media and community management platform. It is designed to eliminate the chaos of the social media marketing workflow and the disorganization that social media managers face coordinating teams... Read more
Category: BostInno, Laura Fitton, OneFortyEvery day, news sites like TechCrunch, VentureBeat, and BostInnovation post articles announcing the most recent financing of startups by venture capital firms. However, amidst all of these financing announcements, the general public never hears about all of the startups that VC firms turn down. In fact, many of the most successful startups... Read more
Category: BostInno, Joe Medved, Softbank Capital