Irvine-based startup Socialcast recently landed a second round of venture funding and plans to head north to expand.
Socialcast raised $1.4 million in venture funding from True Ventures, which has an office in San Francisco.
True Ventures’ Om Malik, a former technology and business journalist who’s written for Forbes and Business 2.0, among other publications, is set to gain a seat on Socialcast’s board.
Malik is the founder of Giga Omni Media Inc. and executive editor of technology blog GigaOM, which counts a monthly readership of half a million people.
Socialcast makes social networking software that’s geared toward workers,sort of like MySpace.com with office-appropriate applications.
The goal of Socialcast is to show companies that a social networking site will foster easier and freer communication among workers, especially in companies with several offices.
A Socialcast site is like a private hub for the office. It has a newsfeed where workers can see what others are doing, as well as forums to ask questions and make suggestions.
Socialcast plans to move to San Francisco this summer,not because of True Ventures, but to have access to a pool of engineers that are experts on the programming language called Ruby on Rails, which is used for developing social Web sites.
Socialcast’s accountants, lawyers and
other consultants already are in the Bay Area, according to Chief Executive Tim Young.
“(The move) didn’t have anything to do with True Ventures,it had to do with how I wanted to grow the company,” he said. “There’s a high concentration (of people) who know Ruby on Rails up in the Bay Area. It’s very competitive and it’s been hard for us to persuade them to come down here.”
Socialcast is seeing growth in the recession.
Some companies are using Socialcast to keep workers connected as they try flexible work schedules or telecommuting.
“There are more workers doing flexible schedules, going mobile or facing layoffs,” Young said. “Companies are using us as a platform to increase transparency and communication between their employees.”
Also, Socialcast’s services have minimal startup costs and are relatively cheap. Monthly subscriptions for small businesses start at around $5 per person.
“It’s an easy, lightweight way to add value to their businesses without incurring a lot of upfront and maintenance costs,” Young said.
Solarflare
Irvine-based chip startup Solarflare Communications Inc. hired a marketing executive from Costa Mesa’s Emulex Corp., a maker of electronics for data storage networks.
Solarflare nabbed Mike Smith to be vice president of product marketing and management.
“Mike (Smith) has deep relationships with many server manufacturers, including EMC Corp., Hewlett-Packard Co., IBM Corp. and Sun Microsystems Inc.,” Chief Executive Russell Stern said.
Smith previously held the vice president of marketing post at Emulex.
Before Emulex, he held various marketing posts at Milpitas-based Adaptec Inc. and Lake Forest’s Western Digital Corp.
Solarflare makes chips that allow faster networks to link with slower ones, helping companies save on power and replacement costs.
It has landed several design wins and started shipping chips to Dell Inc., Irvine’s SMC Networks Inc. and Taiwan’s Accton Technol-ogy Corp., among others.
Solarflare, which has raised some $180 million in venture funding to date, is on track for a potential initial public offering in early 2010.
Court Win
A judge recently ordered Microsoft Corp. to pay $388 million in damages to Irvine’s Uniloc USA Inc., a maker of network security software, after the software kingpin was found to have infringed on a Uniloc patent.
A district court in Rhode Island determined that Microsoft’s Windows XP and some Office programs infringe on Uniloc’s patent for software that prevents people from illegally installing software on multiple computers, according to reports.
Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft said it’s set to appeal the decision.
A few years ago, Uniloc landed $6.1 million in funding from private equity investors. The company has about 20 workers here.
Food Drive
Here’s where I use my powers for good. (And whoever said reporters are cynical?)
A slew of Fountain Valley businesses are hosting a food drive to benefit the Orange County Food Bank this week.
Leading the effort is Kingston Technology Co., the world’s biggest maker of memory products. Also participating is D-Link Systems Inc., a Fountain Valley-based maker of networking gear.
The Orange County Food Bank serves some 23,000 people a month and serves churches, senior centers, shelters and soup kitchens in the area.
Groups, companies and individuals can drop off unopened canned goods, dry staples and peanut butter at Kingston, D-Link or many of the businesses in the Costco plaza on Newhope Street.
Donations can also be made online via virtual shopping at www.ocfoodbank.org.
