Start working on your high hard ones, entrepreneurs.
Tech Coast Angels, among the more prolific financial backers of emerging projects in Southern California, wants a crack at your 60-second pitch.
If they’re sold, the Angels may invest the several hundred thousand dollars, or even millions, needed to help launch your company. The event, set for Monday, Jan. 22, at the UCLA Anderson School of Management, will select 12 potential startups to fast-pitch a panel of investors. More information can be found at www.pitchtheangels.com.
The pitch session is part of Los Angeles County Technology Week. The theme of the event, which will be held Jan. 22-26 at six different locations, is “Technology Made Here.” It will showcase the resources, companies and technologies that make Los Angeles County a world-class tech center.
L.A. County Technology Week is produced by Arcadia-based Technology and Development Group LLC and presented in conjunction with the Business Technology Center of L.A. County, a project of the Community Development Commission of L.A. County.
For more information on Technology Week, go to www.LAtechweek.com.
Broadband Kudos
Who says there couldn’t possibly be another awards show out there?
MySpace will take submissions from anyone with an Internet connection and a camera for the Broadband Emmy Awards. Any user-generated content will be considered as long as it’s submitted through a MySpace profile.
The videos will be presented in a number of categories, though those that have yet to be outlined.
The awards could provide some competition for the Webby Awards, which for the past 11 years have been presented by the International Academy of Digital Arts and Sciences.
While certainly not the Academy Awards, or even the Golden Globes for that matter, the Webby Awards have grown in stature over the past decade and typically attract an A-list crowd of online celebs.
It will be interesting to see if the new kudos do much to address the complaint most-often voiced about the Webby Awards: that they are Anglo-centric and pay too much attention to English-language efforts over international entries.
No date has been set for the presentation of the awards.
Viacom Exits
Viacom Inc. has walked away from a proposed joint venture among the media conglomerates to mount a competitive response to YouTube, the viral video site owned by Google Inc.
The departure of Viacom, home to the young-skewing brands of MTV Networks, could mean that the collaborative effort by NBC Universal Inc., CBS Corp. and News Corp. to launch a viral video alternative is dead. The Walt Disney Co. reportedly pulled out of discussions several weeks ago. Viacom declined comment.
The informal talks between the media giants are said to have centered on creating an Internet mix of user-generated video and material from the broadcast and cable networks in their collective grasp.
In addition to creating a rival, the theory went, it could force Google to better police YouTube for copyright-infringing material from those networks or fork over money to clear the content.
Complicating such a launch, however, is the fierce competition among the media companies and the fact that several have deals in place either with Google or YouTube, such as the short-form content deal between CBS and YouTube.
Desktop Sales
Pasadena’s Central Desktop has forged a significant partnership with SalesForce.com, a leader in the field of customer relationship management.
The marriage allows SalesForce users to create personalized customer extra-nets and portals through Central Desktop.
SalesForce.com specializes in automating sales and marketing teams and customer service applications are a big part of that, which is where Central Desktop comes in.
“Salesforce.com customers now have a powerful tool to easily collaborate with customers and partners in a private and secure environment,” said Isaac Garcia, Central Desktop’s chief executive.
Central Desktop was voted “Best of the Web” by Business Week magazine last year, for the way it helps companies manage projects, deploy professional services, organizes sales and develop deals online.
Talking Tech
Bidding to capitalize on the burgeoning and converging tech and entertainment sectors, mPRm Public Relations has made two appointments for its technology division.
Anthony Sprauve, a former consultant for Walt Disney Internet Group, has been named senior vice president for digital media and technology; Ema Ostarcevic, who was with Connect PR in Provo, Utah, has been named a director in the same division.
Sprauve will manage a staff of about 20 employees and oversee the DMT business. He reports to co-presidents Mark Pogachefsky and Rachel McCallister.
More Juice
Los Angeles-based Juice Wireless has launched JuiceCaster 4.0, the latest version of its mobile publishing tool.
The Juice Wireless application allows users to publish content from their mobile phones to the web.
The software also posts that content to social networking sites such as MySpace, Xanga, and Friendster, and blog services like Blogger.
Los Angeles-based mobile virtual network operator Amp’d Mobile and MTV Networks are developing an original series to appear exclusively on the Amp’d entertainment portal.
Financial terms of the deal, and its content, were not disclosed.
Amp’d provides a youth-oriented cell phone service. Company officials said last week that the service had more than 100,000 subscribers at the end of 2006.
The venture-backed firm also said that 70,000 of those subscribers were added in the fourth quarter.
Staff reporter Dan Cox can be reached at
[email protected]
or at (323) 549-5225, ext. 230.
