Large V.C. Deal Boosts L.A.’s Q1

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Venture capitalists nearly doubled their investment in young Los Angeles-area companies in the first quarter, the best quarter in five years, according to a survey by Dow Jones VentureOne and Ernst & Young LLP.


The largest deal in the nation was $150 million in second-round financing received by Los Angeles-based Amp’d Mobile Inc., a youth-oriented wireless provider.


L.A. County start-ups collected $359 million in the first quarter, up from $196 million a year ago and more than double the previous quarter. The 27 deals counted in survey was a 50 percent jump from the same period the year before.


Other local deals highlighted in the VentureOne report included $48.5 million in first-round finance for MovieBeam Inc., a Burbank-based provider of movies-on-demand. The company is a Walt Disney Co. spin-off in which both Intel Corp. and Cisco Systems Inc. have a stake.


Revver Inc., a Beverly Hills-based provider of technology that allows producers of homemade digital videos to share and make money from their work via advertising links, received $17.25 million in second-round financing.


Venture capital firms nationwide invested more than $6 billion in the quarter, the most since 2001 and an 18 percent increase from the year before.

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