Josh Harris, an eccentric Manhattan entrepreneur known for wiring his home with cameras and living online for six months, is back after a four-year hiatus. But this time he’s in Hollywood.
Harris has recently set up a full studio at a Hollywood soundstage for his new firm, called Operator 11 Exchange, an Internet TV broadcaster. It’s kind of a video version of MySpace where most of the products will be made by the audience and the Hollywood studio functions like an anchor desk that packages their programming.
It’s not too different from an online TV network Harris launched in 2000 in Manhattan called Webcaster Pseudo Programs Inc., which got buried in the dot-com crash.
At the time, Harris became a media darling, some publications calling him Andy Warhol of Webcasting. He sunk a small fortune into a New Year’s bash hundreds of guests gathered at a temporary commune in two big warehouses outfitted with food, drink and disc jockeys. About 100 volunteers slept, ate, bathed while being recorded by more than 100 video and film cameras, which Harris planned to show on his online TV network.
He had just completed a successful IPO of Jupiter Communications Inc., a tech research company he founded in 1986, and reportedly walked away with $10 million in stock.
Harris is raising capital for his new firm at www.operator11.com.
WebMessenger Sold
L.A.-based WebMessenger Inc., a 14-year-old software development company with a hot mobile messaging platform, has been sold for $7 million to Herndon, Va.-based Apptix, a producer of on-demand communication tools for small and medium-size businesses.
WebMessenger develops software that bridges a suite of Mobile Instant Messaging products across desktop and mobile devices. Users can communicate across public and private networks, including AOL, MSN, Yahoo, ICQ, Google Talk, and Skype, on most communications gadgets, such as desktops, cell phones, BlackBerries, and Palm Treo.
With an impressive client list, including IBM, Lehman Brothers, MetLife, Verizon and Sprint, why was WebMessenger sold for a relatively small sum?
“They were looking for an exit strategy and we offered a fair price for the company,” said Jackie Funk, director of marketing at Apptix. “I just saw the WebMessenger CEO and he’s all smiles. The company had changed its business model from consulting to a true software and service provider and I think they wanted to take advantage of our strengths in sales and marketing.”
WebMessenger’s chief executive, Val Babajov, founded the company from his garage in his Los Angeles home and launched a subsidiary in Bulgaria. Of the company’s 46 employees, only eight are based in L.A. with the rest in Bulgaria. All were hired by Apptix, which makes the $20.7 million public company 265-employees strong.
Wi-Fi for Libraries
All 72 city libraries have gone wireless. With public demand for the Los Angeles Public Library’s 2,200 computers at its peak, the city equipped its libraries with Wi-Fi access last week.
The city hopes that people will bring their own laptops for Internet perusing, which will free up more library computers.
The libraries went Wi-Fi without dipping into city coffers. The Library Foundation of Los Angeles, a non-profit that supports the public library, covered the $300,000 cost for the project. About 15 million people annually use the city libraries, which hold 6 million books.
Staff reporter Booyeon Lee can be reached at
[email protected]
or (323) 549-5225, ext. 230.
