UC Davis, Disney form coding nonprofit; Lucid Sight raises $6 million; Sony seeks Crackle Plus domain registration.

MLB, Lakers-Backed Lucid Sight Raises $6 Million

Sawtelle-based video game application developer Lucid Sight Inc. raised $6 million in a new funding round led by fellow Sawtelle-based investment bank Salem Partners. Lucid Sight’s total funding since its 2015 founding now stands at $11 million, Socaltech reports. Lucid Sight is backed by Joey Buss, Los Angeles Lakers vice president of research and development as well as Major League Baseball.

New Crackle Joint Venture Considers Name Change

Sony Pictures Television sold a majority stake in its streaming outfit Crackle Inc. on March 28, but The Verge reports today that Sony doesn’t own the domain name or trademark for the new “Crackle Plus” service. A Pakistani man registered Crackleplus.com in 2017 and is asking Crackle’s new owner, Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment Inc. to pay him $10,000 for the address. After attempting to negotiate a price, Sony decided not to buy. It’s unclear if Sony will change the service name from “Crackle Plus” to another moniker.

Disney, UC Davis Launch Coding Nonprofit

Burbank-based Walt Disney Co. has joined forces with UC Davis and New York-based hardware startup LittleBits to form a nonprofit startup called Snap the Gap to mentor roughly 15,000 10-year-old girls in STEM skills. LittleBits joined Disney’s tech accelerator program in 2016, TechCrunch reports. The first year of the program will teach only California students, but aims to be in all 50 states by 2023.

Tech reporter Samson Amore can be reached at [email protected] or (323) 556-8335. Follow him on Twitter @samsonamore.