Spin Valley Post

Avaak, a company that develops video monitoring and networking products, has raised $10 million in Series B funding led by Qualcomm with existing investors Trinity Ventures, InterWest Partners and Leapfrog Ventures participating. This brings total Avaak’s funding to $17 million.

Avaak recently launched its Vue system, which allows users to use a webcam to monitor their homes or businesses via the Internet and access a live video feed through a mobile device. The system features a network of small, battery-powered cameras that can be placed anywhere.

The Vue’s personal video system is $299 and is sold on Avaak’s site and on Amazon. The new funding will be used to further distribute the Vue system into retail outlets and for product development.

WebMediaBrands is boosting its investment in social media publications today with the acquisition of social media news site Rotorblog.com. Rotorblog, which was was launched in 2006 to cover the social media space, currently attracts 200,000 unique visitors a month. Terms for the acquisition were not disclosed.

WebMediaBrands, which is perhaps best known as the owner of Media Bistro, has been undergoing a major transition. WebMediaBrands just bought the Social Times, the company behind AllFacebook.com. And the company has divested the majority of its properties, including its recent sale of Internet.com for $18 million. The company has acquired a number of online publications to boost its editorial platform.

WebMediaBrand’s other news sites include LearnNetwork, Graphics.com, Ads of the World, Brands of the World, Freelance Connect, Semantic Web, StockLogos.com, and others. RotorBlog was founded by Latvian blogger Maris Dagis and according to its site, only employs two other editors.

SugarSync, a file syncing product that we may have all forgotten in our rush to glorify Dropbox has been rolling out a steady stream of improvements and, as of 11am today, it will offer an API so mobile applications can use SugarSync shared storage. The API information will live at SugarSync.com/Developers.

The API essentially creates a “bridge between local devices and the cloud.” In plain English, this would allow a developer to offload storage to a SugarSync server – think a photo application that can upload and display public links immediately or, barring that, a sort of shared workspace that would allow disparate programs to work on the same files in locked down OSes like iPhone OS and Windows Phone 7. The apps don’t have to be mobile – it works in web and desktop contexts as well – and access to the API is free.

The9, an online game developer and operator in China, has acquired a majority interest in US-based Red 5 Studios for a total of approximately $20 million.

With the move, the Chinese online gaming company says it is beginning to shape its global strategy. For Red 5, the additional capital means more means and potential users for the game(s) that they’re currently developing and extra resources to effectively turn the company into a multi-game studio.

The9 Limited is a relatively unknown, publicly listed online game company located in Shanghai, China, whose business is primarily focused on developing and operating games for the Web. The9 directly, or through affiliates, operates licensed MMORPGs and casual games including Soul of The Ultimate Nation, EA SPORTS FIFA Online 2 and Atlantica, as well as its proprietary games World of Fighter and Jiu Zhou Zhan Ji, in mainland China (with more in development). The company has also obtained exclusive licenses to operate other games in mainland China, including Audition 2 and Kingdom Heroes 2 Online.

Red 5 Studios is an online game developer located in California, formed in 2006 by former executives and developers from Blizzard Entertainment.

The pitch from its corporate website is quite intriguing:

We believe that the future of games lies in connecting millions of gamers together into shared, epic, and fantastic experiences. These online communities, these tribes, are what make online gaming a richer and deeper experience than any standalone game.

We imagine bold new worlds for our players to inhabit, explore and adventure within. Original story, art, sound and code meld together into powerful and wonderful new ways… creating not just games, but worlds for players to live out their heroic alter egos.

We always ask ourselves “what’s next?” We want to transform gaming through our online technologies. We ask ourselves “what we would create in a future where bandwidth was free, where players had unlimited storage, and our games were powered by supercomputers?” We want to create the answers, one game at a time.

Will be interesting to see what this investment and alliance will lead to for both companies.

The British Governement, faced with an upcoming general election in which policy toward the internet, digital inclusion of the masses and how government IT interfaces with the private sector will all come into play, has rolled out the big guns in the shape of the Prime Minister and a clutch of ministers and advisers today.

In a speech in London, billed as “Building Britain’s Digital Future”, Gordon Brown ranged over a wide range of topics.

Here are the highlights: