Author: Staff

Tech Valley Communications, a portfolio company of Riverside Partners, will acquire Vermont-based TelJet Longhaul. The company said its acquisition will create “one of the largest and most dense fiber networks in Upstate New York and Northern New England.” Terms were not disclosed. The transaction is expected to close within the next 90 days.

PRESS RELEASE
Tech Valley Communications (TVC), a portfolio company of Riverside Partners, announced today that it has signed a definitive Asset Purchase Agreement to acquire substantially all of the assets of Vermont-based TelJet Longhaul, LLC, including TelJet’s fiber network and colocation facility. The transaction will create one of the largest and most dense fiber networks in Upstate New York and Northern New England. Tech Valley Communications will have more than 190,000 fiber miles and nearly 1,100 lit buildings, and will operate a network that spans New York, Northern New England (New Hampshire, Maine and Vermont) and reaches Canada.

The transaction is expected to close within the next 90 days, subject to customary closing conditions and regulatory approval.

“Acquiring TelJet’s fiber network and colocation facility is very exciting news for Tech Valley Communications. These assets are complementary to our existing footprint and further our goal of operating the largest, most advanced fiber network in Northern New England and Upstate New York,” commented Kevin O’Connor, Chief Executive Officer and co-founder of Tech Valley Communications.

Tech Valley Communications, founded in 1999, has been building and operating its own FirstLight(R) fiber optic network for over 13 years. Today, the TVC network serves carrier, wholesale and enterprise customers in Upstate New York, New Hampshire, Vermont, Massachusetts and Maine. TVC’s clientele includes national telecommunications providers, CLECs, and leading enterprises, including healthcare organizations, high tech manufacturing and research facilities, financial institutions, colleges and universities, K-12 schools, public safety agencies, as well as local and state governments.

TelJet Longhaul, LLC, founded in 2002, has built one of the largest fiber networks in Northern New England. With an expert team of experienced engineers, TelJet serves wholesale and enterprise customers in Vermont, New Hampshire and Montreal, Quebec. TelJet’s clientele includes CLECs and leading enterprises, including healthcare organizations, financial institutions, high tech development firms, colleges and universities, K-12 schools and media.

“TelJet’s mission is to deliver the solutions necessary for our clients to compete effectively on a local and global basis — and we will continue to hold true to that mission,” stated Greg Kelly, Founder and President of TelJet Longhaul, LLC. “Now as part of TVC, we will be better equipped to fulfill that mission. This transaction provides us the resources necessary to expand our service set and capabilities in Vermont and New Hampshire, which in turn will benefit our clients and help to create new jobs throughout the region. My staff and I are looking forward to joining the TVC team and continuing to provide the outstanding service and support that our customers have come to expect.”

“The growth potential created by combining the assets of TelJet with Tech Valley Communications is substantial, and we are very excited for what lies ahead not only for Tech Valley Communications, but the customer base as well,” commented Steven F. Kaplan, General Partner at Riverside Partners. “With over 25 years of experience in the telecommunications, Internet, and media industries, Greg Kelly is an industry veteran. He has worked hard to build TelJet into a premier telecommunications provider serving Northern New England, and his dedication to his customers will carry through to Tech Valley Communications. This transaction will expand TVC’s geographic reach and deepen relationships with both wholesale and enterprise customers.”

To learn more about Tech Valley Communications, please visit www.techvalleycom.com. For more information on TelJet, please visit www.teljet.com. For more information about Riverside Partners, please visit www.riversidepartners.com

About Tech Valley Communications Tech Valley Communications (TVC), headquartered in Albany, NY, provides fiber optic data, voice, and high-speed Internet services to enterprise, carrier and wholesale customers in Upstate New York and New England utilizing its own FirstLight(R) fiber optic network. TVC offers a robust suite of advanced telecommunications products, including dedicated Internet access, Metro Ethernet networks (E-LAN, E-Line), MPLS, traditional TDM solutions, SIP trunks, virtual PBX and audio-conferencing, managed commercial wireless systems, and Data Center Colocation. TVC’s clientele includes national cellular providers and CLECs and many leading enterprises spanning high tech manufacturing and research, hospitals and healthcare, banking and financial, secondary education, colleges and universities, MDUs (Multi-Dwelling Units) and local and state governments. Tech Valley Communications is the parent company of New Hampshire-based CLEC, segTEL. Tech Valley Communications is a portfolio company of Boston-based private equity firm Riverside Partners.

About TelJet TelJet Longhaul, LLC, headquartered in Williston, VT provides data, Internet and colocation services to enterprise and wholesale customers in Vermont, New Hampshire and Montreal, Quebec utilizing its own fiber optic network. TelJet offers Metro Ethernet services, Internet access, and Data Center Colocation. TelJet’s clientele includes wholesale carrier customers, medium and large enterprises, healthcare institutions, financial institutions, high tech development firms, colleges and universities, K-12 schools, TV and radio media firms.

About Riverside Partners Founded in 1989, Riverside Partners is a middle market private equity firm that focuses on growth oriented companies in the healthcare and technology industries. Riverside Partners is particularly experienced at partnering with founders, owners and management teams and it brings substantial domain expertise and operating experience to its portfolio companies. The partners at Riverside Partners have managed more than $500 million in investments in over 50 companies. The firm is currently focused on companies with revenues between $20 and $200 million and with $5-$25 million of EBITDA.

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Hilex Poly, a manufacturer and recycler of plastic retail carry out bags and film products, has acquired portions of the North American Flexible Packaging division of Amsterdam-based Clondalkin Group, the company announced. Hilex is backed by Chicago-based firm Wind Point Partners. Terms of the deal were not released. Hilex Poly is based in Hartsville, S.C.

PRESS RELEASE
Wind Point Partners announced today that portfolio company Hilex Poly, a manufacturer and recycler of plastic retail carry out bags and film products, has acquired portions of the North American Flexible Packaging division of Amsterdam-based Clondalkin Group. The businesses that Hilex Poly has acquired are Fortune Plastics, Accutech Plastics and Direct Plastics Limited. This transaction will allow the company to continue to diversify its product line, as well as expand its recycling technologies.

Stan Bikulege, Chairman & CEO of Hilex, stated, “We are extremely pleased to welcome the employees of these companies to Hilex. They have developed a great customer base and bring a tremendous new range of product offerings to Hilex that we will continue to expand. In addition, the progressive work undertaken by Hilex in the plastic bag and wrap recycling market can now be expanded to an even wider portfolio of flexible packaging products. We also appreciate the strong support of Wind Point Partners; they understand the importance of this North American manufacturing sector and are highly supportive of this next phase of our growth.”

About Wind Point Partners
Wind Point Partners is a private equity investment firm that manages commitments of approximately $2.5 billion. Wind Point focuses on partnering with top caliber CEOs to acquire middle market businesses where we can establish a clear path to value creation. Additional information about Wind Point is available at www.windpointpartners.com.

About Hilex Poly
Hilex Poly, based in Hartsville, S.C., is the nation’s largest plastic bag manufacturer and operates the largest closed-loop recycling facility in the United States. Hilex Poly’s award winning Bag-2-Bag recycling program was the first closed loop recycling program to introduce plastic bag recycling programs at supermarkets and retailers that also rewarded customers with high recycled content shopping bags. Hilex Poly operates the nation’s largest plastic bag recycling plant, located in North Vernon, Ind.

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ElectNext has raised $1.3 million from investors including Brooklyn Bridge Ventures. The company says it aims to provide contextual political data to media properties.

PRESS RELEASE
Today, ElectNext announced that they had raised $1.3mm to launch a data, analytics and marketing service to bridge the data gap between politicians, lobby groups, and their constituents. The company provides contextual political data to media properties (Crunchbase for politics) and in turn uses that reach to provide actionable insights for campaign managers. Brooklyn Bridge Ventures led the round.

Describing it that way, however, makes the story a bit neater than advertised. This business model isn’t how Electnext started, nor was investor interest always this strong. I think there are five key lessons here that put the company in the position to succeed that they’re in now:

1) Find a lead.

It’s very fashionable these days of crowdfunding and party rounds to go out, tell a good story to individuals, and piece together a lot of cash from a lot of folks–with no investor in particular really taking any responsibility for advising the company. I had been meeting with Keya and her team months and months before I actually invested–because I liked the space and was impressed by her personally. Yet, the product needed direction and Keya had a lot of questions about how to prioritize her time as a non-technical founder. We’ve been on a schedule of meeting up every two weeks and have worked together to hone the strategy. It’s been a terrific partnership and I’ve been super impressed with her ability to learn fast. She knows campaigns like the back of her hand, but she’s a first time CEO of an internet startup. What’s most important here isn’t that I was around to help–but that Keya has an innate ability to ask relevant questions at the right time. I think it mattered less who the lead was, and more that, unlike a lot of other entrepreneurs, Keya reached out and leveraged the resources she had around her wisely. Her success thus far is a function of her ability to know when and what to ask–and to surround herself with people who can provide her answers.

2) Fail fast.

Many startups in the political space have tried the direct to consumer offering–like Votizen and Popvox. It’s a tough slog, and, at the end of the day, it’s tough to gather the audiences and then figure out a business model to support the effort. ElectNext started out along that path, but quickly realized that it would be more efficient to leverage the existing audiences already at major media properties. They left themselves plenty of cash in the bank to pivot and give themselves enough runway to execute the new model when the writing was on the wall for the consumer offering.

3) Use existing models of success.

In the poltical data space, information is all over the place, and often inaccessible, even though voters want to be informed and political figures and groups want to get their data out. Media properties gather big audiences, but none of them are quite resourced to solve the data problem. This problem isn’t new. Singleplatform built a $100mm business gathering up menu data for restaurants and augmenting the offering that media properties had–creating a service to merchants in the process. They power, for example, the menus you see in Foursquare–something Foursquare would have been unlikely to gather themselves.

When ElectNext looked at their strengths, they had great media relationships, disaggregated data, and two sides that wanted better transparency–as well as the interest in making transparency actionable. Same situation. The SinglePlatform team was very generous with their time in helping ElectNext work through it’s model and solidify a base for an attractive offering to all sides. The business isn’t exactly the same, and ElectNext’s knowledge of their space helped them craft a custom offering for their stakeholders, but they started out in a great position because they had seen a similar model work elsewhere.

Too often, startup try and reinvent the wheels around business models, inventing completely new things that have no proxies for success in other areas. That limits who you can learn from and seems incredibly risky, versus porting over something that worked in another sector and making it fit for what you’re doing.

4) Keep up with the investors you meet, even when they turn you down..

Sometimes, you can tell when an investor genuinely has interest in you as a team, but just can’t get their on the model. This happened to ElectNext. Everyone seemed to be very impressed with their team, but a lot of people didn’t love the consumer offering. When the company pivoted, they solidified their offering, got some key proof points, and had continued warm enough connections to investors they had met previously to reapproach people. Almost overnight, investors jumped on board with the new model. The key here is that the change in the company was real. It wasn’t just a slight tweak. It was a definitively different approach–one they committed to before necessarily waiting to hear what investors thought.

5) Go find the customer money.

The driving force behind ElectNext’s consumer to B2B pivot was the thought of “What will customers pay for?” The aim was to create a real business and so they sought out ways they could provide real value to paying customers. They stayed in constant contact with key customers and built up a network of “friendlies” that could give them back channel feedback on what would appeal and what wouldn’t. This helped them hone their offering.

If you’ve got interesting political datasets, work for a media organization that covers politics, or you’re running communications and/or social media for a government official, candidate or lobby group you should reach out to Keya at [email protected] to find out how you can work together.

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Middle-market private equity investor MidOcean Partners has made a “significant equity” investment in Noranco Inc., a supplier of machined and sheet metal components to the aerospace industry. Noranco is based in Toronto. Specifics of the deal were not disclosed.

PRESS RELEASE
MidOcean Partners (“MidOcean”), a leading mid market private equity firm, announced today that it has acquired, along with co-investors, a significant equity position in Noranco Inc. (“Noranco” or the “Company”), a leading supplier of complex machined and sheet metal components, kits, and assemblies for mission-critical landing gear, aero structure, and aero engine applications to the aerospace industry.

The Company, with operations in Canada and the U.S., focuses solely on the aerospace industry, covering commercial/regional jet, business jet and military/rotorcraft markets. The Company’s key customers include Honeywell, United Technologies, Bombardier, Messier-Dowty and Spirit AeroSystems. Through its key customers, the Company supports high growth OEM platforms for Boeing, Airbus, and Bombardier, including the B737, B787, A380, Q400 and Global Express. Noranco sells its products under long term contracts and is a sole source supplier for the vast majority of its revenues.

“Noranco is a company with tremendous technical expertise in producing advanced precision-machined components for the aerospace industry. It serves a broad customer base and a broad base of aerospace platforms, including OEM platforms produced by Boeing, Bombardier, and Airbus,” said Frank Nash, a MidOcean Managing Director. “We anticipate leveraging its impressive capabilities and management team by providing the capital to allow Noranco to continue to support the growth of its customers and to add new capabilities, customers and supported platforms to those Noranco already has.”

Concurrent with the investment by MidOcean and its investor group, Michael Baughan, a MidOcean Executive Board member and former President and COO of B/E Aerospace, will become Chairman of Noranco. Mr. Baughan brings a wealth of experience to the board of directors of Noranco given his experience building B/E Aerospace into a multi-billion leading aerospace supplier through a strategy of both organic and acquisition growth initiatives. The new Board of Directors will also include several veterans of the aerospace industry, including Robert S. (“Steve”) Miller, recent CEO of Hawker Beechcraft (and current chairman of MidOcean’s Executive Board as well as of AIG), and MidOcean Management Affiliate Ray Valeika, a longtime executive and expert in the aircraft maintenance and aftermarket sectors.

Noranco CEO David Camilleri commented, “Noranco is extremely pleased to have completed this transaction with MidOcean Partners. Our position as a leader within this segment of aerospace has been formulated upon great people, precision products, integrated operational excellence, and a world class customer portfolio. With the strategic and financial support of MidOcean and its investor group, alongside a very positive market outlook for aerospace, Noranco can now rapidly move forward with the execution of its robust growth strategy.”

About Noranco
Headquartered in Toronto, Canada, Noranco is a world class, integrated manufacturer and solutions provider to the international commercial and military aerospace sectors. Noranco provides complex machined and sheet metal components, assemblies, and kits for leading OEMs and Tier I suppliers in the landing gear, aero-structures, and aero engines markets. Its products portfolio is comprised of highly complex and difficult-to-manufacture work packages for flight critical applications. The Company has operations in both the U.S. and Canada. Additional information about Noranco is available at www.noranco.com.

About MidOcean Partners
MidOcean Partners is a premier private equity firm headquartered in New York focused on the middle market. MidOcean is committed to investing in high quality companies with stable market positions and multiple opportunities for growth. Targeted sectors include consumer, business and media services, and industrial services. MidOcean utilizes a broad foundation of expertise in its focus industries to create value for its investors and partners. For more information, visit www.midoceanpartners.com.

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Victory Park Capital announced a $75 million credit facility for Kabbage Inc., a leading online provider of small business financing. Victory Park Capital led the facility while Thomvest Ventures, an existing equity investor, participated in the commitment, the company said Wednesday.

PRESS RELEASE
Victory Park Capital (VPC), an asset management firm that specializes in direct credit and equity investing in middle and lower middle-market companies, announced a $75 million credit facility for Kabbage, Inc., a leading online provider of small business financing. Victory Park Capital led the facility while Thomvest Ventures, an existing equity investor, participated in the commitment. The debt facility – Kabbage’s largest financing transaction to date – will fund the company’s rapidly growing customer base and allow it to expand its reach to new customer segments and markets.

“We have followed Kabbage since its inception and have been exceedingly impressed by the power of its innovative real-time data platform and the team’s ability to scale over the last two years,” said Tom Affolter, Principal at Victory Park Capital. “There is a clear void in the market as traditional financing sources remain reluctant to lend. As a firm, we are excited to provide financing to Kabbage as it is uniquely positioned to deploy this capital to meet the demand for funding from small businesses.”

Since launching two years ago, Kabbage has grown at a breakneck pace to become a leader in small business financing, delivering the most advances in the industry. Kabbage has extended more than 60,000 advances and expects to provide more than 100,000 in 2013 alone. Kabbage advances by volume have grown 296 percent on a year-over-year basis, while overall loan volume to small businesses declined during the same time period according to the Small Business Administration. Kabbage has won six major industry awards for innovation leadership in the last nine months, including first place in VentureBeat’s Innovation Showdown, and Top 10 Most Innovative Companies in Financial Services from Fast Company.

“We are pleased to partner with Victory Park in funding the growth of Kabbage and its small business clients through this debt financing, and to share in Kabbage’s future growth as an existing equity investor,” said Peter J. Thomson, chairman of Thomvest and director of Thomson Reuters Corporation.

“This facility represents an enormous vote of confidence from the institutional investment community in the Kabbage model and a significant milestone in our company’s history,” said Rob Frohwein, Kabbage Co-Founder and CEO. “We are proud to have developed a new asset class that allows institutional investors to fund the growth of the small businesses that are the backbone of our economy.”

About Victory Park Capital (VPC)

Victory Park Capital is an alternative investment firm that provides private debt and equity financing solutions to middle-market and lower middle-market companies across a wide range of industries. The firm focuses on traditional and complex situations, and seeks to build long-term sustainable value in its portfolio companies. VPC’s focus on certainty and speed to close provides the companies it seeks to invest in with a high level of security throughout the relationship. For more information, visit: http://www.victoryparkcapital.com.

About Kabbage, Inc.
Kabbage, Inc., headquartered in Atlanta, has pioneered the first financial services data and technology platform to provide funding to small businesses in fewer than 7 minutes. Kabbage leverages data generated through business activity such as online sales, shipping, and dozens of other sources to understand performance and deliver fast, flexible funding in real time. Kabbage is venture funded and backed by Thomvest Ventures, Mohr Davidow Ventures, BlueRun Ventures, the UPS Strategic Enterprise Fund, with additional investors including: Ron Conway’s SV Angel, David Bonderman, founder of TPG Capital, Warren Stephens, CEO of Stephens Inc., Western Technology Investment, H. Barton Asset Management, and TriplePoint Ventures. For more information, please visit www.kabbage.com and follow the company on Facebook and Twitter.

About Thomvest Ventures
Thomvest is a venture capital fund focused on early and growth stage investments in ad tech, enterprise software-as-a-service, financial technology and security software. The capital we invest is our own, enabling us to be more creative, flexible and patient than many venture investors. More than two-thirds of the companies that we have funded in the last decade have either gone public, been acquired, or continue to grow as independent businesses.

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CapMan announced that it has sold Cardinal Foods to a company formed by Swedish agricultural cooperative Lantmannen Group and private equity firm CapVest. CapMan originally invested in Cardinal Foods in 2005 through the acquisition of two independent poultry and egg production companies.

PRESS RELEASE
CapMan sells Cardinal Foods, impact on CapMan Group’s results for 2013 is EUR1.9 million

Funds managed by CapMan and other owners of Cardinal Foods have signed an agreement to sell Cardinal Foods AS to a company formed by Swedish agricultural cooperative Lantmannen Group and private equity firm CapVest. Funds managed by CapMan own approx. 49% of Cardinal Foods’ stock. The impact of the transaction on CapMan Group’s result for 2013 is approx. EUR1.9 million from carried interest income and fair value changes from own fund investments. The transaction contributes EUR3.7 million in cash flow to CapMan Group. The transaction is subject to final approval by the competition authorities and is expected to close by 1 July 2013. The investment in Cardinal Foods has been excellent for investors in CapMan’s funds.

CapMan originally invested in Cardinal Foods in 2005 through the acquisition of two independent poultry and egg production companies. Since then, Cardinal Foods has experienced significant organic growth, while at the same time acquiring and integrating several complementary businesses. Today, Cardinal Foods is the second largest poultry product and egg producer in Norway, with sales in excess of NOK 1.3 billion and approx. 300 employees. Prior to the sale to Lantmannen and CapVest, Cardinal Foods’ subsidiary Norsk Kylling was sold to Rema Industrier in 2011.

“Cardinal Foods has developed according to our expectations and the investment has provided excellent returns for our fund investors. We are proud of the success of the company during our ownership. Cardinal Foods has established a solid market position through both organic growth and market consolidation. We have further improved the cost structure of the operations, from which the new owners can commence their value creation plans,” says Kai Jordahl, Senior Partner and Head of CapMan Buyout.

“Under the ownership of CapMan, Cardinal Foods has become the leading player within white meat and eggs in the Norwegian market. The successful partnership with CapMan has provided strong support to the company, and allowed us to develop through organic growth, acquisitions, and with significant operational improvements. We have an excellent position for further development and are happy to have Lantmannen and CapVest as new owners to assist us in a next phase”, says Torfinn Prytz Higdem, CEO of Cardinal Foods.

CapMan Group is one of the leading private equity firms in the Nordic countries and Russia, with assets under management of approximately EUR3.1 billion. CapMan has five investment partnerships – CapMan Buyout, CapMan Russia, CapMan Credit, CapMan Public Market, and CapMan Real Estate – each of which has its own dedicated investment team and funds. Altogether, CapMan employs 110 people in Helsinki, Stockholm, Oslo, Moscow and Luxembourg. CapMan was established in 1989 and has been listed on the Helsinki Stock Exchange since 2001.

Cardinal Foods AS www.cardinalfoods.no Cardinal Foods is a leading supplier of white meat and eggs and has a significant position in the Norwegian market. The company’s strategy is to continue to develop the most efficient production facilities for poultry and eggs in Norway, combined with innovative and user-friendly, top quality products. The company controls the entire value chain, from farmer to consumer. Slaughtering, cutting and processing of white meat are carried out at Jaeren and Stokke in Vestfold in efficient and full-scale production plants. Egg processing takes place in Norway’s most modern facilities for egg processing, located in Ski.

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Earlybird Venture Capital has joined Bright Capital and Kite Ventures in backing online fine art and auction house Auctionata. The Berlin-based company has raised $20.2 million for expansion, recruiting and technology development.

PRESS RELEASE
Earlybird invests in online fine art and auction house Auctionata, joining its team of investors including Bright Capital and Kite Ventures (in December 2012) as well as HV Holtzbrinck Ventures, eVenture Capital Partners and the Raffay Group. With this round of financing the Berlin-based Startup Auctionata has raised $20.2M for global expansion, recruiting and technology platform growth.

As the first patented online producer of live auctions, Auctionata covers the entire spectrum of an auction house; from expert curation to its unique, HDTV-production quality, fine art online auction events. Auctionata’s vision is to open the international art, antiques and collectibles markets to consumers, making it accessible to everybody through the Internet.

For the buyer, Auctionata brings the auction thrill into the living room and offers a wide selection of significant objects in an online shop. Auctionata exclusively offers a 25 years guarantee of authenticity on all sold objects. For the seller, Auctionata offers a proven, trusted and highly-produced online selling experience. The company has approx. 250 internationally renowned specialists (who appraise and curate all objects for sale), the largest network of experts worldwide. With its full service, Auctionata reaches millions of private sellers, collectors and dealers, who find it difficult to sell in regional and highly fragmented, old-style auction houses.

Dr. Christian Nagel, co-founder and partner of Earlybird states “We look for companies with the potential to be global market leaders. Auctionata sells objects that attract interest worldwide – up to and including the level of Egon Schiele. No other online vendor serves this market segment. Auctionata’s business model was developed by two founding figures with decades of experience in both the art market and online business.”

On 21 June 2013 Auctionata will be the first German online fine art and auction house to sell an original watercolor by Egon Schiele (his famed Reclining Woman) in an online live auction from its own TV studio, with a starting price of $1.5M (€1M).

“Unlike traditional auction houses, where the excitement naturally falls off after each auction, the combination of online auctions and online shop generates a high experience factor for potential buyers and sellers alike,” said Alexander Zacke, CEO of Auctionata. “We are very pleased that our team of investors now includes another highly experienced global player like Earlybird bringing expertise in ecommerce and technology platforms.”

ABOUT EARLYBIRD
Established in 1997 Earlybird currently manages over $700M in assets. We’ve backed more than 80 companies, of which many have sparked some of the most significant innovations in business and technology and resulted in large scale ($1bn+) IPOs and trade sales. Earlybird backs European companies with global ambitions and our active portfolio currently includes more than 20 companies across the consumer internet and enterprise services space such as B2X Care Solutions, Carpooling.com, Madvertise, Peak Games, 6Wunderkinder and Socialbakers.

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Mobile social gaming company PlayPhone has added Bhaskar Roy as chief product officer. Roy joins from Skype, which he joined after his mobile video software and services company Qik was acquired. Based in San Francisco, Calif., PlayPhone is funded by Menlo Ventures, Cardinal Venture Capital, Coral Group, and Scale Venture Partners.

PRESS RELEASE
PlayPhone, Inc., a global leader in mobile social gaming, today announced that mobile product veteran Bhaskar Roy has joined the company as chief product officer. Roy will take primary responsibility for innovation and evolution on the platform underlying the renowned PlayPhone Social Gaming Network. His appointment is effective immediately.

“Bhaskar has a very distinguished track record with some of the tech industry’s most iconic and disruptive brands,” said Ron Czerny, founder and CEO of PlayPhone, Inc. “With proven leadership at companies like HP, Skype, Oracle and Microsoft – along with experience at successful startups like Qik and PlaceWare – we are confident Bhaskar will continue to extend PlayPhone’s leadership position in the mobile social gaming ecosystem.”

Prior to PlayPhone, Roy was co-founder and senior vice president of products at Qik, a provider of mobile video software and services. Following Qik’s acquisition by Skype (and Skype’s acquisition by Microsoft), Roy continued at the helm of Qik products and led the charge in bringing asynchronous communications and new mobile experiences to Skype’s core offering. Prior to Qik, Roy was senior product director for SMB products and director of product management for real-time communication at Oracle. And before Oracle, Roy led product management and channel marketing at PlaceWare, which is now a division of Microsoft Lync following an acquisition.

“PlayPhone’s social gaming network has already demonstrated outstanding traction in the marketplace as is evidenced by the recent Games Portal on Verizon announcement, and is on track to become the favored platform among global operators, developers and consumers alike,” said Roy. “I am very excited to help PlayPhone leverage its technology to open new strategic doors – and to helping the management team both fulfill its commitment to investors and deliver healthy new revenue streams to our collaborators.”

About PlayPhone, Inc.
PlayPhone(R) is a global leader in delivering mobile social gaming via smartphones and tablets through its cross-platform PlayPhone Social Gaming Network. With a presence in more than 25 countries throughout North America, Europe, Asia, and Latin America, PlayPhone’s mobile gaming platform provides developers with the ability to launch and monetize social games around the globe. The PlayPhone developers program includes support for all leading platforms: Android, iOS, Adobe AIR, HTML5, WP7, with full support for Unity. Based in San Francisco, Calif., PlayPhone is funded by top venture firms Menlo Ventures, Cardinal Venture Capital, Coral Group, and Scale Venture Partners.

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Early stage investor Ignition Partners announced Wednesday that it had closed its fifth fund with $150 million in commitments. Ignition also said it had added Nick Sturiale as a partner based in the San Francisco Bay Area, and that the firm had opened a new office in Palo Alto, Calif. Sturiale previously worked at JAFCO Ventures, Sevin Rosen Funds and the Carlyle Group.

PRESS RELEASE
BELLEVUE, WA and PALO ALTO, CA—April 4, 2013—Ignition Partners, an early-stage venture-capital firm, announced it has closed its fifth fund. The $150 million vehicle will target early-stage investments in enterprise-technology companies located throughout the U.S., with a strong emphasis on the West Coast.
Ignition also has added a new partner, Nick Sturiale, based in the San Francisco Bay Area and opened a new office in Palo Alto, Calif. The moves are part of a transition toward creating a more-focused partnership with a larger Silicon Valley presence—and one with deep operational experience in the enterprise. The new dual-geography presence will give the firm access to innovative ideas, and talent, in both markets.
The core team behind Ignition Venture Partners V includes partners John Connors, Frank Artale and Sturiale, who previously worked at JAFCO Ventures, Sevin Rosen Funds and the Carlyle Group. Connors, a former top Microsoft executive who served as its chief financial officer, joined Ignition in 2005. Artale, a longtime software-industry executive who has held top positions at companies including Citrix, XenSource and Microsoft, joined the firm in 2011.
Artale and Sturiale are also former entrepreneurs: Artale co-founded Consera Software, which was acquired by Hewlett-Packard in 2004, and was an early employee at XenSource. Sturiale’s company, Timbre Technologies, was purchased by Tokyo Electron in 2001.
Investors in Ignition’s new fund, which was oversubscribed and raised by the current team in less than three months, include returning and new university endowments, pension funds and investment firms.
“With approximately $450 million in distributions in the last 12 months, our firm has strong momentum going forward, and we are honored to receive such strong support and validation from our limited partners,” said Connors. “We are extremely upbeat about the current market and view the recent string of successful, enterprise-software IPOs as the start of a decade-long run of innovation that will usher in major productivity enhancements, and new ways of doing business, for companies worldwide.”
Recent Ignition exits include the initial public offering of Splunk, a “big-data” company that went public in April and stands as one of the most successful new technology stock offerings of the last several years, and the acquisitions of portfolio companies StorSimple, Azaleos and Zenprise. Previous Ignition successes include virtualization company XenSource (acquired by Citrix) and cloud-development firm Heroku (acquired by Salesforce.com).
Other, current Ignition investments include Cloudera, DocuSign, Parse, Hipmunk, Opscode and Bromium. The new fund will invest more narrowly in areas such as “consumerized” enterprise software, cloud technologies and big data, building on Ignition’s technology “platform” expertise.
“We applaud Ignition’s refined, more-focused approach to early-stage investing and believe the enterprise-IT landscape is poised to create important new companies and substantial new wealth,” said Tom Gladden, a partner at Adams Street Partners, which has invested in the new fund.
Other team members in Ignition V include Administrative Partner Robert Headley; Venture Partner Cameron Myhrvold; Chief Financial Officer Jack Ferry; and Principal Kristina Kerr Bergman. Partners from prior Ignition funds will continue to serve in their current roles to maximize returns from existing portfolio companies.
About Ignition
Ignition Partners helps entrepreneurs build innovative, category-defining businesses of lasting value. The firm, with offices in Bellevue, Wash. and Palo Alto, Calif., specializes in early-stage investments in “consumerized” enterprise IT, cloud computing and big data.

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Arsenal Capital Partners, a New York-based buyout shop focused on lower-middle-market specialty industrial and healthcare companies, has closed its third fund with $875 million in commitments. The firm said the fund, Arsenal Capital Fund III LP, exceeded a $750 million target. Arsenal Capital Partners II LP, was raised in 2006 with $500 million of committed capital.

PRESS RELEASE
Arsenal Capital Partners (“Arsenal”), a leading New York-headquartered private equity firm that invests in lower middle market specialty industrial and healthcare companies, announced today that it has successfully completed fundraising for Arsenal Capital Fund III LP (“Fund III”) with $875 million of committed capital, exceeding its target of $750 million. The firm’s previous fund, Arsenal Capital Partners II LP, was raised in 2006 with $500 million of committed capital. Arsenal now has over $1.6 billion of committed capital under management.

Commenting on the firm’s fundraising success during the current challenging fundraising environment, Terrence Mullen, Co-founder and Partner at Arsenal, said, “We are delighted to have surpassed our expectations for Fund III and achieved a 75% increase in committed capital from our last fund. We sincerely thank all our investors for their tremendous support. We are very gratified by the investors’ response, citing the institutional quality of our firm committed to the opportunities and needs of the lower middle market, our leading franchises in specialty industrials and healthcare, and track record of building high performance companies.”

“Fund III is a testament to the talented and experienced team that we have built and honed over 13 years and our strong culture of teamwork and collaborative value creation. Our uncommon balance of investment, industry and operating talent, working in unison enables us to be a partner of choice with management teams who are seeking to achieve differentiated strategic positioning with enhanced capabilities in growth, technology and operations. With offices in New York and Shanghai and a global team, our international experience and capabilities are a major differentiator in the marketplace. The Arsenal strategy and model continue to win in the market, as evidenced by the 57 investments we have completed since inception,” said Jeffrey Kovach, a Co-founder and Partner at Arsenal.

Bill Farrell, Head of Investor Relations for Arsenal, said, “Arsenal’s excellent performance and consistent track record of building high growth, high quality companies that strategic buyers desire impressed both existing Arsenal fund investors and attracted a terrific group of new investors in Fund III.” The Fund’s investor base is international in scope, with approximately half of the institutional investors from the U.S. and the balance from Europe and Asia. The investor base represents a diverse group of endowments and foundations, public and corporate pension plans, financial institutions and family offices, including PKA A/S, Northwestern Mutual Life Insurance, PPM America, Northeast Utilities Service Company Retirement Plan, KIRKBI A/S, Partners Capital, Unigestion, Storebrand, Purdue University, Funds advised by Bowmark Capital and Cheyenne Capital Fund.

Arsenal, with a team of 29 experienced professionals, has deep sector expertise and leading franchises within the specialty industrials and healthcare industries. The firm has an exclusive focus on lower middle market transactions between $50 million and $250 million of enterprise value. Arsenal focuses on companies with headquarters in the U.S. and significant operations and growth opportunities in both the U.S and internationally. 2012 was a very active and productive year for Arsenal, as the firm completed eight substantial new investments, successfully exited its investment in portfolio company Novolyte in a sale to BASF, and recapitalized Charter Brokerage.

Arsenal has already completed four platform investments and deployed approximately $195 million of equity capital in Fund III. Commenting on the firm’s future initiatives, Messrs. Mullen and Kovach noted that the firm’s investment principals continue to review a robust pipeline of extremely high quality transactions and will select those that best fit within the firm’s “growth and improvement strategy” and offer attractive investment prospects for our investors.

Arsenal was assisted by Forbes Private Capital Group as a placement agent and Kirkland & Ellis LLP served as legal counsel.

About Arsenal Capital Partners

Formed in 2000, Arsenal Capital Partners is a leading New York-headquartered private equity firm that invests in middle-market specialty industrial and healthcare companies. Arsenal makes investments in sectors where the firm has significant prior knowledge and experience. The firm targets businesses that have the potential for further value creation by working closely with management to accelerate growth and leverage the firm’s operational improvement capabilities.

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BancVue, a provider of data-driven consulting services to community financial institutions, has acquired equipment leasing company BancLeasing. Terms were not disclosed.

PRESS RELEASE
BancVue, creator of Kasasa® and the leading provider of innovative products, dynamic marketing, and data-driven consulting services to community financial institutions, announced the strategic acquisition of BancLeasing, a pioneer in providing financial institutions with highly competitive equipment leasing programs.

“This is a win-win-win that will benefit both companies and, more importantly, the more than 700 community financial institutions that BancVue serves,” said BancVue founder & chief evangelist Don Shafer. “Our partner-clients have been asking for a proven means to expand their commercial lending businesses. BancLeasing’s CashFlow Lease Program will allow them to achieve this important goal while strengthening their competitive positions.”

BancVue’s long-standing mission is to enable community financial institutions to compete and win in the war against the megabanks. Toward that end, BancVue offers access to cost-effective banking products and services that might otherwise be time- or cost-prohibitive.

Shafer and BancLeasing President Mark Buchanan believe there is great synergy between the two companies and that BancLeasing’s CashFlow Lease Program will be a strong addition to the BancVue lineup.

“We are excited to join BancVue in its initiative on behalf of community banks and credit unions nationwide,” said Buchanan. “Equipment lease financing is a highly competitive market dominated by the biggest banks. For our community financial institution partners, being able to offer quality commercial and industrial equipment lease financing will partially level the playing field. Our CashFlow Lease Program can help them build stronger banking relationships with clients, and it promotes customer retention by preventing the megabanks from gaining a foothold with a local bank’s best customers via lease financing.”

BancVue started offering the CashFlow Lease program to its existing customers in March of 2013.

About BancVue
BancVue is the leading provider of innovative products, world-class marketing, and data-driven consulting solutions to community financial institutions across the U.S. Featuring offerings like Kasasa®, a national brand of superior products and marketing scale, BancVue products are designed to deliver controlled new account growth, higher profitability, and increased customer retention. Today serving over 700 community banks and credit unions across the country, BancVue is empowering its clients to compete in and win the war against megabanks.

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BA Insight, a developer of advanced search technology, has added $4.5 million, bringing the total amount raised to date to $15.7 million. The company is backed by Milestone Venture Partners, Osage Venture Partners, Paladin Capital Group and Originate Ventures.

PRESS RELEASE
BA Insight today announced that it has secured its latest round of funding, raising $4.5 million, bringing the total amount raised to date to $15.7 million. All four of the company’s current venture capital investors participated in the round including Milestone Venture Partners, Osage Venture Partners, Paladin Capital Group and Originate Ventures. The funding supports the company’s growth as the market continues to drive demand for solutions that unlock data across the enterprise.

BA Insight’s advanced search technology redefines how people access siloed information and collaborate. Organizations are increasingly dealing with rapidly growing volumes of structured and unstructured data, the inability to integrate information from legacy systems, and the move of many organizational systems to the cloud. As a result they often lack insight into critical business information. BA Insight enables enterprises to bring this information together for users, giving them actionable insights into customers, products, projects, expertise and more.

“Enterprise search is broken,” said Philip Eliot, Principal at Paladin Capital Group, “and BA Insight is unique in its ability to deliver useful information to the enterprise regardless of where, when and how they need it. Their solutions revolutionize information access.”

“Our continued investment in BA Insight reflects our confidence in the ability of BA Insight’s platform to transform search into a powerful weapon for the enterprise,” said Todd Pietri, co-founder and General Partner of Milestone Venture Partners. “BA Insight delivers tools that enable organizations to leverage their investments in existing solutions and expose data in an actionable, relevant way.”

BA Insight customers include industry-leading companies across a variety of industries including the legal, oil and gas, and pharmaceutical/life sciences. For more information on products and services, visit www.bainsight.com.

About BA Insight

BA Insight(TM) is the leading provider of integrated search technologies that help organizations leverage the full power of Microsoft SharePoint(R) across the enterprise. BA Insight’s flagship Longitude Search and Longitude Connector products let organizations extend Microsoft’s enterprise search capabilities across dozens of CRM, ERP, ECM, messaging, and collaboration systems, and delivers rich document preview and assembly tools that empower knowledge workers to act upon search results with greater speed and effectiveness.

About Milestone Venture Partners

Milestone Venture Partners is a venture capital fund located in New York City with $100 million under management. Milestone specializes in early-stage software and data services investments in Greater New York. Areas of expertise include enterprise information technology, Digital Health, media, marketing services and FinTech. For more information, visit www.milestonevp.com.

About Originate Ventures

Originate Ventures is a venture capital investment firm, targeting early stage product and services companies located in Pennsylvania and the Mid-Atlantic region. The firm focuses on opportunities with medical devices, healthcare, consumer, information technology, Web-based and commercial products. Operating with an entrepreneurial spirit and vision, Originate’s investments range in size from $500,000 to $4,000,000. For more information, visit www.originateventures.com.

About Osage Venture Partners

Osage Venture Partners (OVP) is a venture capital firm located just outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, that invests in early-stage enterprise technology companies in the Mid-Atlantic region. OVP raised its first fund in 2005, and has invested almost exclusively in enterprise software companies since that time. With over $100M under management, OVP seeks to invest in determined and creative entrepreneurs and provide them with the assistance required to build high growth businesses. For more information, visit www.osagepartners.com.

About Paladin Capital Group

Paladin Capital Group is a leading multi-stage private equity firm providing capital and strategic guidance to growing companies in the IT, telecommunications and alternative energy sectors. The firm focuses on companies with products and services that are “dual use” in nature, serving both commercial and government customers. Paladin has over $950 million dollars of committed capital across multiple funds and has invested in over 50 portfolio companies. For more information, visit www.paladincapgroup.com.

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ProcessUnity, a risk management software company based in Concord, Mass., has raised $5 million in a Series C round led by Rose Park Advisors‘ Disruptive Innovation Fund. The money will be used to expand marketing and sales.

PRESS RELEASE
ProcessUnity, a privately-held risk management software company, today announced that it secured $5 million in a Series C round led by Rose Park Advisors’ Disruptive Innovation Fund. The funding will support the company’s rapid growth and expand marketing and sales of its SaaS solutions.

The company offers two distinct solutions: Risk Suite and Service Delivery Risk Management (SDRM). To address increased information security threats and regulatory mandates, ProcessUnity offers Risk Suite, focused on strong governance and control, vendor risk management, and compliance management. To address increased complexity, cost pressures, and delivery risk for financial service providers, ProcessUnity offers SDRM, focused on managing complex service offerings and the end-to-end client management process of what is offered and how it’s delivered.

“After three years of strong growth and validation from our customers, we are ready to expand our reach and deploy our solutions to broader markets,” said Todd Stone, president and CEO of ProcessUnity. “We are excited to work with Rose Park Advisors’ CEO Matt Christensen and Chairman Dr. Clayton Christensen, and extremely pleased that our existing stockholders also participated in this round.”

ProcessUnity’s customers range from large commercial enterprises to independent consultants all facing the same challenge of managing risk effectively. These organizations rely on the ease of use, instant global deployment, low cost of ownership, and highly responsive service associated with the company’s solutions.

“ProcessUnity’s platform and solutions represent a disruptive innovation for today’s service-based economy,” said Matt Christensen, CEO of Rose Park Advisors. “The company’s solutions automate critical jobs to be done around risk management and product and service management in a way that offers breakthrough cost savings and operating efficiencies. The resulting business improvements, reporting, and analytics allow ProcessUnity’s customers to capitalize on risk management for competitive advantage.”

About ProcessUnity, Inc.
ProcessUnity is a risk management software company headquartered in historic Concord, Massachusetts. ProcessUnity’s Software as a Service solutions provide financial services firms and other organizations with the visibility and control they need to assess, measure, and mitigate risk and to ensure the optimal performance of key business processes. Customers and partners benefit from the ease of use, fast deployment, and low total cost of ownership associated with ProcessUnity’s risk, compliance, and operational control solutions.

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Midokura, a network virtualization startup, has closed a $17.3 million Series A round. The money will be used for development and for the company’s “go-to-market” efforts. Innovation Network Corporation of Japan led the round. Other investors include NTT Investment Partners L.P. and Innovative Ventures Fund Investment L.P.

PRESS RELEASE
Midokura, a global startup focused on network virtualization, today announced it has raised $17.3M in Series A funding. The investment will be used toward furthering Midokura’s vision, product innovation and go-to-market strategy.

The round was led by Innovation Network Corporation of Japan (INCJ), a Japanese public-private partnership. Other investors who participated in the round include NTT Group’s Venture Fund: NTT Investment Partners, L.P. and NEC Group’s Venture Fund: Innovative Ventures Fund Investment L.P.

As part of today’s announcement, Midokura also named Dan Mihai Dumitriu CEO. Dan is a co-founder and previously served as CTO. Fellow co-founder Tatsuya Kato, who had been serving as CEO, is now Chairman of the Board.

Midokura offers an overlay-based network virtualization technology that allows cloud users to provision virtual network devices, including virtual switches, routers, firewalls and load balancers. Virtual network devices can then be connected to virtual machines, as well as other virtual network devices to create complex network topologies.

Midokura’s MidoNet offers the industry a key added network virtualization benefit, as it was designed to be fully distributed and can be scaled out incrementally as demand increases. It also integrates with cloud management solutions so that virtual network device provisioning is automated. With MidoNet, users can virtualize the network stack for popular cloud platforms and reduce associated costs of managing the network. This impacts the overall economics of cloud computing by simplifying network requirements.

Supporting Quotes

“As enterprises and carriers embrace and build out IaaS clouds, an overlay-based network virtualization platform will soon be a must-have technology. The financial support of Innovation Network Corporation of Japan, and other key backers, validates our strategy as well as the work we’ve done over the past three years developing our industry leading product MidoNet. This funding will enable us to accelerate our product engineering, the establishment of partnerships, and the growth of our customer base. We look forward to delivering the most preformant, scalable and fault tolerant network virtualization solution to the IaaS infrastructure market.”

– Dan Mihai Dumitriu, CEO of Midokura

“With funding from INCJ and other key investment firms, we are now entering a new stage of growth in the network virtualization landscape. With our new financial support and management structure we will be able to better serve the global market. I’m excited to be able to accelerate Midokura’s product development and expand our sales channel and customer base.”

– Tatsuya Kato, Chairman of Midokura

“We, INCJ, strongly admire Midokura’s extremely high-value of its innovative network virtualization technology and globally distributed team. We are certain that Midokura’s MidoNet software already leads the global community of Software-Defined Networking, which solves problems over network infrastructure while the cloud service market grows rapidly. We also believe that Midokura has become a role model among startups for innovative software development, in order to foster attractive core industries from Japan in addition to manufacturing businesses.”

– Mr. Kimikazu Noumi, President & CEO of INCJ

About Midokura

Midokura is a global startup focused on network virtualization. Founded in 2010, the team has a pedigree including Amazon and Google, and has spent more than two years building MidoNet, a complete overlay network virtualization solution that integrates with cloud platforms such as OpenStack. Midokura has offices in San Francisco, Tokyo, Lausanne and Barcelona, and is on the web at http://www.midokura.com.

About Innovation Network Corporation of Japan

INCJ was established in July 2009 as a public-private partnership that provides financial, technological and management support for next-generation businesses. INCJ specifically supports those projects that combine technologies and varied expertise across industries and materialize open innovation. INCJ has the capacity to invest up to ?2.0 trillion. To date, INCJ has invested approximately ?600 billion in a total of 38 projects and is currently focused on a broad range of areas from green energy, electronics, IT and biotechnology to infrastructure-related sectors such as water supply. INCJ maintains a hands-on approach to investment, engaging in the business development of cutting-edge core technologies through intellectual property funds, expansion of venture companies and aggressive overseas development through initiatives such as restructuring and mergers of tech businesses and acquisitions of foreign companies.

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Really Simple Software Inc., maker of the streaming DVR “Simple.TV” platform, has raised $5 million in Series A financing from New World Ventures. New World Ventures, a member of The Pritzker Group, is a multi-stage venture capital firm.

PRESS RELEASE
Really Simple Software Inc., makers of the award-winning Simple.TV platform, announced it closed $5 million in Series A funding from New World Ventures.

Launched to critical acclaim in 2012 at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), Simple.TV bridges the gap between streaming video and broadcast TV, giving connected consumers the shows they love anywhere they are, anytime. Winner of “Best of CES 2012”, TIME magazine’s “Top 10 Gadgets of 2012”, and Popular Science’s “Best of What’s New”, Simple.TV is the perfect TV companion for consumers who love Netflix and other online streaming services but want access to live TV.

“The explosion of Internet-connected consumer electronics is rapidly changing television distribution and consumption. This phenomenon delivers tremendous benefits to consumers while also holding great promise for content owners and distributors,” said Matt McCall, New World Ventures partner. “Simple.TV serves the needs of both audiences and we look forward to partnering with its leadership team as they continue to expand their innovative platform for TV everywhere.”

Simple.TV is the world’s first streaming DVR, making it possible for consumers to instantly access live and recorded TV shows on their favorite tablet, phone, or connected TV screen, anywhere, anytime. The New World Ventures funding will be used to expand Simple.TV’s platform, enhance its cloud services, add new client applications across CE devices and expand its service beyond North America.

Simple.TV founder Mark Ely previously served as President of Strategy at Sonic Solutions. While at Sonic in the mid-1990′s, Mark and Simple.TV co-founder Bruce Randall developed the first commercial DVD authoring system for Hollywood studios. Sonic subsequently went on to become a dominant digital media technology provider to premium content owners, PC and CE manufactures and retailers through its Roxio, DivX and CinemaNow brands prior to its sale to Rovi Corp in 2010.

About Simple.TV

Simple.TV is on a mission to bring great TV and movie content to connected devices anywhere, anytime on any device. Simple.TV was launched in 2011 with seed capital from Accanto Partners, a super angel fund based in Tiburon, CA. For more information about Simple.TV, visit http://www.simple.tv.

About New World Ventures

New World Ventures, a member of The Pritzker Group, is a multi-stage venture capital firm helping entrepreneurs build market-leading information technology companies. Since its founding in 1996, the firm has worked side-by-side with entrepreneurs at more than 70 companies by providing a broad network of strategic relationships, advice based on several decades of experience, and capital with tremendous flexibility. Recent successes include Fleetmatics (NYSE: FLTX), SinglePlatform (acquired by Constant Contact), Zinch (acquired by Chegg), Playdom (acquired by Disney), LeftHand Networks (acquired by Hewlett-Packard), and TicketsNow (acquired by Ticketmaster).

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A major shareholder in Japan’s Seibu Holdings Inc. has supported the company’s stand against allowing private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP increase its stake in the railway and real estate group, the Nikkei daily said. Cerberus is trying, through a tender offer, to boost its stake in Seibu by four percentage points to 36.44 percent, the level at which it could veto major board decisions. Yoshiaki Tsutsumi is believed to own less than 1 percent of Seibu, but he also owns about 36 percent of NW Corp., whose interest of just under 15 percent makes it Seibu’s second-largest shareholder, the newspaper said.

(Reuters) – A major shareholder in Japan’s Seibu Holdings Inc has supported the company’s stand against allowing private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management LP increase its stake in the railway and real estate group, the Nikkei daily said.

Cerberus is trying, through a tender offer, to boost its stake in Seibu by four percentage points to 36.44 percent, the level at which it could veto major board decisions.

Yoshiaki Tsutsumi is believed to own less than 1 percent of Seibu, but he also owns about 36 percent of NW Corp, whose interest of just under 15 percent makes it Seibu’s second-largest shareholder, the newspaper said.

Quoting Seibu, the daily said Tsutsumi would not agree to Cerberus’s tender offer and had contacted Seibu to convey his stance. Tsutsumi has potentially made it harder for Cerberus to get its hands on the Seibu shares held by NW, it added.

The move comes as Seibu, which also operates hotels and department stores, is planning to go public again in a multi-billion dollar stock market listing originally planned for 2012.

The tender offer from Cerberus runs to April 23.

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CapMan Russia has created a new fund for investing in small and mid-sized Russian businesses. CapMan Russia II held a first close at the end of March, with EUR97 million ($124 million).

PRESS RELEASE
CapMan has established the CapMan Russia II fund. The first closing of the fund was held on 28 March 2013 at EUR97 million (approx. $124 million). The fund will invest in small and mid-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Russia. The positive impact of the increase in management fees as a result of the establishment of the fund is in line with previously provided guidance.

“The CapMan Russia II fund seeks to capitalise on the continued strong development of Russian SMEs through investments in fast-growing sectors, such as consumer goods and healthcare, and in the growth regions beyond Moscow and St. Petersburg. Our Moscow-based team has been successfully investing in Russian SMEs since 1996 and the establishment of this fund enables us to further build on our leading position in the Russian middle market. Deal flow remains strong and competition is still relatively low,” says Hans Christian Dall Nygård, Senior Partner and Head of CapMan Russia.

In addition to CapMan Plc and the CapMan Russia investment team, 10 investors have made commitments to the fund to date. CapMan’s and the team’s share of the commitments is EUR3 million, or approx. 3%. Fundraising for the fund continues.

“We are delighted to see a combination of existing and new LPs from the Nordics, Europe and the US in our fund. Total commitments for the 2008 vintage CapMan Russia fund were EUR118 million and we are pleased having achieved in excess of 80% of that amount already in the first closing. Russia remains a niche strategy for many LPs, but most LPs who have looked at the market fundamentals and our unique experience with fast-growing SMEs – including 28 exits and 17 years of operation – have been positively surprised by the attractiveness of this opportunity,” comments Jerome Bouix, Senior Partner, Head of Business Development and Investor Relations at CapMan.

In addition to commitments received in the first closing, the CapMan Russia II fund has received a further commitment from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) of approx. EUR20 million (approx. $26 million). The total EBRD commitment is capped at 30% of the fund size and subject to certain other conditions.

CapMan www.capman.com
CapMan Group is one of the leading private equity firms in the Nordic countries and Russia, with assets under management of EUR3.1 billion. CapMan has five key investment partnerships – CapMan Buyout, CapMan Russia, CapMan Credit, CapMan Public Market, and CapMan Real Estate – each of which has its own dedicated investment team and funds. Altogether, CapMan employs 110 people in
Helsinki, Stockholm, Oslo, Moscow and Luxembourg. CapMan was established in 1989 and has been listed on the Helsinki Stock Exchange since 2001.

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Allegan-Mich.-based Perrigo Company has acquired pet health company Velcera Inc. for approximately $160 million in cash. Perrigo is publicly traded.

PRESS RELEASE
The sale of privately-held Velcera, Inc. (“Velcera”) — a leading pet health company committed to providing consumers with best-in-class pet health products that contain the same active ingredients as branded veterinary products but at a significantly lower cost — to Allegan-Mich.-based Perrigo Company (Nasdaq: PRGO; TASE) closed today for approximately $160 million in cash.

Velcera and its FidoPharm subsidiary is best known for its flea and tick treatment PetArmor®, which is the No. 1 generic of Frontline® Top Spot containing the No. 1 vet-recommended active ingredient for flea and tick protection. PetArmor® is backed by 20 clinical trials to prove its effectiveness and safety. PetArmor’s® money-back “Protection Guarantee” promises to protect your dog or cat as well as Frontline® products or PetArmor® will refund the purchase price.

Velcera, together with major retail partners, has been instrumental in developing an OTC market for pet health products traditionally dispensed primarily by veterinarians. Retail sales of the PetArmor® franchise exceeded $100 million during calendar year 2012, the value-brand’s first full year on the market, having launched in April 2011.

Under Perrigo, the PetArmor® franchise brand will continue to enjoy the same broad distribution at retailers nationwide that pet consumers have come to expect since PetArmor® launched two years ago.

“The extraordinary synergies between Velcera and Perrigo means that even more pet owners can receive best-in-class pet health products,” said Dennis Steadman, Velcera’s president and CEO.

To learn more about PetArmor®, visit www.PetArmor.com Facebook: Facebook.com/PetArmor Twitter: Twitter.com/PetArmor YouTube: Youtube.com/PetArmor

Frontline® is the registered trademark of Merial Frontline® and Merial are not affiliated with PetArmor®

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Algenetix, an industrial biotech company, has raised $2 million in Series A-1 financing, the company announced Tuesday. The company’s funding is led by Two Oceans and unnamed San Diego, Calif.-based investors.

PRESS RELEASE
Algenetix, an industrial biotech company incubated from the pipeline of Kapyon Ventures, LLC, is pleased to announce it has closed $2.0M in Series A-1 funding to further commercialize its PhotoSeed platform. The groundbreaking technology vastly improves oil productivity in microbes by accelerating oil accumulation and subsequently preventing its degradation in the cell. The company’s funding is led by Two Oceans and local San Diego investors, and supported by Algenetix’s Executive Chairman, Dr. Jerry Caulder. With this funding, Algenetix will further advance its PhotoSeed program and develop renewable oils that can sustainably replace petroleum for fuels and chemicals without compromising land and food production resources.

“Unlike other similar technologies, Algenetix is charting a path to economically produce feed stocks that use low cost inputs and existing fermentation capacity under a very capital efficient business model, which is fitting for the current funding climate.”

“We have created a compelling IP portfolio and, with the support of Two Oceans and our existing investors, we are able to develop the technology more broadly than previously possible,” says Han Chen, CEO of Algenetix. “In addition to the capital, the investment has also expanded our visibility and engagement with new partnerships in North America, Australia, the Middle East and South East Asia – all of which are important markets.”

“Algenetix is an exciting new player making valuable feed stocks for chemicals, food and materials utilizing single cell organisms, such as yeast and algae,” says Arama Kukutai, Managing Director, Finistere Ventures GP II. “Unlike other similar technologies, Algenetix is charting a path to economically produce feed stocks that use low cost inputs and existing fermentation capacity under a very capital efficient business model, which is fitting for the current funding climate.”

Algenetix will be conducting the development in partnership with the laboratories of Dr. Janet Donaldson at Mississippi State University.

Algenetix (www.algenetix.com):
Algenetix is an industrial biotech company incubated from the Kapyon Ventures pipeline. The company develops single cell petrochemical alternatives using its proprietary PhotoSeed technology, which improves lipid productivity in industrial microbes.

Two Oceans:
Two Oceans is a Family Office based in Sydney, Australia, and is a potential limited partner in Finistere Venture’s Fund II.

Kapyon Ventures (www.kapyon.com):
Kapyon Ventures is a San Diego based incubation firm focused on the development of technology startups from global research institutes. Kapyon’s areas of focus include agricultural biotechnology, industrial biotechnology and cleantech. It works closely with U.S. and international research partners as managers for an investment portfolio of several biotechnology joint ventures.

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NetSocket, a provider of network service assurance technology, has raised $9.2 million in Series B funding. The round was led by new investor Venture Investors, with participation by existing investors Sevin Rosen Funds, Silver Creek Ventures and Trail Blazer Capital.

PRESS RELEASE
NetSocket, a leading provider of network service assurance solutions for unified communications (UC), announced today that the company has secured $9.2 million in Series B funding. The round was led by new investor Venture Investors, with participation by existing investors Sevin Rosen Funds, Silver Creek Ventures and Trail Blazer Capital.

“NetSocket has been innovating in the Unified Communications (UC) service assurance solutions space, as evidenced by the traction generated from our recently announced expanded collaboration with Microsoft. NetSocket’s Cloud Experience Manager (CEM) now optimizes Microsoft Lync UC service management and user’s experience”

The new capital will be used to accelerate the launch of a new solution, aimed at the dynamic and growing Software Defined Networking (SDN) market. The product announcement and launch are planned for this summer. “NetSocket has been innovating in the Unified Communications (UC) service assurance solutions space, as evidenced by the traction generated from our recently announced expanded collaboration with Microsoft. NetSocket’s Cloud Experience Manager (CEM) now optimizes Microsoft Lync UC service management and user’s experience,” said John White, president and CEO of NetSocket. “We plan to apply that same innovation and focused vision to the SDN market which we expect to experience explosive growth this year.”

Joining the Board of Directors at NetSocket will be Jim Adox, managing partner at Venture Investors. “NetSocket has the right mix to become a major market force; a proven leadership team experienced in service assurance and networking technologies, an incredible portfolio of intellectual property and patents, along with a strong communications-focused syndicate of investors,” commented Jim. “I’m very excited about how the new solution will apply the power of NetSocket’s service assurance, routing and policy control software into virtualized networks in an SDN architecture.”

About NetSocket
NetSocket is a leading innovator of network service assurance solutions, providing a trouble-free unified communications experience in enterprise and service provider environments.

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