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US HealthVest has raised $36 million in new financing. Investors include Polaris Partners; Richard Kresch; Fidelity Biosciences; George Conrades, chairman of Akamai Technologies; Trevi Health Ventures; Jonathan Bush, CEO of athenahealth; and Carl Byers, former CFO of athenahealth. The company is a provider of specialized psychiatric care.

PRESS RELEASE
US HealthVest, LLC announced today that it has raised $36 million through co-founders Richard Kresch, MD and Polaris Partners to acquire and develop psychiatric facilities with a focus on specialized, high-quality patient care. Co-investors include Fidelity Biosciences; George Conrades, Chairman of Akamai Technologies; Trevi Health Ventures; Jonathan Bush, CEO of athenahealth; Carl Byers, former CFO of athenahealth; and members of the US HealthVest management team.

US HealthVest is headed by Richard Kresch, who previously led Ascend Health, one of the largest private psychiatric hospital providers in the United States. Before its acquisition in 2012, Polaris-backed Ascend Health operated nine freestanding behavioral health facilities with nearly 900 beds.

“The need for quality psychiatric care is increasing rapidly. US HealthVest has the experience and resources to expand access to care by developing new facilities and acquiring existing facilities with untapped potential,” said Richard Kresch, MD, President and CEO of US HealthVest. “Through our past work, we have developed a strong reputation for working closely with local communities to meet unmet needs by creating important and impactful patient-focused facilities.”

“A new model for mental health services is needed to improve patient care,” said Brian Chee, US HealthVest board member and partner at Polaris Partners. “Polaris Partners is excited to back Richard and his strong team again as they make important contributions in this area of great need.”

“The US HealthVest team has a track record of combining high-quality mental health care with specialized programs and sound cost-structures,” said Jon Lim of Fidelity Biosciences. “We look forward to partnering with Dr. Kresch and Polaris in this new venture.”

About US HealthVest, LLC

We will provide specialized, high quality psychiatric care, including substance abuse treatment, through a broad range of inpatient and outpatient programs. With the development of new facilities and the acquisition of existing facilities, we will expand access to care with a patient-centric approach.

About Polaris Partners

We are multistage investors with proven experience in Healthcare, Technology and Consumer sectors. Our partnership invests across all company lifecycle stages as lead or co-lead investor. Many of our companies have achieved great success. In 2012 alone, ten of our companies realized important partnership acquisitions, including Ascend Health (acquired by Universal Health Services) Avila Therapeutics (acquired by Celgene); deCODE Genetics (acquired by Amgen); and Mark Monitor (acquired by Thomson Reuters). For more information on the firm, its mission and its portfolio companies visit www.polarispartners.com

About Fidelity Biosciences

Fidelity Biosciences invests venture capital in biopharmaceutical, medical technology, healthcare information technology and healthcare service companies. The firm is a subsidiary of FMR LLC, the parent company of Fidelity Investments, one of the world’s leading providers of financial services. For more than 40 years, Fidelity has been a significant presence in the venture capital and private equity industry.

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Private equity-backed Party City Holdings Inc. is buying publicly traded iParty Corp. for $0.45 per share. The price represents a 200% premium over the closing price of iParty common stock on February 28. Thomas H. Lee Partners acquired a majority stake in Party City in June 2012.

PRESS RELEASE
iParty Corp. (nyse mkt:IPT – news), a leading party goods retailer with a strong presence in New England, and Party City Holdings Inc., North America’s largest party supply retailer today announced that they have entered into a definitive merger agreement under which Party City will acquire iParty for $0.45 per share of iParty Common Stock and the greater of liquidation preference or conversion value for each share of iParty Preferred Stock, in cash. The purchase price for iParty Common Stock represents a 200% premium over the closing price of iParty Common Stock as of February 28, 2013.

“Party City is a leading player in our industry and we could not be more pleased with this outcome of the strategic review we initiated last year and the return it affords to all of our stockholders, both Common and Preferred,” said Sal Perisano, iParty’s Chairman and Chief Executive Officer. “The Party City network with their Amscan distribution platform will benefit our stores and products by significantly increasing our scale and broadening our geographic presence. We look forward to working with Party City and its management team as we integrate our companies.”

“We are excited to add iParty’s strong platform of retail stores to our vertically integrated business model,” said Gerald C. Rittenberg, Party City’s Chief Executive Officer. “By joining forces, we enhance our leadership position and accelerate our growth throughout New England, a densely populated region where we currently do not have a market presence. We have maintained a relationship with iParty for many years and have long admired their strong management team and well-recognized brand. We look forward to working together to expand our combined geographic footprint and brand presence on a national scale.”

The transaction, which is currently expected to close during the second quarter of 2013, is subject to customary closing conditions, including approval by iParty’s shareholders.

Under the Merger Agreement, iParty will actively solicit superior proposals from third parties for a period of 30 days continuing through March 31, 2013. iParty does not intend to disclose developments with respect to this solicitation process unless and until its Board of Directors has made a decision regarding any superior proposals that may be made. There can be no assurances that this solicitation will result in a superior proposal. For further information regarding all items and conditions contained in the definitive merger agreement, please see iParty’s Current Report on Form 8-K, which will be filed with the SEC in connection with this transaction.

In connection with the Merger Agreement, the directors, certain executive officers and the Estate of Robert Lessin, Robert H. Lessin Venture Capital, LLC and Boston Millennia Partners, LP, each significant stockholders, have signed agreements with Party City to vote their shares in favor of the Merger.

Thomas H. Lee Partners acquired a majority stake in Party City in June 2012. Ropes & Gray LLP acted as legal advisor to Party City on this transaction.

Raymond James & Associates, Inc. acted as financial advisor to iParty on this transaction and Posternak Blankstein & Lund LLP acted as legal advisor.

About Party City

Party City Holdings Inc. designs, manufactures, contracts for manufacture and distributes party goods, including paper and plastic tableware, metallic balloons, accessories, novelties, gifts, stationery and Halloween costumes, and is North America’s No. 1 party retailer with more than 750 company-owned and franchise locations throughout the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico. Headquartered in Rockaway, N.J., Party City became part of the Amscan Holdings, Inc., family in 2005. With Amscan’s worldwide facilities in Asia, Europe and Australia, as well as distribution centers in the Americas, the merger has made it possible to design, manufacture and distribute products in the United States and overseas. The vision of providing more party for less has made Party City the largest specialty party retailer and premiere Halloween destination in North America. Please visit our site at www.partycity.com.

About iParty Corp.

Headquartered in Dedham, Massachusetts, iParty Corp. is a party goods retailer that operates 54 iParty retail stores in New England and Florida and an internet site (www.iparty.com) for costume and related goods and party planning. iParty’s aim is to make throwing a successful event both stress-free and fun. With an extensive assortment of party supplies and costumes in our stores and available at our online store, iParty offers consumers a sophisticated, yet fun and easy-to-use, resource to help them customize any party, including birthday bashes, Easter get-togethers, graduation parties, summer barbecues and, of course, Halloween. In addition to the extensive assortment of costume and related merchandise available through iParty’s internet site our web site focuses on increasing customer visits to our retail stores by highlighting the ever changing store product assortment for all occasions and seasons and featuring sales flyers, enter-to-win contests, monthly coupons and ideas and themes offering consumers an easy and fun approach to any party. iParty aims to offer reliable, time-tested knowledge of party-perfect trends, and superior customer service to ensure convenient and comprehensive merchandise selections for every occasion. Please visit our site at www.iparty.com.

Additional Information and Where You Can Find It

In connection with the proposed transaction, iParty will file a proxy statement and other relevant documents concerning the proposed transaction with the SEC. Investors and security holders of iParty are urged to read the proxy statement and any other relevant documents filed with the SEC when they become available, because they will contain important information about iParty and the proposed transaction that should be considered before making a decision about the merger.

The proxy statement (when it becomes available) and any other documents filed by iParty with the SEC may be obtained free of charge at the SEC’s web site at www.sec.gov. In addition, investors and security holders may obtain free copies of the documents filed with the SEC by iParty by contacting David Robertson, iParty ‘s Chief Financial Officer, at 781-355-3770.

iParty and its directors and certain executive officers may, under SEC rules, be deemed to be participants in the solicitation of proxies from iParty’s shareholders in connection with the transaction. Information regarding the directors and executive officers and their respective interests in the Company by security holdings or otherwise is included in the Company’s proxy statements and Annual Reports on Form 10-K, previously filed with the SEC, and information concerning all of iParty’s participants in the solicitation will be included in the proxy statement relating to the proposed transaction when it becomes available.

Safe harbor statement under the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995

This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995 as contained in Section 27A of the Securities Act of 1933 and Section 21E of the Securities Exchange Act of 1934. You can identify these statements by the fact that they use words such as “anticipate,” “believe,” “estimate,” “expect,” “intend,” “project,” “plan,” “outlook,” and other words and terms of similar meaning. These statements involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the potential results discussed in the forward-looking statements. Among the factors that could cause actual results and outcomes to differ materially from those contained in such forward-looking statements are the following: conditions to the closing may not be satisfied and the transaction may involve unexpected costs, liabilities or delays any of which could cause the transaction not to be consummated and those risks and uncertainties set forth in iParty’s filings with the SEC. For a more detailed discussion of risks and uncertainties which could cause actual results to differ from those contained in the forward-looking statements, see Item 1A, “Risk Factors” of iParty’s most recently filed Annual Report on Form 10-K for the fiscal year ended December 31, 2011 and our other periodic reports filed with the SEC. iParty is providing this information as of this date, and does not undertake to update the information included in this press release, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

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Pathbrite, a San Francisco-based startup that provides digital portfolio software for students and professionals, has announced a $4 million round of Series A2 funding. The new round, which was led by testing giant ACT and included Rethink Education and other angel investors, brings the company’s total amount raised to $8 million.

Heather Hiles, Pathbrite’s CEO and founder, said the funding will help it refine its Pathbrite for Educators product, as well as spread the word about the company and help execute its go-to-market strategy.

“[With the] funding, we can keep our heads down and do what we’re doing,” she said.

Launched last year, Pathbrite enables students and professionals to collect, track and share the digital artifacts showcasing their achievements. It’s like “credentials 2.0,” Hiles told GigaOM last summer when it raised $2.5 million in a Series A round.

In K-12 and higher education classrooms, students can upload multimedia projects, drafts of papers and other materials to Pathbrite, where professors and teachers can add comments and grade the work. Professionals could also use the site to showcase videos of presentations, articles, PowerPoint decks and other documentation that provide a richer picture of achievement than a resume.

Educators have used forms of e-portfolios in the classroom for the past decade or so – from blogging platforms to Google Apps to Evernote to products connected to learning management systems (LMS) like Desire2Learn. But Pathbrite aims to be a standalone, cloud-based product that can accommodate all kinds of media and, conceivably, be a student’s showcase from grade school right into her professional life.

Pathbrite for Educators, which will be completed later this month, lets teachers and professors create templates that reflect their grading rubrics, easily track the progress of their class and assess each student’s individual work.

Hiles said Pathbrite is currently in more than 100 universities and school districts (with K-12 users slightly outnumbering those in higher ed). Stanford, for example, recently purchased 1000 licenses for students in its design, education and engineering schools. It’s also being piloted in Philadelphia public schools.

In addition to selling software licenses to institutions and districts, Pathbrite has also adopted model in which it sells directly to students in classes where the professor has made using e-portfolios a required activity.

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Oil Price Information Service has acquired mobile app and website GasBuddy. Terms of the deal were not disclosed. GasBuddy is an app that helps consumers find cheap gas prices.

PRESS RELEASE
Oil Price Information Service (OPIS) has acquired GasBuddy, the mobile app and website relied on by more than 26 million motorists to pinpoint the most comprehensive and accurate gasoline prices at service stations and convenience stores across the U.S. and Canada.

“Through our combined resources, consumers will have the very best retail fuel prices, tools and information to save money at the pump,” said OPIS CEO Brian Crotty. “I look forward to working shoulder-to-shoulder with Dustin Coupal and Jason Toews, co-founders of GasBuddy, and their talented staff,” he added.

“We are excited to gain access to OPIS’s enormous database of spot and wholesale gasoline prices and OPIS’ award-winning daily news wire,” said GasBuddy co-founder Jason Toews. “That access will further enhance GasBuddy’s ability to alert consumers to retail gasoline and diesel price changes in the marketplace.”

OPIS will also accelerate investment in GasBuddy’s “OpenStore” software, which enables convenience stores to reach their customers with highly targeted value offerings. “Expanding the couponing features of this platform will provide discounts to consumers for a host of products and services sold at service stations and convenience stores,” Crotty added.

Horizon Partners served as financial advisor to GasBuddy / OpenStore in this transaction. To learn more, visit www.horizonpartners.com.

About GasBuddy
GasBuddy is a leading consumer app and website to help consumers find cheap gas prices. People use the website and app to share the gas prices that they see on their daily commutes. Through the efforts of millions of consumers, GasBuddy makes it easy to find cheap gas prices. The GasBuddy app is available to download for free at: www.gasbuddy.com/GasBuddyMobileApps.aspx.

(www.gasbuddy.com)

About OpenStore

OpenStore is the industry leading multi-channel marketing solution that brings mobile app, website, email, SMS, and social media marketing to convenience store companies. Through its marketing solution, convenience stores deliver content and digital coupons, which build customer loyalty and increase sales. More than 6,000 convenience stores rely on OpenStore’s multi-channel marketing solution (www.OpenStoreLoyalty.com).

About OPIS

OPIS, a subsidiary of UCG, is a leading source for worldwide petroleum pricing and news information and has offices in Gaithersburg, MD; Wall, NJ; St. Paul, MN; Gothenburg, Sweden and Singapore. Every day, OPIS publishes spot prices for all refined products, more than 30,000 wholesale gasoline and diesel rack prices and more than 110,000 retail fuel prices (www.opisnet.com). Through its subsidiary, Axxis Software, OPIS also provides leading-edge software solutions for petroleum marketers looking to automate price collection, data storage and repricing of dealer and commercial accounts. (www.axxispetro.com)

About UCG

Founded in 1977, UCG is one of America’s leading, privately held providers of specialized business-to-business information. UCG’s portfolio is composed of companies serving the information and software needs of decision makers in health care, oil and energy, technology, telecommunications, banking and finance, and the mortgage industry. The company has received many awards for journalistic excellence and was voted one of D.C.’s 50 Best Places to Work by Washingtonian Magazine.

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I’ve been using Sonos’ brand new PLAYBAR for over a week, but it was apparent that the product is a hit even after just a few hours of use. The Sonos PLAYBAR is a sound bar, a high quality bar-shaped speaker enclosure that can be mounted below your television on the wall, or placed on your entertainment console to combine three front speakers into one. What makes the Sonos PLAYBAR so amazing is that it finally tackles a space that was so confusing, so commercialized, and so devoid of any innovation whatsoever.

Continue reading…

When movies were first introduced in the late 1800’s, they were silent. Three decades later, the invention of synchronized soundtracks satisfied our natural desire to hear what is seen. Soundtracks unleashed a wave of creativity in filmmaking that transformed the audience experience. ET would not be the same without the famous score. Jaws would just be a silly robotic fish rather than a movie that kept people out of the water. Today, it’s hard to imagine movies without sound. Sound made movies whole.

Television is undergoing an analogous transformation. Although we sometimes watch with family or friends, we mostly experience TV in relative social isolation. We are disconnected from most of the people watching with us, deaf to the roar of the crowd during a game or the laughter of the audience after a punch line. We have learned to suppress our urge to talk about what moves us, settling instead for chance meetings at the water cooler the day after.

But all that has changed with the sudden rise of realtime social media, particularly Twitter. Just in the United States, tens of millions of people are talking to each other as they watch TV. This year’s Super Bowl alone spurred over 24 million tweets. After 80 years of sequestered viewing, television audiences worldwide have forged Twitter into a social soundtrack for TV. If you are not part of the soundtrack yet, chances are that you will be soon.

I personally felt the impact of the social soundtrack last year as my wife Rupal and I watched the second U.S. presidential debate. When Mitt Romney blurted out “binders full of women,” I recognized he had said something offensive but I wondered, just how bad was that? Rupal thought it was really bad, but I was less sure. Then I glanced down at my phone and saw my Twitter feed light up with negative reactions. In that instant, my mind was made up: realtime social influence nudged me to conclude that far from a harmless slip of the tongue, Romney had inadvertently provided a glimpse of his troubling position on gender equality. I had no need for post-debate pundits to opine on the matter, my social network settled the issue. During that same debate just a few minutes later I found myself asking, “Did President Obama really just say gangbanger?” Rupal was not so sure. In a moment I had my answer in a tweet (*): “Prediction: we will soon learn about binders full of gangbangers.” I read the tweet to my wife, we shared a laugh, and so the social soundtrack flowed naturally into our home, making our TV experience whole.

While this exemplifies the social soundtrack’s impact on live TV viewing, it’s also perceptible before and after a show airs. Hearing chatter about a show is becoming a common way to discover new programs and decide what to watch. After a show airs, social commentary often spills over for hours if not days. As a result, content creators, TV networks, and advertisers have new opportunities to engage their audience over longer spans of time.

As I recently wrote, this shift in audience behavior is driving deep changes in the global media landscape:

We are witnessing the creation of a fundamentally new mode of human communication. One-way broadcast TV has been augmented with millions of real-time audience feedback signals that are shaping audience decisions of what to watch and how to interpret what they see. This new force promises to redefine how political campaigns of the future will be won, how marketers will sell, and over time this mass-interactive medium will give rise to new forms of news and entertainment.

Although audience voices predominantly fill the social soundtrack, there is ample room for all constituents of the TV ecosystem to join the conversation. Marketers are experimenting with campaigns that seamlessly span TV and Twitter. Integrating hashtags into TV ads leads TV audiences to participate in authentic conversations about brands and products. Marketers are using Twitter for realtime response to TV — see Oreo. In the future, marketers will be able to synchronize and coordinate their messaging automatically at scale across TV and Twitter to provide the combined benefits of TV’s sight, sound, and motion with social media’s contextualized targeting and canvas for authentic engagement.

Most exciting for me, however, is the future of content creation. What new TV shows will be created from the ground up to leverage the social soundtrack? What will be the Jaws or ET of social TV? What yet-to-be-invented genres of content will emerge? As social TV finds its stride, we’ll gradually forget that TV ever existed in a social vacuum. Just as the distinction between movies and “talkies” faded as sound became an expected part of movies, we will shift from “social TV” back to just “TV” and simply expect all TV to include a social soundtrack. At that point, a deep transformation of TV will be complete.

(*) This tweet came from Brian Bedol, Bluefin Labs investor and board member. Coincidentally, it was Brian who first suggested to me the analogy of realtime social media as a soundtrack for TV.

Prospect Capital provided a a $70 million term loan to support the recapitalization of subsidiaries of Cinedigm Digital Cinema Corp., the company announced. New York-based Cinedigm makes digital cinema distribution and exhibition software.

PRESS RELEASE
Prospect Capital Corporation PSEC -0.13% (“Prospect”) announced today that Prospect has provided a $70 million term loan to support the recapitalization of subsidiaries of Cinedigm Digital Cinema Corp. CIDM +9.49% (“Cinedigm”).

Headquartered in New York, New York, Cinedigm is a leader in the digital entertainment revolution. Cinedigm’s pioneering digital cinema deployment and servicing efforts, and its state-of-the-art distribution and exhibition software, are cornerstones of the digital cinema transformation. Cinedigm is also the leading digital aggregator of independent content in the world, providing end-to-end digital content delivery to theaters, digital and on-demand platforms, and DVD/Blu-ray. Through partnerships with iTunes, Netflix, Amazon, Google, Hulu, Vudu, Xbox, Playstation, and others, Cinedigm reaches a global digital audience. Cinedigm’s library of over 18,000 movies and television episodes includes award-winning documentaries from Docurama Films(R), next-generation independents from Flatiron Film Company(R), and acclaimed independent films and festival picks through partnerships with the Sundance Institute and Tribeca Film.

“We appreciate Prospect’s creativity with this complex transaction, which positions Cinedigm for growth in the digital entertainment marketplace,” said Adam Mizel, COO and CFO of Cinedigm.

“With our deep expertise in media and technology industries, as well as other verticals, Prospect is pleased to support Cinedigm, a market leader in its industry,” said Ted Fowler, Managing Director of Prospect Capital Management LLC. “We are interested in pursuing other large financing and investment opportunities with small-cap public companies like Cinedigm, closely held private companies, and private equity owned companies.”

ABOUT PROSPECT CAPITAL CORPORATION
Prospect Capital Corporation (www.prospectstreet.com) is a closed-end investment company that lends to and invests in private and microcap public businesses. Our investment objective is to generate both current income and long-term capital appreciation through debt and equity investments.

We have elected to be treated as a business development company under the Investment Company Act of 1940 (“1940 Act”). We are required to comply with a series of regulatory requirements under the 1940 Act as well as applicable NASDAQ, federal and state rules and regulations. We have elected to be treated as a regulated investment company under the Internal Revenue Code of 1986. Failure to comply with any of the laws and regulations that apply to us could have an adverse effect on us and our shareholders.

This press release contains forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995, whose safe harbor for forward-looking statements does not apply to business development companies. Any such statements, other than statements of historical fact, are highly likely to be affected by other unknowable future events and conditions, including elements of the future that are or are not under our control, and that we may or may not have considered; accordingly, such statements cannot be guarantees or assurances of any aspect of future performance. Actual developments and results are highly likely to vary materially from any forward-looking statements. Such statements speak only as of the time when made, and we undertake no obligation to update any such statement now or in the future.

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Carlsberg has launched a partial take-over bid worth 2.65 billion Danish crowns ($461.49 million) for 30.31 percent of the shares in Chongqing Brewery Company, Reuters reported Monday. If the bid of RMB 20 per share is successful Carlsberg, which announced its immediate plans to up its stake in the Chinese brewery last week, will gain control of CBC and potentially own up to 60 percent of the shares.

(Reuters) – Carlsberg (CARLb.CO) has launched a partial take-over bid worth 2.65 billion Danish crowns ($461.49 million) for 30.31 percent of the shares in Chongqing Brewery Company (600132.SS), the Danish brewer said on Monday.

If the bid of RMB 20 per share is successful Carlsberg, which announced its immediate plans to up its stake in the Chinese brewery last week, will gain control of CBC and potentially own up to 60 percent of the shares.

The second largest shareholder in CBC, Chongqing Beer Co, has committed to selling its shares with the aim of disposing of its remaining 20 percent stake in CBC,” Carlsberg said in a statement.

“Our Asian business is very important for our long-term growth strategy and we are very pleased that we now can take this important step forward in China”, Carlsberg CEO and President, Jorgen Buhl Rasmussen, said in the statement.

Carlsberg, which inherited a stake in Chongqing Brewery through its takeover of Britain’s Scottish and Newcastle, raised it in 2010 to make it the biggest shareholder in the Chinese company with 29.7 percent.

Asia has become the main battle ground for the world’s biggest brewers. The region accounted for 18 percent of Carlsberg’s total sales volume in 2011 and 12 percent of its operating profit.

Carlsberg, like other beer companies, has been relying on high-growth emerging markets to compensate for weak sales in Europe. But in February the Danish brewer reported that sales growth had stalled in key market Russia.

Last year, Carlsberg said it aimed to increase its stake in Chongqing Brewery to 100 percent as the company tries to offset Europe’s weakness, much like bigger rivals AB Inbev (ABI.BR), SABMiller (SAB.L) and Heineken (HEIN.AS).

The Carlsberg share is up 0.1 percent at 1047 GMT, underperforming the Copenhagen main index .OMXC20, which rises 0.6 percent.

($1 = 5.7423 Danish crowns)

(Reporting by Johan Ahlander; editing by Niklas Pollard)

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U.K. supermarket chain Tesco on Monday announced three new hires to oversee its forthcoming digital entertainment services. Tesco plans to launch an ebookstore called blinkboxbooks and a digital music store called blinkboxmusic later this year, and will roll out Clubcard TV, an ad-supported streaming TV and movie site, soon.

Gavin Sathianathan, who was Facebook’s head of retail for Europe, the Middle East and Africa, will be managing director of blinkboxbooks. Mark Bennett, who was head of digital at U.K. supermarket chain Sainsbury’s, will be managing director of blinkboxmusic. And Scott Deutrom, who was director of advertising at blinkbox, will be managing director of Clubcard TV.

Tesco bought a majority stake in video streaming site blinkbox in 2011 and acquired white-label ebook service Mobcast and streaming music service We7 last year. Those services will be the foundations of the new blinkbox sites.

The Telegraph has more:

“The three Blinkbox retail sites will sit separately from Tesco’s main online store and will only carry subtle Tesco branding. However, the supermarket will advertise the sites heavily in store and use them to ensure that customers in search of specialist online sites for books, music, films and TV box sets continue buying from the Tesco empire instead of falling into the habit of shopping for entertainment products elsewhere. It will target the millions of customers who still haven’t started shopping online in a big way.”

“The development of these new services demonstrates our total commitment to providing the very best entertainment as easily as possible for our customers,” Michael Comish, Tesco’s CEO of digital entertainment, said in a statement. “They allow us to provide even more choice in how customers buy and enjoy their entertainment.”

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Today, Google is celebrating South African singer and political activist Miriam Makeba.

Makeba was born in Johannesburg in 1932. Her professional career began in 1950 as part of the jazz group the Manhattan Brothers. Shortly after that, Makeba joined an all-female group called the Skylarks. In 1956, she scored her first hit “Pata Pata.”

After visiting the United States, Makeba was denied entry back into South Africa in 1960. For thirty years, Makeba lived in exile. She returned to her home country in 1990, shortly after Nelson Mandela was released from prison.

In her long career, Makeba won a Grammy award, sang for President John F. Kennedy, and became a “citizen of the world.” In her lifetime, Makeba held nine different passports and honorary citizenship in ten different countries. Throughout her exile, Makeba was a strong anti-apartheid activist.

Makeba died in 2008 after suffering a heart attack performing her first hit, “Pata Pata.” Today would have been her 81st birthday.

In today’s Google Doodle, the famed singer serves at the second “g” in the refashioned logo.

Here we go again. Amazon is offering a month-long free trial of its Trusted Advisor cloud services monitoring tool. That may seem kind of ho-hum news for rank-and-file Amazon Web Services observers, but for a half dozen or so small companies that hoped to make their living providing similar services, this freebie is a big deal.

News of an updated version of Trusted Advisor — complete with new features and its free trial (for the month of March) was unveiled on the AWS blog early Monday morning. Before now Trusted Advisor was available to customers that signed up for enterprise or business class AWS support.

According to the blog, Trusted Advisor looks over a  customers’ AWS environment and makes suggestions on how to save money, boost performance and shutter security gaps:

“Because the AWS Trusted Advisor draws upon the aggregated operational history of hundreds of thousands of AWS customers, you can be confident that the recommendations that it makes can help you to save money, bolster your security profile, improve the fault tolerance of your application, and  increase overall performance. This is a unique and powerful benefit that is only possible with cloud-based, API-enabled infrastructure.”

Meanwhile, companies like Newvem, Cloudyn, Cloud Vertical and Cloudability have to be more than a little worried about this new tool, although they’d be the first to tell you that their own respective offerings watch and measure AWS better than Amazon itself does.

A Newvem spokesman characterized the freebie as big news for AWS users and “a great value as a broken-to-fix support play  as in something is wrong with my security, I’ll use Trusted Advisor to fix it.” But, he added, Newvem provides more insights on how to improve a user’s AWS resource usage and to evaluate costs, risks and assets. Newvem started charging for its service late last year.

Amazon’s news is a no-brainer for a company that knows it needs to provide more enterprise-class support and monitoring options to placate enterprises used to having such tools, as GigaOM reported last summer.  But it also illustrates the issue that, to grow, Amazon is encroaching more and more on spaces pioneered by small members of its ecosystem.  Being an AWS technology partner is a risky proposition that is not for the faint-of-heart or the slow-of-foot.

What about the little guys?

Usually, when small companies characterize a huge company’s incursion into their territory as a validation of their strategy, it’s time to pat them on the head and offer condolences. In this case, however, there is some truth that a smaller, more nimble third party (aka Newvem, Cloudyn, et al) can offer more value.

As Forrester Research analyst Dave Bartoletti told me last month with regard to some Cloudyn news:

“Amazon’s tools will get better and better but Amazon has no desire to get you to use less of its services. It’s like in storage — You’d think EMC would be the best vendor of storage management but historically they haven’t been.”

 

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Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. announced the appointments of Hiro Shimizu and Sakae Suzuki as directors for KKR Japan. Shimizu joined from Goldman Sachs Japan, where he served as Managing Director and Head of the Financial Institutions Group within the Financing Group. Suzuki joins from McKinsey & Company, where he most recently served as a principal.

PRESS RELEASE
Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. L.P. (together with its affiliates, “KKR”) today announced the appointment of Hiro Shimizu and Sakae Suzuki as Directors for KKR Japan. Mr. Shimizu joined KKR Capital Markets from Goldman Sachs Japan, where he most recently served as Managing Director and Head of the Financial Institutions Group within the Financing Group. Mr. Suzuki joins KKR Capstone from McKinsey & Company, where he most recently served as a Principal with particular expertise in telecom, media & technology, and operations.

In their new roles, Mr. Shimizu and Mr. Suzuki will work alongside KKR’s team in Tokyo led by Shusaku Minoda, Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer of KKR Japan. This increases KKR Japan’s team to 12 people based in Tokyo.

“The addition of directors for both KKR Capital Markets and KKR Capstone in Tokyo evidences KKR’s optimism for and commitment to the Japan market,” said Joseph Y. Bae, Managing Partner of KKR Asia. “Hiro and Sakae will increase KKR’s ability to bring value-add to Japanese companies as they increase their global competitiveness.”

“We are pleased to welcome world-class talent like Hiro and Sakae to the KKR Japan team,” said Shusaku Minoda. “Hiro will use his extensive experience to expand the presence of KKR Capital Markets in Japan, while supporting and expanding our large and growing base of Japanese investors. As a member of the global KKR Capstone team, Sakae will apply his skills in operational improvement across a wide range of industries to support the growth of KKR investments in Japan and worldwide.”

Mr. Shimizu spent 14 years at Goldman Sachs, where he held various positions during his tenure, including Head of Credit and Alternative Sales within FICC as well as Head of Distribution for Japan within the Special Situations Group. He has extensive experience in marketing alternative products across a broad spectrum of credit, equity and real estate products, which he marketed to institutional clients. Mr. Shimizu holds a BA in Economics from Vassar College.

Mr. Suzuki began his career at McKinsey & Company, where he worked for three years before moving to Gateway Japan, where he served as Senior Manager Business Planning and Online Sales. He then joined Global Freight Exchange (GF-X), where he held the titles of Senior Vice President of GF-X and President of GF-X Japan. Following GF-X, he moved to ZS Associates, where he served as Senior Manager, overseeing sales force effectiveness improvement at medical diagnostic and medical device companies, before returning to McKinsey. Mr. Suzuki holds a BA from Reed College, and a PhD from California Institute of Technology in Physical Chemistry.

About KKR

Founded in 1976 and led by Henry Kravis and George Roberts, KKR is a leading global investment firm with US$75.5 billion in assets under management as of December 31, 2012. With offices around the world, KKR manages assets through a variety of investment funds and accounts covering multiple asset classes. KKR Japan, established in 2006, is an integral part of KKR’s Asia Pacific team, which consists of more than 90 executives in seven offices across the region. KKR Japan’s experienced team of executives has established itself as a key player in Japan’s evolving private equity marketplace. In 2010, KKR completed an investment in a leading recruitment services firm Intelligence Ltd. from Usen Corporation. In 2011, KKR and Itochu Corporation were co-investors in Samson Investment Company, one of the largest private exploration and production companies in the United States. Also that year, KKR, Google and Recurrent Energy, a U.S. subsidiary of Sharp Corporation, formed a venture to invest in solar projects in the US. KKR has pan-Asian pool of capital of more than US$5 billion invested in 28 companies across the region. KKR’s portfolio is mixed by country, industry and sector and includes both minority and control investments. KKR seeks to create value by bringing operational expertise to its portfolio companies and through active oversight and monitoring of its investments. KKR complements its investment expertise and strengthens interactions with investors through its client relationships and capital markets platform. KKR & Co. L.P. is publicly traded on the New York Stock Exchange KKR +0.38% , and “KKR,” as used in this release, includes its subsidiaries, their managed investment funds and accounts, and/or their affiliated investment vehicles, as appropriate. For additional information on KKR, please visit KKR’s website at www.kkr.com.

KKR Capital Markets (KCM) has a platform of more than 30 investment professionals globally across debt and equity capital markets. KCM supports our firm, our portfolio companies and select third-party clients by providing tailored capital markets advice and by developing and implementing both traditional and non-traditional capital solutions for investments and companies seeking financing. Our capital markets services include arranging debt and equity financing for transactions, placing and underwriting securities offerings, structuring new investment products and providing capital markets services.

KKR Capstone is a team of more than 60 operating executives across North America, Europe, and Asia who work exclusively with KKR portfolio companies to drive operational improvements. KKR Capstone is dedicated to delivering management expertise in functional areas such as pricing, organizational design, sales force effectiveness, and operational efficiency. This integrated, global team is one of the most experienced in the private equity industry. KKR Capstone is a consulting firm owned and controlled by their senior management and is not a subsidiary of KKR.

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What we have here is a nice driver quality 1963 Chevrolet Corvette split window coupe. One of the rarest Corvettes ever produced, the split window was available for one model year only. What I like about this ad is that the owner seems to be giving a very fair and honest description of the car. The Ermine white lacquer paint for instance is said to be in nice shape, but does have some cracking and the undercarriage, although clean, is not detailed. Equipped with a numbers matching 327 cu.in. V8, a Borg Warner T-10 4-speed and showing a very nice a red interior, this beautiful coupe is sure to stand out wherever it’s driven. The “buy it now” price is set at $65,000.00 U.S. which seems in line with other ’63 Corvettes on the market. So, if you’re interested you can click through to see a few more pics, or go directly to the eBay link below.

Source: eBayMotors.com

BGR confirmed some of the best news BlackBerry could possibly get late last week, but not everyone is convinced that the BlackBerry Z10 will have the same draw in the United States. The nation’s No.3 carrier Sprint (S) recently confirmed to Bloomberg that it will be the only top carrier in the U.S. to pass on BlackBerry’s (BBRY) first next-generation smartphone. Instead, Sprint will wait for the BlackBerry Q10 before it gives the new BlackBerry 10 platform any support. “We aren’t saying there’s anything different about our customers,” a Sprint spokesperson said. “We think our customers will be happy with the qwerty keyboard and touch screen on the Q10.”

Buyout group CVC Capital Partners has appointed former Lloyds Banking Group boss Eric Daniels as a senior adviser in its Global Financial Institutions Group. Daniels was group chief executive at Lloyds. He stepped down in 2011 from Lloyds, which he first joined in 2001 as a group executive director, Reuters wrote..

(Reuters) – Buyout group CVC Capital Partners has appointed former Lloyds Banking Group boss Eric Daniels as a senior adviser in its Global Financial Institutions Group (FIG).

In a statement on Monday, CVC said Daniels starts in his new position immediately.

“With (Daniels’) breadth of knowledge and understanding in banking, insurance and wealth management we hope to further strengthen our capabilities and build on the success the FIG team has achieved over the past four years,” CVC Managing Partner Jonathan Feuer said.

Daniels was group chief executive at Lloyds. He stepped down om 2011 from Lloyds, which he first joined in 2001 as a group executive director.

He holds a similar advisory position at investment banking boutique StormHarbour.

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Canon today announced the successful creation of a new full-frame CMOS sensor, designed exclusively for shooting video. The new sensor can capture full-HD video with extremely low noise in settings where it has been hard for traditional cameras to even operate at all in the past. The sensor will have immediate benefits for astrophotography and for use in security systems, but the developments here could eventually help improve the quality of professional and consumer cameras, too.

The new sensor from Canon features large pixels, each of which measure around 7.5x those found on the sensor Canon uses in its EOS-1DX DSLR. The larger pixels are paired with new noise reduction technologies that counteract the added noise effect of using larger pixels, which allows for full HD video shooting in environments as dark as an outdoor setting with just a crescent moon providing illumination. That means it can capture video with fully visible objects even in situations where the human eye would be hard-pressed to make out any definite shapes.

Canon has already built a prototype device to test out the new sensor, and captured things like footage from a room where only lit incense sticks provided any light, the Geminid meteor shower and other night sky scenes. The prototype would be most useful in the immediate future for astronomical and nature photography, medial research and security implementations, but through “further development,” Canon imagines similar CMOS sensor tech will also be able to greatly improve other more creative pursuits.

Low light video is already an impressive feature of full-frame DSLR cameras, but a sensor like this that takes things to the extreme could take nighttime video capture to a whole new level. Imagine greatly reducing the cost of filming at night, for instance, or, depending on how things progress, bringing similar improvements to mobile and smartphone shooters. We’re still a long way off from that, but this is a very impressive first step, as you can see from the sample video available on Canon’s own site.

Prepublication Now Available

The childhood obesity epidemic is an urgent public health problem. The most recent data available show that nearly 19 percent of boys and about 15 percent of girls aged 2-19 are obese, and almost a third of U.S. children and adolescents are overweight or obese (Ogden et al., 2012). The obesity epidemic will continue to take a substantial toll on the health of Americans. In the midst of this epidemic, children are exposed to an enormous amount of commercial advertising and marketing for food. In 2009, children aged 2-11 saw an average of more than 10 television food ads per day (Powell et al., 2011). Children see and hear advertising and marketing messages for food through many other channels as well, including radio, movies, billboards, and print media. Most notably, many new digital media venues and vehicles for food marketing have emerged in recent years, including Internet-based advergames, couponing on cell phones, and marketing on social networks, and much of this advertising is invisible to parents.

The marketing of high-calorie, low-nutrient foods and beverages is linked to overweight and obesity. A major 2006 report from the Institute of Medicine (IOM) documents evidence that television advertising influences the food and beverage preferences, requests, and short-term consumption of children aged 2-11 (IOM, 2006). Challenges and Opportunities for Change in Food Marketing to Children and Youth also documents a body of evidence showing an association of television advertising with the adiposity of children and adolescents aged 2-18. The report notes the prevailing pattern that food and beverage products marketed to children and youth are often high in calories, fat, sugar, and sodium; are of low nutritional value; and tend to be from food groups Americans are already overconsuming. Furthermore, marketing messages that promote nutrition, healthful foods, or physical activity are scarce (IOM, 2006). To review progress and explore opportunities for action on food and beverage marketing that targets children and youth, the IOM’s Standing Committee on Childhood Obesity Prevention held a workshop in Washington, DC, on November 5, 2012, titled “New Challenges and Opportunities in Food Marketing to Children and Youth.”

[Read the full report]

Topics: Food and Nutrition

Berkshire Hathaway Inc. is on the hunt for more deals like its planned purchase of H.J. Heinz Co, Warren Buffett, the conglomerate’s chief executive, said on Monday, Reuters reported. Berkshire likes the ketchup maker’s business, the price of the $23 billion deal, and its partner in the transaction, private equity firm 3G Capital, Buffett said in an extended interview.

(Reuters) – Berkshire Hathaway Inc is on the hunt for more deals like its planned purchase of H.J. Heinz Co, Warren Buffett, the conglomerate’s chief executive, said on Monday.

“If we get a chance to buy another Heinz, we will do that,” Buffett said on CNBC.

Berkshire likes the ketchup maker’s business, the price of the $23 billion deal, and its partner in the transaction, private equity firm 3G Capital, Buffett said in an extended interview.

“We hope to own Heinz 100 years from now,” Buffett said. “If you own great brands and you take care of them, they’re terrific assets,” he said.

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Markley Group, which made its name as a colocation, peering and data center provider in the heart of Boston, is adding business-class cloud capabilities to the mix with its new Markley Cloud Services, slated to debut on Tuesday.

The move shows that data center providers — companies like Equinix and Markley — see the need to add cloud services to their repertory. “Data center customers who buy cage space are all asking for additional services — it’s ‘bring me a cloud or I’m leaving’” said Carl Brooks, analyst at The 451 Group. One of Markley’s aces in the hole is that this Boston site sits smack dab atop the biggest telco and ISP interconnect site in the region. And, as we all now know, proximity to those fiber pipes is gold for data center customers who want the fastest possible connections to their end users and partners.

The new services take advantage of Markley’s data center know-how and its proximity to those telcos and ISPs which are colocated in this Downtown Crossing facility.

The initial Markley Cloud implementation builds on VMware technology, and Cisco Unified Compute Systems, NetApp storage, and Juniper routers but Markley is also “playing around with OpenStack,” said  Joshua Myles, product manager. “We polled 200 or so of our customers and 87 percent of them are VMware shops so we went with what they were comfortable with,” Myles said in a recent interview.

The new services mean that existing Markley business customers who want to try out a hybrid cloud model can “burst” workloads as needed from their own resources to Markley’s cloud.

The direct fiber links between Markley’s data center and the carrier hotel in the same building is a huge benefit to Markley and its customers, which include The New York Times, W.B. Mason, the Boston Red Sox, MIT, Harvard University, the Boston Internet Peering Exchange and other companies which prefer not to be named.

Initially, the new cloud services will be offered from this site, but will roll out at other Markley data centers across the country later, Myles said.  In total, Markley runs 13 data center sites in the U.S. and Europe.

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