1020 Placecast, a location-based ad network and platform, has raised $5 million in a second round of funding. New investor Quatrex Capital joined for this round, with participation from previous backers Onset Ventures and Voyager Capital. 1020 will use the money to continue building out its location-based ad targeting technology.
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Hark, the herald angels sing! Total ad spend will rise this autumn, after nine consecutive quarters of annual decline, according to an Advertising Association and WARC forecast.
Yahoo has hired Jeff Bronikowski, who until a year ago was SVP of global digital initiatives at Universal Music Group, as the new head of Yahoo Music, according to Billboard; he is replacing Michael Spiegelman, who is now the senior director of global entertainment and lifestyles products at Yahoo (NSDQ: YHOO).
Google (NSDQ: GOOG) has lowered its “equipment recovery fee” to $150 from $350 when customers drop its Nexus One phone before their contract with T-Mobile USA officially expires.
If only the rest of Electronic Arts’ businesses could be doing so well ... During the company’s earnings call Monday, executives said that the company’s digital business was “growing very rapidly and (is) profitable” (Executives had said during a call last quarter that digital was in fact now the most profitable part of EA’s business).
» AOL (NYSE: AOL) is mulling over serious bids for its ICQ instant messaging service.
With sales of traditional video games down, Electronic Arts (NSDQ: ERTS) continues to look (so far unsuccessfully) for its digital business to make up the gap.
Electronic Arts (NSDQ: ERTS)—which continues to try to move its business “beyond the console”—is bringing Madden NFL to Facebook.
Google (NSDQ: GOOG), which shook up the e-mail industry when it integrated chat with e-mail, is now trying to catch up to its rivals by letting Gmail users share status updates.
Even with all the focus on local online ads by newspapers and directories sites, large parts of the space remain untapped.