News Briefs

NanoPass Technologies, a developer of painless skin delivery solutions for vaccines and large molecules , announced it has recently closed a new round of financing, led by Israel HealthCare Ventures (IHCV), a healthcare-dedicated venture capital fund, with the participation of existing investors. The capital raised will be used to accelerate the market penetration of NanoPass’ applications through additional licenses with pharmaceutical companies. NanoPass is based in Nes Ziona, Israel.

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Allot Communications announced that it has signed a definitive agreement to acquire Oversi Networks, a provider of rich-media caching and content delivery solutions for Internet video and peer-to-peer (P2P) traffic. Under the terms of the acquisition, Allot will be paying $16 million in cash, as well as up to $5 million based on Oversi’s performance during 2012. The acquisition is subject to the satisfaction of certain closing conditions and is expected to close during the third quarter of 2012. Oversi is based in Petach Tikva, Israel.

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Mobli, a real-time photo and video sharing mobile application, announced a new partnership with the tennis champion Serena Williams, to launch her channel in the company’s application, documenting her journey to the 2012 London Olympics. According to Forbes, Williams invested an undisclosed amount in the company, adding to investments from the actors Leonardo DiCaprio and Tobey Maguire. The company is headquartered in NYC with an R&D center in Ramat Gan, Israel.

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Chiasma, a privately held biopharma company, announced that it closed a $38.5 million equity financing co-led by new investor Abingworth and current investor MPM Capital. The round also included investments from existing shareholders. The proceeds will be used complete the phase 3 trial of Octreolin, the company’s proprietary oral form of the peptide octreotide, which is planned to be completed in the second quarter of 2013. Chiasma, based in Jerusalem, is developing oral drugs that previously were only available by injection, thereby providing patients with pain-free medications that are self-administered.

 

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Correlsense, a provider of application performance management software, announced that it has closed $3 million in series C financing with investors including Accel Partners, Vertex Venture Capital, ProSeed Venture Capital Fund, eXeed Technology and Technion Research & Development Foundation. The funding will be used to expand sales and technology partner channels as well as enhance the company’s sales and marketing teams. Correlsense, founded in 2005, is headquartered in Framingham, Massachusetts and holds its R&D center in Herzliya Pituach, Israel.

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Ormat Technologies announced that its wholly owned subsidiary, Ormat Nevada, concluded and signed a $61.4 million engineering, procurement and construction (EPC) contract with Enel Green Power North America. Under the EPC contract, Ormat will provide two air-cooled Ormat Energy Converters at Enel’s Cove Fort geothermal power plant project in southern Utah. Ormat Technologies develops geothermal and recovered energy-based power plants around the world.

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The Israel based online campaign optimization company, Promodity, announced it has secured $1.5 million in angel funding to further ongoing product development and marketing. The company offers a web service and application to manage online campaigns and increase conversion rates. According to the company, their automated cloud-based software empowers marketing professionals to manage all marketing campaigns in one place, without the need for IT.

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Tapingo, a provider of a mobile commerce platform enabling students to use their phone to order and pay for food and goods at merchants on and around college campuses, announced that it has secured its first institutional financing round from Carmel Ventures. Carmel has invested $3.5 million and Shlomo Dovrat, Co-Founder and General Partner of Carmel Ventures, has joined the Company’s board of directors. Tapingo is commercially available on a number of college campuses in the US and plans to expand in the following months. The company, based in San Francisco, has an R&D center in Tel Aviv, Israel.

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Mazor Robotics, a developer of surgical robots, announced its Renaissance platform received FDA marketing clearance, expanding the applications of the Renaissance system to include the precise positioning of surgical instruments and implants during brain surgery. The Renaissance technology, a surgical guidance system originally designed for use in spine surgeries, is applicable in brain procedures for multiple applications, including biopsies. The company is based in Caesarea, Israel.

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CJ Hellovision, Korea’s leading cable operator, and cloud gaming company Playcast Media Systems announced they have entered a deal to launch a cloud gaming service in Korea. The service will allow cable-TV subscribers to play console-quality video games from major game publishers through their existing set-top boxes. CJ Hellovision has 3.51 million subscribers and is a subsidiary of regional giant CJ Corp. Playcast, founded in 2007, is a privately-held company based in Israel.

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Ecommerce company FiftyOne has raised $10.1 million in an investmend round from Vintage Investment Partners and previous investors Pitango Venture Capital, Delta Ventures, Adam Street Partners, OnLine Venture and Venture Strategy. FiftyOne was founded in 1999 as an online foreign exchange company named E4X. In 2007 it turned into FiftyOne, focusing on international ecommerce solutions for US retailers. It is headquartered in New York City and its R&D is based in Tel Aviv, Israel.

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eyeSight, a developer of touch-free interfaces for digital devices, has raised $2 million from Mac, a new Korean-Israeli fund, as well as from private investors. The company said it will use the proceeds to expand to new markets. eyeSight’s interfaces for televisions, tablets and smartphones is already embedded in the latest generation of Pantech smartphones. The company was founded in 2005 and is headquartered in Israel.

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Threat detection company Seculert announced that it has closed a $5.35 million round of venture financing led by Norwest Venture Partners (NVP), with participation of existing investor YL Ventures. The funding will be used to further invest in sales and product development teams as well as establish a US presence. Seculert, which developed patent-pending cloud-based technology that provides early detection of cyber threats, is based in Petach-Tikva, Israel.

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Israeli startup UppSite, which coverts websites into applications, announced it has secured $2.1 million in funding round from Israeli incubator thetime and Matomy Media, in addition to other private investors. Uppsite was founded in 2010 by Gal Brill and was recently chosen by WordPress as its only mobile solution in WordPress VIP Partners Program. 

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Holden, the Australian subsidiary of General Motors has today announced Better Place as its preferred partner for renewable energy and faster charging solutions for the long range Holden Volt electric car. According to Holden, Better Place will develop a number of membership packages for Volt customers including the installation of a ‘Charge Spot’ unit at home or work, and zero emissions charging1 provided through the purchase of renewable energy or 100% Government certified renewable energy certificates.

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