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o'reilly alpha tech ventures

littleBits goes big, closes $3.65 million funding round

littleBits, makers of the eponymous educational circuitry kits, has announced the close of its series A funding round this morning, having taken in $3.65 million from various investors. True Ventures, funder of companies like MakerBot and FitBit, leads the group, with Khosla Ventures, O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures, and Lerer Ventures pitching in.

Along with the funding, littleBits has also announced that supply chain and manufacturing firm PCH International will be helping to scale up production.

littleBits kits are made up of a series of electronic modules that connect together with magnets, with a color-coding system to guide assembly. Each … Read more

VCs to Demo: Funding tough but not impossible

PALM DESERT, Calif.--On the day that the Dow sank below 7,000 for the first time since 1997, a panel of venture capitalists told attendees at Demo 2009 what most people already know. This is an extremely challenging environment for raising money.

But challenging doesn't mean impossible. There are still some opportunities for both entrepreneurs and investors.

The panel, which was moderated by Matt Marshall of VentureBeat consisted of Christine Herron of First Round Capital, David Hornik of August Capital, Bryce T. Roberts of O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures, and Eric Tilenius of Tilenius Investments.

Tilenius said that "… Read more

O'Reilly makes Foo Camp a startup land

I've long thought that the missing ingredient from Tim O'Reilly's geek empire were the boring business suits that would turn geekdom into cash. Tim's conferences have increasingly spotlighted rising startups in Web 2.0 and open source, but not to the extent apparently envisioned at the O'Reilly AlphaTech Ventures Startup Camp, which is scheduled to precede this year's Foo Camp on July 10-11 in Sebastopol, California.

Tim describes the idea thus: "This startup boot camp will consist of sessions led by startup veterans and other experts in a roundtable discussion format on various topics important to founders." Interesting and useful to get feedback from fellow entrepreneurs and Tim, but I'd recommend taking this one step further.

I'd actually find it fascinating for Tim to plumb the depths of the geek sorcery that will descend upon Foo Camp and align technical founders with experienced businesspeople: a "dating" service for technology startups.… Read more