John Cook’s Venture Blog writes about the latest development in online advertising:

Show me the ads! Internet entrepreneurs with business models that don’t rely on online advertising are having a tougher time raising venture capital money, according to a story in The Wall Street Journal.

Redfin Chief Executive Glenn Kelman is quoted throughout the article, telling reporter Rebecca Buckman that he was consistently prodded by venture capitalists to consider an online advertising strategy during his recent fundraising efforts. Unlike online real estate sites such as Zillow.com, Redfin — acting as a real estate broker — generates revenue by charging a flat fee to list properties for sale or by taking a cut of the commission when it sells a home.

In a follow-up blog post to the Journal story, Kelman explains why he believes investors and entrepreneurs are suffering from a “page-view fetish.” And he explains why this new-found fascination with online advertising could disrupt the “swashbuckling” spirit that has defined the tech industry for years.

The circularity of the quest to generate page views perhaps explains the anomie behind many ad-driven Web 2.0 businesses. My friends at these companies sometimes seem not merely daunted, which happens to all of us, but occasionally uninspired. Silicon Valley has gone from taking out the middleman to being a middleman, hoping to waylay users at a website before passing them on to a business that probably hasn’t changed how it actually serves customers at all. Travel sites like Kayak have become portals to other portals like Orbitz. The Web is becoming a gigantic lead-generation contraption for business-as-usual. It’s hard to get excited about that.

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Tags: advertising, online, internet, revenues, market, wallstreet, magazin

A survey from Continental Research of just under 1,000 people shows that they are using less content now than they did last year. The survey covered people from O2, T-Mobile, Orange and Vodafone. The only two categories which showed increased usage were sending a photo message to another phone and downloading a mobile game reports Cellular News… there are some nice graphs through the link. This flies in the face of some other surveys saying that mobile content and service use is increasing, although a poll released by Harris Interactive showed much the same result concerning mobile internet use. It also goes against revenue figures for mobile content and services which are (slowly) climbing, except for things like third-party ringtone sites. Despite this, the survey shouldn’t be ignored without good reason.

The survey also found that “a large majority (68 percent) of mobile users agreed with the statement I would prefer a more basic mobile phone that was simple to use and affordable”, while “only 25 percent of mobile users agreed I am prepared to pay more for a mobile phone that looks stylish. Similarly only 25 percent of mobile users agreed that I am prepared to pay more for a mobile phone that has the latest in mobile technology”. Not great figures, but the perennial argument applies here: The total mobile user base is a pretty big one to grab a quarter of.

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Tags: moconews, uk, europe, usage, mobile,

PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association just released their VC investments data for the second quarter of 2007, which reinforces what most already know: funding is flowing like a river raging after a monsoon.

• Venture capitalists invested $7.1 billion in 977 deals in the second quarter of 2007, which is the highest level of deals reported in a quarter since Q3 2001.
• Based upon the first half of 2007 data, this year may see a new 6-year high in VC investments.
• $1.6 billion was invested in 378 seed/early stage deals in the second quarter compared, up from $1.3 billion into 289 deals in the first quarter of 2007. That works out to 39% of total deal volume.
• Internet-specific companies got $897 million (160 deals) in the second quarter down from the first quarter when $1.4 billion went into 177 deals.
• U.S.-based venture capitalists invested $408 million into 34 deals in China while 18 deals in India got $119 million.
• Big ticket investments in the 2Q 2007 included Calix Networks, Joost, and Telsima.

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Tags: vc, startup, investment, deals, financing

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Tags: startups, india, startup, venture, financing, iXiGO, intrasoft, adiance, cashtech, globallogic, onMobile, india, europe, markets, mobile, community

during the last 3 months we many times have been asked: “what is youmato ? what is it all about?”

Well, youmato stands for “you, me and the others” and “mato” it self is a traditional target of the Japanese Kyūdō (弓道:きゅうどう, Kyūdō?). Kyūdō is the Japanese art of archery and the means “way of the bow”.
The different rings within the logo present “you” (in the center) “me” (around you) and “the others” (the outer-ring).
At Kyūdō, after warming up, the archer may then move on to shooting at a target called a mato.

We do see this as a metaphor for the entire social network experience. After users have learned how to use social networks, they move to youmato and target their friends and contacts as a kind of natural life style evolution.

CNM recently decided to acquire an existing social network platform speeding up our development process. The team of the acquired platform will stay on board and will safeguard a smooth integration process.

youmato is about the 3 important “P’s” in life and will be launched as an exclusive closed-alpha during september 2007. Until than we will tell you more about the 3 “P’s”.

Stay tuned and keep an eye on your mailbox. Maybe you will receive an invitation to join in and to create a brand new social network experience.