Ram Shriram

Here’s How Planetary Resources Plans to Mine Asteroids (Release)

Liz Gannes in News on April 24 at 6:53 am PT

Planetary Resources is building its own spacecraft to mine asteroids for raw materials, including platinum and water.

Decide.com Raises Funding for Stealthy E-Commerce Company

Tricia Duryee in Commerce on April 19, 2011 at 8:43 am PT

Seattle-based Decide.com has raised $6 million in a second round led by some e-commerce legends. The company’s goal? Something about helping electronics purchasers avoid buyer’s remorse.

Bump Technologies Founders Talk About Platforms, APIs and Showing the iPhone and Android How to Get Along

Kara Swisher in News on April 7, 2010 at 1:18 pm PT

Bump Technologies has definitely gotten a lot of attention, mostly due to the gimmicky feel of the service, which allows users to swap a wide range of data–contacts, photos and soon, much more–when they tap two phones together. But it’s more than just a cute way for hipsters to trade phone numbers. When thought of as a technology platform that can be used by a variety of players, it gets much more interesting. Here’s the video of my interview about that with its founders.

New Yorker: Bezos' Initial Google Investment Was $250K in 1998 Because "I Just Fell in Love With Larry and Sergey"

Kara Swisher in News on October 5, 2009 at 9:30 pm PT

Considering the ongoing skirmishes going on right now between Amazon and Google over digital book publishing, it’s more than ironic that Amazon CEO and founder Jeff Bezos was one of only a few initial investors in the search giant. But–in one of the many interesting details in New Yorker author Ken Auletta’s new book, “Googled: The End Of The World As We Know It”–it was indeed Bezos who invested $250,000 in the start-up in 1998 at four cents a share. Not that there’s anything wrong with that! There’s a great excerpt in the New Yorker this week.

StumbleUpon's Garrett Camp Speaks (About Being a Born-Again Start-up)!

Kara Swisher in News on April 20, 2009 at 12:00 pm PT

Last week, StumbleUpon announced it was buying itself out of its much-vaunted previous corporate buyout, by being born again as an “investor-baked start-up.” The Canadian-born social-bookmarking company, which was launched earlier, came to the Bay area in 2006 and got some fancy venture investors and soon became a traffic-generating hit. Then StumbleUpon was bought by eBay two years ago for $75 million in one of Web 2.0′s high points. End of a fairy tale? Um, nope. Here’s CEO and co-founder Garrett Camp, talking to BoomTown in a video interview about it all.

StumbleUpon Stumbles Out of eBay's Arms to Be Reborn as a Start-Up (Plus the Entire Press Release)

Kara Swisher in News on April 13, 2009 at 1:20 pm PT

The content-discovery service, StumbleUpon, has gotten itself back to start-up status, after being bought by eBay two years ago. It announced today that it was returning to being an “investor-backed startup” by a roster of well-known Silicon Valley investors, including Ram Shriram of Sherpalo Ventures, Accel Partners and August Capital. Its founders, Garrett Camp and Geoff Smith, are also back, with Camp now in place as CEO. “We are grateful to eBay for its guidance. However, we realized there were few long-term synergies between the two businesses. It is best for us to part ways and focus on our respective strengths,” said Camp, stating the very obvious. That’s quite a boomerang since it was acquired by the auction giant in 2007 for $75 million.

They Will Survive–Silicon Valley Entrepreneurs Talk Downturn!

Kara Swisher in News on October 30, 2008 at 2:32 pm PT

Earlier today, BoomTown posted a video of star venture capitalist John Doerr’s 10 tips to start-ups for surviving the econalypse that he ticked off at a roundtable in Silicon Valley on Wednesday. Beside the words of wisdom from the Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers partner, I also trolled for advice from the panel of well-known entrepreneurs I moderated at VentureBeat’s “How to manage your start-up in the downturn” event. The message: They will survive! (Cue the disco ball.)

The Entire Video of John Doerr Giving 10 Tips for Start-ups to Avoid the Econalypse

Kara Swisher in News on October 30, 2008 at 2:29 am PT

Here’s a video of star VC John Doerr reciting his 10 tips for start-ups to follow in the economic downturn, dispensed at a VentureBeat roundtable event on the downturn yesterday. And the Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers VC didn’t need a massive, noisy PowerPoint like Sequoia Capital to make his quick and clear points, which he delivered in four minutes flat.

"How To Manage Your Start-Up in the Downturn"? Well, Come to This Event and Find Out!

Kara Swisher in News on October 28, 2008 at 5:05 pm PT

Tomorrow, BoomTown is trying to find a silver lining from a group of entrepreneurs at VentureBeat’s “How to manage your start-up in the downturn” roundtable event. Toni Schneider, chief executive of Automattic will join Max Levchin of Slide, Jason Calacanis of Mahalo, O’Melveny & Myers’ Sam Zucker, and Nirav Tolia of Web 1.0′s Epinions. Along with my group, for whom I am planning all sorts of verbal tortures (“Exactly how much do you make?”), there is also a star-studded investors panel.