11 posts and columns on Redwood City

Chris Shipley Opens a "Community Center" for Silicon Valley Geeks

in News on March 25, 2011 at 6:00 am PT

Last night in Redwood City, Chris Shipley–who used to run the famed Demo conference–had a ribbon-cutting for Studio G, a new office for her Guidewire Group aimed at the start-up community. Here’s the video of the party.

Kabam Raises Serious Dough to Develop Serious Games for Social

in Commerce on January 20, 2011 at 4:30 am PT

Social games developer Kabam has raised a hefty round of funding to develop games for Facebook that appeal to a more traditional gaming demographic–and probably not your mother.

Skype Snaps Up Mobile Video Chat Player Qik

in Commerce on January 6, 2011 at 10:50 am PT

Skype has confirmed it is acquiring Qik, a start-up that has been getting attention over the past year for becoming the default video chat software on many new smartphones with forward-facing cameras.

Voices

Start-Ups Are Drawn to Pulse of Downtown

in News on November 4, 2010 at 5:00 am PT

Many Silicon Valley start-ups are increasingly hankering for downtown, urban offices. The shift can be seen in Redwood City, where many tech companies long have made their homes–but primarily in the Redwood Shores office parks where Oracle Corp. and Electronic Arts Inc. are headquartered. This year, a trickle of start-ups has moved into downtown Redwood City, with digital ad companies Turn Inc., YuMe Inc. and compensation research firm Equilar Inc., among others, relocating to the area since January.

A BoomTown Bier-Trinken Visit to the Gourmet Haus Staudt, Home of iPhonegate! (Can You Say Oktoberfest in April?)

in News on April 27, 2010 at 5:33 am PT

When BoomTown was kibitzing with SurveyMonkey CEO Dave Goldberg about where to meet up this week for a chat to catch up, we decided to forgo the obvious and instead choose the complete Silicon Valley cliche of the moment. Destination: Redwood City and the now-infamous Gourmet Haus Staudt. As in, the the beer garden behind the German grocery store where the iPhone 4G prototype was snatched from a birthday-celebrating Apple engineer by person still unknown and sold to the now-police-shookdown Gizmodo gadget site. Here’s our Gemütlichkeit travelogue!

Is This Apple’s Next iPhone?

in Mobile on April 19, 2010 at 7:31 am PT

Gizmodo claims it is and it certainly appears to be a legitimate Apple prototype. “Found” in a bar in Redwood City, Calif., the device boasts a number of new features. Among them: a front-facing camera and slick new design.

The Beaver Brothers of Zazzle Talk About Customizing, Well, Everything!

in News on December 24, 2009 at 6:00 am PT

A few weeks ago, BoomTown motored down to Silicon Valley, to the Redwood City, Calif., HQ of Zazzle, the online site that lets users order a variety of custom products by using a special (and patented) printing technology. I went to talk to the Beaver brothers–Jeff and Bobby, who founded the company with their father, who is CEO, way back before the first Web 1.0 bubble burst in 1999–about recent changes, including finding more ways to slap custom designs on more products and recent international expansion.
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BillShrink's Pham Speaks About the T-Mobile Deal, the Econalypse and More!

in News on May 20, 2009 at 6:00 am PT

Last week, BoomTown paid an economically-minded visit to the Redwood City, Calif., offices of BillShrink, a Silicon Valley start-up aimed at helping consumers find cheaper prices on gas, cellphones and plans and credit cards via a Web-based comparison and alert system. Launched about a year ago and armed with about $9 million in funding from Bessemer Venture Partners and Trinity Ventures, it has aims of moving into a range of other money-saving arenas too. But today, it got a major boost in its existing business by inking a deal to be part of a huge national advertising campaign by T-Mobile aimed at boosting price awareness among consumers, an apt message for these econalyptic times.
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Voices

Will Wright’s Future in Toasters

in News on April 9, 2009 at 2:36 pm PT

Videogame creator Will Wright’s employment at Electronic Arts is toast–the very breakfast food that’s helped to inspire the next stage of his career.

Video of RockYou Founders Talking About the New $17 Million Funding for Asian Expansion

in News on November 3, 2008 at 4:00 am PT

Widget maker RockYou announced today that it has nabbed a $17 million investment from two Asian firms, SoftBank Group and SK Telecom Ventures. The investment will be added to $35 million from the Redwood City, Calif.-based start-up’s C round in June. Overall, RockYou has raised a total of $67 million and–before the current econalypse–had previously reported a $400 million valuation. In a video with BoomTown, the company’s co-founders, CEO Lance Tokuda and CTO Jia Shen, said the new funding would be used to expand into the Asia-Pacific market, add offices and staff and make acquisitions.