VC Roundup: Massachusetts edition

Welcome to the VC Roundup, where we’ll parse through venture capital news related to Philadelphia-based private equity firms and the companies they fund. Subscribe to the roundup as an email newsletter. If you have any VC-related news to pass along to us, please drop us a line.

DEFINITE READS

Reuters has a profile (complete with video) on First Round Capital’s Phineas “Phin” Barnes. Barnes played basketball in college and started his career at AND1, the basketball shoe company that was formally based in Paoli. Since then he has worked at MTV before becoming a principal at First Round.

Safeguard partner company NuPath, the Conshohocken-based specialty pharmaceutical company, has dialed back expectations for its IPO, exactly as Joe Destefeno predicted.

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DreamIt’s 8tySix is now “Sqoot”

It looks like Sqoot’s Mo Yehia and Avand Amiri have taken the startup ethos “be flexible” very seriously.

After entering the incubator as the Dish86, the company rebranded (as reported by Technically Philly in our DreamIt Demo Day Preview series) as 8tysix. Now, however, the company is settling on Sqoot (pronounced “SKOOT”).

“It implies motion and getting things done,” says Yehia. “It’s memorable short and cute.”

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Event Highlights: August 8 – August 13

With 15 events on Wednesday and Thursday alone, this week’s events calendar is likely too full for even the most ravenous tech junkie.

If you want to save a little time for other things (you know, like sleep), you may want to pick and choose this week. To help you out, we’ve chosen three events you won’t want to miss.

We’ve built up your anticipation, and DreamIt Ventures Demo Day is finally here. Check it out on Wednesday, along with the first-ever Philly WordPress Meetup. Then join Philly Startup Leaders on Thursday for their first annual TECH Cocktail Philadelphia.

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Thanks to our weekly sponsors

Technically Philly is made possible by advertisers and sponsors that are important to Philadelphia’s technology community. This week we’d like to thank:

Volpe and Koenig, P.C. — Since 1987, intellectual property boutique law firm Volpe and Koenig has provided guidance on matters relating to patents, trademarks, copyrights, trade secrets, e-commerce, technology joint ventures, non-disclosure agreements, technology acquisitions, licensing and litigation. Whatever your intellectual property law issue… Volpe and Koenig bring law to your ideas.

Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce – The Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce is dedicated to promoting growth and economic development, advocating for sound public policy, and serving its members with outstanding programs and benefits. GPCC is the premier advocate of the region’s business community, representing members in 11 counties across three states with one voice.

Caffeine Fish – Caffeine Fish develops the Trainboard iPhone app and offers iPhone development consulting in the Philadelphia area.

Towerstream – Towerstream is the leading 4G service provider in the U.S. and is setting up shop in Philadelphia. Contact Towerstream to find out how, in less than a week, you can have first-class 4G service for your business.

Eight Eleven – The folks at Camden-based Eight Eleven do it all. Branding, communications, marketing, advertising, Websites, Web content management, user-experience (Web & software) and public relations. And they also do it for a lot of tech companies, of all sizes, to boot. Heck, they even customized a media kit just for you. Hit ‘em up.

NextFab Studio — NextFab is a membership-based, high-tech workshop and prototyping center. Our facility provides comfortable, clean, and safe workspaces with hand tools, 3D printers, computer controlled machine tools, software, and electronics workbenches. Expert instructors and a community of collaborators are on hand to help you problem-solve and achieve your vision. NextFab Studio has everything necessary for you to invent, repair, create, and innovate!

Springboard Media – Springboard Media is a certified Apple Specialist and retailer based in Center City and now, in Exton. They’ve got a ton of accessories and a great trade-in program that can score you up to $1,500 when you’re ready to upgrade.

Interested in joining these organizations and individuals in supporting Technically Philly? Check out our ad packages and contact our Ad Sales Manager. Can’t find something that fits? We’ll customize a package for you.

Friday Q&A: Gil Beyda of Genacast Ventures

Genacast Ventures Managing Partner Gil Beyda

Gil Beyda, originally from Los Angeles, has Dave Morgan to thank for bringing him to Philadelphia.

When Beyda and Morgan founded Real Media in 1995, they chose to locate the online ad serving company in Fort Washington because of the cheap office space available there.

After selling the company to 24 /7 Media, the duo teamed up again in 2001 to create Tacoda, a behavorial advertising company that they then sold to AOL in 2007. With two exits under his belt, Beyda was ready to try something new.

“I was not a corporate AOL guy, so I set off to figure out what I wanted to be when I grew up… again,” says Beyda.

Eventually, he settled on a second career as an investor, teaming with Comcast to create Genecast Ventures. In its short existence, the new fund already has four portfolio companies and a successful exit in Invite Media and Beyda says that he looks to be more active in the months to come.

We chatted with Beyda about what companies he likes to invest in and why Philadelphia’s investor ecosystem is just fine, thank you. Oh, and we critique his LinkedIn profile.

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Links: Kensington in Popular Mechanics, Pittsburgh makes cars fly and more

DEFINITE READS

• Popular Mechanics magazine reports on Google Sketchup being used to design the skate park at Pop’s Playground in Kensington (or Fishtown if we’re willing to accept east of Frankford and south of Lehigh avenues will ultimately become Fishtown)
• New York Times media critic David Carr gives a column to Buzz Bissinger, the Pulitzer Prize winner, celebrated author, Inquirer Currents columnist, Chestnut Hill curmudgeon and, yes, one of our 10 recommended tweeters to follow for Philadelphians.
• The Inquirer reports that the three Haddonfield, N.J. teens charged with hacking into that school district’s computer system were put on probation, during a ‘contentious’ hearing.

Below, join Brent Celek’s fantasy football league, Pittsburgh helps make cars fly and more.

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Duffels4Dignity4Devs supports child victims of domestic violence with sign up

Until midnight tonight, web developers have the chance to support children leaving homes of domestic abuse.

The Northern Home for Children, the historic Manayunk orphanage, is partnering with marketing shop Red Tettemer to raise money for their Duffels4Digitnity program, which accepts donations of any amount to purchase duffel bags of clothes, toothbrushes and stuffed animals. The bags are given to children, from infants to teenagers, who are relocated to foster care during late night domestic disputes — a more recurrent problem than we might want to imagine.

Alcatel-Lucent, the Paris-based telecommunications giant with offices in Murray Hill, N.J. and staff in Doylestown, has jumped into the fray with their “Duffels4Dignity4Devs,” a pledge to donate one dollar for every developer who signs up for their Open API Service. The platform gives access to network and third party technology through bundled API solutions without cost.

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1and1′s American invasion starts in Pennsylvania

If you have ever purchased a business or design magazine, it’s likely that you have run across one of 1and1.com’s print ads – some as large as 15 pages.

All of the promotion is paying off as the company is one of the web’s largest hosting companies with a strong presence in Europe offering telecom and consumer Internet services.

However, in America, the German-based company is still making inroads and it’s starting with the Philly area.

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Comcast Roundup: NBC deal could be done after Thanksgiving, Fanvibe partnership and More

Every Thursday morning at 8:30 a.m. EST, find all the stories you need to know about your friendly telecommunications giant in the Comcast Roundup. Get an e-mail subscription for our Comcast news updates.

DEFINITE READS

• Bloomberg reports that 11 members of the Congressional Black Caucus called for the FCC to approve the Comcast-NBC deal, noting the company’s commitment to diversity.
• Multichannel News gives a ‘view from the top’ on the NBC deal, including noting that the acquisition could be passed as soon as after Thanksgiving.
• The LA Times reports on the continued effort by Dish and DirecTV to get coverage from Comcast SportsNet Philadelphia, after filing a formal request for access last month, a March conclusion to the Versus debate and word of resolving the situation in January.

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Announcement: new events policy, call for reader submissions

Technically Philly will now be accepting paid events to be posted to our calendar and we are opening the doors to you, our readers, to help Technically Philly highlight important events.

Previously, we’ve had a strict policy of only listing free events. However, we have found that this policy left events off of the calendar that we feel could be of value to the community.

Second, we’d like to acknowledge that Philadelphia is home to a large number of awesome events every week. We try to attend as many as we can, but we inevitably fall short. To help fill the gap, we’d like to extend an offer to organizers and attendees to submit reviews of events. To see a sample, read Chris DiFonzo’s post about attending a DreamIt lecture.

You’ll notice we acknowledge that the content is from a reader while shedding light on any conflicts of interest, something that will be mandatory for any post submitted in this way to maintain the editorial transparency that is a core component of Technically Philly’s philosophy.

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