Six Apart, the company known for its Moveable Type blogging platform, has
raised $10 million in second-round financing from August Capital.
As part of its investment, two of August Capital’s partners — David F.
Marquardt and David M. Hornik — will join Six Apart’s board of directors.
The investors bring significant IT experience with them. Marquardt is a
director of Microsoft and Seagate Technologies boards, while Hornik fills
the same role on PayCycle and Nomis boards.
“Weblogging is on a growth trajectory on par with the beginnings of e-mail,”
Hornik said in a statement. “We’ve been watching Six Apart for a long time
and have admired their innovative and carefully crafted products, which have
created one of the most loyal and engaged global communities we’ve ever
seen.”
During the last year, San Mateo, Calif.-based Six Apart has released new
versions of its Movable Type publishing platform and award-winning TypePad
hosted weblogging service.
It also established
Japanese and European subsidiaries and signed licensing pacts with
Hitachi, NTT and Nokia, among others.
Six Apart, which was founded by the husband and wife team of Ben and Mena
Trott in 2002, is also backed by Tokyo-based venture capital firm Neoteny.
Former PayPal executive Reid Hoffman, who now runs the LinkedIn social
software platform, is also an investor.
In separate Internet-industry financing news, Demandware announced $7.15
million in first-round venture capital from North Bridge Venture Partners
and General Catalyst Partners.
The Woburn, Mass.-based e-commerce firm’s on-demand, e-commerce offering is
aimed at retailers and manufactures who are purchasing e-commerce
technology. Its founders hail from early e-commerce companies including
ATG, Allaire, Macromedia, Intershop and NaviSite.
Demandware’s approach to e-commerce infrastructure combines a customizable
application with the cost benefits and scalability of software delivered as
an on-demand service. The firm’s financing and strategy was announced at the
Shop.org Annual Summit, a trade show for the online retail industry.