VC Buzz – $248.7+ Million in Today’s Deals

SAN FRANCISCO — PeoplePC Inc. announced that the company has received $65 million in funding from a syndicate led by SOFTBANK Capital Partners, with participation by SOFTBANK Venture Capital; Maveron, the venture capital firm co-founded by Starbucks chairman Howard Schultz and Dan Levitan; Hambrecht & Quist; and Nexus Group. PeoplePC provides a more efficient way to link buyers and sellers, allowing sellers to reduce customer acquisition and retention costs and to pass much of these savings on to buyers — the members of PeoplePC.

ARDSLEY, N.Y.– TradeOut.com, a global online marketplace for business surplus, announced it has secured $22 million in third-round financing from Benchmark Capital, eBay and Morgan Stanley Dean Witter. Meg Whitman, President and CEO of eBay, and Bill Gurley and David Beirne of Benchmark Capital will join TradeOut.com’s board. TradeOut.com’s online business surplus marketplace provides an efficient central marketplace where a large universe of buyers and sellers transact business utilizing true market pricing.

STAMFORD, Conn.–Greenwich Technology Partners Inc., an internetworking and e-commerce consulting firm for Global 2000 companies, announced a $20 million round of equity financing led by Chase Capital Partners . Other new investors included STV Partners III, an affiliate of the Starwood Capital Group, Credit Suisse First Boston Venture Fund I, the CIT Group and Wheatley Partners II. Existing investors, including two VantagePoint partnerships and FGII Partners, contributed the balance of the financing.

BEAVERTON, Ore. — Corillian Corp., a provider of eFinance solutions for the financial services industry, announced it has closed on a $20 million round of venture capital funding led by BCI Partners, FT Ventures and Battery Ventures. The company’s Voyager eFinance Suite provides Internet-delivered banking, bill payment, brokerage, and electronic bill presentment transactions. Voyager’s Application Server allow financial institutions to deliver financial services to customers using browser-based interfaces and OFX-enabled personal financial management software including Quicken and Microsoft Money.

LONDON– Protege, a business incubator for managing international expansion of North American Internet companies, announced the completion of a $20 million investment from Global Retail Partners, the venture capital fund backed by Carrefour S.A, Paul Allen’s Vulcan Ventures and Donaldson, Lufkin & Jenrette. The investment is the first outside funding Protege has accepted to date. Protege will expand its business focus to include building and managing European Internet start-ups.

MINNEAPOLIS — ZoneTrader.com, a business-to-business auction site for refurbished and surplus business equipment, announced it raised $16.5 million in venture capital. This new investment was led by premier venture capital firms, Trident Capital and Technology Crossover Ventures, and joined by Riggs Bank and William Esrey, chief executive officer of Sprint.

SAN FRANCISCO — buzzsaw.com Inc. announced the completion of its first round of financing totaling $15 million from Crosspoint Venture Partners. The company, a new enterprise backed by Autodesk Inc., introduced a comprehensive business-to-business e-commerce hub for the building design and construction industry at www.buzzsaw.com. buzzsaw.com is the first Internet business spun out of Autodesk as part of an effort to incubate Internet business ideas and Internet technologies relevant to the design industry. Autodesk will also provide equity investments to take advantage of new business models and new growth markets created by the Internet.

PASADENA, Calif.– HomePage.com, one of the Web’s fastest-growing providers of free personal homepages, announced that it has received a $12.2 million first-round investment led by idealab Capital Partners. ICP was joined in the financing round by Moore Capital Management and J.& W. Seligman & Co. Inc.

REDWOOD CITY, Calif. — medpool.com announced that the company received $12 million in funding from its venture capital partners to support the company’s e-commerce solution to hospital procurement. Investors and lead strategic partners of medpool.com providing funding include Institutional Venture, Mayfield Fund and Domain Associates.

AUSTIN, Texas — Partnerware Technologies, a pioneer of Partner Relationship Management solutions, announced it has raised $8.5 million in its second round of funding from investors in the technology and software sector. Adams Capital Management, Edgewater Funds and PA Ventures join existing Partnerware investor Admiral Bobby R. Inman.

MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.–SOFTBANK Venture Capital announced that it is the lead financier for DrDrew.com’s current round of funding. DrDrew.com is the newly launched web destination based on the television and radio doctor, Dr. Drew Pinsky. Among new investors are several individuals: Greg Maffei, CFO of Microsoft Corporation, and Joe Grundfest, Professor, Stanford University School of Law. They join Dale Fuller, former president of the popular web site WhoWhere.com, who participated in drDrew.com’s initial round of funding.

SAN FRANCISCO — Casecentral.com Inc., a pioneer of Web-based document repository solutions for the legal industry, announced that it has raised $6 million in an initial round of funding Housatonic Partners and FARM Capital. The company plans to open new production and sales offices in principal cities around the US, and increase its development staff.

BOSTON– Zero Stage Capital has invested $3 million in venture capital funding in Gazelle Systems, a provider of customer relationship management solutions to the restaurant industry. Gazelle will utilize the first-round venture capital financing for development of first-to-market application and web solutions, as well as an aggressive marketing campaign.

RALEIGH, N.C.– HiddenMind Technology, a Research-Triangle-based wireless software development firm, announced that it has received an additional round of equity financing in the amount of $3 million. The additional capital is being provided by Gerald L. Trooien, a Minneapolis-Saint Paul investor who also supplied HiddenMind with much of its initial capital. The additional investment brings HiddenMind’s total equity investment in 1999 to $6.5 million. HiddenMind provides advanced tools for multi-platform device interoperability in client-server, web-enabled and wireless environments.

REDWOOD CITY, Calif.–Draper Fisher Jurvetson, an early stage Internet venture capital firm, announced the funding of Headlight.com, a provider of online training for small and medium-sized businesses. Headlight.com is an e-commerce Web site that provides simple, quick access to more than 1000 online courses.

NEW YORK and PARIS–Hachette Filipacchi Medias, a unit of Lagardere SCA, has acquired an equity interest in Phase2Media, an Internet advertising and marketing firm, as part of a strategic alliance to create global advertising and marketing platforms for its numerous publications. The investment completes the first round of financing.

WYNNEWOOD, Pa. — Physician Verification Services Inc., a provider of online services to the healthcare industry, has closed a financing with S.R. One Limited and a small group of private investors. S.R. One (West Conshohocken, Pa.) is the venture capital subsidiary of SmithKline Beecham plc.

Physician Verification Services operates a centralized Internet notary service covering physicians and other healthcare professionals. The company provides qualified physicians, pharmacists, and other healthcare professionals with convenient identifiers that confirm their professional status online, allowing them to access professionals-only resources without repeated registration. There is no charge to healthcare professionals.

Under the terms of the transaction, Wit Capital will acquire 100% of the fully diluted shares of SoundView in exchange for approximately $320 million (based on Wit Capital’s closing price of $17.56 on 10/29/99) in newly issued Wit Capital Common Shares and options. The exchange ratio in the merger is subject to adjustment for changes in Wit Capital’s trading price from $17.56 up to $18.56 or down to $15.56 and is not adjustable for changes beyond these levels.

SAN FRANCISCO–Recruitsoft.com, creator of an Internet-based Hiring Management System, announced that it has completed the acquisition of iLogos Corporation, a pre-eminent provider of Internet recruiting intelligence in North America. Terms of the agreement were not disclosed.

Recruitsoft.com is a company comprised of specialists in the fields of human resources management and Web-based business solutions. Recruitsoft.com recently established its headquarters in San Francisco and is offering its Internet-based enterprise-wide recruiting solution to American corporations. The company is funded in part by Telesystem Software Ventures LP, Canada’s largest venture capital fund dedicated to the software industry.

CAMBRIDGE, Mass — AnyDay.com, creator of the Internet’s premier online DayPlanner, announced the addition of 11 strategic partners to provide event listings and services. Partners include: — SportsTicker, Talk City, Tribune Media Services, TSNN.COM, AccuWeather, Astrology.net, Desktop.com, Extended Systems, MapQuest, Paragon Software, and VerticalOne.

AnyDay.com Inc. is backed by SOFTBANK Technology Ventures and Carlyle Venture Partners.

NEW YORK–NetCustomize Corp. announced the launch of its personalized entertainment desktop and wireless application available over the Internet, offering users personalized entertainment content. Through a filtering application and a seamless interactive rating system, NetCustomize’s technology learns the users’ tastes and preferences and adapts to deliver the content they want.

NetCustomize received funding from the ABS GE Capital Giza Fund and Sum International Holdings, Ltd.

OffRoad Capital uses the Internet to create a community of accredited investors — defined by the SEC as individuals with a net worth of more than $1 million — who share an interest in funding private companies. Members can exchange information and talk to company principals on-line as they analyze and debate the merits of each financing opportunity presented. OffRoad membership is available for a one-time fee of $1,000 and subsequent annual subscription of $250 ($2,000 and $500, respectively, for investment managers), both of which are being waived permanently for Schwab clients.

SAN JOSE, Calif.–FastParts.com has named John Spensieri senior vice president of marketing, continuing the consolidation of the company business in San Jose. Prior to joining FastParts.com he was with International Data Group where he served as president of a new business unit and launched the Channel Services Group. The company is venture capital backed by Draper Fisher Jurvetson, SoftBank Technology Ventures, and Gabriel Capital.

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