Why Aren't VCs Backing Augmented Reality? Some people believe that Augmented Reality (AR), the class of technologies that place images or data on top of other views of the physical world, could be the web browser of the future. AR has rocketed out of the research labs and is catching mass market interest fast - from mobile phones displaying restaurant reviews when you look through your phone's camera to next month's Esquire Magazine, which you'll be able to hold up to your webcam to see marker-based 3D "holograms" in your hands telling you jokes. The International Symposium on Augmented and Extended Reality this month had major sponsors from all around the world, including Qualcomm, Volkswagon, Intel and Nokia.
Despite all this energy, media darling startup Layar is reported to have raised...a mere $1 million investment from venture capitalists. Why are VCs not investing more in Augmented Reality? Here are three reasons why we think investment in this sector has been slow so far. AR is Just Hype, It's Not Useful. Exclusive: French tech firms which raised over €1 million in 200. [France] As my first post on Techcrunch Europe I thought it could be interesting to give you some insights on the French market, and especially the situation regarding fund raising.
So here is a list of (almost all) French companies in the web industry that have raised more than €1 million in 2009. Divided into three categories (Web, Mobile & E-Commerce), they are ranked by decreasing amount, and then by date. Despite all my research, I cannot guarantee that this list is 100% exhaustive, but I am pretty confident that this list covers 95% of transactions made in 2009. Don’t look for a source for each line, they were too numerous. But the main ones were company or investor websites, Journal du net or Neteco and blogs etc – and of course previous articles published on TechCrunch ;-) Web Easyvoyage : 31,6 million euros in Oct. 09. Konbini : 3 million euros in July 09. Wedia : 2,6 million euros in June 09. Scan & Target : 1 million euros in April 09. E-Commerce. Come Up With Your Own Target Stock Price For Apple Or Google Wit. Have you ever wanted to be a Wall Street analyst or come up with your own discounted cash flow model for a publicly traded company?
Me neither, but I like the idea of tweaking a few variables in a company’s business model and seeing how that might change a its stock price. A new site launching today called Trefis lets you do just that. Started by three engineers and math whizzes from MIT and Cornell (Manish Jhunjhunwala, Adam Donovan, and Cem Ozkaynak) who did time at McKinsey and UBS bank, Trefis breaks down a stock price by the contribution of a company’s major products and businesses. For instance, 51.3 percent of Apple’s stock price is attributed to the iPhone, 25.5 percent to the Macintosh, and only 7.7 percent to iTunes and iPhone apps. Don’t agree? You can change the underlying assumptions by simply dragging lines on charts forecasting the future price of the iPhone, its market share going out to 2016, and so forth. Larry Page Outlines His Plan And Vision For Google.