Capital Window Blog

September 1st, 2010

Capital Window Client “Spot On Energy” Opens Up 4,000 Retail Point Of Sale Locations.

Dallas, TX (PRWEB) August 31, 2010

Spot On Energy™ announced today an agreement to be placed in 4,000 Circle K convenience stores by the end of 2010. Point of sale placement provides outstanding opportunity for consumers to see and purchase a new item.

Spot On Energy™ patches are newly released to the retail market. Many health conscious adults need extra energy to survive their hectic lifestyles. Energy drinks, with massive amounts of preservatives, sugar and calories come with unwanted side effects. Stomach problems and nervous jitters are avoided when you avoid the digestive tract by using a patch.

The combination of favorite energy ingredients and the patch application provides the benefits of increased energy with sustained release for an optimal boost without negative effects.

Spot On Energy™ is available in many retail outlets, independent pharmacies, convenience stores, and Internet stores nationwide, including Amazon.com, Costco.com, Kroger, and Valero Corner Stores.

“Circle K adds to the strong retail foundation for the Spot On Brand. We are thrilled to be joining this outstanding retailer,” said Brenda Stoner, co-founder of Spot On Energy™. Circle K is placing Spot On Energy in a new energy display being deployed in their stores. The product will be merchandised by Acosta Sales and Marketing.

About Spot On Energy
Spot On Energy™ is the leading brand for Enceutical Corp, a provider of health and wellness products to wholesale and retail markets. Located in Dallas, Texas, with sales and service offices in Peoria, Illinois, the Company is focused on coupling well known formulas and supplement ingredients with advanced delivery systems to create innovative new products.

For additional information about Spot On Energy™, visit www.SpotOnEnergy.com.

Contact:

Brenda Stoner

Spot On Energy

ph 866-380-0542

bstoner(at)spotonenergy(dot)com

www.spotonenergy.com

For additional information about Spot On Energy™, visit www.SpotOnEnergy.com.Contact: Brenda Stoner Spot On Energy ph 866-380-0542 bstoner(at)spotonenergy(dot)com www.spotonenergy.com

August 20th, 2010

U.S. Southwest Fund Rolls Out $750MM Real Estate Fund To Preserve Wealth While Minimizing Fees, Engages Capital Window

CARLSBAD, California (August 20, 2010) – The days of the old real estate fund investment model – wherein investment capital was lost by fund managers that promised high yields and then over-levered investments while enriching themselves by extracting multiple fees and profit participations – are over. Real estate fund investors are now being drawn to a new real estate fund model developed by U.S. Southwest Fund. As fund manager, U.S. Southwest Fund takes a minimal management fee to cover expenses during the life of the fund, and receives no profits until the end of the fund when investors have received all of their capital back and a minimum 8% return.

With this approach, U.S. Southwest provides fund investors with a conservative strategy that preserves capital and delivers a solid risk-adjusted return, while achieving extraordinary profits for its stakeholders.Responding to concerns of the global investor community, Southwest designed its fund as a conservative strategy for risky times to protect investors from any possibility that their capital will be used in any way other than as specifically set forth in the fund’s investment documents. With Southwest’s unique operating structure, fund investors do not have to worry that the fund manager will put their capital at risk with leverage, invest in risky developments or inflated projections about future property performance. Investors in Southwest Fund enjoy maximum transparency through unfettered 24-7 access to the fund’s operating records, and direct access to the fund’s third-party administrator. Southwest Fund is truly designed to preserve investor wealth while providing solid risk-adjusted returns.”U.S. Southwest Fund has already raised $175 million of its target $750 million capital raise, a tremendous investor validation of its fund model. One of the world’s top 10 banks recently committed $25 million to the fund, and may increase the size of its investment,” reported Marc Makebakken, co-founder of U.S. Southwest Fund. “Recognizing the need for additional capital and resources to build on this important first investor cornerstone and complete our $750 million raise, we identified Capital Window as a qualified firm that is familiar with our situation and has demonstrated success in delivering what we need.” Additionally, Makebakken is moving to Sweden for six months to close capital from Dutch and Scandinavian pensions that have given Southwest “soft” circles of $1.3 billion in Northern Europe.“I’ve observed that U.S. Southwest Fund is truly committed to delivering on its projected profit performance while adhering to principles that always put investors’ interests first,” said Capital Window CEO Thomas Carter. “The opportunity to provide a new, investor-centered fund to the real estate investor community represents a unique business model that Capital Window understands. We are thrilled to assist such an innovative firm.”Capital Window and U.S. Southwest Fund have been working together and plan to reach out to their networks of qualified investors over the next 6-8 weeks.

About U.S. Southwest Fund, LLC

Founded by Marc Makebakken and Charles Cecil, U.S. Southwest is a real estate fund manager that has developed a unique fund investment vehicle that is focused on the needs and objectives of its fund investors. U.S. Southwest’s fund strategy enables it to achieve exceptional returns on investment for its shareholders while delivering solid risk-adjusted returns to its investors. To learn more about what makes the Southwest Fund different from other real estate investment funds, visit http://www.SouthwestFund.net

About Capital Window Corporation:
Capital Window full service business consulting company that specializes in packaging and positioning companies to experience growth and attract capital. Capital Window has developed a business packaging standardization process that has helped many companies attract millions of dollars in both venture and private equity markets. The Capital Window team of seasoned entrepreneurs whose skills at measuring opportunities, packaging companies and raising capital has consistently helped individuals and companies achieve their goals. Since its inception in 2006, the company has served more than 125 clients in preparing investment packaging, business development and related consulting services.

Nothing herein may be considered an offer to purchase or sell

the securities of U.S. Southwest Fund, LLC. or Capital Window, Inc.

August 17th, 2010

Worldwide Advertising On Social Networks Estimated To Hit $3.3 Billion In 2010

Social networks worldwide are estimated to bring in $3.3 billion in advertising dollars this year, according to updated estimates by eMarketer. That number represents a 31 percent increase from 2009′s $2.5 billion. A full 39 percent of that amount, or $1.3 billion, will go to Facebook.

In the U.S., social ad spending is estimated to rise 20 percent to $1.7 billion. Facebook is gobbling up even more market share in the U.S. It is expected to make up 50 percent of that amount ($835 million), compared to a 36 percent share last year (when it’s U.S. advertising revenues were estimated to be $500 million out of a total of $1.4 billion).

The big market share loser in social ads this year is MySpace, whose share is estimated to drop from 32 percent in 2009 ($445 million) to 19 percent in 2010 ($323 million). Social games and apps, interestingly, are also expected to pretty much stay flat in terms of ad revenues, with $142 million of the total this year. The social game segmentation really doesn’t make sense to me. It kind of makes me wonder whether the folks at eMarketer have ever heard of Zynga.

August 16th, 2010

Playing the IPO Market

Scott Gehsmann of PricewaterhouseCoopers weighs in on the state of the IPO market.

August 15th, 2010

Kayak’s Projected Market Cap: More Than $705M

One of the more solid and genuinely useful Internet startups out there, travel fare aggregator Kayak, was dissected in a report released today by NeXt Up Research for SharesPost. NeXt Up thinks that with a heavy advertising spend, Kayak should have a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18 percent from 2009 to 2012. Based on estimated revenue and comparison to competitors, the report estimates Kayak’s market cap at between $705 and $771 million.

Is Kayak a promising IPO candidate? You decide. Here are some of the relevant assessments:

• Meta search engines like Kayak accounted for less than 8 percent of online travel booked in 2009, due mostly to low awareness.

• Kayak is spending heavily to make itself better known — NeXt Up estimates an advertising budget of $50 million a year, but Kayak has said itself it plans to spend $100 million on marketing.

• The travel industry should recover from the recession and see a CAGR of 4 percent from 2009 to 2013, with online travel agents growing with a 7 percent CAGR.

• Promising Kayak initiatives include its iPhone apps (see our story) and Travelpost, its TripAdvisor competitor.

• Kayak is projected to have revenue of $180 million in 2010, growing to $305 million in 2014 with EBITDA margins of 30-35 percent.

• Kayak has raised about $224 million in venture funding and debt from General Catalyst, Sequoia Capital, Accel Partners, Oak Investment Partners, Tenaya Capital, Trident Capital, Gold Hill Capital, Norwest Venture Partners, Silicon Valley Bank and AOL.

August 14th, 2010

CloudCrowd Raises $5.1 Million To Outsource Labor To The Cloud

Labor as a service startup CloudCrowd has just raised $5.1 million in funding, according to an recent SEC filing. We’ve confirmed the funding with the startup, which had previously raised $1.5 million in seed funding. This recent round of funding was led by DFJ with and the startup’s co-founder and CEO Alex Edelstein participating in the round.

Like CrowdFlower and Amazon’s Mechanical Turk, CloudCrowd is trying to bring labor into the cloud, by creating a vast network of workers around the globe. The startup has roughly 25,000 workers, who have completed more than a million tasks since the site’s launch in October 2009. You can read our recent coverage and video interview with CloudCrowd here.

The bulk of CloudCrowd’s business are client-driven tasks: a company submits tasks to CloudCrowd and the service will farm that out to eligible workers. Workers can also access CloudCrowd through a Facebook app, where they can pick available tasks and arrange payment.The tasks can be as simple as checking the quality of an image or involve the translation of entire web pages. Because pricing is determined by the level of difficulty, the payouts range from one penny to several dollars. Once a task is completed, a different user will check the finished product for an additional fee, creating a level of quality control.

With each task completed, a worker earn a credibility rating that determines the types of tasks they are offered. Workers who don’t have a rating yet are assigned basic tasks until they develop a reputation. Workers are able to see how much each separate task pays, and earnings are distributed through PayPal.

CloudCrown also has a consumer facing business. The company offers EditZen, a simple web site, where consumers can submit pages for editing at $4 a page. The also plans to launch TranslationZen, which will offer translation services with a similar labor model.

And the model is seeing success. The company is on track to complete 2 million tasks, and this round of funding should help scale the business further.

August 13th, 2010

Building a SecondMarket to Make Way for Wall Street 3.0

At the height of the credit crisis, as formerly liquid markets seized up and assets that were considered to be as liquid as cash froze almost overnight, SecondMarket saw possibility. Now, five years since its inception, this illiquid-asset broker is taking off, making a name for itself by facilitating the sale of stock in private companies like Facebook and LinkedIn, and doubling its market participants every six months.

“At the end of 2008 we had about 2,500 buyers and sellers. At the end of 2009, we had about 6,500. We just hit 14,000 and we’re only halfway through 2010,” said SecondMarket’s founder and chief executive officer, Barry Silbert.

Simply, SecondMarket is an online illiquid-asset marketplace; it’s what you might get when you cross a traditional broker-dealer with an eBay-like (EBAY: 20.32 ,-0.71 ,-3.38%) electronic auction platform. Sellers list their assets, which are too illiquid — meaning they don’t have a large enough base of buyers and sellers — to trade on a traditional exchange, and the company notifies potential buyers in its client base or institutional investors of the new listing. The firm eventually has its traditional traders and salesman work on getting the bid and the ask price to a point where both buyers and sellers are satisfied, but the initial process is done online.

This firm’s technological approach is not wholly unheard of; start-up Sharespost.com employs a similar methodology for the sale of stock in privately-held companies, by using an online platform to facilitate trading. Yet SecondMarket has managed to garner the attention of big-name investors, as the company received $15 million in Series B venture capital funding from prominent Asian mogul and Facebook investor Li Ka-shing’s foundation and Singapore sovereign wealth fund, Temasek Holdings PLC. Last year, the company saw $35 million in revenue; this year, they’re on track to do between $50 million and $55 million in revenue.

The business model involves SecondMarket acting as a standard broker-dealer for sophisticated and accredited investors, facilitating trades and taking a commission that ranges from 2% to 5%, depending on the deal, equally split between buyer and seller. What makes it different from many big banks is that the firm doesn’t take positions, meaning it’s not betting against the clients for which it trades.

SecondMarket currently trades nine different asset classes, including auction-rate securities, bankruptcy claims, limited partnership interests and restricted securities, to name a few. Sales of stock in privately-held companies, while less than 25% of the firm’s revenue, is the fastest growing part of the business and has been getting the most attention, as SecondMarket facilitates the sale of stock in big tech names like Facebook, Zynga and EHarmony. Silbert says he is probably most passionate about this facet of the business because he thinks it a crucial step in revitalizing the market.

“I think the public markets have gotten so far away from what they were created to do — something like 70% of public trading in the public is done by high frequency trading,” Silbert said. “The public market in a lot of ways has become a bit of a casino and all these factors have made it not that attractive to go public anymore.”

Silbert explained that he hopes the secondary market can become a viable third option, aside from going public or selling their company altogether, for entrepreneurs and venture capitalists to get liquidity out of the business. Others share that hope, particularly in the venture capital community. Mark Heesen, President of the National Venture Capital Association, said the average time it takes for a start-up to go public from the period when the venture capitalists initially provide funding is now a little less than 10 years.

http://www.foxbusiness.com/personal-finance/2010/07/16/building-secondmarket-make-way-wall-street/

August 8th, 2010

Demand Media Files for IPO

Content farm Demand Media has filed to become a publicly traded company with the United States Securities and Exchange Commission. The IPO filing was originally anticipated back in April when reports surfaced that Demand Media had enlisted Goldman Sachs to help them with the undertaking.

The news was first reported by AllThingsD, which noted that the filing lacks specifics on how much Demand Media intends to raise in the process or the estimated share price upon public offering.

A look at the filing also shows that the private company is not yet profitable, instead generating most of its revenue through ad sales and domain name registrations. The company projects that online advertising will grow to $31 billion in 2012, and hopes to use its four-tier solution — content, social media, monetization and distribution — to capitalize on the space.

On the financial side of things, here’s what the filing discloses: “For the year ended December 31, 2009 and the six months ended June 30, 2010, we reported revenue of $198 million and $114 million, respectively. For these same periods, we reported net losses of $22 million and $6 million, respectively, operating loss of $18 million and $4 million, respectively, and adjusted operating income before depreciation and amortization, or Adjusted OIBDA, of $37 million and $26 million, respectively.”

Demand Media’s IPO filing follows Yahoo’s recent acquisition of Associated Content, another content farm that relies heavily on high placement in search engine rankings.

August 2nd, 2010

Let’s fund every entrepreneur

(A VC) — There was a great conversation Thursday at Y Combinator‘s AngelConf in Silicon Valley. Anthony Ha of Venturebeat had a couple posts on it that I just read, one on Paul Graham’s comments, and another onRon Conway and Mike Arrington’s comments. I would have enjoyed being part of that discussion, so I’ll join in now.

I second Ron Conway’s hope that “any entrepreneur that has ‘the guts’ to start a company gets funded.” That is my kind of thinking. We need more entrepreneurship, not less.

So I’m with Ron 100% on this. Of course, getting funded does not means tens of millions of dollars of funding for every entrepreneur. It means enough funding to actually build something and see if the idea works and the team has the right stuff to build a company. Then market forces should take over and determine what ideas and teams get more funding, and which ones should close the doors and think about what is next for them.

Mike Arrington expressed the contrary opinion, apparently held by many VCs (not me), that this mini explosion in angel investing is creating a bunch of “dipshit companies.”

I don’t know what a dipshit company is. I haven’t seen one. If you listen to the chatter on Techcrunch’s comment threads, you will see that people think Twitter and Foursquare are dipshit companies. Fine. Many great companies have been built on a wall of derision, and I personally think those two are going to join that list of laughed-at great companies (and maybe already have).

My point is you just don’t know what is a crazy idea and what is a brilliant idea. And you don’t know what is a great team and what is a weak team.

Dave McClure Files For $30 Million Venture Fund: 500 Startups

In January, we broke the news that prolific Silicon Valley angel investor Dave McClure was to set up its own venture capital fund.

Yesterday, the man filed for the fund with the SEC, providing us with more details (hat tip to FormDs.com). The name will be 500 Startups – McClure has long called himself the master of 500 hats – and the initial fund will amount to max. $30 million according to the filing.

McClure has turned to 99 Designs to come up with a logo for the fund (my favorite so far).

Here’s part of the brief for the logo design:

500 Startups is a new, edgy, risk taking seed fund which invests in early stage consumer internet companies.

Incubator/seed investment funds are popping up left and right and we’re looking to differentiate ourself through edgier design. Our founder likes to swear. In public. A lot. Think Ari Gold, but for tech companies and without a suit.

We are not — *not* — your typical fund composed of a bunch of stiff white guys sitting around a board table. We’re young. We’re diverse (Women! People of color!). Our investments are blustering balls of sleepless eagerness, And the markets we’re looking to dominate are murky and emergent.

Our values:

- “Fun at All Costs”… authentic, down-to-earth, *real*

- Creative, Smart, Innovative Environment

- Learn & Educate at Same Time

- Move Quickly, Take Risks, Make [Manageable] Mistakes

Sounds like McClure, alright.

For your reference: McClure has been investing in early stage startups for years.

He is a direct angel investor in a half dozen or more startups, including Mint, Simply Hired, Mashery, bit.ly, UserVoice, SlideShare, TeachStreet and others. And he has invested in dozens more through fbFund, a $10 million Facebook investment fund backed by Founders Fund and Accel, and FF Angel, a Founders Fund early stage fund.