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Wedge Buster Closes Series A Funding as it Launches a set of Social Media Games

September 26, 2012 by

Wedge Busters

While looking into RocketPlay, a company that has started developing gaming apps for social media I also started looking around for others in this field since it is relatively new and seems to offer a great deal of opportunity.

Enter Wedge Buster, a startup formed last year and based in Los Angeles that has just closed its first round of funding which will give it a $2.2 million cash infusion and which already has its site up and running.

Wedge Buster is focusing on two different but related areas, sports gaming and fantasy sports, and will be presenting its offerings on two related but different platforms, social media and mobile platforms.

The Series A funding round has some interesting investors including NFL quarterback Drew Brees, pro skater Rob Dyrdek, 37 Venture Technologies as well as some angel investors that the company said include players in the gaming and media industry. The company said that it will use the funding to speed game development, support marketing strategies and expand the distribution gaming network with media companies.

It already has a stable of games at or near a stage where they can be played by users. It has ether developed or acquired 100 games and since its launch earlier this week has a number of games already available.

Among the games is Soccer Trouble, Around the World Darts, WB Striker, WB Footy and a number of others that span everything from baseball to sharpshooting. Currently in the fantasy space it has four offerings including one where it offers a Fantasy Football Commissioner with SI and Turner. The company is now launching on Facebook and expects to soon be launching on Android and Apple phones as well in the near future.

The potential of this space appears to be huge. Earlier this year Juniper Research said that overall, games and infotainment in the mobile space is expected to become a $65 billion market by 2016 due to the growing move to mobile devices.

Wedge Buster claims that others are missing the value that social media offers, but are they? Also are the barriers to entry that high that established Internet players cannot quickly enter? I think the answer to both of these is no.

In the area of Fantasy sports look at RotoWire, which has a presence on Facebook as well as on the Internet and mobile apps as well. Its rivals also have followed suit. Then players like Zynga have entered this type of social games with its first partnership.

Others are sure to follow since this is obviously a growth area and so established players in the gaming field such as EA Sports see opportunity here. That said with its broad based approach, having so many games that can appeal to a wide, diverse audience will certainly place Wedge Buster in a good position right from the start.

Filed Under: Android, Apple, Apps, EA Sports, Fantasy Sports, Market Research, RocketPlay, RotoWire, Sports Social Media, Sports Social Media Data, Startup, Venture Capital, Video Games, Wedge Buster, Zynga

Barnes & Noble Expected to Offer Nook Video Services

September 25, 2012 by

Barnes & Noble is planning on offering a video streaming and downloading service later in the fall as it faces increased competition not just from Amazon but also from the expected Apple iPad Mini and the upcoming Windows 8 tablets from Microsoft and its OEMs.

The company, which has been pondering the fate of its Nook e-reader for some time despite its popularity when released, said that the service will enable Nook users to buy movies and television shows from Time Warner’s HBO; Viacom; Sony Pictures Home Entertainment; and Walt Disney Studios. It said that it is planning to add additional media content in the future.

It is commonly viewed that Amazon’s Kindle platform is the primary rival to the Nook and recently Amazon provided a huge upgrade to that platform in terms of quality of tablets and added a new larger model.

However the physical tablets are only part of the equation as Amazon offers both a streaming video service via its Prime offerings, but users get two day shipping on many items purchased using Amazon. Amazon has added a huge new library of videos via a deal with Epix as it seeks to also steal customers from Netflix as to help differentiate its offerings.

Aside from the Amazon threat is the looming issue of just additional competition in the overall tablet space. Intel has said that there are almost two dozen new tablets pending using its processors that will be running one of the versions of Microsoft’s Windows 8 operating system.

Microsoft will also be entering the space with its own tablet, called the Surface. Google’s Nexus 7 was released just a few months ago to very favorable reviews and looks to be a long term contender. Then Apple, the overall market leader in the tablet space, is expected to enter the smaller form factor sector next month with a 7-inch iPad.

Barnes & Noble has not yet provided a pricing structure for the video service. Amazon offers its streaming video by the year while Netflix has a per month charge.

Filed Under: Amazon, Apple, Barnes & Noble, Google, Intel, iPad, Microsoft, Nook, Surface, Tablets, Windows 8 Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

iPad now on Duke’s hard court

September 25, 2012 by

Duke University’s men’s basketball team is the latest college sports team to adopt a tablet as a major training tool as the school revealed this week that it was going to eliminate notebooks and move over to Apple’s iPad.

The school will be providing the latest version of the iPad with a 64GB storage capacity and players will have a range of information ranging from the static such as schedules and scouting reports, to live video of the teams’ plays as well as those of rivals and scouting reports. Also included will be tracking software and the ability to wipe the memory if they are stolen or lost.

Tablets are gaining ever increasing acceptance across a wide spectrum of usage models and sports, often viewed as so old school that it is still considering the typewriter, has actually been at the forefront of adoption.

There are at least eight NFL teams that have moved away from paper notebooks and onto iPads including the Dallas Cowboys, Washington Redskins and the Baltimore Ravens. MLB and the NBA have also been quick to follow suit.

Colleges have seen what their professional brethren are doing and have also started to adopt the technology. At the start of this season Stanford University adopted the iPad for its football players. Ohio State announced earlier this year that it was going to outfit all of its student athletes with iPads over the next two years. Other schools moving in this direction include Syracuse and the University of Colorado.

The one constant I am seeing is that almost all of the schools and pro teams are using Apple’s iPad as the tablet of choice and that is a great PR boost for the company (not that they really need it), but if rivals want to get high profile positioning of their tablets they might be well rewarded by going after some teams. I guess we might see this change a bit when the Windows 8 tablets come out next month, but then again maybe not.

Filed Under: Apple, Basketball, Dallas Cowboys, Denver Broncos, Duke University, iOS, iPad, Major League Baseball, Microsoft, NBA Game Time, NCAA Football, NCAA Hoops, NFL, PlayerLync, Windows 8 Tagged With: , , ,

Ryder Cup Gets Big Online Push — Live Video and Social Media Too

September 24, 2012 by

Following on their successful joint effort at the season’s last major, the PGA and Turner Sports will kick out the online jams for this week’s Ryder Cup matches, with a lot of free online live video and some social-media bells and whistles that include a U.S. vs. Europe Twitter contest.

According to a press release from Turner and the PGA, the Rydercup.com website will be the host of a wide array of event coverage that will supplement the TV coverage, which is also extensive — 8 a.m. to 7 p.m. (Eastern) on ESPN on Friday, 9 a.m. to 7 p.m. on NBC Saturday, and noon to 6 p.m. on NBC Sunday. Online coverage will start Friday and Saturday at 8:30 a.m., and continue until play concludes. Sunday, online coverage of the singles matches starts at noon. The matches are taking place at Medinah Country Club just outside Chicago.

The live video online will probably be similar to the experience we saw at the PGA Championship, with live updates, video archives and scores. There was both good and bad, with a great feature that let you go back and replay anything that had happened previously, and a terrible feature called “predict it” that keeps annoying you in a popup window asking you to predict what’s about to happen. Though sports prediction games are increasingly appearing, I have yet to be convinced that predicting shots in golf online is what the experience is all about.

There is one big whiff, however, on the Ryder Cup mobile side — the accompanying mobile-device apps for all this online goodness only work on iPhones and iPads, leaving half of the mobile consumers who use Android platforms high and dry. Though Turner reps claim the mobile website will work just as well as the iPhone app, any mobile user knows that a dedicated app almost always delivers better performance.

On the social-media side, Rydercup.com will offer a “Tweet Battle” between Team U.S.A. and Team Europe, with a “Social Scoreboard” showing which team is winning, both online and at the course. The score will be tallied by counting the number of fans using the respective hashtags — #RyderCupUSA or #RyderCupEurope — in their social media posts. The event is also on Facebook and on Twitter, with something called “The 13th man” replacing the “Social Caddy” feature from the PGA, where you could follow a bunch of Twitter streams.

The PGA earned itself no small amount of social media self respect by not censoring messages from the PGA, especially when its parking situation at Kiawah Island resulted in a lot of angry fans and media for long delays getting out to the course. Right now it appears the site is taking a very USA-USA-USA stance, which is perhaps understandable, but probably not so appealing to European fans. Not sure if other golf fans agree but I for one would rather we see a return to the days when this competition was more collegiate and friendly, and less jingoistic. You can still compete hard without having to make it a sports equivalent of war. But I may be on the short side of that argument.

Filed Under: Android, Apple, Apps, ESPN, Golf, Golf Channel, iPad, iPhone, Live sports via mobile, NBC Sports, PGA, Turner Sports Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Mobile Sports Report TechWatch: New Kickstarter Rules, Wal-Mart Kicks out Kindle

September 24, 2012 by

Kickstarter has imposed a set of rules that will limit the type of products that can be promoted for funding on the crowdfunding site. Gone now will be renderings of projects that are being promoted and instead the site will require an actual working prototype of the project.

It will now also require that the project creators provide a “Risks and Challenges” section that will enable potential investors to have the needed information to make an informed decision about the obstacles that the development might face. In other words, you need to let potential “kickstarters” know that your cool idea may, in fact, not ever happen.

Wal-Mart dumps Amazon’s Kindle
Many smartphone users have probably “showroomed’ — used their phone to check out a price of an item that they are looking at in a store against what Amazon offers it for, and retailers have been seeking ways to slow this trend.

One way is to make Amazon less welcome and now Wal-Mart has said that when its current supply of Amazon Kindle Fire Tablets is sold it will not renew the product offering. The fact that there is almost no profit on the product may have helped with the decision. Target ceased selling them several months ago.

Apple asks judge for more
Apple has requested an additional $707 million in damages from Samsung, on top of the $1 billion that it was awarded by the jury. Among the parts of the request was for an enhanced award of $535 million for willful violation of Apple’s designs and patents, approximately $172 million in supplemental damages using an enlarged period of time for the violations and it is asking that the court to review damages that the jury awarded that were less than Samsung’s expert calculate that the damages actually were.

Apple loses two in Germany
Apple’s cases against both Motorola Mobility and Samsung were tossed out in a Mannheim court after it ruled that the two companies did not infringe on patents that Apple owns relating to touch screen functions.

Other bad news for Apple
One of the bigger pieces of news prior to the iPhone 5 and iOS 6 introductions was that Apple was jettisoning Google Maps, a preinstalled app since the beginning of time, or the first iPhone hit the market at any rate.

Instead Apple was including its own map technology, which with its elimination of some towns and the moving of other landmarks it is apparently the company’s most advanced software ever as it can see into the future. Or it is terrible. It is unusual for Apple to release something this raw and unfinished and the company it is now saying it is still a work in progress.

To make matters worse Google is mocking Apple’s failure with an ad that shows an Android phone using Google Maps showing an accurate vision of a street while Apple’s app shows a basically barren road.

Google sued for patent infringement
Of course it is not all smooth sailing for Google either as, for the second time in as many years it finds itself being sued by Skyhook Wireless, this time over patent infringement. The issue revolves around geolocation technology and WLAN-based positioning systems.

There are a total of 9 patents involved in the case, which was filed in US courts in the District of Delaware by Mass.-based Skyhook, according to Foss Patents.

Filed Under: Amazon, Android, Apple, Google, iOS, iOS 6, iPhone, Lawsuit, Motorola, Samsung Tagged With: , , , ,

Friday Grab Bag: Samsung News, New World Cup Mascot, Windows 8 Tablet Tidbits

September 21, 2012 by

World Cup 2014

Oddly I never think of an armadillo when I think of Brazil, yet in just a few years fans will be flocking to the country to watch the 2014 World Cup and no doubt will be inundated with images of the new World Cup mascot, an armadillo.

FIFA unveiled the mascot, which it has not yet completely ruined by giving it some cute name, Monday with the assistance of Brazilian soccer legend Ronaldo. Don’t worry, they are unveiling its official name in November.

Twitch gets a $15 million investment for eSports broadcasting
Twitch.tv has received a $15 million investment that is intended to help the company expand its eSports live streaming capabilities. The money, which came from venture capital investment firm Bessemer Venture Partners, will be used to expand its engineering team.

This is the company’s third round of funding, bringing its total to $23 million, with the last being a $8 million round in 2007 when the company was known as justin.tv. It received a small seed funding in 2007.

Samsung strikes back at the iPhone
Samsung has said that it plans to add Apple’s just released iPhone 5 to its existing patent lawsuit that it has with its rival. The move has been expected as the company said that if Apple included LTE Samsung believed that the technology would likely violate its extensive patent holdings in that area.

Hopefully this will go better than Samsung’s Facebook campaign, where it asked which smartphone a user would like to have if stranded on a desert island. The Apple faithful flooded the site and voted for the iPhone.

However on a brighter note the company has landed a major deal with American Airlines that calls for the airline to equip 17,000 flight attendants with the Samsung Galaxy Note, according to CIO.

StubHub out Ticketmaster in for MLB?
A report from the New York Post is claiming that Ticketmaster is seeking to replace StubHub as the office site to resell your MLB tickets. According to the piece the deal between MLB and StubHub has expired and there is pressure from several teams to switch.

The reason for the switch is pretty obvious; you can get discounted tickets for top teams at StubHub, while Ticketmaster has a reputation of piling on charges and raising the price. Teams like the Yankees want their seats sold at a higher price.

Intel gets first marquee Atom smartphone user in Motorola
Motorola Mobility has unveiled its Razr I smartphone, its first that is powered by Intel’s 2GHz Atom Z2460 processor. The phone features a 4.3 inch display that can use its entire area, displaying images from border to border.

Among its other features are an 8 MP camera, the ability to start up in one second, NFC and the screen has a resolution of 960 x 540 pixels. No pricing was announced at the rollout.

Anti-Japan protests lead to Intel Extreme Masters tournament cancellation in China
The latest round of the Intel Extreme Masters tournament was scheduled to take place in a few days in Guangzhou, China at the Anime Comics and Game Show has been canceled due to anti-Japanese protests, organizers have said.

The protests, sparked over a fight between Japan and China over a set of islands has led to the cancelation of a large number of Japanese vendors at the show.

More details on Surface Tablet from Microsoft
Microsoft’s CEO Steve Ballmer told the Seattle Times that company would be pricing the device in the same price range as Apple’s iPad rather than in the area that Amazon and Google are seeking to carve out at the low end.

This is not really a surprise since Amazon and Google are positioning their tablets as front end devices that will be used to purchase additional goods and services from the company, and are selling the tablets at cost. The range that Microsoft is looking at is from $300 to between $700-$800.

Leaked pricing on the pending Asus tablet, according to a report from ZDNet, is that it will be even pricier, coming in at $599, $799 and $1,299 depending on model and features. The most expensive is expected to have an 11.6 HD display.

Google asks ITC to ban wide array of Apple products
The International Trade Commission has agreed to investigate alleged patent violations by Apple based on charges brought by Google. Google is claiming that Apple is violated a number of patents that came to the company via its Motorola Mobility purchase. It is also asking the ITC to ban all Mac OS X computers, all iPads and most iPhones.

Microsoft wins a round in patent battles
Microsoft has earned a victory in its patent battle with Motorola in a lower regional German court that ruled that Motorola has infringed on a Microsoft patent that relates to text input. Motorola is expected to appeal in the case.

The ruling could result in both the banning of select Motorola smartphones as well as unspecified damages if the appeal is unsuccessful.

Filed Under: 4G LTE, Android, Apple, Asus, Baseball, Electronics Sports League, eSports, Facebook, FIFA, Galaxy Note, Intel, Intel Extreme Masters, iOS, Lawsuit, Major League Gaming, Microsoft, Motorola, Samsung, Smartphone, Soccer, Tablets, Venture Capital, Video Games Tagged With: , , , , , ,
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