News Facts:

• Zmags, the rich-media mobile and social marketing platform provider, has been honored as a Red Herring Top 100 North America tech startup, a prestigious award recognizing the year’s most promising private companies.
• Zmags was selected based on its innovative technology that enables brands and marketers to create completely new kinds of digital marketing and e-commerce environments for the Web, tablets, smartphones and social sites with curated digital experiences such as digital catalogs, lookbooks, microsites, and other types of rich-media content. Using Zmags, more than 2,000 of the world’s most progressive companies are seeing increases in customer engagement, order values, page views and conversions, as well as heightened brand loyalty.
• Red Herring’s editorial staff evaluated the 150 companies competing for placement in its Top 100 on both quantitative and qualitative criteria, such as financial performance, technology innovation, management quality, strategy, and market penetration.
• Zmags COO and CMO, W. Sean Ford, presented to the judging panel and accepted the award on behalf of the collective Zmags team.
• Zmags was also a proud winner of the Red Herring 100 Europe in 2009, an award given to the top 100 private technology companies based in EMEA (Europe, Middle East and Africa).

Supporting Quotes:

• “Choosing the companies with the strongest potential was by no means a small feat,” said Alex Vieux, publisher and CEO of Red Herring. “After rigorous contemplation and discussion, we narrowed our list down from hundreds of candidates from across North America to the Top 100 Winners. We believe Zmags embodies the vision, drive and innovation that define a successful entrepreneurial venture. Zmags should be proud of its accomplishment, as the competition was very strong.”
• “It’s an incredible honor to be selected as a Red Herring Top 100 tech startup,” said W. Sean Ford, COO and CMO of Zmags, accepting the award on behalf of the company. “As we enter a new era of ‘discovery commerce,’ it is Zmags’ mission to redefine the social and mobile shopping experience, and to help smart marketers create new types of curated digital experiences that inspire users to interact, engage and purchase.”

About Zmags

Zmags is redefining the online content and shopping experience across Web, tablet, mobile, and social channels with our cloud-based rich-media marketing platform. We provide marketers and e-commerce teams from many vertical industries with a deeply engaging and fluid online presentation capability that lets them tell highly captivating stories through curated digital experiences, such as digital catalogs. With Zmags, leading brands have measurably and dramatically increased customer engagement, conversion rates, order size and brand loyalty without the burden of IT constraints. Zmags is among the fastest growing technology companies in North America, ranking #70 on the Deloitte 2011 Technology Fast 500. Zmags is headquartered in Boston, MA. with European offices in London and Copenhagen. For more information about Zmags, please visit www.zmags.com.

Sonian Well Positioned to Take Advantage of a Potential $2.2 Billion Market

OpenView Venture Partners, an expansion-stage venture capital firm focused on providing technology companies with deep operational support, has announced that it is leading a $13.6 million Series C investment in Sonian, the pioneer in cloud-powered archiving and search. The firm’s investment will help Sonian grow its sales and marketing efforts and accelerate innovation. Scott Maxwell, OpenView’s Founder and Senior Managing Director, will also join Sonian’s board of directors.

“We are excited to work with Sonian,” said Maxwell. “It’s a dynamic company that is capitalizing on the opportunities that big data presents by offering a cost-effective, scalable e-mail archiving solution that maximizes the benefits of the cloud.”

Over the past decade, the volume of e-mails sent has grown by 500 percent. According to research by Gartner, the e-mail archiving market is expected to reach $2.2 billion by 2014 — a 20 percent annual growth rate. Gartner also predicts that cloud-based solutions will account for more than 50 percent of the market’s total size.

“It has been another great year for Sonian and we are very excited about our future as we continue to grow our channels and further enhance our operational expertise,” said Sonian CEO Jeff Dickerson. “More than 35 market-leading partners including IBM, ISI and Tech Data and thousands of customers have chosen Sonian for their cloud archiving needs. With this funding, we look forward to expanding our current customer relationships, continuing to build out our sales and marketing teams, and developing new solutions that help customers accelerate their move to the cloud.”

Sonian’s scalable, channel-ready solution for storage management, regulatory compliance, and eDiscovery has been adopted by more than 9,000 customers.

“Almost every company faces challenges regarding mailbox management, and many of them are looking for cloud-based solution like Sonian’s,” commented Maxwell. “We’re very pleased to not only add another extremely promising company to our portfolio, but also to be able to continue supporting Boston’s local economy.”

Sonian marks OpenView’s first investment in a Boston company since it was founded in 2006, and Maxwell’s first since arriving on the city’s venture capital scene more than 12 years ago. OpenView’s other Boston-based portfolio companies, Exinda, Zmags, and Intronis, were all originally founded elsewhere.

Sonian is the twentieth company to join OpenView’s current portfolio and the second to be added since the VC raised its third fund of $200 million in March. It invested in UnboundID, a leading platform provider for identity services based in Austin, Texas, later that month. Summerhill Venture Partners, and Prism VentureWorks returned as investors for Sonian’s latest round of funding.

About OpenView Venture Partners

OpenView Venture Partners (openviewpartners.com) is an expansion-stage venture capital fund based in Boston that is focused on high-growth software, Internet, and technology-enabled companies. Through its staff of seasoned operating executives, who collectively bring several decades of technology and management experience to the firm, OpenView is able to help portfolio companies quickly optimize their product, go-to-market, and organizational and operational functions. Founded in 2006, the firm invests globally and has approximately $445 million in total capital under management.

About Sonian

Sonian’s cloud-powered information archiving platform enables organizations to address eDiscovery needs, achieve regulatory compliance, and reduce IT costs. Sonian’s archiving services can be deployed in minutes, require no hardware or software, and are compatible with many email, instant messaging, and social media systems. Sonian provides the only archiving offerings in the market built from the ground up using advanced cloud computing technologies. Over 9,000 customers benefit from Sonian’s industry-leading security, performance, and usability. Boasting strong partnerships with the world’s leading technology companies, Sonian combines innovative technology with deep archiving expertise to satisfy customers of all sizes and industries. For more information, please visit www.sonian.com.

 

 

Exinda, a global provider of next-generation WAN optimization and application performance assurance solutions, today announced it is the recipient of the 2012 Red Herring 100 Americas Award.

The company was honored by Red Herring editors as one of the top 100 private companies based in the Americas playing a leading role in innovation and technology.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20120508/CL02292LOGO)

Exinda enables organizations to assure the performance of their strategic business applications through policy-based WAN optimization, intelligently applying acceleration and containment based on the priorities of the business. The company addresses the business objectives of thousands of organizations worldwide, helping them to improve application performance, maximize network resources, improve productivity and deliver a reliable end-user experience.

“Exinda is honored to receive the 2012 Red Herring 100 Americas Award, especially given the quality and pedigrees of the companies vying for this award,” said Exinda CEO Michael Sharma. “Exinda’s above-market growth and unique approach to solving customers’ network challenges has contributed to our success. Exinda is well-placed in the market and is leading the charge in a fundamental shift in WAN optimization, with application assurance and user experience replacing traffic compression and acceleration at center stage.”

Previous Red Herring Award winners include companies such as Google, Yahoo, YouTube, Skype, eBay, Twitter and Salesforce.com.

“Choosing the companies with the strongest potential was by no means a small feat,” said Alex Vieux, publisher and CEO of Red Herring. “After rigorous contemplation and discussion, we narrowed our list down from hundreds of candidates from across North America to the Top 100 Winners. We believe Exinda embodies the vision, drive and innovation that define a successful entrepreneurial venture.”

Red Herring’s editorial staff evaluated the companies on both quantitative and qualitative criteria, such as financial performance, technology innovation, management quality, strategy and market penetration. This assessment of potential is complemented by a review of the track record and standing of startups relative to their sector peers, allowing Red Herring to see past the “buzz” and make the list a valuable instrument of discovery and advocacy for the most promising new business models in Americas.

About Exinda®

Exinda is a proven global supplier of next-generation WAN optimization and application acceleration products. The company has helped more than 2,500 organizations in over 80 countries worldwide improve the end user experience, manage application performance, manage congestion over the WAN and reduce network operating costs for the IT executive. For more information, please visit http://www.exinda.com.

News Facts:

• Zmags, the leading provider of rich media mobile and social merchandising, today announced that The Honda Motor Company has selected Zmags Professional to develop highly engaging interactive online brochures, incorporating rich imagery and video content.
• In partnership with Genex, Honda’s interactive agency, Honda has launched its first Zmags-powered interactive brochure for the 2012 Acura RDX, with plans to launch more experiences for other models in the coming months.
• Zmags helps marketers create rich, engaging and consistently branded digital catalogs and publications for all touchpoints including tablets, Facebook, smartphones and the Web.
• Using Zmags, Honda aims to provide prospective Acura customers with a completely new kind of immersive experience as they research their next car, creating greater brand and content engagement.

Supporting Quotes:

• “When they are considering a new car purchase, consumers are spending hours carefully researching options online prior to setting foot in a dealership,” said Mark Ortiz, national interactive marketing manager, Honda Motor Company. “We want to give our customers a compelling interactive experience that showcases our brands in a dynamic way by curating an immersive experience that compels consumers to spend time with our brand online.   We’re thrilled with how well Zmags is already making this vision possible for us and looking forward to seeing how far we can take this versatile platform in the future.”
• “Honda is a perfect example of an innovative brand that recognizes the value in recreating the look and feel of the showroom experience across all of its digital channels,” said Sean Ford, COO and CMO of Zmags. “Using Zmags, Honda will forge exciting new brand experiences that not only inform customers, but also help them discover, visualize and share information about their next car.”

About The Honda Motor Company

For more information about Honda vehicles, please visit www.automobiles.honda.com. For media inquiries please visit www.hondanews.com. For more information about Acura vehicles, please visit www.acura.com. For media inquiries please visit www.acuranews.com.

About Zmags

Zmags is redefining the online content and shopping experience across web, tablet, mobile, and social channels with our cloud-based rich-media marketing platform. We provide marketers and e-commerce teams from many vertical industries with a deeply engaging and fluid online presentation capability that lets them tell highly captivating stories through curated digital experiences, such as digital catalogs. With Zmags, leading brands have measurably and dramatically increased customer engagement, conversion rates, order size and brand loyalty without the burden of IT constraints. Zmags is among the fastest growing technology companies in North America, ranking #70 on the Deloitte 2011 Technology Fast 500. Zmags is headquartered in Boston, MA with European offices in London and Copenhagen. For more information about Zmags, please visit www.zmags.com.

The Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges, a consortium of 34 institutions, chose Instructure® Canvas ® to replace Blackboard’s ANGEL learning management system.

(Logo: http://photos.prnewswire.com/prnh/20120201/SF45541LOGO)

“We chose Canvas because it’s an open platform that empowers instructors to use social media and mobile tools to engage students,” said Connie Broughton, the State Board’s director of eLearning and Open Education. “We felt constrained by the concept of managing learning in a box. We need something more flexible than a traditional learning management system.”

The State Board collaborated with its 34 colleges and with six Washington public universities to review feedback from over 800 faculty members, almost 100 hundred of which worked through a pre-defined and detailed rubric, completing a set of tasks and providing feedback on their experiences in each of three finalist products. They explored the option of staying with Blackboard or moving to one of the Blackboard competitors. In the end, Canvas came out first in each criterion on the rubric, including mobile and social.

Two Washington colleges, Lower Columbia and Bellevue College, also created faculty-driven task forces to evaluate the options. Both arrived at the same conclusion – Canvas is the top faculty rated choice.

Lower Columbia created its rubric based on 15 essential and 11 important criteria, including integration with social media, mobile, usability and ADA compliance. The college then conducted a winter pilot of 76 courses using Canvas. When feedback came in, 99 percent of the responses were positive.

“The faculty said Canvas is easy to use and navigate, intuitive, visually appealing, well organized and consistent,” said Renee Carney, Chair of the Lower Columbia task force.

The other institution in Washington that assembled its own task force was Bellevue College. It conducted a six-month evaluation and chose Canvas based on faculty feedback.

“Faculty saw Canvas as a paradigm shift,” said Russ Beard, Vice President of Information Resources. “They chose Canvas because it saves them time and enables new ways of providing content and learning. They said there is no apple-to-apple comparison of Canvas to anything out there.”

Instructure has added more than 170 customers since January 2011, including Auburn University, Brown University and the Maricopa Community College District. For more information about the Washington consortium’s selection of Canvas, register for the May 25 live webinar from Lower Columbia College about its decision to use Canvas.

About Instructure:

Instructure is a technology company committed to improving education. We provide instructors and students modern tools and resources to empower the learning experience. Founded by graduate students in collaboration with educational institutions, Instructure provides Canvas – the open, easy-to-use, cloud-native learning platform.

Devin Knighton
Director of Public Relations
Instructure Canvas
801-722-8187
[email protected]

Monetate has released a new eBook,“The Top 10 Testing, Targeting, and Optimization Best Practices: Second Edition,” packed with winning strategies for organizations to maximize online revenue by creating a more relevant customer experience through effective website testing and optimization.

The company offered the new eBook exclusively to attendees of its Agility Summit held last week and has now made it available for free download. The valuable resource provides an updated look at proven strategies to put an end to the one-size-fits-all web by tailoring the online customer experience based on the behaviors and attributes of website visitors.

Containing tangible tips and strategies for marketers to increase relevance and maximize online revenue, “The Top 10 Testing, Targeting, and Optimization Best Practices: Second Edition” explains:

• How basic customer segmentation helps turn first-time browsers into buyers.
• Why maintaining inbound message consistency is critical to increasing conversion.
• How using time-triggered messages helps retain existing customers .
• Why optimizing for tablet users will increase relevance and boost conversions.
• How to improve conversions by badging products with ease and simplicity.
• And much more.

 

“The number one challenge we constantly hear from the C-suite is identifying ways to make the online experience more relevant for consumers,” said Monetate CMO Kurt Heinemann. “With customer expectations continuing to grow, the ability to deliver on these expectations is becoming more difficult. We’ve published this eBook to help businesses deliver real-time relevance online.”

Monetate offers enterprise brands the ability to quickly and easily act on big data and deliver a more relevant online customer experience. The Monetate Agility Suite empowers organizations to change anything, anywhere on the website at any time, making it easier than ever to test, merchandise, and target customers while executing quickly and intelligently at the browser level.

To access a free download of the “Top 10 Testing, Targeting, and Optimization Best Practices,” click here.

About Monetate
Monetate drives billions of dollars of revenue every year for some of the best-known brands in the world, including Best Buy, QVC, Urban Outfitters, Aeropostale, The Sports Authority, and PETCO. The company’s comprehensive product suite and conversion expertise enable marketers to deliver a more relevant customer experience with unprecedented agility.

Leading marketers rely on Monetate’s cloud-based browser technology to achieve a new level of speed and control, allowing them to run 16 times more optimization campaigns compared to industry averages. The Monetate Agility Suite includes advanced products for testing, merchandising, targeting, and cross-channel consistency, providing an opportunity to bypass IT restraints and react in real time to customer demands.

Monetate also helps marketers implement best practices and drive online revenue through its expert strategic services and content publishing teams. For more information visit http://monetate.com/ or follow us on Twitter @Monetate.

Intronis, which promotes cloud storage and online backup to managed services providers (MSPs), has raised $3.85 million to fuel company expansion, CEO Kent Plunkett has confirmed to MSPmentor.

The investors include existing investors and friends and family — such as Plunkett’s own family, which invested $850,000. “It’s safe to say that’s a vote of confidence in what we’re doing here at Intronis,” said Plunkett. Also still involved with the company: OpenView Venture Partners.

Intronis is growing roughly 50 percent or more annually, and performing “right on plan” so far in 2012, Plunkett indicated. “Our MSP partners are responding well to our messages and [cloud] services we’re offering,” he added.

An SEC filing dated May 1, 2012, offered some clues about the funding. Plunkett confirmed the final figure — $3.85 million — during a conversation with me earlier today.

Overall, the cloud storage market continues to perform strongly. Most of the MSPs in our annualMSPmentor 100 survey have pushed into both managed and cloud storage. And among the world’sTop 100 Cloud Services Providers, 73% offer cloud storage services either from their own data centers or via third-party cloud storage providers, according to our second-annual Talkin’ Cloud 100 survey results, announced May 16, 2012.

Still, we’re starting to hear rumblings that some cloud storage companies are trimming expenses and perhaps even cutting some staff. Are there too many vendors in the market? We’re poking around for firm details now.