MojoPages Gets Austin Powered, Reaction Design’s Technology is on Fire, ParAccel Raises $22M, & Other San Diego BizTech News

It was a week of deals before the Fourth of July weekend—partnership deals, funding deals, and even some buyout deals. So let’s just deal ’em.

—ParAccel, which develops business analytics technologies that accelerate database queries, moved into new digs in San Diego six months ago—after doubling its staff to 60 employees. Now the company, which also has offices in Cupertino, CA, has raised $22 million in a third round of venture funding from Menlo Ventures, Walden International, Bay Partners, Mohr Davidow Ventures, and Tao Venture Partners.

—Bakersfield, CA-based Ellis Energy Investments, which mostly operates oil industry service firms, made a shift to renewable energy by acquiring the assets of San Diego’s Pyron Solar. The recapitalized solar technology startup, which is developing industrial-sized solar arrays that concentrate sunlight, plans to unveil a solar array demonstration project it has been working on with San Diego Gas & Electric.

—MojoPages, a San Diego-based online business directory that includes consumer reviews, has raised $5 million in a Series A round of venture funding led by Austin Ventures of Austin, TX. The two-year-old startup plans to use the funds to expand its search business and attract new partners.

—The $100 million invested in San Diego’s V-Vehicle Co. during the three months that ended June 30 was counted among the biggest cleantech venture deals of the second quarter in a report issued by Deloitte and the San Francisco, CA-based Cleantech Group. Researchers say venture capital invested in renewable energy and cleantech startups rebounded to $1.2 billion during the quarter, but that’s still down 44 percent from the same quarter in 2008.

—Reaction Design CEO Bernie Rosenthal said he expects the simulation software developer to grow at 50 percent a year for the next few years. The company, which specializes in technology that models combustion reactions in engines and turbines, is benefitting from increasing environmental restrictions on fossil fuel emissions. The development of new fuels also has engine and turbine designers turning to Reaction Design’s simulation software to help them save on development costs.

—San Diego’s Concerro, which specializes in Web-based software that enables nurses to bid for their work shifts, acquired the assets of CommandAware, a hospital-incident management system, from Los Angeles-based PortBlue. The deal is expected to enable Concerro to expand its business.

—On a final note, I’ve received a number of congratulatory notes concerning Xconomy’s syndication agreement with the San Diego Union-Tribune, which operates the biggest news website in this region. Under our agreement, Xconomy will provide news and feature stories for both SignOnSanDiego.com and San Diego’s largest metro daily newspaper. Thanks for reading!

Author: Bruce V. Bigelow

In Memoriam: Our dear friend Bruce V. Bigelow passed away on June 29, 2018. He was the editor of Xconomy San Diego from 2008 to 2018. Read more about his life and work here. Bruce Bigelow joined Xconomy from the business desk of the San Diego Union-Tribune. He was a member of the team of reporters who were awarded the 2006 Pulitzer Prize in National Reporting for uncovering bribes paid to San Diego Republican Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham in exchange for special legislation earmarks. He also shared a 2006 award for enterprise reporting from the Society of Business Editors and Writers for “In Harm’s Way,” an article about the extraordinary casualty rate among employees working in Iraq for San Diego’s Titan Corp. He has written extensively about the 2002 corporate accounting scandal at software goliath Peregrine Systems. He also was a Gerald Loeb Award finalist and National Headline Award winner for “The Toymaker,” a 14-part chronicle of a San Diego start-up company. He takes special satisfaction, though, that the series was included in the library for nonfiction narrative journalism at the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. Bigelow graduated from U.C. Berkeley in 1977 with a degree in English Literature and from the Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism in 1979. Before joining the Union-Tribune in 1990, he worked for the Associated Press in Los Angeles and The Kansas City Times.