Memjet To Unveil Innovative Printing Technology, Energy Innovations Moves into Poway, Skinit Gets $60M, & More San Diego BizTech News

So many innovations, so little time. It’s a good thing you don’t have to choose between Memjet’s superfast printing technology and Energy Innovations’ supercool concentrating photovoltaic solar modules. You can have it all, and you can get it now.

—Memjet, the San Diego-based startup with new inkjet printing technologies, is getting ready to step on the global stage this fall with the launch of super-fast printers with Memjet technology inside. Memjet CEO Len Lauer told me he sees a $30 billion global market for Memjet’s technology, but in an e-mail after the story appeared, he says it’s probably closer to $200 billion.

—The future of Qualcomm’s Flo TV continues to stir widespread speculation. During an earnings conference call, Qualcomm Chairman and CEO Paul Jacobs said the company is talking with partners and considering a number of alternatives for its Flo TV subsidiary. Flo TV provides about 20 channels of broadcast programming to certain mobile devices.

—San Diego telecom entrepreneur Hiep Pham told me San Diego isn’t attracting wireless startups to the extent it did 15 years ago. It’s far easier nowadays to find high-quality engineers in China and India, so many wireless startups are getting started there.

—Energy Innovations, a startup founded by Bill Gross at Pasadena, CA-based Idealab in 2001, has moved to Poway in eastern San Diego County to begin manufacturing its concentrating photovoltaic solar modules. Energy Innovations has raised a total of $60 million in venture capital from Idealab, Mohr Davidow Ventures of Menlo Park, CA, and an unnamed individual investor, according to CEO Joe Budano.

—ABS Capital Partners (which has offices in Boston, San Francisco, and Baltimore, MD) and Norwest Equity Partners (in New York and Minneapolis, MN) invested $60 million in Skinit, a San Diego company that sells branded vinyl skins to personalize consumer electronics.

—The San Diego News Network thanked its readers and advertisers for their support in a farewell message posted on the SDNN website.

—Provide Commerce, the San Diego-based e-commerce company that operates ProFlowers, RedEnvelope, Cherry Moon Farms, and Shari’s Berries, acquired Illinois-based Personal Creations, an online merchant that offers more than 3,000 personalized gifts. Financial terms were not disclosed.

—San Diego’s Huntington Capital provided $5 million in a combination of debt and equity warrants to RPI, a specialized fulfillment printer based in Tukwila, WA. The company handles 40 percent of the photo-printing products market.

—What’s the slogan that defines San Diego’s status as a technology hub for algae-based biofuels? Mayor Jerry Sanders invited people to suggest something more exciting than the one he came up with: “When you think of pond scum, think of San Diego.”

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.