Sharpcast has raised a $10 million round from existing investors Sigma Partners, Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Selby Venture. This brings the total raised to $26.5 million. Sharpcast offers file-syncing through its SugrarSync service, which syncs data across multiple devices and the cloud.
Syncing is becoming a serious technology trend as people split up their digital lives across devices and the Web. It is one of the promises of Windows Live Mesh from Microsoft, which won the Crunchie for best technology innovation. Apple offers syncing through its MobileMe service. Startups like Sharpcast are looking to carve out their own niche here with both free and subscription services. → Read More
Online backup site Mozy is giving away 50 free year-long accounts to commemorate the official release of their Mac backup client. To get yours, send a message to techcrunch@mozy.com that answers the question, “Why do you deserve free backup service for your Mac?” Data-loss horror stories are encouraged. The Mozy team will select the fifty best responses and will email the winners instructions to claim their free accounts. Mozy is a cloud-based alternative to Apple’s Time Machine, which works very well but doesn’t have the added security of off-site data backup. And at $4.99 a month for unlimited storage, the price is couldn’t be much lower. We covered Mozy’s Mac version last April when it was introduced as beta. The final version of the software has introduced support for Apple Mail and Leopard, along with a host of technical features like bandwidth throttling and compatibility for programs with resource forks. In addition to local backup solutions like Time Machine, Mozy faces competition from online storage sites such as Apple’s .Mac, Sugarsync, and recently-released Syncplicity. Carbonite, one of the leaders in this space, works on Windows machines but has yet to release a Mac version. CrunchBase Information Mozy Carbonite Sharpcast Information provided by CrunchBase → Read More
Sharpcast has been holding their heads down over the last four years working on a technology that promises to solve a basic need: that of accessing your files no matter which device you’re currently using. Today Sharpcast finally takes the lid off SugarSync, a consumer product that promises to automatically synchronize data across desktop computers, laptops, mobile phones, and even televisions. This release comes a year after the company announced the first version of a photo application that could sync photos across devices. SugarSync is the all-purpose syncing system, previously dubbed “Hummingbird”, that was anticipated back then. Turns out the photo app was just a proof of concept. While the photo app required users to change their behavior by giving up other apps like iPhoto and Picassa, SugarSync syncs files from the file system level. Once users download, install and configure the SugarSync client (available for both PCs and Macs), they don’t have to use any SugarSync-specific programs to edit and organize their files. As long as these files reside in folders that have been configured for synchronization, they will be kept up-to-date with not only Sharpcast’s cloud storage but all other synced computers as well. Make a change to a file on your PC and that file will be instantly updated on your laptop as well, assuming both devices are turned on and connected to the internet. You’ll also be able to access these synced files through the web browser wherever you go. If this sounds like FolderShare, Mozy or Dropbox (which I raved about last week), that’s because there’s a good deal of overlap between the four. Except for the backup-focused Mozy, all of them can be used to sync files across devices. But they do differ in substantial ways. Files on Dropbox have to be placed in a particular folder, whereas with SugarSync you can choose to sync any areas of your hard drive. Sharing files with others is also currently much easier with Dropbox, although SugarSync says it has plans for comparable sharing functionality. And file versioning is absent from SugarSync, while it’s available with Dropbox. As for FolderShare, it requires all devices to be turned on whereas SugarSync does not. SugarSync perhaps differs most from these other solutions by supporting the syncing of files to mobile devices and TV sets. If you have a BlackBerry or Windows Mobile device, you can install an application that → Read More
Companies are starting to figure out that the contact information on your mobile phone may be the most important social network you have – perhaps even better than the email inbox that Yahoo is targeting. Danish startup ZYB started offering a service that simply backed up your mobile phone contacts to the web in mid-2006. A year later they turned all that data into a mobile social network. They’re one of the small startups with a real shot at mobile social network with critical mass. As of August 2007 they had 200,000 active users. It’s no surprise, then, that ZYB is being emulated. Israeli startup NewACT, with $6.5 million in funding over two rounds from Cedar Fund, are launching a new service called SYNCY into beta today. The service lets users migrate contacts, calendars and media from a mobile phone to the web. It’s part ZYB, part Sharpcast. While Syncy supports over 700 handset models, the iPhone isn’t one, so I took it out for a spin by installing it on a SonyEricsson phone. The feature that won me over was the ability to get immediate Web access to the photos and videos I’ve takes of our kids using the phone. Incidentally, the last time I had digital copies of such files was when I switched handsets. That’s when I had no choice but borrow a cable and install Nokia’s phone management application—by far, not a user-friendly proposition to access “everyday media”. Syncy’s handset client is simple to operate and once syncing is configured to run automatically, it’s smooth sailing from there onwards. There’s also an Outlook plug-in which synchronizes contacts and events (Exchange is not required). Google calendar integration will be available shortly. NewACT claims that Syncy is the only service to offer cross-phone synchronization. Meaning, you can sync a Nokia phone then stick the SIM in a Motorola phone and Syncy’s server will reformat and readapt the data to fit the exact data structures of your new phone. 500 TechCrunch readers will receive access to Syncy’s limited Beta by requesting an account and entering “TechCrunch.” CrunchBase Information Zyb NewACT Sharpcast SYNCY Information provided by CrunchBase → Read More
If you work or play from multiple computing devices – laptops, desktops and/or mobile phones, Sharpcast can be a killer productivity tool and an excellent way of keeping all kinds of files syncronized. In a very basic sense, it’s like IMAP for all your files. Sharpcast came out of beta and released a 1.0 version of their photo synchronization application today. Sharpcast Photos syncs the photos you add and edits you make on your desktop, web, and mobile phone in real time. The new version now allows you to collaboratively edit your photos and galleries, also in real time. Collaboration consists of the ability to share files and read/write privileges in public or private folders along with real time chat built into the client. The demo I saw of Sharpcast’s real-time syncing is quite impressive, pushing file updates to all the platforms in under a second. Edit a photo in their application, on the web, or your desktop, and the changes are instantly pushed to each location. But Sharpcast isn’t trying to be the next Flickr, rather, the photo syncing application really a demo for their file syncing API. In the specific case of photos, whole photos are stored in each location, with edits to the original photo represented as meta data directions on how the to render the final version. They currently have a broader file syncing application, Hummingbird, in the works. Hummingbird will handle syncing for all file types. It is essentially the same animal as the photo sharing application, but with fewer bells and whistles. Hummingbird will note and push your updates to your other platforms, but won’t carry out the same real-time updates of the photo product. To avoid the problem of two people making concurrent edits to a file, they will have to be saved, and then opened elsewhere to make changes. While Microsoft Word does support editing concurrency, Hummingbird does not currently support it. Sharpcast took $13.5 million in financing last March. → Read More
Silicon Valley based Sharpcast, which closed a $13.5 million round of financing in early March (and $16.5 million total over two rounds), is now open to the public. The official announcement is tomorrow – Wednesday – but the site is open now for new registrations. Sharpcast is important, but hard to understand at a glance. The basic idea is to remove the hassle of syncing data across computers and mobile devices. The first product, Sharpcast Photos, showcases the technology quite well. In the future we’ll see products from Sharpcast that allow auto syncing of contacts, calendars and documents as well, all from their native applications (outlook, ical, etc.). Sharpcast Photos, though, allows users to upload photos to a desktop application. It is available only for Windows machines today, with a Mac version promised soon. Once the photos are in the desktop application, users make a few option selections and the photos are then placed on the web, synced to other computers and synced to a mobile device. The process works all multi-directionally, too. Upload a photo the web and it syncs to the desktop (and mobile device). Take a picture with the mobile device and it syncs to the web and the desktop. I saw a demo of Sharpcast at the DEMO conference in February, and then again a couple of weeks ago from CEO Gibu Thomas and Marketing/Business Development Director Allen Bush. The application is extremely well done and the syncronization is near instantaneous to a mobile device. If anything, the Sharpcast guys have waited too long to launch the product. I found distressingly few bugs to complain about. This is the future. The question is whether Sharpcast will be part of it or not. If they execute, they will be. → Read More
Sharpcast, which I wrote about briefly after seeing their product at a recent conference, announced a big round of financing today – $13.5 million from Sigma Partners, Draper Fisher Jurvetson and Selby Venture Partners. The company is based in Palo Alto. The product is a suite of consumer services that acts as a “uber-interpreter” across platforms (PC, mobile, etc.). Sign up to beta test their first product, Sharpcast Photos, on their website. If you have the time and are interested, read CEO Gibu Thomas’ post on Web 2.0 and why he created Sharpcast. This round of funding signals that Sharpcast is in it for the long haul – no $30 million acquisition for them at this point. From what I’ve seen so far, they have real technology that can help bridge the gap between mobile and desktop applications. → Read More
DEMO 2006: 70 companies gather at a hotel in Phoenix, Arizona to compete head on for our attention. $15,000 buys you 5 minutes in front of 700 people, and a chance to make history (which is not recorded real time because the wifi is crushed under the load and no one can get online). At least there is reliable internet access in the press room, along with dozens of free USB drives laying around (this whole “press” gig is pretty damn awesome). A few companies caught my eye today as the ones to watch this year. Here they are: Blurb Blurb will turn your blog or other website into a book. As in, a real, tangible book that you can hold. The service is now in private beta and will be available to the public in March(ish). CEO Eileen Gittins does a great job describing the product and this looks to be an interesting space, especially for ego-type purchases where bloggers buy a copy for themselves.t’ll be about $30 for a four color, 40 page, 8×10 hardcover book with a custom dust jacket. Kaboodle I wrote about Kaboodle, a clip service that is really useful for gathering and sharing information on the web, back in October. They launched some incredible new features this week to normalize data across items: search for items, clone/copy a page, find related items, vote on items, etc. They are also allowing users to create profiles to allow more social aspects. A lot of people are finding Kaboodle to be a very useful shopping tool. Kosmix Mountain View based Kosmix is a structured search engine with three current verticals: health, politics and travel. More are coming soon. Instead of showing linear, Google-like results, Kosmix is categorizing results to create a taxonomy. They claim their engine can be used to create good results over almost any topic area. This is one to watch and I’ll be doing a full profile on them soon. Krugle Fred Wilson wrote about Krugle today as well, saying “It’s a search engine for open source software. Vertical search for open source. Sounds like a good concept. The demo was simple and the proposition was compelling. Not sure how they make money, but the demo isn’t supposed to focus on that.” Knowing how often developers use search engines to find code snippets, this will be an extremely useful. The company is based in → Read More
