Waterloo Tech Digest - March 9, 2010
In this issue:
Read the latest Waterloo tech news stories every day as they happen (links to over 100 items in the last month, including video interviews by the Financial Post with members of the Google Waterloo team).
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S P O N S O R S
GO BEYOND STAFFING
For over 30 years, Procom has been matching people with companies, for jobs that are a perfect fit - contract, full-time, or part-time. We partner with large and small companies across North America, including some of the world's best-known enterprises, to provide a range of services, training tools, and the ideal candidates to help them flourish. We've been named one of Canada's 50 Best Managed Companies and go beyond staffing to look strategically at the processes and people that will truly help a company succeed. Phone: 519.885.4331.
RISK FREE LEAD GENERATION
From sales opportunity development to increasing attendance for events, Virtual Causeway accelerates your sales process! With a focus on selling and marketing complex services and technology, we guarantee a consistent and reliable flow of quality leads - assuring that your pipeline is constantly full. Contact us today to learn how we can help connect you with your next customer. Call 519-886-1600 ext. 405 or email marketing@v-causeway.com for details.
AERO CORPORATE BENEFITS - Your Employee Benefits Solutions Provider
Located in Waterloo, we've served the KW technology community for over 20 years, providing employee benefits solutions to companies large and small. Our mission is simple. Help our clients succeed by doing what we do best: -- Design and monitor programs that attract & retain the most qualified employees -- Contain costs of employee benefits, retirement plans, and HR support -- Provide employee-level support & advice to help you manage risk & compliance. Please contact Herb Goedecke at 519.489.2376 x11 or herbg@aero-corp.com for details.
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[1]---------------------------------------------------------------
Aimetis raises $5M Series A round
March 1, 2010
Aimetis has raised $5 million in funding from Covington Capital and VentureLink, both based in Toronto. It was a Series A round for company, which was founded in 2003. Aimetis has developed software used in network video surveillance and business intelligence applications.
VentureLink has also invested in Covarity while Covington was an investor in Coreworx and Agile Systems.
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S P O N S O R
GOWLINGS & AIMETIS
Gowlings was pleased to assist Aimetis Corp. in completing its $5 million Series A financing with Covington Capital Corporation and VentureLink Brighter Future Fund Inc. Gowlings' Waterloo Region Technology Law Group provides sophisticated, practical and timely advice in all areas of technology law to a broad range of clients, from start-ups to public companies. 40 professionals serving Waterloo Region and Guelph (over 700 professionals nationwide). The Right People. Right Here. Contact John.Durdan@gowlings.com or Sean.Gomes@gowlings.com at 519-576-6910.
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[2]---------------------------------------------------------------
Open Text receives $34M contribution from Ontario government
March 4, 2010
Open Text has received $33.75 million from the Ontario government through its Next Generation of Jobs Fund. The fund is managed by the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade.
Open Text had announced three months ago that it will be doubling its size in Waterloo, with room for an additional 700+ employees. With the provincial funding, the government says it is helping create nearly 400 new jobs -- in Waterloo, Richmond Hill and Ottawa. Along with the new jobs, the Open Text announcement mentioned both "digital media" and "green computing," which should keep the government happy.
It is the 18th investment from the fund, which was the source of a $29.6 million contribution to Agfa HealthCare early last year (see below). GE, Ford, Pfizer, AMD, and Ubisoft are among the other companies that have received funding through the program.
[3]---------------------------------------------------------------
Open Text to acquire Montreal's Nstein for $35M
February 22, 2010
Open Text also announced that it is acquiring Montreal-based Nstein Technologies for about $35 million. Nstein shareholders will receive cash unless they choose to receive payment in Open Text shares. They still have to approve the deal, which Open Text expects will close before the end of June.
Nstein develops content management software and trades on the TSX Venture Exchange.
[4]---------------------------------------------------------------
MKS sales up 16%
February 23, 2010
MKS earned US$1.1 million on sales of US$15.3 million in the quarter ended January 31 (Q3 10). Sales were up 4% from Q2 and 16% from a year ago, although an increase in expenses led to a sequential dip in operating income and earnings.
Operations generated US$4.8 million in cash, and MKS paid US$1.5 million to shareholders through its quarterly dividend. It ended the quarter with US$22.1 million in cash, up US$3.1 million from the end of Q2.
The company's core ALM business accounted for 87% of revenue, which is a bit lower than in recent quarters, as MKS' interoperability unit had a good quarter, providing a third of the profits and reporting a 16% increase in sales from the previous quarter. MKS has integrated the sales forces between the two business segments and is cross-selling its product lines.
In the conference call, MKS said it will be integrating ALM with software modelling tools such as MathWorks and Enterprise Architect.
MKS had an average of 317 employees worldwide during the quarter, up from 309 in Q2.
[5]---------------------------------------------------------------
Intellitactics acquired by Chicago firm
March 3, 2010
Intellitactics, which was founded in Kitchener and has its development team in the area, has been acquired by Chicago's Trustwave. Financial details were not disclosed.
Intellitactics was founded in 1996 by John and Paul Sop. It received funding from investors in the Maryland-Virginia-Washington, DC area and has been based in that region for many years now, with a U.S.-based executive team.
Trustwave told the Record that it intends to invest more money in the company's Kitchener office, which currently employs 20-30 people.
[6]---------------------------------------------------------------
Arise looks to raise money, receives 30 Ontario FIT orders
February 11-March 8, 2010
Arise is hoping to raise up to $10 million through an offering that would combine a secured debenture and an equity component. The offering would be led by Toronto's Sandfire Securities.
The company also took $500,000 through two drawdowns from its equity facility with Haverstock Master Fund. Each of the drawdowns have been at a lower price per share than the one before it (see previous digest). The sixth drawdown last week was at a price 20% below the fourth drawdown a month earlier.
Arise also announced that it expects to receive an extension of its credit facility with Germany's Commerzbank AG by the middle of this month. The extension would run to the end of the year.
Arise says it has received 30 orders in Ontario with a combined value of about $5 million for solar projects under the feed-in-tariff (FIT) program.
[7]---------------------------------------------------------------
Coreworx to acquire Calgary firm
March 2, 2010
Coreworx will acquire Calgary's Decision Dynamics Technology in an all-stock deal. Decision Dynamics shareholders will receive one million shares in Acorn Energy, Coreworx' parent company -- shares that are worth about $7 million currently.
Decision Dynamics trades on the TSX Venture Exchange and over the first nine months of 2009 reported a loss of $1.1 million on sales of $2.7 million. It develops project cost management software for the energy industry. The company will become a subsidiary of Coreworx, which is itself a subsidiary of Acorn Energy.
The deal needs to be approved by Decision Dynamics shareholders and is expected to close next month.
[8]---------------------------------------------------------------
STOCK REPORT: New highs for Open Text; jumps for Sandvine, Biorem
February 2010
Lots of good news on the stock market for local tech companies during the month. Open Text shares soared to new heights in February, ending the month above $50. The last time the company's stock hit those levels -- in 2003 -- Open Text split its shares, and adjusting for that split, the February-ending price is the highest ever for the stock.
Shares in Biorem have also been on a roll in 2010, jumping 27% in February and 51% over the first two months of the year. Their month-end price was their highest since July 2008.
It was a similar story at Sandvine, where the company's shares climbed to their second-best month-end price since March 2008. Dalsa shares has their best month-end since August 2008.
MKS shares finished the month above $10 for the first time (reverse split-adjusted) since January 2007. And while Descartes stock was just up slightly in February, it was its best month-ending price since March 2002.
For the month of February:
Biorem [TSXV: BRM] +27%
Sandvine [TSX: SVC] +25%
Open Text [TSX: OTC] +22%
MKS [TSX: MKX] +12%
Dalsa [TSX: DSA] +11%
RIM [TSX: RIM] +10%
--S&P TSX COMPOSITE INDEX +5%
Descartes [TSX: DSG] +3%
--S&P TSX VENTURE INDEX +3%
RDM [TSX: RC] 0%
===============================
TurboSonic [OTCBB: TSTA] -1%
ATS [TSX: ATA] -6%
Com Dev [TSX: CDV] -6%
Arise [TSX: APV] -13%
Companies with headquarters outside the area:
Agfa-Gevaert [Brussels: AGFA] +23%
Blue Coat [Nasdaq: BCSI] +18%
ON Semiconductor [Nasdaq: ONNN] +10%
Sybase [NYSE: SY] +9%
Oracle [Nasdaq: ORCL] +7%
Intel [Nasdaq: INTC] +7%
NCR [NYSE: NCR] +5%
McAfee [NYSE: MFE] +5%
Ansys [Nasdaq: ANSS] +5%
Acorn Energy [Nasdaq: ACFN] +4%
Electronic Arts [Nasdaq: ERTS] +2%
===================================
Google [Nasdaq: GOOG] -1%
T-Ray Science [TSXV: THZ] -11%
[9]---------------------------------------------------------------
Startup Notes
Miscellaneous Tidbits
- Aimetis raises $5M Series A round
- Open Text receives $34M contribution from Ontario government
- Open Text to acquire Montreal's Nstein for $35M
- MKS sales up 16%
- Intellitactics acquired by Chicago firm
- Arise looks to raise money, receives 30 Ontario FIT orders
- Coreworx to acquire Calgary firm
- STOCK REPORT: New highs for Open Text; jumps for Sandvine, Biorem
- Startup notes from ParkVu, Dejero, Unsynced, LiveHive, PostRank, Primal Fusion
- Miscellaneous tidbits from Accelerator Centre, MedShare, Agfa Healthcare, TurboSonic, Unitron, Igloo, RIM, Dalsa, exactEarth, RoweBots, Desire2Learn
Read the latest Waterloo tech news stories every day as they happen (links to over 100 items in the last month, including video interviews by the Financial Post with members of the Google Waterloo team).
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
S P O N S O R S
GO BEYOND STAFFING
For over 30 years, Procom has been matching people with companies, for jobs that are a perfect fit - contract, full-time, or part-time. We partner with large and small companies across North America, including some of the world's best-known enterprises, to provide a range of services, training tools, and the ideal candidates to help them flourish. We've been named one of Canada's 50 Best Managed Companies and go beyond staffing to look strategically at the processes and people that will truly help a company succeed. Phone: 519.885.4331.
RISK FREE LEAD GENERATION
From sales opportunity development to increasing attendance for events, Virtual Causeway accelerates your sales process! With a focus on selling and marketing complex services and technology, we guarantee a consistent and reliable flow of quality leads - assuring that your pipeline is constantly full. Contact us today to learn how we can help connect you with your next customer. Call 519-886-1600 ext. 405 or email marketing@v-causeway.com for details.
AERO CORPORATE BENEFITS - Your Employee Benefits Solutions Provider
Located in Waterloo, we've served the KW technology community for over 20 years, providing employee benefits solutions to companies large and small. Our mission is simple. Help our clients succeed by doing what we do best: -- Design and monitor programs that attract & retain the most qualified employees -- Contain costs of employee benefits, retirement plans, and HR support -- Provide employee-level support & advice to help you manage risk & compliance. Please contact Herb Goedecke at 519.489.2376 x11 or herbg@aero-corp.com for details.
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
[1]---------------------------------------------------------------
Aimetis raises $5M Series A round
March 1, 2010
Aimetis has raised $5 million in funding from Covington Capital and VentureLink, both based in Toronto. It was a Series A round for company, which was founded in 2003. Aimetis has developed software used in network video surveillance and business intelligence applications.
VentureLink has also invested in Covarity while Covington was an investor in Coreworx and Agile Systems.
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
S P O N S O R
GOWLINGS & AIMETIS
Gowlings was pleased to assist Aimetis Corp. in completing its $5 million Series A financing with Covington Capital Corporation and VentureLink Brighter Future Fund Inc. Gowlings' Waterloo Region Technology Law Group provides sophisticated, practical and timely advice in all areas of technology law to a broad range of clients, from start-ups to public companies. 40 professionals serving Waterloo Region and Guelph (over 700 professionals nationwide). The Right People. Right Here. Contact John.Durdan@gowlings.com or Sean.Gomes@gowlings.com at 519-576-6910.
////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
[2]---------------------------------------------------------------
Open Text receives $34M contribution from Ontario government
March 4, 2010
Open Text has received $33.75 million from the Ontario government through its Next Generation of Jobs Fund. The fund is managed by the Ministry of Economic Development and Trade.
Open Text had announced three months ago that it will be doubling its size in Waterloo, with room for an additional 700+ employees. With the provincial funding, the government says it is helping create nearly 400 new jobs -- in Waterloo, Richmond Hill and Ottawa. Along with the new jobs, the Open Text announcement mentioned both "digital media" and "green computing," which should keep the government happy.
It is the 18th investment from the fund, which was the source of a $29.6 million contribution to Agfa HealthCare early last year (see below). GE, Ford, Pfizer, AMD, and Ubisoft are among the other companies that have received funding through the program.
[3]---------------------------------------------------------------
Open Text to acquire Montreal's Nstein for $35M
February 22, 2010
Open Text also announced that it is acquiring Montreal-based Nstein Technologies for about $35 million. Nstein shareholders will receive cash unless they choose to receive payment in Open Text shares. They still have to approve the deal, which Open Text expects will close before the end of June.
Nstein develops content management software and trades on the TSX Venture Exchange.
[4]---------------------------------------------------------------
MKS sales up 16%
February 23, 2010
MKS earned US$1.1 million on sales of US$15.3 million in the quarter ended January 31 (Q3 10). Sales were up 4% from Q2 and 16% from a year ago, although an increase in expenses led to a sequential dip in operating income and earnings.
Operations generated US$4.8 million in cash, and MKS paid US$1.5 million to shareholders through its quarterly dividend. It ended the quarter with US$22.1 million in cash, up US$3.1 million from the end of Q2.
The company's core ALM business accounted for 87% of revenue, which is a bit lower than in recent quarters, as MKS' interoperability unit had a good quarter, providing a third of the profits and reporting a 16% increase in sales from the previous quarter. MKS has integrated the sales forces between the two business segments and is cross-selling its product lines.
In the conference call, MKS said it will be integrating ALM with software modelling tools such as MathWorks and Enterprise Architect.
MKS had an average of 317 employees worldwide during the quarter, up from 309 in Q2.
[5]---------------------------------------------------------------
Intellitactics acquired by Chicago firm
March 3, 2010
Intellitactics, which was founded in Kitchener and has its development team in the area, has been acquired by Chicago's Trustwave. Financial details were not disclosed.
Intellitactics was founded in 1996 by John and Paul Sop. It received funding from investors in the Maryland-Virginia-Washington, DC area and has been based in that region for many years now, with a U.S.-based executive team.
Trustwave told the Record that it intends to invest more money in the company's Kitchener office, which currently employs 20-30 people.
[6]---------------------------------------------------------------
Arise looks to raise money, receives 30 Ontario FIT orders
February 11-March 8, 2010
Arise is hoping to raise up to $10 million through an offering that would combine a secured debenture and an equity component. The offering would be led by Toronto's Sandfire Securities.
The company also took $500,000 through two drawdowns from its equity facility with Haverstock Master Fund. Each of the drawdowns have been at a lower price per share than the one before it (see previous digest). The sixth drawdown last week was at a price 20% below the fourth drawdown a month earlier.
Arise also announced that it expects to receive an extension of its credit facility with Germany's Commerzbank AG by the middle of this month. The extension would run to the end of the year.
Arise says it has received 30 orders in Ontario with a combined value of about $5 million for solar projects under the feed-in-tariff (FIT) program.
[7]---------------------------------------------------------------
Coreworx to acquire Calgary firm
March 2, 2010
Coreworx will acquire Calgary's Decision Dynamics Technology in an all-stock deal. Decision Dynamics shareholders will receive one million shares in Acorn Energy, Coreworx' parent company -- shares that are worth about $7 million currently.
Decision Dynamics trades on the TSX Venture Exchange and over the first nine months of 2009 reported a loss of $1.1 million on sales of $2.7 million. It develops project cost management software for the energy industry. The company will become a subsidiary of Coreworx, which is itself a subsidiary of Acorn Energy.
The deal needs to be approved by Decision Dynamics shareholders and is expected to close next month.
[8]---------------------------------------------------------------
STOCK REPORT: New highs for Open Text; jumps for Sandvine, Biorem
February 2010
Lots of good news on the stock market for local tech companies during the month. Open Text shares soared to new heights in February, ending the month above $50. The last time the company's stock hit those levels -- in 2003 -- Open Text split its shares, and adjusting for that split, the February-ending price is the highest ever for the stock.
Shares in Biorem have also been on a roll in 2010, jumping 27% in February and 51% over the first two months of the year. Their month-end price was their highest since July 2008.
It was a similar story at Sandvine, where the company's shares climbed to their second-best month-end price since March 2008. Dalsa shares has their best month-end since August 2008.
MKS shares finished the month above $10 for the first time (reverse split-adjusted) since January 2007. And while Descartes stock was just up slightly in February, it was its best month-ending price since March 2002.
For the month of February:
Biorem [TSXV: BRM] +27%
Sandvine [TSX: SVC] +25%
Open Text [TSX: OTC] +22%
MKS [TSX: MKX] +12%
Dalsa [TSX: DSA] +11%
RIM [TSX: RIM] +10%
--S&P TSX COMPOSITE INDEX +5%
Descartes [TSX: DSG] +3%
--S&P TSX VENTURE INDEX +3%
RDM [TSX: RC] 0%
===============================
TurboSonic [OTCBB: TSTA] -1%
ATS [TSX: ATA] -6%
Com Dev [TSX: CDV] -6%
Arise [TSX: APV] -13%
Companies with headquarters outside the area:
Agfa-Gevaert [Brussels: AGFA] +23%
Blue Coat [Nasdaq: BCSI] +18%
ON Semiconductor [Nasdaq: ONNN] +10%
Sybase [NYSE: SY] +9%
Oracle [Nasdaq: ORCL] +7%
Intel [Nasdaq: INTC] +7%
NCR [NYSE: NCR] +5%
McAfee [NYSE: MFE] +5%
Ansys [Nasdaq: ANSS] +5%
Acorn Energy [Nasdaq: ACFN] +4%
Electronic Arts [Nasdaq: ERTS] +2%
===================================
Google [Nasdaq: GOOG] -1%
T-Ray Science [TSXV: THZ] -11%
[9]---------------------------------------------------------------
Startup Notes
- ParkVu has opened an office in Louisville, Kentucky. The company was founded two years ago in Waterloo by Jeff Fedor and Terry Goertz. It has rebranded its mobile music service under the name Music WithMe (with a website that shows Motorola devices instead of BlackBerrys).
- Ron Neumann is now the CEO of Dejero Labs. He's been the company's chairman for the last year. Randy Fowlie had become Dejero's CEO last fall.
- Ontario Securities Commission reports show a $425,000 warrant financing for Unsynced (developers of Kik), raised between December 30 and February 3 from 11 investors.
- LiveHive technology was used by CTV on its website for the Academy Awards, which included a prediction contest along with polls and trivia, and was also used at NBCOlympics.com during the Vancouver games.
- PostRank introduced "custom pages" analytics, providing various metrics about web pages that do not have an associated RSS feed. http://bit.ly/a0novv
- Primal Fusion released a new brainstorming tool http://bit.ly/94S3hz
Miscellaneous Tidbits
- Tim Jackson has been named the new CEO of the Accelerator Centre and associate VP of commercialization at UW. He succeeds Tom Corr in both roles. Corr is now CEO of Ontario Centres of Excellence. Jackson remains a partner at Tech Capital Partners.
- Chris Thiessen became the CTO of MedShare in January. Thiessen was the founder of Zoomii, where he created an interface into Amazon.com that looked like a traditional bookstore. Before that, he worked at Intellitactics.
- Construction formally began on the Agfa HealthCare R&D facility at the UW Research & Technology Park. It is expected to be completed in March 2011. Agfa's Waterloo office is currently in a RIM-owned building on Phillip Street.
- TurboSonic has cut salaries 20-50% and put other employees on unpaid leaves to cut costs. Over the first half of the current fiscal year, TurboSonic operations have consumed US$3.8 million in cash and the company had US$2.0 million in cash on its balance sheet on December 31. In the most recent quarter, TurboSonic lost US$298,000 (with an operational loss of US$521,000) on sales of US$3.5 million. While sales over the first six months of the year are up, sales in the quarter ended December 31 (Q2) were down 36% from a year ago.
- Unitron's free uHear iPhone/iPod Touch app has been downloaded 300,000 times. The software lets users test their hearing and detect signs of hearing loss. uHear was designed by Donald Hayes, Unitron's director of audiology. Semacode's Simon Woodside worked with the company to develop the software. uHear was listed at #24 among iTunes' most popular free medical apps on Monday.
- Igloo has started offering free online communities with blogs, wikis, forums, and document sharing, along with templates for specific applications, including corporate website, intranet, and e-learning. http://bit.ly/biQ7hS
- At the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, RIM provided a sneak peak at its new WebKit browser, scheduled to be launched this year.
- A custom Dalsa line scan sensor is part of the DigitalFilmTechnology film scanning system that just received a scientific & engineering award from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.
- Dalsa was also ranked as the third fastest-growing MEMS company worldwide by France's Yole Développement, based on 2008-2009 annual revenue growth. Yole ranked Dalsa as the world's 29th largest MEMS company, which Dalsa says makes Dalsa Semiconductor the largest independent pure-play MEMS foundry.
- Also from Dalsa: the company will provide image sensors for new aerial photogrammetry cameras made by Vexcel Imaging, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Microsoft.
- exactEarth, the Com Dev subsidiary, has received a $1.4 million contract with the Canadian Space Agency to provide space-based automatic identification system data.
- RoweBots launched the newest version of both its Unison Operating System, which it says enables ultra-miniature web servers for embedded applications, and its DSPnano Operating System.
- The student newspaper at Portland State University reported that the university is replacing Blackboard with Desire2Learn after faculty and students "overwhelmingly preferred" the Desire2Learn software.
posted by Gary Will at 12:49 AM
