VentureBeat |
- Google delays Android 3.0 Honeycomb due to rush to compete with iPad 2
- Tim Draper doesn’t think we’re in a tech investment bubble yet
- Twitter co-founder Dorsey: Instrument everything
- Futurist Paul Saffo predicts The Great Turbulence ahead (video)
- Deals & More: InsideView gets $12M to drive sales via social media
- Sprint smack talk luring away bitter T-Mobile customers?
- Nintendo 3DS costs at least $101 to make, sells for $249
- Podio launches a work app builder and business app store
- Sulia CEO explains how to be friends with Twitter
- How to be a smarter entrepreneur with VCs
- As recovery drives big data growth, Oracle earnings soar 78 percent
- RIM opens up to Android, but will it be too late?
- After a long wait, Google starts testing in-app purchases
- By the numbers: the 2012 plug-in Prius
- DesignPax enlists AdRoll and Retargeter for faster, cheaper design
| Google delays Android 3.0 Honeycomb due to rush to compete with iPad 2 Posted: 25 Mar 2011 08:01 AM PDT
It's not difficult to fathom why Google is Android 3.0: the update has long been touted as being made specifically for tablets, and Google has been strangely quiet about how exactly the update will apply to smartphones. The company's rush to deliver a compelling tablet OS was most likely driven by the release of the iPad 2 — that's why Android 3.0 tablets like the Motorola Xoom were announced way back in January, months before Apple had even confirmed the existence of the iPad 2. Google's Android head Andy Rubin also confirms this line of thinking to Bloomberg: “To make our schedule to ship the tablet, we made some design tradeoffs,” he said. “We didn’t want to think about what it would take for the same software to run on phones. It would have required a lot of additional resources and extended our schedule beyond what we thought was reasonable. So we took a shortcut.” Now that shortcut is finally coming back to bite Google. The delay, which is expected to last for a few months, will surely infuriate open source advocates who think that Google's entire Android development process should be open for everyone to see. For consumers, this news means that we won't see tablets from smaller device makers and Android 3.0 phones anytime soon. Motorola will continue to ship its Xoom tablets, and other Android 3.0 tablets from major companies like Samsung's 10-inch Galaxy Tab aren't being affected. The real question now is if it was worth it for Google to push Android 3.0's development to compete with the iPad 2. Motorola's Xoom tablet was well reviewed, but its sales haven't been anywhere near iPad 2 levels. It's also more expensive and thicker than the iPad 2, so there's very little compelling consumers to choose it over Apple's slate. Companies: Apple, Google, motorola, Samsung People: Andy Rubin
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| Tim Draper doesn’t think we’re in a tech investment bubble yet Posted: 25 Mar 2011 06:30 AM PDT
Draper said so during a question and answer session after his speech in a windy tent yesterday at the Global Technology Symposium in Menlo Park. The potential for a bubble is on everyone’s minds in Silicon Valley these days because a lot of people remember the froth around the dot-com days and the subsequent crash. And some fear that we are in the same boat with rising valuations for start-ups such as Groupon, Zynga, Facebook and Twitter. “Is it a bubble? No,” Draper said. “It feels like the beginning of things coming back and we will have a good five years ahead that look very promising.” Draper Fisher and its various affiliates have invested more than $4 billion across a portfolio of more than 400 companies. Draper serves on the boards of Glam, Meebo, ShareThis, SocialText, and others. His previous successes include Skype, eBay, Overture, Baidu, Parametric Technology, Hotmail and more. So Draper has a lot of perspective on when it’s time to party and when it’s time to quit. To add some perspective, he was also very bullish during 2000 and 2001, just before the bottom fell out of the dot-com market. He said, “We are in an interesting situation. I am seeing things happen where everyone wants to be an angel now. But it may take 15 years before a startup goes public. There are a few dynamic pieces. It used to be 5 years to 7 years before Sarbanes Oxley (tougher accounting regulations) went into effect in 2002. Now there is a new expert financial class of investor.” He explained, “Companies are doing EPOs instead of IPOs. The shares are sold only to qualified institutions and high net worth individuals and so it is a much freer market. There is a shorter liquidity window with expert financial. Is there a bubble at the late stage? It is interesting that these companies (like Facebook) are getting higher multiples than if they had gone public. There is the possibility you are worth more private than public. Is there a merger bubble? A lot of mergers happen just before companies try for an IPO, since it’s the last chance to grab them. Those buyers are paying higher prices.” Draper said that Yuri Milner, head of Russia’s DST, has been brilliant making his expert financial investments in Facebook, Zynga, and many new Y Combinator startups. Draper said he was very excited about globalization and international investments. He traveled to lots of the emerging countries to get in early on a lot of tech companies and continues to do so. He said that 50 percent of the 10X successes — where investors make more than ten times the money they put into a startup — are overseas now. Among the areas where he foresees breakthroughs in the next 15 years: desalinated water, near infinite energy supplies, green buildings, better batteries, self-navigating cars, interactive education, genetic disease prediction, cure for heart disease, cures for cancer, non-invasive surgery, near-thought communications, new life forms, and food drop. Yes, Draper is an eternal optimist based on his vision, but it’s nice to know he isn’t panicking about investment bubbles just yet. Companies: Draper Fisher Jurvetson People: Tim Draper
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| Twitter co-founder Dorsey: Instrument everything Posted: 25 Mar 2011 06:00 AM PDT When Jack Dorsey co-founded Twitter, the company was flying blind for its first two years. No one, he tells students in this Entrepreneur Thought Leader Lecture at Stanford University, no one at the company knew how users were using the system and relied entirely on intuition. So when he founded Square, the first thing he wrote on the server was an admin dashboard, which has given that company a much better insight into its customers. But too many companies haven’t followed this path. (Can’t see the video? Click here.)
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| Futurist Paul Saffo predicts The Great Turbulence ahead (video) Posted: 25 Mar 2011 06:00 AM PDT
That basically means he foresees a lot of disruptions coming where all of the rules are broken and the overall economy behaves in strange ways. We are only a couple of years into a decade or more of turbulence, driven by technological change and globalization.
But in a question-and-answer session, he got into the idea of the Great Turbulence, an era he thinks will last for the next 20 years. He noted that the past couple of decades that ended with the great financial crash of 2008 could be viewed as the Great Moderation, a period from the 1980s to a few years ago where there was stability and relatively low unemployment and inflation. It was mostly sunny, with an occasional storm. Now it’s mostly stormy, with occasional sun. In this time, the patron saint of economists is Joseph Schumpeter, who championed the notion of “creative destruction,” which means destroying an old economic order so that a new one can be built. Technology is changing so much that different companies are leading each new wave, such as Microsoft in one era, Google in another, and Facebook in yet another age. One of the indicators of big change is lots of small changes. This time isn’t for the faint of heart, but it’s full of opportunities to create vast wealth. Those who take advantage of globalization are likely to win, as opposed to those who resist it. He pointed to companies like Zynga, which makes social games like FarmVille on Facebook, as one of the beneficiaries in a creator economy. Whatever the company, the entrepreneurs are likely to be in great positions to ride the turbulence. Saffo didn’t forecast the downturn, but he felt like something crazy was going to happen. “When change clusters at the extremes,” Saffo said. “You can bet more fundamental change lies ahead.” Afterward, I asked Saffo if he felt there was a new bubble brewing in Silicon Valley and technology investments. He said he didn’t think so, even though there is some froth. He recognizes that there is a lot of enthusiasm around innovators like Facebook, Twitter, and Groupon. But the larger technology industry isn’t necessarily in the same boat. Here’s a Q&A session between Saffo and Mark Gorenberg, a partner at Hummer Winblad Venture Partners at the Global Technology Symposium. Companies: Discern Investment Analytics, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners, Institute For The Future People: Paul Saffo
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| Deals & More: InsideView gets $12M to drive sales via social media Posted: 25 Mar 2011 06:00 AM PDT Today’s funding announcements including one company offering sales data and two companies offering local deals:
DealsGoRound grabs angel funding for daily deals exchange: The secondary marketplace for daily deals from sites like Groupon and Living Social has raised an undisclosed amount in angel funding. The company, which is based in Chicago and was founded in early 2010, also launched out of beta today. DealsGoRound currently facilitates resales and exchanges of daily deals in more than 50 U.S. cities. Offline Labs raises $1M for members-only site: The company founded by former Slide employees has raised a round of seed funding from a long list of investors including Sequoia Capital, Redpoint Ventures, Polaris Ventures and General Catalyst Partners. Based in San Francisco, the company is launching Sōsh, its first product, soon. Though details are yet to be released, the company says the product will bring memorable activities to members through events and deals. SocialVibe lands $20M for digital ads: The Los Angeles-based startup has raised a fourth round of funding led by Norwest Venture Partners with participation from Redpoint Ventures, Jafco Ventures and Pinnacle Ventures. The company, which works with big-name advertisers including Coke, Disney and McDonalds, delivers ads by engaging with consumers through networks like Zynga and rewarding them for their interactions. Companies: DealsGoRound, Emergence Capital Partners, Foundation Capital, General Catalyst Partners, Greenhouse Capital Partners, Groupon, InsideView, Jafco Ventuers, Living Social, Norwest Venture Partners, Offline Labs, Pinnacle Ventures, Polaris Ventures, Redpoint Ventures, Rembrandt Venture Partners, Sequoia Capital, SocialVibe
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| Sprint smack talk luring away bitter T-Mobile customers? Posted: 24 Mar 2011 08:29 PM PDT
Neither camp thinks AT&T’s purchase of the T-Mobile network is a good idea, but only one of them (Hesse) can say they voiced that opinion directly to the face of AT&T President Ralph De La Vega. When Hesse was asked what his thoughts were on the recent carrier acquisition while on stage — sitting between Vega and Verizon CEO Dan Mead, to top it off — for a CTIA Wireless 2011 CEO panel, he paused a bit and then fired off a response. “My opinion doesn’t matter. I think the FCC (Federal Communication Commission) and DOJ (Dept. of Justice) with have the say on that,” adding that he doesn’t believe it’s healthy letting two companies control 80 percent of all consumer wireless communication. It’s arguable that as a former executive of AT&T in the `90’s and the current head of Sprint, Hesse’s opinion does matter. Regardless, it got a reaction from those in attendance who weren’t expecting much commentary about AT&T’s big purchase since the news was barely two days old and all T-Mobile executives were canceled from all appearances at the CTIA show to presumably prevent just that. "I do have concerns that it would stifle innovation and too much power would be in the hands of just two," Hesse said, which is both an expected and justified reaction for the leader of a company playing the role of underdog in a fight with two giants. Verizon’s Mead weighed in shortly thereafter claiming that there’s plenty of competition among carriers, which would be true if your idea of remaining competitive was based on adult CEOs playing checkers with five-year-olds who still get excited about punch. Otherwise, I think it’s safe to point out that it wouldn’t be in his company’s best interest to say anything less about competition in the marketplace. The discussion about carrier competition ended shortly thereafter but the snark from Sprint did not. Hesse took another jab, this time at Verizon after moderator Jim Cramer posed the question of why the wireless networks go down. “Aren’t you on Verizon?” Hesse said to Cramer as he nodded his head yes. Ironically, Verizon’s LTE network looks to be the most impressive at this point. But perhaps it’s the entire company and not just the CEO that’s adjusting its attitude to fit new roll as the underdog carrier. In another CTIA panel, Sprint Senior Vice President of Network Bob Azzi made fun of AT&T’s marketing department for being in charge of upgrading their network. “If three can become four, then four can become five,” he said. Without competition to point out things like this to the consumers, people will believe whatever they’re told or just have to deal with it due to no alternatives. Even if Hesse’s words don’t resonate with all the unhappy T-Mobile subscribers who want to switch carriers, Sprint is the choice most similar to the motivations that attracted them to T-Mobile in the first place. This post is is sponsored by Sprint, the Now Network. Learn more here. As always, VentureBeat is adamant about maintaining editorial objectivity. Sprint had no involvement in the content of this post. Companies: AT&T, sprint, T Mobile, Verizon People: Bob Azzi, Dan Hesse, Dan Mead, Jim Cramer, Ralph De La Vega
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| Nintendo 3DS costs at least $101 to make, sells for $249 Posted: 24 Mar 2011 08:21 PM PDT
According to a product “teardown” by UBM TechInsights, the 3DS costs about $15 more to make than the Nintendo DSi cost. Does that mean Nintendo is gouging consumers with the hefty price? Not necessarily, since the cost estimate is simply an estimate of the raw materials for the 3DS. It doesn’t include the very real costs of marketing, advertising, research and development, retailer margin and other costs that go along with a worldwide product launch. Still, Nintendo is making a tidy profit and certainly isn’t losing money, like some hardware manufacturers do when they first launch a product. Modern game consoles in particular are priced on a “razor and razor blades model,” where manufacturers lose money on the console and make money on the games at the outset. Then they cut costs and over time start making money on the hardware. Nintendo has never really believed in that approach and has typically charged whatever consumers will pay, as it did with the Wii. The Wii started out at $250 in the U.S. and has only come down in the past five years to $199, even though the costs of making the Wii are considerably lower than they used to be. There are some interesting tidbits in the teardown. The 3DS uses a graphics processor designed by Digital Media Professionals, an unknown company, and it has a Nintendo proprietary ARM processor. Atheros makes the gadget’s 802.11n/Bluetooth chip, which provides wireless connectivity. The gyroscope is made by InvenSense, with the model number ITG-3200. Nintendo declined to comment on the teardown report. Companies: nintendo, UBM TechInsights
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| Podio launches a work app builder and business app store Posted: 24 Mar 2011 08:00 PM PDT
Podio is launching what it calls the world’s first business app store and business app builder to help people at work create productivity apps with no need for technical expertise. The approach is a good example of how company’s can try to snare users by making it dead simple for them to create what they want themselves, as part of a “creator economy.” The Copenhagen-based company will sell its Podio App Builder, which allows people to create custom work apps for business processes from recruiting to expense reporting. Users can build those apps within a matter of minutes. Podio is also unveiling its Podio App Store today with more than 200 business applications available for free. Podio launched last fall in Europe in a private beta test and has more than 20,000 users among 8,000 organizations. They’re using it as a collaborative work tool at places such as Greenpeace, InMobi and Rebate Networks. The user-made apps can be created for any project, business unit, or company. The user simply creates a space, invites contacts, and begins adding and customizing the apps needed. Podio automatically enables features such as document sharing, active streams, task management, contacts, multi-lingual support, reporting and calendars. Podio combines actions from all of the apps into a single user interface that’s easy to manage. Users have already developed more than 2,000 apps on their own. Those apps can run on the iPhone or Android mobile devices. Language support includes English, Danish, French, Spanish, and German.
Podio has opened up a physical store in San Francisco where it will work with users to help them create their own apps. The company has raised $4 million in funding from Sunstone Capital, in addition to an earlier angel round. The company’s chief executive is Tommy Ahlers, and it has around 15 people. “The key point here is that a user-created environment is much easier for people to work in,” Ahlers said in an interview. “We feel like we are putting all of these different web apps together.” Companies: Podio People: Amit Gupta, Tommy Ahlers
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| Sulia CEO explains how to be friends with Twitter Posted: 24 Mar 2011 07:43 PM PDT
Sulia has already created "channels" of expert tweets on its own site. Under the deal with Twitter, Sulia will be providing those streams to publishers including Flipboard, The Washington Post, WSJ.com, Gannett, and others. Those publishers pay Sulia a licensing fee or a share of their ad revenue, and then Sulia gives Twitter a cut of that payment. I talked to Sulia chief executive Jonathan Glick earlier today about the deal. He acknowledged that there are challenges building on Twitter’s platform, as companies like UberMedia have discovered. Glick had his own issues with the platform — he was originally going to offer users a way to create lists of other Twitter users, but then he talked to Twitter and found out that the microblogging service was building that feature on its own. So instead Glick realized that by looking at different Twitter lists, Sulia can figure out who the experts are in different fields. Then the service decides which tweets are and are not relevant to a given topic. For example, Sulia can filter the venture capital channel stream so that it includes all the experts’ tweets about venture capital and excludes all their tweets about their children. These filters are keyword based, and they're adjusted on-the-fly — Glick said that until yesterday, the word "color" probably wasn't a relevant term in venture capital, but Sulia's technology could see that a number of VC experts were tweeting about the new Color app, so it added Color as a relevant term. Glick said Twitter noticed all the hard work Sulia put into sifting out the best tweets. In fact, it was Twitter that reached out to Sulia about a partnership. The way Glick sees it, Twitter wants to have a close relationship with a few select partners. That doesn’t mean you need don't need to be buddies with Twitter executives, but you need to do something well that Twitter can't do for itself. (This seems in-line with what Twitter says itself about how it sees the platform.) "I’m not personal friends with them, I didn’t grow up with them, it’s not like we’re in the in-crowd or anything," Glick said. He added that he sees microblogging as a revolutionary new broadcast technology that's "on par with the invention of television, on par with the invention of cable." Thinking about the platform that way is helpful, because "like any kind of broadcasting, they're going to need shows," and creating the programming is "a different skillset from building out the pipes." That's where Sulia's channels come in. Could Twitter build its own filtering service for tweets around different topics? Glick acknowledged that it's possible, but "it's not something that they can do well without getting deeply into … fairly non-technical judgment decisions that aren’t currently part of the culture." Investors seem to think there's a business opportunity here too. Sulia has raised funding from First Mark Capital, Village Ventures, IA Capital Partners, Founder Collective, and others. People: Jonathan Glick
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| How to be a smarter entrepreneur with VCs Posted: 24 Mar 2011 06:36 PM PDT
VCs can be tremendous partners that enable a business to soar. But just as more than 50% of marriages end in divorce despite the best intentions, given the risk inherent in venture capital investment coupled with the 10% success rate of investing in start-ups, there are many potential obstacles that await the first (or even) second time entrepreneur reaching out to VCs. Tomer Tzach is the CEO of an online marketing company DPlace Marketing, which operates Zoara.
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| As recovery drives big data growth, Oracle earnings soar 78 percent Posted: 24 Mar 2011 05:14 PM PDT
The company also raised its dividend by a penny a share, or 20 percent. It’s no surprise that the company’s stock price is up 2 percent in after-hours trading. Oracle is one of the giants of the database software industry, and its fortunes reflect the state of corporate tech buying. Its results show that a tech recovery is continuing. Profit was $2.1 billion, or 54 cents a share, compared to $1.19 billion a year earlier. Revenue was $8.8 billion, up 37 percent from a year ago. Despite some concerns, Oracle said it doesn’t expect a big impact on its operations in Japan after the earthquake. Oracle said that, excluding one-time items, its profits will be 69 to 73 cents a share in the current fourth quarter, topping the average 66 cents a share estimate from analysts. Revenue is expected to grow 9 to 13 percent to $10.4 billion to $10.7 billion. Oracle said sales were driven by new software licenses, a measure of brand-new business, as opposed to renewals by current customers. Hardware sales from the Sun deal were $1 billion. Oracle continued to spar with rivals during its call. Yesterday, Oracle launched a spat with Intel and Hewlett-Packard, saying that Intel had plans to eventually shelve its Itanium chip architecture. HP said that was a “shameless” attempt to hurt demand for HP’s Itanium-based systems while bolstering Oracle’s Sun hardware and chip business. Oracle chief executive Larry Ellison was on jury duty, so President Safra Catz took a shot at HP. She said Oracle’s hardware business is showing a healthy margin and that Sun would deliver a $1.5 billion profit by fiscal year-end. That’s what Oracle promised with Sun, in contrast to HP’s acquisition of 3Par, Catz said. Companies: HP, IBM, Ocale, Sun Microsystems People: Larry Ellison, Safra Catz
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| RIM opens up to Android, but will it be too late? Posted: 24 Mar 2011 04:41 PM PDT
The Canadian company hit its earnings estimates. But RIM’s stock price is down about 10 percent in after-hours trading today to $57.59 a share, presumably because RIM’s outlook was cautious for the current quarter. The company expects revenue to be $5.2 to $5.6 billion — a range that some consider too conservative. That helps put the launch of the BlackBerry PlayBook, a tablet with a 7-inch screen, in perspective. RIM really needs to hit a home run with the PlayBook, but it will be hard work to make the tablet stand out in a sea of competitors when it launches on April 19 for $499. The support for Android apps is important, as the QNX operating system on the PlayBook is designed to run BlackBerry Java apps. This means RIM will have access to a wider ecosystem of developers to get content for the Playbook. Since there are more than 200,000 Android apps available, RIM solves the problem of any shortage of QNX apps with the Android support. Right now, there are about 25,000 BlackBerry apps, so the Android addition is huge. RIM is adding the new features with two “app players” that provide a software layer that can run BlackBerry Java and Android version 2.3 apps. These players will let users download BlackBerry Java and Android apps from the BlackBerry App World market and run them on the PlayBook. RIM also said it has gained support from two makers of game tools: Ideaworks Labs and Unity Technologies, to enable games based on the engines created by those companies to run on the PlayBook. Mike Lazaridis, co-chief executive and president, said the addition of Android would give users a greater choice of apps and showcase the PlayBook’s versatility. The natural question is whether the Android apps will be able to run fast running through a software layer. But the PlayBook that I saw was quite capable of multitasking and was very responsive, so it seems like it should be able to run the Android apps without a problem. Developers currently building apps for the BlackBerry or Android platforms should be able to quickly and easily port their apps to the BlackBerry Tablet OS (built on the QNX Neutrino software), thanks to a high degree of compatibility between the applications programming interfaces (APIs). For users, the app players will be optional and will run in a secure “sandbox,” or walled off section of the PlayBook. RIM will disclose more info at its BlackBerry World conference May 3-5 in Orlando, Fla. The tablet will be able to support HTML5 and Adobe Air and Flash apps. And developers will be able to write native apps for the BlackBerry Tablet OS as well. The company has a limited version of its BlackBerry Tablet OS Native Development Kit that will be in open beta by this summer. As for the earnings, RIM reported a profit of $984 million, or $1.78 a share, beating analyst expectations. The cautious outlook recognizes that consumers have shifted to RIM’s lower-priced products. RIM also expects to incur new marketing costs as it pushes into the tablet market. The company also warned about potential supply-chain disruption from the Japan quake. For the full fiscal year, BlackBerry shipments were 52.3 million, up 43 percent. Check out our earlier video demo of the PlayBook in action. Companies: Research In Motion, RIM
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| After a long wait, Google starts testing in-app purchases Posted: 24 Mar 2011 03:40 PM PDT
In-app purchases have been transformational for app makers on Apple’s iPhone, allowing them to execute free-to-play business models that have been very lucrative. But for app makers for Android, it’s been a long wait. In-app purchases allow consumers to browse content more conveniently. They can try out an app for free and pay real money for virtual goods inside the app without ever having to leave the app to complete the transaction. In-app purchases are key to free-to-play, and they have led to an explosion of digital commerce in Facebook games such as FarmVille and in titles such as We Rule on the iPhone. This model is an important option because some consumers don’t want to pay 99 cents or more for an app just to try out something on the Android Market.
Apple implemented in-app billing in the fall of 2009, giving iPhone developers a new business model that stabilized their companies and allowed them to grow much faster in comparison to Android developers. Game maker Rovio, for example, launched its popular Angry Birds game on Android but it had to use a free ad-based model because there were no in-app purchases. Android’s growing numbers of phones still encouraged developers to make apps for it, but now the in-app billing should make a big difference in how much developers are willing to invest in making apps for the platform.
Companies: Android, Apple, Google, in-app purchases
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| By the numbers: the 2012 plug-in Prius Posted: 24 Mar 2011 03:16 PM PDT
As we’ve reported in prior driving impressions, the Plug-In, which won’t go on sale until spring of 2012, will move on—or primarily on—electric power for up to 14 or so miles per charge, and a full charge only takes about three hours with a standard 110V household power outlet. There are several conversation points here, and it takes some juggling of figures to get a grasp of whether the plug-in might be right for you. That starts with two big questions: Firstly, how much does the Prius cost to run on electric power versus normal hybrid operation; and secondly, what’s the net difference in carbon footprint and emissions? Both of those answers are going to be dramatically different from family to family, depending on how often you remember to plug in, how far you travel per trip and each day, and whether it’s possible or convenient at waypoints. Charges cost less than 50 cents a pop First, the cost-of-ownership question. According to Toyota spokesman John Hanson, the Prius PHEV only uses about 3.8 kWh of the battery’s 5.2-kWh capacity (for battery longevity). Starting with what electricity costs me here in Portland, Oregon—11.7 cents per kWh, slightly higher than the 11.04-cent national average at the end of last year—that pegs each full charge at about 44 cents. With a total of about six charges, given the five full charges and two partial ones, that puts our total cost of electricity at about $2.67. In a driving style that’s comparable to what we followed with the Plug-In—which is to say gentle and careful, with only a couple of exceptions to test the power on tap—we’ve seen in the range of 48 mpg in the standard Toyota Prius. So we would have used about 2.15 gallons of gasoline in a non-Plug-In model. At the current national average of about $3.54 a gallon, that’s $7.61 in a standard Prius to cover those 103 miles. In our PHEV test car, we used 1.13 gallons ($4.01), plus that $2.67 in electricity—bringing our total for the PHEV of $6.68. Just to index this in some way, here it is adjusted for 100 miles, at the average cost of residential electricity: Prius Plug-In (100 miles): $6.12 Payback? Probably not. With the 2012 Toyota Prius Plug-In expected to sell at $3,500 to $5,000 more than a comparable Prius, payback in this traditional sense probably isn’t going to happen—even if gas prices double. Now let’s look at the second issue—emissions. If we used six full charges, and capacity is roughly 3.8 kWh, we used a total of about 22.8 kWh for 103 miles, or about 22.16 kWh for 100 miles. That’s about 222 kW over 10,000 miles, charging with the sort of frequency we did (which would mean an average twice a day for a 10,000-mile annual commuter). Using the national average of 1.297 pounds of CO2 per kWh, that’s only about 288 pounds of CO2 from our charges. Again using the assumption of about 91 mpg in the Plug-In versus 48 in the standard Prius (from 55-percent EV Mode use), that’s 2.08 gallons per 100 miles in the Prius, 1.10 in the Plug-In. Adapting 2.97 tons per 15,000 miles to 10,000 miles results in 1.98 tons. We then take the ratio of fuel used for the plug-in (1.10/2.08) and multiply it by that, then add in the carbon from plugging in. Shrink your carbon footprint—significantly Altogether the difference is very significant, with the standard Prius emitting nearly 70 percent more CO2: Greenhouse gases (CO2) per 10,000 miles: For other emissions, the grid has some cleaning-up to do As for smog-forming emissions, it’s another matter entirely. While going electric greatly reduces our carbon footprint for vehicles, our power plants, on average, are much dirtier than the tailpipes of our newest, cleanest vehicles; coal plants in particular emit significant amounts of sulfur dioxide as well as NOx. Some argue that increasing the number of electric vehicles will speed the replacement of our oldest dirtiest power stations, and in some situations major power plants are hundreds of miles from urban centers, keeping them from contributing to local smog issues. While this was harder to calculate, we estimated overall smog-forming emissions based on the same proportion of plugging in, over 10,000 miles annually. The Plug-In would use about 2.2 Mwh per year, and based on estimations in several papers, 2.5 pounds of NOx per MWh is a rough equivalent average emissions level in the U.S. Of course, it varies drastically by region within the U.S.; check with your local power provider for more information. Smog-forming pollution per 10,000 miles: Final thoughts: Ask these questions for yourself While the Prius Plug-In probably won’t pay off economically, it makes sense under some situations if you want to make even more of a difference in cutting carbon emissions. If you plan to charge it only occasionally, or drive longer distances, carrying the extra 300 pounds of the larger battery pack all the time might offset the gains from charging; consider a longer-range EV like the NissanLeaf, a plug-in with a longer electric range like the Chevrolet Volt, or a hybrid like the Prius or the Ford Fusion Hybrid. On the other hand, if you mainly take short trips, faithfully charge up in between errands, and can cover most of your driving in EV Mode, you could very significantly cut carbon emissions with a Prius Plug-In—and still have a vehicle that’s good for longer trips. [EPA Green Vehicle Guide; U.S. Department of Energy; ACEEE] Written by Bengt Halvorson, this article originally appeared on High Gear Media's Motor Authority, one of VentureBeat's editorial partners. Companies: Toyota
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| DesignPax enlists AdRoll and Retargeter for faster, cheaper design Posted: 24 Mar 2011 01:10 PM PDT
Chief executive and co-founder Ayal Ebert compared the DesignPax model to LegalZoom, a site that simplifies the process of creating legal documents. DesignPax customers submit their order and any relevant media (such as the company logo) on the DesignPax site, receive their designs within 48 or 72 hours (depending on the product), then request revisions as necessary. There are different pricing packages, starting at $49 for a banner ad, and customers get up to three free revisions. Ebert said he used to work at Advertising.com, and he started DesignPax because he saw that creating ads with traditional designers was too inefficient and expensive for many businesses. The New York City company is faster and cheaper because it uses a self-serve model and because its designers are overseas, mainly in Israel and Argentina. At the same time, he said DesignPax delivers higher quality results than a crowdsourced design service like 99designs or Crowdspring (he said the fact that only one design gets chosen and only one designer gets paid affects the quality of work on those sites) or an ad-creation service that uses templates, such as Google Ad Builder. With the new partnerships, businesses that want to create ads through AdRoll and Retargeter can hire Ebert's company to handle the design. Right now, Ebert estimated that 40 percent of his customers are small businesses that work with DesignPax directly, 40 percent come in through various ad company partners, and 20 percent are small ad agencies. He predicted that ad network partnerships will become increasingly important to DesignPax, especially once the company releases its "white label" product that allows ad networks to offer DesignPax services under their own branding. You can see a sample DesignPax ad at the top of this post, and there are more samples on the company’s website. Companies: AdRoll, DesignPax, Retargeter People: Ayal Ebert
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