San Diego serial entrepreneur Michael Robertson is going to have to find something else to do now that Gizmo5, the VoIP (voice-over-Internet-protocol) company he founded in 2003, has become part of a certain search giant to the north. We have that news and more.

—Google confirmed that it’s buying San Diego-based Gizmo5, a six-year-old company that provides Internet-based calling software for mobile phones and computers. The service will become part of the Google Voice number-unification service. Google did not disclose the purchase price, which media reports put at about $30 million. Gizmo5’s 6 million users will still be able to use the service, according to a statement. But Google is suspending new Gizmo5 signups, and existing users can no longer sign up for a call-in number.

—Platformic, a Web-based startup that enables customers to create and manage their own websites, said it is adding social media capabilities. The two-year-old San Diego-based company, which has targeted broadcast companies, says its expanded software-as-a-service product will help a broadcaster’s audience share photos, create their own user profiles, and create personal blogs on the broadcaster’s Platformic-powered website.

—Qualcomm’s No. 2 executive opened a regional mobile technology conference in San Diego by providing an overview of steps the chipmaking giant is taking to help ease the pressure on wireless network bottlenecks as mobile data traffic soars. Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) Chief Operating Officer Len Lauer told the 3G CDMA Americas Regional Conference that in the year 2014, worldwide mobile data traffic in one month will exceed mobile data traffic for all of 2008.

—Technology innovations that help companies optimize their profitability will likely lead to the next wave of analytics-based software startups, according to Stephen Coggeshall of San Diego-based ID Analytics. Another hot area will be analytics that can help forecast consumer behavior, said Coggeshall, who was participating in a discussion about new opportunities in analytics during the San Diego Software Industry Council’s annual forum on analytics.

—Israel’s Panoramic Power won $250,000 and became the first winner of the top QPrize, the incentive prize competition launched earlier this year by Qualcomm Ventures. Panoramic Power is developing energy-monitoring wireless technology that enables a company or institution to deploy so-called “smart grid” technologies within their existing facilities.

—The San Diego-based Cannon Power Group said is getting $19.4 million in federal renewable energy grants to help fund construction of a giant wind farm in eastern Washington state, about 110 miles east of Portland, OR. The $1 billion Windy Point/Windy Flats project is expected to generate enough electricity for 250,000 homes.

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San Diego-based Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) says Panoramic Power, a wireless sensor startup based in Kidron, Israel, is the winner of the first QPrize, the incentive prize competition launched earlier this year by Qualcomm Ventures. Panoramic Power has developed energy monitoring wireless technology that enables a company or institution to deploy Smart Grid technologies within their existing facilities. Panoramic Power, which previously won $100,000 as a QPrize regional winner, was awarded another $150,000 and the opportunity to compete in a global business plan competition held at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain.

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[Corrected 11/11/09, 3:15 pm. See below] Qualcomm chief operating officer, Len Lauer, says the San Diego wireless chipmaking giant is working across a broad front of technology development to accommodate a surge in wireless data traffic.

“The mobile Internet has arrived,” Lauer says in the opening keynote talk yesterday at the 2009 3G CDMA Americas Regional Conference. With more than 4 billion wireless subscribers around the world now—including 885 million 3G phone users—Lauer says the growth in wireless data is reflected by a roughly one-third increase in revenue reported over the past year by Verizon, AT&T, and other major carriers.

[Corrects to say Lauer was comparing monthly data traffic in 2014, not monthly growth in data traffic] By 2014, or just five years, Lauer says  worldwide mobile data traffic in one month will exceed total mobile data traffic for all of 2008.

Qualcomm founder and former chairman and CEO Irwin Jacobs and his son Paul Jacobs, who is Qualcomm’s current chairman and CEO, sounded a similar theme when they warned of capacity constraints last month during a keynote appearance at the CTIA Fall 2009 conference in San Diego.

In addition to the increasing demand for mobile data from smart phones and netbooks, Lauer says the trend can only accelerate as new wireless device categories proliferate, especially in what he calls machine-to-machine (M2M) communications. Examples of M2M technology developers include CardioNet, a Pennsylvania wireless health company that uses wireless sensors to continuously monitor heart patients for irregular heartbeats; wireless smart grid technologies being deployed by electric utilities (including San Diego Gas & Electric), and eBook devices like Amazon’s Kindle.

“Other operators are seeing this as a viable market, but it is going to take awhile to develop,” Lauer says, citing estimates that 229 million M2M cellular connections are forecast for 2013. “We do see from Qualcomm’s standpoint this being a very large opportunity for our chips.”

To cope with the surge in wireless data traffic, Lauer outlined a range of technology advances that Qualcomm has underway:

—The latest generation of advanced wireless receivers, which include updated revisions to the EV-DO (Evolution Data Optimized) telecommunications standard (part of Qualcomm’s CDMA2000 family), operate …Next Page »

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The moderators of San Diego’s 9th Annual GadgetFest kept saying during Tuesday night’s showcase for new technology products that past winners have gone on to even greater glory and success. That may or may not be good news for the Motorola Droid that goes on sale tomorrow at Verizon stores nationwide. After making a cursory appearance at CTIA and perhaps elsewhere, the Droid debuted its impressive features and ended the evening as runner-up.

GadgetFest moderators Ken Rutkowski and Andy Abramson reminded the audience that Grand Central, a GadgetFest winner three years ago, was acquired shortly after the 2006 event by Google (and has since been transformed into Google Voice). They also pointed to Motorola’s Q Phone, Sling Media’s Slingbox, and the Truphone as paragons of GadgetFest virtue. All three devices were introduced at GadgetFest instead of the CTIA or other major trade shows, according to CommNexus, the San Diego wireless industry group that sponsors the event.

So expectations were high. But the Droid, with all its iPhone-slaying hoopla, finished the GadgetFest competition in a dead-heat with EcoDog, a local cleantech startup that trotted out Fido—a device that helps homeowners sniff out savings in their electric utility bill. The GadgetFest judges ultimately proclaimed EcoDog this year’s best in show after the Vista, CA-based company received perceptibly more-boisterous applause from the audience in the Irwin M. Jacobs Qualcomm Hall at Qualcomm’s San Diego headquarters.

At the end of the show, while the judges were deciding how to resolve the tie, one of the moderators asked EcoDog founder and CEO Ron Pitt if he had anything more to say. He replied, “My product is the only product up here tonight that saves you more money than it costs.”

So what are the up and coming gadgets that got previewed at GadgetFest? Here’s a rundown, just in time for the Christmas shopping season:

—TelCentris, the San Diego-based provider of unified communications services, presented an update to its VoxOx system, which aggregates voice over Internet technology, text messaging, instant messaging, serial conferencing, file sharing, and e-mail onto one user interface. As TelCentris executives explained to me in July, the company makes most …Next Page »

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[Updated at 4:45 pm 11/2/09 to clarify size of NASA Ames sensing device] The U.S. Department of Homeland Security has taken the wraps off a program to develop miniaturized sensor technologies for detecting deadly chemicals—sensors tiny enough to be installed inside ordinary cell phones.

DHS officials meeting in San Diego last week say they have provided total funding of roughly $3 million over the past year for what they call their “Cell-All” program. The funding went to three different R&D groups—including two teams based in San Diego—who successfully demonstrated their prototypes Oct. 27 at San Diego State University’s Regional Technology Center for about 40 government and industry representatives. Among other things, the center serves as a technology clearinghouse and homeland security test bed for public safety agencies in the region.

While implementing such technology is still years away, DHS officials say the concept would make it possible to deploy millions of chemical sensors in the pockets, purses, and belt holsters of cell phone users throughout the United States. Their goal is to integrate miniaturized “sniffer” technology with the mobile handset’s operating system so that a sensor that detects certain volatile chemical compounds would trigger a warning alarm on the user’s phone. At the same time, data about the chemical would be transmitted to first responders and federal emergency operations centers.

“It’s almost like crowd-sourcing the chemical detection problem,” said Stephen Dennis, who is overseeing the Cell-All program for the DHS Science and Technology Directorate in Washington D.C.

Whether a cell phone owner would still be alive after his phone helped to detect, say, a nerve gas attack is another question. But the arguments cut both ways. Japanese emergency services and hospitals were heavily criticized for their slow and uncoordinated response to the 1995 gas attack in Tokyo’s subways. Doctors at many hospitals did not realize they were dealing with cases of sarin nerve gas poisoning until a professor at Shinshu University’s school of medicine recognized the symptoms from television news accounts and mobilized a team to send diagnosis and treatment information by fax. The sarin killed 12 people and sickened thousands.

If such cell phone sensor technology is eventually deployed, Dennis emphasized the system would use an “opt-in” network that would require each cell phone user to activate the sensor in their handset. “We’re very mindful of privacy issues,” Dennis said. “Even though it’s very early in development, we want to send the message that people will control whether or not they want this technology.”

It stands to reason, though, that enough people would participate so that conceivably hundreds, or even thousands, of sensor-equipped cell phones would be present at any given time in shopping malls, airports, public transit systems, and other places where people congregate.

“Instead of large stationary [sensor] systems, you’d have numerous, ubiquitous sensors throughout a region,” Dennis said. “Putting the sensors where people are is a big goal.”

The sensor technology under …Next Page »

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San Diego’s tech sector got some money and glory during a week that was overshadowed by news from two life science conferences: TEDMED and the annual Biocom Investor Conference. Get your tech news now while it’s still hot.

—To stay connected with open-source development for smart phones, San Diego’s Qualcomm created a subsidiary, the Qualcomm Innovation Center, that is focused on making sure the chipmaker’s technology works smoothly with Android, Symbian, and other open-source wireless platforms. Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) also joined the Symbian Foundation and is supporting the open source systems used by Nokia and others.

—One of the big selling points for algae-based fuels is that algae absorbs a lot of carbon dioxide before it gets harvested and turned into biofuels. Yet San Diego-based Sapphire Energy and other algae biofuel companies say they are having a hard time getting enough carbon dioxide at an affordable price to support their research and development efforts.

—Federal stimulus funds will help cover almost half the cost of a new $60 million wireless communications system that San Diego Gas & Electric is developing as part of its smart grid program. The $28.1 million grant is part of $3.4 billion to be allocated nationwide.

—Carlsbad CA-based Verdezyne, which is applying advanced biotechnology tools to the development of industrial chemicals and biofuels, raised nearly $3 million of a planned $15.2 million round of venture capital.

—JMI Equity, the venture firm based in San Diego and Baltimore, led a $5 million investment in Axeda, the Waltham, MA-based startup that makes a cloud-based system for wireless tracking of company assets. Axeda also raised $4 million in venture debt from MMV Financial of Toronto.

—TechAmerica San Diego, the local chapter of the industry group previously known as the AeA, issued nine awards at its 16th annual high tech awards luncheon. The group named winners in nine categories: MadCap Software (Software); InterKnowlogy (Internet); Verari Systems (Hardware); Quake Global (Communications); SeaBotix Inc. (Defense); Peregrine Semiconductor (Integrated Circuits); OneRecovery (Medical Device) IPS Group (Cleantech); Legend Films (Emerging Growth).

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San Diego-based Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) says it has established a separate wholly-owned subsidiary, Qualcomm Innovation Center, (QuIC), to ensure that certain open source software operates seamlessly with Qualcomm technology.

The company says it has transferred experienced software engineers to the innovation center, where they will focus on open source initiatives such as Linux and Webkit, and on open source operating systems like Symbian, Android, and Chrome. Job postings on the company’s website indicate the center is based in San Diego and Boulder, CO. In a statement released early today, Qualcomm did not say how many engineers its QuIC subsidiary will employ

The company’s initiative is aimed at consumer products that run open source software, enabling Qualcomm-based technologies to keep pace with shifting opportunities in open software as they emerge by optimizing the performance of mobile operating systems and the software applications that run on them.

The wireless technology giant said QuIC’s board of directors has named Rob Chandhok, senior vice president of software strategy at Qualcomm CDMA Technologies, as QuIC president. Chandhok plans to address the Symbian open source community at a conference in London Wednesday.

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I can’t do justice to a comprehensive review of yesterday’s FiReGlobal (West Coast) conference at the Four Seasons Hotel in Seattle. Instead, I’ll just give a few of my key takeaways. The all-day event, organized by Strategic News Service, focused on how to solve some of the most pressing problems in technology, business, and society—in areas as diverse as broadband access, entrepreneurship, education, sustainability and the environment, political discourse, human health, and mobile devices.

The sweeping conference had the tagline, “Global technology driving local solutions.” Interesting, as that’s sort of the reverse of Xconomy’s mantra, which is reporting about local stories with global impact. But I think they’re two sides of the same innovation coin.

So, in “ESPN plays of the day” style, here’s my top 10 list from the conference (if only I had the video to go with it):

10. Setting up entrepreneurial zones. A panel led by Ty Carlson of Microsoft proposed denoting special “R&D zones” from Oregon to British Columbia geared toward supporting startups in fields like renewable energy, sustainable farming, and biotech. The idea would be to offer tax credits and other incentives to create a more entrepreneurial culture in the Northwest, especially in rural areas.

9. What government should and shouldn’t do. Investor and entrepreneur Martin Tobias of Seattle-based Kashless said, “Startups and investors can’t make a 10-year bet when you have a two-year tax credit.” Those conditions freeze out small companies, especially in costly ventures like energy. So government should create open markets and set minimum market sizes for new technologies, Tobias said. But it shouldn’t pick the technology winners themselves.

8. Northwest tech startups do the Olympics. Tom Guthrie, CEO of Seattle-based Twisted Pair Solutions, said his company has helped numerous agencies on the Olympic Peninsula inter-operate their radios—a key problem in disaster response and other scenarios. Twisted Pair, which is backed by Ignition Partners and other investors, is also working on a laser system to deliver broadband signals. Meanwhile, Paul Manson, CEO of Vancouver, BC-based Sea Breeze, talked about his company’s project to build a high-voltage, direct-current undersea cable between Victoria, BC, and Port Angeles, WA. This would be a fast, controllable power transmission component of a smart grid; it should be under construction by mid-2010, he said.

7. The world according to Dell. In a chat with Mark Anderson of Strategic News Service, Michael Dell said he is excited about China and the rest of Asia as fast-growing economies. He anticipates a U.S. recovery from the recession, but says, “I don’t think you’ll see an immediate snap-back.” And he likes South America as an emerging market (Dell does sales of more than $1 billion in Brazil alone). But Europe, not so much—he sees a lot of uncertainty in the workforce there.

6. Get ready for Dell smartphones. “Mobility is absolutely the theme,” Dell said. He was talking about the relative importance of desktop computers, laptops, netbooks, and mobile devices to …Next Page »

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The big story out of the International CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment expo in San Diego last week could perhaps be summed up in one word: “spectrum.” We also have reports from the Algae Biofuels Summit and other big news, so read on.

—Qualcomm co-founder Irwin Jacobs and his son Paul, who is now chairman and CEO of the San Diego wireless giant, told CTIA goers that Qualcomm’s labs have reached the limit in terms of optimizing the efficiencies of wireless devices within current radio bands. Yet demand continues to accelerate for mobile data services. FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski said in a different session that finding more spectrum is the agency’s No. 1 priority. “Spectrum is oxygen,” Genachowski said.

—In a report that preceded the CTIA conference, Seattle-based Ontela released a survey that shows people still have problems doing simple things like transmitting photos on their mobile phones, even as the popularity of mobile data plans and services such as text messaging continue to grow in the U.S.

—Denise gave us a preview of the 3rd Annual Algae Biomass Summit, which also was held in San Diego last week. Cleantech San Diego president Lisa Bicker said more than 625 cleantech companies are now based in the region, including more than 30 algae biofuels companies.

—At a time when investment capital has been pouring into the development of algae-based biofuels, Bill Barclay of Columbia, MD-based Martek Biosciences said it could take a decade or more for commercial-scale algae biofuels production to become reality. Scientists still need to identify the best algae strains, optimize production processes, and find the best ways to convert “green crude” to fuels.

—San Diego-based Achates Power has raised $12.1 million out of a $20 million venture round, according to a regulatory filing. The company has been developing a radical new design for a high-efficiency two-stroke automotive engine.

—We’ve been too busy to do much celebrating, but Xconomy’s San Diego website officially marked its one-year anniversary last week. In the past year, we’ve published more than 1,400 news stories, briefs, and commentaries about the innovation leaders, businesses, technologies, and trends that make up the “exponential” part of the San Diego economy. Thanks to all our readers for their great comments.

—While the Obama Administration continues to push its plans for healthcare reform, Gary West is refining his own plans for using the new San Diego-based West Wireless Health Institute to catalyze innovations in wireless health that help deliver healthcare equivalent to what’s generally available today at lower cost. The non-profit institute, which was funded in March by a $45 million donation from the Gary and Mary West Foundation, ranks as one of the first organizations in the world to seek improvements in healthcare specifically through advances in wireless technologies.

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The co-founders who introduced San Diego-based Qualcomm’s wireless digital technology in 1989 envisioned from the early days that it would be ideal for the Internet. But Irwin Jacobs says now even he’s amazed at how many things a cell phone can do today.

A new generation of innovators is now using Qualcomm’s proprietary technology to develop new cellular devices and services in such fields as healthcare, transportation, and energy—and “None of that was quite obvious to us in the early days,” Jacobs said in a presentation at a wireless conference in San Diego yesterday. Yet the Qualcomm co-founder and his son, Qualcomm chairman and CEO Paul Jacobs, also say the wireless industry is pushing the limits of cellular networks by cranking out ever-faster wireless devices that feature more and more mobile data services. Many of the new products just over the horizon are driven by Qualcomm’s own advances in technology—including 4G smartphones, netbook computers, and palm-size wireless TVs.

Rapid changes in cellular technology and the potential for network constraints became part of a wide-ranging keynote address at the CTIA Wireless IT & Entertainment conference in San Diego. Unlike most keynotes, though, Qualcomm’s father-and-son dynasty appeared together onstage for what was intended to be a living-room discussion with CTIA president Steve Largent, the former Oklahoma Republican Congressman and Hall of Fame pro football receiver.

Irwin Jacobs

One of their most interesting revelations came while Irwin, who turns 76 later this month, was discussing the technology advances that led to the current generation of smartphones. Despite rapid technology advances, the market for mobile Web-based services was slow to develop, and Irwin observed, “The iPhone was really a major breakthrough, in terms of developing a simple interface.”

Paul added, “We always used to talk about developing the killer app, and the killer app ended up being a simple user interface,” and he says most advances in computing capabilities and graphics technologies are now focused on making the interface even simpler to use. Paul, who was named Qualcomm’s CEO in 2005 and chairman earlier this year, says he envisions a future in which wireless technologies are “increasingly embedded in everything,” enabling a homeowner to use their cell phone to remotely control their TV, stereo, and lights.

According to Irwin, wireless networks provide cellular coverage for roughly 80 percent of the world population today, and he estimates there are …Next Page »

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As the international wireless industry group CTIA convenes its 2009 conference on information technology and entertainment in downtown San Diego this week, one of the emerging sectors claiming much of the agenda and industry attention is wireless healthcare.

San Diego, with its concentration of both life sciences and wireless technology startups, also has emerged as a de facto capital of wireless healthcare—particularly since March 30, when the Gary and Mary West Foundation founded the West Wireless Health Institute atop La Jolla’s Torrey Pines Mesa and provided $45 million in startup funding.

The non-profit institute, which is focused primarily on research and education, ranks as one of the first organizations in the world to seek improvements in healthcare specifically through advances in wireless technologies. In June, the institute revealed its first clinical research program, which involves testing remote heart monitoring technology for San Jose, CA-based Corventis. But the institute hasn’t announced much else since then. So I arranged to get an update on its progress from Gary West, the founder and board chairman.

West moved to San Diego from Omaha, NE, after making his fortune in telemarketing and in providing customer services for the telecommunications industry. He says he founded the institute to help address the costly inefficiencies that plague our healthcare system, and at a panel discussion last night at Qualcomm, he used his personal encounter with high blood pressure as an example. West says when his high blood pressure was initially diagnosed, his doctor prescribed medication and told him to return in six weeks to see if it was working. He returned; it wasn’t. So his doctor prescribed another medication and told him to come back in six weeks. West says the hit-or-miss process, which took about six months to get right, could be done far easier and less expensively by using sensors and wireless technologies to monitor patient response.

What is most immediately striking, though, is the sheer scale of West’s thinking. At a time when the Obama Administration’s plans for healthcare reform are sputtering, West views the institute as nothing less than a catalyst for overhauling a costly and overburdened U.S health system. West pointedly tells me he doesn’t care whether or not healthcare reform includes a public option—which has become one of the polarizing issues in the political debate in Washington D.C.

“That’s all noise to me,” West says. “What we’re talking about is going to benefit the world of healthcare from a quality and cost standpoint, regardless of what methodology they choose to deliver healthcare.”

He contends that unless escalating medical costs are reigned in, the American healthcare system will bankrupt our economy. To West, the institute’s prime directive is driving innovations in wireless technology to take costs out of the healthcare system—while at the same time maintaining healthcare services that are as good or better than what …Next Page »

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[Corrected 9:05 a.m. 9/25/09, see below] In a performance reminiscent of the frothy days of the dot-com boom, stock in Watertown, MA-based lithium ion battery maker A123Systems (NASDAQ: AONE) soared more than 50 percent in its first day of trading yesterday. It’s been years since a New England technology firm burst out of the IPO gate so strongly, and Wall Street’s interest in the company—which hopes to supply batteries for many of the electric vehicles likely to come to market over the next several years—has significantly boosted the portfolios of the major venture investors, strategic investors, and executives who hold shares in the company, at least on paper.

The individual investor whose shares gained the most value yesterday is legendary Boston-area entrepreneur and philanthropist Gururaj “Desh” Deshpande, the founder of Sycamore Networks and the donor behind the Deshpande Center for Technological Innovation at MIT. Desphande owns 7.3 percent of A123Systems; at the IPO price of $13.50 per share yesterday, that stake was worth just over $95 million. By the end of the day, when the company’s stock price had climbed to $20.29, Deshpande’s shares were worth nearly $143 million. (See Table 1 below.)

A123Systems’ main venture backer, North Bridge Venture Partners of Waltham, MA, also fared well yesterday. With 9.3 percent of A123’s outstanding shares, the venture firm is the battery maker’s single largest shareholder. Its stake was worth just under $121 million at the offering price and had grown in value by $60 million by the end of the day. [Update: PE Hub has an interesting table today, using investment data from Thomson Reuters, estimating the share values for A123's six largest venture backers. The VC firms' (as yet unrealized) multiples, based on yesterday's closing price, vary from 3.03 to 7.23, according to Thomson's estimates; North Bridge's multiple comes in at 4.35.]

Overall, the company’s eight largest shareholders saw the value of their holdings increase by almost $270 million on Thursday [Updated and corrected: not $365 million as a previous version of this story reported due to a double-counting error in the math]. The company’s total market capitalization increased by $600 million over the course of the day, ending at $1.96 billion. Not bad for a company that has raised only about $352 million in private, dilutive investments. (A123Systems also benefited from $100 million in refundable tax credits from the state of Michigan, a $249 million Department of Energy grant this August, and about $250 million in other government grants and loans, leading PE Hub’s Deborah Gage to comment that “the biggest backers of A123Systems are taxpayers.”)

Here’s a list of A123Systems’ biggest shareholders, drawn from regulatory filings, and the amounts by which their stakes grew in value yesterday.

Table 1. A123Systems’ Eight Largest Shareholders and Their Stakes

* The “Shares Owned” figures refer to shares owned after the offering.

Source: A123 Systems Form S-1, page 124.

Of course, the gains reflected in the table above are on paper only—none of A123’s largest shareholders actually sold shares in the initial offering. But as part of the offering, several A123Systems principals did sell portions of their stakes in the company. Co-founder Yet-Ming Chiang, who developed the company’s battery technology in his laboratory at MIT, sold the most shares—a stake amounting to about $2.8 million at the IPO price of $13.50 per share. Here’s the list of selling shareholders identified in regulatory documents:

Table 2. Selling Shareholders in Yesterday’s IPO

Source: A123Systems Form S-1, page 125.

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Former BAE Systems executive Walt Havenstein takes over today as SAIC’s new CEO, but the big question is if the new boss will move the company’s headquarters from San Diego to McLean, VA. Get our roundup of San Diego’s biztech news here.

—San Diego defense contractor SAIC (NYSE: SAI), which has been shifting some key executives and corporate functions to Northern Virginia since 2006, appears poised to announce the relocation of its headquarters from San Diego to McLean, VA. If SAIC moves its HQ, San Diego’s roster of Fortune 500 companies would go from four to three. It only increased to four in August when CareFusion (NYSE: CFN), the Cardinal Health spinoff, established its HQ here. The other two are Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM) and Sempra Energy (NYSE: SRE).

—How unique is your company’s culture? Xconomy asked the CEOs of startups in Seattle, Boston, and San Diego to use one word to describe their company’s corporate culture. We got 21 different answers. San Diego’s CEOs said Innovative, Love, Open, Entrepreneurial, and Speechless. Actually, “speechless” is my word. VMIX CEO Mike Glickenhaus was the only one who said, “I wish I could come up with one but I can’t.”

—At a time when rapid changes in technology are bringing Internet TV closer to reality, DivX CEO Kevin Hell says he is positioning the San Diego-based digital media company to be the friendly and agnostic technology provider. Hell says he wants the DivX format to be the “any-to-any-solution” that plays video content on any device from any manufacturer.

—Corporate buyout executives from Qualcomm and Google voiced cautious optimism about the economic climate for M&A deals involving venture-backed companies during a panel discussion organized last week by the San Diego Venture Group. Qualcomm’s Duane Nelles and Google’s Karim Faris also said it’s becoming more important for startups to secure an early corporate partner with a vested interest in developing the technology.

—San Diego Gas & Electric is leading a coalition of 28 companies, academic institutions, and other organizations to integrate emerging “smart grid” technologies in the regional power grid—and are bidding for $100 million in matching federal stimulus funds to help pay for it.

—Connect, the San Diego non-profit group that promotes technology and entrepreneurship, issued its second-quarter report on San Diego’s innovation economy. The study found 102 new technology companies were created during the three months that ended on June 30. That’s more than the 66 startups during the first three months of the year and better than the 76 companies launched during the same quarter in 2008.

—In its fifth edition of the “Venture Impact” report, the National Venture Capital Association found that venture-backed companies employed more than 12.1 million Americans in 2008. These companies generated $2.9 trillion in revenue in 2008, roughly one-fifth of U.S. gross domestic product. San Diego attracted $1.2 billion in venture investment across biotechnology, software, and information technology, among other areas, according to the NVCA report.

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San Diego Gas & Electric has formed a coalition with the non-profit group Cleantech San Diego, UC San Diego, and major companies like Qualcomm, IBM, and Intel to integrate emerging “smart grid” technologies in the public utility’s regional power grid.

The coalition’s goal is to develop and deploy a host of innovations, including renewable energy generation, new types of energy storage systems, advanced electric transmission and distribution technologies, advanced sensors, and wireless “smart meters.” It also plans to seek $100 million in federal economic stimulus funding, part of more than $4.5 billion in smart grid funding designated by the Obama Administration as part of its new national energy policy.

Smart grid technology also is intended to enable residential utility customers to use the Internet to monitor their home energy consumption. SDG&E, the public utility operated by San Diego’s Sempra Energy (NYSE: SRE), began installing digital smart meters in suburban San Diego last year. The meters monitor each customer’s electricity and gas usage and use Zigbee wireless networking technology to regularly transmit data to the utility’s computerized information center.

The coalition SDG&E put together includes state agencies, a labor union, academic researchers, and companies developing such technologies, such as GE, Cisco, Itron, BAE Systems, SAIC, BMC Software, and On-Ramp Wireless. Altogether, 28 organizations are participating in the effort.

“The stimulus dollars are matching funds, so SDG&E and the coalition are matching the amount they are requesting,” says April Bolduc, a utility spokeswoman. “SDG&E has been working with many of these companies for years on individual projects and this is the first time they’ll all be brought together to work together on interconnecting all of the projects to create a smart grid.”

SDG&E, which is leading the coalition, will pass any federal smart grid funding through to the participating tech companies to complete their work, Bolduc says. “SDG&E will be prioritizing and making decisions along with the partners.”

UC San Diego, which has invested heavily in its own energy initiatives, will provide research and development resources—along with UCLA and the Energy Policy Initiatives Center at the University of San Diego School of Law. Lisa Bicker, president of Cleantech San Diego, says their role is to explain the benefits of smart grid technologies to diverse segments of the community.

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The keynote speech that former SEC chairman Christopher Cox delivered yesterday at San Diego’s Seventh Annual Venture Summit was billed as a look at the conditions necessary for the IPO window to reopen, a topic of keen interest to scores of VC partners in the audience.

But Cox’s main theme was really focused on the unprecedented scale of the government’s $14 trillion Wall Street bailout and how it has imperiled the U.S. economy. He left the impression the IPO market won’t be warming up anytime soon. So, after the luncheon, it was only natural for attendees to show high interest in two panel discussions that focused on mergers and acquisitions (one for the life sciences sector and one for technology).

The consensus? Cautious optimism—at least in the session I attended on technology M&As. Executives from Qualcomm and Google agreed that the overall economy seems to be stabilizing, and the climate for corporate buyouts of technology startups has been improving.

“From Google’s perspective, it appears that the worst is over,” said Karim Faris, who joined Google’s corporate development team in 2008.

The half-day summit was organized by the San Diego Venture Group, a non-profit networking group for the venture community and service providers. More than 550 people registered for the event, according to Peter Shaw, who is president of the group’s board (and a freshly recruited Xconomist). Shaw told me this year’s summit was the venture group’s “most ambitious ever” because they never before hosted a high-profile speaker like Cox, or dual-track panel discussions.

If anything, however, the former SEC chairman’s talk only underscored how crucial buyouts have become for venture firms to realize some return on their investments. “A real imbalance in the supply and demand for cash has required all of us to become …Next Page »

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Qualcomm technology that’s being incorporated in a new line of small and lightweight netbook computers—which Qualcomm calls smartbooks—could make the wireless devices one of the hot gift items for consumers this Christmas. Read on as we unwrap that news and more.

—Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs says a lineup of “smartbook” computers that are set for launch in coming months will be powered by the wireless giant’s Snapdragon processor—and also will include Qualcomm’s satellite-based TV technology that broadcasts to mobile devices. In an interview with the San Diego Union-Tribune, Jacobs says Qualcomm’s MediaFLO technology also will be used to rapidly cache data onto smartbook computer screens “so when you open it up, there’s already live data on it.”

—San Diego’s Sapphire Energy plans to build a 300-acre “integrated algal bio-refinery” in Southern New Mexico. Sapphire, which is developing processes for harvesting green crude oil algae to produce gasoline and other biofuels, says the project is expected to take three years to build out. Sapphire also is co-sponsoring a 3,000-mile cross-country road trip by Algaeus, a Toyota Prius hybrid electric vehicle that is using a blend of algae-based fuel and gasoline when it’s not running on electricity.

—EvoNexus, the startup incubator formed by the San Diego industry group CommNexus, has enrolled its first three startups. The companies, chosen from 45 applicants, are Medipacs, which is combining new intravenous infusion technology with wireless monitoring capabilities; IO Semiconductor, a wireless chip design startup; and Pixon Images, which is developing real-time video enhancement technologies. The three startups get business coaching, furnished office space for up to two years, and other help at no cost.

—Sean Barr, the Canadian consul in San Diego, says the job of the five-person Canadian consulate in San Diego is to help facilitate collaborations between technology companies in San Diego and Canada. One example of such collaborations is that San Diego’s Isis Pharmaceuticals has been working with OncoGenex Technologies of Vancouver, BC, on an experimental drug for prostate cancer. As Barr put it, “The Canadian government has sort of recognized that the opportunities here are significant enough to warrant a full-time presence that’s focused on the life sciences and biotechnology, cleantech, ITC (Information Technology and Communications), and defense and homeland security.”

—Carlsbad, CA-based MaxLinear, a fabless semiconductor company, has focused its business on making it possible to watch TV on any mobile device. The company introduced its latest tuner-and-demodulator designs to provide a single-chip solution for all broadcast TV applications.

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As interest builds in the coming introduction of new wireless netbooks, Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs tells the San Diego Union-Tribune that many netbooks based on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processor also will include Qualcomm’s MediaFLO, the company’s satellite-based TV broadcast for mobile devices.

In an interview with the newspaper’s editorial board, Jacobs says the new line of netbooks—which he calls “smartbooks”—will use MediaFLO technology so users can watch live events and FloTV programming transmitted directly to their display screens. But the technology also will be used to rapidly broadcast and store Internet content. Qualcomm calls it “data casting,” Jacobs says. “That’s sending snippets of data down, so headlines, weather, sports, stock quotes — whatever you might be interested in — we are looking at broadcasting that down to the device. So when you open it up, there’s already live data on it. I think that will be pretty compelling.”

Paul Jacobs

The next three months should tell whether Jacobs is right, but we should expect a few more surprises by the time the Christmas shopping season begins in earnest.

In June, Collins Stewart analyst Ashok Kumar said Hewlett-Packard plans to launch a line of netbooks before the year ends that will be powered by Qualcomm’s Snapdragon processors, rather than the Intel Atom processors now dominating the sector. As the world’s No. 1 desktop PC maker, HP’s decision to power its netbooks with Snapdragon chips represents a significant endorsement for Qualcomm over Intel and the line of Atom processors developed for the emerging netbook market.

Neither Qualcomm nor HP have announced the deal, but Kumar told me at the time that he’s got sources in HP’s Asian supply chain who are vouching that HP’s new netbooks will have “Qualcomm inside.”

Analysts have been closely watching the uptake of Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chipset—both for what it means for Qualcomm’s expansion into smartbooks (as opposed to netbooks) as well as the ramifications that has for Intel’s business. But in his interview with the Union-Tribune, Jacobs minimized the significance of the looming head-on competition between Qualcomm and …Next Page »

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FLO TV, San Diego-based Qualcomm’s (NASDAQ: QCOM) satellite-based mobile TV service and Portland, OR-based Rentrak Corp. (NASDAQ: RENT) say they are collaborating on a system that will provide comprehensive data on mobile TV viewership and advertising. Using Rentrak’s TV Essentials media measurement system, the partners plan to deliver reports to provide a basis for setting advertising rates on FLO TV and insights into audience viewing patters without “divulging any individual subscriber’s personal information.”

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[Editors note: Revises and corrects the terms of QPrize convertible note funding]

When San Diego-based Qualcomm Ventures announced it was organizing a new international prize competition last May, the economy was already reeling and the venture capital industry had slammed on the brakes.

That slowdown in VC activity—especially for early stage startups—was probably the key factor in the company’s decision to set aside $550,000 in incentive funding for finalists in the “QPrize” competition, according to Nagraj Kashyap, who heads Qualcomm Ventures. With the Aug. 21 deadline for “QPrize” applications drawing near, Kashyap agreed to meet with me to discuss the business plan competition and the corporate venture arm, which usually maintains a relatively low profile here.

Nagraj Kashyap

Since Qualcomm (NASDAQ: [[ticker: QCOM]]) launched the venture arm nine years ago, it has provided funding for about 30 startups around the world, with investments typically ranging from $500,000 to $10 million, and from Series A to Series C rounds. Kashyap says the fund’s managers look for startups that provide both a strong potential for return on investment and that complement Qualcomm’s existing products and services. Its investments include lithium battery developer A123 Systems of Watertown, MA, video game console maker Zeebo of San Diego, and remote blood pressure monitor startup Triage Wireless in San Diego.

Kashyap says Qualcomm Ventures’ foray into organizing a business plan competition “all started when we saw this precipitous drop in venture funding, which hurts the early stage guys disproportionately.” An additional source of seed-stage funding won’t change the prospects for some startups, such as semiconductor design companies, because the capital costs are so high these days. But Kashyap says seed funding can make a big difference to …Next Page »

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It was a light week for technology stories in San Diego last week, as I took time away from Xconomy for a family road trip through the Pacific Northwest. The traffic along Interstate 5 was mild, however, in comparison to the record Internet traffic on Xconomy’s San Diego website for our two-part story about SAIC, Network Solutions, and the rise of the Web. Read on for that and the rest of last week’s news.

—Mike Daniels, a former senior executive at San Diego-based SAIC (NYSE: SAI), told me the San Diego research and engineering contractor also known as Science Applications International Corp. probably made five or six offers before it finally acquired Network Solutions of Herndon, VA, for $4.7 million in 1995. In a follow-up Q&A, SAIC founder J. Robert Beyster said that by 2000, the company had realized billions on its investment.

—San Diego’s Rayspan is using $12.5 million in Series B venture funding to advance its work on a smaller, more sensitive, and more versatile antenna for mobile devices. The technology under development at Rayspan is known as MIMO, for multiple-input-multiple-output, and it could pose a threat to rival embedded antenna technology developed by San Diego-based Ethertronics.

—Qualcomm (NASDAQ: QCOM), the San Diego-based wireless chipmaker, and Verizon Wireless said they are forming a joint venture to encourage corporations to use Verizon’s cellular network for more than phone services. Using machine-to-machine (M2M) wireless technology, for example, public utility companies could monitor and interact with circuit breakers, transformers, and other equipment to manage the power grid more efficiently and reliably.

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