Capital Chaos

 Box.net (Palo Alto, CA) just completed a series B round of $6M led by US Venture Partners with participation from Draper Fisher Jurvetson.  DFJ had led the previous Series A round of $1.5M back in June, ‘06.  The online storage company claims to now have 1.4 million registered users which is triple the amount it had at its last round of funding.  The company is basically a virtual storage unit for individuals, businesses and enterprises and has done some pretty cool deals with Facebook, WordPress, iPhone for video/pic storage (you can share access to your box with others as well).

The service for individuals which I have checked out is pretty easy to use and works really well.  The “plus” subscription rate is $25/yr for 2Gig of space (file size is limited to 50MB).

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 US Venture Partners (Menlo Park, CA) is a very aggressive early stage investor.  Since 1981, they have invested in over 350 companies (Ask Jeeves, Yoomba) and have a very diversified portfolio.  These guys are very interested in helping entrepreneurs build great companies and have a track record for doing so.  Their investment strategy is really based on the people who are leading the company so make sure you have a great reputation, excellent references and some track record for proving previous successes.  They have what is called a “Six Step Investment Decision Process” which is:

They invest in a variety of sectors including Enterprise Network and Storage, Biotech, Enterprise Applications, IT Software, Internet and Consumer, Semiconductors, Mobile, Medical Devices. 

At the end of the day, because these guys are a fairly big (and it’s a top-tier firm) your best bet is to get an intro to them.  These guys are not afraid to get their hands dirty at any stage.  Paul Matteucci (mobile applications, RFID technologies, storage and enterprise applications) and Chris Rust (seed and early stage investments in the IT sector) are the two guys you want to be able to pitch.  Both are highly respected and

Contact:
2735 Sand Hill Road
Menlo Park, CA 94025
Telephone: (650) 854-9080