Tariq Krim, the founder of Netvibes has been working on a new project for well over a year now called Jolicloud. Jolicloud is an operating system intended for use on netbooks. The company has raised $4.2 million in funding from Atomico and Mangrove. Niklas Zennström of Atomico, Gilles Samoun (fotopedia CEO), and Michael Jackson (Mangrove partner) have joined the Jolicloud Board of Directors as a result of the funding.
The Jolicloud operating system utilizes a web application and cloud service interface. Krim sees Google’s announcement of the Chrome OS as a validation for what he is trying to achieve with Jolicloud. Krim left Netvibes on a full-time basis this past May. Netvibes is an RSS reader website built on a cloud that has built in web applications. In a way Jolicloud and Netvibes complement each other. Jolicloud wants to be your default OS on a netbook and Netvibes wants to be your default homepage.
The user interface of the Jolicloud OS is similar to the iPhone operating system. The icons of applications are large and there is very little hardware needed to keep Jolicloud running smoothly. Jolicloud will also support touchscreens.
Xobni is a San Francisco, Calif. based startup that built a platform around Microsoft Outlook. Xobni makes it easier to find people, email, and attachments within Outlook. Bill Gates even called Xobni the next generation of social networking. Xobni has recently raised $7 million in Series B. Xobni started as a Y-Combinator company then went on to raise $4.26 million in Series A.
Xobni’s Outlook software has been downloaded over 1.5 million times. Xobni is currently doing product trials with Fortune 500 companies. Some of the companies Xobni has partnered with includes LinkedIn, Facebook, Skype, and Yahoo! Cisco’s investment in Xobni is an indication that they are becoming serious about enterprise email. In August 2008, Cisco acquired PostPath, an email and calendar company for $215 million.
Prior to the $7 million investment, Xobni raised $4.26 million in funding from Khosla Ventures, Atomico, and First Round Capital. The individuals that participated in Xobni’s first round of funding was Ariel Poler, Saar Gur, and Tom Pickney.
WooMe is a video dating social network that allows users to communicate on webcams. One of the features that makes WooMe popular is Woo Sessions. Woo Sessions are basically webcam video chatrooms. WooMe calls themselves an “introduction platform” according to VentureBeat’s Chris Morrison.
WooMe raised a second round of funding at $12.5 million led by Index Ventures, Atomico, and Mangrove Capital Partners. This brings WooMe’s total funding to $16.9 and now they are valuated at $41 million.
In terms of users, the company say that they have roughly 350,000 users and has 15,000 sessions per day. WooMe hopes to raise about another $500,000 in this round from “strategic angels.” WooMe started in December 2006.
