Zynga is a social network game-making machine.  The company has just raised $29 million from Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, Institutional Venture Partners, Union Square Ventures, Avalon Ventures, and Foundry Group.  Union, Avalon, and Foundry were all previous investors.  Zynga is based out of San Francisco, Calif.

Zynga was started by Mark Pincus.  Through this round of funding, Kleiner Perkins partner and former chief creative officer of Electronic Arts Bing Gordon will join Zynga’s board of directors.  Zynga’s last round of funding was $10 million in January 2008.  Reid Hoffman and Peter Thiel of the PayPal mafia were a couple of investors involved in the last round of funding.

Zynga currently has about 18 million uniques per month.  Zynga’s revenue model is advertising and selling game add-ons.  Zynga’s top games on Facebook are Poker, Blackjack, Scramble, Word Twist, PathWords, Sudoku, Sea Wars, Mafia Wars, Dragon Wars, Triumph, Attack!, My Heroes Ability, Ghost Racer, Dope Wars, and YoVille.  Zynga recently acquired YoVille.

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Zynga

Mevio, a video website that was founded by Ron Bloom and Adam Curry started the company originally to podcast.  About 4 years later, the founders decided to rename their former company, Podshow to Mevio.  Mevio hosts original videos and will allow others to syndicate their content.

This idea impressed Crosslink Capital, Sequoia Capital, Kleiner Perkins, DAG Ventures, and Sherpalo Ventures because these companies gave Mevio $15 million in Series C.  All of these VC firms were previous investors as well.  To date, Mevio has raised about $38 million. 

Some of Mevio’s clients include Coca-Cola, Anheuser Busch, and Hewlett Packard.  Mevio has over 1 million hours of video content.  Mevio also self-proclaims themselves as a leading site to discover new artists and free use licensing for original music. 

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Mevio

Information Source:
Silicon Alley Insider