Accel Partners led the series B, reconfirming their belief in the upside of enterprise 2.0. Investors include Virginia-based Valhalla Ventures and MenloPark's Sierra Ventures.

From the press release:

Vienna, VA - May 7, 2008 - Parature, the global leader in on-demand customer service software, announced today that the company has secured $16 million in Series B venture capital financing. This round was led by, Palo Alto, CA based Accel Partners, with participation from existing investors Menlo Park, CA based Sierra Ventures, Vienna, VA based Valhalla Partners, as well as existing angel investors led by Ching-Ho Fung. Richard Wong, Partner at Accel Partners has been named to Parature’s Board of Directors. These three venture capital firms have impressive track records of success in the information technology industry, and specifically

...More

The OnDemand funding frenzy continues. Web-based personal assistant Rearden Commerce has closed a huge round with JPMorgan, AmEx, Oak, and Foundation Capital.

From the Press Release:

Rearden Commerce, Inc., creator of the first web-based personal assistant and a leading choice of CFO’s for managing spending on business services, today announced that it has secured $100 million in funding from investors including JPMorgan Chase & Co. (NYSE: JPM) and American Express (NYSE: AXP) with participation from Oak Investment Partners and Foundation Capital.

This funding will be devoted to supporting Rearden Commerce’s rapid expansion and development plans due to the widespread adoption of its user-friendly, web-based personal assistant. The company’s growth plans include dramatically expanding its B2B penetration

...More

SaaS startup Vurv has been acquired by Taleo for $129M. As the IPO drought continues, M&A is looking more attractive to business software companies.

From WSJ:

For nearly a decade, companies have been touting "software as a service" -- Web-based services that handle business tasks that once required installing software on computers. But a tough market for initial public offerings has start-ups in the field eyeing other ways to grow and raise money.

Taleo Corp., which offers Web-based services for recruiting and assessing workers, has agreed to acquire a smaller rival, Vurv Technology Inc., for about $128.8 million, the companies announced Tuesday.

And Rearden Commerce Inc., whose Web service helps corporate employees buy travel, dining and other services, on Tuesday announced that it has raised $100 million from several

...More

Central Desktop, a collaboration tool used to coordinate Obama's California campaign, received $7M A-round from OpenView. The SaaS collab tool is aimed at small businesses, and has done pretty well--over 125,000 users with no venture capital.

From the press release:

Over 125,000 Customers Marks Rapid Adoption of the Central Desktop Collaboration Platform

PASADENA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Central Desktop, the Complete Business Collaboration platform for business teams, today announced a $7M investment from OpenView Venture Partners.

...More

New column and lead article in the February issue of SemanticReport delineates the relationship between Enterprise 3.0 and the Semantic Web.

Bottom line: The Semantic Web brings meaning (quite literally) to the World Wide Web.  A clearly disruptive technology, semweb will lead to a new generation of both consumer and enterprise applications.

Based and living in China for the past four years (both in Beijing and Qingdao), David Scott Lewis is SVP with Startech Global Corporation, the outsourcing hub for Tsinghua University (China's MIT and Hu Jintao's alma mater) and Zytech Solar, a Going Green 100 winner.  He is also a "Contributing Author" to SemanticReport.com. 
...More

I recently wrote a post on my TechSpend Blog called Who Needs Free Software Anyhow. It was mostly in response to people looking at tools like Zoho's ZohoWriter and Google's new online spreadsheet. and saying things like "Who needs this second-rate, not quite as good as the Microsoft version stuff?"  Intuitively, I thought that this new class of SaaS/Web 2.0 stuff was cool. Then I realized that there were real business and personal applications for it.  Now - I think it will revolutionize the way we think about business.  That is - if the sleepy bureaucrats in most corporations wake up.

Between the time I first saw these tools and now, I got elected chairman of the board of directors of eNucleus, Inc., a cool SaaS firm based in Chicago and Vancouver, WA. 

...More