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TechCrunch

TechCrunch is a group-edited blog that profiles the companies, products and events defining and transforming the new web.

Dave McClure Files For $30 Million Venture Fund: 500 StartupsToday

In January, we broke the news that prolific Silicon Valley angel investor Dave McClure was to set up its own venture capital fund.

Yesterday, the man filed for the fund with the SEC, providing us with more details (hat tip to FormDs.com). The name will be 500 Startups – McClure has long called himself the master of 500 hats – and the initial fund will amount to max. $30 million according to the filing.

McClure has turned to 99 Designs to come up with a logo for the fund (my favorite so far).

Here’s part of the brief for the logo design:

Why Apple Should Buy Infineon: To Own Mobile And Screw IntelToday

Apple’s earnings and revenue growth in mobile have been awe-inspiring to witness. From zero presence three years ago, Apple is now the most profitable cell phone maker in the world.

Apple’s success in this compressed period has helped it become an enormous buyer of components. In fact iSuppli projects that next year Apple will become the second-largest semiconductor buyer worldwide and may edge out HP in 2012 to become the world’s largest.

Though this scale presents Apple with enormous bargaining power, it also begs the question: Should Apple own its own wireless chip development?

This week’s rumors that Intel is about to acquire Infineon’s wireless chip business to make a run at the smartphone market bring this question front and center. Infineon is Apple’s sole supplier for cellular basebands, the core chipsets used in mobile phones to handle voice and data communications.

Based on Apple’s deep relationship with Infineon, and its famed secrecy around M&A, it i

China’s Focus Media Sells Internet Division Allyes To Silver Lake For $124 MillionToday

Focus Media, one of China’s leading digital media groups, this morning announced that it is selling a 62% indirect equity ownership of its Internet division, Allyes, to US-based private investment firm Silver Lake.

Under the terms of the agreement, Silver Lake will pay $124 million to Focus Media, in exchange for the equity ownership of Allyes. Focus Media had acquired the internet advertising service company, reportedly the largest in China, back in February 2007.

Certain remaining shareholders of Allyes also agree to sell their equity ownership in Allyes to Silver Lake, so that in time the investment firm will own a controlling stake in Allyes. The transaction is expected to close soon, subject to customary closing conditions.

Established in 1998, Allyes is said to be the largest online media service provider in China, offering a suite of interactive marketing solutions. Allyes markets a proprietary suite called AdForward,which includes online ad-p

100,000 Android Applications Submitted To Date, AndroLib ClaimsToday

Despite earlier reports to the contrary, Android Market watcher AndroLib says there aren’t 100,000 applications available in the store – yet. There have, however, 100,000 apps been submitted to Android Market since its public debut, the site wagered this morning, up from approximately 5,000 in June 2009.

The Androlib directory covers multiple markets, including international ones, so not all apps and games are available in the United States, necessarily. Not all markets are counted, even, so AndroLib claims it may potentially undercount the number of apps, although it’s safe to say there’s somewhat of an error margin either way as with every data aggregation.

According to AndroLib, an estimated 18,000 apps have been removed or otherwise unpublished from Android Market, so the current number of active apps currently available in Android Market is closer to 83,300 today. That’s more in line with the number Google itself

Bloomberg: No Facebook IPO Before 2012, ProbablyToday

Bloomberg reports that Facebook is to – probably – put off an eventual IPO until at least 2012, according to multiple people familiar with the matter.

Waiting at least another year (and a half, approximately, to be clear) would reportedly give CEO Mark Zuckerberg more time to follow through on his vision without too much public scrutiny and the implications thereof, attract more users and developers, book more sales and work out other issues, such as the user privacy kerfuffle and legal matters.

All this talk about Facebook going public at some time reminds me of similar chatter that has surrounded professional social networking company LinkedIn for years. In both cases, founders and management have repeatedly stated they’ll only IPO when the time is right, and repeatedly expressed that gaining more users and ramping up revenues are the current focus.

And in both cases, media outlets continue to speculate about when they’ll go public anyway.

Don’t get me wrong, both are bound to IPO at some point, and they’ll be high-prof