So Who is Funding Widgets?

I thought it might be a fun exercise to go through the prominent widget companies – both platforms and applications – and explore which venture capital firms are cutting the checks to propel them forward.

Of course, just about every website has a widget or a widget strategy of some kind.  In terms of the applications / widget developers, I’ve tried to focus on those companies – like Photobucket - with monster, hugely distributed widgets, or those companies – like Lijit - whose widgets are the primary reason for their existence.

So without further ado, here are the folks and funds that have skin in the widget game.

Benchmark – Benchmark has invested in avatar company Gizmoz, widget distribution platform Gigya (review), and start page / widget aggregator PageFlakes.

Sequoia – Sequoia has invested in widget powerhouse RockYou, and is also rumored to have invested in Widgetbox.

Mark Cuban – Mark Cuban is an investor behind Goowy, which is the developer of widget platform and aggregator YourMinis.  Cuban has also invested in file sharing service Box.net (review), the developer of one of my favorite widgets.

Union Square Ventures – Union Square Ventures has invested in Feedburner (sort of a widget company), Adaptive Blue (review) (a toolbar / widget powered service), and avatar company Oddcast.

Trinity Ventures – Trinity was the lead investor in Photobucket.

Novak Biddle – This Bethesda, Maryland based fund has invested in widget platform Clearspring and site builder / widget aggregator Freewebs.

Steve Case / Ted Leonsis - Former AOL execs invested joined Novak Biddle in the Clearspring investment.

Columbia Capital – Fellow East Coast fund Columbia Capital has joined Novak Biddle in the Freewebs investment.

Index Ventures – Index Ventures has invested in start page / widget aggregator Netvibes.

Accel – Accel Ventures has invested in start page / widget aggregator Netvibes.

First Round Capital – First Round Capital has invested in Gigya.

Hummer Winblad – Hummer Winblad has invested in Widgetbox.

Mayfield – Mayfield has invested in photo widget Slide.

Blue Run – Blue Run has invested in photo widget Slide.

Khosla Ventures – Khosla Ventures has invested in photo widget Slide.

Founder’s Fund – Founder’s Fund has invested in photo widget Slide.

Lightspeed Venture Partners – Lightspeed is an investor in RockYou.

Partech – Partech is an investor in RockYou

Brad Feld – Brad Feld is an investor in blog search widget company Lijit.

Colorado Fund – Colorado Fund has invested in Lijit.

Boulder Ventures - Boulder Ventures has invested in Lijit.

Lighthouse Capital Partners – Lighthouse Capital Partners is an investor in Vendio, owner of Widgipedia.

MVC Capital - MVC is an investor in Vendio, owner of Widgipedia.

Bay Partners – Bay Partners has created a fund solely targeting Facebook App developers.

Google – Google has created a fund for Google Gadget developers.

NEA IndoUS Ventures (added 8/6/07) - Invested $3M in content discovery widget Minekey.

The Entrepreneurs' Fund III (added 8/7/07)- Invested in widget provider JS-Kit.

What’s striking to me is the blue chip nature of this list.  Funds like Sequoia, Benchmark, Hummer Winblad, Mayfield, Accel… these are the some of the most prestigious names in Silicon Valley. 

It would appear that the debate about whether widget powered businesses have legs is over – at least in the offices of the blue chip funds.

Comments

[RSSvision]

Well done ! Thks for this list

[Todd Vernon]

Great post. Lijit's last round (just closed) was lead by Boulder Ventures as well.

Interesting to compare against
http://www.lijit.com/blog/2007/06/19/june-widget-statistics/

Thanks for doing this.

[lawrence]

Thanks Todd - I added Boulder Ventures to the list. If anybody else has funds that should be on this list, feel free to chime in.

[Richf]

Okay Im new to this whole widget world (and blogs for that matter). I have a couple of questions I hope someone can shed some light on. I stumbled on Yahoo's widgets and strating tooling around. There are a ton of widgets that do just about anything you can think of. They fill a need whether it be to load pictures onto your screen in a picture frame, track tasks and to does, ton of countdowns, games, track just about anything ... you name it. Most of them on Yahoo seem to be put togehter by individuals, simple to use but lack a lot of funtionality, seem to be works in progress. Is there anyone making money off these widgets? There are no links or banners etc.

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