AMIMON, Inc. announced today it has raised $14 million in a second round of private venture funding. This brings the total investment in the company to more than $21 million. AMIMON is developing a wireless video modem chipset for the transmission of uncompressed high-definition video streams with equivalent data rates of up to 3Gbps, which it plans to bring to market in the first quarter of 2007.
This second round was led by Stata Venture Partners of Boston. Other participants in this round include Argonaut Private Equity and previous investors Cedar Fund, Walden Israel and Evergreen Partners.
“AMIMON’s ability to distribute uncompressed wireless HD video streams with wired-equivalent quality is a strategic building block for the home multimedia network,” said Lee Barbieri, Managing Partner of Stata Ventures. “We decided to invest in AMIMON due to the enormous market potential for its innovative technologies, its talented management team, its superior technology, and the significant traction it has made with major consumer electronics vendors.”
“This strategic investment will fuel our progress toward full production by early next year,” said Dr. Yoav Nissan-Cohen, chairman and CEO of AMIMON Inc. “The major players in the consumer electronics market, including TV, projector, flat panel display and set-top box manufacturers, are excited about the many new applications enabled by our wireless HD technology.”
AMIMON’s wireless high definition interface (WHDI™) was recently demonstrated with SANYO Electric Company, Ltd. at its booth at the InfoComm 2006 trade show in Orlando, Fla, and received an Infocomm 2006 Best Buzz Award by Insight Media. The Company also was recently named Israel’s Best Start-up in the communications sector by Red Herring Magazine and the Israel Venture Association.
About WHDI™
AMIMON’s wireless high definition interface (WHDI™) technology enables wireless transmission of uncompressed high-definition video streams in the 5GHz unlicensed band. Equivalent video data rates of up to 3Gbps (including 1080p) are achieved using 40 MHz of bandwidth in compliance with FCC regulations. Video data-rates of up to 1.5Gbps (including 1080i and 720p) can be delivered using 20MHz of bandwidth, conforming to worldwide 5GHz spectrum regulations.
WHDI™ enables applications such as wireless flat-panel TVs, wireless projectors, and wireless HDMI ™ and wireless VGA repeaters (dongles).
WHDI™ has been demonstrated at ranges of up to 100 feet through walls, and has a latency of less than one millisecond. All other wireless solutions are limited to delivering compressed video such as MPEG, which is typically not available at the output of most consumer electronic video devices.
About AMIMON
AMIMON is a fabless semiconductor company pioneering wireless uncompressed high-definition video for universal connectivity among CE video devices. AMIMON’s uncompressed Wireless High-Definition Interface (WHDI™) allows flat-panel televisions and multimedia projectors to wirelessly interface to all HDTV video sources at a quality equivalent to that achieved with wired interfaces such as component video, DVI and HDMI™.
AMIMON operates internationally out of offices in Herzlia, Israel, Santa Clara, Calif. USA, and Tokyo, Japan. The Company is funded by Cedar Fund, Walden Israel Venture Capital, Evergreen Partners, Stata venture Partners and Argonaut Ventures. More information is available at http://www.amimon.com.
About Stata Venture Partners
Stata Venture Partners is a private equity fund that invests in early stage new business opportunities around the world. They have strategic investments in a wide array of technologies ranging from semiconductors to telecommunications backbone and infrastructure. Stata Ventures specializes in helping companies build the internal infrastructure and long term strategic plan needed to be successful in today’s dynamic marketplace. Stata Ventures was begun by Ray Stata, founder and Chairman of Analog Devices, a leading semiconductor corporation.
About Argonaut Private Equity
Argonaut Private Equity is a diversified global private equity fund dedicated to building emerging market leaders. With more than $2 billion under management provided by a single entrepreneur, Argonaut is uniquely positioned to assist entrepreneurial companies. Its equity investments range from $1 million to $200 million and span such diverse markets as consumer electronics, specialty materials, telecommunications, drug discovery and delivery, medical devices, aviation and healthcare services. Argonaut’s portfolio includes investments in the United States, China, Israel, India, Japan, Eastern Europe and Australia.
About Cedar Fund
Cedar Fund is a venture capital firm, investing in high technology companies. Cedar Fund seeks to invest in outstanding entrepreneurs pursuing high growth markets with distinguished technologies in the telecommunications, networking, Internet-infrastructure and enterprise software areas. Cedar Fund invests in all stages, and specializes in early stage, Israel-related situations. With its quality investment track record and over $225 million under management, Cedar Fund is among the largest and most notable venture capital firms focusing on Israel-related, early stage investments. For more information, please visit http://www.cedarfund.com.
About Evergreen
Evergreen Venture Partners is one of Israel’s pioneering and premier venture capital firms focusing on early-stage technology investments. Evergreen’s current $650 million of private equity funds under management represents one of the largest portfolios in Israel with investments in almost 100 technology start-ups. Founded in 1987, Evergreen’s long track record of success is based on the experience, skills and commitment of its core team which has worked together for the past three funds. Evergreen has executed 30 successful portfolio company exits through IPOs or trade sales. Some of these companies include P-Cube, Actona, Creo, Galileo, Backweb, Exalink, Radvision and Radware. Evergreen’s seventeen years of successful private equity investments has attracted a global network of blue-chip investors, including Bank of America, HarbourVest, Teachers of Illinois Retirement System, NIF Ventures (Daiwa), ABN-Amro, CALTECH, and Ontario Municipal Retirement Fund. For more information, please visit http://www.evergreen.co.il
About Walden Israel
Walden Israel is one of Israel’s leading early-stage technology venture funds, operating in Israel since 1993. Walden Israel manages three focused funds concentrating in the communications and information technology markets. The fund is managed by experienced technology entrepreneurs and has backed more than 40 Israeli start-ups to date. Walden Israel’s 2006 exits include: Passave (acquired by PMC-Sierra, Inc. (NASDAQ: PMCS), nLayers (acquired by EMC, Inc. (NYSE:EMC), and Ex Libris (acquired by Francisco Partners). For additional information about Walden Israel, please see: http://www.walden.co.il.
WHDI is a trademark of AMIMON, Ltd. All other trademarks or registered trademarks are those of their respective holders.
