Private Equity Week Wire for Tuesday 5/8

DENVER — TViFusion Inc. a new media company formed to provide outsourced services (including affiliate sales, advertising sales, technology services and distribution) to start-up and early stage digital television channels, announced today that it has secured a $10 million funding commitment from Warburg Pincus.

SOUTHBOROUGH, MA — SANgate Systems today announced that it has raised an additional $10 million in equity funding from JerusalemVenture Partners and Battery Ventures. The capital will help accelerate organizational growth and the development and delivery of the industry’s first enterprise storage appliance. The SANgate enterprise storage appliance enables customers to perform remote mirroring, point-in-time copies and data migration using any vendor’s storage subsystems.SANgate provides the only enterprise-class solution supporting both mainframe and open systems environments.

DALLAS — American Capital Strategies Ltd. (Nasdaq: ACAS), a publicly traded buyout and mezzanine fund, announced today that Jeffrey N. MacDowell has joined the company as a principal in its Dallas office. Mr. MacDowell had been Vice President-Finance and Corporate Development at Dynamex Inc. (Amex: DDN), a leading provider of same-day delivery and logistics services in the United States and Canada.

HARTFORD, CT – Conning Capital Partners, the Hartford-basedprivate equity group, announced the sale of Sterling Collision Centers,Inc. to Allstate Corporation (Allstate). Financial terms were notdisclosed.Sterling operates a network of 39 collision repair stores in seven statesand nine metropolitan areas. In addition to its multi-state operation,Sterling has re-engineered the auto collision repair process resulting inimproved costs to insurers and faster turnaround and enhanced customersatisfaction.Sterling was founded in late 1997 by management and Conning CapitalPartners and has been backed during its ensuing development by Conning andBerkshire Partners LLC.

SUNNYVALE, CA — K2 Optronics, Inc., a developer of optical components for the telecommunications industry, has appointed Catherine P. Lego to the Board of Directors. Ms. Lego is Managing Partner of The Photonics Fund, a participant in K2 Optronics? Series A and B financing rounds.

SAN JOSE, CA — MaXXan Systems Inc., a new company developing next-generation networking infrastructuretechnologies for the enterprise storage industry, today announced that it has received $26 million in first round venture funding. Venrock Associates and U.S Venture Partners jointly lead this round of financing.

NEW YORK — The MONY Group Inc. today reported operating income for the quarter ended March 31, 2001 of $11.7million, or $0.23 per share. The company’s first quarter operating results include a $0.06 per share after tax loss from its equity partnership portfolio. Excluding the venture capitalloss, MONY would have met the previously provided guidance of $0.29 per share in operating income for the quarter. Net income for the first quarter of 2001 was $13.3 million, or$0.26 per share and includes $0.03 per share of realized gains from investments.

SAN DIEGO — Akonix Systems Inc., a supplier of enterprise software applications that enable major organizations to foster and enhance online communities, today announced they have secured $5 million in first-round financing. The round was lead by Mission Ventures under the direction of Jeffrey Starr, general partner at Mission Ventures, who has joined the Akonix board. In addition, Windward Ventures participated in the funding and Peter Shaw, venture partner at Windward Ventures, has joined the Akonix board as chairman. Proceeds from the new financing will be used for general and corporate purposes, including continued growth, developing professional services resources, building a sales organization, and expanding product development.

NEW YORK — Ripplewood Holdings L.L.C., the New York-based private equity firm, announced today that Robert L. Berner III has joined the firm as a Managing Director. Prior to joining Ripplewood, Mr. Berner had served as a Managing Director of Charterhouse Group International, Inc., a leading private equity firm, since January of 1997, where he was on the Investment Committee and served on the boards of directors of many of the firm?s portfolio companies. From 1986 until 1997, Mr. Berner held numerous positions with Morgan Stanley, most recently in the Merger and Acquisition Department. Mr. Berner was a cofounder of that firm?s Food, Beverage and Consumer Products Group in 1989 which, under his leadership, successfully completed over $125 billion of transactions. Mr. Berner holds a B.A. in finance from the University of Notre Dame and an M.B.A. from the J.L. Kellogg Graduate School of Management at Northwestern University.

SAN MATEO, CA — SecurityFocus, the leading provider of security intelligence services for business, announced today the closing of an $8.2 million round of financing, led by E*TRADE Venture Capital and SOFTBANK Venture Capital (SBVC). SecurityFocus will use this first round of institutional financing for ongoing product development, as well as for sales and marketing support for its current security intelligence services.

REDWOOD CITY, CA — Postini Inc. today announced the close of a $6 million Series B financing round led by Summit Accelerator Fund. Additional participants in the round include new investor, Sun Microsystems and August Capital, the lead investor in Postini’s Series A round. Postini will use the funds to increase marketing and sales of its innovative email infrastructure technology, which enables email providers and corporate IT managers to rapidly and cost effectively deploy high-value email applications. Postini’s first round of financing closed in January 2000, and was led by August Capital and a group of strategic, individual investors. With the closure of this second round, Postini continues to establish itself as the innovator in delivering high-value email applications through its unique, seamlessly integrated technology.

MIGDAL HA’EMEK, ISRAEL — Applied Spectral Imaging (ASI) announced that Dr. A. I. (Ed) Mlavsky will assume the role of Chairman of its Board of Directors. Dr. Mlavsky replaces Noam Karstaedt, President of Denali Ventures LLC, who has been the Chairman since 1995. Dr. Mlavsky is Chairman of Gemini Israel Venture Funds and the previous Executive Director of the BIRD (Israel – U.S. Binational Industrial Research and Development) Foundation. He is also a co-founder of Tyco International, Inc. He became a member of ASI’s Board of Directors following Gemini’s investment in ASI in 1998.

SAN FRANCISCO — Moonlight Systems, a leading provider of data center automation software, has secured a total of $10.8 million in series B funding. Bay Partners lead the funding round and was joined by BA Venture Partners and Board member, Naren Gupta and others. At the completion of this round, Moonlight Systems has raised a total of $14.35 million to date. Neal Dempsey, general partner of Bay Partners, will join the Board of Directors of Moonlight Systems.

For yesterday?s Wire, click here.