Startup Roundup: Ohanarama closes $600,000 in seed funding

Technically Philly’s Startup Roundup parses out the small pieces that make our greater Startup ecosystem thrive. We want to keep you in touch with the innovations that we can’t quite get to covering, but that deserve highlight. Follow along with a weekly email newsletter by clicking here and selecting the Startup Roundup button or follow Startup Roundup’sRSS feed. If you’ve got news to share, get in touch.
MUST READS
Ohanarama, which aims to bring families together through social networks, is launching a beta nationally today at CE Week in New York. The company also announced that it has closed on $600,000 in a round of seed investment with Softbank Capital — which has invested in Huffington Post and Associated Content—and backing the round is Contour Venture Partners, which has invested in TicketFly. Ohanarama presented at our Switch Philly startup demo event in April during Philly Tech Week. You can watch Ohanarama’s presentation here. The investment brings the company’s total funding to $1.5 million.
Does Philadelphia have a distinct startup culture? Go tell Quora. And while you’re at it, check the rest of the thread.
Final Form Games‘ Jamestown, released only a few weeks ago, is getting a ton of great reviews. Notably, Ars Technica calls the game an “instant classic.”
PopTent, which hosts contests for brands for its community of video creators to make viral marketing videos, is expanding from its Philadelphia and Los Angeles offices to, uh, San Paolo, Brazil. Yep, the country is one of the world’s fastest growing video markets, the company says. The company also announced that it’s already awarded $2 million in cash payments to the winners of its contests, only seven months after reaching $1 million in payments.

GIVE A GLANCE
LaunchRock, which is operating out of the Bay Area, is looking for a designer, product manager and someone in business development, according to an email newsletter, showing its growth before it exits beta.
The Greater Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce issued a statement on City Council’s passing of mandatory paid sick leave legislation and legislation to raise property tax, saying it will reduce Philadelphia’s opportunity to “attract, retain and grow jobs,” it said in a statement. [Full Disclosure, GPCC is a former advertiser.]
Viddler is amidst an overhaul of its core network architecture, which will give it greater uptime and reliability. A snapshot of its new setup, here, and don’t miss a Q&A with the team’s Systems Architect.
Eight Eleven Inc., a marketing agency, has moved to a new space in Center City from Camden. We’ll second that.
DuckDuckGo is getting national press for its guide to “escaping the search engine filter bubble,” which illustrates how search engines like Google and Bing are delivering personalized results that are potentially not showing you the most valuable information.
SCVNGR, which opened an office in Philly this spring, is working directly with Allmenus.com locally with its LevelUp deal service, which the company was excited to share in a press release. When users take advantage of the deal, a partnership with American Express will directly redeem the coupon deal on their financial statement.
MIGHT BE WORTH YOUR TIME
ListenLogic announced last week that it has launched a reputation management system to track brands’ social media reputation.
Smarter Agent announced last week that it has won an OnMobile Top 100 award, which recognizes change-makers in the mobile market. The full list is here.
As PhillyBurbs reports, New Hope’s myYearBook founders Catherine and Geoff Cook were awarded Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year awards in the region.
Brolik, a branding agency based in Philly, announced that it has taken on Alue Optics, a sunglasses retailer, as its newest client.
InterDigital is helping promote a contest to win $50,000 in prizes and wireless equipment for mobile application design. Full disclosure, InterDigital is a former sponsor of Technically Philly.
Startup Roundup will post weekly on Wednesdays until there’s not a Philly startup story left to link to on the Internet. See others here, or sign-up for its email newsletter.