Editor’s note: Craig Le Grice is a member of BIMA‘s Executive Committee, and Chair of the organisation’s Silicon Roundabout group, he is an industry advocate for entrepreneurship and next generation talent. Follow him on Twitter: @craiglegrice.

Silicon Roundabout, Tech City, Old Street Roundabout – whatever you call it, the still-gritty area of East London has been getting a lot of attention recently. Cited as the UK’s answer to Silicon Valley in California, it’s bustling with technology startups and attracting a lot of focus from both in and out of the UK. Indeed, the Government invested £50m earlier this year to continue developing the area’s prominence as David Cameron attempts to make the area globally renowned for digital innovation.

But the area has its critics too. Despite there being more than 600 companies based there (according to Government funded TCIO), most of the products, tools and services that make it to consumer, critic and investor acclaim still come from the San Francisco Bay Area – Silicon Valley.

For me, Silicon Roundabout has five major areas of development to continue trying to crack in order to match its West Coast USA rival:

• Investors
• Infrastructure
• Community
• Talent
• Identity

Investors

It takes much more than just money to build a centre of excellence, but it’s a vital place to start. Silicon Roundabout has attracted many great venture capital firms, private equity experts and dedicated banks (with the likes of Silicon Valley Bank arriving in 2012). But it needs more. Major funders have to properly understand the sector, and start investing. The UK, as a whole, still lags behind its US friends when it comes to funding startups.

Our government has injected millions of dollars into the technology sector but the majority has reached the large, established firms – often structured as tax breaks rather than the physical cash required for growth.

Private investment is there. But much of it is spectrumised – designed to support very small companies at seed stage (with deals at the sub £250k level) or large established businesses exiting the startup stage, if not yet fully mature. The mid-level space – where companies raise the money that catalyses real ‘growth’ – A rounds and B rounds – is still vastly under catered for when we compare Silicon Roundabout to Silicon Valley.

It’s this acceleration stage that creates the early success stories associated with the startups emerging from California that we read about.

Infrastructure

Every company needs infrastructure, but startups especially so. One element of Silicon Valley that delivers a specific and unique DNA is its migratory effect. It’s exceptionally easy to bring people to the area – with hundreds of companies moving from other parts of the US to call it home each year.

Silicon Roundabout is still a cool part of East London. It now needs to connect in a deeper and broader way to the rest of London and other technology pockets of the UK such as Manchester, Croydon, Newcastle, Edinburgh etc.

Logistically, compare getting from Palo Alto to SFO international airport to the journey from Old Street to LHR. Much has to be done in this space – including better linkage to London City airport – to connect non-UK people and companies to the area efficiently.

Community

Tech startups are unlike most other companies, in most ways. As such, people working in technology need to be surrounded by peers and a real community of equals, experts and comparative disciplines.

It is imperative that we continue to support the communities and sub-communities (like Silicon Drinkabout, TechMeetups, TechHub, Google Campus etc.) around Silicon Roundabout that foster and nurture relationships, building a united ecosystem. Support for these must come from individuals, corporates and government bodies equally.

Talent

One of the most frequent grumbles from within the technology community is the scarcity of great talent. And, while the UK is catching up with the US, it’s still a real issue. Great events like Silicon Milkroundabout have made headway in attracting talent to the industry but collaborative efforts from education, government and industry alike is now needed to find, shape and embrace future talent.

We have more than just the movie ‘The Social Network’ to remind us that platforms of tomorrow are potentially being created in student dorms today.

Identity

I started this piece by using several terms for the same area. To replicate the ‘brand’ value of Silicon Valley, we will have to adopt one and stick with it. Whether we call it Silicon Roundabout, Tech City or Old Street Roundabout, creating a consistent destination brand is crucial. Silicon Valley, Hollywood, Canary Wharf, Brooklyn DUMBO etc… They’re all renowned spaces for their specialist skill sets.

We have the opportunity to build a world-class centre for digital technology. Showcasing the best of British, developing global products of tomorrow and introducing ‘new news’ to the world.

Let’s put London (and the UK) firmly on the map.

Let’s build a sustainable startup scene.

Let’s forget about trying to be ‘as good’ as Silicon Valley – and just do it.

Image credit: Getty Images

Vodafone announced the Smart III today, a new low-end Android smartphone running version 4.1 firmware (Jelly Bean) for less than £99 ($150 USD) in the United Kingdom.

There’s a 1 GHz single-core ARM A9 processor and 512 MB of RAM, which should be just enough for handling most modern apps in the Google Play store. Everything is thrown up on a 4-inch WVGA touchscreen, at a resolution of 480×800 (233 ppi). It’s a far cry from the 1080p displays found in the Samsung Galaxy S4 or HTC One, but it should serviceable for those looking to buy their first smartphone.

The Smart III comes with 4GB of internal storage, although there’s a microSD slot for up to 32GB of additional space. It’s also equipped with a 5-megapixel rear-facing camera, which isn’t bad for a low-end Android device. It can also shoot video at 720p and 30 frames per second, which should be fine for a quick clip on YouTube or Facebook.

The device weights just 136 grams and comes in at 10.9mm thick, which is about right for a smartphone of this size.

The Smart III is exclusive to Vodafone in the UK and there’s no word of a wider release at this point. CNET reports that the device is being made by Alcatel, who is known for producing a plethora of low-end Android smartphones at competitive price-points.

Consumers can pick up the Smart III for £95 as a pay-as-you-go handset, or grab it for free as part of a £13 per month two-year contract. It follows the Smart II, which was launched last year for £70 on pay-as-you-go but only came with Android version 2.3 (Gingerbread). Ouch.

If you know someone who’s looking to buy their first smartphone and wants to spend as little money as possible, you could do the worse than the Smart III in the UK.

Four members of the notorious LulzSec hacker group have been sentenced in London today following a number of high-profile hacks and DDoS attacks affecting companies such as Sony Pictures, PBS and Fox.com in 2011.

The BBC reports that Ryan Ackroyd, a former British soldier and member of LulzSec who went under the handle ‘Kayla’, was jailed for 30 months. Ryan Cleary (pictured) or ‘Viral’, was jailed for 32 months while Jake Davis, a 20-year-old known as ‘Topiary’, was given a two-year sentence; he will, however, only have to serve half of this time.

Mustafa al-Bassam, who operated under the pseudonym ’T-Flow’, was given a 20-month sentence – suspended for two years – as well as 300 hours of community service.

LulzSec, a name derived from the terms ‘lol’ and security, is understood to have been a splinter-group that emerged from the much wider hacker movement known as Anonymous in May 2011.

Later that month the group, which had six members in total, hacked into the database for the X-Factor television show in the United States and released personal information for over 250,000 potential contestants. It later published the names and email passwords for hundreds of Fox employees.

LulzSec then leaked a text file through its Twitter account and pastebin detailing the database structure of Sony’s Japanese website. At the end of May the group also gained access to PBS’ servers, posted thousands of stolen passwords online and published a fake news story in protest against an hour-long documentary examining WikiLeaks.

The group then hacked servers at Sony Pictures and Sony BMG and took account information for over 1 million users, a sample of which was later released in a torrent file. LulzSec later infiltrated the servers of the National Health Service (NHS) in the UK, as well as video game developer Bethesda, a portion of the Senate website and CIA.gov, the official site of the Central Intelligence Agency.

Lulzsec was later known for applying a redirect on the Sun’s website, which presented users with a fake story about Rupert Murdoch committing suicide.

The hacker group has also been linked to numerous DDoS attacks, whereby LulzSec members would overwhelm websites with an unusually high amount of traffic in order to bring them down, against 20th Century Fox and Nintendo, among others.

Cleary was arrested on June 21, 2011, followed by Al-Bassam was arrested on 19 July and Davis on 27 July. Three additional LulzSec members were then arrested in the early part of 2012 after it was revealed that the group’s former leader – Hector Xavier Monsergur, or ‘Sabu’ – had been arrested previously by the FBI and was now working as an undercover witness.

Image Credit: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

Floorplanner, which offers an online 3D floor-planning platform to some 7 million users, has announced its acquisition of Mydeco3D (Mydeco).

Mydeco offers a 3D room planner tool that adds depth to online property listings by enabling floorplans to be populated with virtual versions of real-world products and furnishings.

Why does this matter? It’s because of what Floorplanner refers to as the “imagination gap”, or the inability for most people to visualize their furniture or belongings in a property for sale or rent, even after viewing pictures online or in person.

Mydeco tries to bridge this gap for home buyers or potential renters, with software that shows the difference between how a property looks today and what it might look like after it has been purchased, furnished and decorated. Almost a million rooms are said to have been designed with Mydeco’s 3D tools to date.

Jeroen Bekkers, founder and CEO Floorplanner, says:

“A floorplan is a crucial component of any property listing. Our research shows over 50% of consumers spend more time viewing properties that have an interactive floorplan, making a sale or let much more likely.

Floorplanner has always had a unique interactivity that helps people visualise properties more clearly. With the addition of Mydeco’s technology, we’ll be able to close the Imagination Gap of house-purchasers and home-makers by delivering room styling in an even more compelling way.”

Financial terms of the acquisition were not disclosed.

Image credit: Marcin Wichary / Flickr

Helsinki, Finland-based e-commerce personalization engine maker Nosto Solutions (Nosto) today announced that it has opened up new offices (PDF) in London at TechHub @ Google Campus.

The company, which is working with brands like Rovio’s Angry Birds, JOY and Intersport, made the move to support the growing number of UK retailers using its solution.

Nosto essentially offers ‘plug-and-play’ solutions for online marketing automation to e-retailers.

The company’s SaaS solution enhances customers’ online shopping experience by enabling personalized product recommendations in real time, based on their behaviour on the e-commerce vendors’ websites.

The company currently hand-picks customers and partners while it’s in ‘invite-only’ mode, but says it will publicly launch its service later this year.

The establishment of its new offices in London follows a significant round of seed financing totalling £1.9 million ($2.5 million), which included some debt funding and grants.

One of the company’s backers is Open Ocean Capital, which boasts MySQL creator and original developer Monty Widenius among its partners. Another investor is Sanoma Ventures.

Image credit: Flickr / trenttsd

LeWeb London is just around the corner, and it’s shaping up to be a really interesting couple of days in the UK capital. If you want to be there, we’ve got some good news – we have two passes to give away to two lucky readers and a discount code for the rest of you.

LeWeb London 2013 takes place on 5 and 6 June, and will focus on the theme of ‘The New Sharing Economy’. Speakers taking part in the packed two-day programme will include Google’s Vice President for Northern & Central Europe, Matt Brittin; Facebook’s Head of European Platform Partnerships, Julien Codorniou; Crunchfund’s Michael Arrington; Airbnb co-founder, Joe Gebbia; Yelp co-founder and CEO, Jeremy Stoppelman, and many more.

Meanwhile, 16 teams will present onstage as part of the startup competition.

Two free passes to give away

So, how do you get hold of one of two free passes for the event? Leave a comment below telling us why you’d like to attend. At 1pm London time on Thursday 16 May 2013 we’ll select two winners. Please make sure that your Disqus account has a social media account like Twitter, Facebook or Google+ connected so that we can contact you if you’re selected.

Discount code

If you want to guarantee yourself a place at LeWeb London 2013, use this special link to get a £200 discount on your ticket.

TNW will be represented at LeWeb London 2013 by Robin Wauters and I – we’ll see you there!

Image credit: Thinkstock

The Sun, the UK’s best-selling tabloid newspaper, will be going behind a paywall from August 1 this year for £2 ($3 USD) a week.

We first reported this paywall was coming back in March, but now the Guardian has ratified the details via an internal email sent around staff at The Sun newspaper.

The new service will apparently be called ‘Sun+’, serving up online access via the Web and mobile apps. While some may have questioned the wisdom of a tabloid switching to a paid digital model, The Sun’s publisher NI Group (formerly News International) is dangling a large carrot in front of potential subscribers in the form of access to highlights for all 380 English Premier League games from next season. It won exclusive rights to the mobile and online clips back in January this year.

Indeed, it seems these Premier League rights could prove pivotal for The Sun’s move into the subscription realm, having shelled out £30m ($45m) for the privilege.

It’s not entirely clear how The Sun will offer the clips, but it will likely be similar to what was offered by previous incumbents Yahoo and ESPN, which had the online (Web) and mobile coverage divided between them. Essentially, goals from each game can be broadcast just after they’re scored, with short highlights made available later.

The Sun is the UK’s biggest selling daily newspaper, and with it disappearing behind a paywall, this now means that all NI Group’s UK titles, including The Times and Sunday Times, will have some form of paywall in place. It’s not yet clear whether The Sun will operate a metered paywall, offering limited access for free, but by streaming EPL goals in near real-time, it does become a slightly better proposition.

Feature Image Credit – MIGUEL MEDINA/AFP/Getty Images

The UK is about to get its first bar dedicated to watching and playing competitive video games, known as eSports, courtesy of Meltdown.

The new venue, spotted by Polygon (via Eurogamer) is expected to open on 342 Caledonian Road (London) on June 1 and stream a number of professional gaming events – think Starcraft II, Street Fighter IV, League of Legends and the like – on a daily basis.

Once it’s up and running, players will be able to visit Meltdown London and buy video game themed beverages from 5pm until midnight, Monday to Friday, and up until 1:30am on weekends.

It follows two similar eSports bars which were setup in Paris and Berlin under the Meltdown moniker by StarCraft 2 journalist and commentator Sophia “Foxy” Metz.

The interest in eSports is growing all the time, both as an occupation for professional players and as a form of entertainment for its respective communities and interested onlookers.

The long-term sustainability of such an establishment is yet to be proven, but we’re all for a new haunt to meet fellow gamers and generally have a good time. You can check out the full details for Meltdown London’s grand opening on June 1 over on its dedicated Facebook page.

Related: Competitive gaming is coming of age as the esports scene takes off / Blizzard buys the remains of IGNProLeague, doubling down on esports and building its own content network

Image Credit: Miguel Villagran/Getty Images

Netflix has announced it’s adding a slew of Disney and Pixar films to its online streaming service in the UK and Ireland, including Ratatouille, Wall-E, The Chronicles of Narnia, and Pirates of the Caribbean: Curse of the Black Pearl. The deal also sees Disney classics such as Dumbo and The Aristocats added to its roster.

While these titles are available now, Netflix has also announced that it will be adding a selection of “exclusive” titles from Disney, Marvel and Dreamworks SKG (whose films are marketed and distributed by Disney) in the coming months, including The Help, War Horse, People Like Us and Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides. From next year, it will also add Marvel’s Avengers Assemble, John Carter, and The Muppets.

While this is no doubt good news for existing Netflix subscribers, particularly those with children, this may not be the most compelling of propositions to lure new bodies on board. For example, earlier this year, BSkyB announced its first co-branded linear channel for Disney and Pixar flicks (in addition to Sky’s existing Disney Channel), which will see the satellite service air a number of big-name Disney titles first, once their cinema run has ended.

Meanwhile, over in the US, Netflix has already scored a major scoop by gaining exclusive access to Disney’s first-run films in a multi-year deal, though admittedly this doesn’t kick-off until 2016. But as we said at the time, this really brings video-streaming into the next era.

“We are delighted to be able to offer our members an incredible variety of fantastic family films, from recent hits like Marvel’s Avengers Assemble to beloved classics like Mary Poppins,” said Netflix chief content officer Ted Sarandos. “We aim to make Netflix better all the time and hope members enjoy the rich offering of films we are making available from the Disney studios.”

Given that this deal includes older classics and ones that will be a few years old by the time Netflix gets them next year, this news will be met with mixed feelings. Ultimately, however, for those already subscribing to Netflix, having access to a broader selection of Disney, Pixar, Marvel and Dreamworks titles can only be a good thing.

Netflix claims more than 36 million members in 40 countries, and has been moving increasingly towards original TV shows in recent times, including horror series Hemlock Grove which first aired last month.

Feature Image Credit – AFP/Getty

Amazon is beefing up its content offering on LOVEFILM Instant, its on-demand streaming service in the UK, Germany and Scandinavia, with exclusive access to the US television series Vikings.

It will be the first time that any show has been distributed through LOVEFiLM before any traditional broadcast station, channel or network in both Germany and the UK.

Starting on May 24, all nine episodes of the Norse action-drama will be made available to LOVEFiLM Instant subscribers in the UK. Uploading the entire season in this fashion is unusual, given that traditional television networks have long championed the model of drip-feeding an episode on a weekly basis.

House of Cards, the political drama made and released exclusively through Netflix, has already bucked this trend however by offering the entire season simultaneously.

LOVEFiLM Instant subscribers in Germany will be given access to all nine episodes on June 15, although a wider release across Scandinavia hasn’t been confirmed yet.

“As the first time a TV series has arrived on LOVEFiLM Instant before airing on traditional broadcasting platforms, this is an incredibly exciting landmark in our history,” Chris Bird, Director of Film Strategy at LOVEFiLM said.

“We are serious about securing the best film and TV entertainment for our members and this demonstrates how content creators view LOVEFiLM as an effective broadcasting medium for their high-quality and premium entertainment.”

The competition between Netflix and Amazon, which owns LOVEFiLM Instant but also Amazon Instant Video in the United States, is heating up rather quickly. Both firms are desperate to attract new users to their services by offering exclusive or original content.

Netflix launched its first original series, Lillyhammer, back in February 2012 and has since launched House of Cards to critical acclaim. A trailer for Hemlock Grove has also been released and Arrested Development is being resurrected this month.

Amazon has replied with 14 pilot episodes pitched by Amazon Studios, an in-house division for developing exclusive movies, comics and television shows. These include eight comedy pilots such as Zombieland, a spin-off of the 2009 horror-comedy film that shared the same name, as well as political satire Alpha House and Onion News Empire.

The LOVEFiLM Instant catalog pales in comparison to Netflix and Amazon Instant Video in the US. A single show such as Vikings will do little to change public perception, but it’s a small step towards creating an attractive streaming proposition.

Image Credit: Andy Buchanan/AFP/Getty Images