Online publishers have long butted heads with comScore (NSDQ: SCOR) and Nielsen over discrepancies between the publishers’ internal audience-measurement numbers and those issued by the third parties. ComScore announced this morning that it is aiming to address that gap with a new product called Media Metrix 360 that it says provides a more accurate audience figure. The new product blends traditional panel-based information with data from a website’s server. Until now, comScore has relied exclusively on a panel of users as proxy for overall internet use. Critics questioned whether it accurately captured total usage, including on mobile phones and computers used in public places away from the home or office. Under the new hybrid service, comScore allows publishers to enable themselves for the server-based part of the system by placing tags on their sites. ComScore has partnered with Akamai (NSDQ: AKAM) to ensure it can handle a large number of requests as publishers initially sign up. Once the tags are embedded on a site, usage can be tracked wherever it is viewed and by whomever is viewing it, not just by the comScore panel.  The company said it would start measuring audiences in Canada and the U.S. in July, followed by the UK in August, with the rest of the world starting to roll out in the fourth quarter 2009. ComScore will continue to segment results by demographic, geo-demographic and analytic measurements like frequency of use. 

Limelight (NSDQ: LLNW), the content delivery network, has acquired multi-platform video ad insertion firm Kiptronic for an undisclosed sum. The terms of the deal were not disclosed, but it was a combination of stock and cash. Updated: Dan Rayburn reports the deal size was small, about $12 million in total. Kiptronic itself was a small company, with around 15 developers. This acquisition means that Limelight, like competitor Akamai (NSDQ: AKAM), is moving upstream, and adding services on top of video content delivery—with this acquisition, it gets a way to monetize the content it helps deliver on behalf of its clients. Akamai bought online ad targeting firm Acerno last year, for $95 million, though that was more about advertising analytics. Limelight has also been moving into mobile video, developing some specialty in delivery video ads to the iPhone platform, as detailed here in SAI. Kiptronic has recently started working with NBC on inserting ads into its mobile videos, where its system was integrated into NBC.com’s existing web-based ad infrastructure, letting the advertisers buy, track and traffic ads and control placement using the same system they use for the general website. The San Francisco -based company had raised at least $7 million in funding from the likes of Blueprint Ventures and Prism VentureWorks. More details in release.

Limelight (NSDQ: LLNW), the content delivery network, has acquired multi-platform video ad insertion firm Kiptronic for an undisclosed sum. The terms of the deal were not disclosed, but it was a combination of stock and cash. This acquisition means that Limelight, like competitor Akamai (NSDQ: AKAM), is moving upstream, and adding services on top of video content delivery—with this acquisition, it gets a way to monetize the content it helps deliver on behalf of its clients. Akamai bought online ad targeting firm Acerno last year, for $95 million, though that was more about advertising analytics. Limelight has also been moving into mobile video, developing some specialty in delivery video ads to the iPhone platform, as detailed here in SAI. Kiptronic has recently started working with NBC on inserting ads into its mobile videos, where its system was integrated into NBC.com’s existing web-based ad infrastructure, letting the advertisers buy, track and traffic ads and control placement using the same system they use for the general website. The San Francisco -based company had raised at least $7 million in funding from the likes of Blueprint Ventures and Prism VentureWorks. More details in release.

The BBC’s digital video ingestion and catch-up service has now served more than 414 million TV shows since launching in 2007. Auntie’s future media controller for vision and online, Anthony Rose, coughed up plenty more stats in this CNET UK interview, revealing iPlayer to be a bit of a beast. NB. This one’s for stats geeks… It eats TV for breakfast:-—Hours of TV encoded each week: 400+—Servers needed for the job: 60 (each packing a dual Quad Core Intel (NSDQ: INTC) Xeon)—Video formats encoded: 15—Minutes taken for shows to appear online: 15 It’s a bandwidth hog:-—Data transfer on a busy evening: 12.5Gb every second—That’s 7 petabytes every month—Download servers put to work: 2 facilities operated by Siemens (streams come via content delivery networks like Level3, Akamai (NSDQ: AKAM) and Limelight) It stays up late:-—Streaming peak: 10pm—iPhone peak: midnight—Weekend peak: 8am to 10am

Akamai (NSDQ: AKAM) first quarter revenue was up 12 percent over the same quarter last year, to $210 million, while “normalized” earnings per share was $0.43 - consensus estimates had been for $208 million and $0.40. The company’s international efforts continued to grow; 28 percent of revenue was from international clients in the first quarter versus 25 percent during the fourth quarter 2008. The company, which helps clients stream audio and video, also added new customers. It had 2,950 customers at the end of the first quarter, 10 percent more than a year ago and 3 percent more than at the end of 2008. While competition from a growing number of content-delivery providers could hurt the company’s ability to grow, the results suggest Akamai has been holding up fine so far. Traffic from one-time events like the presidential inauguration and the NCAA tournament helped lift revenue in the first quarter, which could mean a slowing of revenue growth in the second quarter.  Release | Webcast

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New York, Feb 9th (TradersHuddle.com) - Shares of Akamai Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:AKAM) are trading very close to calculated support at $24.62 with current price action closing at just $25.27 places the stock price near levels where traders will start paying attention.

Akamai Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:AKAM) provides global delivery se. Read More --

New York, feb 5th (TradersHuddle.com) - Shares of Akamai Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:AKAM) are trading very close to calculated support at $24.5 with current price action closing at just $25.51 places the stock price near levels where traders will start paying attention.

Akamai Technologies, Inc. (NASDAQ:AKAM) provides global delivery ser. Read More --

Akamai Technologies (AKAM) beat the Zacks Consensus expectation of $233.0 million in revenue and 35 cents in adjusted (normalized) earnings for the fourth quarter of 2009. The company reported $238.3 million in revenue and 46 cents a share in earnings. Despite a difficult consumer spending environment, growth was observed in the in-digital media and e-commerce space, [...]

(AKAM) Akamai Technologies Beats Forecasts – Outlook Disappoints

Acorda Therapeutics (ACOR, news: 31.00 0.00%) downgraded to Neutral from Outperform, $32 target, at RW Baird… Affymetrix (AFFX, news: 5.67 0.00%) upgraded to Neutral from Underweight, $8 target, at JP Morgan… Aixtron (AIXG, news: 31.85 0.00%) downgraded to Neutral from Buy at Merriman… Akamai Technologies (AKAM, news: 26.50 0.00%) upgraded to Neutral, target raised to $27.50 from $21.50, [...]

Schaeffer's analyst Colleen S. King takes a look at the major news of the day on Wall Street.

Elizabeth Harrow takes a look back at news that drove the major market indices today.

IPO Hardball's Francis Gaskins presents a solid crop of upcoming IPOs this week. The list below also includes his unique Grade and Rank for each company. For more details please visit the website and subscribe.

If coffee is the morning drug of choice, then the choice of accompaniment is the bagel. Einstein Noah Restaurants (BAGL) offers three brands of bagel specialty and received the following grade and rank C, 6.5 FBR Capital (FBCM) is the REIT subsidiary of financial powerhouse Friedman Billings C+, 6

Technology is also on the rise with the following:
Infinera Corp (INFN) a photonic-based optical networking firm B-, 8 Limelight Net (LLNW) who delivers rich media over the Internet B-, 8.5 and Starent Networks (STAR) a multimedia infrastructure company providing services for mobile B-, 8

Rounding out the group is:
Response Gtncs (RGDX) who provides diagnostic tests for cancer C, 5.5 and Yingli Green Energy (YGE) makes vertically integrated photovoltaic products B-, 8

Related companies mentioned in this podcast are:
(AKAM) (FOLD) (JAZZ) (LDK)

Tom Dorsey and Tammy DeRosier - Odds and Ends: From Cinco de Mayo to NASDAQ

After an 8 percent drop in the Shanghai Exchange and similar pullbacks of close to 10 percent throughout Asia stock exchanges the major American stock indices really took it on the chin today. What’s going on and what does it all mean for investors?