Celator Pharmaceuticals Inc., clinical-stage biopharmaceuticals company focused on cancer treatment, has raised US$32.5 million in the final closing of a private placement of common stock and warrants to purchase common stock. The deal was led by U.S. venture capital firm Valence Life Sciences. Celator, which has offices in Vancouver and Princeton, New Jersey, has been venture-backed since 2002. Its other investors include BDC Venture Capital, Domain Associates, GrowthWorks, Hearthstone Investment, Quaker BioVentures, TL Ventures and Ventures West Capital. 

NXT Capital’s venture finance group has provided a $3.5 million subordinated venture loan to SkyCross. SkyCross is a manufacturer of antenna solutions for wireless devices in the mobile phone, personal entertainment and computing industries. Headquartered in Fremont, CA, SkyCross is backed by TL Ventures, Investor Growth Capital, Intel Capital, Gabriel Venture Partners and DOCOMO Capital. [...]

Donuts, the Washington state-based domain name registry company, is packing on a whopping $100 million in funding from VCs including Austin Ventures, Adams Street Partners, Emergence Capital Partners, TL Ventures and Generation Partners. Stahurricane (CEO Paul Stahura’s investment fund) is also participating in the investment. The company is naming former ICANN CFO Kevin Wilson to [...]

Noble Biomaterials, the Pennsylvania-based bacterial management solutions provider, raised $8 million from Northwater Capital’s Intellectual Property Fund and investors including TL Ventures and Dupont Capital Management. PRESS RELEASE: Noble Biomaterials, Inc., a global leader in bacterial management solutions, recently announced it raised $8 million in Series B equity financing. The round was led by Northwater [...]

Skycross Inc., a Viera, Fla.-based manufacturer of wireless antenna solutions, has raised $11 million in Series E financing from Docomo Capital, TL Ventures, Investor Growth Capital, Gabriel Venture Partners and Intel Capital. The company plans to raise a total of $15 million in the Series E round, and aims to close its second tranche by the end of June.

NetLogic Microsystems, a Santa Clara, Calif.-based chipmaker, said Monday that it has agreed to buy Optichron for an initial cash payment of $77 million. NetLogic said it may also provide up to $108.5 million in a milestone payment, as well as $12.5 million in additional consideration. Optichron’s investors include U.S. Venture Partners, Battery Ventures, TL Ventures and VentureTech Alliance. The sale has been approved by the boards of both companies and is expected to close in second quarter.

March 21 (Reuters) – Chipmaker NetLogic Microsystems Inc said it will buy a privately held fabless semiconductor provider for an initial $77 million in cash, to expand its footprint in the 4G long-term evolution (LTE) market.

Optichron Inc’s advanced processors will support wider signal bandwidth, spectrum maximization and power efficiency for carriers deploying next-generation LTE, NetLogic said.

“The exponential growth in mobile data traffic in the next five years, coupled with global spectrum scarcity, are forcing service providers and operators worldwide to push the limits on capacity and throughput for their limited spectrum,” NetLogic said in a statement.

Earlier this year, Connie wrote about how TL Ventures was in the midst of litigation with three of its former staffers, including ex-partner Bob Fabbio. At issue was more than $2.3 million in clawbacks that TL claims is owed by Fabbio, former managing director Stan Tims and former principal Stephen Andriole.

There is some dispute as to whether the clawbacks can even be requested before the funds are officially dissolved, but the larger issue is whether or not remaining TL Ventures partners used management fees to pay off part, or all, of their own clawback liabilities.

As the trio’s attorney Cindy Olson Bourland told me: “I believe the evidence will show that certain partners… engaged in self-dealing by stashing away money for clawback instead of running TL Ventures in accordance with its investment strategies.”

Finite Carbon Corp., a Wayne, Penn.-based forest carbon development company, has raised $2 million in Series A funding from TL Ventures. The company’s president is Scott Nissenbaum, a former managing director with Novitas Capital (fka PA Early Stage Partners). www.finitecarbon.com

In an unusually public battle for the venture world, Bob Fabbio — the famed cofounder of Austin’s Tivoli Systems, later sold to IBM Corp. for $745 million, and of Austin-based Dazel Corp. in 1991, which HP picked up for more than $150 million eight years later — is battling with the venture firm TL Ventures [...]