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 From C/Net News.com

Widget makers aren’t just drawing big money from investors, now they’re luring the venture capitalists themselves.

On Thursday, Hummer Winblad Venture Partners’ Will Price left his post as general partner to join Widgetbox as its chief executive officer. Widgetbox operates a large community of widgets–roughly 41,000 pieces of software in the form of games or gadgets–which it distributes to sites and social networks like MySpace.com or Facebook. The company has raised $14.5 million since it was founded in April 2006, from investors including Sequoia Capital, NCD Investors, and Hummer Winblad.

Price, who worked on early financing of Widgetbox, said he left Hummer Winblad for two reasons. One was his desire to once again run a start-up; the other was the promise he sees in the widget market.

“We’re seeing a huge sea change going on in the Web–the model used to be about driving traffic to one domain. Now we’re talking about a model of syndication of the Web or deconstruction of the Web,” Price said in an interview with CNET News.com. “This is a company at the nexus of those things.”

The news comes on the heels of big investments in widget rivals. ShareThis, maker of a widget to share content with friends, raised $15 million on Thursday from Draper Fisher Jurvetson and others. Earlier this year, widget ad provider Gigya said it drew $9.5 million from Benchmark Capital, Mayfield Fund and others.

Price estimates that the widget market is worth between $20 million and $30 million annually, and most of that money is put into the services to build them. As for advertising on widgets, sales are still just a drop in the bucket (or rather, dew in the bucket) compared with total online advertising sales. That’s a wide gap between the amount of exposure people have to widgets on Facebook or even publisher sites like The New York Times. ComScore estimated that roughly 650 million came in contact with a widget in December.

“Anyone who can close that differential will see a lot of money,” he said.

Widgetbox is developing an advertising platform to make money from its collection of widgets, according to Price.

By Matt Richtel, New York Times

Venture capital is on the move — to New Mexico, Pittsburgh and points beyond.

A new survey shows that venture capital investment – the stuff that fuels technology innovation – is growing in parts of the country where it has been largely unapparent. The survey from the National Venture Capital Association, based on data provided by Thomson Financial, found that while Silicon Valley remains the hotbed of seed capital, other regions are seeing it grow more quickly.

In New Mexico, for instance, venture capitalists put $128 million into 21 companies in 2007, the survey found. Compared to the investments made a decade ago, that’s an increase of 600 percent in the number of companies and of 375 percent in the amount of funding.

Or take Pittsburgh, the second fastest-growing region of the country in terms of venture capital investments over the last decade. In 2007, it was home to 44 new venture-financed companies – up 267 percent from 1997 – that collectively got $198 million, an increase of 513 percent).

Other regions where venture capital is growing relatively quickly include Seattle, Los Angeles and the Washington metro area.

At the same time, Silicon Valley – including the San Francisco and Berkeley area – remains the unambiguous leader in seed capital investments. In 2007, for example, venture capitalists put $7.6 billion (with a “B”) into San Jose and another $2.5 billion into the San Francisco/Berkeley area.

A number of factors propelled growth elsewhere. Among them, some not-very-startling developments: increasingly capable telecommunications and accessible travel has made it possible for venture capitalists to live in financial centers but to oversee investments in distant areas. But there have also been specific efforts by regions outside of Silicon Valley to attract capital, and those efforts are paying off, said the National Venture Capital Association.

The trade group argued that, for instance, New Mexico has improved its business environment, has a slower lifestyle that is attracting some entrepreneurs, and has made an effort to attract alternative energy investments. Pittsburgh, the trade group asserted, has engendered investment in part because of the strength of institutions like Carnegie Mellon University and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (where life-sciences developments are catering to a surge in the likes of biotech and medical technology investment).

More broadly, the growth of interest among venture capitalists in alternative energy appears to be benefiting regions of the country with different environments and climates.

Don’t expect Silicon Valley to give up its epicenter status anytime soon – or the critical mass of investors, universities and entrepreneurs.

“We’re not saying anyplace is going to overtake Silicon Valley,” said Emily Mendell, a spokeswoman for the NVCA. “We’re just saying you can take venture capital out of Silicon Valley.”