Friday, April 18, 2008

GuildCafe becomes GamerDNA, expands site offerings

After completing the final $1 million a $3 million Series A round of financing, gaming social network operator GuildCafe Entertainment Inc. is changing its name to GamerDNA Inc.

The Cambridge-based company said the funding and rebranding are part of its plan to expand product development, open new offices and launch GamerDNA.com -- an online community for video game players that will feature news and information.

GuildCafe.com will continue as a separate website focused on video gamer groups, or guilds, including new features the company is developing under the GamerDNA brand. GamerDNA.com is currently in closed beta, but is available to registered members of GuildCafe.com, company officials said.

GuildCafe was founded in 2006 as Sparkforge Entertainment Inc. by CEO Jonathan Radoff. Last year, IDG Ventures Boston, now called Flybridge Capital Partners, reportedly made a $600,000 seed investment in GuildCafe.

In the early 1990s, Radoff, a Northborough native, founded NovaLink USA Corp., which developed the online game Legends of Future Past. In 1997, he founded Framingham-based software maker Eprise Corp., which was acquired in 2001 by Divine Inc. in a stock deal worth about $43 million.