Leroy Hood wins Heinz Award

Leroy Hood, the president of the Institute for Systems Biology in Seattle, has been awarded the 12th annual Heinz Award for Technology, the Economy and Employment.

The award comes with a $250,000 unrestricted cash prize.

Hood was honored for his pioneering work on high-speed gene-sequencing machines, which made the Human Genome Project possible.

Previous winners have included Apple Computer co-founder Steve Wozniak and MIT bioengineer Robert Langer.

The award is one of many Hood has received for his contributions to biotechnology, including the Lasker Award, Kyoto Prize and the Lemelson-MIT Award.

The Heinz awards, presented by the Heinz Family Foundation, will be given at a Oct. 24 ceremony in Pittsburgh.

25 colleges to get digital service

Seattle-based Cdigix said it will launch its digital media service at 25 new universities across the country in coming weeks, including the University of Washington.

The company offers college students a digital music service, called Ctrax, which gives access to songs and song downloads through a subscription.

The service is supported through online advertising sales and is free to students and schools.

The company hopes to partner with 100 schools by the end of the year, said Chief Executive Larry Jacobson.

Deals announced with content firms

Revenue Science, the Bellevue-based online behavioral targeting firm, announced deals with two major content companies this week.

Gannett, owner of televisions stations and 90 daily newspapers, including USA Today, picked Revenue Science to provide technology for delivering targeted advertising to specific visitors to its Web sites — such as people interested in buying a car or booking a vacation, the company said Monday.

Revenue Science's United Kingdom unit is set to announce a deal today with Advertising.com UK, which sells space on Web sites and other online venues to advertisers.

Desktop toolbar is launched

Seattle-based RealNetworks has launched a test version of a desktop toolbar and screensaver called RealTime.

The free service takes a user's RSS feeds and displays headlines from them in a ticker-style format on a desktop.

It also can show those headlines along with photos as a slideshow in a screensaver.

RealTime will officially release early next year, the company said.

Microsoft

Social-network site to charge for extras

SEATTLE — Wallop, a startup spun out of Microsoft's research lab, is launching the test version of an online social-networking site with the premise that people will want to pay extra to look good.

The company, which aims to compete with established brands such as MySpace and Facebook, plans to sell graphics and other features people can use to decorate their personal-profile pages.

Wallop says the plan to charge users for the decorations will supplant the advertising that supports many such free sites. The add-ons will initially cost somewhere between 99 cents and $4, said Karl Jacob, the company's chief executive.

More time sought for Chapter 11 plan

The former owner of the London Fog brand has asked a bankruptcy court for more time to file its plan of reorganization under Chapter 11.

Seattle-based London Fog Group, which sold the London Fog name last month, has asked the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Reno, Nev., for an extra three months of exclusive control over its affairs to decide how to reorganize the company.

The company asked that the hearing on the issue be held before Oct. 18.

According to court documents filed Friday, London Fog needs more time to plan whether it will sell its last remaining business — Homestead, a line of bedding and other linens — or make it the centerpiece of its Chapter 11 plan.

London Fog said it has been delayed in deciding on the reorganization plan because it's still "wrapping up the loose ends" from the separate sales of two of its brands — London Fog and Pacific Trail.

New York-based Iconix Inc. bought London Fog for $30.5 million in cash and $7 million in stock in August. Portland-based Columbia Sportswear purchased Pacific Trail for $20.4 million in March.

London Fog Group filed for protection under Chapter 11 on March 20.

Internet-ad revenue shows 37% increase

Internet-advertising revenue in the United States grew 37 percent in the first half of this year, reaching a new high of $7.9 billion.

Keyword ads displayed alongside search results remain the most lucrative format, accounting for 40 percent of revenue from January to June, the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) said Monday. Banner display ads made up 21 percent and classified ads 20 percent.

Revenue is on target for a fourth consecutive year of growth, said Pete Petrusky, director of entertainment and media at PricewaterhouseCoopers, which conducted the quarterly study for the IAB, an industry trade group.

Online ad revenue reached $12.5 billion last year.

Despite the growth, Internet advertising accounts for only about 5 percent of all U.S. advertising revenue.

Compiled from TSeattle Times business staff, he Associated Press and Dow Newswires