BackWeb secures $20 million private placement

BackWeb has secured a $20 million round of private placement, from an investor pool that includes GE Pension Trust, Intel, Merrill Lynch, Nippon Investment and Finance/Daiwa, and CDC Valeurs de Croissance. All previous major investors re-invested, including Goldman Sachs affiliate GS Capital Partners II, SOFTBANK Holdings, BRM Technologies, Trinity Ventures, D.S. Polaris and Evergreen International Investments. The funds will be used to expand the company's professional services operation, as well as domestic and international sales and marketing operations. "BackWeb's solution is an excellent match for a market with great potential," said David Weiderecht, Vice President, GE Investments, the investment advisor to GE Pension Trust. Sally Fundakowski, Intel's Director of Business Developer Relations Group, added that BackWeb's software "makes effective and productive use of system and network resources behind the scenes and provides significant advantages to the enterprise customer."