More money being invested into the mobile video space, this time at the infrastructure end: Avvasi, a Canadian developer of software and hardware to help mobile operators optimize and monetize mobile video, has raised $15 million in a second round of funding. Existing investors participated including the Canadian VCs Celtic House Venture Partners and Tech Capital Partners. Ontario Emerging Technologies Fund also participated.

Mate Prgin, CEO of Avvasi, says that the company has “several” operator customers of different sizes both in North America and Europe, but declined to give their names. He also would not disclose how much money his company has raised to date. The company is due to release its first commercial product during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona later this month. The funding will be used to speed up its product-release schedule.

Hulu, the second-most popular video streaming service after YouTube, has had an on-again, off-again view on mobile, and at the moment it’s back on.

At the DLD Conference in Munich, GigaOm interviewed Hulu CEO Jason Kilar, and while he didn’t say anything specific, it appears Hulu is interested in mobile. It’s been nearly a year since reports indicated that Hulu would soon release an app for the iPhone and iPod Touch. Those reports either seem to be incorrect or the NBC Universal (NYSE: GE) and News Corp (NYSE: NWS). joint venture has decided to shift its plans to the mobile web and multiple other platforms. Kilar: “The computer in your pocket is very important. Mobile is a monster – we are very bullish. We will embrace any device.”

Another media partnership for hot location-based social networking startup Foursquare. The company is partnering with Bravo TV so that viewers will get “badges” when they visit certain locations, corresponding to the cable network’s shows, according to the NYT. Bravo will also promote the partnership on air. That could be quite a boon, considering Bravo’s reach.

Five major publishers were highlighted by Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) at Wednesday’s unveiling of the iPad and the iBookstore. Two days later, one of them was starring in a different e-reader drama when reports emerged that Macmillan titles were no longer being sold directly by Amazon.com (NSDQ: AMZN). Macmillan wants to set its own prices, preferably in the $12.99-$14.99 range, instead of wholesaling them to Amazon, which prefers lower rates even when it means selling at a loss. Amazon wants to sell Kindles and to make e-books into a kind of currency. Macmillan wants to keep consumers from getting in to the habit of thinking e-books are $10 or less. Amazon wants to sell more books. Guess who is caught in the middle.

Samsung Electronics, which makes chips, TVs and mobile phones, reported that annual profit jumped 75 percent to a five-year high of 9.7 trillion won ($8.3 billion) on record sales of 89.8 trilion won.

It said mobile-phone shipments climbed 31 percent to a record 68.8 million, and that telecom income rose sevenfold to about 990 billion won. That beat the 742 billion won median estimate in a Bloomberg survey of 21 analysts, reported Bloomberg.

Samsung’s strong performance followed results at competitors such as Apple (NSDQ: AAPL), Nokia (NYSE: NOK) and LG Electronics (SEO: 066570) as shipments in the handset industry rose an estimated 10 percent, the first increase since the third quarter of 2008.

When we did the first version of this chart heading into the 2009 holiday sales season, four contenders—including the unexpected Barnes & Noble (NYSE: BKS) Nook—were set to crowd the instant-download e-reader field that Amazon (NSDQ: AMZN) had to itself for the last two years. Within weeks it already had changed: the iRex missed its 2009 ship date, PlasticLogic released more info on the Que, Amazon kept fine tuning the Kindle, and more e-readers flooded the zone at CES.

Then, the landscape tilted again Wednesday with the beyond-hyped unveiling of the Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) iPad, the tablet designed to be a better e-reader within a multipurpose media approach. Sure, some of the other devices offer the ability to listen to MP3 music and Kindle users can surf some elementary web waves. But Apple is the only one claiming to have a device that is as good an e-reader as it is a video player, music center or internet portal. (It’s also the only one where you can still use the platform for other e-readers: both Kindle and Barnes & Noble have iPhone e-book apps and are expected to be on the iPad.)

»  T-Mobile Nexus One owners had a data outage this morning. [CNET]

»  The upcoming Samsung Galaxy 2 may have the features Android fans are looking for. [DroidDog]

»  A new study says talking on your phone while driving doesn’t cause accidents, but yes, texting does. [Gizmodo]

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Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) confirmed yesterday that it will provide an update on its mobile business at Mobile World Congress in Spain, which is now just two weeks away.

In the company’s second-quarter conference call, Bill Koefoed, Microsoft’s General Manager of Investor Relations said: “We also continue to make progress in the mobile space and you will hear more about that at Mobile World Congress in February.” Peter Klein, Microsoft’s CFO, then detailed that it will revolve around Windows Mobile (via Seeking Alpha transcript). “As we have been saying from a product perspective, we are working very hard on the next version of Windows Mobile. As Bill indicated, we will be talking more about that in Barcelona in a few weeks.”

After Apple (NSDQ: AAPL) unveiled its hotly anticipated tablet computer yesterday, not surprisingly, some of its biggest competitors dismissed the iPad as much of a game-changer.

Nintendo has faced steep competition from Apple’s iPhone and iPod, which have turned out to be powerful portable gaming devices much like the Nintendo DS. But President Satoru Iwata tried not to sound too impressed, by saying Apple delivered “no surprises,” and called it “a bigger iPod Touch,” according to Yahoo News.

Microsoft (NSDQ: MSFT) also weighed in on the device, criticizing it for being “locked down.” Of course, Apple has eaten away at Microsoft’s Windows Mobile share of the phone market, and has seen much more success in the MP3 market than Microsoft’s Zune. “It is a humorous world in how Microsoft is much more open than Apple,” said Brandon Watson, Microsoft’s director of product management in an interview with Technologizer.

Clarification: The company now says they are only looking to raise $12 million, with the potential to reach $13.8 million if an over-allotment of shares is exercised. The $64.3 million figure in SEC filing, it says, is “because it’s required under the rules, but there’s really not a scenario to implement that entire equation,” says a spokesperson.

Original post: Vringo, the video ringtone and sharing firm based in New York City, has filed for a $64.312 million IPO, according to its SEC document. About 10 days ago we mentioned in a tweet that the company had raised about $3 million in new debt financing in form a bridge note. Founded in 2006, the last previously reported round for the company was a $12 million round in 2007, led by PE firm Warburg Pincus. It has raised a total of $17.5 million since inception. Warburg owns about 31.9 percent of the company, and judging from the state of the business (see S-1 details below) looks like the PE firm forced its hand in pushing this through.

Vringo’s service is an application that needs to be downloaded onto compatible handsets (says more than 200). Users can create or take video, images and slideshows from library and Web, and make it into their call signature. Also, in a reverse of ringback tones, Vringo also has a more gimmicky tech called VringForward, that lets its users select which video ringtone their friends will see when they call.

Google (NSDQ: GOOG) said that is now allowing advertisers to embed phone numbers into mobile ads so that customers can click to call.

The ads will work on phones with high-end browsers, including the iPhone, Android or other smartphones, and will be based on the person’s location, the company said on its blog. That way if they are calling to make restaurant reservations, you’ll call the nearest location. While the the ability to “click to call” is not new, Google said advertisers who participated in the beta trial saw improved click-through rates, and experienced more visits to their websites in addition to incremental phone calls.