Ness Computing, a Los Altos, California-based startup that is making search personal, has completed a $15m Series B funding.
The round was led by SingTel Innov8, with participation from American Express Ventures and an affiliate of the LeFrak Organization.
The company intends to use the capital to incorporate additional user preference signals from new social platforms into its technology, expand to new verticals by applying its “Likeness Engine” to personal search and discovery for nightlife, events, movies, shopping, etc., and build its team of engineers and computer scientists in systems and interface engineering and machine learning (http://www.likeness.com/jobs.html).
Led by Corey Reese, Co-Founder and CEO, Ness aims to make search personal by using advanced machine learning techniques to recognize patterns in large-scale sets of data. Its “Likeness Engine” curates personalized recommendations based on people’s tastes and preferences.
The company’s first product, the Ness Dining Guide, is a personal search engine for restaurants available for iPhone app.
Launched in August 2011, Ness users have already generated over 3 million ratings, and the app includes more than 5 million Instagram images for restaurants.
In July 2011, the company raised $5m in Series A round (read here).
FinSMEs
22/08/2012