TechPortal Startup Nominated
By Anna Lynn Spitzer
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Each year U.S. universities create approximately 600 new companies. SRCH², a UC Irvine startup headquartered at Calit2’s TechPortal incubator, has been nominated as one of the best in the country.
The National Council for Entrepreneurial Tech Transfer this month announced the 195 companies nominated by their home universities for the University Startups Showcase; SRCH² was the only UCI startup on the list.
Founded by computer science professor Chen Li, the company was incorporated in 2008; it recently changed its name to SRCH² from Bimaple to better reflect its mission. The company produces a proprietary search engine, which uses in-memory algorithms to support ultra-fast instant search on large amounts of data. Li says it is up to 100 times faster than the most commonly used enterprise search software.
SRCH² now has a nine-member team, including new CEO Dev Bhatia, a startup and growth-stage executive with experience in mobile Web and Internet advertising, application services, content and analytic software.
The USS competition is organized by NCET2, as part of its 7th annual University Startups Conference, March 20-22, 2013 in Washington, D.C. It is supported by the National Venture Capital Association, University-Industry Demonstration Project, Strategic Investors Forum, Mid-Atlantic Venture Association, International Business Forum, and Global Corporate Venturing Group.
The 100 finalists will be invited to showcase their companies to leading venture capitalists, angel investors, strategic investors and SBIR program managers.
“We are elated to have been nominated by UCI,” said Li. “We’ve had a lot of growth and product innovation over the last several years and to be recognized among the top startups in the country is a tremendous honor.”