SAMEGRAIN CLOSES FIRST ROUND OF FUNDING
BALTIMORE, MD (March 3, 2014) — SameGrain, Inc. (samegrain.com), an award winning “privacy first” social discovery start-up, announced today that it has secured $800,000 in seed funding. Renowned investor Bill Miller of Legg Mason led the round as a private investor and will be joining SameGrain’s board of directors. The funding will support SameGrain’s future product development, team expansion, and marketing efforts.
SameGrain’s team consists of start-up company veterans from Apple, AOL, Advertising.com, Ernst & Young, and Millennial Media. Prior to the close of this round, the company won several awards, including “Best Start-Up Idea” by the Washington Post and was selected as one of three Maryland start-ups to watch in 2014.
“This funding round will enable us to accelerate our go-to-market plan,” commented Eric Eller, SameGrain’s CEO and co-founder. “As a result, we anticipate launching our mobile app in the Spring.”
SameGrain’s website and app uses a proprietary algorithm and patent pending technology to privately match individuals that share similar backgrounds, beliefs, health issues, life experiences, habits, professions, interests, and more; whether they are located around the corner or around the globe. It enables people meeting for the first time to immediately discover what they share in common via their mobile devices and can also be used to locate roommates, travel companions, colleagues, teammates, pet owners, musicians and just about anyone who shares multiple common threads.
In addition to matching users via information from their existing social media profiles, the company has hundreds of curated questions designed to bring like-minded individuals together. SameGrain also has plans to match individuals who share an interest in the same Wikipedia topic.
The company is currently meeting with universities and organizations to discuss platform partnership opportunities. Platform partners are able to leverage SameGrain’s algorithm to match students, alumni, members, attendees or anyone within a large group.
“This is the first of many milestones,“ stated SameGrain Founder & CMO, Anne Balduzzi. “As SameGrain grows, our emphasis on protecting an individual’s privacy will give users the freedom to comfortably connect with others on a more meaningful level.”
When launched this year, the website and app will be free to use. Advance sign-ups for the website and app are currently being accepted at samegrain.com.