The upcoming Semantic Technology and Business Conference in San Francisco (June 2-5) will feature a number of sessions, panels, and keynotes focused on semantic web start-ups. The Start-Up Competition will highlight some of the most promising new companies in the world of semantic technology today, and other events will expound the strengths and successes of companies that have made it past the term “start-up” to full-fledged “competitors.” Read more

A new panel has been added to the lineup for next week’s Semantic Technology and Business Conference in San Francisco. Incubating and Investing in Semantic Startups will give attendees the opportunity to meet entrepreneurs who have recently raised millions in venture funding for their startups. Attendees will also:

• Learn from the leader behind the technology transfer program that was the birthplace of Siri and is now incubating Tempo, Desti and Trapit.
• Learn from the experience of people responsible for evaluating startups as targets for potential investment, incubation, and/or acquisition.
• Learn about the do’s and don’ts for positioning your idea for incubation and venture for funding. Read more

Mike Butcher of TechCrunch reports, “As if there weren’t enough technology startup accelerators already in Europe, yet another launched today with the hope of attracting ‘cloud’ based startups in the areas of Big Data, Machine Learning and other similarly high-end areas. But unlike some, this one will have some pretty heavyweight serial entrepreneurs involved. SeedCloud is an new London-based incubator which also announces its first transaction, a £500,000 fundraising for Sentience Technology.” Read more

SemanticWeb.com and parent company WebMediaBrands recently announced a contest to earn the title of  “Top Semantic Technology Start-Up.” Today, we have two exciting announcements to make about the contest.

Deadline Extension

We have had several requests to extend the deadline, and are announcing today that we will now accept applications for the contest until April 30, 2012. We also learned of some applicants who encountered technical problems when trying to submit in the early days of the contest. We have fixed the code that caused these problems, and encourage all who experienced difficulties to try again.

Judges

We are also pleased to announce the panel of judges that will be at SemTechBiz evaluating the companies. It’s a great group, and we’re looking forward to a lively afternoon!

Left to Right, they are: Read more

Paul Miller recently discussed why many semantic search startups are failing to compete with Google, also noting a few interesting exceptions. He writes, “In recent weeks, I’ve received a flurry of information on partial alternatives to Google’s market-dominating search engine. Most appear useful in their own niche, but I doubt even their creators would be surprised to learn that none tempt me to change my Google-powered default search behaviour. Far more damaging for their prospects, any hope they had of attracting my occasional use is dashed by the very way that they seem to work. They may excel in certain verticals, or in particular types of search, but most make the unfortunate mistake of expecting me to mould my behaviour to them.” Read more

SemanticWeb.com and parent company WebMediaBrands recently announced that a competition will be held at the upcoming Semantic Technology and Business Conference (SemTechBiz) in San Francisco to select the “Top Semantic Technology Start-Up.” The contest begins with an online application process. Out of that pool of applicants, ten companies will be selected to compete in person and on stage at SemTechBiz San Francisco. There is no charge to apply. The ten finalist companies will need to register one individual, but for already registered attendees, there is no additional fee.

Requirements

SemanticWeb.com is currently accepting entrants from now until April 23, 2012. Companies encouraged to apply are those who meet the following conditions:

1. have a demonstrable product (at least in “beta” stage) in the SemTech and or SemWeb space
2. have received no more than a Series A round of financing

Companies can be located anywhere but must have the financial means to attend SemTech 2012. Ten Finalist companies will be selected to compete in a “Pitch Slam” before a panel of expert judges at the Conference. These finalists will be listed in an article at SemanticWeb.com.

Read more

SemanticWeb.com and parent company WebMediaBrands are pleased to announce that a competition will be held at the upcoming Semantic Technology and Business Conference (SemTechBiz) in San Francisco. The contest begins with an online application process. Out of that pool of applicants, ten companies will be selected to compete in person and on stage at SemTechBiz San Francisco. At the conference, a single winner will be awarded the prize as “Top Semantic Technology Start-Up.”

Dramatic growth in semantics-based products and applications released over the past years is on the rise. Semantic technologies are no longer a discovery of the future. Organizations such as Google, Yahoo!, LinkedIn, The New York Times, Facebook, Apple, Oracle, IBM, the Library of Congress, Amdocs, Volkwagen & the BBC use them today.

Requirements

SemanticWeb.com is currently accepting entrants from now until April 23, 2012. Companies encouraged to apply are those who meet the following conditions:

1. have a demonstrable product (at least in “beta” stage) in the SemTech and or SemWeb space
2. have received no more than a Series A round of financing

Companies can be located anywhere but must have the financial means to attend SemTech 2012.  Ten Finalist companies will be selected to compete in a “Pitch Slam” before a panel of expert judges at the Conference. These finalists will be listed in an article at SemanticWeb.com.

Read more

For a semantic web start-up, getting the technology right is just half the battle. The other half is figuring out just how your potential users will take advantage of it.

That’s the issue that Réda Berrehili, co-founder and CEO at France-based Tumbup, has been working on. The service has been in development and beta for about one and a half years now, building from its 6,000 users an understanding of what they and their friends like to inform what he calls a Giant Global Graph of interests and linked entities, in order to support recommendations of everything from restaurants to literature.

That experience is leading the company to refocus more narrowly on the entertainment sector, such as TV shows and movies, with plans to use the data resident within its Giant Global Graph to, as he says, “revolutionize the way people entertain themselves.”

Read more

SemanticWeb.com is pleased to announce that we are sponsoring a Web Mining Hack Day, Saturday, June 25, 2011 in Palo Alto, California. More details below after the jump.

Hosted by AOL, and organized by Diffbot and StartX (the Stanford University incubator), the Hack Day promises to be a great opportunity for back-end coders and UI/UX design experts to get together with the goal of building exciting semantic applications. The organizers suggest that participants will be able to:

1. Meet and network with other web mining experts, hackers, and students.
2. Learn about new semantic technologies and open web APIs.
3. See the new the AOL West Coast Headquarters, StartX, Stanford University’s startup accelerator.  Have some pizza on us.
4. Hack on new ideas and show off your projects.

Read more

Google recently announced a few changes to its news search feature. According to the article, “Android and iPhone smartphone users now have the option to see news stories relevant to their current location via the Google News mobile News Near You feature. When visiting Google News from one of these devices, you are prompted via popup whether you want to see news near you. If you choose yes, then this section will be added to your standard Google News layout on that device. (Note: This feature does not appear to be compatible with the FireFox browser for Android.)” Read more