PROVIDENCE – The Slater Technology Fund today announced it has invested $350,000 in WaveSyndicate, a Providence-based software developer that helps bloggers and other Web-site creators improve their audience targeting through content integration.
“We’re still in the early days of video online, and as is typical, I think the business models will shift as the industry evolves,” Thorne Sparkman, managing director of the Slater Technology Fund, said in a statement today. “I’m expecting a new batch of winners and that some big companies will be created from scratch. I’m betting that this will be one.”
WaveSyndicate’s software embeds links to other information, such as product pages, in the video and audio material users post on their Web sites. Slater says the software can “increase the effectiveness of advertising, and [help developers] understand and optimize the value of media as it is consumed by a distributed online audience.”
The company is led by Jared Rosoff, a Brown University graduate and founder of telecommunications policy management firm TAZZ Networks; and Bob Chatham, former chief marketing officer of Web analytics vendor Visual Sciences (which was later acquired by Omniture) and principal analyst at Forrester Research.
“Slater’s commitment to WaveSyndicate has been invaluable to our growth,” Chatham said in a news release. “As we continue to expand our roster of customers and look toward wide adoption of our software platform, we have been aided tremendously by the support provided by Slater’s financial, business and intellectual resources.”
The Slater Technology Fund, established in 1997 by then-Gov. Lincoln Almond and the R.I. General Assembly, provides seed capital to technology-based businesses in Rhode Island. Additional information is available at www.SlaterFund.com.
