When I visited Dublin recently for the F.ounders event, I didn’t even get around to attending the bigger event that was happening alongside it, the Dublin Web Summit. I did, however, get a chance to meet one of the co-founders of DataHug, which won the event’s Spark of Genius startup competition (and a prize package worth €30,000).
Founded in late 2009 by former consultants Connor Murphy and Ray Smith, DataHug essentially enables clients to “better understand and exploit” the collective company network. Or as one of the judges at the startup competition put it more eloquently: it’s like “LinkedIn on steroids as it not only answers who knows whom, but also how well they know them”.
The product, a Web app, is currently in alpha preview mode only and in trial by a select few customers only, but you can sign up for the beta here (and see some screenshots below).
Basically, DataHug is building technology capable of intelligently indexing corporate email systems and generating actionable insights about the everyday connections between people based on the gathered data. Which sounds bafflingly useful for any company to my ears.
We’ll update on the company’s progress once DataHug gets around to releasing the public beta of its software, which should be before year’s end.
My guess is many companies are going to hugely appreciate all the intelligence they can gather about their people’s business relationships. The great thing about DataHug is that the data is already there for the taking – they’re just putting a terribly useful layer on top of it.
Keep an eye on this one.
