Technology
Ex-Microsofties Win Support for Startups
By Seattle Business Magazine January 24, 2012
Ex-Microsofties are on a roll. Symform, a variation on the cloud-storage idea already marketed by the likes of Dropbox and Mozy, announced this morning it has received an additional $2 million in venture capital funding. Founded by former Microsoft engineers Basssam Tabarra and Praerit Garg, Symform offers up to 200 gigabytes of free storage while also allowing businesses to offer up their unused capacity for use. The idea is to minimize the environmental impact of cloud storage by using dormant capacity.
Meanwhile, Seattle-based Booyami is seeking to break into online commercial lending with its recent announcement of $905,000 in investment capital. Founded by James Walter and Corey Ross, Booyami is looking to ease the flow of data from borrowers to lenders via the automation of Borrowing Base Certificates (BBCs). The BBC Easy program pulls information directly from companies accounting software, simplifying the borrowing process. Walters technical expertise comes from many years at Microsoft working for the Xbox and Windows 7 groups, while Ross is the expert in banking as a result of his experiences at Banner Bank and Bank of America.
These announcements are welcome news in the Pacific Northwest, where venture capital plummeted in the fourth quarter of last year.