Estimated Value: $80 million
Business: Search engine designed to understand natural language nuances and the context of search phrases.
Location: San Francisco, CA
More Info: About Powerset
CTO: Barney Pell
Investors: Dr. Tenenbaum, Allan Schiffman, Rob Rodin, The Founders Fund, Amidzad, Eric Tilenius, Esther Dyson, Adrian Weller, Azeem Azhar, Todd Parker
Analysis: It has taken a long time for Barney Pell's brainchild to launch, especially given the astronomical hype shortly after the company was founded. Would-be Google-killing search engines are also a dime a dozen, and we're skeptical of all of them. But we hear that the relevance of Powerset's alpha-product is good and, more importantly, that potential acquirers may be sniffing around.
We value the company at $80 million, primarily because of its potential attractiveness as a takeout candidate.