Pulse raise $9 Million in VC Funding
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Pulse raise $9 Million in VC Funding
Santa Clara: California-based Pulse, a mobile newsreader, has raised $9 million in venture capital to pacify operations. The company is backed by New Enterprise Associates, GreyCroft Partners and Lerer Ventures, reports WSJ. Alphonso Labs, a year old company, makes the Pulse app. Pulse is an elegant news reading applications for iPhone, iPad and Android devices. It has colorful panning story bars and fills them with content from the favorite sources of the user. It has redefined news, providing user the opportunity to experience the news they desire from traditional sources, their favorite blogs and social networks. Ankit Gupta and Akshay Kothari, who are Stanford graduate students, founded Pulse in May 2010 as a reason of frustration with the news reading experience on mobile devices. Kothari said that the valuation was not top priority for them, but more important was to get the right people in the round and in the boardroom. Pulse has been selected as one of 50 apps in Apple's App Store Hall of fame and named one of TIME's top 50 iPhone apps of 2011. It is available as a free download for iPad, iPhone and Android. It has multiplied its user base by 20 times since November. The current round of funding has raised the company's total venture fund to $10 million. The fund raised will be used for expansion of the team from 10 engineers to 16-20 by year's end and go on with improving the product. The company is still working on its business model and ways of monetizing it but has not revealed its plans. The user can choose up to 60 news sources, including the Huffington Post, Vanity Fair, The Atlantic, Yahoo! News and many more and then read them in a customizable interface on the iPhone, iPad and Android phones and tablets. It enables the users either to choose a clean-text view of a chosen news story or to go to the website directly. The app also enhances the users to easily share the news stories through Facebook, Twitter and other social media sites. Patrick Chung from NEA Partners will join Pulse's Board of Directors, where as Greycroft Managing Director Alan Patricof and Lerer Ventures Manager and Huffington Post co-founder Ken Lerer will serve as advisors to the company.

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