Startup hatched in UConn dorm advances online social planning technology platform
Rocky Hill, Conn., January 18, 2011 – Connecticut Innovations (CI), the state’s quasi-public authority responsible for technology investing and innovation development, today announced that Shizzlr Inc. has become the newest tenant of CTech@Science Park at Yale, the New Haven-based technology business incubator managed by CI.
Shizzlr, launched by two graduate students from their dorm rooms at the University of Connecticut (UConn), is an Internet-based social network company that has developed a proprietary, location-driven location-driven social planning technology platform that integrates with Facebook.
With Shizzlr you can see where the crowd is going, what plans your friends have, and what local events are going on in your town or school. After seeing what is happening around you and where the crowd is going, Shizzlr simplifies communicating with friends so you can make plans. The technology allows you to have group conversations with friends via text message, the Web, e-mail, and mobile applications – so everyone can give their input and stay up to date on when and where to meet up. The platform also enables local businesses and brands to effectively reach out to users as they are making decisions about their social plans. Using aggregated data about user plans, businesses and brands can offer incentives to Shizzlr users to encourage them to visit their establishments and can also better prepare for the anticipated volume of customers.
During the first half of 2010, Shizzlr was incubated at the Connecticut Center for Entrepreneurship & Innovation at the University of Connecticut School of Business in East Hartford. There the company founders received assistance from the University of Connecticut School of Law’s Intellectual Property Law Clinic and from UConn business school faculty and administrators. The company retains two University of Connecticut faculty members on its advisory team.
Shizzlr already has a few thousand users of its technology, is just about to release its mobile applications and plans to expand both the applications for its technology and its student user base.
“Keith Bessette and I could not be happier to join the entrepreneur community at CTech. The resources and fellow entrepreneurs we now have access to on a regular basis are sure to make this sometimes rocky journey a little smoother,” said Nick Jaensch, co-founder of Shizzlr. “Charlie Moret has seen Shizzlr from its infancy, and we cannot thank him enough for this opportunity. Finally, we have an actual address – you can’t beat that!”
“We’re excited to welcome Shizzlr – launched in 2009 in a dormitory at the University of Connecticut School of Business – to CTech@Science Park at Yale,” said Charlie Moret, CI managing director, business development. “The interaction with other technology entrepreneurs on site, as well as access to funding and additional technical and business resources, will undoubtedly help Shizzlr sizzle!”
About Connecticut Innovations, Inc. Connecticut Innovations (CI) is a quasi-public organization dedicated to driving a vibrant, entrepreneurial, technology-based economy in Connecticut. CI stimulates high-tech growth by investing in: early-stage Connecticut technology companies, university/industry research collaborations, technology transfer, and clean energy initiatives through the Connecticut Clean Energy Fund. CI also fosters collaboration among government, business, nonprofit and academic organizations to advance technology growth and promotes public policies consistent with CI’s mission. For more information on CI, please visit www.ctinnovations.com.
About Connecticut’s CTech Incubators CTech hastens the growth of early-stage technology companies in Connecticut by creating a community in which the entrepreneur can succeed. CTech incubators house startup technology companies and provide access to a broad network of resources including other entrepreneurs, investors, business advisors and technologists. Today CTech incubators can be found in Bridgeport, Farmington and New Haven. For more information about the CTech incubators, please visit www.ctech-ct.org.