Clearspring
Encyclopedia
Clearspring Technologies is a web technology company based in McLean, Virginia
, USA. Clearspring's AddThis sharing platform reaches 1.2B unique visitors monthly and is used by over 10MM web publishers to virally distribute and track content across blogs, social networks and other web sites. Clearspring’s Audience Platform enables brands to deliver interest-based advertising to social influencers and intenders. The company has raised over $58M in venture capital from leading Internet investors Institutional Venture Partners, New Enterprise Associates
, Novak Biddle Venture Partners, Steve Case
, Nigel Morris
, Miles Gilburne, and Ted Leonsis
.
2004: The company began as R&D and consulting concern focused on commercializing research concepts around the semantic web and social networks. Funding for the work came primarily from grants and consulting projects.
2005: With funding from friends and family, alongside a $100K investment from Idea Foundry, the team created the first Semantic Start Page. This service provided users customizable, browser-based dashboard to consume information and news. Users could add widgets from publishers across the web and share content across their social graph.
2006: The company raised a Series A investment led by Novak Biddle and ZG Ventures to fund the development of the technology developed in 2005. The team relocated the headquarters of the company to Virginia and focused on launching the first part of this platform – a widget sharing and tracking platform for publishers. This platform was called LaunchPad.
2007-2008: Clearspring grew LaunchPad into the #1 Comscore ranked platform. The company began to launch its first experimental advertising programs and NEA led an $18MM Series C investment in the company to finance their continued rapid growth. In 2008, Clearspring acquired AddThis LLC, the largest link sharing and tracking platform. The thesis of the acquisition was to create a single content sharing platform for publishers under one brand, AddThis. The total reach of the combined platform per Comscore was 254MM Unique Users WW.
2008-2009: Clearspring upgraded AddThis with widget-sharing capabilities from LaunchPad. The company then discontinued the LaunchPad offering. During this transition period, AddThis continued to grow and by the end of 2009, reached 600MM unique users WW.
2010: The company launched the Clearspring Audience Platform, enabling brands to deliver interest-based display advertising to users across the web. At the end of 2010, AddThis topped over 1B unique users reached monthly and is used by over 8MM unique domains. This same year, Clearspring led the creation of OExchange - the first open standard for online content sharing - alongside Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft and others.
2011: In May, Clearspring raised a $20M D round of venture funding led by Institutional Venture Partners. In September, the company hired a new CEO, Ramsey McGrory, formerly of RightMedia and Yahoo!. Co-founder Hooman Radfar is now Executive Chairman. In October 2011, the company's AddThis platform turned 5 years old. In November 2011, Clearspring acquired data science company XGraph.
McLean, Virginia
McLean is an unincorporated community and census-designated place in Fairfax County in Northern Virginia. The community had a total population of 48,115 as of the 2010 census....
, USA. Clearspring's AddThis sharing platform reaches 1.2B unique visitors monthly and is used by over 10MM web publishers to virally distribute and track content across blogs, social networks and other web sites. Clearspring’s Audience Platform enables brands to deliver interest-based advertising to social influencers and intenders. The company has raised over $58M in venture capital from leading Internet investors Institutional Venture Partners, New Enterprise Associates
New Enterprise Associates
New Enterprise Associates is a global investment firm focused on venture capital and growth equity investments. With approximately $11 billion in committed capital, NEA is among the largest venture firms. The firm invests in three broad industry sectors: information technology, healthcare, and...
, Novak Biddle Venture Partners, Steve Case
Steve Case
Stephen McConnell "Steve" Case is an American businessman best known as the co-founder and former chief executive officer and chairman of America Online . Since his retirement as chairman of AOL Time Warner in 2003, he has gone on to build a variety of new businesses through his investment...
, Nigel Morris
Nigel Morris
Nigel Morris is a businessman who co-founded Capital One with Richard Fairbank, and retired as COO in 2004.He lent the Labour Party £1,000,000 as part of the Cash for peerages affair....
, Miles Gilburne, and Ted Leonsis
Ted Leonsis
Theodore John Leonsis is an Internet pioneer, sports team owner, venture capital investor, filmmaker, author and philanthropist. His early new media company, Redgate Communications was acquired by America Online in 1994, and Leonsis became a senior AOL executive for the next 13 years...
.
History
Clearspring Technologies was founded in 2004 by Carnegie Mellon University graduate students Hooman Radfar and Austin Fath in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.2004: The company began as R&D and consulting concern focused on commercializing research concepts around the semantic web and social networks. Funding for the work came primarily from grants and consulting projects.
2005: With funding from friends and family, alongside a $100K investment from Idea Foundry, the team created the first Semantic Start Page. This service provided users customizable, browser-based dashboard to consume information and news. Users could add widgets from publishers across the web and share content across their social graph.
2006: The company raised a Series A investment led by Novak Biddle and ZG Ventures to fund the development of the technology developed in 2005. The team relocated the headquarters of the company to Virginia and focused on launching the first part of this platform – a widget sharing and tracking platform for publishers. This platform was called LaunchPad.
2007-2008: Clearspring grew LaunchPad into the #1 Comscore ranked platform. The company began to launch its first experimental advertising programs and NEA led an $18MM Series C investment in the company to finance their continued rapid growth. In 2008, Clearspring acquired AddThis LLC, the largest link sharing and tracking platform. The thesis of the acquisition was to create a single content sharing platform for publishers under one brand, AddThis. The total reach of the combined platform per Comscore was 254MM Unique Users WW.
2008-2009: Clearspring upgraded AddThis with widget-sharing capabilities from LaunchPad. The company then discontinued the LaunchPad offering. During this transition period, AddThis continued to grow and by the end of 2009, reached 600MM unique users WW.
2010: The company launched the Clearspring Audience Platform, enabling brands to deliver interest-based display advertising to users across the web. At the end of 2010, AddThis topped over 1B unique users reached monthly and is used by over 8MM unique domains. This same year, Clearspring led the creation of OExchange - the first open standard for online content sharing - alongside Google, LinkedIn, Microsoft and others.
2011: In May, Clearspring raised a $20M D round of venture funding led by Institutional Venture Partners. In September, the company hired a new CEO, Ramsey McGrory, formerly of RightMedia and Yahoo!. Co-founder Hooman Radfar is now Executive Chairman. In October 2011, the company's AddThis platform turned 5 years old. In November 2011, Clearspring acquired data science company XGraph.
External links
- AOL Founders Invest in Widgets
- Wave of Widgets Spreads on the Web
- New Clearspring tool converts Web sites to widgets
- Clearspring Launchpad Sends Widgets To All
- AddThis Indeed: Clearspring Raises $20 Million As It Rides Social Sharing Boom
- Clearspring Snags Yahoo-Right Media Exec Ramsey McGrory As CEO
- Sharing on the Web: How, When, Where and Why We Do It [INFOGRAPHIC]
- Clearspring Buys Data Science Start-Up XGraph