Thirst builds an iPad app that filters users' Twitter streams and surfaces the most relevant news stories, videos and photos. The product centers on a custom natural language processing (NLP) system that selects important stories around keywords or subjects. Thirst launched its iPad app as a proof of concept to test the effectiveness of its NLP processor on the Twitter platform. Founders Anuj Verma and Kunal Modi are recent Berkeley graduates. The company is backed by nearly $1 million from investors including BlueRun Ventures, former Powerset COO Steve Newcomb and DCM general partner Jason Krikorian. The article notes competition from iPad news readers like Flipboard, Pulse and News.me and questions how large companies built on the Twitter platform can become, while indicating Thirst intends to expand beyond Twitter.

Total raised

$1M

Funding rounds

1

Latest round

Equity

Latest activity

May 2012