Friday, January 25, 2008

HyperActive Pittsburgh

Occasionally, "Silicon Valley's Coolest Investments" are well beyond the 20-minute rule:

Then there is the more mundane--figuring out how to speed up selling burgers and fries at a fast-food joint. Such calculations are becoming a precise science: Hyperactive Technologies, located in Pittsburgh, has created a combination camera and computer program (appropriately called "HyperActive Bob") that uses video and predictive technology to tell cooks how many burgers and fries need to be cooked at what time to accelerate service. Last May, the company purchased QTime solutions, a drive-thru timer to help speed up how Hyperactive develops its recommendations. Private angel investors organized by Spencer Trask Ventures presumably had a quick meeting to decide to put $8.5 million into the firm in 2006.

You can read a bit more about the big cash infusion here. The article identifies Spencer Trask as "New York-based." I don't understand what the Silicon Valley connection might be, but I'm still curious about a local start-up capturing venture capital from well outside of the region. Were Pittsburgh-based venture capitalists not interested? I'd like to know more about this funding success story, which appears to be an exceptional case.

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