Another Genacast portfolio company exits to Google [Startup Roundup]

WHO’S MAKING MOVES?

DuckDuckGo‘s new look is now live, after soft-launching it earlier this month. See it here. Read about the new features here.

VeryApt, the apartment finder founded by Wharton grads, is trying to raise $1 million by September, founders told the Philadelphia Daily News.

Nearly 200,000 Independence Blue Cross members have signed up for its mobile app, which uses a platform developed by Radnor-based, venture-backed firm Relay, according to a release.

What can medical education learn from Netflix and Facebook? That’s the title of a paper written by medical education review app Osmosis, published in the Annals of Internal Medicine. Osmosis, which has office space in Venturef0rth but also a home office in University City, just won $50,000 at the Milken-Penn Graduate School of Education Business Plan Competition and was awarded $150,000 by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation.

Any health IT companies looking for office space? The building at Broad and Mifflin Streets that houses Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s Pediatric and Adolescent Care and other healthcare clinics is looking for tenants, according to a Craigslist post. The post describes the space as “class A startup” or “traditional office space.”

Soceana, a social impact company founded by a Penn junior Tess Michaels, competed in the 1776 Challenge Cup Global Finals for Smart Cities last week. Soceana is a software platform that helps corporations promote volunteerism.

Can one free year of FiOS get three incubators to sign on as customers? That’s what Verizon hopes. They’re giving one free year of the service to Benjamin Franklin Technology Partners, Pennsylvania Biotech Center of Bucks County and edtech accelerator Education Design Studio, Inc., which will move into the Kensington Oxford Mills building in July, said EDSi head Brien Walton. BFTP will consider becoming a FiOS customer, it told the Philadelphia Business Journal, but only after it gets out of a longterm contract with its current Internet provider.

Speaking of BFTP, a new release said the state-backed economic development agency created or retained 711 jobs in 2013.

WHO’S GETTING FUNDED?

Divide, a Genacast Ventures portfolio company, was acquired by Google for an undisclosed amount, according to a Genacast blog post. Divide is a New York City-based bring your own device company. That marks Genacast Ventures’ second Google exit with a portfolio company: the first was Invite Media. Genacast is run by Philadelphia-based investor Gil Beyda and Comcast Ventures.

Two Wharton startups won $7,500 each as part of an annual award that goes to a startup that’s already won a Wharton award. The startups are Digipuppets, an edtech startup, and Identified Technologies, a robotics startup.

WHO’S GETTING BUZZ?

El Sawyer, one-half of the documentary film team that made prison re-entry film Pull of Gravity, is also the cofounder of MING (Media in Neighborhoods Group), a FastFWD company focused on media training and re-entry. He was interviewed by Colorlines about Pull of Gravity.

How should can an entrepreneur get started without a technical cofounder? This post from Simplpost offers some advice.

STARTUP ROUNDUP SNAPSHOT

Analog Watch Co.’s founder Lorenzo Buffa (far left) poses with other designers at the Museum of Modern Art’s Kickstarter@MOMA party Monday night. Buffa’s wooden watches are being sold at MoMA (and at his new storefront on East Passyunk Avenue). Photo from Buffa’s Twitter.