Sumazi, a Web application that helps people create new connections for both business and leisure, announced it is launching its iPhone application at TechCrunch Disrupt in San Francisco.
Sumazi CEO and founder Sumaya Kazi hopes to provide users with a way to directly connect with that "rock-star engineer" that they need for a job opportunity or contract.
There are large number of users on social networks — 500 million on Facebook and 75 million on LinkedIn, for example. But any given person makes only four meaningful connections each year, according to a study Kazi cited, limiting the utility of those broad networks for finding someone to recruit.
There isn't necessarily a way to quickly connect that skilled engineer with someone looking for a user interface "rock star," Kazi said, an example of a niche she hopes Sumazi will fill with its iPhone and Web apps. The site seems like an obvious competitor to Linkedin. Kazi claims Sumazi is less unwieldy than LinkedIn's "recommended connections" option.
Sumazi's iPhone app allows users to directly connect two people on their contact list — and provide a reason for the two of them to be connected. The progress of the connection can be monitored in real time, and users can see whether they rejected or accepted the connection and get some feedback. The Web application provides users with a way to simply sniff out connections they might need, be they business connections or anything else by posting "needs" on a news feed.
Sumazi's real-time social network provides analytics and feedback on posts to users to help them tweak their process to find more, better connections.
Kazi's end goal is to create an engine that automatically connects users without any needing any kind of interaction. The engine, hopefully, will even provide introductions for users, Kazi said. — no human interaction required.
The San Francisco, Calif.-based company was launched earlier this year in February and has raised $25,000 so far.