Social Engagement Service Wayin Raises $14m

In the US, social voting platform Wayin has raised $14m in venture capital, which it will use to extend its system for collecting use sentiment data.

Wayin, which was launched in 2010 by Sun Microsystems founder Scott McNealy, provides a platform through which users can upload their own polls, and receive an 'instant pulse' of other people's sentiment about their posts. Users can see other questions and polls based on popularity, live events or topics of interest, and they then receive points or rewards for creating and voting on those polls.

Resulting sentiment data is then made available to companies, to gain insight into consumer opinion and interests, as well as into what customers are saying about their brands.

To date, Wayin has raised $20m from companies including TIBCO Software, Wilson Sonsini Goodrich and Rosati, Burt Sugarman, Michael Medman, Doug Burgum, Greg Jamison, Jim Gray, Christian Lawless and others.

US Venture Partners led this most recent funding, with its Partner Rick Lewis joining the Wayin Board of Directors.

Tom Jessiman (pictured), CEO of Wayin, comments: 'Wayin sits at the intersection of media, gaming, social, and surveys. We offer personal or corporate brands the ability to converse with their fans in a fun, give and take environment.'

Web site: www.wayin.com .