Google rival Pricesearcher among private firms to join stock exchange capital-raising scheme
Nine “ambitious” private companies, including a potential search engine rival to Google, have been selected to join the London Stock Exchange's capital-raising programme.
The stock exchange has this morning added another cohort of companies to its ELITE programme, which gives fast-growing private firms access to expertise and investors.
Pricesearcher – an unbiased search engine for prices, which doesn't charge retailers to be listed, is ont of the firm joining the community.
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Chief executive Samuel Dean told City PM his “vertical search engine” – a search engine focusing on a specific sector – could challenge tech giant Google.
He said: “Google has said its biggest threat is the rise of vertical search engines, for example people now go straight to Youtube for videos and they wouldn't use Google to search for jobs.
“Retail is only sector not to be properly aggregated.”
“Our funding so far has enabled us to add hundreds of millions of products to our index and by December we should have all the products in one place.”
Dean said the funding raised from the programme would go towards a marketing campaign to make Pricesearcher a household name.
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Specialist drug delivery company BDD Pharma and travel business Simpson Travel will also join the programme, alongside technology companies QBS and Wi-5.
Events co-ordinator FIRST Agency, engineering tech firm HiETA Technologies, AI consultants Nexus Frontier Tech and healthcare innovators PMD Solutions will join the 900-company community today.
Head of ELITE UK, Umerah Akram, said: “I am delighted to welcome the latest group of companies to ELITE, a clear demonstration of the UK's ability to grow great businesses.
“ELITE is committed to giving the business stars of the future the very best chance to succeed, providing them with access to relevant expertise and capital.”