Research in Motion acquires contact management software firm Gist Inc
15 Feb 2011
Blackberry maker Research in Motion (RIM) announced yesterday it had acquired Seattle-based contact management software firm, Gist Inc. The move is aimed at improving software on its popular BlackBerry smartphones.
The two year-old start-up helps users manage personal contacts from email, social networks, and other sources by creating rich business profiles that include the most news, status updates and work details.
Gist lets users log in to customize their public profiles, adding and displaying just the items they want the world to see, with a focus on dynamic content on online networks like Microsoft Outlook, Gmail, Yahoo Mail, Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn and blog posts.
Gist Public Profiles puts the user back in control of their online persona and identity, and are optimized for SEO and discovery by search engines like Google.
Gist software is currently on the iPhone, Android, Chrome, Firefox, and Salesforce.com but not RIM's Blackberry OS.
Gist is funded by venture capital Foundry Group and Paul Allen's Vulcan Capital.