South Side-based Rhiza Labs is the latest Pittsburgh startup to establish a West Coast outpost, except, unlike others that look toward Silicon Valley and the San Francisco Bay Area, Rhiza is setting up shop in Seattle.
The decision to settle in the Pacific Northwest was a natural one, said Rhiza CEO Josh Knauer, since the software company has a growing customer base not only on the West Coast of the U.S., but Western Canada as well. Knauer noted Seattle has easy access to lots of points on the West side of the country, (not to mention its similarly cloudy skies).
Rhiza has developed software that allows company executives, and other non-data geeks, to easily use data more effectively. One of Rhiza’s big clients is cable giant Comcast
Comcast
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, which uses Rhiza’s software to target advertising more effectively based on ad content and consumer locations and then matching those needs.
Other clients include the U.S. Department of Energy
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and Dunn & Bradstreet.
As part of the West coast expansion, Rhiza hired Maryl Widdows as vice president of sales and marketing. The company, which has about 12 total employees, won’t say how many people it plans to hire as part of this expansion. The Seattle office is expected to open in January.
Knauer said the company is seeing a “tremendous boom” in customer demand and will be hiring both here and in Seattle.