Iddiction, a new startup led by Outfit7′s founding CEO Andrej Nabergoj, has secured $ 3.5 million in a seed round of funding.
Details on what exactly Iddiction will do are scarce, since Nabergoj says the company is currently in stealth mode. That hasn’t stopped big-name investors including Comcast Ventures, Highland Capital Partners, IDG Ventures and Playdom founder Rich Thompson, to name a few, from pouring some significant funds into the startup.
Here’s what Nabergoj did say: Iddiction is named after a slang term to describe dependency on mobile devices — particularly iPhones and iPads. The company is looking to improve “the experience of discovering apps for the user” in a way that “benefits the user, the app developer, and the App Store.” Its public launch is slated to occur “in the next couple of months.” Here’s a particularly relevant excerpt of his Iddiction pitch:
“By definition, top-ranking apps get the lion’s share of downloads because they are the most easily discoverable. The rich get richer and the small get smaller. In addition, most of the great apps that were able to climb to the top have no ways of staying and getting back there.Developers are looking for ways to achieve and maintain high ranks by spending money on various customer acquisition channels. Big guys can afford that, but what about the small guy? Being featured by Apple is one way, but is only available to a lucky few.
Most recently Nabergoj was the CEO of Outfit7, the mobile app startup best known for its very popular Talking Tom Cat app. I interviewed him while he was still in that role this past summer, and he talked passionately and at length about the problems individual app developers have with getting their apps discovered by users in crowded app store environments. He left Outfit7 in late July, and Iddiction seems to be a natural next step for his interests. It’ll be interesting to see what he ultimately comes up with.
Image of Andrej Nabergoj courtesy of Flickr user eirikso.
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