Friday, September 26, 2008

Epernicus sets up lab scientists' social network

By Stephen DeSantis

What LinkedIn did for the business world, Epernicus Inc. hopes to do for scientists. The startup brands itself as a social networking site “with a purpose,” tailor-made to help researchers. But this is no Facebook for bench jockeys. The company relies on members looking to solve real research issues.

Epernicus plans to seek its fortune by being a conduit between its members and contracted laboratory supply vendors, recruitment firms and consultants.

The site epernicus.com has almost 6,000 members but wants to build a sufficiently sized member base so that those revenue-generating clients are more enticed to use its services.

Epernicus may be able to begin commercialization by the end of the year, said co-founder Vivek Murthy, an attending physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital and an instructor at Harvard Medical School.

The Cambridge-based firm’s co-founder is Mikhail Shapiro, founder of Framingham-based medical device company Cyberkinetics Neurotechnology Systems Inc., and senior associate with Third Rock Ventures LLC in Boston.

A common problem for researchers is that it is very difficult to find people with specific expertise, said Murthy.

“So the classic example is that you are working late in the lab, having trouble with an experiment. If you wanted to ask someone that has some expertise in it, who would you go to if you didn’t find what you needed right away in your immediate proximity?” Murthy said.

Epernicus members create profiles with professional information, just like most networking sites. But the real difference lies in its direct utility. Scientists input what type of research they have explored, what they would like to explore and their expertise.

One of Epernicus’ earliest members was Krystyn Van Vliet, the Thomas Lord assistant professor of materials science and engineering and biological engineering at MIT. Her entire group is on the site and uses it for collaborations.

“Even for colleagues we already knew, we weren’t aware that they had certain skills or reagents. We say ‘Wow, we didn’t know they were working on that,’” said Van Vliet.

Epernicus is not alone in the space, and will be competing with Nature Networks, SciLink and Labmeeting, which offer similar services.

The social networking arena is seeing a higher number of “vertical” startups geared toward very specific audiences, said Dave Andonian, managing partner at venture capital firm Dace Ventures in Boston. He said that could play well to vendors looking to targeted audiences with known needs.“Their primary challenge is that it is not that you can’t build a valuable service and make it profitable. It is simply a question of scale,” Andonian said. “How big is their total market?”