SearchMe lays off 20 percent

"Visual search engine" company SearchMe had, according to CrunchBase, 52 employees and $43.6 million in funding, led by Sequoia Capital. Just two weeks ago, TechCrunch ranked the company No. 76 in "Startups Best Positioned To Weather A Downturn." But VentureBeat confirms the company has fired 20 percent of its staff. Using the ad-hoc Sequoia formula, "you need a year of cash and a revenue model," here's my guess: Too much spending. And it doesn't help that the first demo I clicked on the site's front door broke Firefox.

New Sequoia-backed search engine not that great, just wants 1 percent market share

A tipster talks about working across the hall from Mark Kvamme-backed SearchMe.

I talked to one of their engineers. He said, "We're just like Google." I asked if they were any better or going after verticals. "Nope. We figure that even 1 percent of Google's market is enough to make money on."

Sequoia clones unsuccessful search engine — maybe Google will buy it anyway

Sequoia partner Mark Kvamme just plunked down $31 million on a company he also chairs, called Searchme. It's an image-based search engine. Search is a crowded field but Searchme CEO Randy Adams thinks there's room for innovation. "Search," he told BoomTown, "is still largely a text and list experience." True, but Snap CEO Tom McGovern told me almost the exact same thing in May 2006. Didn't work out for him. Now Snap is a site for bloggers. Below, a video demonstration of Searchme's "innovation" and another video showing two-year-old Snap doing pretty much the same things. More »