Mountain View, California — Among the flourishing list of mobile applications, Google has added another food-related acquisition since acquiring Zagat in September, snapping up the Silicon Valley-based startup Clever Sense, a restaurant-recommendation-engine specialist whose technology may ultimately be broadened to work like Apple’s Siri assistant, for an undisclosed sum, the companies announced on Tuesday.
The Internet behemoth has been beefing up its local offerings. It acquired in September for example a restaurant ratings publisher Zagat to boost its online maps and local business listings with trustworthy reviews and recommendations. On Tuesday the company added to its arsenal Clever Sense, the maker of the app Alfred, which serves as a digital personal assistant.
The company first released its butler-like app, named Alfred, for the iPhone and iPad this past summer. Clever Sense only launched the Android flavor of its application, named Alfred, last week.
The app is programmed to learn the kinds of restaurants that a specific customer likes, then recommend similar joints based on Web reviews and other analysis. Similar to Siri, Alfred searches the Internet and provide users with recommendations on restaurants, bars, and night life in the locality where the person is, could however down the line broaden its scope, potentially making it the Android alternative to the Siri personal assistant on Apple’s iPhone 4S.
It is the kind of service–one that relies on complex algorithms to arrive at relevant results–that is right up Google’s alley. Alfred racks up a treasure trove of experiences the user has sampled.
Ideally, the more a consumer uses the application, the more relevant future recommendations will be. Thus, applying machine-learning technology, Alfred makes culinary, bar and club recommendations based on smartphone users’ preferences, location and context. This clearly indicates that for Clever Sense, Google adds deep pockets and global reach.
Alfred, an app from Clever Sense, which was just acquired by Google. (Credit: Clever Sense)
Clever Sense’s co-founder and CEO Babak Pahlavan explained in a notice on the company’s website that Alfred may include other information sources and services.
“Together with the Google team, we will accelerate our efforts toward this shared vision. Google helps local businesses connect with potential customers, and its worldwide presence can bring the value of Clever Sense to a much larger audience,” Pahlavan wrote on the company’s Web site.
Moreover, discovering local information is extremely essential to both users and businesses, and the acquisition of Clever Sense will benefit both, Pahlavan said. “With Google and Clever Sense collaborating together, our entire team looks forward to building more intelligent, serendipitous and magical services!”, he added.
It stands to reason Google will work with the Clever Sense team to make Alfred include more than food in future iterations of the technology. However, according to Google describing the acquisition said: The Clever Sense team is at the cutting-edge of formulating a recommendation engine that connects the online and offline worlds by delivering personal and sophisticated information to users at the right time, the right place, and within the right context.
“By enveloping their technology and expertise with our team and products, we will be able to provide even more people with intelligent, personalized recommendations for places to eat, visit, and discover.”
The company launched an Android version of Alfred last week. However, terms of the deal were not revealed, but the Clever Sense team will commence co-operating with Google’s local services division immediately, the home to the business directory and reviews service Google Places.