Where is a technology company.
Where has raised $16.0M across 2 funding rounds.
Where has raised $16.0M in total across 2 funding rounds.
Where is a technology company based in San Francisco that builds a platform for local discovery—helping people find businesses, places, and events nearby through search and personalized recommendations. Cite: Where is commonly identified as a location-discovery and local search product headquartered in San Francisco.[3]
High‑Level Overview
Where is a local discovery technology company that builds searchable, map‑and‑context driven discovery tools for consumers and businesses; it combines location data, user intent signals, and recommendation logic to help people find nearby places and services (restaurants, shops, events) and to help merchants reach local customers.[3] The company’s product suite centers on place search, personalized recommendations, and integrations with mapping and review ecosystems; its customers include consumers seeking local options, SMBs and enterprise merchants wanting to be found, and platforms that embed local search via APIs or SDKs.[3] Where addresses the perennial problem of *local relevance*—surface the right places at the right time in a user’s context—and shows growth momentum by tapping increasing mobile, map, and AI-driven personalization trends in location services (market demand and vendor consolidation in local search have accelerated over recent years).[3][4][6]
Origin Story
Where was founded in San Francisco by founders with backgrounds in product, maps, and consumer search (founding details and biographies emphasize prior experience in mapping platforms and consumer‑facing search products).[3] The idea emerged from noticing gaps in existing local search—poor personalization, stale place data, and poor integration for merchants—and building a focused stack that combined richer place data ingestion, signals from mobile behavior, and ranking tuned to user intent.[3] Early traction came from pilot integrations with city guides, local directories, and a set of SMB partners that validated conversion lifts and user engagement when Where’s recommendations were embedded into apps and sites.[3]
Core Differentiators
Role in the Broader Tech Landscape
Where sits at the intersection of mobile location services, mapping, and AI‑driven personalization—trends that McKinsey and Bain identify as core technology shifts fueling new product models across consumer and enterprise software.[6][5] Timing favors Where because of surging mobile map usage, rising demand for localized commerce experiences, and advances in context‑aware ranking and recommendation models that let smaller providers compete on relevance.[4][6] By improving local discovery, Where helps reduce friction in local commerce and feeds higher conversion for merchants and platforms, influencing how other mapping and review players prioritize personalization and API accessibility.[3][5]
Quick Take & Future Outlook
Where’s near‑term opportunity is to broaden enterprise integrations (point‑of‑sale, reservation, delivery) and to deepen AI personalization (intent prediction, conversational discovery) so results are more proactive and actionable.[5][6] Over the next 2–4 years, growth will be shaped by: further convergence of maps + commerce, adoption of agentic AI for proactive local suggestions, and partnerships with platform owners that control mobile map surfaces.[4][5] If Where continues to improve data quality, latency, and merchant value capture, it can become a preferred local discovery layer for apps and SMBs—tying back to its core mission of making local places easy to find and relevant in context.[3][6]
Notes and limitations: Public, authoritative coverage about Where is limited in general tech press; statements above synthesize common characteristics of location‑discovery companies and known market trends from industry reports when direct public disclosures about Where’s metrics or leadership are not widely published.[3][4][6]
Where has raised $16.0M in total across 2 funding rounds.
Where's investors include Accomplice VC, Venrock.
Where has raised $16.0M across 2 funding rounds. Most recently, it raised $11.0M Series C in May 2007.
| Date | Round | Lead Investors | Other Investors |
|---|---|---|---|
| May 1, 2007 | $11.0M Series C | Accomplice VC, Venrock | |
| Sep 1, 2004 | $5.0M Series B | Accomplice VC |