Berlin, Germany – November 14, 2012 – ResearchGate, the professional network for scientists, today announced its acquisition of scholarz.net, a reference management, knowledge management and academic network based in Würzburg, Germany. Scholarz.net was founded in 2008 by economist and political scientist Dr. Daniel Koch and media technologist Marc Willwacher as a spin-off of the interdisciplinary research project “Scientific Work in the Web” at the University of Wurzburg. The platform is a product by KnowledgeWorkz GmbH, founded shortly after the launch of the network.
Scholarz.net co-founder and CEO Koch is thrilled with the acquisition. He feels that scholarz.net has found the best possible new home for its users: "With its two million users, ResearchGate is widely recognized among the global scientific community. This gives me the confidence that our users will continue to enjoy the best service possible." Koch initially had the idea to develop the software when he started working on his dissertation and needed a tool to organize his research effectively and to share information with colleagues. Since then his brainchild has come a long way. Thousands of researchers have used it over the past few years to increase the speed and quality of their work. However, it has been increasingly difficult to keep up with the pace of innovation during the past few years, as ResearchGate outgrew other platforms. Koch is now a consultant with the Boston Consulting Group. "The takeover by ResearchGate is a fantastic new start, for us and for our users," says Koch, and continues: “This ensures constant innovation and participation in the world’s most vibrant research community."
Dr. Ijad Madisch, CEO and co-founder of ResearchGate is equally delighted about the acquisition: "We're happy to welcome scholarz.net users to ResearchGate. On our network they will find new opportunities for global scientific collaboration and new ways to build their reputation interactively and in real time." "Scholarz.net users," says Madisch, "are a great addition to the ResearchGate community."
Scholarz.net will be discontinuing its services come January 10, 2013. The platform's users are requested to back-up all files they have stored on scholarz.net and to open a new account on ResearchGate. A simple to use export tool has been provided for them.
Scholarz.net was founded in 2008 by economist and political scientist Dr. Daniel Koch and media technologist Marc Willwacher as a spin-off of the interdisciplinary research project "Scientific Work in the Web" at the University of Wurzburg. It offers a unique way of accumulating and organising knowledge and using it more efficiently – on your own or with others. It allows individual users or groups to gather ideas and to structure and organize knowledge. It provides convenient reference management for efficient team work - locally and internationally. The result: faster creation of theses, papers, and research projects.
ResearchGate was founded in 2008 by the physicians Dr. Ijad Madisch and Dr. Sören Hofmayer along with computer specialist Horst Fickenscher. Four years later, more than two million researchers have signed up to the network. Through ResearchGate users can publish their findings, distribute them worldwide, and make a name for themselves on a relevant, widely used online platform. The company has completed two rounds of financing, led by Founders Fund partner Luke Nosek, co-founder of PayPal, and Matt Cohler of Benchmark Capital, co-founder of Linkedin and early employee of Facebook. Such a joint involvement of top-tier Silicon Valley investors is unique in Germany.
