image search results in what Corkran calls a “dynamic mosaic”—a single page of thumbnail-sized views that can be easily reviewed, sorted, and enlarged to view pricing, metadata, and other information. The site features more than 3 million royalty-free images that can be purchased and licensed for immediate use, including professional photos from Getty Images, Corbis, and other agencies, as well as amateur “microstock” images. The search function retrieves up to 8,000 images for the mosaic display, which can be scrolled and scanned the way Google Maps users can move North-South and East-West.
“This is what’s groundbreaking about it,” Corkran says. “It turns a very frustrating search experience on its head. You can revise your search by price, type of collection, and other criteria, and our map changes every time you change a search term. This is the real technology innovation that we’ve brought to the industry.”
Corkran founded BrightQube with Sean Davidson, the startup’s chief information officer, in 2007. They self-funded much of the site development, and raised about $500,000 from Southern California’s Tech Coast Angels and other individual investors to launch the business.
BrightQube has been generating strong sales, and Corkran said the business is now close to generating positive cash flow. He notes that “the nice thing about a Web-based business is that they’re highly cash efficient.”
The company currently has just three full-time employees, and has reached the point of seeking a first-round of venture capital investment to fund the expansion of its business, said John Santoro, BrightQube’s vice president of marketing.
“We’re trying to build an community of graphic designers,” who represent the biggest segment of BrightQube users, Santoro told me. The company has created an email “tips and photos” newsletter to help customers and has been adding similar instructional content to the Web site in a bid to make it an online hangout for designers.
Whether venture funding can be had is another matter. “It’s not my ideal goal to be launching a company in the midst of this recession,” Corkran says. “But the people who understand the problems we’re addressing our intrigued. And we feel like we’re just getting started.”
