Kaggle

In coming months, Kaggle, which is in the process of moving to San Francisco, is set to run a contest for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and Wikipedia, among others.

May the Best Algorithm Win… Jennifer Valentino-DeVries 2011

He founded a company called Kaggle to help businesses of any size run Netflix-style competitions.

SFGate: Don Asmussen: Bad Reporter Ashlee Vance 2012

He founded a company called Kaggle to help businesses of any size run Netflix-style competitions.

SFGate: Don Asmussen: Bad Reporter Ashlee Vance 2012

Preparing for the Heritage prize has required months of work by two Kaggle employees, in part because the real-world data is complicated and messy, Mr. Goldbloom said.

May the Best Algorithm Win… Jennifer Valentino-DeVries 2011

"We've discovered it's a powerful way to do predictive analytics," said Anthony Goldbloom , Kaggle's founder and chief executive.

May the Best Algorithm Win… Jennifer Valentino-DeVries 2011

"All these companies are having trouble finding data scientists, but I had no trouble when it came to choosing one," simply by looking at Kaggle's leader board, said Mr. Goldbloom, describing how he found a recent hire.

May the Best Algorithm Win… Jennifer Valentino-DeVries 2011

For businesses, Kaggle typically charges about $10,000 for the use of its contest platform, not including consulting fees.

May the Best Algorithm Win… Jennifer Valentino-DeVries 2011

Kaggle's success speaks to the growing need for people who can take massive amounts of data and crunch the numbers to make something meaningful.

May the Best Algorithm Win… Jennifer Valentino-DeVries 2011

And the start-up handling the competition, Kaggle Pty.

May the Best Algorithm Win… Jennifer Valentino-DeVries 2011

In addition to cleaning up the data, Kaggle is working with a specialist to render the information anonymous, so it can't be traced back to any patients.

May the Best Algorithm Win… Jennifer Valentino-DeVries 2011