Campus Buddy

What it does: Publishes data on college class grading
Founder: Mike Moradian, 25
Website: campusbuddy.com
Based: Los Angeles

After experiencing a particularly rough time in a calculus class during his sophomore year at UCLA, Mike Moradian began to think students could benefit from knowing more about how professors grade. Through a Freedom of Information Act request, the business economics major got information about grade distributions at classes at the public university. That data became the basis for CampusBuddy, the business he launched in February 2008. Moradian aggregated public data on grade distributions for classes, professors, and majors at 250 public colleges, starting with the University of California system. The service has 280,000 active monthly users out of the nearly 1 million people who have joined, most through its Facebook app. Moradian says a "small percentage" of active users pay $1.50 monthly for access to detailed grading data. The site also makes money by referring students to such services as textbook sellers and moving companies and through advertising. CampusBuddy employs 100 interns who work remotely for school credit and maintains a staff of five at its Beverly Hills office. Moradian says the company had $60,000 in revenue in 2009 and projects $400,000 this year. —JT

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