When Charles Benaiah visited Dalhousie University to tell students about his experience founding and selling a startup in New York, he didn’t expect he’d soon be planning to establish his development team in Halifax.

But Benaiah, who received his MBA at Dal in 1993, was so impressed with his alma mater and the Atlantic Canadian startup community that he is working on a plan to build up a Halifax presence for his new company, watzan.

Now headquartered in New York, watzan is a “big data” visualization tool that makes it easier for companies to show clients the products they may be most interested in. It’s the natural successor to Benaiah’s previous startup, Sequence, which personalized content for magazine readers in print and online. He sold Sequence to the printing giant R.R. Donnelley & Sons in 2011 for an undisclosed amount.

 “I’m working on a new business,” said Benaiah in an interview last week. “We are coming out of the gate with a product in the next couple of weeks.”

Benaiah believes that one of the problems with using big data to match consumers with products is that people have difficulty noticing the product that matches their tastes. Usually products are presented in a grid with little description, and it is hard to pick out the most suitable product.

Watzan is a B2B2C — business-to-business-to-consumer — tool that the company will license to large corporations to help their clients find the things they want. The technology presents the results of a search in a more pleasing display than the traditional grid. It also brightens and/or enlarges products that are best suited to customers, making it easier for them to find what they’re looking for.

Benaiah is already in touch with such brand names as Hugo Boss, DKNY and Tommy Hilfiger, and what he’s learned is that they believe watzan could help generate online sales, attract new clients and even boost sales within retail locations.

He has been working with a team of contract developers in New York to develop a prototype in the next three weeks. They hope to have the first customer using the product by the first quarter of 2014. He is looking for about $500,000 in funding, about half of which would be equity financing.

Benaiah is working on a plan to establish a development team in Halifax and has already discussed the move with Innovacorp, Dalhousie University and the Atlantic Canada Opportunities Agency. He says he was amazed with the talent and entrepreneurial spirit he witnessed at Dalhousie and the programs in the region in place for entrepreneurs.

 “The Dal students I met are creating proportionally greater ideas, compared with the other entrepreneurs I’ve been around,” said Benaiah. “The talent level there is as good as anywhere.”

He was also impressed by the development of the startup community and the enthusiasm he witnessed at Invest Atlantic. He knows Halifax is a city that tends to attract people, and he believes it would be an ideal location for his development team.

 “Having a base of operation in a place that has good people who want to stay there is attractive to a company like mine.”