Concur president and chief operating officer Rajeev Singh has taken a minority stake in PubliCola, the Seattle news Web site founded by Josh Feit and Sandeep Kaushik. The involvement of Singh -- the 41-year-old co-founder of Redmond-based Concur -- follows an investment in the startup by Seattle developer Greg Smith.

Launched in January, PubliCola is led by Feit who previously served as the news editor of the alternative weekly, The Stranger. The site has a political bent, but also covers music, film and sports. 

Kaushik said they aren't releasing the amount of funding to date, but he noted that it is "significant" and will help assure that "PubliCola is going to be around for some time to come."

Singh

“PubliCola is taking a unique approach with the best of independent journalism on a local level.” Singh said in a statement. “In the era where the news is filled with stories about  the end of newspapers, PubliCola is poised to be a leader in the future of news.” 

Feit, who remains majority owner of the startup, said that Singh's tech and business expertise will "be critical to our growth.” With the new cash, PubliCola plans to broaden its coverage beyond politics and public affairs.

"We've been a scrappy operation to this point, and we expect to stay that way for some time to come," notes Kaushik in an email. "We are going to be patient, and we are certainly not going to make the mistake that other internet startups have made in the past, expanding too fast and blowing through a pile of money before we are assured that we are on a sound business footing. Our focus is not only on creating a news web site that has broad appeal to readers, but on one that is profitable as well.

Singh also is joining the company's advisory board, which was formed last week. Members of that advisory group include former Seattle P-I editor Mark Matassa; club owner Linda Derschang; artist Ben Beres; and DJ Riz Rollins.

The new ownership team and advisory board plans to spend the next several weeks looking into new ways to broaden the focus of the site.

"There are going to be changes at PubliCola, but they will happen incrementally as we build our audience and revenue base," said Kaushik.