RSS guru Niall Kennedy’s last day is coming up at Microsoft, where he has worked for the past five months as a program manager building a new online feed syndication platform for Microsoft's Windows Live division. He exits Friday, Aug. 18.

He plans to start his own company centered on a piece of software he developed before getting hired by the Redmond giant in April.

“I’m surprised no one else has done it yet,” Mr. Kennedy said.

So what’s Mr. Kennedy working on? The way he describes it, there is a sweet spot in the Web 2.0 world where a third party can build something unique that ties together the offerings of major services. He said he focuses on the “users in charge” view of the world and that his product would be aimed at consumers for their personal use. He wouldn’t elaborate further. He did drop a hint though: What he was working on would be in a space that large companies feared to tread.

“There are certain things independent companies can do that large companies cannot,” he said. “For instance, if you wanted to bridge all three of the search players—you can see that in Zillow.com, where they can use Google Maps, and Microsoft’s bird’s-eye views. Other companies couldn’t combine those technologies, and that’s an advantage I have in the marketplace.”

Before his stint at Microsoft, Mr. Kennedy had been a community manager at Technorati and was the product manager for search at NexTag. RedHerring.com recently caught up with Mr. Kennedy to talk about his Redmond departure and venture capital prospects.

Q: Would you work for Microsoft again?

A: A lot of things change in companies over the years. There may be something in the future they’re doing that’s exciting, and I’d use the same criteria I used to evaluate this opportunity; namely, is it the only place in the world to do it, are there pieces in place to do it, and are there good managers around me that I could work with?

Q: Now you’re going to build your own company. Presumably you’ve been in touch with the venture community?

A: I’ve been in touch with them about what we could work on. We’ve scheduled meetings. And I’ve had relationships with VCs for many months prior to Microsoft, when I was evaluating doing a startup before.

Q: So how was leaving Microsoft? Did you get a severance package?

A: There was no severance package. I asked management when it would make sense for my last day and let them know why I was considering leaving, and if they saw the situation changing in the near future. Then I made a decision.

Q: What went wrong there?

A: I wasn’t getting the headcount I needed to make the project work. There were people allocated that were pulled, and in the meantime I was able to deliver passive candidates to them. But when it got to the offer stage, they couldn’t make an offer.

Q: What are you looking for in the VC community?

A: I’m not looking to take in millions. I was looking for a $200,000-$300,000 bite first because what I want to build isn’t something that would need a huge capital infusion.

Q: You’ve contrasted elsewhere what it’s like being an intra-preneur, versus an entrepreneur. Care to elaborate?

A: At most companies, you have the general line of business pipes and then you also have a high-level executive slush fund. Those tend to back smaller projects that are the passions of the executives… and there are different pieces of the organizations that fall into the slush fund group versus P&L. It tends to work better when you operate with one high-profile person as your backer.

Contact the writer:SWolfe@RedHerring.com