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06:19 PM Monday, June 16, 2008
Jun
16
Mon
Experticity, the Seattle based sales closing platform currently part of the MS Accelerator Program is, well, accelerating, in market traction and customer adoption. Experticity enables service businesses (retail, banking, other) to deliver live, on-screen sales-closing and support agents, to customers in-store, on-line and on-the-go (mobile). Imagine you are lost in a store, looking for help in say, plumbing. You touch a screen and it routes you to a live on-screen plumbing expert. You see and speak with the expert through live two-way video and audio. The expert pushes content to the screen, answer questions, closes the sale, and then moves on to the next customer wherever they are located. When you get home and have further questions, you can go back on-line and get the same live on-screen customer service in home through the retailer’s website.
Experticity’ sales closing platform, delivers live, multi-language front-line staff and content. Remote-based staff in one market or call center help overworked staff in another, load-balancing staff from anywhere to anywhere, across time zones. Boston or Birmingham home-based employees can serve in Atlanta one minute and in Anchorage the next, based on customer demand, delivering consistent, higher quality customer service and sales. As service businesses look for ways to improve deteriorating customer experience, increase sales and contain costs at the same time, Experticity offers a platform which delivers all three.
In the June’08 Chain Store Age Magazine, James Pelrine, Staple’s six-sigma black-belt and manager of process improvement reported dramatic results from their deployment. Video-Agent™, Staples’ trademarked term for Experticity, has reduced delivery of customer print jobs from seven days to less than 48 hours, with substantially reduced errors. Besides contributing to stronger store sales, the units are also lessening the impact of a severe labor shortage in the area. Pelrine states “Every retailer understands the difficulty of hiring, training, and replacing product specialists. With [Experticity], we can sell more specialized products and services and share those product specialists in real-time with other stores,” with a 6 month expected ROI.
With gas prices rising above $4/gallon, it now takes an average starting front line employee more than three hours of work simply to pay the full cost of driving to work. This will make staffing these front line jobs even more difficult. With Experticity, Enterprises can tap home-based and offshore workers to work the front lines reducing both labor cost and carbon emissions. Manufacturers, who are finding they can’t get the product support on retail front-lines that they need, are also embracing Experticity as a “virtual in-store demonstrator, with better coverage, customer experience and costs. For these reasons, enterprises are now embarking on Experticity pilots in almost every retail vertical. And interest and momentum is growing beyond retail, as airlines, banks and even industrial parts suppliers seek ways to deliver service, better, cheaper, faster.
With Experticity’s recent release of their “@Home” platform, it can now enable web-sites (think etailers, travel sites, health care, financial services sites) to more effectively close sales and offer support. According to D.L. Baron, President and CEO of Experticity “ The web is great tool for enabling transactions, but selling doesn’t begin till someone says no – everything else is simply taking the order. With cart-abandonment numbers of 50-90%, a lot of people are saying no. And while click-to call and click-to chat solutions are better than nothing, it’s like a blind person talking to a blind person. There is no nuance or context, which is critical to effective selling. Experticity is to chat as high-def TV is to telegrams. Once you have experienced Experticity, chat seems hopelessly archaic”. Experticity has delivered major sales increases, improvements in customer satisfaction and cost reductions. Expect to see Experticity coming to a store, web-site and/or factory floor near you.
Company Facts:
Management Team - DL Baron CEO, Matt Scoble - VP of Business Development
Location - Seattle, Washington
See more information at http://www.experticity.com
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11:33 PM Tuesday, June 10, 2008
Jun
10
Tue
I just started to engage with a cool vertical company - Canopy Financial based out of San Francisco. This company provides a 100% .NET SaaS solution to connect the healthcare and financial services industries. Their core product is a complete set of healthcare banking services for both consumers and businesses. Their product HealthDIrect is a platform for account management and administration for Health Savings Accounts (HSAs), Flexible Spending Accounts, Health Reimbursement Arrangements (HRAs) etc. Their product handles business processes such as eligibility, account management, claims submissions, reporting, analysis etc.
The company was founded in 2004 by executives from Fair Isaacs, United Health Group and American Express. They already have an impressive set of customers in a very short period of time including Wachovia , Fifth Third Bank, Soverign Bank among others. They are currently serving over 45 Financial institutions.I will be working with the management team over the next few months to get more visibility within our Financial Services vertical. See more about this company at http://www.canopyfi.com
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01:44 PM Thursday, June 05, 2008
Jun
05
Thu
StoreXperience is an innovative company I have discussed in previous blogs that’s building a Personal Mobile shopping assistant application for consumers with mobile phones and devices. Their technology is based 100% on Microsoft’s technologies, leveraging platform products like Microsoft Performance Point, Dynamics, SQL Server among others. They are an example of how the Microsoft Emerging Business team in collaboration with our Global sales force work together to accelerate the growth of innovative companies. I teamed up with Kevin Kerr, Worldwide Technology Strategist in Worldwide sales, to manage their incubation and eventual exposure to the marketplace.
According to CEO Herve Pluche, he saved two years of cost by his engagement with both Microsoft Emerging Business and our Global sales force. See his testimonial in the following video (transcript below):
Video: Microsoft Startup Accelerator Program
HERVE PLUSH: Hello, everyone. I'm Herve Plush. I'm the president and founder of StoreXperience. We engage with Microsoft on the Accelerator program back in August of 2007, and I have to say that what we've accomplished over the past eight months, through the partnership with Microsoft, is probably what would have taken two years without the support of Microsoft.
Now, before I drill on the Microsoft support, let me tell you a few words about what we do.
In essence, we create interactivity between the consumer at the point of sales and the store and the brand. So, we allow the store and the brand to give you the information you need, through your mobile device, to make an educated decision as to what you're going to buy at the point of sales, and we give you a financial incentive to buy it now as opposed to wait until tonight or tomorrow to buy online. So, we are the anti-commerce solution for traditional stores and brands.
Now, focusing on the Startup Accelerator program, it offered us really two primary benefits. One was access to cool technologies. We build an application that relies on fundamental technology building blocks, and Microsoft has such a wide array of technologies that are compatible, that we were able in just a few months to build a business solution that leverages many of these technologies. So, that was really one of the primary benefits of the Accelerator program.
The other benefit, which is probably even more important for a startup, is market exposure. It's relatively easy for people that have typical skills to come up with great technical solutions, but very quickly you get to a point where you have to gauge market interest for the solution that you've built. You have to appear on the radar screen and collect feedback from the market as to how valuable that solution is. Thanks to Microsoft, we were given an opportunity to be an exhibitor at the annual convention of the National Retail Federation in New York. So, here we are six months after we built our solution, presented to our industry, the retail industry, and that was amazing feedback. In less than two days we generated 200 leads, and that was really for us a catalyst, an accelerator in terms of market penetration.
So, fantastic support and value in terms of access to cool technologies, and access and exposure to the market, that allowed the company to validate its offering and position, find a sweet spot in the marketplace. So, that was quite amazing. And honestly, I couldn't think of a better partner, a partner that gives you the tools, and gives you the market support and exposure to our target market, which is the retail market. So, these are the two main components; not mentioning how fun it is to work with people that wear the Microsoft company tag. That's the cherry on the cake.
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01:37 PM Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Jun
04
Wed
A couple of months ago, I hosted a roundtable in the Silicon Valley between Venture Capitalists and senior executives of our Health Solutions Group. At this roundtable, the Health Solutions group unveiled to investors for the first time their partnership strategy around HealthVault - Microsoft's consumer Health store platform.
As I mentioned in one of my previous blogs, Microsoft is expecting ISVs to build innovative applications on top of this data platform to empower consumers to be more proactive about their own healthcare.
One such company I have recently came across is BiancaMed, a new startup out of Dublin, Ireland with a focus on health and wellness monitoring in the home. BiancaMed's particular focus in the analysis and measurement of sleep and breathing. The company has developed a unique patented non contact bio-motion sensor technology (LifeSense).
This sensor is coupled with cell-phone and web technology to provide a complete technology platform (LifeMinder) for automated remote monitoring of sleep, breathing and related markers of health such as activity, exercise, blood pressure, blood glucose and weight. They have already launched an FDA-approved home sleep apnea screening product (LifeScreen Apnea) in partnership with Spacelabs Healthcare. In addition, the initial products and services offered by the company are
- A consumer-level baby monitor which reassure parents that their baby is breathing
- A turnkey solution for pharmaceutical companies to provide automated sleep monitoring in clinical trials
The product pipeline includes products to address home sleep apnea diagnostic testing, chronic disease management of heart failure and COPD, and consumer-oriented connected wellness. All of their connected health platforms are enabled by using a cell-phone based platform (Java midlets) which collects and receives data from a number of personal health devices (SleepMinder, blood pressure, glucose, weight, oximetry, etc.)
This company is exactly the kind of company Microsoft will like to build on top of HealthVault. I will be working with CEO Conor Heneghan over the coming months to accelerate the adoption of Microsoft based technologies and HealthVault.
The company is a privately held limited company. It raised a Series A investment round in October 2006 of €2.5 million, funded by DFJ ePLanetVentures and ResMed. Check out more info about the company at http://www.biancamed.com
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01:17 AM Wednesday, June 04, 2008
Jun
04
Wed
Over the last fiscal year, I have had the pleasure of working the management team of Xterprise - a very innovative company based in Dallas, that extends Microsoft's core products to bring RFID technologies to enterprises. Xterprise provides a solution across vertical industries for enterprises looking for more efficient ways to manage their business.
More specifically, Xterprise extends Microsoft's BizTalk product to transform companies into what CEO Dean Frew calls a "High Definition Enterprises". In other words, enabling enterprises to have precise, current, real time and insightful information about all aspects of their business.
Dean Frew and his team anticipated this future need in enterprises early enough and built a suite of compelling extensions to Microsofts core products, compelling enough for the product group to select Xterprise as one of the first few companies in the world to participate in the Microsoft Biztalk 2006 Technology Adoption Program (TAP). The Microsoft TAP programs allows a select group of ISVs to use products before they are commercially released. This allowed Xterprise to have an early entry into the marketplace with their iGPS (Intelligent Global Pooling Systems) solution which has now resulted in the second largest UHF RFID deployment in North America.
The traction the company has had with Microsoft global field sales over the last year has been very impressive. The company continues to grow rapidly and have had big wins at across different vertical industries including Oil and Gas, Automotive and Retail. Well known enterprises like Continental AG, Exonn Mobile and Pepsico are some of the companies that have embraced their solution. I expect more explosive growth from this company over the next few years with the assistance of Microsoft Global sales organizations who have all expressed lots of excitement about their offerings and the impact its having on some of Microsoft's largest customers.
Xterprise are currently in the Microsoft Accelerator program and will have a dedicated Microsoft business development and sales team working with them in FY09. Check out more information about them at http://www.xterprise.com
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12:28 AM Thursday, May 15, 2008
May
15
Thu
During the course of this fiscal year, I have worked with a number of very innovative companies building applications targeted a vertical markets. These companies showcase how Microsoft technologies can be used to create game changing solutions that can transform an industry. One such company is DriveCam, a cool company that has created a set of web based software and tools that capture, transmit, analyze and report key details of driving. A palm-size video and recording device is mounted behind the rear view mirror in a vehicle and captures what is happening inside and outside the vehicle. Saved event files are transmitted to DriveCam's analysis center via Wi-Fi or a cellular connection and stored in a server (Windows Server 2003).
The entire product is built using the latest Microsoft technologies - .NET, Windows Server and SQL Server 2005. I recently enrolled DriveCam into the Accelerator program and currently assisting CIO Tom Fisher leverage some of the latest features of the upcoming SQL Server 2008 release. Car insurance companies are currently trying to attract young drivers to sign up for their insurance policies using DriveCam's solution as an incentive. Their solution is currently installed in 85,000+ vehicles in North America, Europe, Australia, Asia and Africa. The Wall Street journal recently had an article on DriveCam which you can read here
Company Facts:
Location - San Diego California
Investors - Menlo Ventures, JMI, ICP and Insight Ventures
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11:39 PM Friday, May 09, 2008
May
09
Fri
Unleashing the power of the mobile internet, fring™ is a community and service that enables users to talk, chat and interact with other fring users and their favourite online communities & services, all from their mobile devices.
Originating from a vision of freedom, fring was born out of a desire to fundamentally change the way people communicate. fring users, or fringsters™ enjoy true mobility without the boundaries that have traditionally existed between the mobile and fixed internet worlds. Launched in Feb 2007, fring already growing more than 100,000 new registrations per month and has users in 160 countries around the world, with no one country accounting for more than few percentages of traffic.
fring™ facilitates free and low cost calls over the mobile internet connection and live instant message chat - instead of SMS - to each other and their communities. Integrating all buddies into one, searchable list, fring also displays real-time presence indicators (online, away, offline, in-a-call, on their mobiles or in front of their PCs) and enables users to quickly swap music tracks, pictures, video clips and other files between each other, from mobile-to-mobile and mobile-to-PC.
Developed specifically for the mobile environment, fring's unique hybrid peer-to-peer/client-server architecture reduces battery consumption and bandwidth usage, permitting optimal functionality even on low-end devices. Maximizing the handset’s internet capabilities, Fring connects via GPRS/3G (using the data within an existing data subscription plan rather than traditional cellular airtime minutes) or through WiFi at home, in the office or any hotspot, making the mobile calls themselves completely free. Fring can be set to automatically switch between the best available connection type.
Fringsters can even make low cost local and international calls to landline and regular cellular numbers using their existing SkypeOut/SkypeIn accounts or almost any internet voice service (SIP), even from non SIP-enabled handsets.
Available via a simple download of a thin client and installation process, fring is a consumer-centric application that does not require a PC or any dedicated hardware or airtime. All that’s needed to use fring is one of over 400 compatible handsets with internet connectivity and an internet data package or a WiFi account.
Company Facts
Location – Headquartered in Tel Aviv, Israel with marketing representation in the UK, Germany, Benelux, Finland, France, Russia & South Africa via onsite agencies
Stage – Beta
Funding – fring is backed by US-based venture capitalists North Bridge Venture Partners and by Venfin limited, Israeli venture capital funds Veritas and Pitango, and Yossi Vardi, as a founding private investor.
Team – Avi Shechter, CEO; Alex Nerst, Founder and Chief Technological Officer; Boaz Zilberman, Founder and Chief Product Architect; the fring team count for 50 proud employees
For recent press about fring, please visit:
http://www.fring.com/newsroom/in_the_news/english/
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02:35 PM Tuesday, May 06, 2008
May
06
Tue
Microsoft Auto is a new product group at Microsoft I have been engaged with over the last several months. The goal of this team is to provide a connected experience in cars for consumers. Two way data connectivity will allow consumers to get access to the internet and services while in their cars. The team introduced the first product SYNC with Ford last year and has been a very big hit for Ford which was struggling and has helped them connect with younger buyers. With that success, other Automotive Manufacturers are jumping in on the action.
Today, Microsoft just announced an agreement with Hyundai Motor company in South Korea to build a music and information system in their cars to debut in 2010. The product will be a voice controlled system linking mobile devices to car stereo systems eventually including multimedia and navigation systems. Essentially, the same applications and services that are being targeted on mobile devices today are applicable to an operating system in the car while driving. Imagine being able to tell your navigation system to take you to the nearest Starbucks, give you access to the latest traffic information, find you the nearest available parking etc. Better still, seamless integration between the mobile device and the in car system is essential.
See the latest announcement on the new Microsoft-Hyundai partnership here.
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06:12 PM Thursday, April 17, 2008
Apr
17
Thu
Yesterday the Emerging Business team had the pleasure of hosting VCs at our Silicon Valley campus at our first roundtable on Microsoft's investments in the Health Care space. Distinguished members of the new Health Solutions Group ( a product team formed about 2 years ago) gave a hearty pitch to VCs about our new suite of platform products and opportunities for VCs to invest in the Microsoft Healthcare ecosystem.
The center of the pitch was around HealthVault, which is a free web based platform that enables patients to store and share information with hospitals and physicians using enhanced security and privacy measures. The team was careful to point out that HealthVault is NOT a PHR (Personal Health Record) System - which is what Google is building. Rather its a way for individuals to store and share their health information. Its a shared data platform that allows multiple applications to work with a persons Health Data, attempting to integrate the silos of consumer data that typically exists in duplicate forms across many different entities in the Health care ecosystem (Hospitals, Health plans, employer databases, pharmacies etc).
The event had three sections: an introduction to the charter of the Health Solutions Group by Nate McLemore, Director of Business Development; an Overview of HealthVault by Grad Conn, Sr Director of Product Marketing and finally the Health Vault Partner Strategy by Bill Ried, Director of Platform Strategy. Grad Conn's description clarified a lot of questions in my mind about what HealthVault is - not a PHR - but used an analogy to PayPal. Its an enabler system - which can be customized by application providers into many cool healthcare apps - and will only be visible by the HealthVault logo - similar to how Paypal enables payments in lots of different apps and is only visible through the logo. Finally Bill Reid talked about the opportunities for partnership with Microsoft and showed demos of many different application ideas for VCs to think about.
They also talked about the Be Well Fund - which is a $3million dollar fund available in total for non profit institutions to build cool Healthcare apps on top of HealthVault. The team is currently looking at proposals - so if interested - please submit your proposals to the HealthVault team before the end of the month - and winners will be announced at the Health Vault partner conference in May.
We had a lunch networking session where VCs could interact, get up close and personal with many members of the Health Solutions team, ask questions and exchange information. Most VCs I talked to found the event very useful. Our team hosts roundtables like this on different market spaces every few months in several locations around the world. If you are a VC, look out for invitations to these events as you will find the insight very useful. For more information please go to the HealthVault website at http://www.healthvault.com or contact me and I will be happy to give you pointers.
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07:16 PM Thursday, March 20, 2008
Mar
20
Thu
Watch While You Wait, Don't Wait While You Watch
Bamboo MediaCasting is a cool Israeli emerging company that provides the first “DVR” like application for mobile phones . Their solution set provides innovative solutions and support services for mobile content delivery. I met CEO Guy Morag, a great guy recently at the World Mobile Congress in Barcelona. I think his company has one of the coolest apps I saw at the show. With Bamboo MediaCasting, carriers and service providers automatically push delivery of rich-media content that users experience with maximum convenience and crystal-clear quality:
Push – Bamboo MediaCasting delivers regular and episodic rich-media content to
subscribers in the background or during off-peak hours
Store – The pushed content is automatically stored in the phone’s memory giving you
a crystal-clear video and audio experience.
-No streaming or downloading; no WAP.
-Independent of the service connection; available anywhere – underground or on a
plane.Easy replay and social elements - show to a friend, share the experience, etc.
Play – When the consumer is ready for their regular dose of subscription programming,
they just click play and the show starts immediately.
Bamboo MediaCasting is like DVR for your phone:
- Tell it what you want
- The content gets delivered and stored
- Watch or listen when you’re ready, as many times as you want
Their application consists of a cool graphic user interface which engages mobile customers with rich-media such as video clips of sports highlights or previews of their favorite TV shows regularly and with great quality. With Bamboo MediaCasting, consumers watch while they’re waiting. They don’t wait while they’re watching. Users simply select the content they wish to receive either daily or weekly and the Bamboo software delivers the content to them in full-track form on a regular basis, eliminating the need for the user to always browse the Internet on the their phone in order to view content.
What makes their solution unique is their delivery approach. The service is easy to use and automatically pushes a self-selected mix of video and audio entertainment to the user's mobile phone, where it is stored for play at a convenient time and place. The company has paid a lot of attention to the user experience and features intuitive and adjustable controls for the service.
Alternatives to the Bamboo MediaCasting model for video and audio content include streaming, downloading and PC sync. Each of these methods has their deficiencies – mostly related to bandwidth issues, annoying browsing on a mobile device - and most importantly they require significant effort on the part of the user. On a home computer in a comfortable chair, while in a thermostat-controlled house or office, asking a user to navigate several web pages and wait for a download makes sense; much less so for a mobile user on a mobile device (small screen, no keyboard, inherent device limitations that will hardly change). Bamboo Media Casting provides a “white-label” solution to mobile carriers and operators. Key customers to date are France Telecom owners of many Orange companies such as Orange UK and Orange France. Their product Silverstripe is a client – server solution with clients running on various handsets and platforms. SilverStripe uses .NET (C#) and native code for Windows Mobile devices, J2ME for Java only handsets and Symbian code for Symbian handsets.
Their solution offers several models for advertising including full sponsorship of service, per-channel or per-program. Ad campaigns are very targeted based on the subscribers mix of channels and this data can be used to make the ads more effective to the advertiser and interesting to the subscriber.
Potential Strategic Microsoft Partnership Possibilities:
Bamboo MediaCasting can enable Microsoft to provide a 'lean back' experience on mobile phones for its consumers who regularly engage with Microsoft's web content assets as a natural extension to the web experience. Bamboo MediaCasting provides their solution on multiple platforms, including Windows Mobile and others. The solution functions as a native cross platform Microsoft Internet content bridge, allowing its consumers to easily and intuitively mobilize on-line content and consume Microsoft media on a regular basis.
Microsoft could also possibly extend its mobile advertising offering by utilizing Bamboo technology as a rule-based caching ad engine. Video ads will be served with perfect quality on any Microsoft mobile application, with full segmentation and reporting. Get more information at http://www.bamboomc.com
Company Facts
Location – Kfar Saba, Israel
Stage – Seasoned Startup with paying customers
Funding – $16M invested in Round A and B
Team – Guy Morag, CEO; Avi Marinstrauss, VP Sales; Meir Fuchs, VP R&D
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12:20 PM Thursday, March 06, 2008
Mar
06
Thu
Skoots (formally AutoBid Systems) made a big splash at this years National Automotive Dealer Association (NADA) conference in San Francisco this past week. Readers to my blog may recall I discussed their innovative solution which is set to transform the way consumers shop for cars and also make it easier for thousands of dealerships worldwide to make their inventory visible to an unlimited audience. Automotive News have just picked them as one of the top 10 (they made #5 on the list) of innovative companies at the conference. I am currently working with the Skoots management team on a Silverlight implementation of their product which is coming soon and will be even cooler! See the article below and see my prior blog about this company here
10 cool dealership technologies found at NADA
Ralph Kisiel
Automotive News | March 3, 2008 - 12:01 am EST
SAN FRANCISCO — Thousands of dealers roamed the exhibition floors here at the National Automobile Dealers Association Convention & Exposition, looking for everything from software to carwash equipment.
Computer services, Internet services and customer relationship software vendors accounted for about a third of the 700 vendor booths spread out in three halls of the Moscone Center. It's an open marketplace of technology that will help dealers keep their customers and sell more vehicles.
Here are some cool technologies that I found while walking the halls.
5. More than 200 dealerships are now allowing customers to electronically negotiate the sales price of a new or used vehicle by using LIVEoffer and eNegotiate from Skoots Inc. For the dealership, it's all automated. A consumer can use this to negotiate without human interaction. Dealers establish a hidden floor price on their vehicles in stock.
Want to see it in action? The Checkered Flag automotive group in Virginia Beach, Va., calls it "Make My Deal" and features the option at www.checkeredflag.com.
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04:48 PM Monday, March 03, 2008
Mar
03
Mon
One of the most obvious trends I observed at the World Mobile Congress were startups that are beginning to interweave entertainment like TV and games with mobile social networking themes. One company I met that I think have a really standout solution is Ammeon.
Ammeon is a privately held startup that provides of mobile broadcast, multicast, interactive services and communities. Based in Ireland and privately funded, the company has a product Commune which is a complete social broadcast/multicast platform, combining interactive mobile TV with social networking. The Ammeon solution provides a space where communities can watch exclusive scheduled TV content, upload their own video contributions, chat with friends, interact with competitions and polls and purchase related content.
Their suite also include:
Commune Studio , a Web-based user interface that provides a community management set of tools for creating, managing and scheduling content, with simple drag and drop capabilities to create nice interactive layouts;
Commune InterAct - enables the delivery of interactive mobile communities or "community channel spaces". Users can subscribe to a number of community spaces based on community themes. These spaces contain professional and user-generated content with members enabled to upload their own content and own their own channel.
The client from my recollection is built in Java/J2ME - however companies like this will have a strong value proposition to Microsoft if they embrace Silverlight for mobile in the future. This will enable them to continue delivering their current applications and value cross plaform and be a Microsoft strategic partner. Check out more information about this company at http://www.ammeon.com
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12:45 PM Thursday, February 28, 2008
Feb
28
Thu
One of the best ISVs I saw at the World Mobile Congress is a cool startup called Vyond. This Israeli startup creates mobile virtual world experiences on the mobile phone. The company has a platform which can allow users to create avatars, virtual communities, play games, purchase mobile content and enable social networking within a 3D environment. This company is one of the first startups I have seen to introduce Second Life experiences in the mobile world. The company white labels its technology through partners and unlocks the true potential of next generation handsets. "End users and consumers will benefit from the ever evolving immersive 3-D environment containing a suite of entertainment and social networking features" the company says on its website.
The company is trying to target content partners looking for new and innovative ways to introduce their content, in this case via mobile virtual worlds. Their platform also has the capability for the purchase and distribution of different types of mobile content including ringtones, wallpaper, games and more. They are also looking to attract advertisers offering them two options:
- Ad Placement – allowing advertisers to place ads in designated areas including billboards, posters etc
- Sponsorship – an advertiser could choose to sponsor a specific region, enabling the placement of virtual products in that region and customize the overall appearance of that area.
How it works:
The companies has a small footprint, cross platform application that resides on the handset that when loaded connects to a server firm which downloads the appropriate content per region. The application can be distributed in various formats including WAP, SMS etc.
Check them out at http://www.vyond.com
Company Facts
Management Team – Adi Ashkenazy CEO & Founder, Amir Tertman, VP of Business Development
Location – Nes Ziona, Israel
Investors – Jerusalem Capital
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10:41 AM Saturday, February 23, 2008
Feb
23
Sat
Continuing my review of cool startups I saw at the World Mobile Congress - the next company I want to review is VIIF. VIIF is a German startup, potentially disruptive company that I was introduced to by investors, Neuhaus Venture Partners a German Venture Firm in Barcelona. I met the CEO Daniel Hoepfner who gave me all the scoop about the company. The company has taken advantage of the fact that most phones in Europe and Asia are now equipped to make video calls. However instead of using the functionality for a traditional video call, the call gets routed to a server on the other end which gives consumers access to on-demand TV and user generated video content. It works out of the box without any modifications of user’s mobile phone!
To access the service the user dials a phone number – like making a normal phone call. Instead of pushing the voice call button the user pushes the video call button. No browser usage, no special device, no software client download and no pre-configuration of the mobile phone are needed. As the user establishes a video call, the costs are independent of the transferred data traffic, the user simply pays per minute – as with a regular voice call.
When recording a video during a call, it is stored directly on the ViiF platform and is immediately available to other users. However, it is up the user whether to keep the stored video private or allow public. It also allows users to access and inform friends about the new video via an automatically generated SMS, including the call back number. Most Mobile TV ISVs we’ve seen offer broadcast TV. I like this because its content is on-demand and there the revenue model is simple – consumers will just be using their existing minutes… Check out more information at their web site http://www.viif.de
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11:05 PM Thursday, February 21, 2008
Feb
21
Thu
Freedom Shopping is a startup with a point-of sale solution aimed at enabling RFID technology to be deployed universally around the world. The core of their solution is a kiosk like system which will sit on isles in retail stores, supermarkets etc. Users are simply able to scan products quickly and go through checkout lines without any human intervention. Several supermarket chains have adopted this self check out style in Europe, however its poised to take off in America in a big way soon . Every retail store in the US from Walgreens, to Safeway to Best Buy needs one of these applications to improve the customer experience and efficiently track inventory and streamline their costs.
Freedom Shopping may be one of the first breakthrough startups for widespread adoption of RFID-enabled retail with a light application that operates on the edge of existing point of sale (POS) terminals. Coupled with pre-packaged hardware for reading RFID tags and RFID-reading security gates, an existing store can outfitted and operational in a day.
The company is 100% on the Microsoft stack and have built the product on Microsoft’s latest technologies including:
- BizTalk RFID platform
- Windows mobile/CE 5 & 6
- Windows XP & Vista
- Silverlight
- Microsoft SQL 2000/2005 & Management Studio/Tools
- MS Office
- MS Exchange Server
- Windows Server platform
- .Net Compact Framework 2.0
- .Net framework 2.0 & 3.0
- Visual Studio 6.0,2005, Orcas RC/Beta
Freedom Shopping’s application began operating in stores in 2005 and has over a million RFID transactions to date. The company also has seven pending patents covering RFID check out and related technologies. I will be working with the management team over the next few months to make sure they get the necessary technology and business development support from Microsoft as they expand the company and get more market traction. Check them out at http://www.freedomshopping.com
Company Facts
Location – North Carolina and Japan
Stage – Established product/market development
Funding – Private investors. Raising first institutional round
Team – Rob Simmons, CEO; Mike Daily, President; Kevin Kent, VP, Business Development
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