Zimbra co-founder invests in Dimdim’s open source web meetings

October 21, 2008 | Anthony Ha

Satish Dharmaraj, the co-founder and chief executive of Yahoo-owned communication company Zimbra, has made a personal investment in web meeting startup Dimdim.

Dharmaraj says he put his money into Dimdim because its technology complements Zimbra’s. Both offer open source software for different aspects of collaboration. Zimbra — which Dharmaraj sold to Yahoo for $350 million last year, and which he continues to lead from within Yahoo — offers a desktop client that incorporates email, documents, task management and more. Dimdim provides a basic suite of web meeting features which you can use for free (making it a more affordable alternative to web meetings products like WebEx and GoToMeeting).

It looks like there’s more news about Dimdim/Zimbra collaboration coming soon; in the long-term, a single product that incorporates Zimbra and Dimdim’s tools would be pretty cool.

The size of Dharmaraj’s investment was not disclosed, but he is taking a seat on Boston-based Dimdim’s board. Dimdim announced $6 million in venture funding back in June.

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About the Author, Anthony Ha

Anthony Ha writes about enterprise technology, cloud computing, tech policy, and random cool startups. Before joining VentureBeat in January 2008, he worked at the Hollister Free Lance, where he won awards from the California Newspaper Publishers Association for breaking news coverage and writing. Anthony attended Stanford University from 2001 to 2006, and now lives in San Francisco. Reach him at anthony@venturebeat.com.

  • The MarkTend team uses DimDim (DumbDumb name but one that is hard to forget) for our weekly team meetings. I have to tell you I am fairly impressed with the service and when they start to price it I will likely pay for it.

    Michael Kassing
    MarkTend.com
  • Yes, I'm a fan too. In my case, I'm usually not the one who sets up the web meetings, so I don't get to choose the service, alas.
  • Mike,

    Thanks for the kind words. Great men think alike. We use Dimdim for our meetings too.

    We have launched Dimdim Pro which is a paid service. I allows customization, 2 way video, and larger room.

    If you want to buy a Dimdim Pro room please click here - http://dimdim.com/registration/Dimdim_Signup.ht...

    Warm regards,
    ddg
    CEO
    Dimdim.com: Meet freely.
  • Cool, thanks.
  • DD,

    Its funny, I was just getting ready to setup the Wednesday meeting. I already worked your system into our functional business model due to the diverse locations that our team find themselves.

    Quick suggestion; BaseCamp + DimDim = Love

    Now we are talking about a service I would gladly pay much more for. Give me an online office where the team can come, talk, share, set tasks, hit milestone, and work together. Also, give it to me so I can afford it at a bootstrap price.

    In return, we will make sure no one infringes on the DimDim trademark (not likely to happen but Cheers on your registration today [2008-10-21 - Registered - Principal Register / Registration Number: 3519919 ]).

    Cheers,

    Michael Kassing
    MarkTend.com
  • Dave
    We use it all the time. Great service.

    Dave
    www.wrapmail.com
  • I should introduce my company this free web meeting tool...I bet they pay good money to Webex.