The battle for your address book: Will souped up contact apps monetize the data explosion?
[Editor's Note: Below, MobileBeat advisory board member Jason Devitt explains why we should care about new innovative address books. Not only are they key to a much better user experience, but they may greatly impact the way we pay to use our phones. He also looks at how different parties, from carriers to mobile startups, are approaching new address book services from opposing angles.]
There’s a battle brewing for control of your mobile phone’s address book…. Continue Reading
Jajah holds strong, dials up $2.8M to expand VoIP services
Jajah, a voice over internet protocol (VoIP) communication service, has taken in $2.75 million of an anticipated $5 million fourth round of funding, peHUB reports. The Menlo Park, Calif.-based company provides service to millions of users, much like competitors mig33 and Jaxtr. Last April it scored a deal with Yahoo to provide phone-to-PC calling capabilities to the 90 million people who use the search giant’s messenger product.
Jajah has seen impressive growth over the three years… Continue Reading
Yoomba latest in wave of VoIP closures
Yoomba, a Menlo Park, Calif.-based company that let users send and receive phone calls and instant messages through their email programs, has shut its doors, reports VentureWire — continuing the trend of VoIP consolidations and failures that has emptied a once crowded space (including still afloat Jajah and Broadsoft).
There was a fairly salient flaw in Yoomba’s business model — users could only call others who had downloaded the program, and its market share just wasn’t… Continue Reading
Cellity to beef up your contacts with Addressbook2.0
Mobile application developer Cellity aims to take your contacts to a whole new level on Dec. 16, when it publicly launches its Addressbook 2.0 for any phone that supports Java — not just smartphones. The application draws data from your email, social networks, standard contacts and even Twitter to give you a one-touch dashboard for all your connections, the company says.
After you import your friends from Facebook, MySpace and even Xing or LinkedIn, Addressbook 2.0… Continue Reading
In Beijing this summer? Use Jajah’s mobile Chinese-English translation service
Jajah, the Internet telephone company, today introduced a nifty English-Chinese translation service — perfect for English speaking tourists in China.
Called JAJAH.Babel, the service allows anyone in China to use their mobile phone to call a local number, speak in English and immediately let someone hear their message translated into Chinese Mandarin.
It’s perfect for cab rides during the Olympics this summer. If you get into a cab, and want to tell the Chinese driver to take… Continue Reading
Jaxtr raises $10 million to expand cheap international calls
Jaxtr now has a buck for every one of its users. The company has raised $10 million in a second round of financing to expand its cheap overseas internet calling business.
The Menlo Park, Calif.-based company uses a voice-over-internet-protocol service to knock the costs out of overseas calls. It can charge as little as 1 cent a minute for calls to China because of its unique system. It lets users advertise to an online community how… Continue Reading
Internet calling service Jaxtr growing
Updated
Jaxtr, a Silicon Valley company that offers Internet calling, is crowing about its growth rate. Five million people have used the service since it launched, up from half a million users in July, it says.
To be clear, this is not the same as its monthly active users, which the company didn’t disclose. So many users who experimented with the service once may be counted in its number, but may no longer be using the service.
Indeed,… Continue Reading
Jangl and Jajah, once rival web-calling companies, join forces
Online telephone services Jajah and Jangl have joined forces to overcome the large odds against them in the cut-throat, low-cost world of telephone calls.
Under their accord, the two sides will exploit Jajah’s wider infrastructure and Jangl’s growing user base on Web sites. The deal heralds a consolidation in the busy Internet telephone industry — which is filled with wannabe start-ups.
Jangl and Jajah have been scrappier than most. Jangl offers a white-label calling service on dating… Continue Reading
Roundup: Ebay stamps Jajah, iPhone a $1B ecosystem?, Verizon-Google spat, more
Here’s the latest action:
–Jajah gets shut out of eBay
–German cell-phone software vendor buys iPhone game maker
–Verizon secretly pressuring FCC Chairman to renege on wireless opening?
–Facebook advertisers are “selling shovels to other miners”
–Ballmer: Ads to make up quarter of Microsoft business
–Research firm Gartner predicts continuing chip-industry slowdown
–Google’s DoubleClick acquisition may face still more hurdles
Jajah gets shut out of eBay — This was pretty predictable. As reported earlier, Jajah released a button aimed to give small businesses… Continue Reading
Jajah releases free 1-800 number button
Jahah, the Internet telephone company, has introduced a new service that lets people call you from email for free with a one-click calling button.
This latest could be highly viral, especially for small businesses wanting the equivalent of a free 1-800 number.
The USAToday just wrote a piece looking at how these “J” companies — Jajah, Jaxtr and Jangl — embody the new Silicon Valley dot.com boom. (The story cites us at VentureBeat a few times. I’m… Continue Reading
Lypp, offering free conference calls
Lypp is a free group calling service that works with your existing landline or cellphone number, and launches a private testing version tomorrow.
It’s a nifty service. Free conference calls. So what’s the catch, you ask?
Nothing to start off with, except for a limited number of minutes: 500 a month.
Here’s how it works: You initiate calls with instant messenger (AIM, iChat, GTalk, Jabber, MSN or Yahoo), from the Web or on your phone, and Lypp will… Continue Reading
Jajah stays scrappy on VoIP, mobilizes Indian masses
Jajah, as we’ve mentioned several times, remains among the edgiest of the new Internet telephone companies.
Today, the company seeks to mobilize users in India, offering them free calls if they get five other people to register for the service. Some 100 million Indians have both an Internet connection and a real phone, which are necessary to use the service.
The merits of viral strategy appear obvious considering such marketing has worked well for Internet companies such… Continue Reading
Roundup: Free calls via texting, Mr. Wong takes on Delicious, Facebook’s growth and more
Here’s the latest action:
Free mobile calls, via texting — An Ottawa company called bOK is using VOIP to give Canadians free mobile calls, using SMS. Here’s how it works: You send a text message with your contact’s phone number to bOK, and, just like better-known JaJah, bOK calls both parties — voila, free incoming call!
The service is temporarily free for any phone number in the U.S. and Canada. Anyone with a US-based phone plan, though,… Continue Reading
Jajah offers way to avoid iPhone long distance charges
updated
Jajah, the Internet telephone company, has created a version of its service especially for the iPhone, and claims to the easiest way to avoid paying the punishing surcharge for iPhone international calls.
AT&T charges $4 a month just for the right to make international calls. Then, if you want to call London, you’ll have to pay 23 cents a minute. With Jajah, it is three cents a minute, and you don’t need to pay a surcharge.
We’re… Continue Reading
Deutsche Telekom invests in Jajah, the VoIP company
Jajah continues to be the VoIP company with chutzpah.
It has just scored a major backer: Deutsche Telekom, which on a revenue basis may be the largest telecommunications company in the world. It’s a big ally for Jajah, the small Mountain View upstart that is barely a year old, but which wants to make a run on Skype and other Internet telephone providers.
Deutsche Telekom, Germany’s largest carrier, has joined the $20 million investment in Jajah that… Continue Reading
Jajah gets $20M, and Intel patent to take on Skype
Jajah, the Internet telephone company living up to its “scrappy” reputation, has just pulled in $20 million from the venture capital arm of giant chip maker Intel and others.
This is a big endorsement for the young company, which goes up against a multitude of competitors. It now plans to target Skype, armed with a valuable patent it will borrow courtesy of Intel.
Jajah also signaled it is about to obtain funding from a major telecommunications company… Continue Reading
Jajah brings free calls to Germany and Austria
We’ve called Jajah, the Mountain View Internet phone upstart both quirky and scrappy.
It remains so. It has just cut some deals that will let people call for free to anyone with a landline, even if those people aren’t registered with Jajah. For now, Jajah is doing so only in two European countries, Germany and Austria, which have a combined population of 110 million people. If it makes money there — and it says it… Continue Reading
Roundup of best Silicon Valley news: YouTube, FON, Ning & more
Catching up:
YouTube is making $7.5 million a month –Everyone has been guessing whether YouTube is profitable, given the high costs it faces hosting all its videos. This guy says YouTube is doing $7.5 million a month in ads, and is profitable.
FON, the company that wants to encourage people to share their WiFi routers, having problems? — The general manager of US division has left. We’re beginning to think this Fon idea my be too clunky to fly…. Continue Reading
Jajah grabs attention with free mobile calls
Updated
Jajah, a Mountain View VoIP start-up that began offering free phone calls in June, has gone one better. It is now allows free calls from your mobile phone.
It just launched the service at DEMO.
Jajah is a scrappy, quirky company. It can, without warning, cut off calls if you talk too long. But Jajah may be one to watch nonetheless — because it works so simply and for free. And it is raking in the dough,… Continue Reading