Enough about MAXroam and Cubic. Time to shine the beam at my old buddies at Jajah.
What a fantastic job they are doing with these buttons. Kudos to Frederick and the team. In the week that eBay acknowledge the mess at Skype -- although I have to agree with Alec, I think Skype has been a great success. The boys at Jajah do it again.
Piss off eBay and just get a pile of free publicity. And what do hits mean? Hits mean conversions to paying customers. And that's what it's all about.
Today is July 1st, Canada Day.
It's also the day I start my new gig. I'm joining Pat Phelan and his amazing team over at Cubic Telecom in Cork, Ireland. A lot of you might know Pat, he is very well known in the VoIP space and is the person behind AllFreeCalls (Yak4Ever), Roam4Free and the very widely read blog by the same name.
I met Pat while I was working at Jajah. What really struck me about him was his combination of clear vision and realistic focus on revenue generation. He intuitively knows what customers want, what they are willing to pay for and how much they will pay. I've been involved with startups for a long time. A lot of people focus on raising money to achieve their vision. Pat doesn't... he focuses on selling stuff. I can't tell you how refreshing this is.
I have been offered a few gigs since I left Jajah. None of them really got me excited. Two weeks ago I went to Cork and met with Pat's team. That got me really excited. What a great group of people. For me the team is everything. It doesn't matter what you do for a living, if you're with a strong dynamic team and you're having fun, any ambitious vision can become reality.
So what am I/we going to do?
Well I can't really tell you the specifics just now. We will launch our product in September and there is a lot of work to do before then.
However, what I can tell you about is Pat's vision. He wants a world in which you can pick up your mobile anywhere in the world and call anyone in the world for as long as you like and not worry about the price.
The real beauty is that the solution is not technical. No downloads, no special numbers, no websites. It's a simple service that anyone can understand yet surprisingly, nobody has done it yet.
Given my background and experiences over the last seven years I have seen just about every proposal in this realm and Pat's approach is the best I've seen. I'm so excited I can barely stand it!
We launched JAJAH Mobile Web today. Want to know more? Check out the video, it's me on the voice over:
Technorati Tags:
JAJAH, Mobile, Nokia, Blackberry, Treo, Windows Mobile, Money
In an earlier post I spoke about how I didn't really care about a new mobile from from Apple. I was wrong. I take it all back.
I want one!
This is what it will look like with JAJAH running on it ;-)
'Tis the season for silly predictions so I thought I would add mine.
Technology
1. Mobile operators won't change this year. Why should they? They have a cash cow and until they are forced by competition they won't do anything. Things that will force them to change are the services from companies like JAJAH (I work for JAJAH) and Truphone.
2. Dual-Mode handsets will proliferate but nobody will be able to use them because everyone is still looking at this issue from a technical perspective. What I mean is that until the industry begins to coordinate and cooperate nothing much will happen. You might have a Nokia E61 with Truphone running on it but that's pretty much useless if you walk into a hotspot and Truphone doesn't have a roaming/authentication agreement with the hotspot operator. The strength of GSM is all in the roaming framework. Until this is replicated in the SIP/Wi-Fi world we won't really see the sheer disruptive power of this service combination. I'm not expecting it in 2007. As a result item 1 above will remain true.
3. Because of item #2 Femtocells might get a look in. Many people have been talking about these but I have to state for the record that it was my good friend Michael Kuhlmann who first touted such an idea about 3-4 years ago. I won't disclose the full details of his idea but it would make a lovely complement to JAJAH's service.
4. Some entity will make a move on Research in Motion. It could be Private Equity and it could be Nokia but this is a great company and it's turning into a nice little cash-generating beast and I think with the Pearl they are onto something.
5. Apple will announce the... integrated home entertainment system. You might have thought I was going to say iPhone but although I'm in the wireless world I don't really care that much about it. It doesn't ease any pain I have. I'm actually quite happy with the innovative products that Nokia keeps bringing to the market. What I want, no *need*, is an integrated home entertainment system. The full shabang. Internet access, TV, movies, photos, music... all from the one box and all with one remote. I have to be able to use this thing without taking a 3 year degree. There is only one company that can do it -- Apple. It should be called the Fuji.
The World
1. Bush! I have no hope whatsoever for the man. This year means that it's one year closer to the next presidential election. I'm not sure who said this but it remains true: "...the US Presidency is just too important to only allow Americans to vote. We all need to get a vote this time around."
2. Gordon Brown becomes the UK Prime Minister and announces a troop withdrawal from Iraq. Otherwise he doesn't stand much of a chance in the next UK elections.
3. Warmest year on record yet again? What d'ya think? Global warming, is it for real? What a bloody stupid question that is. Of course it's for real. I guess it won't be until Miami is under six feet of water that people will seriously start recycling their Pellegrino bottles. Do you think Al Gore will run?
4. Valverde wins the Tour in 2007 and Man. U win the Champions League.
5. I'll actually get my kitchen reno finished ;-)
Look at this -- and I promise not to dwell on this and groan on and on so it will be my last post on the subject for a while. I'm driving from my Mum's house in Norfolk today and I had to spend two hours in the car so I though I would catch up with my sister in Hong Kong. I have JAJAH Mobile on my Nokia N70 so off I go and call her. (Just a note to the old bill if they're reading this. I was using a handsfree).
We chatted quite happily in total for nearly one and a half hours and it cost me $2.72 plus my Orange pay as you go connect fees on my mobile of £1.24. In US $ a total of $5.03. It's unbelievable! Really!
I'm back in the UK today. I'm off to Barcelona tomorrow to attend the ETRE conference followed by an MVNO conference. What's JAJAH up to?
Anyway, while I'm in Europe I get The Guardian everyday. What a dream. Great journalism, beautiful design and I love the new berliner format -- perfect on the plane, perfect on the train. I also discovered today that there is a Guardian blog that is highly acclaimed.
I'm writing this from the Surf and Sip hotspot at the Caffe Nero in Paddington. Surf and Sip is run by my great friend Rick Ehrlinspiel. If you need a hotspot try and use a Surf and Sip hotspot.
