5 Million

Jangl and TalkPlus On the Block

Doug Mohney — Sun, 11 May 2008 19:33:54 -0400

VoIP companies Jangl and TalkPlus are for sale, reports Om Malik. The VC community isn't interested in further funding the ventures, so it's time to close shop.

Jangl first offered anonymized online calling and then developed click-to-call VoIP widgets for social networking sites. The company raised around $9 million in venture funding, but the only way Jangl made money was through online dating sites; people will apparently pay to make anonymous phone calls to avoid psychos and stalkers. Jangl's senior management got snapped up by Jajah last week, so game over.

TalkPlus had raised $5.5 million in 2006. The company had provided a mixture of mobile UC functionality and low-cost long-distance calling, so you could call your mistress in Taipei using one virtual identity, the wife with another one, and use a third number for work purposes; a voice drop feature enabled the ability to make an MP3 voice through a phone number and then email it. There was also the ability to generate throwaway numbers a la AOL Phoneline.

Both companies have developed interesting technology, but the question becomes who might acquire it and how much someone might be willing to pay for it.

For more:
- GigaOm reports on Jangl and TalkPlus for sale.
- Michael Cerda's blog on Jangl and Jajah

Related articles:
Jangl rolls out ad-based VoIP widget
AOL Opens Up, Yahoo Outsources PSTN interfaces

Sonus Networks Reports 1Q Financials, Lots of Cash

Doug Mohney — Sat, 10 May 2008 20:54:37 -0400

Sonus Networks reports its financial results for the first quarter of 2008 were up as compared to last year and it squeaked out some net income on a GAAP basis as well.

Sonus revenues were $74 million, as compared to $71.1 million for the same period a year ago; net income on a GAAP basis was $600,000, much better than last year's first quarter GAAP net loss of $4 million. However, the last quarter of 2007 delivered $97 million in revenue and GAAP net income of $14.1 million.

The results include stock-based compensation and related costs, amortization of intangibles from the company's April 2007 purchase of Zynetix and some other bookkeeping adjustments. If you kick out the adjustments, non-GAAP net income for the quarter was $5.2 million. Investors aren't likely to worry too much because the company has piled up over $407 million in cash and investments, plus it has no debt.

Highlights include a new wireless access node, a centralized call routing database, the latest release to its IMS core architecture and serving over more than a million Carphone Warehouse Networks residential customers on its technology. Carphone Warehouse Networks estimates it will have 3.5 million broadband subscribers by 2010. (And Carphone just got a chunk of cash from Best Buy).

For more:
- Check out the Sonus Networks first quarter 2008 financial report.

Related articles:
Sonus Networks to acquire Atreus Systems

P&F: Nearly 8 Million Business VoIP Lines by 2012

Doug Mohney — Tue, 06 May 2008 17:44:48 -0400

Projections by Pike & Fischer’s Broadband Advisory Services say over 5 million U.S. businesses will use an Internet telephony line (i.e. VoIP) by 2010 and ramp to 7.8 million by 2012.

More importantly for carriers, revenues from business customers will triple over the next five years to hit more than $6 billion, P&F says in its “VoIP in the Business World: Market Forecast and Analysis” report. The biggest chunk of the market will be large enterprises with AT&T and Verizon likely to retain the biggest chare of these customers.

Smaller companies have fewer built-in resources and may take a bit long to adopt VoIP, but the sheer size of the SMB market has attracted a number of new entrants who are doing a better job selling into it.

Related articles:
Enterprise VoIP in 2008 an uphill battle
VoIP mobile users to hit 250M by 2012
Europe VoIP to reach 88 million