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There
are currently two billion email accounts worldwide and 3.3 billion
people who own cell phones, yet less than 2% of these people get
email on their mobile phones. This is primarily because mobile email
is currently only available to people who can afford high-end smartphones
and expensive data plans. Furthermore, getting email on these phones
requires complex setup by IT personnel or phone company retailers.
Through market research that Funambol has performed, the company
has found that as more people get used to accessing the Internet
from their mobile phones, they are going to expect mobile email
on their device as well. Funambol also found that most people are
interested in accessing email on their phone if it worked on their
existing device, was easy to use and was free or low cost.
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| Private
Company, founded in 2001 |
| Markets
Served: Consumer, General Enterprise, Wireless Operators |
| Operating
Systems Served: Android, BlackBerry, iPhone, J2ME,
Linux, Mac OS X, Palm, Symbian, Windows Mobile for Pocket
PC, Windows Mobile for Smartphone, Windows XP / Vista |
| 2007
Mobile
Star Awards™
Winner: |
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| 2008
Mobile
Star Awards™
Entrant: |
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To solve
this need, Funambol developed an ad-funded mobile email solution powered
by open source software. This solution creates a BlackBerry-like mobile
email experience for the mass market. The marriage of open source
with a mobile advertising revenue model is the only practical approach
to putting mobile email into the hands of billions of users. Open
source enables mobile email to work on billions of mobile devices
- Funambol has been tested and works on more than 1.5 billion devices.
The ad-funded model enables service providers and mobile carriers
to provide mobile email for free while still generating significant
revenue throughout the mobile value chain. Through this method, Funambol
is blazing the trail and pioneering an entirely new category of free
ad-funded mobile services by offering a solution that provides a compelling
way to monetize mobile users by offering free mobile email that users
crave.
To make this solution a reality, Funambol has partnered with the mobile
advertising industry's heavy hitters. This past quarter, Funambol
announced partnerships with two of the largest mobile advertising
platform providers, Amobee Media Systems and Smaato. The resulting
mobile email solution that Funambol developed runs on commodity handsets,
makes push email easy to use and accesses the most popular email services,
such as Google's Gmail and Yahoo! Mail. The user's email client contains
a small banner ad, provided by Amobee and Smaato, which allows email
to be highly affordable or even free.
Meet
Funambol CEO
Fabrizio
Capobianco.
Recent
Funambol News on MobileVillage:
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