Archive of thenextweb.com
Written on 29th June 2009
0 COMMENTS 
Zee, Editor in Chief at The Next Web, Principal at WeDoCreative.
Today, Nimbuzz are celebrating and with good reason. The Dutch startup has become the first social messenger to see their application preinstalled by a Tier 1 Global Mobile Network, in this case, O2 Germany.
Its with thanks to an initially agreed partnership with Toshiba in February that the application was initially incorporated. With 25% of the 85 million mobile users in Europe, the deal is somewhat of a coo for Nimbuzz who will see their application pre-installed by one of the worldsleading mobile players, with potential for further integration into international markets.
Accessed via a central icon on the home screen the app integrates seamlessly (more…)
Written on 17th December 2008
11 COMMENTS
Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten, Serial Internet Entrepreneur
Last time I wrote (”Nimbuzz, coming to an iPhone near you“) about Nimbuzz they were adding 10.000 new members a day. It is not even 4 weeks later and now they are adding 20.000 new members a day.
It looks like Nimbuzz is on a roll!
Today they are announcing a major distribution deal with Indian based Spice Mobiles. India currently has 241 million Mobile Phone subscribers and Gartner expects those numbers to increase to 737 million by 2012.
India’s biggest Mobile Operator seems to be Bharti Airtel with 74 million subscribers. Vodafone is the fastest growing Mobile Operator with 23.5% of the market. They recently gained 1.2 million new subscribers in one month!
Spice Mobiles is a smaller but ambitious player which is owned by Idea Cellular and is estimated to have about 3.5 million subscribers right now.
Nimbuzz will soon come pre-installed on Spice Mobiles handset which are sold through their 25,000 retail outlets. The stores will also heavily market the Nimbuzz software with in-store Nimbuzz logos, links and service description on the Spice Mobiles website, and links to Nimbuzz on its WAP Portal. It is going to be pretty hard for Indian consumers to miss the Nimbuzz brand.
Complete Press Release:
NIMBUZZ SIGNS MAJOR DISTRIBUTION DEAL WITH SPICE MOBILES
Partnership brings pre-installed IM and Social Networking capabilities to Spice Mobiles users
(more…)
Written on 26th November 2008
4 COMMENTS
Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten, Serial Internet Entrepreneur
Nimbuzz, the free calls & universal chat solution from Rotterdam, has just launched an iPhone app. You can get it in the Apple iPhone store or download it here. Since they partnered with StudiVZ over 10 million people login per day (making it more popular than Skype???) and they add 10,000+ new users every day.
I downloaded the app on my iPhone and the integration with social networks (MSN, Yahoo, Facebook, Myspace, StudiVZ, Hyves) and Chat networks (MSN, Skype, Google Talk, ICQ) is seamless. Just enter your account data for any network and all your contacts from those networks will show up. Calling/chatting with them is as easy as clicking their names.
The app also offers Landscape mode for chat which makes typing slightly easier when you are chatting. 
Written on 11th November 2008
3 COMMENTS
Patrick de Laive, Internet entrepreneur and co-founder of The Next Web Conference. Twitter: @patrick
The biggest social network in Germany, StudiVZ announced a partnership with Rotterdam based Nimbuzz.
Basically it comes down to this:
1. Nimbuzz enters a commercial partnership with social network StudiVZ (12 million users), bringing real-time web and mobile communication to their social networks.
2. They have agreed on a revenue share that will start generating income from adverts sold on StudiVZ in ‘09
3. Nimbuzz will add the following features to the StudiVZ community: location sharing, SIP calling, Personal Message and they have support for 11 languages.
Nimbuzz claims to grow at 10k registrations a day and they have a 25% active user base in over 200 countries worldwide. More distribution deals will follow.
It seems like Nimbuzz has found a way to tap into existing social networks in stead of building one of their own. I think that is a smart move. They have received over 25 million in funding from amongst others Mangrove and Holtzbrinck Ventures.
Update: Holtzbrinck gmbh, bought StudiVZ a couple of years ago. Aha…. that explains part of the deal. If you are wondering what to spend 25 million on finding on here is one example. Yes, it is a Nimbuzz sponsored Porsche. That explains the 10k sign-ups a day!
Written on 12th July 2008
2 COMMENTS
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
After using an oldtimer phone for too long, I feel liberated today due to my recent acquisition of the iPhone. Ok, I realize this might sound awkward, as the shiny object is one of the most lockedin devices of this era – yet some of the new phone possibilities just really turn me into an even happier guy than I normally am. The most recent example? Truphone’s latest iPhone app.
Truphone is a similar service like Nimbuzz, Fring, and a dozen of other mobile VoIP start-ups, and the first one to launch a VoIP application for the iPhone 3G. This is absolutely marvelous, as it allows you to save a stack of euros on calls abroad. Calls to any landline anywhere in the world are just 6 cents per minute, to mobile is 15 cents per minute. Note please that we’re talking about dollar cents here, so we basically get a 30 percent discount on the fare. On one condition though: you need to have access to wifi, as iPhone VoIP apps aren’t allowed to use 3G.
Screenshots from iPhone app store
After the simple activation process – confirm a call, login on the Truphone site, and validate email – I gave the app a shot. To keep it simple and clear, here’s a list of pro and cons.
Pro’s
- Truphones merges into the iPhone seamlessly, as it has almost the same UI as the iPhone’s phone application
- The sound quality is really good, sometimes crystal clear.
- Contacts are imported, so you can easily dial up your friends
- You get a four dollar credit to start with, thanks Truphone!
- A friend told me that when I called him with Truphone, he saw my regular number on the screen.
Cons
- When you receive a regular incoming call, your Truphone conversation is instantly killed
- Your elite contacts, “favorites”, aren’t imported
- No speaker phone option
Although the pro’s list is somewhat longer, the first con really sucks. I have to start every Truphone conversation with apologies, as the call might be terminated by an incoming call. Hence I won’t use the Truphone application for important calls abroad.
All in all, the Truphone iPhone app is a first good try and it will certainly help you to save money, especially when you live in Europe. Let’s hope they can find a way to stop those incoming calls, so Truphone can say they’re the iPhone 3G VoIP winner.
Written on 3rd July 2008
5 COMMENTS
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
Remember my ‘Wow!’ post about Nimbuzz last May? The Dutch mobile VoIP and IM start-up then launched a VoIP app that was compatible with more than 500 handsets which allowed free calling in 50 countries. I received a couple of comments on this lyric post, mostly from people who wondered why they should say other mobile VoIP clients like Fring and Truphone goodbye, and start using Nimbuzz. I figured that yesterday’s announcement about their second round of funding – $15 million from a round led by Naspers/MIH and Mangrove (known from Skype) – was a good excuse to dive a little deeper in that.
The Nimbuzz team relaxing
With 500k seed capital, a series A of $10 million in 2007, now another $15 million, 70 employees, and offices opening in Argentina and Brazil, there must be something special about Nimbuzz. Of course you could say they’re the prime example of a new bubble, but that would be a little too simple and cynical. So I’ve contacted Tobias Kemper from Nimbuzz to figure out what they offer that 129 other mobile VoIP start-ups don’t. Turns out it’s a rather technical story.
Kemper: “Fring is focused on 3G and Wifi, Truphone is trying to be more of an operator and isn’t free. And – as no one has understood this yet – we do buddy calling, we’re connecting existing communities. Fring also has buddy calling but nowhere near the seamless experience that we can offer, since we also work on GPRS and EDGE. Again, Fring does work on Edge, but not without credits such as SkypeOut.” Right.., so to sum it up: Nimbuzz has a broader reach as they support more mobile generations.
That’s a good thing, as Kemper told me they’re not just focusing on techies and early adopters – even though these groups are the only ones who know what mobile VoIP is about. Hence their effort to support to reach that number of 500 compatible handsets. Kemper: “We even work in more countries than Truphone with our dial in solution and had it since inception, whereas Truphone only came out with it last month and it seemed to be all the rage.”
As an expansion of their accessibility promise, Nimbuzz will soon launch a “Communicator” widget (terrible name, Kemper agrees) that allows visitors of your site and social profile or readers of your emails to connect to your phone, even if they’re not on Nimbuzz.
So to answer the questions of commenters like Travis and Bram, if you’re happy with Fring and Truphone, stay there. Though you might want to switch when Nimbuzz becomes more popular. I think they will, as they sincerely seem to focus on people who don’t own an iPhone or fancy Nokia phone. Yet we have to remember that the group with less-developed phones might not be interested in this whole mobile VoIP thing, as it’s hard to grasp. Also, the accessibility-mission has a major downside, with makes Nimbuzz – ironically enough – less accessible: the size of their app is around 1 MB – which is way too large. So that aspect needs some work.
Nimbuzz is currently expanding to Latin America and Africa, following the footprint of their investor Naspers/MIH – who already owns a stake in Mxit, a popular South African GPRS and 3G-based IM service. According to Kemper, Nimbuzz is “actively talking with operators and social networks to intergrate our solution and offer our features.” Sounds like they’ve no problems finding destinations for that 15 million.
Written on 12th June 2008
6 COMMENTS
Guest blogger, sharing views on The Next Web
This is a guest post by Charlie van de Kerkhof from the Ministry of Web Development
When you’re talking about German start-ups, you’re talking about Berlin. The city is booming. There are cheap offices and a bunch of angel investors of which one might help you to get that so-wanted lead investment. I learned this optimistic lesson at the TechCrunch UK/Twidox meetup yesterday. Mike Butcher had left London to find out how it feels to say ‘Ich bin ein Berliner’ and to meet 15 startups – all eager to promote their business. These are my personal highlights:
Undersigned and Chris from Hiogi
Hiogi – the community answers your questions
Hiogi is a mobile search service that is based on a knowledge community. You can ask anything via Twitter, SMS or email and receive an answer on your mobile. I’ve tried it and ask for the best pizza place near Senerfelderplatz. Within 10 minutes I had my answer and I must admit, it was a very good pizza. Hiogi has just released an open API which gives you acces to the latest questions and answers that were posted. Not surprisingly, these guys have received funding this year and won a couple of prices.
Hobnox – platform for professionals from the creative industry
Hobnox is an online music and video platform where users can watch, connect, collaborate and create. The Next Web has already written about this in May 2008. They are now busy with the community feature of their product where you can download and upload the music to the site and share it with friends.
Jimdo – a personal website for everyone
Jimdo is an online website builder. You can create your own JimdoFree-Page and add several modules to it – like a blog, guest book, photo gallery, etc. The team is now working on adding social modules like Open Social widgets. Jimdo is based in Hamburg and received the first round funding earlier this year. By the way, one of their most important competitors is Webnode, who presented on The Next Web conference. (more…)
Written on 13th May 2008
10 COMMENTS
Ernst-Jan Pfauth, editor in chief
The guys from Skype have a bad day today, as two mobile industry experts from a Dutch town called Rotterdam launched a mobile application that brings free mobile VoIP calling to 500 hundred different types of mobile phones. Wow! This means that users can make calls around 50 countries and just pay for their local data usage. So you’d better use a flat-rate data plan.
The new Nimbuzz mobile VoIP application works worldwide on Nokia Symbian Series 60 devices when connected using a 3G or Wifi network – with a Windows Mobile offering for release in June. For GPRS/EDGE connections, or when using Java-enabled phones, Nimbuzz also offers its “hybrid-VoIP” solution, which counts for the 50 countries.
Co-editors Boris and Patrick at Nimbuzz’s HQ in Rotterdam
Although the Skype-bashing part is the most interesting, I gladly tell you that Nimbuzz’s app also includes conference calling, instant messaging, chat and group chat, and photo and file sending across multiple IM communities, including Skype, MSN, Google Talk, Yahoo!, AIM, Jabber and ICQ, plus 23 social networks, including Facebook and Myspace. Founder Evert Jaap Lugt received VC and strategic funding since 2006 by Mangrove Capital Partners (Skype investor), Naspers/MIH (Tencent, Mail.ru, Gadu-Gadu, Mweb, Sanook, Tradus) and Holtzbrinck (StudiVZ).
My expectation that for a while, this service will remain a niche thing – they now have 500,000 beta users -, yet after some enthusiastic “you gotta try this” conversations, the masses might pick it up. I know that for a lot of people downloading and installing a mobile app is still little too much to ask, but when Nimbuzz users tell them they can call for free, they’ll probably give it a shot.
The most interesting question here is: what will Skype do? Launch a similar new-and-improved service? Might Nimbuzz become really successful and Skype’s mother company eBay take the advice of their ‘Disruptive Innovator’ Rolf Skyberg – make Skype the third pillar in the eBay empire -, then an acquisition could be in sight. Don’t you also just love to speculate about the next (mobile) web?
The Next Web Blog is closely associated with The Next Web Conference which is held annually in Amsterdam, The Netherlands. At this event speakers from all over the world come together to talk about, and show off, the future of the Web. (More info 
