We have all heard about Texas suing Vonage over the whole issue of a 17-year-old not being able to make a phone call to the cops when her family home was being robbed. I guess, Texas is fair in saying that Vonage should have told that. Now most media reports indicate, and I personally checked it out, Vonage is quite upfront about 911, and lets customers know that they have to sign-up. It was actually on the dash-board the first time you sign-up. MIT Technology Review found out that indeed Vonage people let customers know about this right away. Continue »
Archive for March, 2005
Broadband Grows, Gear Doesn’t
Despite a growing demand for broadband, the equipment sales for all sorts of broadband gear will decline for near foreseeable future. Synergy Research Group forecasts that revenues of broadband gear is going to decrease 5.4 percent to $6.0 billion in 2005. By 2009, decreasing prices will cut the market to $5.2 billion annually, a CAGR of negative 3.4 percent. IMS Research forecasts nearly 400 million broadband users by end of 2009, up from 150 million at end of 2004. Asia is supposed to super charge the growth, primarily in new markets like China which are adopting DSL and its future variants quite aggressively. Continue »
DOCSIS 2.0 - Don’t Count Cable Guys Out
Its fairly fashionable to dismiss cable service providers and their HFC (and) coax networks, especially when compared to the new fangled fiber and copper-fiber hybrid network being planned by phone companies. In the near term cable guys are better equipped to handle the triple play offerings. (Though their lack of wireless offering is likely to become a headache for them.) Even in the longer term, things are not that bleak for them, thanks to DOCSIS 2.0. (Lets not forget DOCSIS 3.0, the newest iteration of the standards being planned by CableLabs. I am pretty sure there is going to tons of exciting developments there, though right now its a nice little acronym.) Continue »
India Broadband Report, March 25, 2005
By Dr. Abhishek Puri Continue »
Novatel’s 3G for home box
3G is prompting many of the smaller players to think different. Earlier I wrote about the mobile broadband gateways that are being introduced in Germany by O2 and Vodafone. IP Wireless has introduced a product that taps into 3G UMTS. Now Novatel Wireless is developing a new MBG, strangely called Ovation MCU 1200 and will launch this product in mid-2005. The WAN connectivity is via UMTS/3G network, but it is distributed locally through 802.11 b/g networks. I wonder how effective these devices will be in the near term. My experience with UMTS in San Francisco has been good, not great. I know the upload speeds are too slow to basically allow decent VoIP calls. And given how cheap even the basic broadband is in the US, the 3G mobile gateways will struggle to find mass acceptance. Perhaps these are good solutions for markets where there is no cheap wired option, like Asia or parts of Latin America. Still, I welcome the desire to innovate and extend 3G beyond a phone. Continue »
Why We R Really They
Fred Wilson and I rarely disagree on many things about technology, but finally we disagree on something - it is his whole “WE” versus “They” argument.
And so you’d better involve the consumer, make them enjoy doing business with you, and make them part of your company, and give them something for doing that. That’s ‘we company’ behavior. Continue »
The New Road to Riches, Redux
Following up on my last October’s cover story, The New Road to Riches, many more people are coming around and embracing the build-it-flip-it model. Good to know that Jeff is on board. He writes, “What is interesting is that Topix is the yet another Internet startup to develop a meaningful presence without any VC financing, and end up being taken out - at least partially. These exits would not make sense for ‘traditional’ VCs that need to deploy at least $5 to $10M per deals, and need to generate at a bare minimum 3X to 5X on that capital. But it makes sense for angels and founders - and people helping them develop the shop like yours truly, who have to accept to live for some time on ‘Macaroni and Cheese’. Alternate model ? ” New Road to Riches/Business 2.0. Continue »
Bill tells you why VCs never say no
Bill Burnham, a good pal and a fellow blogger has finalized his future plans - he is starting Celsius Capital with Carlos Bhola, who by the way is a cofounder of Vonage. The new fund will raise $150 million, and invest in IT/Software in US and China. Bill who made his bones at CSFB and then at Mobius is going to be logging up a lot of air-miles. He is a straight shooter, and today he explains why VCs rarely say no to a potential investor. They tend to string along the entrepreneurs, because they are worried that he or she might actually turn out to be a future superstar and might hold a grudge against them. In this sense Silicon Valley and Silicon-e Valley are no different - you really cannot take anyone at face value. Still watch for Bill’s second installment in this series! Continue »
Wireless Gear: Flirting with Disaster
Business 2.0: Three years ago companies like Ericsson, Lucent Technologies, and Nortel Networks were stock market pariahs. Yet in 2004 they staged remarkable turnarounds. Cellular-phone companies were upgrading their networks to meet the demand from millions of new customers, so they needed to buy lots of wireless equipment like base stations, back-office gear, and switches. Those happy days might soon become a distant memory because of the rapid consolidation of wireless carriers. Continue reading at Business 2.0 site. Continue »
Vonage to raise another $100 million
Running a VoIP company costs money - a lot of money. Perhaps that’s why Vonage which has already raised $105 million in VC funding in its last round, is going for another $100 million in VC dollars, reports Business Week’s Justin Hibbard. That would bring the total VC dollars to over $300 million! The company is raising money at a pre-money valuation of $950 million, he points out, before going in for an IPO by end of 2005. Interesting timing, given that company is facing some issues right now. Incidents of outages have increased, Texas has sued them over e911 and competition from Cable guys is increasing. Vonage and others who have used the “arbitrage” well, but with Kevin Martin at FCC, well this party might come to an end. I think it is prudent for Vonage to raise as many dollars as it can, while it can. Continue »
