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HP vs. Dell: Showdown at the Windows 7 upgrade corral
Here's a tale of two PC titans: HP and Dell. One executes well every quarter. The other doesn't. Both see big PC upgrade cycles ahead. Both are looking to ride... Continued »
Category: Communications
November 17th, 2009
Ring Central: a virtual phone system for a 21st Century workforce
The rise of smartphones, VPN connections and even WiFi hot spots changed the way we work. No longer was it necessary to go into the office to catch up on e-mail, do some research or create presentations. However, despite the changing times, businesses still wanted to give the impression that employees are in the office when they’re receiving or making business phone calls outside the office.
Ring Central, which provides cloud-based corporate phone services, is offering a phone system that brings the best of both worlds - the flexibility of a single phone number that follows workers everywhere they go, but without having to leave the internal phone-tree system.
Ring Central is like a corporate version of Google Voice, a Web-based phone number that can be programmed to ring a cell phone, remote office line or even the home phone - but without leaving the corporate PBX-like system. That way, even if the call goes unanswered, callers still have the option of being transferred to a switchboard operator or another employee. In a statement, the company explained its services:
As the traditional office transforms and more staff are working from various remote locations, the inability to integrate distributed and mobile employees into a single business phone system results in a plethora of numbers and overall inefficient and non-professional communications. Legacy on-premise business phone systems are not only extremely expensive, but were designed for the old world of centralized office environments and before the era of Internet and mobile phones. RingCentral delivers cloud based business phone systems – RingCentral Office — that is designed for the modern mobile and distributed business world, and does so at a fraction of the cost.
A survey conducted by the company found that only about 15 percent of small- to medium-sized business employees work from a single physical location while nearly half of the employees - 45 percent - saying that they spend about 75 percent of their time conducting business away from the office.
As a guy who spends a fair amount of time working from the halls of Moscone Center, random WiFi hot spots, my own kitchen table and even a commuter train, I recognize the importance of a single phone number for people to reach me. I use a Google Voice number to stay connected but that’s certainly not tied to my physical office line. I have my own system of using Google Voice and the office line and, for it works - for the moment.
If you’re a company that has a largely mobile workforce, there is a better way. And so far, Ring Central seems to be it.
Related coverage: Business Week: 1.4 million Google Voice users, global push in the works
November 16th, 2009
Cisco raises bid for Tandberg; Lands 40% of shareholders
Cisco on Monday said that it will raise its bid for video conferencing company Tandberg to $3.4 billion, up from $3 billion. The higher offer arrived after Tandberg shareholders balked at the first bid.
In a statement, Cisco said 40 percent of Tandberg shareholders tendered shares to the networking company.
Tandberg shareholders have proven to be a tough crowd for Cisco. The rub: Cisco extended the deadline for the deal to Dec. 1 and said it will withdraw its offer if 90 percent of Tandberg shareholders don’t agree to it.
Among some of the key items:
- Cisco said that Tandberg’s largest shareholders, Folketrygdfondet and OppenheimerFunds, have already accepted the higher bid. That’s likely to push other shareholders off the fence.
- If Tandberg doesn’t take this offer Cisco “will withdraw the offer and evaluate alternative ways to expand our activities in the video communications market.”
- Cisco raised the interest payable on the offer price to 3 percent from 1.75 percent.
October 1st, 2009
Polycom: A potential takeover target following Cisco-Tandberg deal
With Cisco gobbling up Tandberg for $3 billion and bolstering its video conferencing lineup all eyes turn to Polycom, another market leader that looks ripe to be acquired. If not, Polycom is expected to be able to hold its own against Cisco.
Cisco’s acquisition of Tandberg gives the company a bigger installed base for its telepresence products and an arsenal of lower-end video conferencing gear. Polycom will either need to compete head-on, or be acquired. Analysts seem to be betting that Polycom will be acquired. If not, analysts say Polycom (all resources at ZDNet, TechRepublic) can gain video conferencing share in the short run as Cisco completes the Tandberg purchase.
Cowen analyst John Marchetti notes that Polycom can find plenty of partners given that Tandberg is now owned by Cisco. Marchetti adds that Polycom can compete with Cisco, which is likely to take a hands off approach with Tandberg, but it’s hard to rule out a takeover in the future. Marchetti says:
September 25th, 2009
AT&T cries foul to FCC, uses Google Voice to spark Net Neutrality debate
There’s a Net Neutrality battle going on and AT&T has put a double-edged sword at the feet of the FCC - and Google’s name is written all over it.
AT&T sent a letter to the FCC today, asking the regulatory agency to look into the practices of Google Voice, specifically its refusal to connect calls to certain numbers - such as adult chat lines - because they charge excessive fees. According to AT&T’s reasoning, Google is acting like a telecommunications company because it’s connecting calls. And as a telecommunications company, it’s subject to laws that prohibit a carrier from blocking access to numbers. (AT&T statement. PDF of letter from Washington Post, Techmeme)
In a rebuttal blog post, Google actually agreed with AT&T on its points about carriers that charge excessive fees. In it, , writes:
We agree with AT&T that the current carrier compensation system is badly flawed, and that the single best answer is for the FCC to take the necessary steps to fix it.
But Google is not a telecommunications company and therefore isn’t subject to those regulations. In fact, Google Voice doesn’t even work unless it’s linked to a landline or wireless phone. As a stand-alone service, it is incapable of placing and receiving phone calls. It’s a Web service.
September 22nd, 2009
FCC's Net neutrality push: Is wireless access different?
The Federal Communications Commission forged ahead with its Net neutrality proposals and invited industry players to comment on six principles. It didn’t have to wait long. The big question: Would Net neutrality regulations hamper the wireless industry?
FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski on Monday outlined six Net neutrality principles including two new ones focused on network management transparency and non-discrimination against content and applications (Techmeme, FCC speech).
The reaction from Comcast, AT&T and Verizon was mixed. To wit:
- Comcast says: “Before we rush into a new regulatory environment for the Internet, let’s remember there can be no doubt that the Internet has enjoyed immense growth even as these debates have gone on. The Internet in America has been a phenomenal success that has spawned technological and business innovation unmatched anywhere in the world. So it’s still fair to ask whether increased regulation of the Internet is a solution in search of a problem.”
- AT&T says: “We are concerned, however, that the FCC appears ready to extend the entire array of net neutrality requirements to what is perhaps the most competitive consumer market in America, wireless services.”
- Verizon also raised the wireless issue, according to CNet News’ Maggie Reardon: “Our customers want an open experience,” David Young, Verizon’s vice president of regulatory affairs. “They want more choices, which is why we allow third-party developers and are providing developers complete access to our network. But our concern is that these new regulations, which apply regulation to the Internet for the first time, could have unintended consequences.”
- The CTIA, a wireless industry group, says: “As a justification for the adoption of rules, the Chairman suggested that one reason for concern ‘has to do with limited competition among service providers.’ This is at the core of our concerns. Unlike the other platforms that would be subject to the rules, the wireless industry is extremely competitive, extremely innovative, and extremely personal. How do the rules apply to the single-purpose Amazon Kindle? How does it apply to Google’s efforts to cache content to provide a better consumer experience? How about the efforts from Apple and Android, Blackberry and Nokia, Firefly and others to differentiate the products and services they develop for consumers? Should all product and service offerings be the same?”
Reading the tea leaves it appears that the big network providers aren’t going to fight a whole lot over landline access. Wireless will be a different story entirely.
And that makes a lot of sense. Think about it: There’s limited bandwidth in wireless; there’s unlimited data plans in theory; and wireless networks aren’t nearly as developed. If the FCC goes too heavy on new regulations there could be unforeseen wireless repercussions. Meanwhile, the FCC’s take on transparent network management requirements may be more of an issue in the wireless industry. Simply put, network management—and making sure there’s enough access to go around—is really the entire game in the wireless industry.
Smart Planet: Net neutrality: When does transparency collide with competitive edge?
September 10th, 2009
Meet Cliq, MotoBlur: Live blog from Motorola-Android announcement
Motorola co-CEO Dr. Sanjay Jha is addressing the audience at GigaOm’s Mobilize conference in San Francisco today. I’m here to share some details as they develop.
10:29 am: Dr. Jha takes the stage and starts his keynote speech by talking about wireless broadband. For users, it means fast connections to what they want - connecting to friends, family and co-workers without limits, using their devices to share photos and access information. The growth for wireless broadband has been large - especially in north America - but the real growth is in other countries, he said.
Dr. Sanjay Jha announces MotoBlur at GigaOm's Mobilize Conference. (Credit: CNET)
With the growth in wireless Internet, the way we communicate has changed, as well. It’s gone from one-to-one - phone calls, emails, etc. - to one-to-many, specifically status updates on Facebook, tweets, etc.
10:33 am: Now, we’re talking smartphones. They need things like high-res displays and anytime and anywhere wireless broadband access but, more importantly, they need a multi-threaded, muti-tasking graphical OS. Android, he says, is the robust operating system that will take smartphones to the next level.
Jha says he’s about to share details on a new device and, in the coming weeks, will be sharing news of a second device - which will be available in time for the holidays.
10:39 am: But first, we’re talking about mobile social networking. Jha points to stats that some 180 million people are using social networking sites via mobile today. By 2012, that number could grow to 800 million.
Jha announces MotoBlur, a service where everything social comes to you on a mobile device in one app. The idea is to focus on what people have to say instead of how they send it. Manage messages from Facebook or e-mail, tweets and so on simultaneously. Jha says it syncs everything - photos, messages, contacts and more - from everything from Facebook and MySpace to Yahoo Mail and Flickr.
10:44 am: Jha continues the Motoblur demo. The idea is to take everything from everywhere and bring it into one central place. I liked how the caller ID - because contacts are integrated with social networking - displays not only the caller’s name, phone number picture and even social status update. (Hint: If your caller’s status update says he’s in a foul mood, you may not want to answer that call.)
10:46 am: Jha and Cole Brodman, Chief Technology and Innovation Officer for T-Mobile, are on stage together to announce Motorola Cliq device for the holidays. T-Mobile has taken over the announcement and is calling the Cliq the “First Phone With Social Skills.” Brodman calls it the next chapter in Android innovation. Cliq becomes a core piece of the holiday lineup. It’s interesting that Brodman made a point of noting that the T-Mobile network is ready for the network traffic that will come from such a device. (Did you hear that, AT&T?)
Also see: Gallery: Motorola’s Android phone at Mobilize
- Motorola T-Mobile Cliq statement
- Motorola on Cliq
- Motorola’s big Android bet kicks off today
- Motorola: Android devices get us back in smartphone game
10:49 am: Brodman, noting the popularity of the Sidekick as a messaging phone, says that T-Mobile knows those customers and what they want - and that the Cliq addresses that and more, but not just for kids but for socially active and business-centric adults, too. And, of course, you can’t forget the fashionistas who want two colors - white and titanium. The company expects it to be a strong item for the holidays. No one mentions taking on the iPhone - but the message is clearly there.
10:52 am: Jha is back on stage alone, offering details. 5 mp camera, 3G and wireless. Video capabilities. He calls the browser a “best in class” powered by Google and all of its tools - Google Docs, calendar, mail, and more. Jha says the promise to consumers is the ability to customize for an experience that meets their needs. He also said the plans are to take Motoblur global and thinks it can be a real differentiator for it. Jha also mentioned a second phone for the overseas market, called Dext.
10:54 am: Jha wraps up the keynote portion and, while that’s all he may have to say about Cliq today, we’re sure to hear more and more about it in the coming days and weeks.
September 9th, 2009
Comcast's Burke: TV Everywhere trials going national in 30 to 60 days
Comcast has built a TV Everywhere site that’s “complicated technically,” but will roll out nationally as a pilot in the next 30 to 60 days, said Stephen Burke, chief operating officer of the cable giant.
Burke, speaking at the Bank of America Merrill Lynch 2009 Media, Communications and Entertainment Conference, gave the quick update on Comcast’s TV Everywhere rollout. TV Everywhere is a partnership with Time Warner to extend cable subscriptions online and other providers are following suit. In a nutshell, cable subscriptions would be portable to the Web.
The technical details are complicated due to the authentication required for a user to get the online video. Comcast’s challenge is to make that authentication easy enough for widespread adoption. “Anyone who subscribes to cable should get a lot of that video as long as they first prove they are subscribers,” said Burke, who noted the TV Everywhere has 22 content providers lined up.
The stakes for Comcast and other cable providers are high—especially as consumers demand their video be on more screens. “I think we have a model here that if we do it right will allow us to get ahead of the inevitable,” said Burke.
On other topics Burke said:
September 8th, 2009
Review: Cisco's 891 ISR does more with less
Cisco’s 891 (ISR) adds to Cisco’s Integrated Service Router family of security, wireless networking, VoIP telephony, network switches and routers that could make its mark on remote offices and small businesses. ZDNet Australia gets the verdict on it from Matt Tett of Enex TestLab:
Technology convergence is, in theory at least, a great idea. One product doing more things means less complexity, more integration and lower cost, but too often it has been for the worse.
In many cases, the good features of a stand-alone device, built up through years of product evolution, are lost. Technology hashing is rife in consumer products such as mobile phones, digital cameras, PDAs and, of course, business technology too, which includes firewalls, anti-malware devices, content filters, intrusion detection and prevention devices.
September 3rd, 2009
J.D. Powers: Verizon tops in voice quality; AT&T, Sprint get no love
Among wireless carriers in the U.S., Verizon Wireless has the best voice quality in five of the nation’s six regions, with U.S. Cellular - not AT&T or Sprint - taking the honors in the sixth region. In the west, Verizon shared the top ranking with Alltel and T-Mobile. The honors comes courtesy of J.D. Powers and Associates, which conducts a semiannual study of voice call quality across the country.
Overall, J.D. Powers found that the wireless industry has done a good job at upgrading its networks, noting that reported problems with connectivity issues such as dropped calls and static have declined since the last report six months ago. In a statement, Kirk Parsons, senior director of wireless services at J.D. Power and Associates, said:
As carriers continue to upgrade existing network infrastructure and create more robust coverage footprints, wireless customers are recognizing an improvement in performance. As customers continue to increasingly stress wireless networks with growing call volume and data usage for texting, e-mailing and surfing the mobile Web, it is critical for carriers to keep enhancing network performance by maintaining and upgrading to next-generation technologies.
The study measures wireless call quality, based on seven problem areas that impact overall carrier performance: dropped calls; static/interference; failed call connection on the first try; voice distortion; echoes; no immediate voicemail notification; and no immediate text message notification.
Also see: NYT: Customers Angered as iPhones Overload AT&T
Scrutiny of wireless service becomes increasingly important because, in the wireless game, carriers are quick to alter the message to meet their needs. Case in point: AT&T touts the “most bars worldwide” and yet it has been the subject of much ridicule in major cities across the U.S. because its voice and data service on the iPhone is considered to be among the worst. Maybe if I were somewhere else in the world, AT&T would be a good choice - but I’m not much of a global traveler.
After trials with AT&T, Sprint and T-Mobile in the San Francisco/Silicon Valley region - and a small handful of other places around the country - I’ve stuck by Verizon Wireless because, for me, it offers the best coverage. The others were hit or miss around the region, though Sprint and T-Mobile were strong contenders. For me, AT&T isn’t in the race (which also means I don’t own an iPhone.)
For a long time, I’ve been advising friends and family (and even readers of this blog) to shop the service instead of shopping the phone. It can be the coolest and sexiest device in the world - but if the service sucks, what’s the use?
Of course, with the carriers offering 30-day no-obligation trials of their devices and service, I would strongly encourage phone shoppers to take a test run first. At least you know what you’re getting yourself into before you get locked into a two-year contract.
Previous coverage:
September 1st, 2009
Raytheon acquires BBN Technologies, firm that developed Internet, e-mail, VoIP
Waltham, Mass.-based defense contractor Raytheon said on Tuesday that it has agreed to acquire Cambridge, Mass.-based BBN Technologies, known for having developed ARPANET, forerunner to the Internet, and e-mail.
Terms of the agreement were not disclosed, according to the release.
BBN’s portfolio encompasses technologies including advanced networking, speech and language technologies, information technologies, sensor systems, and cybersecurity.
Some of BBN’s notable developments in the field of computer networks include ARPANET, the first person-to-person network email sent (and first use of the “@” symbol), the first Internet protocol router, an early predecessor of voice over IP called “Voice Funnel”; and work on the development of TCP.
August 31st, 2009
SmartPlanet: Disney buys Marvel for $4 billion; here's why it's a smart business move
Walt Disney Co. said on Monday that it plans to buy Marvel Entertainment, Inc. for $4 billion in a deal that would add characters such as Spider-Man, Iron Man, the Hulk and the X-Men alongside Mickey Mouse and WALL-E.
Under the deal, Disney will acquire more than 5,000 Marvel characters as well as several multi-million-dollar movie franchises. In return, Marvel gets the distribution heft of the world’s No. 2 media company.
Want to know why Wolverine and Hannah Montana make sense together? Read it on SmartPlanet’s Smart Takes blog.
August 24th, 2009
Wireless: Examining the race to the bottom
The wireless industry is facing quite a conundrum: Subscriber growth is faster than the relatively pokey video business, but revenue per subscriber is falling.
Toss in the movement by Apple, Google and others to make wireless carriers mere dumb pipes and there’s turbulence ahead.
Stat of the week came from Bernstein analyst Craig Moffett. In a research note, Moffett said that the U.S. video business (think cable) is growing 50 percent faster than the wireless industry. Video (cable) aggregate revenue growth is up 5.3 percent in the last 12 months compared to 3.6 percent for wireless.
Moffett’s big takeaway is that there are two many wireless players relative to the cable industry. He writes:
There are plenty of explanations for the troubles of the Wireless industry. The Wireless industry, like most Telecommunications businesses, is characterized by high fixed and low variable costs. Networks are increasingly undifferentiated. Handset makers (à la Apple) are gaining market power. The service is expensive; for a family of four, a bill of $200 per month is not unusual. Scale is everything… and growth is slowing. Worse yet, management teams appear to have wildly inflated views of their ability to grow in an industry that is no longer growing. But what really makes the Wireless industry so unstable is much simpler. There are just too many cooks in the kitchen.
Simply put, Moffett argues that the dumb pipe is meeting the price war. And it’s deadly for the wireless industry, which still has a bevy of players.
To wit:
- Sprint cuts its Boost Unlimited price from $100 to $50 and screws over T-Mobile.
- Leap and MetroPCS cut prices to be lower than Sprint. Virgin Mobile, which is being acquired by Sprint, also cut prices.
- Tracfone is wholesaling the networks of AT&T and Verizon at $45 a month.
- Now everyone is having trouble justifying a premium.
Moffett adds that this industry dismemberment has been expected in the video industry for years. However, the downfall hasn’t happened yet. Why? There just aren’t enough players. Cable companies have a structural advantage and the broadband business is solid. In fact, Moffett convincingly argues that broadband service will become the primary business of cable companies, which will be the only modem in town for most locales.
Also see: U.S. national broadband strategy: Funding is the elephant in the room
July 20th, 2009
Shopping together, online: Into a closet vs. real-time
So, Zappos has begun to test its “My Zappos“ social shopping service, first alluded to here in June.
You can put shoes, clothes and accessories into your personal closet, online. You can blog about it. You can share your choices with friends, via Twitter and Facebook. And get feedback, as you try to make a decision.
You can also post personal photos, making the whole closet more like a personal locker of ideas and images, not just your shopping druthers.
Or you could just shop together in real-time, using the sharing functions of a company called DecisionStep.
On the Charlotte Russe site for women’s shoes and fashion, you can immediately share what you’re looking at with one or more friends using the Share Item or ShopTogether options on the toolbar at bottom of the screen. You can talk in a chat window with friends while you’re at it.
And if you’re not sure what you should be interested in, you can see pretty quickly what others are looking at, by looking under Style Tips at the bottom of the page and choosing Watch Others.
This is like the Zappos map. And, yes, Zappos may the online retailer that tends to set the standard in its use of social media (see “Following Zappos” case study).
But if you’re just about to make a purchase, do you want to put it in your closet and wait to see what feedback you get?
Or do you want your friends to weigh in right away?
Or not at all?
Don’t worry. These features won’t go away. Expect, over time, that all shopping sites will have closets with social communication built-in. And real-time chat on product images, specs and more, as well.
Welcome to Shopping 3.0. If you can’t make up your mind on your own, the barriers are being taken down.
July 15th, 2009
Google Voice only gets better with launch of mobile app
Google Voice was already a game-changer when it re-emerged a few months ago with a new look and some new features. Now, with the addition of mobile apps for Blackberry and Android phones (of which there are expected to be many more later this year), the service becomes that much more powerful. (Interestingly enough, there was no iPhone app for Google Voice. Hmmm.)
As much as I like the Google Voice service, it’s true that the experience has been less than perfect. The transcription of voice messages, for example, is so far-from-perfect that I don’t even rely on it. But I’m also not losing sleep over that. It would be nice if Google could beef it up - but I’m glad that the company is focusing on other things instead - like these mobile apps.
For some time now, I have been using my Google Voice number as a find-me-anywhere work number. When someone calls my GV number, it rings in three locations - my cell phone, home phone and office phone. No matter where I am, that call reaches me. But I’ve resisted using it as my new mobile number, largely because there was no real way to make calls from my existing cell phone and have my GV number appear as the Caller ID number.
As a side note, SMS text has never been a problem - I can send and receive text messages using my GV number on my Blackberry and recipients see the text as coming from my GV number, not my cell number.
But phone calls were a different story - until now. By using the app, users can dial directly from within Google Voice and the recipients will see the GV number pop up.
In addition, the mobile app also integrates with the contacts on my Blackberry so I can better communicate with the folks who are in that address book. On the Google Voice Web application, the service integrates with my Gmail address book already and allows me to customize the settings, such as a specific ring tone for some callers.
The invitations for Google Voice have been out for some time now - and the company is slowly inviting people to get their own numbers, including a cool new feature that lets people use words to select their own vanity number - something like (408) CALL-SAM. (No, that’s not my number.)
I’ve seen some chatter this morning about Google becoming a phone company - but I think that’s a bit misleading. Google is providing a phone number - but not phone service. To use Google Voice, users still need access to phone service somewhere - whether it’s work, home, cell or even your mama’s house. Without an actual phone to ring, Google Voice is nothing more than a single-number voicemail service (which is perfectly OK for some people, too.)
When it comes to Google Voice, the telecoms shouldn’t feel threatened. People like me are still paying for landline and mobile phone service - even if our Google Voice number is the only one we’re giving out.
Also see: Dumb wireless pipe wars: Google Voice coming to BlackBerry, Android
July 9th, 2009
In an economic downturn, prepaid mobile is big business
Why pay $100 or more each month for a two-year cell phone contract when you can pay $50 and keep yourself off the hook?
At least that’s the thinking behind the latest ad campaign by Boost Mobile, a prepaid, or “no-contract,” mobile service provider whose parent company is none other than Sprint Nextel.
In an economic downturn, consumers are reevaluating the privilege of paying mobile service providers — including Sprint — $50 to $150 (or more) per month for their cell phone. And according to Boost Mobile president Matt Carter, that’s a revolutionary idea worth calling someone about.
ZDNet: How much have sales of prepaid phones increased since the beginning of the economic downturn?
July 2nd, 2009
Tailoring Web technology to a bespoke dress shirt business
It’s not easy to mix up the monotony of putting on a shirt and a tie every day for work, but what if the shirt was made-to-order, with details of your own choosing?
Fashion startup ShirtsMyWay allows you to spruce up your tired work uniform and customize your own dress shirt from nearly-limitless options — from the color of the stitching around buttonholes to the shape of the breast pocket — and ships it to you for the price of an off-the-rack shirt from Brooks Brothers.
Always liked the look of the white-collar, blue-body banker dress shirt, but preferred the reverse? It can be done in two clicks. Like to keep things on the outside crisp and white, but prefer to have a little private bling on the inside? A few more clicks and you’ll have brown and white “French Rails” lining your collar and cuffs (see image below).
Or better yet, 20 copies of your new favorite shirt.
I spoke with Shanghai, China-based founder Michael Yang on how his startup is addressing the increased demand for custom clothing on the Web.
What gave you the idea for ShirtsMyWay?
Michael Yang: [Co-founder] Peter [Crawfurd] and I both wanted to start a company, and we had both been to Asia and had shirts made there for ourselves. The idea evolved over a very long process: we did some research online and saw that the customization wave was going up and online clothing sales were going up and put two and two together. We looked online and realized that people were only doing online tailoring, and no one was really doing design.
There are so many components to a shirt, and we thought you should be able to customize them all. You have the collar, the cuffs, the contrast fabric inside the cuffs, the sleeve, the placket, the yoke, the pocket, and you can go on. So we made every component customizable, down to the buttonhole thread.
That level of customization sounds daunting. How do you help the average customer choose?
MY: A lot of people simply love the level of customization — and some people are overwhelmed by the amount of options. We have a shirt model on the site that helps a lot with the visualization, so they can see what, say, a placket actually is.
Right now we’re working on a “shirtpedia,” where we try to educate people who don’t know so much about shirts. What kind of customers are we looking for? People who are interested in tailored or custom-fit shirts. We’re aiming for mass customization so that the average person can go in and do this. It’s a trend that’s going to spread to habit – rather than go to JCPenney or another offline store.
Your focus is only on men’s dress shirts. Is there interest in expansion to women’s shirts or pants?
MY: The natural progression that not only would come to mind would be to expand into customizing a whole wardrobe – shoes, pants, shirts, blazers, suits and so on. But it’s difficult to say right now. Originally that was our vision, but right now we see that there are things happening in our market — we’ve shaken it up a bit — and we probably have to take it as it comes.
We only launched in February, so we don’t have any pre-global economic downtown basis to compare to. Surprisingly, we are doing very well. The amount of sales we’re able to generate actually corresponds to our original goals. How is the economic downturn affecting the online industry? I’ve been looking at reports and some numbers indicate that online commerce hasn’t gone down.
So we’re already looking to expand. Right now we’re still tossing ideas around. We are currently shipping internationally — [North] America, Europe, Australia, Asia — but we pick certain countries because of the shipping costs. We have a policy of free shipping for most countries, so we’re already doing that.
You mentioned a “trend” in online custom clothing and a push away from brick-and-mortar stores. Is that really true?
MY: There are a lot of men who go online to buy clothing, and our initial idea was that men can’t be bothered to go into stores and shop around. There are a lot of men who want to just do it and get the package shipped to their door.
The current discussion right know concerning expansion is if the next step is to target women or to diversify into another product. Women buy practically 90 percent of the items in the household. We have gotten quite a few requests from women to make dress shirts for women. It’s quite a complicated process to diversify into women’s clothing. Peter and I have only have experience in men’s, rather than women’s, clothing. So we’ll possibly stick to what we’re good at. But you never know – my sister’s a clothing designer; maybe I’ll take lessons from her.
You and Peter are based in Shanghai, but you’re both from Denmark. How do you navigate the right channels to keep your business afloat?
I’m of Chinese origin; my parents are Chinese. They moved to Denmark and I was born and raised in Denmark. Peter and I went to high school together in Denmark and then the same university. I studied computer science and business administration and Peter studied international business. He worked in India for some time and I was in Denmark. As we started to itch, that entrepreneurship, we put our heads together in Denmark and moved to Shanghai to do the groundwork.
I speak Shanghainese, the native dialect, and I also have quite a big family here, around 20 family members, and they’re all entrepreneurs themselves. Beyond that, we have a consulting company here that is helping us with legal and accounting issues.
Peter supervises the operations and does the marketing, and I do the IT and supervise the accounting. We work quite differently, Peter and I — he does day-to-day work, while I do project work.
How does ShirtsMyWay function in the background? What happens behind the scenes?
MY: We use open source, which was a relatively natural choice for us. We run on PHP. When we started doing this there was a choice between Flash and AJAX, I picked AJAX. AJAX makes more sense if you want to do SEO — Flash is hard to control. AJAX is sort of like a lego box that you can piece anything together however you like it.
How does it work? People go online, customize their shirt, put in in the shopping cart and click order. We save the details so they can be retrieved later — users will be able to retrieve their own data soon. We have a back-end system that pulls up the order and sends it to the factory. We have an alliance with one factory that we’ve been working very closely with, which has only been getting better and better. They produce the shirt, quality control it and give it to us. We actually go in and quality control it ourselves. If it’s OK, we ship it out. If it’s not, we send it back to the factory.
We source our own fabrics because we don’t want to just put whatever the factory has up on our site. A lot of those fabrics are not so good, so we go out and handpick high-quality and stylish fabrics.
We’ve had around 0.2 percent or even lower return rate. For every 500 shirts we sell, maybe only one is returned. People are pretty happy.
The U.S. is our biggest market, for good reason. I think that in the States, people are quite far ahead on the innovation curve in order to be able to embrace the kinds of things that we’re doing. In terms of customizing your own clothes online, certainly I think that more people in the States do and would love do do these kinds of things than, say, Europe or Australia or other parts of the world. We do have a pretty good market in those other areas, but combined. The factor of embrace in the States is equal to the rest of the world put together. That’s the feeling that we get.
July 1st, 2009
60% of Americans would give up alcohol for their mobile phones
In a survey indicative of how users interact with their electronic devices, one in three Americans said they would give up television to keep their mobile phone, and a full 60 percent said they would give up alcohol for a week instead.
According to the results of a new survey by Best Buy Mobile — which polled 1,000 Americans over the age of 18 — 47 percent of Americans who don’t already own a smartphone say they are too confused to differentiate smartphones from regular cell phones.
Yet a “large portion” of adults plan on buying a smartphone in the next 12 months, according to the survey.
June 30th, 2009
Helping corporations leverage the Web, using open source and the cloud
What do open source and cloud computing have in common?
For Navid Safabakhsh, principal at San Francisco and Philadelphia-based interactive web development agency Freshout, it’s that both technologies are low-cost, high-yield solutions to help corporations leverage the customer data they collect on the Web.
I spoke with Safabakhsh about how his company’s mix of open source, collaboration and the cloud helps companies innovate by plugging into the Web — and their customers.
June 25th, 2009
With drop.io, real-time collaboration in the cloud
Is cloud computing a load of bull or the real deal?
For drop.io founder and CEO Sam Lessin, it’s everything…literally. Without it, his company and its eponymous service — which allows two-click sharing of anything with anyone, privately — might not exist.
I spoke with Lessin about drop.io (pronounced: drop-eee-oh) to find out how his New York-based tech startup helps businesses collaborate in real-time, all from the comforting arms of the cloud.
ZDNet: First things first: you named your company after your flagship service. What is drop.io?
Sam Lessin: drop.io is simple private sharing and real-time collaboration. A unit of exchange — a “drop,” a private URL — every drop has its own phone number, its own location, et cetera. It’s a place to collect media. The cool part about it is the technology behind it: one aspect of it is file conversion, the other is real-time messaging.
June 24th, 2009
Want To See (And Talk About) What Your Friends Are Buying? Zappos Set To Introduce 'Social Shopping'
Zappos, the online retailer of shoes and clothing, is about to become a social networking site, borrowing aspects of Twitter and Facebook and applying them to their customers’ particular passion: buying stuff.
CEO Tony Hsieh Wednesday confirmed to Between The Lines that it is working on an internal project that will “soft launch” in the next two weeks that will enable what he calls “social shopping’’ at Zappos.
Here’s how social networking for a purpose (shopping) will take place:
• Profiles. Akin to Facebook, Zappos’ customers will be encouraged to create personal profiles. On their profiles, customers will describe the types of shoes, clothing, accessories and other products they like and broadly speaking are interested in.
• Followers. Akin to Twitter, other Zappos customers can register to follow any other customer. They won’t have to ask the other customer’s permission.
• Closets. Unlike either Twitter or Facebook, customers will place products they are looking at in personal closets, housed online at Zappos.
• Socializing. Then, akin to both Facebook and Twitter, the customer can ask all friends and followers to comment on the footwear or jewelry or housewares they put in their closets and are thinking about buying. This will allow them to get responses from their “social shopping” network on what’s good or bad about each product or the maker of same, while they are making up their minds.
When customers who take part in the social shopping log on to Zappos they will see a constant feed of what’s been put in the closet of other people they’re following or the comments that have been generated by other customers. This will be similar to Facebook’s update stream, but Hsieh calls it an “activity stream.”
Read the rest of this entry »
Tom Steinert-Threlkeld is editor-in-chief of Securities Industry News, as well as a long-time media, technology and business journalist. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
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