How did embee mobile start and what market failure does it aim to address?
Embee Mobile started in September 2008, looking at the mobile payment space and how over the past 20 years, learning from the failures of the past. The company is focus on enabling e-Commerce for Prepaid Mobile Users Worldwide.
Who is your target audience?
Our initial target audience has been the prepaid mobile users in the United States. At present, 19.2 percent of the roughly 280 million mobile subscribers are prepaid. In relative terms, that means there are 7x more prepaid users than iPhone users in the United States. IDC, during the first part of 2009, the top 10 carriers in the United States added just under 3.5 million retail net subscribers. Out of these, 75 percent were prepaid users. In 2010, we will expand beyond the United States and begin to offer our services to the over 2.5 billion prepaid mobile subscribers worldwide.
What prompted you to focus on prepaid, closed loop systems? Generally speaking, does a service like yours need to dis-intermediate mobile network operators (MNOs)?
After looking at being an MSB (Money Service Business), like Western Union, we felt that the type of regulations and oversight was not something a small startup could afford, both in time and resources. This is because an MSB processes open loop systems (credit cards, bank accounts) and a lot of regulations are required to stay in compliance. The benefit of closed-loop systems is the fact that they are independent from the Financial System and allows us to start servicing our customer right away. If we had gone the other route, we probably would have been operational today, in comparison to already generating revenue and in operation for 9 months.
Why Facebook? Any other social networks in the pipes?
Using a social network like Facebook allowed us to quickly develop an application and target the place where lots of people “hang out” on the Internet. The destination makes it easy for people to find us and a lot of the cumbersome infrastructure of putting together your own portal, was made simpler and quicker by using the Facebook interface. In 2010, we do plan on offering our application on other platforms.
Where will embee mobile be five years from now?
We hope that in 5 years, we will have significant reach Internationally and be able to offer our service all the way down to the handset. We also expect to grow in two ways. The first is to offer a variety of methods for users to earn points for products and services. The second is to offer a wider range of products beyond mobile top up, such as real goods and services.
Eric Chan has worked in the social media, mobile and enterprise software technology. Prior to Mobileslate Consulting, he founded Caboodle Networks, where he filed two patents in semantic search technology; the company was eventually sold to Mobile Content Networks. In addition, Eric is also an Adjunct Professor in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University, and in the past has been the Education Director for the Robotics Academy at NASA Ames. Eric previously started an Internet Consulting Firm, Unique Net Solutions, building ecommerce portals and interactive sites. He is currently the Chief Operations Officer of embee mobile. Follow on Twitter at @embeemobile and @mobileslate.
