Chyngle: Mobile Venue Networks
In September, we witnessed Chyngle’s DemoPit winning pitch at TechCrunch50 and were impressed with their efforts to socially-mobilize and monetize the hyper-local venue. They’ve decided to focus on stadiums. We kinda like the idea of ordering junk from our seats–very convenient! Would be nice if we could figure out a way to text the loud-mouth jerk behind us and ask him to shut up and sit down.
In August, we ran into Billing Revolution at the VC Task Force event “Mobile Monetization: Real Cash or Virtual Bucks.” Other panelists were Hill Ferguson, VP Product Zong ; John Loschky, VP Product, Billing Revolution; Russell Tillitt, CEO, Embee Mobile; Fabio Sisinni, Director, Go to Market Mobile. Paypal. We were very impressed with the quality of this panel–probably one of the best-qualified panels we’ve seen in a while. Indeed, a very smart bunch of guys. Hats off to VC Task Force. Billing Revolution is trying to make a go of mobile billing by by-passing the carriers and keeping the money. Unfortunately, this requires consumers to set up an account with them in advance. PayPal obviously fought the same battle years before, but had a first move advantage. Some would argue that it was a first move disadvantage. Whatever the case, it seems that PayPal’s requirement to create an account is still a point of friction for many consumers and merchants. It will be interesting to see how and if Billing Revolution can avoid these pitfalls. Can’t really remember what Embee and Zong are up to, but that Russell Tillitt sure seemed smart.
It seems Chyngle and Billing Revolution made an appearance this month at the CTIA FundFest where they pitched a panel of 3 judges. The judges picked Chyngle with Billing Revolution not quite snagging 2nd place. Read Mike Demler’s coverage of the contest here.
