Mobile VAS Company MobMe Plans To Raise Capital Through IPO

Kerala-based Mobile VAS company MobMe Wireless Solutions is planning to raise capital through an Initial Public Offering (IPO) rather than choosing venture capital funding, reports TechCircle.

The report states that MobMe has appointed IDBI Capital Market Services Ltd as its merchant banker and plans to debut on the NSE SME Exchange. It has also appointed Gyan Magnus Associates as IPO advisors and Desai & Diwanji as the lawyers for the issue. That being said, there is still no information on when the company plans to file the issue and how much capital it’s looking to raise through this issue.

Offerings: Founded in December 2006, MobMe offers various telecom products and services to operators, brands and the government. This includes network solutions for telcos to manage SMSC, USSD, IVR and Outbound Dialler (OBD) services, value added services for telcos and brands and hosted enterprise solutions across SMS, voice and data platforms for Brands, Businesses, Banks and Government Institutions.

It also offers a product called ZULO (Zero-User-Latch-On Alerts) which allows telcos to target zero users by sending alerts to them to increase their usage. According to a company presentation, MobMe claims to have deployed ZULO in 32 regions across multiple telcos in two continents. This includes 19 regions operated by Aircel, 10 regions operated by Vodafone and few regions operated by Zantel Africa.

Besides this, it also claims to work with several state governments, central departments, nodal agencies, telecom network operators and regulatory bodies in various mobile governance initiatives.

Previous Developments: Last month, MobMe had inked agreements with a mobile authentication and digital signature solution provider Valimo and a digital security company Gemalto to launch a mobile digital signature solution called Mobile Express.

While the solution is still in private beta with no information on its launch date, Finland-based Valimo had then stated that MobMe will be using Valimo’s Mobile ID solution and Gemalto’s UpTeq PKI (Public Key Infrastructure) SIM cards to develop a secure authentication channel to enable legally binding digital signatures on transactions through mobile phones. The company had claimed that this solution is the first-ever mobile signature solution in India and that it will be available for all handsets.

Prior to this, the Kerala Government had awarded an m-Governance contract to MobMe in November 2009. This contract covered 21 pilot projects over 8 months across state government departments using a single number, 537252. Among the services offered in the pilot project include University exam results & related information, Vehicle details over SMS, News alerts to journalists, Insurance details, Blood donation requests sent out taking location inputs into account, Movie ticketing on mobile for Kerala State Film Development Corporation, Audio guides for tourists at hotspots, Bus route timings and Inventory tracking for Public Distribution System among others.

In June 2009, MobMe had tied up with the smartphone manufacturer HTC to pre-load its photo-sharing application MobShare onto HTC’s Android powered handset, HTC Magic. It had also tied up with a prominent Kerala newspaper Mathrubhumi to launch a co-branded mobile site in a revenue-share deal in November 2008 and had partnered with Network18′s CNN IBN to enable the television channel to make use of MobShare platform for its Citizen Journalism initiative.

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