TokBox
Type | Private |
---|---|
Headquarters | San Francisco, California, California |
Founder(s) | Serge Faguet Ron Hose |
Key people | Ian Small, CEO Roelof Botha, Board Member Scott Friend, Board Member Bernd Girod, Board Member Jawed Karim, Investor |
Owner | Telefónica Digital a subsidiary of Telefónica |
Website | www.tokbox.com |
Alexa rank | 62,978 (April 2013) |
Type of site | Videoconferencing |
TokBox was founded by entrepreneurs Serge Faguet and Ron Hose and is financed by Sequoia Capital, Bain Capital and Youniversity Ventures. As of 2010, TokBox has received $14 million in series A and B funding and is headquartered in the South of Market district in San Francisco, CA. TokBox was acquired by Telefónica Digital a subsidiary of Telefónica in October 2012.
In 2011, TokBox changed its focus from running a branded video conferencing service to building the OpenTok API platform.
Features
Multi-party video chat
TokBox's OpenTok platform allows users to start a multi-party video chat with up to 20 people. The API does not require download for use and it is set up to allow the creator of the video chat to invite non-tokbox users into the call via email, instant messaging or by publishing the URL on their Twitter / Facebook / MySpace accounts.OpenTok plug-n-play apps are downloadable widgets that allow users to quickly add group video chat functionality to their websites and blogs.
TokBox Platform & Partnerships
TokBox makes the OpenTok API available to partners who wish to add multi-party video chat to their own websites or applications.TokBox lists SlideShare, eBuddy, Bibbil, ProctorU, McKinney, and PokerView as partners who use the API.
2007
August – Series A funding from Sequoia CapitalOctober – Launched www.tokbox.com
November – Launched multi-party chat and partnership with Meebo
2008
April – TokBox Version 2 launchedJuly – Series B Funding from Bain Capital Ventures and Sequoia Capital
September – Launched the TokBox platform/ API
2009
Added document collaboration tool—Etherpad (now owned by Google)2010
January rolled out its first set of paid features--$9.99 per month.November announced the OpenTok API
2011
February TokBox announced that as of April 5, 2011 they will be discontinuing the TokBox video chat and video conferencing service to focus solely on their API, OpenTok.Controversy
TokBox was the subject of controversy when 50% of their engineering staff was fired in July 2009. This happened around the time TokBox changed CEOs. The VP of Marketing is stated as saying the firings were part of the CEOs new restructuring plan. None of the original founders are currently with TokBox.Around 2007, one of the users had privacy issues—his friend was able to connect to his account—allowing his friend to view and hear him talk to himself. However, Tokbox seems to have addressed this issue now.
0 comments:
Post a Comment