In this day and age, new tech startups are pretty much a dime a dozen. Everyone thinks that they have that next million dollar idea that could take the world by storm; unfortunately, very rarely is this the case. Fortunately enough for recently founded Pinger, Inc., they may have found their niche in a big way. Taking advantage of increased texting rates for cell phones, Pinger has created a unique application that allows you to receive texts for free on your iOS mobile device.
As ludicrous as the concept sounds, not only has it been successful, it has been running away with the entire market. The Pinger iPhone app was originally priced at $5.99, with the cost of the program going towards offsetting the hosting and service fees. However, not only has the app gone free in the store, but the company is looking to expand functionality further.
Before we get too carried away, the obvious question in everyone's minds is how did Pinger manage to become free and still stay solvent? Really, the answer is as simple as listening to your radio or watching television: paid advertising. Just try to wrap your brain around the concept of this single app, according to VentureBeat.com, being able to serve up over 1.2 billion (yes, that is with a 'B') ads, attached to the 4 billion free texts that have been exchanged over the last year or so. Not only is that a staggering number of ads, but a overwhelming volume of text messaging. These are the kind of investment opportunities that venture capitalists salivate over, and has since allowed the company to raise another additional $11 million dollars for expansion.
Pinger's first line of business is to use this infusion of funds to develop a way to expand their interesting marketing scheme to the world of voice communications. If they have their way, short of an ad being played while your call is being connected, they are hoping to bring free calls to iPhones via both 3G and Wi-Fi, and the iPod Touch via Wi-Fi very soon. How soon will we have this in our hands, you ask? A press release dated back in June states the technology is going to be "available later this summer," but seeing as how that time period has come and gone, I can only assume that we will be hearing an official announcement very soon.
Rest assured that as soon as we know anything, you guys will have all of the details.
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[via VentureBeat.com ]
