Monday, February 4, 2008
Interview with James Whitley, GoLife Mobile
Portland-based GoLife Mobile (www.golifemobile.com) recently launched a beta of the firm's software for mobile phones, and announced some funding from Monster Venture Partners, so we thought it would be interesting to hear more about the idea behind the company and its founders. We spoke with James Whitley, CEO of the firm, about GoLife Mobile.
What is GoLifeMobile, and what's the idea behind the service?
James Whitley: At the end of the day, GoLife Mobile is about enabling mobile devices to interact with the real world. It's as simple as that. To us, the interesting thing about mobile is not that you can make calls, and it's not about SMS--it's where you can use mobile to interact with real life. For example, if you're running late in a meeting, and know you need to feed a parking meter, we want to you to be able to use your mobile device to add more minutes. Or you want to make a golf reservation, and you can use your mobile phone to do that and also invite a buddy. If you think about mobile, it's truly a window into the world. A good way to think about it is looking back at Star Trek. There's always the tricorder--a universal device you can use to see if this guy is dead, translates any language, summons the ship, and can beam you up. That's where mobile is headed, and we're enabling that environment.
Where is the service now--I believe you rolled out your software recently?
James Whitley: There are two components. The first component, is what you see when you go to the web site. We've got a couple of widget applications which you can download to your phone. There are a couple of widgets we've released, including GoSocial, which allows you to connect to social networks, look at a person's wall or pictures. Another we have released is StreetNewz, which if you're out on the town, you can take a picture, type in a headline, and post it to your friends' walls or to a public web site. We've also got a number of other widget applications coming out shortly. Underneath that, and where we are spending most of our time, is building a framework that allows this to happen. Another piece we've just released is a piece related to developers. We want to work with them in ways they're not used to, to empower them to create applications. It's more than just another web app--although pulling up the weather is certainly compelling and interesting--but it's knowing that it's cold outside, so that when you are walking into a restaurant you're not as nearly interested in ice tea but instead hot cocoa. It's to enable things in real life.
What's your background?
James Whitley: My background is in building technology. I've been developing technology groups and organizations, and have spent well over ten years at a number of large and small organizations, doing some bleeding edge things. I've work on banking, digital music downloads, and building infrastructure, and management of health care information in a web 2.0 environment. How I got into mobile is I spent the last couple of years thinking about where this technology is going. Technology hasn't changed much, certainly on the Internet side. There are applications and services, but there aren't a lot that are new and revolutionary. I spent a couple of years thinking about that, and met up with my co founder, Mounir, and we talked about a shared vision to enable and become a tool for the world.
How are you backed and funded?
James Whitley: We spend over a year self-funded, and we recently have taken a round from Monster Venture Partners. They're fabulous, and it's an extremely good model. We're in talks for the next round of funding to move us to the next level.
How did you run into Monster Venture Partners and how was that experience?
James Whitley: We had been doing lots of research on due diligence on various investment partners. Ideas are clearly the start, but building out those ideas is very much dependent on the partners you have on your team. You can take bad money. We spent a lot of time thinking about who do we want, criteria, doing research, and talking to people in the Pacific Northwest about where we want to be. Rob's name started floating up and we reached out to him, and spent quite a bit of time with him back and forth to Seattle, to lay down our vision.
What's next for you?
James Whitley: Executing in a number of areas. You'll see in a couple of weeks, we'll be adding additional widgets to build out our story. The widgets there now are just beta and demonstration widgets, it's not really selling or telling the whole story. We'll be releasing applications which can start filling out and telling the story. We'll also be announcing strategic partners and their development on our platform. You'll also be laying out for developers why our opportunity is interesting, and why it's different from what other people have done and are doing.