Comments on: HelionVC Denies Funding SmsGupShup While SmsGupShup Is Silent On The Issue

By: Nikhil Pahwa

Nikhil Pahwa — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 14:04:10 +0000

Hi Rajiv, have updated the post. Thanks for sending the mail across.
@Maneesh - thanks

By: Rajiv Dingra

Rajiv Dingra — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 10:39:07 +0000

@Eka - Ya even I think its a good product. The reason it works better than mytoday is because its an open platform compared to mytoday which is closed.

By: Ekalavya

Ekalavya — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 10:14:03 +0000

I’m sure the funding has gone through. Always liked the concept of smsgupshup. Infact Watblog was one of the first blogs to write about SmsGupShup when they launched and I’d managed to register the key word Cricket.

I wonder why NetCore’s mobs didn’t take off though.

By: raghav soni

raghav soni — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 07:22:08 +0000

thats a nice way of doing business spreading rumours before announcing deals…has seen this a lot of times cos this is the strategy to get good bargaining power with vs’s………even if they haven’t received 10million$ they would now after getting noticed on techcrunch………how could u forget to put tc article up here………

By: Rajiv Dingra

Rajiv Dingra — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 06:59:25 +0000

@Maneesh - Or maybe they have confirmed verbally but haven’t signed on the dotted line.

Whatever the issue I dont expect Ashish Gupta to Categorically deny something if there were talks going on. So Im not sure what to say.

By: Maneesh Madambath

Maneesh Madambath — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 06:54:52 +0000

Wild guess.. SMS or Helion has a tie up with some news guys about giving an exclusive story.. so keeping mum about it right now..

err.. suddenly the guess seems stupid..

but then $10 million is a “big rumour” to float around jlt..

@nikhil that post was damn nice…

By: Rajiv Dingra

Rajiv Dingra — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 06:42:10 +0000

Thanks for the comment nikhil. I think this is the first time in a couple of years that you have commented on WATBlog. Did contentsutra ban you from doing so Well jokes apart. Yes your post was brilliant and will look forward to the aggregation as well. And Also with regards to ashish gupta’s reply I could forward his email to you if you may want me to

By: Nikhil Pahwa

Nikhil Pahwa — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 06:28:19 +0000

Hi Rajiv,

as we’ve mentioned in our post on the initial report, we had contacted Webaroo and received neither a confirmation, nor a denial. Like you, we’ve also contacted Ashish Gupta of Helion Ventures, and are awaiting a response from him.

Our sources have given contrary inputs on whether the funding has been closed, which is why we haven’t published a *confirmed* story.

I’m glad you liked the post on the burn rate of Push SMS services (taking Webaroo and MyToday as examples). We’ll shortly be publishing an aggregation of some excellent inputs from our readers on the business model of Push SMS services.