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GignoSystem America, a subsidiary of GignoSystem Japan, has leveraged the success of operations in Japan to enter into the Americas market. GignoSystem America has quickly launched an extensive portfolio of mobile content in Canada and the United States. GignoSystem's most recent growth can be tied to business created by sending traffic from mobile sites and related services. We had a chance to talk with Patrick Stanton, Director of Business Development to learn more about their business. Tell us a bit about your services and the technologies you are using? GignoSystem America offers services globally in all media types (video, image, photo, audio) through wireless operators. We offer several wallpaper sites exhibiting images from Corbis, Bikini.com, National Geographic, etc., as well as entertainment sites with daily celebrity news from the World Entertainment News Network. Our most popular services have been sites that offer entertaining content for personalization like ringtones and wallpapers. Additionally, sites that offer daily freshness and immediate gratification often attract a lot of attention (entertainment news, image of the day, etc). GignoSystem develops services in WAP (WML, xHTML, and iHTML) as well as applications (Java, DoJa, and Brew). How did you get started? GignoSystem Japan was founded in 1996 and began offering services on NTT DoCoMo's iMode service in 1999. Since then, over 50 sites have been launched in Japan offering ringtones, images, photo services, and games. In 2003, offices were opened in London and Seattle to bring content distribution beyond Japan. Currently, GignoSystem generates over $50 million a year in revenues from content services. What advice do you have for other developers with regard to submitting to carriers? The most important thing is to offer content that is unique, popular and well suited for mobile devices. Not every piece of content on the Internet makes sense for the mobile device and with the operators having control over their portal, they will not be willing to put up ten sites offering essentially the same content. In addition, innovative uses of available technology that make services and applications more useful and interactive are always well received. What helps your service sell through the carriers? We depend on the operators as our marketing channel. It is difficult to reach the audience as a content provider, so we work with the operators to reach their customer base. For some content providers, we can market through their established channels such as print, web and TV. What Openwave products and services have you used and how have they helped you succeed? We currently work with the Openwave SDKs for developing applications, especially setting up WAP Push services. Using the SDKs makes our lives much easier because they allow us to develop our applications quickly and error free. What's next for you? We have some streaming video services we will be bringing to market shortly, as well as some innovative original concept games. Contact information: is it okay to have developers contact you and if so, what is your preference? Sure, email me. |