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  • Audioboo gets further cash from 4iP

    Mike Butcher

    Mike Butcher is the European Editor for TechCrunch. A former grunge rock drummer, he became a long time journalist, and has since written for UK national newspapers and magazines including The Financial Times, The Guardian, The Times, The Daily Telegraph and The New Statesman. Mike is also a co-founder and shareholder of TechHub, a co-working space/service/community with several locations... → Learn More

    Monday, October 26th, 2009

    [UK] 4iP, quasi venture investment fund from TV broadcaster Channel 4, is putting even further, undisclosed, investment into Audioboo, the ‘Twitter for audio’ startup. As part of the deal, UBC Media, the content and software supplier to the radio industry, is also effectively injecting cash into the forthcoming Audioboo Pro version of the startup’s iPhone app by buying 8 licences, though how much those cost hasn’t been released.

    Audioboo has already sold a Pro version to The Royal Opera House, although that one sale won’t get it very far. However, they say media brands like the The Guardian, Channel 4 News, the BBC, TechCrunch Europe (well, me now and a again), The Telegraph and PaidContent have all used “Audioboos” style interviews as part of their content. I can confidently say that Audioboo is a great reporting platform because you literally just record the audio and upload from inside the app. The professional version allows one to queue uploads as well.

    However, I have had equal success with the iPadio app which, like Audioboo, also tweets out a link to the audio. The difference between the two is that iPadio is really going after the internal corporate communications market, while at the same time giving away the app to create adoption. Audioboo is going after consumers and media brands.

    Daniel Heaf, Investor for 4iP, said: “Our first round of funding helped Audioboo to market to prove both a user and market need. Now is the time to help Mark and his team fully realise that opportunity.”

    No doubt Audioboo will use this PR opportunity to boost it’s attempt to fund-raise in the US, which I gather it’s off to do shortly.

    • http://Highkeylee.blogspot.com Lee Martin

      This is great news for Auduoboo.
      The other major difference between iPadio and Audioboo is quality of the audio. Audioboo is extremely high quality.

      • http://Www.nemisys.uk.com John Duffy

        Hi Lee. I’ve just checked, there’s no difference in audio quality. Both 22Khz, I’ve done a screen grab from in Audacity to check. Not trying to convert you, but do have a check if you’d like. HD

    • http://www.buzkast.com Laurence Moore

      We’re in the same space – however as a company – it’s been difficult to gather such momentum to make any impace. Any advice would be greatly appreciated. Twitter @buzkast

    • http://www.buzkast.com Laurence Moore

      …insert [bootstrapped] before company ;)

    • http://www.ipadio.com Mark

      There are no audio quality differences between any of the iphone record and audio service – Tweetmic, ipadio and others. We all rely on pretty much the same technology – have a play with the free ipadio app if you like (it does up to 60 minutes of record and upload). ipadio also offer phonecasts which operate from anywhere – like the series featured on our home page from GOSH – the childrens charity on a fundraiser from the Great Wall of China, or the calls from the Red Cross from sat phone in indonesia. In these cases iphones would not do the job only phone signal available. So yes the audio is a phone call – but there is no other choice in many instances.

      Mark
      PS I’m biased.

    • http://www.simplyzesty.com Niall Harbison

      Saw them give a presentation today at media140 and sounds like an interesting concept. Said they were going after the huge radio market. They might fill a void that podcasts never really filled I guess.

    • http://www.ukstevieb.com/2009/10/27/steviebs-shared-items-october-27-2009/ StevieB’s Shared Items – October 27, 2009 | LostInCyberspace

      [...] Audioboo gets further cash from 4iPOctober 26, 2009 Tagged as RSS Google Shared + Categorized as News Bites [...]

    • http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/06/07/audioboo-the-twitter-for-audio-closes-first-major-round/ Audioboo, the Twitter-for-audio, closes first major round

      [...] the UK startup’s initial funding which will be converted in to equity, along with UBC Media (an existing Pro customer), Imagination Technologies (owners of PURE Radio and who have both Apple and Intel as backers), and [...]

    • http://www.techcrunchchina.com/archives/599 Audioboo完成首轮重大融资,意欲打造音频版Twitter | TechCrunch中文站

      [...] 4的数字媒体基金4iP,UBC媒体 (现有高级用户之一 ), Imagination科技公司,天使投资包括Qualcom的Don [...]

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