While many ‘social audio’ startups like Audioboo, SoundCloud and Cinch continue to battle each other on the consumer field, there is one company that, while offering a consumer service, is starting to get a considerable amount of traction in the business and enterprise space – largely ignored by the consumer players.
ipadio, bills itslef as a live phone-casting company, and for a while it looked a lot like AudioBoo or Soundcloud. But today it’s secured a £1m ($1.6m) investment from the London Business Angels network, Nemisys (the company that founded ipadio) and backing from the UK government’s Enterprise Finance Guarantee scheme. The company is initially taking just over £700k, with the remainder available later in 2011. The investment will be used to expand the business. It has a number of clever new products like ‘Voice Forms’ and is developing the high-definition live streaming of phone calls to the web.
Founded in 2009, ipadio live-links the telephony system to the Internet. That means consumer can just “call in” audio, instead of having to use data via the company’s iPhone or Android app and then cross post to social media platforms. Here are some examples from the recent turmoil in Egypt, where the calls were literally called-in, without the need for a smartphone app.