UK/US mobile social networking startup Next2Friends has run into problems with a dispute concerning a supplier to the US company it works with on the service.
Elements of the site’s web design and development work is outsourced to a company called Genetibase, a company owned and controlled by two of the US-based co-founders of Next2Friends. Genetibase sub-contracted design work from well-known US designer Nic La but La is now preparing legal action against the firm for, he alleges, not receiving “the full payment as promised” for work completed.
On his blog he writes:
Hello everyone, I just wanted to announce that I no longer work on the project Next2Friends as of May 2008. As a matter of fact, I’m preparing a legal action against Anthony Nystrom of Genetibase, one of the founders of Next2Friends. Some of you may already know, I started working for Anthony on the project Next2Friends in September 2007. As of today, I have not received the full payment as promised. In the past months (almost a year), Anthony had made many promises to make the full payment but consistently failed to fullfil his promises. Therefore, I’m preparing to take legal actions to collect the outstanding payment.
In response, Roy Shelton, Co-founder and CEO of Next2Friends denied the issue would affect, or was related to, Next2Friends. He told me vie email. “I believe Nic La , like many other resources contracted with Genetibase and certainly not direct with Next2Friends Limited. I was not aware of the dispute until this morning. I feel it is always unfortunate when payment disputes occur within a companies’ sub contractor community, unfortunately this is beyond Next2Friends Limited control.”