Ribbit Sells For $105 Million

I wrote two weeks ago about Ribbit, the next generation phone service provider getting purchased by BT for a reported $55 million, but it now looks as if the company received $105 million. The deal took a few weeks to finalize (not that it is indicative of anything) and when ti was officially announced, the total amount paid by BT had almost doubled. This isn’t just good news for telecommunications entrepreneurs, but in many ways it is “validation” that the voice 2.0/ teleco 2.0 era is upon us.

Many will debate the price paid for Ribbit and the fact that they do not have any revenues (yet), but to a company like BT $105 million is a drop in the bucket compared with the potential return that the Ribbit technology platform could bring them. It will be very interesting to see if BT will “close-up” the platform or keep it open; monetizing it by giving businesses the ability to easily create telephony applications.

Garrett Smith

Garrett is the former VoIP Supply CMO.

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Khyle says:

July 29, 2008 at 10:54 AM

In the story I read, BT made a point of saying that it's a big deal to allow developers access to their infrastructure via an API.

This is great news for the industry, and IfByPhone in particular. A huge company seeing value in CEBP (Communications Enables Business Processes) shows how quickly the market is maturing.
Garrett Smith says:

July 29, 2008 at 11:03 AM

@Khyle: I know that is what they said, expect most companies do not have a great record when it comes to developers and open platforms.

BTW, congrats on the new Lead Generation product - very cool.
Khyle says:

July 29, 2008 at 11:20 AM

@Garrett - thanks. We have a few more things up our sleeve. And our Voice Broadcast app for the iPhone has been pretty popular too.