|
1.
Steve Macdonald
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:07 pm
These ventures are extremely risky. They are
typically all or none: either monster success stories or absolute failures.
It all depends upon whether they hit that magical tipping point…
2.
Alaska Miller
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:35 pm
LAUGH OUT LOUD.
Hey guys! Let’s scrape up $360 million and
launch a phone company!! Just outright hilarious. Of course management all
walked away with a good piece of that 360 mil.
3.
Host a web meeting in the next 5 minutes for free
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:43 pm
Hey whoever let them burn that much . AmpD was a
MVNO and now anybody can become a MVNO. Try SONOPIA it is free and you can
become another AMPD by just spending $50. Not that everybody would like to
become one especially when it is going to the deadpool 
4.
EP
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:44 pm
It really is amazing that so much money went
into such a risky industry. I dont understand what the investors where
thinking, with that kind of money poured in at what kind of exit valuation
would they have been able to walk away happy? It seems like a really bad play
ending in a worst case scenario.
5.
Jimmy
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:45 pm
So a company whose main business was being a
phone company is web 2.0?
Man, that definition sure has gotten broad. 
6.
Duncan Riley
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:49 pm
Jimmy
it was pretty much both, it was a phone company offering Web 2.0
functionality, it’s exactly why I noted it as such and certainly some of its
competitors aren’t strictly phone companies either, you’ll see services such
as VelvetPuffin and Loopt in the TechCrunch archives.
7.
Andrew
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:52 pm
seems like Web 2.0 now is any company that
became successful or launched after the bubble burst
8.
Mike Malone
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:52 pm
Bankrupt doesn’t necessarily mean dead… the
group of investors who are $360 million into this deal will probably want to
salvage _something_. The company has done enough marketing/advertising to
have a bit of brand recognition, which someone will probably find valuable… and
they presumably have some sort of user base.
Basically, this may not be the last we hear of
amp’d mobile.
9.
Host a web meeting in the next 5 minutes for free
June 2nd, 2007 at
9:58 pm
“Bankrupt doesn’t necessarily mean dead…”
when a founder lets his company go
bankrupt..that means he is no more interested to run it.
of course the investors who have pumped
..millions of dollars..and feel duped…and who are not willing to face the
fact that they made a wrong investment decision…will still be looking for
some way to make the company stand on its own again…so that the investors can
get maybe 10 cents of the dollar…
but..a startup without the original founder is
like a patient in a coma.
10.
EH
June 2nd, 2007 at
10:05 pm
A vintage turn-of-the-millenium story!
11.
Doug Mehus
June 2nd, 2007 at
10:09 pm
It’s worth noting that Telus Ventures, the
venture capital arm of Canadian diversified telco Telus Communications Inc.,
and also my wireless phone company, was a signficant investor in Amp’d. They
also aggressively promote Amp’d to young users in e-mail marketing and on http://www.telusmobility.com/
Cheers,
Doug
12.
india JACK
June 2nd, 2007 at
10:19 pm
Dude, all you guys are idiots…
AMP’d is pulling in $20 Million bucks a month
from customers!!!!
That’s about $20 Million more than any of you
guys have ever pulled in…
There will be. Little beelt tightening a
dilution of equity and an AMP’d 3.0 that will be a Billion Dollar revenue
generating company in 2 years…
You guys suck, how muchy of the $360 Million did
you get?? NONE…..
It’s like you think AT&T and Verizon are
customer centric companies….
If AMP’d is really up for sale there will be 20
companies with multi-billion $$ balance sheets ready to buy them….
13.
Neil
June 2nd, 2007 at
10:34 pm
agreed, C11 doesn’t mean the end of the game,
but in this case (according to 12) 20 mill revenue doesn’t cover the costs of
running the operation which is a shocking statment to read.
As far as this story goes, I think it highlights
the problems that Telco’s have in entering the SNS space. Sure, they have
users, and yes they stand to make a hell of a lot of money from GPS, PSMS and
also the opportunity to migrate users to new services in a non formal
environment.
The problem is that using a SNS on a mobile
phone isnt very interesting. The screen is just too small to make anything
other than messaging interesting. I can see Telcos partnering with SNS to
create synergy, or buying out an existing SNS and introducing mobile realted
content, but the cahnces of someone like AT&T, BY etc building their own
network from scratch are zero - IMHO.
14.
Allen Stern
June 2nd, 2007 at
10:40 pm
I am with Jimmy - where is this Web 2.0? I mean
the bodega down the block from me closed last week - maybe it was Web 2.0
too? They had an internet site 
The interesting thing here for me was that they
offered me a job about 18 months ago.
15.
Bryan
June 2nd, 2007 at
11:05 pm
MVNOs aren’t real wireless carriers. They just
piggy back off of the real ones. More importantly, they have virtually
nothing to do with Web 2.0 which is what TC is all about.
Thanks to Duncan for writing about so much stuff
lately, but I dont think that any MVNO deserves to be written about on
TechCrunch unless it has some real Web 2.0 roots in it.
16.
will
June 2nd, 2007 at
11:13 pm
whats a “Mobile social networking company” ?
17.
bigbuda
June 2nd, 2007 at
11:19 pm
Just walked by a amp’d mobile booth in my local
shopping mall the other day, was wondering how they make any money…. a
service that does not differentiate, a name few have ever heard of. The only
company that has a chance is probably helio, been hearing lots of buzz about
helio.
18.
Mike Malone
June 3rd, 2007 at
12:01 am
I think the other lesson to learn from this
bankruptcy is just how expensive it is to bring a consumer product to market.
Starting a website is one thing — there is (comparatively) little upfront
cost and you can scale as you grow. When you’re building a consumer product
you need to do a lot of R&D, make a lot of investments (in people,
distribution, manufacturing, etc.), and have a ton of publicity (which often
ends up being the most expensive part).
Reminds me of some comments my brother has made
about his experience at TiVo. He started there when the company was virtually
unknown and had maybe two dozen employees. By the time he left he was the
head of Product Marketing and the company had burned through several hundred
million dollars in funds. That’s just the way it goes.
19.
Laura
June 3rd, 2007 at
12:03 am
So, bankruptcy means their terrible TV ads will
be pulled en masse, right? Because I’m betting that ate up a heckuva lotta
cash. When will these old-skool people learn that TV ads are the worst 6
figures you can spend?
20.
tapster
June 3rd, 2007 at
12:42 am
adding ampd to the dead pool is a little
premature to be honest. Filing for Chpt 11 is a strategy, not closing of the
doors
less sensationalist commentary on moconews - eg.
http://www.moconews.net/entry/.....perations/
21.
myplaylist.biz
June 3rd, 2007 at
1:10 am
Well thats good news. Im looking forward to
seeing more of the same in the next few months. These over funded VC backed
cooperate losers don’t have what it takes, with either innovation, kudos, or
fiber. Let the good times roll and all rejoice that there is one less monster
in the water.
22.
Jordy Mont-Reynaud
June 3rd, 2007 at
1:28 am
I have to say I agree with the folks who think
the emphasis on Amp’d as a Web 2.0 company is a pretty big stretch.
For example, I’m not sure how you can claim that
Loopt (a company with $5M in funding who distribute their mobile GPS app
through carriers and MVNOs) is a competitor to Amp’d (an MVNO that raised
$300M+ which sells phone service and hardware). Never mind the massive
difference in size, if those companies did interact it would be as partners,
not competitors.
|
