Profig (YC S12) Launches An Affordable, Feature-Rich Instant Phone System

http://techcrunch.com/2012/08/20/yc-profig-instant-virtual-phone-system/

by yabbadabbadoo • 14 years ago

73 38 14 years ago

plinkplonk• 14 years ago

Is this anything like what Plivo (another YC company) is doing? What are the differences, if any? Sorry if these are stupid questions, I know next to nothing about telephony or the market opportunities therof.

yabbadabbadoo12• 14 years ago

Plivo is an API. We're a GUI. We're Plivo's target customer (in fact, we're built on top of plivo). Our target customers are businesses who want a powerful, affordable business phone system but don't want to spend time worrying about setup. Our focus is on customer service - we handle all new customer setups personally, and any follow on issues after that.

marquis• 14 years ago

Do you support automated extensions? For example, if we wanted to offer pro support to users and give them a unique PIN code to reach us faster. Also, you mention SIP handsets, so I assume this would work for SIP desktop apps?

Josh2600hz• 14 years ago

I don't work at Plivo, but I have a lot of respect for those guys because of their open-source roots. I might bicker with them here or there online, but I only do out of admiration.

Plivo is an XML ---> infrastructure play. Their bait is to developers to come in and use their Twilio-ish code and then realize that what's under the hood is pretty badass and build bigger apps.

From what I can tell, Profig is a hosted VoIP play with black box infrastructure. I'd love to know what's under the hood, but I don't see any infos. They're more like a RingCentral or a Packet8 than a Twilio.

Does that help? I think Plivo is a lot more innovative than Profig, but I've learned not to judge startups by their first forays into the wild. I'm interested to see where they'll go from here.

(Disclaimer: I write thepbxblog.com and I work at 2600hz, a communications infrastructure company).

Looks like from the comment below me that Profig runs on Plivo.

efinkelman• 14 years ago

Have you taken a look at TelAPI.com?

davidw• 14 years ago

At $30 a month, it offers less in terms of low priced options to get started compared with, say, these guys:

https://secure.grasshopper.com/

I have no idea about anything else though - I ended up not using Grasshopper because they rejected my credit card for whatever odd reason.

Edit - changed the wording to make it clearer what I mean about pricing tiers.

yabbadabbadoo12• 14 years ago

Actually, we offer way more. You can compare what we offer - http://profig.com/virtual-phone-system - with what grasshopper offers.

Plus, we'll be launching our mobile apps soon, which are SIP clients, and that'll cut down the bill even further, up to half.

zio992• 14 years ago

yabbadabbadoo, the website stylesheets are broken on Chrome at the moment. Looking forward to seeing it when its back up.

samstave3• 14 years ago

I called your main number and hit 2 for sales and it rang and rang and no answer.

I am interested in your solution for a large client who is moving offices (they are a very successful YC alumn)

Can you contact me?

rcacique2• 14 years ago

Are you focusing on the US only?? or are you planning to expand outside?

cs702• 14 years ago

yabbadabbadoo: Profig looks interesting, but I can't discern why or whether it's better than using existing cheap SIP providers like OnSIP, which allow startups, small business, and even medium-sized corporations to use Android, iOS, Windows, OS X, and Linux softphone SIP clients as well as brandname SIP phones from Polycom, Cisco, etc.

Please help me understand, how exactly is Profig better?

yabbadabbadoo12• 14 years ago

First, onsip requires SIP handsets. With our virtual system (http://profig.com/virtual-phone-system), you don't need anything other than your current phones, even cell phones. You can be up and running in minutes.

Second, if you do need SIP handsets, we have those as well (currently in beta). So we match OnSIP in every regard there.

But where take the lead is our add-ons. On top of the regular phone system, we offer a whole lot more:

- Call Tracking

- Voice Broadcasting

- Sales Call Center - dials over 1000 numbers/min, skips dead #s, leaves pre-recorded msgs on answering machines, only connects live pickups

- Support Call Center - integrates with our CRM to show relevant info about your customers as soon as the phone rings

- Click-2-Call - put a button on your site and allow your visitors to talk to you directly

- Surveys

and more in the pipeline...

All these features come in a single dashboard - a business can use 1 or as many features as they want, on demand.

Please see our site for details.

nanijoe• 14 years ago

So, if I bought your service for my company, would it be running across my data network?What would happen to my "phone system" if my connection to the internet were to go down?

dr_2• 14 years ago

1) How is this any different than uReach, which is what we currently use? It starts at 24.99 a month. 2) The logo looks too much like Simple's (simple.com)

yabbadabbadoo12• 14 years ago

Pls see our features here - http://profig.com/virtual-phone-system - and compare.

Plus we offer much more than a regular phone system:

- Call Tracking

- Voice Broadcasting

- Sales Call Center - dials over 1000 numbers/min, skips dead #s, leaves pre-recorded msgs on answering machines, only connects live pickups

- Support Call Center - integrates with our CRM to show relevant info about your customers as soon as the phone rings

- Click-2-Call - put a button on your site and allow your visitors to talk to you directly

- Surveys

and more in the pipeline...

All these features come in a single dashboard - a business can use 1 or as many features as they want, on demand.

Please see our site for details.

josh26003• 14 years ago

I get frustrated when people just paste generic answers so I'll help out by answering in more detail.

Basically, when you buy from UReach, the underlying technology is very different. I don't know what UReach runs for sure, but they're what we call BlackBox infrastructures. You have no idea what keeps this company up and running, and given that UReach's CTO is a former Director for the Members of Technical Staff at AT&T, and since UReach has been around forever, it's probably safe to say that they're not running FreeSWITCH as their core (More likely big iron hardware; which is antithetical to a SaaS service like this).

Profig will have a faster feature iteration time period because they're a smaller company, whereas it's much harder for UReach to dev new features. Also Profig has the added advantage of having a small core market: hosted PBX. They aren't (at least at this time) targeting providers; something UReach is doing actively.

TL;DR: Profig runs on a great core, and they don't have 10+ years of embedded stuff to work through so their pace of feature iteration will be higher.

Does that help answer the Question?

alttab2• 14 years ago

This is a YC company that finally really excites me.

The best technology removes problems from the equation all together. Profig (which is kind of a silly name despite its amazing core service) provides a virtual phone system that can be developed like web infrastructure.

Once their account creation is automated (which it sounds like that's their main to-do based on yabbadabbadoo's responses and product description), build-up and tear-down of virtual communication infastructure would be like going to pick up pens and pencils for your business (a trip that might take 20 minutes).

The faster and cheaper critical business infrastructure (e-mail, "productivity", research, communication) can be integrated into an organization the more market opportunities exist for smaller players, as new or temporary opportunities could be capitalized on with much less foresight or risk.

YC companies like this that use other YC companies as initial users sounds like something Xhibit would do, but what PG is essentially doing is actively researching into building virtual companies at increasingly marginal rates, directly on the market itself with real companies.

I will be watching this one more closely for sure!

yabbadabbadoo12• 14 years ago

Yes, our name doesn't fully match our product :) That's because it's from our original idea. When we pivoted, we considered getting a new name, but pg's advice was - "If it's short and can be easily spelled, you're good. Move on." - so we stuck with it.

As for the product, you hit the nail on the head. Our goal is to disrupt the process of setting up communication infrastructure. We want our users to be able to spin up/down solutions on demand.

rcacique2• 14 years ago

Fontacto is a 500Startups company doing the Virtual Phone System thing (The Google Voice for businesses) outside the US, which is a heavily overlooked market.

philfreo• 14 years ago

There really should be screenshots of the app, especially since there's no free trial.

mattwdelong• 14 years ago

Do you support Canadian numbers? I can't find the answer in the FAQ's or else where on the site.

yabbadabbadoo12• 14 years ago

Hi Matt. We'll update our FAQ. Currently, we're US only, but we're in beta for Europe, Asia and Latin America. We also have a beta for Canada. Hit ua up at contact@profig.com and we can let you into our beta.

Profig (YC S12) Launches An Affordable, Feature-Rich Instant Phone System

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