Tribolet of magicJack Talks Voice, Apps and 4G

The future of communications is in the hands of end users. That was the overarching message during this morning’s opening keynote by Michael Tribolet, chief business officer of magicJack VocalTec Ltd., at the ITEXPO West event in Austin, Texas.

“magicJack sold 8 million of these devices by accident,” he said. “That’s a lot. That’s much more than we had at Vonage.”

But the transition of users from traditional telephone service providers to devices like magicJack is just the beginning of the change, he indicated. Over time, Tribolet said, magicJack believes 4G wireless technology will help further decouple communications from geography and the carrier.

Tribolet also talked about the rise of applications.

“I think our industry today is driven by apps,” he said. “Apps are absolutely dominating.”

In fact, some applications, like the Angry Birds game, have become so popular it’s mind boggling.

“More Angry Birds have been hurled than there are birds in the world!” Tribolet reported.

While magicJack is considered a consumer product, Tribolet mentioned the company has begun to develop hunt groups and other functionality to allow it to appeal to business users.

Tribolet joined magicJack in June. He previously was managing director and CEO of ACN Europe BV, a $500 million a year privately held company with more than 1,500 employees that is the world’s largest direct selling telecommunication business servicing Europe. He’s also served as president of Vonage America, and has worked for Dialpad Communications.

In the company announcement of his coming aboard magicJack, Tribolet commented, “In my quest to move back to the U.S. and join the top VoIP company, there really wasn't any company on my list at the end of the day other than magicJack VocalTec. With the new product magicJack PLUS and the service magicJack Apps launching, I feel I am joining at the perfect time. I believe the company will now enjoy a huge amount of growth and profitability with its one-of-a-kind assets and the near monopoly it enjoys. While I had studied the company’s SEC filings explaining various parts of the business, it was not until I talked directly with Dan that I understood the level of opportunity that exists for this company and the need to better communicate this story with potential investors.”  

He continued, “For instance, do most people know magicJack develops its own VoIP software, has an amazing chip company, owns the top VoIP telecom network in the industry and has the largest capacity session border controller and application software in a 1U server?  It is important that various investment banks fully understand what we do, what we can do and how we can do it more efficiently than everybody else. I will immediately prepare an investor presentation for a large-scale road show to meet as many qualified investors as possible. Further, I will engage with bankers to make sure we will increase the investor pool and therefore increase liquidity. I have never felt more opportunity in my professional career and look forward to being part of the magicJack success story.”

Want to learn more about the latest in communications and technology? Then be sure to attend ITEXPO West 2011, happening now, in Austin, Texas. ITEXPO offers an educational program to help corporate decision makers select the right IP-based voice, video, fax and unified communications solutions to improve their operations. It's also where service providers learn how to profitably roll out the services their subscribers are clamoring for – and where resellers can learn about new growth opportunities. To register, click here.

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