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Versaly provides consumers range to personalize mobile phones

	ALAN BERNER / THE SEATTLE TIMES Matt Feldman is president and CEO of Versaly, which offers ringtones, images, games and text-based content.
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Who: Matt Feldman, president and chief executive officer

What it does: Creates, produces and distributes entertainment delivered over mobile phones. Versaly works with content owners such as "Star Trek," Paramount, NBC and Experience Hendrix that want to offer their content to cellphone users.

Customer: While Versaly's customers are mobile-phone users, it has to develop close relationships with content providers to develop the offerings and mobile operators to deliver the content. "Versaly is the necessary intermediary between brand owners and carriers," Feldman said. "We're in the middle working with both sides."

Revenue sharing: "There are a 100 different hands in the pot," Feldman said. For example, when a mobile-phone customer pays for a ringtone, a portion of the payment goes toward the billing transaction. The rest is shared among the carrier, the song publisher, the artist who wrote the song and Versaly. Typically, Versaly walks away with 40 to 50 percent of the payment.

The content: Mobile-phone customers can find Versaly content from their carriers — Versaly works with all the major carriers in the U.S. — or at www.forfones.com.

Competitive advantage: Most of Versaly's competitors specialize in just one type of content, such as only ringtones. Versaly offers ringtones, images that can be used as wallpaper on a phone's screen, games and text-based content

New deal: Versaly is creating a line of mobile phone products for UltraStar, an Internet services and online marketing company for the music industry. As part of the agreement, Versaly is offering a service to allow attendees at Sting concerts to take pictures with their camera phones and create a personal slide show on the phone.

Future: Over the past six months, the industry has undergone significant consolidation, "European and Japanese companies in our space have tried to get into the U.S. and failed so they've had to purchase local companies to get in," Feldman said. "We've seen a lot of money come into the U.S. so now the companies we used to compete with have a lot more cash to work with."

New hire: In order to better compete, Versaly recently hired Nogi Asp, formerly chief financial officer at Bsquare, to fill a new CFO position at the company. He's charged with preparing the company for venture-capital investment or to merge or be acquired.

Funding: Feldman and Mike Davis, the company's co-founder and chief technology officer, have put just more than $1 million of their own money into the company.
 
Employees: 17

Revenues: Last year, revenues exceeded $1 million.

Etiquette: "In this company, as long as it's a fun ringtone, it's not rude to have your mobile phone ring during a meeting."

— Nancy Gohring

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company