昨日、スマート・コミュニケーションズがChikka.comを非公開の金額で買収したことが確認されました。Chikka Asia Inc.のトップエグゼクティブ2名が、この出来事について自身のTwitterアカウントに更新を投稿しました。
これは長らく噂されていましたが、ついに両者が昨日合意に署名したとの報せが入りました。
デニス・メンディオラは、Chikkaの創設者兼チーフイマジネーションオフィサーです：
Gio BacarezaはChikkaのビジネス開発ディレクターです：
まだ詳細を確認中で、入手次第この投稿を更新します。
Chikka Asia, Inc. は、SMS を通じてモバイル機能を完全に統合した世界初のインスタントメッセンジャーであるChikka Messengerでよく知られている無線アプリケーションサービスプロバイダーです。同社は世界中のネットワーク事業者からのモバイル加入者を含む約 3800 万の登録ユーザーを抱えており、Google Talk と相互運用可能です。
更新: 複数の情報筋によると、この取引額は約7億5千万ペソでした。
After I initially left a comment I appear tto have clicked
on the -Notify me when new comments are added- checkbox and from
now on whenever a comment is added I get 4 emails with
the same comment. Perhaps there is a means you can remove me from that service?
Thankk you!
Nimbuzz naman tayo.
papa chat nman tau ngun
Smart move by Smart. There is a lot of money to be made with Chikka :)
The smart company is really smart.. maybe in future they see that chikka will be a threath :D …
Smart is not shutting down chikka. In fact they are pouring in more capital to the company (for the new office, new servers etc)
Chikka just had its third retrenchment a month or two ago. Business is REALLY going bad. CP? They’ve reduced their content department from 20+ members to 2. Yes. Only 2 remains. This isn’t a good move at all when few years back, Google was buying Chikka.
At first this sounded like great news, but it seems the merger isn’t going so well now. I wonder what this really means for smart now?
I think smart finds no more use of chikka. They are starting to shut them down.
yes, nakain na ni smart si chikka… nararamdaman na ng chikka people ngayon yan… :) smart move si smart talaga… nice.
i cant access chikka.com in my new laptop. eseries sony ..also in samsung mini laptop.help!
wow.. chikka was bought by smart? really now…
why would smart bother to buy chika? hmmm… chika has loads of information, from cellphone numbers to emails, to contacts. chika is even on your desktop.. :) may be that will answer your questions, that why would smart bother buying chika.
anyway…
chika was very famous back then but didnt evolve to much profitable terms…
IMO
chika is cheating… chika users pretend as the normal users masked with the name… then when you reply.. 2.50php will cost the sender.. :( too bad…
0919******* penge load pki send po jan
0919******* penge load pki send po jan
0919******* pene load pki send po jan
why is it that telcos are acquiring content providers. ito na ba ang business model ngayon? they have wolfac right? globe has EGG? what next? ung IG kaya or ZED?
huh! no doubt smart will charge chikka’s free txt messages to globe/sun while maintaining the free service to smart network only.
I enjoyed reading your opinions.. But for me i don’t think smart will kill chikka’s operation. Chikka is the leading content provider for Smart. Note that telecoms here’s does not develop content from themselves but they look for CP which can make and develop products and services for them. Most of the free txt alerts, horoscopes, ring tones and other services are dveloped by CPs. And i think buying chikka is a good move for Smart. Maybe chikka has the best and fastest innovating CP.
Wag na problemahin yan. Kadaming free text websites. Kung marunong lang kayong maghanap.
they can shut down the free text service but there will always be other options, if smart bought them to kill competition, they are dead wrong.
I doubt if it is a good thing. The good old days of free texting from pc to globe, sun, and smart may be over! Smart has its greedy intentions for buying chikka.
patay tayo nyan. siguradong di na libre ang chikka. smart pa. eh talagang smart yang mga yan.
Paano na po kaya ang free text nila?
This would be interesting. Hope it would still be free.
magiging free pa kaya ang chikka?
38 million registered users? pag nakareceive ka ng chikka message automatically registered ka na sa server nila bibigyan ka na agad ng password. Hateful behavior in my opinion. Ang dami ko na kinagalitan na sa hotline ng mga telco kasi sabi ko alisin nyo ako sa chikka, i don’t want to receive them, pero ayaw pa rin nila iblock…
i think smart just bought chikka for the database records. after all, their uzzap is going quite well. but anyways, i still think my little kuripotxt is better than chikka :P wahaha
the only people really happy about this development are dennis and his group, congrats on your new found riches.
This is not exactly like Google buying AdMob, which to me is such painfully obvious move by Google for even more global domination.
Chikka was hot with potential a few years ago (which is like a several decades in the IT world), now it seems to have lagged in it’s evolvement and lost a lot of it’s relevance. Messaging now is even more integrated than it was before. I totally agree with Abe, it’s all about being mobile and connected.
A little skeptical with this move, but Smart is Smart. They won’t invest unless there is a ton of money involved.
greedy corporations hehehe…
@christopher:
well, yeah Smart won’t buy a non-income generating product/company. But it’s also possible that they would shutdown/close Chikka’s operation. It happens in the corporate world – they buy you then shut you down! If you are becoming a threat, then might as well eliminate you from the competition. That’s the worst case scenario. ;)
Good to know that Smart is expanding its services! :D
But I think this will conflict with their “other” chat network/free sms product – Uzzap. I wonder how Smart will market it with their product line up.
I think smart won’t buy a non-income generating product/company.
I think this is a win-win move for both parties =) And its consumers will get more, with expanded mobile services.
Err I wonder what’ll happen to their free text service?
I am not sure if this is a good move. we’ll see. There were free internet based free sms before that did not work.
it’s about time!
will they still allow free texting to globe and sun cell networks?
ow.. Thats y i cant connect to chikka since yesterday.. mybe der uprading or somthing.. i just hope this merge between smart and chikka will be good & w/o a catch to its service in the future..
& hope the app & service will still be FREE!
Wow! This is good news! And this adds portfolio to Smart’s Services. I’m sure with the integration of these two companies, there would be other services that Smart would offer to its subscribers soon.
Interesting bit of news… Will the Chikka service be expanded to Western territories then?
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