Tello Reveals Itself 622380

SAN MATEO, Calif. -- After operating in stealth mode for more than one year, Tello Corporation officially launched today and announced the availability of an instant communication and collaboration service for businesses. The company was founded by a group of technology industry leaders to facilitate real-time communications across networks, applications and devices in the context of critical business processes. (See www.Tello.com for related product announcement.)

Tello was formed in late 2004 and closed its Series A round of financing in April 2005 with Eagle River, Evercore Partners, Rho Ventures and Intel Capital as the leading investors. The company is led by Doug Renert, CEO, who joined from Oracle Corporation where he spent eight years, most recently as vice president responsible for vertical industry applications.

“Tello was founded with the goal of accelerating business communication and collaboration. It enables enterprises to use the wide variety of voice and instant messaging systems available today to manage time-sensitive business processes,” said Doug Renert, CEO of Tello. “The industry has spent years making asynchronous business processes more efficient through enterprise applications. Tello is now doing the same for real-time communications.”

Tello’s founders include the following technology veterans who also serve on the company’s board of directors:

Craig McCaw is chairman and CEO of Eagle River, a private company focusing on strategic investments in the communications industry; and Clearwire Corporation, one of Eagle River’s portfolio companies, which operates wireless broadband communications networks.

Jeff Pulver is the chairman and founder of pulver.com, co-founder of VoIP provider Vonage, publisher of The Pulver Report and VON Magazine, and creator of the industry standard Voice on the Net (VON) conferences.

John Sculley is a venture partner at Rho Ventures. Previously, he co-founded private investment firm Sculley Brothers, and served as CEO of Apple Computer from 1983 to 1993. Prior to Apple, he was president and CEO of Pepsi.

Michael J. Price is a senior managing director of Evercore Partners. Prior to Evercore, he co-founded FirstMark Communications Europe, and previously spent eleven years at Lazard, where he led the firm’s global Telecom and Technology Group.

“Serving the demand for instant communication across disparate networks and devices is an immense and timely opportunity,” said Craig McCaw, co-founder and director of Tello Corporation. “Tello offers an unrivaled proposition, which is uniquely designed to address a critical industry need.”

In a separate release:

SAN MATEO, Calif. -- Tello Corporation today launched the first instant communication service that enables business users to locate and collaborate with key contacts beyond their enterprise boundaries and across multiple platforms - including phones, mobile devices and PCs. The service is being introduced in conjunction with Tello's official company launch, also announced today (see related press release at www.Tello.com).

Tello's service enables end-users to communicate more effectively with their business contacts - such as customers, suppliers or partners - at critical times. For the first time, users can quickly locate and collaborate with others by selecting the ideal communication medium - be it a voice call, instant messaging session, or rich media tool such as a web meeting - regardless of the communications system or device their contact is using.

The service consists of Tello Enterprise for businesses and Tello Basic for individuals and runs on the Tello Connect platform. It features a federation system that aggregates contacts' presence (i.e., shows if the contact is available on a certain application or device) and allows interoperability of disparate voice and instant messaging systems.

Additionally, Tello interfaces with other communication tools, allowing users to launch voice calls, instant messaging and web sharing from a single interface. Tello also integrates with enterprise applications for triggering instant communications to solve critical business issues.

"In today's business environment, workers are becoming increasingly mobile so knowing when, where and how to reach individuals at critical moments is more and more difficult. Additionally, enterprises need to be more responsive than ever to their customers and partners," said Brian Partridge, senior analyst at Yankee Group. "These trends point to the growing importance of real-time communication, and the need for presence-aware solutions that span technology and service silos. Tello addresses this need."

"Most enterprises today have a wealth of communication tools in place, but they still find it difficult to get in touch with customers and partners when it matters most - for example, when closing a sale or solving a critical problem," said Doug Renert, Tello CEO. "With the launch of Tello, businesses can now turn their existing communications applications and devices into strategic assets that drive their core business processes."

Tello's current partners include Avaya, Cisco and Digium. Tello Connect, the service platform for Tello Enterprise, interoperates with systems available from these and other organizations.

"Avaya's IP telephony solutions are designed to bring more intelligent communications to businesses, helping workers and customers reach the right person, using the right medium - in real time," said Carl Baptiste, vice president, product management, Avaya. "Tello's solutions will work with Avaya's capabilities to help businesses use IP, SIP, instant messaging and presence with voice to foster more productive and efficient communications."

Tello Corp.