Small screen struggles.L.A.-based Helio Inc., the mobile service formed last year in a joint venture between EarthLink Inc. and SK TelecomCo. Ltd., is trying all kinds of tactics to lure young customers to its mobile lifestyle brand. Launched earlier this year, the mobile virtual network just announced a trade-in program offering users cash for their old cell phones. Hello has custom-branded handsets that the firm says are optimized for its video-heavy mobile offerings. Called Hello Trade-Up, the program underscores the competitive challenges facing startup mobile operators. The darling of venture capitalists, companies such as Hello ($440 million in funding), L.A.-based Amp'd Mobile Amp'd Mobile was a mobile phone service launched in the United States in late 2005. The company was a Mobile Virtual Network Operator and operated on the Verizon Wireless CDMA EV-DO network. Its primary non-Venture Capital investors were MTV Networks and Universal Music Group. Inc. ($250 million over three rounds of venture funding) and Walt Disney Noun 1. Walt Disney - United States film maker who pioneered animated cartoons and created such characters as Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck; founded Disneyland (1901-1966) Disney, Walter Elias Disney Co.'s Mobile ESPN Mobile ESPN is a cellular phone-based sports information service offered by ESPN and Verizon Wireless. It will be carried on the Verizon Wireless Network after it is relaunched in May of 2007 as the ESPN MVP. service are "floundering," according to according to prep. 1. As stated or indicated by; on the authority of: according to historians. 2. In keeping with: according to instructions. 3. a Wall Street Journal report. Amp'd Mobile has spent heavily on marketing in a campaign that started well before its early 2006 launch, ESPN ESPN Entertainment and Sports Programming Network mobile has plenty of backing behind it--yet both have failed to reach the 10,000 subscriber mark. Users haven't adopted mobile-video watching as fast as companies had hoped: only about 1 percent of the nation's estimated 215 million cell phone users reported watching videos on their phones last year, according to measuring firm M:Metrics. Hello is run by EarthLink founder Sky Dayton Sky Dylan Dayton (born 8 August 1971) is an American entrepreneur. Dayton is the founder of EarthLink, co-founder of eCompanies, founder and Chairman of Boingo, and the CEO of Helio. Early life Dayton's father was a sculptor and his mother a dancer and poet. and has already announced groundbreaking partnerships with social-networking site MySpace.com in order to mesh young people's Internet and mobile lives. The latest campaign offers a rebate check to new Hello customers who send in their old mobile phones. |
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