Mobispine acquires Fun Text

Mobispine, the mobile messaging company, announced the acquisition of Fun Text and its parent company Image Semantics. The combined company will deliver SMS and MMS messaging solutions to a rapidly growing network of over 30 mobile Operators around the world who collectively serve in excess of 350 million subscribers.

The new company will bring innovation to both the enterprise and the consumer mobile messaging markets. Mobispine is already the world leader in converged messaging between the desktop and the mobile phone. Fun Text is a consumer service that connects content with communication and enables users to send professionally created multimedia to express their emotions. The combined vision is to deliver next generation mobile messaging services on a global scale.

Together the companies already support Vodafone, Orange, Telefonica, Sprint, TMobile and O2 in Europe and North America. In addition, Mobispine has recently expanded into high growth BRIC countries by opening an office in Sao Paulo Brazil and winning contracts with Russian and Indian mobile operators. The global operations of the combined company will be supported by offices in 5 countries together with worldwide partnership agreements with messaging infrastructure leaders such as Ericsson and Acision.

"The combination of Mobispine and Fun Text creates a company with the scale and resources to deliver innovative mobile messaging services to a global audience" said James Pycock, one of the Founders of Fun Text.

In addition to enhancing the solutions offered to mobile operators around the world, the company will expand its direct-to-consumer activity by offering some of the key services on a global scale.

"We strongly believe in the opportunity for innovative consumer and enterprise messaging services and we are delighted to bring Fun Text into the Mobispine portfolio" said Dusyant Patel, CEO at Mobispine.

Fun Text is the fourth acquisition by Mobispine in a little over 12 months as the company becomes a new force in mobile messaging. Mobispine, which is listed on a Swedish stock exchange, provides value-added messaging services that range from desktop-to-mobile messaging, photo and video albums and communities, through to content sharing applications.