"Giant steps are what you take."

This is what you'll hear on my ringback ironically.

Here’s the dealio... Ben and I started Jangl to bridge people on the web with their phones. We’ve built this capability contextually into the social web, have done the deals to distribute and evangelize it. That’s probably how you heard about Jangl in the first place.

We accomplished more than most companies do on the amount of money we raised and the time we spent on it. And in our opinion it needed another 18-24 months worth of runway to realize its fullest potential; but at the end of the day every venture capitalist has their own coefficient of venture. To that end, we took company forward into an M&A process. Unfortunately with much bigger things happening in the marketplace it turned out to be the worst time in a few years to be selling. We were just days from closing an M&A transaction which was going to mean good things for all involved. But there are more ways deals can blow up than there are ways for them to stick. So it blew up, and now the company is responding to acquisition interest. Ben and I resigned Tuesday and put our heads together to figure out how we can keep as many of our great team together, and still pursue our passion for being the web's phone.

The end result is Ben and I, along with five others have been acquired as a team into Jajah. They are signing lots of deals and want to sign even more, which is what I do, and they need those deals integrated which is what Ben does. It’s a perfect compliment, and in a fast growing environment, and with a great group of people. Jajah have obviously found a sustainable groove so we're going to round out their team and take this to the next level. We’ll have our best feet forward in terms of seeing our passion through, only with a different jersey on. (Hey, look what happened when Pau Gasol joined the Lakers...) Game on.

I want to publicly thank the people that have sweat right by me in the trenches at Jangl, especially: Tim Johnson for his relentless push of our news (he is off to creating a great agency so reach him at whitespinnaker at gmail dot com); Aaron Burcell for his loyalty, savvy, drinks and programatic prowess; Brian Longest for his noiseless thinking and execution; Azeem Butt for getting us on a dev schedule we should have been on years ago; Sue Flemming and Chris B for all the mad design skillz; Matt O for the details and chocolate rain; James Huie for doing 3 jobs in one; Neil Alarcon for holding down the back end; Matt Murillo for the beautiful front end work; Henry Muljono for the smiles and more great front end work; Yuriy & Alex for banging out releases; Marcos for being a solid citizen; Nancy Herney for being my counselor; and finally Chris Hadsell from Cardinal for believing in my franchise every step of the way. I’ll miss you all and will see some of you sooner than later.

If anyone has any further questions, they can wait for the book:)

Technorati Tags: Jajah, Jangl

Comments

[PhoneBoy]

It's funny, there was some speculation about Jajah and Jangl becoming "more than partners" back when you signed the infrastructure deal with them. Kind of happened in a way, I guess :)

Best of luck to you, Ben, and the rest of the (former) Jangl team. I know it's gotta be hard, but that's the business world.

[Alexnader Muse]

Congrats guys!

[William Volk]

Michael,

This is William Volk, the CEO of MyNuMo. You need to contact me immediately. You have my contact information.

Thank you.

Bill

[JamesH]

Thanks for the recognition. Regardless of how it turned out, I am glad to have worked with everyone at Jangl - especially the list above.

James
[email protected]

[Timothy Johnson]

I'm with James. It was an honor and privilege, and a great ride. You and Ben should be commended.

Let's do Patron shots this weekend, seeing as May 5 was kind of busy. :)

Tim
[email protected]

[omfut]

Michael,
You guys did a great job. I always thought you guys would steer the company to the next level. Iam still surprised what happened to all those deals and partnership you guys built. I don’t know if this is an indication of Voice 2.0 bubble breaking.

All that said hats off to you guys. I know its hard times.Iam sure jajah must be happy to have you guys on board.
Just wrote an artilce about jangl- check out if u get a chance http://latestgeeknews.blogspot.com/2008/05/is-voice-20-bubble-breaking.html

Cheers,
Omfut

[Ivan]

Michael, Congrats. You got off the fence and made something. And you took the time to share the ups and downs of the ride through your blog. Thanks and very best of fortune.

[Aaron Burcell]

Thanks for the nod, MC. "The Franchise" will come together again after some time... until then, we'll have new taco joints to explore in Mountain View.

[luca]

Hey Michael, congratulations to you an your team!
Great to know that I can now meet two friends all at one in the same place ;-)

[Chris]

Ah, VC's got you too. That sucks!!

Somebody needs to file legal action for breaching fiduciary responsibility. Here's a hint. The defendants should be the VC's on the board of directors.

[John Furrier]

Good luck guys. As entrepreneurs I tip my hat to you for going for it. I can only say that years of hard work must have been a big sacrafice. Most people don't understand how hard it is to build something from nothing and having a deal (venture) blow up in the 11th hour must have been trying. Good luck in your new roles. Dust off and jump back on the horse.

[John Furrier]

Good luck guys. As entrepreneurs I tip my hat to you for going for it. I can only say that years of hard work must have been a big sacrafice. Most people don't understand how hard it is to build something from nothing and having a deal (venture) blow up in the 11th hour must have been trying. Good luck in your new roles. Dust off and jump back on the horse.

[Detlef]

Michael,
Congratulations!
Glad to see 2 great companies combining their assets.
Detlef

[Ted Malone]

Congratulations to you and Ben. I'm sure you'll go on to do great things with the J-Clone!

All my best,

-Ted

[Justin Siegel]

Mike let me know how we can work together in the future.

Justin Siegel
MocoSpace

[Dave Theriault]

Hello Michael,

I was just there a few weeks ago talking with Sue, and we were talking about growth - it's crazy how fast things change. If anyone from the leaving Jangle team wants assistance transitioning then drop me a line!

[NEON JAVA]

Just learned today about the throw-down between Jangl and SnapVine with Whitepages.com as the well-heeled referee. I'm happy the Jajah trapeze net was there for you, but sad for me: I tried SV and JJ, but Jangl was my tool of choice -- I just wrote you guys up in my blog AND in my monthly email newsletter I send out to 2000 people. Too little, too late, but you've got nothing but love from me, hombres.

So now that you're all Jajah-men, will there be some logical segue plan for us Janglr's? Is there a special fire exit I'm supposed to be using?

[Michael Cerda]

@ Phoneboy: thanks for the support the past few years, you're a gentleman and a great tech blogger. You've always had sensibilities and insights other hadn't.

@ A Muse: thanks much. Don't mess with Texas.

@ W Volk: you know who to contact.

@ James: thanks for your help - listen to your wife!:)

@ Timmy: I already thanked you. We'll work together again I'm sure.

@ Omfut: Perhaps a bubble is leaking some, and some companies are dying due to lack of traction. Jangl wasn't one of those though. Jangl's situation was circumstantial, and shouldn't weigh too heavily in the analysis of voice 2. Always like to read your stuff bro.

@ Ivan: thank you, good luck with dialdo.

@ Aaron: boat drinks.

@ Luca: you're a consummate guy, glad we'll keep in touch.

@ John: you know it brother. I'm dusted off and have risen for a new day. Podtech rules.

@ Detlef: we work together at last I guess. See you at the next bad conference;)

@ Justin: will keep in touch.

@ Dave T: hopefully you didn't think Sue was snowing you. The reality is, when you were there things were really growing and we were planning on the next growth phase. Things really did change by circumstance, very late in the game. Unfortunately, the buyer knew they were sucking us dry. Bad karma points for them.

@ Neon Java: you are an empress for sure, keeping that Jangl phone widget up and all. Felt good to see your comment. Stuff ought to continue to work actually, since Live Universe owns Jangl now.

[Lucas Lain]

Michael ... do you have an email where i can contact you?

Best regards,

Lucas.

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