EFax (fax service)

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The correct title of this article is eFax. The initial letter is shown capitalized due to technical restrictions.

eFax is a service of j2 Global Communications that allows users to receive and send fax documents in digital format (e.g., in one's email) rather than at a traditional paper fax machine.

1 History
2 Trademark claim
3 See also
4 External links

[edit] History

eFax began as a service of JetFax, Inc., which in the 80s and 90s manufactured and sold JetFax fax machines. In early 1999, JetFax changed its name to eFax.com, Inc. and began to offer the eFax electronic fax service. During the dotcom boom, their stock shot up but fell during the bust and they ran out of funds. eFax.com was acquired by j2 Global Communications in late 2000. j2 Global, which at the time was called JFAX.COM, then changed its name and focused its business around the eFax service which quickly became the flagship service of the company. The service is available through toll-free numbers and also through local numbers in over 2,000 cities in 31 countries^{[citation needed]}. It has been estimated [1] that the company as a whole has a few hundred thousand paying customers and several million who use its free advertising-supported services.

[edit] Trademark claim

The term "E-FAX" is the subject of a 1999 trademark registration application in the USA by E-Fax Communications inc. [2]; this has not yet been granted, but the company says is it actively pursuing others who use the term [3]. However, the Unix/Linux program called "efax" has been produced since 1993 [4], and the term is also widely used to refer to computer-based faxing in general; see examples at [5] [6] [7] [8] [9] [10] [11] [12] [13] [14] [15] [16]. Some reports of judgements made on this issue, which found that "e-fax" is a descriptive term, can be found at [17] [18].