UberConference
 | |
| Industry | Telephony |
|---|---|
| Founded | 2012 |
| Headquarters | San Francisco, California |
Key people | Craig Walker (businessman), CEO |
| Products | UberConference |
Number of employees | 60 |
| Website |
www |
UberConference is a cloud-based conferencing system from Switch Communications, Inc., a privately held company in San Francisco, California. The company, formerly known as Firespotter Labs, was co-founded by Craig Walker one year after he was the first Entrepreneur-in-Residence at Google Ventures. Prior to the launch of UberConference, Firespotter launched a restaurant seating application called NoshList.
Product
History
The co-founders of UberConference are CEO Craig Walker, VP Telephony John Rector, VP Engineering Brian Peterson, and Creative Director Alex Cornell. UberConference was launched in May 2012 at TechCrunch Disrupt,[1] the annual trade conference run by technology news source TechCrunch. UberConference was chosen as the best new product from a group of 30 startup entrants.
A number of features have been added, including screen sharing and file sharing (which allows users to share the image of their own screen with other callers), as well as integration into a number of Google Apps, including Google Hangouts. UberConference has been a featured app in the Google App store.
UberConference’s development was funded by an initial investment of $3 million in Firespotter from Google Ventures, and another $15 million in the fall of 2013 by Andreessen Horowitz and Google Ventures. It is also a portfolio company of Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers[2] Currently, UberConference employs over 60 full-time workers spread across offices in San Francisco, CA, San Jose, CA, and Raleigh, NC.
The team is composed of former Google Voice (previously GrandCentral)[3] and Yahoo! Voice (previously Dialpad)[4] employees.
Features
UberConference is a “visual audio conferencing system”. Callers see an avatar of the other participants in their mobile browser or from their desktop client. It is not a video conferencing system, although when used in conjunction with Google Hangouts live video conferencing is available.
UberConference is built on WebRTC to allow real-time call control, across a variety of carriers on one side and browsers on the other. Other features include basic call controls, HD Audio, document sharing, call recording, and detailed profiles on the callers from their public social media profiles on Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. UberConference does not require a Personal Identification Number to join a call.
In addition to these features, UberConference has been integrated into file hosting services from Box, Dropbox, and Evernote.
Google Integrations
UberConference currently supports four major integrations with Google Apps for Work as a part of their Google Apps Premier Technology Partnership. These include:
- Google Hangouts: connect by phone with an UberConference phone number
- Google Apps Marketplace: Receive meeting reminders from your desktop
- Google Drive: share and edit files in UberConference
- Google Chrome: start instant calls from anywhere in your browser
Pricing
UberConference is free to most users but also provides a pro and business-grade service for an additional cost. Both of these plans are $10 per user per month, and offer additional features. In the free version, calls are limited to 10 participants, but with UberConference Pro, up to 100 callers can participate. International dialing, uploadable custom hold music, and the ability to dial out to add a caller is available. UberConference Business is similarly priced but offers additional reporting features and call analytics.
Awards
UberConference is the Third Annual Winner of TechCrunch Disrupt, Mobile Productivity Nominee in The Webby Awards, 2014 Best Places to Work SF Business Times, and TMC Internet Telephony 2014 Communications Solutions Product of the Year. The company was also the silver winner in The American Business Awards Telecommunications Company of the Year.