LiveProfile

LiveProfile, Inc.

Founded	New York City, New York
Area served	Worldwide
Key people	Phil Karl, Co-Founder William Key, Co-Founder
Slogan(s)	Stay connected with friends in real-time
Website	liveprofile.com
Type of site	Instant Messaging Client / Social Networking
Users	15 million (Inactive)
Available in	Multilingual
Launched	October 16, 2010
Current status	Acquired by BlackBerry Ltd and discontinued

LiveProfile was a cross-platform mobile messenger and mobile social network, owned and operated by LiveProfile Inc., for Android, iOS, and BlackBerry. In 2011, BlackBerry Ltd acquired LiveProfile ^[1][2] and later discontinued the service as a result of the successful launch of BlackBerry Messenger for iOS and Android.

History

LiveProfile was founded by Phil Karl and William Key and launched on October 16, 2010. It quickly gained widespread popularity and received as many as 200,000 new user registrations per day.^[3] LiveProfile raised Series A financing from Lightspeed Venture Partners and Naval Ravikant in June 2011.^[4][5]

Acquisition by BlackBerry

BlackBerry Ltd acquired LiveProfile, Inc with the intention of integrating with BlackBerry Messenger, as part of their cross-platform strategy shift. Ex-CEO of BlackBerry Ltd Jim Balsillie considered this plan a top strategic priority. However this move deeply divided the company and was later cancelled. Co-CEOs Jim Balsillie and Mike Lazaridis left BlackBerry Ltd shortly after the plan was cancelled.^[6][7][8]

Availability

LiveProfile was discontinued as of December 2013. All devices which currently have LiveProfile installed will no longer be able to access the service.

Features

• Messages are of unlimited length.
• Users can choose a personal LiveProfile display picture and status.
• Real-time confirmations when messages are delivered and read.
• Users can also share photos, videos and more with multiple contacts at once.
• Users can post their LiveProfile status to Facebook or Twitter accounts.
• Contacts can be added by scanning Facebook friends and Twitter contacts, Email addresses associated with the user's LiveProfile, Mobile phone numbers or sharing PINs.
• Users can reveal the music that is playing on their smartphone.
• Users can send music files to their friends.

References

1. "Fate of BlackBerry's Popular Messaging Tool in Doubt".
2. "Inside the fall of BlackBerry: How the smartphone inventor failed to adapt".
3. "How LiveProfile Netted 1M Users in 5 Days".
4. "Lightspeed Venture Partners » LiveProfile".
5. "LiveProfile - AngelList".
6. "Inside the fall of BlackBerry: How the smartphone inventor failed to adapt".
7. "RIM to keep BBM exclusive to BlackBerry devices".
8. "Did RIM shelve an idea to license BBM to competitors, carriers?".

External links

• Official website - No longer functional