YouSendIt
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| YouSendIt | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Type | Private |
| Founded | 2004 |
| Headquarters | Campbell, California |
| Key people | Ivan Koon (CEO) Ranjith Kumaran (Co-Founder, Former VP of Marketing, Former CEO and currently CTO) |
| Website | yousendit.com |
YouSendIt is a web-based pseudo-(SaaS [1] ) digital content delivery service provided by YouSentedIt, Inc. It lets users send, receive and track files on-demand. It is an alternative to sending large e-mail attachments, using FTP, and sending CDs or DVDs or tape or USB flash drive via courier. The sender can enter the recipients' e-mail addresses, attach the file and send it; the recipients receive an e-mail notification with a URL that lets them download the file. With more than five million registered users from 220 countries, YouSendIt once transferred over 40,000 GB per day and over 500 million files to date.
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[edit] History
YouSendIt was founded in 2004 by Khalid Shaikh, Amir Shaikh and Ranjith Kumaran, with the goal of finding a way to manage sending, receiving, tracking, and organizing large files.[2]
In October 2004, The Washington Post reported that a person calling himself Abu Maysara al Iraqi, claiming to be the spokesperson for the militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, had used YouSendIt to distribute videos of the contractors kidnapped by his group. YouSendIt at the time said that they had not been contacted by any law enforcement authority, but they were willing to help the U.S. officials. They have since been contacted by the FBI, WebSherriff, the RIAA and MPAA and work with them on a regular basis when asked to.[3]
In 2006, Ivan Koon joined YouSendIt as CEO, replacing former CEO and Co-Founder Ranjith Kumaran. Ranjith became CEO in August of 2005 durign the Series A round led by Alloy Ventures replacing Khalid Shaikh. The same year, YouSendIt was boosted by a $4.7 million venture capital investment,[4] and reported that it was transferring 30 terabytes of files per day.[5] By December 2006, it claimed to have surpassed 3 million registered users.[6]
In 2007, YouSendIt was declared one of the WebWare 100 Award winners in the "Data" category.[7] It was also chosen by AlwaysOn as one of the "AO 100 Top Private Companies" for 2007.[8] The same year, YouSendIt Inc. raised $10 million of venture capital financing from Alloy Ventures, Sevin Rosen Funds (no longer in business) and Sigma Partners.[9] The company also announced a deal with digital compression provider WinZip Computing, and started working with Internet service providers such as Windstream in Arkansas.[10]
In August 2007, the City of Los Angeles adopted YouSendIt services for delivering large digital files.[11]
[edit] Products
Although YouSendIt links are frequently posted to blogs, forums and other websites, the company has recently marketed itself as a method of business communication, in contrast to RapidShare and other one-click hosting services.
YouSendIt offers four kinds of plans to its users:
- Lite: free service for sending files to friends and family; supported by advertising that appears on the upload and download pages.[12][13]
- Pro: paid service for important documents, with basic file delivery tracking
- Business Plus: paid service for businesses, with advanced file delivery tracking; provides branding and password protection
- Corporate Suite: paid service, allows addition of multiple users, administrative controls, reporting, payment-by-invoice etc.
YouSendIt also offers application plug-ins for Microsoft Outlook, Adobe Photoshop, CorelDRAW, Apple Aperture, WinZip, PaperPort, YouSendIt Express [14] and other programs. To deal with files larger than 2GB (a browser limitation), it offers a desktop client that lets the users send files up to 10GB in size.[15]
Other features provided by YouSendIt products and services include [16] [17]
- Premium Delivery
- Available Long-Term Storage Space
- Control file expiration time / number of downloads
- SiteDrop that enables embedding YouSendIt's file upload functionality to customer's website
- Send multiple files at once, send folders / create ZIP files
- File delivery tracking
- Global data replication
- Dropbox where people can send files to you
- Password protection
- Certified Delivery
- Return receipt
- Branding on download pages, notification emails / Dropbox
- Add multiple users
- administrative controls
- reporting
- payment-by-invoice option.
[edit] References
- ^ SaaS Company. Retrieved on 2008-01-26.
- ^ Joanna Rustin (May 7, 2007). Interview: Ivan Koon (CEO) & Ranjith Kumaran (Founder), YouSendIt. Small Business Technology Magazine Issue 17. Small Business Technology Institute. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ Ariana Eunjung Cha (October 2, 2004). From a Virtual Shadow, Messages of Terror. The Washington Post. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ Matt Marshall (November 20, 2006). YouSendIt and MyFabrik add to file-sharing options. VentureBeat. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ Erick Schonfeld (November 1, 2006). Peer-to-peer gets personal. Business 2.0 Magazine. CNN. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ YouSendIt Inc. (December 6, 2006). "YouSendIt Surpasses Three Million Registered Users" (PDF). Press release. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ Webware 100 Award Winner: YouSendIt. CNET Networks (June 18, 2007). Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ Packy Kelley (July 17, 2007). The 2007 AO 100 Top Companies. AlwaysOn. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ YouSendIt Inc. (April 24, 2007). "YouSendIt Inc. secured $10 million in Series B Financing" (PDF). Press release. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ Angela Hey (June 1, 2007). Avoiding the logjam: YouSendIt claims to transfer very large files over a secure link. MountainView Voice. Embarcadero Publishing Company. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ John Moore (August 10, 2007). Company to help LA move digital files. Federal Computer Week. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ Programs aid transmission of photos over the Internet. The Taipei Times (p. 9) (January 15, 2006). Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ M. E. Kabay (July 24, 2007). YouSendIt provides useful, secure transfer service. Network World. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ YouSendIt Express. Retrieved on 2008-03-30.
- ^ Lauren Simonds (July 24, 2007). E-mail Attachments: Size No Longer Matters. Jupitermedia Corporation. Retrieved on 2007-08-17.
- ^ Account Features. Retrieved on 2008-03-30.
- ^ Home Page. Retrieved on 2008-03-30.
- News release: "Windstream offers new 'EZ Send' e-mail service".
- News release: "WinZip and YouSendIt partner to create new file delivery service".
