Yahoo! goes for Call Ezee

By siliconindia   |   Friday, 19 December 2008, 19:28 IST   |    178 Comments
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Bangalore: The Indian market has drawn considerable interest of the Internet giant Yahoo! with it making its third investment in an India-based company, to include voice based search in its portal. The search portal has acquired 30 percent of stake in the Chennai-based tele-search service provider Info Network Management Company (INMAC), mostly known by the consumer brand 'call ezee'. After their investment in Bharat Matrimony, a matrimonial site and Tyroo, an online advertising network in 2008, the internet portal has made its strategic investment on the tele-search engine to establish a strong hold on the emerging markets. "The approach to the emerging markets is not a delayed process since we wanted to have a firm grip on the developed markets and then turn towards the emerging ones," said Keith Nilsson, Senior Vice President of Emerging Markets. The company also expects to grow its revenue share from India, as it's the fastest growing market for them. Moreover, there are also plans to share the databases of the online and tele-search. Through the deal INMAC expect to expand its reach in the local market, tripling its presence in the country by the next 10-12 months. Currently, the 'call ezee' service is available across 15 cities which will increase to 20 within the next six months. It is a telephone directory search service, including mobile or landline number and request the contact details of any business or list of businesses that offer the product or services they are looking for. "This strategic investment will also help us to increase the current database by five times to 15 million. Thus, in the future, a person will be able to avail the information of another city by calling up the local number instead of dialing the number of the other city," said T.S. Narayanswamy, Managing Director, INMAC. Infact, the company is also in talks with telecom service provider Tata, for a nationwide single number for the Ezee service. The company, which has a current workforce of 1000 people, also plans to increase its headcount to 2000 by the next 12 months.