Vindicia, a leading provider of SaaS billing solutions that help digital leaders optimize customer retention and acquisition through integrated marketing best practices, today announced that it has made this year's Silicon Valley/San Jose Business Journal's "Fast Private 50" for the third consecutive year. Ranking 20 by the publication, Vindicia was honored at a ceremony last night at the Computer History Museum for its consistent and rapid sales and revenue growth over the last three years.

Vindicia has grown into a leader in its market, with top clients across the successful and growing markets it serves -- from online gaming to software to media/content, and online dating. Many of the world's most recognized names use the Vindicia CashBox™ solution to maximize revenues while optimizing customer support and services. Some of these clients include Cryptic Studios, Peanut Labs, SpeedDate, and Cisco, which are either headquartered or have an office either in or around Silicon Valley.

Vindicia, a leading provider of SaaS billing solutions that help digital leaders optimize customer retention and acquisition through integrated marketing best practices, unveiled new marketing capabilities for its CashBox™ SaaS billing solution. The company launched new dashboard applications to help digital merchants make better business decisions and identify key trends in their customer base. In addition, a new integration feature provides native integration into common email systems, beginning with Responsys' Interact Suite.

The new dashboard and reporting capabilities provide digital merchants with the financial and customer data they need to develop a deeper understanding of their business. The dashboard application gives digital merchants an integrated, unified perspective on their organizations' online business. Providing visualized transaction, revenue, and subscriber data, the dashboard enables digital merchants to understand impacts of different customer acquisition efforts, highlight demographic trends, and generate insights on partner and affiliate profitability.

Summary

• Zuora, the subscription billing and commerce leader, today announced that Elevate Inc, a premier digital services provider with an array of IP and wireless residential services, is using Zuora's subscription commerce platform to rapidly roll out its innovative subscription services across the U.S., Canada and Puerto Rico.
• Elevate offers literally hundreds of configurations of residential services tailored to the needs of each individual residential customer, including broadband service up to 10 mbps; IP-based TV and satellite TV service offered in cooperation with DirecTV™ and DISH Network™; mobile and digital phone services; and a fully integrated suite of home security and automation services.
• Elevate represents the new breed of communications provider, revolutionizing the market by delivering flexible service bundles at lower prices with superior customer service. The key to this strategy is speed and flexibility, and with the Zuora for Communications cloud billing platform, Elevate can execute at a more rapid clip than competitors who are held back by decades old, on-premise technology.

Speed-to-Market and Innovative Services are Key to Unseating Incumbent Communications Service Providers

MetraTech, the leading provider of agreements-based billing and compensation solutions, and Scribe, a global data integration provider, has announced that the two companies are collaborating to connect the Metanga cloud billing application to Microsoft Dynamics CRM and other business applications. This technology partnership delivers faster time to revenue at a fraction of the cost of traditional integration solutions for independent software vendors (ISVs) that create and support cloud-based services.

Using Scribe Online, customers can integrate customer and transactional data between Metanga, MetraTech's multi-tenant, cloud-based billing application, and other online and on-premise business applications. The Scribe Online platform simplifies the implementation and maintenance of integration solutions, and like Metanga, it is built on the Windows Azure platform. Its unique collaborative user experience and ability to support global integrations make it an ideal solution for integrating a broad range of applications quickly and easily.

Vindicia Widens Online Gaming Market Lead with New Clients Heatwave Interactive and Idea Fabrik

Company’s Revenues from Online Gaming Sector Rise 470%

Ideal Solution for all Genres and Business Models, Vindicia CashBox™ Helps Game Publishers Increase User Adoption and Boost Revenue

E3 Expo LOS ANGELES and BELMONT, Calif. — June 7, 2011 — Vindicia today announced the addition of two new game publishers and developers Heatwave Interactive and Idea Fabrik’s HeroCloud Service to its customer roster, reinforcing its position as the industry’s top provider of subscription and microtransaction billing and eWallet solutions. Since first announcing its leadership in the online gaming market last year, the company has seen its revenue in this sector grow by 470%.

Heatwave Interactive and Idea Fabrik join a long list of successful game publishers – including Mind Candy, Trion, Cryptic Studios, Wicked Interactive and hi5 – which have selected Vindicia CashBox to increase user adoption and boost revenues. Leveraging the company’s expertise in supporting many different business models, from subscriptions to microtransactions to hybrid models, Vindicia’s online gaming clients have maximized revenue through increased customer acquisition and customer retention.

Vindicia will acknowledge its customers’ successes and celebrate its continued sector growth as a sponsor at the F2P Forum reception to be held on Wednesday, June 8th at the Belasco Theater. 

“Vindicia's deep understanding of the gaming market, including the unique requirements of both players and publishers, has been instrumental in helping us to grow and scale seamlessly,” said Garvin Yeung, CEO of Wicked Interactive. “Since selecting CashBox to support our Suba Games portal we’ve seen a direct and dramatic impact on customer attainment and retention.”

“Growth in online gaming has been explosive across all categories and geographies,” said Vindicia Chairman and CEO Gene Hoffman. “Innovative publishers understand that creating a premier game and environment is only the first step. Offering gamers a range of billing options, from subscriptions to F2P, helps position publishers for high rates of customer acquisition and retention.” 

CashBox ensures that publishers are not losing customers to a lack of billing options, broken payments or fraud. Even the smallest increase in customer retention can lead to sizable revenue increases due to the power of Average Customer Lifetime Value (ACLV) in a subscription business model or monthly Average Revenue per User (ARPU) in a Free-to-Play (F2P) or freemium model.

For further information or to attend the F2P Forum reception at E3, contact Steph Jorgl at 650-264-4700 or sjorgl@vindicia.com. 


About Heatwave Interactive
Heatwave Interactive is a leading global publisher and developer of brand integrated, multi-platform entertainment. Founded in 2007, the Company specializes in high profile, high impact mass market games for PC, mobile, and social platforms. Heatwave has partnered with top celebrities and entertainment brands to provide audiences with engaging games and applications including iSamJackson; CMT Presents Platinum Life: Country, Platinum Life: Web Edition; and Gods & Heroes: Rome Rising. Co-founded by award-winning, game industry veteran Anthony Castoro, Heatwave Interactive is backed by Syncom Venture Partners. For more information, please visit Heatwave's corporate website: www.heatwave.com.

About Idea Fabrik
Idea Fabrik is an industry leading online games company. The company licenses its HeroEngine game development technology platform to dozens of studios worldwide for projects which include EA/Bioware’s upcoming MMO title, Star Wars: The Old Republic. Idea Fabrik also provides the HeroCloud managed service, offering independent developers low-cost access to the HeroEngine technology. For more information about Idea Fabrik, including details about the company’s online game development studios across the globe, visit the official website at http://www.ideafabrik.de.

About Vindicia
Vindicia is a leading provider of SaaS billing solutions that help digital leaders optimize customer retention and acquisition through integrated marketing best practices. Over the past twelve months, Vindicia clients sent $2 billion through its CashBox solution, billed in every global region, and generated $50 million in annual incremental revenue. Our clients include Symantec, TransUnion Interactive, Intuit, Activision Blizzard, Bloomberg, and Next Issue Media. To learn more, please visit www.vindicia.com.

SaaS billing solutions vendor Vindicia has wrapped up a partnership agreement with Idaho-based Kount Inc. for the purpose of extending the latter’s online fraud prevention solution to its customers.

Kount’s fraud mitigation solution, Kount Complete, is ideal for merchants of online, ecommerce and call center operators as it avoids the risk of being defrauded by online thieves.

Zuora, the subscription billing and commerce leader, today announced immediate availability of its January '11 release, delivering the 24^th straight month of consistent product enhancements to its customer base. Each month for the past two years, Zuora has delivered new innovations based on the feedback and experience of hundreds of customers who have already moved into the Subscription Economy with Zuora.

"With Zuora we always know we're at the forefront of innovation in subscription commerce, which gives us great business agility. Being a Zuora customer means we're part of a community of the top minds building the most advanced subscription businesses, and the monthly product releases mean Zuora just keeps on getting better and better!" said Justin Bowser, Managing Director of Online Business at HTK Limited.

Zuora, the subscription billing and commerce leader, today announced that Kantar Video, a division of WPP, the world leader in advertising and marketing communications services, is powering its new on-demand video analytics platform with Zuora. Kantar Video is a new unit within Kantar, which services 22,000 customers in 50 countries and 3 million brands including 50 percent of Fortune 500 companies providing in-depth data and research.

Kantar Video believes the influx of larger and direct response advertisers will drive global video marketing spend to grow by at least 30% per annum compounded through 2015 reaching at least $15B/year (USD). To address this new market, Kantar Video set forth with an aggressive plan to launch a new platform offering customers integrated media audience measurement, competitive intelligence, and behavioral analytics within a single, on-demand platform that helps track and measure online and mobile video and video advertising worldwide. 

(Via NewYorkTimes.com)

Zuora, a provider of an online service that manages subscriptions and online billing, announced today it has raised $20 million in its third round of funding to further CEO Tien Tzuo’s vision of what he calls the “subscription economy.”

Zuora, the subscription billing leader, today announced that Tyler Sloat, has joined Zuora as Chief Financial Officer. Sloat brings strong financial experience in securing capital and growing market leaders in both mobile payments and storage and cloud computing, including raising over $100 million for Obopay.

Sloat joins on the heels of two other key executives joining the company last month, further illustrating Zuora’s aggressive efforts to deliver on the growing opportunities of the Subscription Economy. In August, Zuora named Luke Braud, former Senior Vice President of Products and Engineering for NetSuite as Vice President of Products and Engineering. The company also named seasoned marketer, Andrew Harman, as Chief Marketing Officer.

“In the rapidly growing subscription market the consumers of these services are demanding flexible models designed to meet the way they use services. Whether a SaaS, Cloud, Media, Consumer Services or Telco player, a company’s billing capabilities will define the product catalog they will be able to offer to the market. As companies shift more of their revenue to these service models, recurring billing and payments are becoming increasingly strategic, changing the face of the CFO role,” said Sloat. “Just as Zuora has developed the best practices in recurring and subscription billing, part of my role will be communicating to other CFOs how to make the shift to the Subscription Economy. I’m thrilled to join the company at such a key time in the company’s growth and look forward to working with the other members of this Dream Team of executives to bring Zuora to the next level.”