It is the first Thai software company with its own intellectual property to present as collateral and it has a high-profile in several Asian countries.

Pongrepee has returned home after working for more than 10 years in the United States with EarthLink and Launch.com, determined to make sure Pop idol leads in developing mobile software and content.

Launch.com is an online music service which has been acquired by Yahoo.com while EarthLink is one of the leading Internet service-providers in the US, with headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia.

He wants to use his US experience in technology development for his Thai company so it can export software throughout Asia. The company sells technology products and content, especially music-related, for mobile phones.

He said his goal was to make his company's flagship product, Symphony, among the top three in the field in Asia by the end of this year, thereby pushing the business to the global forefront.

He sees great opportunities in the huge digital content management business and in digital convergence, including areas of cross-licensing, transparency and piracy prevention. Pop idol will explore each of these avenues.

Symphony is associated with digital content management. It is designed to manage and deliver large amounts of content to millions of mobile-users efficiently.

It can be adjusted and customised for specific requirements.

"We provide the infrastructure for mobile applications. We work on mobile content, content aggregators and with mobile application-providers to help them deliver their services smoothly and easily," he said. "It helps content owners find out where and how many times music was downloaded and who their customers were."

He said music was the strongest area of his overall vision, though he will eventually move beyond that into music videos, video on demand, full-track music downloads and game downloads.

 That also means going beyond mobiles to MP3 players and personal media players.

The company's current overseas interests are in Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia.

It aims to add four more Asian countries in 2006. "The good thing about the company is its sound relationship with the major music labels, which I came to know when I was working for Launch.com. This also allowed me to start my own business," Pongrepee said.

The company has signed contracts with the big international quintet - Sony, BMG, Warner Brothers, EMI and Universal - as well as  Thai companies such as Bakery Music, Co & Kabue, INN, UPL, Vithita and BEC.

The company is to provide digital content management to more than 20 content partners, 100 content-providers and 100 services through 10 telecom companies across Asia.

It now has three levels of business partners: channel partners (content-providers); telecom partners (mobile operators), both local (AIS, DTAC and Orange), and global (mobile operators in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore); and content partners (EMI, Universal Music, Sony BMG, Warner Music, Vithita, Aquarius, and Forte).

The company has also developed mobile games. In 2003, it sold a game bundle for Sony Ericsson (Asia)'s T610, Z600 and T230 models launched in Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore, Taiwan, Vietnam and Thailand.

It has come up with games for mobiles which can be downloaded from the Internet.

It also developed "i-humm", a technology which  converts a phone-user's humming of his favourite song into a personalised, digitised ringtone, a service being provided for the past two years.

The company is backed by the National Innovation Agency (NIA), SME Bank, and ACB. ACB is its intellectual property guarantor; Symphony is its collateral for loans from the SME Bank and the NIA, impressed with its innovations, allows it interest-free handouts of up to Bt 1.4 million.

It has been granted a Bt7-million loan by SME Bank. Pongrepee said that the money would be spent on business extension, advertising, and on enhancing the features and functions of its flagship product. It is counting on a more than 50-per cent revenue rise over last year's Bt 40 million.

asina@nationgroup.com

Asina Pornwasin

The Nation