ComBOTS - a publicly traded company which was founded by the founders of web.de after web.de was sold to United Internet in 2005 for 200 million Euro and 5.8 million (9.26 %) in shares - today announced to terminate the further development of their communication service and undertake a realignment of the company.
They wanted to revolutionise the web by integrating rich media messaging, advanced telephony and reliable file transfer in one easy to use tool for PC and mobile and have been pumping millions of Euro in R&D and marketing ever since without attracting a significant number of users and with zero revenue.
Recently they tried to cut down their expenses (lowering their net loss to 3.3 million in Q2 2007 coming from 9.3 million in Q2 2006). Since the share price of United Internet has been developing nicely they easily could have kept this service alive for a few more years.
Background of the decision is the unsatisfying market acceptance of the free-of-charge service for the personal, internet based communication, which has been offered in the 1.0 version since mid of March.
(via)
