

Andreessen Horowitz, Salesforce Put $1.4M In Flotype (YC W11) - lyime
http://techcrunch.com/2012/01/05/andreessen-horowitz-salesforce-put-1-4m-in-real-time-messaging-infrastructure-startup-flotype/

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tferris
Nice idea.

If Flotype inherited NowJS' concept of one namespace for both server- and
client-side it's a very smart thing built on NodeJS.

I am sure there're tons of companies who would love to get a out-of-the-box
real-time communication system w/o going too deep into node.js (which is btw
perfect for this job).

The idea behind nowjs is great but still isn't that trivial—your code has to
be build around their core concept and at the end of the day you are pretty
dependent on one sole company for core functions such as communication for
your product. Further, there's is more to consider (are messages saved, if yes
at flotype or do I have to build my DB and so on) and you quickly face the
make or buy decision because with taking NodeJS and building your own
communication stack on top. I want just to say that an integration with
Flotype is more than just adding a one-liner—correct me if I am wrong—and
currently it's too risky to rely on a new product which future is unknown. The
point or what I am feeling uncomfortable with is that it's just proprietary
tech.

I think Sri will solve this issue (maybe with a freemium model where also the
sources are under a public license and you pay money just for the servers)

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dannielo2
What's this, an enterprise product? How was it sold since there are companies
using it already?

It says Coming Soon all over the website, can't sign up or anything.

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astrofinch
They are the same guys behind nowjs:

<http://nowjs.com/>

Presumably their early customers are from there.

I actually know two of them, and I can remember discouraging one when I heard
the idea for nowjs and it sounded similar to appjet. (Sorry Sri!) It's crazy
how far they have come in fewer than 18 months. Congrats guys!

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route3
From the TC article:

"Bridge, a technology that enables real-time communication between any server,
any device, on any platform. Bridge is essentially an API that developers can
use to avoid the complexity of building real-time messaging into their
applications, and help push more data faster between servers, web browsers,
mobile phones and other devices."

Sounds very similar to Amazon SNS, which Amazon describes as

"...a web service that makes it easy to set up, operate, and send
notifications from the cloud. It provides developers with a highly scalable,
flexible, and cost-effective capability to publish messages from an
application and immediately deliver them to subscribers or other applications.
It is designed to make web-scale computing easier for developers."

Right now their website doesn't have much information so it's difficult to
determine how they plan to differentiate themselves from existing platforms
that (appear to) solve the same problem.

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harscoat
Congrats to @sridatta and his Flotype team!! We are a European startup and
having met only 1 time Sridatta in a bus to Google RootAccess event, he was
kind enough later to give us advice for our YC interview couple of Months
later. Thanks! You spread great karma :)

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smiler
Anyone know what this is built on? Is it zero mq or some other open source
messaging system, or is it all proprietary?

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dshankar
A mix of both.

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mbesto
darshan - I work in enterprise technology and am working with real-time
applications (SAP HANA). I'd like to get in touch about this. Contact details
in my profile.

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nivertech
What's SAP HANA?

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mbesto
<http://www.sdn.sap.com/irj/sdn/in-memory>

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grizzlylazer
Congratulations to the Flotype team!

