Featured Company: Syncplicity
Web Site: www.syncplicity.com
Headquarters: San Francisco
Year Founded: 2007
Founders: Leonard Chung, CEO; Isaac Hall, Vice President of Technology; Ondrej Hrebicek, Vice President of Product and Platform
Investors: Angel investors
Employees: 4 plus part-time contractors
Company News: www.syncplicity.com/Press
*Updated 5/20/08
By Leonard Chung, CEO
Syncplicity is a company with a simple goal: eliminate the limitations, headaches, and worries associated with user data. We have built a product that ensures your files are always available, wherever and whenever you need them—automatically. Chores such as backing up or emailing files back and forth are a thing of the past. Create a letter on your desktop, and it’ll be on your laptop, waiting for you. Use Google Docs or want to view your letter on your cell phone? No problem—your letter is already there, ready to go. Sharing your letter with co-workers? They’ve already got the latest version. Any edits they make are safely synchronized and every file along the way has been backed up so there is never any risk of data loss. All of this is done seamlessly. Syncplicity is the only product that never asks you to change the way you work or forces you to create new places to store your data. Just install Syncplicity and leave your worries behind.
The Real Cost of Data
Quick: name the most important part of your computer. It’s a bit of a trick question as the most important and expensive part of a computer isn’t something you can touch like the processor or hard drive. It’s your data. Data is the only part of your computer that increases in value over time. Over time, your data becomes more valuable as you invest more time and money while the rest of your computer loses value.
Think of how much time and money you spend taking care of your data. If you do a good job, it’s costly, difficult, and monotonous. The time and money spent managing copies across a desktop and laptop or between home and at work, spent tracking and emailing files back-and-forth to share and collaborate with others, and spent protecting data with backups is high. If you do a bad job, the time and money lost to inconvenience (going to work and realizing the file you wanted is still at home) or catastrophe (your hard drive crashes) is even higher.
Eliminate Headaches
Given that data is the most important part of a computer, why is it still so hard to deal with? Why hasn’t there been a solution that is broadly adopted? There are many specialized products available today that do everything from backing up files to uploading photos to Web sites. We founded Syncplicity around the realization that these products were as much of the problem as they were the solution. The costs and headaches of losing and managing data were just replaced with learning and managing multiple products, each devoted to a small sliver of the overall problem. Backup and folder sharing software, Web site word processors, and photo uploaders, oh my! Users didn’t want multiple products, but instead a single solution. They wanted their data to be available anywhere, anytime they needed it, but they didn’t want to just replace one type of headache for another.
We built Syncplicity around three simple ideas:
Users must have their data readily and safely available anywhere and anytime it’s needed.
Always remove and never add complexity. Make a complete and user-friendly solution that works the way people do rather than the other way around.
Data should be active and mobile: it should never be held back by barriers such as those between machines, users, and Web sites.
Why Syncplicity?
Taking these ideas to heart, we’ve built a one-of-a-kind, complete solution that eliminates headaches for consumers and businesses. Here’s just a taste of some of the features that set Syncplicity apart:
The only complete solution: Never buy, learn, and deal with the hassles of multiple data management products. Syncplicity is the only solution that does it all.
Real-Time Backup: Murphy’s Law doesn’t pay attention to the clock. Syncplicity backs up and versions your files not once a month, once a week, or even once an hour, but immediately. Create a masterpiece only to accidentally delete it three seconds later? Skip the sinking feeling. Just go straight to the Syncplicity Web site and get your precious data back.
Sharing made Simple: Instantly share any folder with anyone with a simple click of the mouse. Because your files are already in Syncplicity, others get access right away. And if they choose to use the Syncplicity client, the files simply show up on their computers.
Access anytime, anywhere: Access your files while away from your computer through the Syncplicity Web site. At friend’s computer, and need to print out a file? Grab it from the Web and print it out. Find a typo along the way? No worries. Just make the change and upload it back. The edited version will be waiting for you on your computer when you return.
Multiple Computers, One View: Keep all of your computers in sync. With Syncplicity, it doesn’t matter which machine you use. Writing a letter at home on your desktop, but need to run? No problem! Just save the file like you normally would, grab your laptop and go. Your letter will be on your laptop, ready and waiting.
Works the way you do: Pleasant and powerful. The Syncplicity client is built to be second to none. It intelligently synchronizes your computer and never requires any configuration.
Syncplicity’s Simple Interface
The Web and Desktop, together at last: Syncplicity is the only solution that bridges the online and offline worlds. Think with “and” instead of “or.” A document is no longer in Google Docs or Microsoft Word. With Syncplicity, you have the choice to use the best tool for the job. Write a letter in Microsoft Word and share it using Google Docs.
Syncplicity is currently free while in beta. After beta, it will be available at a competitive monthly price for both consumers and businesses.
If you would like to learn more about Syncplicity, please visit our Web site at www.syncplicity.com. We are also actively pursuing partnerships and trials for businesses. If you are interested in these opportunities, please send an email to partners@syncplicity.com.
What do you think about Syncplicity? Leave your comments below. Feedback about StartUp Beat?—email us at editor@startupbeat.com
