Personalized Mobile Content Provider HooQs Sees Global Growth [Israel Media Tour]

An article by Ayelet Noff    5 Comments

Company Name: HooQs
Founded in: 2007
Location: Tel Aviv

HooQs, an Israeli startup launched in 2007, brings personalized mobile content to users with a unique mobile media recommendation system. Based in Tel Aviv, HooQs was co-founded by Aner Ravon and Itay Gissin. HooQs’ partners and distributors are spread globally and as a result the founders plan to open European and North American headquarters in 2009 in order to grow their business and become more easily accessible to partners. However for the creators, there was no better place to start than Israel.

HooQs’ concept came about when its creators noticed a lack of personalized mobile media and decided to make it easier for users to find music and videos that interest them by incorporating a prediction engine for recommendations into their site. When searching for video and music from a mobile device it can be difficult to find content that interests you quickly. There is so much content to choose from that you sometimes don’t even know what you’re looking for. HooQs created a way to make mobile content find you instead.

Once a user watches a video, HooQs gives him a personalized homepage with 5 to 30 recommended clips based on what other users with similar tastes are watching and listening to. Each time that the user watches, downloads or shares a video on HooQs, he is, in essence, creating recommendation statistics for users with similar interests. HooQs creates recommendations based purely on user behavior. Recommendations take into account how long a user views a clip, as well as whether he downloaded or shared the clip. Users are not required to answer any questions or give any information in order to receive recommendations. In fact, anyone can receive recommendations based on his behavior on the site without even registering.

According to Aner, the service picked up quickly, with over 300,000 mobile downloads a month in the beginning. The first version did not include the recommendation system and was intended purely for learning purposes to create a better model. The second version of HooQs, which was released a few weeks ago, has much more functionality, including the recommendation system which allows for collaborative media filtering, making it much easier for users to find desirable mobile content quickly and efficiently. This recommendation engine was developed by Nimrod Steinbock, CTO of the company.

The addition of this unique recommendation engine has aided in the growth of HooQs. The service currently has over 250,000 users that account for over 500,000 mobile downloads a month. HooQs distributes video content on virtually every subject—users are downloading niche content from pizza recipes to kite boarding lessons and everything in between.

HooQs channels cover a range of subject matter including music, animation, animals, TV, tech, sports, games, politics and “hotties.” The site even has a “whatever” category which features channels such as Best UFO Clips. “How to” videos are also popular, as well as videos about the iPhone and, of course, videos made by gorgeous women (surprise, surprise).

The improvement of mobile devices, with the introduction of mobile handsets such as the iPhone, has only served to raise the consumption of mobile media and HooQs’ mission is to serve this increased need. HooQs can be used on any mobile device that is media enabled and has an Internet connection. Additionally, the company is currently working on an iPhone application.

Itay tells me that unlike other mobile media distributors, HooQs has decided to remain an independent service, managing and developing everything on their own. Mobile operators may partner with them to incorporate the HooQs recommendation engine into their own portals. In fact, two operators already signed agreements with them for distribution and integration of their recommendation engine.

HooQs’ revenue model is based on the distribution of their mobile media and on partnerships with mobile operators that are incorporating their service. The company recently raised over $1 million from Zohar Gilon, Eilon Tirosh of GingerBit, Yigal Ahuvi of Partam, and Yaron Gissin on behalf of BEC. Hooqs is still on the lookout for further investments.

This post was originally posted June 30th on Mashable.com