Peel smart remote control application on select smartphones
 
Peel Technologies
U.S.-based smart remote control application Peel Technologies is gearing up for global expansion after securing funding from Chinese Internet giant Alibaba.
The company,  which raised $5 million from Alibaba in 2013 and closed a second round of funding of $50 million in June,  has acquired a Shanghai-based rival Mozitek for an undisclosed sum to jump start its efforts in China, the country with over 1.2 billion mobile users.
The Peel smart remote control application, which can is installed on select smartphones, uses an infrared blaster in order to communicate with anything that uses a remote control including TVs, set top boxes and air conditioners.
Some hardware manufacturers integrate Peel’s infrared software in their phones, eliminating the need for certain chips to manage the infrared blaster,  reducing costs, space required and energy usage, according to Thiru Arunachalam, a former product manager at Apple who co-founded Peel in 2009.
The Peel smart remote control, which has over 118 million active users, is also expanding its presence in India by forming partnerships with local phone makers including Spice, Celkon and Lava Xolo.
In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, Peel Co-founder and CEO Arunachalam discusses the company’s strategy and expansion plans. Edited excerpts:
WSJD: What is your approach to the China’s market?
Arunachalam: Peel has always been a global first, mobile first company. China was always considered as one of the important global markets for us to conquer because it has a large and growing consumer base for smartphones and there are so many fast-growing Chinese smartphone vendors with global aspirations. We studied what Google did in China before entering the market. Some foreign companies actually tried to take their products and force them into China. But Peel has adopted a local strategy. We are different from Google who sent their U.S. engineers to China. We acquired a local smart remote control company, Mozitek, to take advantage of the company’s localized products and existing sales relationships with Chinese hardware makers. Mozitek’s CEO has become Peel’s head of sales for China. I want the local team to operate independently with its own line of Chinese products and clients.We also have teamed up with Chinese hardware makers ZTE and TCL as they know the local consumer behavior.
WSJD: What are your growth targets for China’s market?
Arunachalam: We are now focusing on growing our users in China first before thinking of making money. In the U.S. market, we only started monetizing our application in the fourth-year of operation. We will continue to beef up our team in China and we aim to have 100 million users in the country by 2016. U.S. is a small country compared to China and Latin America. Currently, 35% of our users are from North America, 30% are from Asia and 25% come from Europe.I expect our user distribution will change as China’s market will continue to grow. China is great for us as many Chinese hardware makers also manufacture devices for India, another important market in Asia.
WSJD: How would Alibaba help Peel’s expansion in China?
Arunachalam: Alibaba is currently helping with strategic advice regarding developing relationships with Chinese hardware manufacturers, distribution partners and local acquisitions, as well as assisting with introduction to potential business development and marketing partners. To date, Alibaba has taken a relatively hands-off approach to its investment, encouraging Peel to focus on consumer experience and rapid growth rather than revenue.
WSJD:  Would Alibaba’s investment affect your potential cooperation with other major Chinese Internet companies?
Arunachalam: Commercial cooperation is not a problem. There is no reason that we cannot work with Tencent and other Chinese Internet companies. In fact, we are working with Chinese search engine Baidu to promote our customized shareable URL links that let users tune in directly to TV shows. Peel will also partner with China’s Twitter-like social platform Sina Weibo to reach more users in the country.
WSJD: Is Peel in talks or looking to acquire more technology companies in China and Asia?
Arunachalam : Yes, we are keeping an eye out for potential synergistic companies to acquire. Peel currently has sales offices in both South Korea and India.
WSJD: What do you think of competition with other smart remote control applications?
Arunachalam: We know the customers and we already have millions of users. I doubt if other rivals can catch up as we have scale.  We also have  patents to protect our technology.


QUIK can you ride on PEELs alibaba fame right into CHINA?
THe OEMs will need flagships that have a hub and PEEL....also expand with them into the smarthome.

Can you be there on their table at MWC?

 Thanks in advance.