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Looks like Loopup have have an entry added to Microfofts' app store (I assume run be Microsoft)

No review yet but I assume the service can be bought, and what is interesting is the capabilities writeup and the three slides - I think they are new (I don't recall seeing them), the second provides another NEW statement about coverage strategy:

"Progressive program to add countries according to customer needs"

I you recall last week I posted about a new blog entry where Loopup said they had been approached by a household name multi-national requiring over 80 country coverage and that they where going to push for 80 countries by year end. Add those 2 statements to the one I just posted and ask yourself why are they spending money on additional country approvals????

They are doing it to satisfy customer need, so what customer needs 80 countries?

https://appsource.microsoft.com/en/product/web-apps/loopup1616493528873.loopupdraas?tab=Overview

No..No..No..not.. the dreaded director buys, usually the kiss of death when Executive directors start buying cheap shares.

It also means there is nothing going on that they need to keep secret, so shorters can act with impunity.

Of course, if they where to buying a few million or at £4/share that's a different story, but usually it's some piffling amount that angers and shows half-arsed commitment.

Sorry, for my lack of enthusiasm and well done for buying against the recent trend, I suspect all those accumulating now will make a killing in the long run - sadly I can't join in.

Interesting background to strategic importance of who provides Cloud services and threats from Chinese

https://www.politico.com/newsletters/politico-china-watcher/2021/08/26/us-at-risk-of-losing-cloud-computing-edge-to-china-494105

Extract:
"The flow of information guides the flow of technology, capital and talent,” Chinese leader Xi Jinping explained in 2014. “The amount of information controlled has become an important indicator of a nation’s soft power and competitiveness.”

The cloud is critical because it’s where everything comes together. It powers email, databases and storage, as well as artificial intelligence and big data applications requiring mountains of computing power. Like other digital infrastructure and services upon which modern societies increasingly depend, it’s everywhere, but also out of sight — and for many policymakers, out of mind.

The leading U.S. providers — Amazon, Microsoft, Google — have a massive first-mover advantage. But the Chinese government is following a familiar playbook: pushing rules that favor its providers, leveraging state financing and packaging services with hard infrastructure."

Still a sleepy backwater, but a little more lively today. Hopefully employees that know what is going on tucking a few away - that's not insider trading.

But for a penny or two rise could literally be anything, even a short reducing

I wondered whom it might be , the Multinational household name and considered it might be one of our existing clients that wishes to expand the services it takes - I suspect a proportion of the pipeline is.

So who can we chose from, and the only company I could think of was Travelex, as our other Law clients are far from household names and I suspect the service would be great for them.

Anyway I have now discounted them as they are only in 26 countries (1,000 Bureau de Change outlets). That got me to thinking that 80+ countries in a huge representation and is unlikely to be any entity we have talked to before.

Someone like McDonald's will nicely, I might even be persuaded to have a big Mac is they signed up. lol

Any upward movement is welcome but as you say its really only a fraction of what we want to see, nevertheless it indicates strength and stability.

As well as the news on the blog it is Ben's discussion day today - so something new to watch in a few days - I must say the marketing focus is very pleasing, I just with Steve and his mate would come out of their hiding place. Perhaps they are huddled up somewhere in secret meetings on some corporate deal (fat chance) - more likely taken the summer off like Dom Raab, watching cricket or on the beach..

stew - you cant read anything into the use of the past tense.

Otherwise, further into the text the past tense is used again to suggest they are no longer doing what they were - so have contracted a new service.

I think it simply means they have the intent to change and have discussed their needs and Loopup capabilities with Loopup.

If they are in discussions, they may not be, it could be months before a company makes a decision of corporate significance.

But, the very fact that they are on the radar of multi-nationals and are even considered is a feather in their cap - they are doing something right IMO.

The company Blog has been undated with an entry

"Do multinationals need a service provider with global coverage for Microsoft Teams Calling?"

and it contains some very interesting information NOT previously released about operations from the senior vice president for telecommunications strategy - IMO it is better than any RNS we've had for ages as it is from our Strategy lead and suggests the strategy is perhaps starting to pay off .

Read it yourself, but the key sections for me are:

"a household-name multinational approached us recently to provide full PSTN cover in the 80+ countries they have offices. They were looking to roll out a single cloud solution for all of their employees. Due to the breadth of their locations, they had previously needed to work with multiple carriers. The result had been so many disparate contracts across their sites, it was understandably difficult for their central IT team to even pull together a consolidated list of all the carriers they were working with."

and he follow with:

"We’re on track to have 81 countries live this year.

Both bits of information are new as far as I know, but even more interestingly is it a pure coincidence the 81 target or are they related to discussions with that household name multi-national that needs 80+.

If they start landing large multinationals or even 1 the SP should rise strongly depending upon who, though I suppose it could take many months to go through the process to get a contract so they need to be talking now for that material boost in 2022 if they win the business.

There is also an insight into the complexities of operating in multiple countries and statement that:
"The telecommunications industry tends to operate locally, rather than globally. Even today, the world’s largest carriers tend to provide services to users in relatively small range of countries."

So we are distinguishing ourselves even against the worlds largest carriers, that broad coverage is clearly becoming our "Unique selling point".

I suggest all the trolls read it before posting more drivel.

https://loopup.com/en/resource-center/blog/do-multinationals-need-a-service-provider-with-global-coverage-for-microsoft-teams-calling/

triumph1 - you'll not be surprised I disagree with that viewpoint, though you are not the only one to express it.

The company has a business that has been under pressure but they did sign up clients last year and transferred clients to longer term commitment contracts - if /when they get to grips with retaining/ migrating completely to a PS client base there is no reason that business cannot thrive - so it is not a pure punt on cloud telephony though that provides the greatest opportunity of growth.

The business is profitable operationally unlike many others that PI's rave about and don't describe them as a punt.

The truth is the BoDs credibility is in tatters (with me at least), but the business is far from it.

All to play for with a "REALISTIC" strategy, definitely not a punt in the sense you mean.

Yes something easy to remember. something like:

Stratospheric Communications and SuperDuper Meetings International Ltd

Or perhaps "iZoom", that's catchy and I'm sure that wouldn't infringe any patents.

We'll also need some hard meetings to start the ball rolling, where certain directors are given their P45s

Episode 2 of Ben Lee talking about MS Teams takes place on Thursday, these sessions could become a useful source of information about what Loopup do and the market they are tapping - many people often grapple to understand the detail of it as do I.

Subject: "MS Teams Calling: Direct Routing, Operator Connect or Calling Plans?"

"Join our host and Microsoft Lead for Consulting Ben Lee, in conversation with our Senior Director Jason Sloan on Thursday 29th August at 4pm BST / 8am PST. Together, Ben and Jason will cover:

- How Calling Plans differ from Direct Routing
- When you might choose one over the other
- An introduction to Operator Connect
- How Direct Routing can provide flexibility for deployment options and integrations
- Cost considerations of Calling Plans vs Direct Routing solutions"

These sessions are a great initiative as I pointed out previously, agenda looks good ( aside from having the wrong date in the text) it looks like it will be interesting. I'm not registering for them as they are really for clients/potential clients but will watch when posted on the website afterwards.

For comparison I took a look at Zooms Cloud Comms guy's linkedin webpage a couple of weeks ago - he has hundreds of thousands of followers and latest Video was to introduce a collaboration to provide a bespoke Zoom phone. I'm not up to date with technology but it seems obvious company's need to have a strong proactive internet presence with rich dialogue to push their services - a static website is no longer enough. " From small acorns great oak trees grow" - we have to start somewhere.

I really hope they continue this and hopefully we start seeing the team giving more public presentations to potential clients, they are now actively managing the main website - pity about the other website "Enablit" (missing an opportunity). Hope Steve knows, did he get the memo?

https://www.linkedin.com/events/directroutingvcallingplans-whic6823648143159128064/

bigsmoke - I know it's was in jest, but in reality anything is possible here as it's all down to the unknown factor of how successful they will be with their new strategy.

Could be 10p if they fail and the existing business capitulates - or at a stretch £10 with super-rosy coloured specs on (look at Zoom, founded after Loopup but had an investor finance them for $100m as I recall), thing change quickly as C19 taught us.

Realistically, I'd go as far as to say there is major room for improvement in the SP once we get through the current negative sentiment.

I'd steer clear of offering your love (wrong forum), I'm sure stew appreciates the kind gesture though.

BigBoo2 - thank you for your kind words, I've been called all sorts but never a Saint, I can't live up to that pressure, sometimes I struggle just being nice.

The Spanish website case studies are indeed in English. Clearly they wanted one version of those or didn't want to pay to maintain multi-language versions including files.

The service is for marketing and presenting the company in various languages , not translating all documents - if they don't see it as a necessary action that's OK - they have finite resources like all companies.

On occasion I have wondered how do they handle language complexity when marketing without employing an army of multi-lingual staff and diluting sales effort; it seems they contract it out to a company who most likely do it much cheaper and more efficiently than they can.

It guess is an important issue as they expand in markets where they don't have a specialised team fully in place and expansion could be constrained - so it's one partnership from 2018 ( we pay them of course) I was not aware of that IMO could be very valuable with the new focus on international companies.

"‘One of our strategic business goals is to reach new customers in the right language and enable their LoopUp experience to be culturally relevant. We needed a translation and localization partner to support our global expansion goals and provide high quality multilingual content. Welocalize provides translation and localization services that help LoopUp realize global goals. They deliver product and marketing content in multiple languages that truly reflects the LoopUp brand and experience.’ Rob Jardine, Chief Marketing Officer, LoopUp"

https://www.welocalize.com/welocalize-and-loopup-connecting-remote-teams-around-the-world/

monica69 - don't be silly, of course a change in working practices has an impact - working from home helps in selling the service but is is also required in the office.

The pressures Loopup have encountered are not due to home working and a continuation helps as the company has said clients would not commit to change in the middle of the pandemic and high risk - lets see what happens going forward has companies execute necessary changes they've identified.

Loopup signed up some prestigious clients in 2020 as well as the non PS losses .

https://www.youinvest.co.uk/articles/stockmarketwire/207468/loopup-wins-new-law-firm-contract-expands-existing-partnership-cw

The SP is now very stable, normally that would be considered boring, but in this case it's great to be forming a solid foundation .

We will always get pestered by tolls, derampers and other nasties that frequent the BBs. the most recent one is busy trying to annoy HUR posters but I'm sure that particular nasty will be back.

We must answer them by taking the opportunity to present positive facts, they hate the truth, do not let them steal the narrative, answer them with a positive or ignore them as there is usually little thought or effort in their posts and they don't stand up to scrutiny.

Yesterday we had a good RNS and I don't know why on Earth it is wrong to be positive, when we have endured so much negativity - I was pleased and I'm still pleased.

Just checked Hong Kong and only 5 suppliers listed in that specialization, with Loopup right in there.

Pokerchips - Microsoft have literally thousands of partners and the awards in specializations simply helps customers identify who they should be thinking about using is solution areas - it gives Lookup parity with the best of breed.

I have just looked at the specialisation awarded and put in search criteria for Manchester as a test and it lists in 3 categories "Best Match, Most Responsive and Nearest" - Loopup appears on all three lists with around 20 other European companies, and they where first on the list in the "Best Match category and 10 and 9 in the other two.

So right up there is terms of visibility for that solutions and ahead of some big names (e.g. Orange)

Answer to your question, in Europe (800km from Manchester) we are head to head with about 20 companies, a US (New York within 1000 miles) search resulted in again about 20 companies in the Best Match category and Loopup where second on the list - superb IMO. No absolute number but it is not a huge field.

https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/solution-providers/search