Netspace founder and new MessageMedia chief executive, Stuart Marburg.
There has been something missing in Netspace founder Stuart Marburg’s life since he sold his company to iiNet for $40 million in 2010.
“I really missed going to work every day,” he told ARN.
“I have a passion for the industry and I missed that after leaving Netspace.”
But after a four year hiatus Marburg has re-emerged as chief executive of mobile messaging firm, MessageMedia.
In 1992, Stuart co-founded Netspace, one of Australia’s original and leading internet providers.
Following the sale of Netspace, Stuart founded Call Dynamics, a call tracking and marketing analytics company that helps businesses maximise their marketing spend.
Stuart is currently a director of call dynamics and TenPaces, an investment and advisory firm for fast moving technological businesses.
He is also a non-executive director of ASX listed Longreach Ltd (LRG) and remains on MessageMedia’s Advisory Board.
MessageMedia, founded in 2000, is Australia’s largest business text messaging service provider, and a leading player globally with a significant market share in the US, UK and New Zealand.
Marburg said while the company was strong in Australia, his main focus would be to ramp up efforts in the US.
“Last year we grew 28 per cent and our plan is to keep doing that,” he said.
“We send 30 million messages a month and really key things is to get to 200 million messages in the US.”
The company has about 12 staff in its San Francisco office and US clients include Rackspace and Coca-Cola.
In Australia clients include Coles, NAB, Commonwealth Bank, HP, Dell, Honda, Cadbury and several cab companies – mainly text messages for customers.
Marburg said everything came back to return on investment.
“SMS saves time, it always saves money and it goes direct to the telephone,” he said.
“Customers spend money on IT to get a return and that’s what SMS really does help with.
“We generate productivity gains, raise revenues and reduce expenses.”
