Simple Notification App 'Yo' Raises $1.5 Million From Pete Cashmore, Betaworks And The Tencent Founders
The round, which closed last week, includes eight investors. The founders of China's Tencent led Yo's seed investment, putting in more than $250,000. Mashable founder Pete Cashmore, Betaworks and notable angel investors also contributed to the round.
Yo is an app that lets users send push notifications to friends by pressing a friend's name. Users can't customize the push notifications; the only message they can send to friends is the word "Yo."
Since its launch in April, the Israel-founded startup has grown to more than 2 million downloads. Co-founder Moshe Hogeg says users are sending more than 2 million "Yos" per day. A new version of the app will be launched before the end of the month. Yo currently has three employees.
The app has been a punching bag for tech blogs and even comedian Stephen Colbert who stated, ""When I first learned about an app that boils down all your communication into two letters, I expressed myself in one: 'Y?'"
But Yo investor John Borthwick of Betaworks says he sees the app as a promising notification system that's paving the way for a new suite of apps.
"Over the past year we have seen a handful of apps that function exclusively in the notifications layer - i.e., the content lives in the the notification, the content is the notification," Borthwick wrote on Betaworks' blog. "We are fascinated by these uses of simple yes/no on/off communications tools...As the notification layer becomes the primary interface of alert-based information on your phone - as the OS's allow navigation and controls in those alerts - there will emerge a new class of applications that mediate this layer for web sites, other apps and connected hardware."