Page 6 - FnBox Press Kit

Fnbox Company History
2002: A Simple idea
FNBOX was founded in 2002 when CEO & Founder, Rodrigo Teijeiro turned to internet technology to save money on calls to Argentina. As a 23-year old sophomore in college, Rodrigo started Fnbox and his first subsidiary, Tarjetas Telefonicas with just two programmers in Ukraine,
his girlfriend as the web designer, and his two current partners; Tomas O’Farrell, a marketing expert, and his brother Alvaro, an IT and web designer. Within five days of going live, Rodrigo was selling US$500 worth of VoIP minutes through TarjetasTelefonicas.com.
2004: Proprietary technology leads to quick success
However, with his quick success, he soon discovered that a foreign IP address was buying 95% of all of the minutes with stolen credit cards. He and his partners closed down the site and concentrated on developing a fraud protection system. After two
years, with his degree in Business Administration in hand and the fraud protection system ready to go, Rodrigo moved back to Argentina and re-launched Tarjetas Telefonicas. This time the site attracted 325,000 valid users across eight countries in just five years.
2006: Seizing and opportunity leads to investment and explosive growth
In, 2006, with a team of developers in place and Facebook spreading like wildfire among college campuses
in the States, Rodrigo decided to launch a social network customized for Latin American audiences. As
an early mover in the social space, Sonico registered 4.4 million users
in its first year. Fnbox immediately raised US$8 million in financing from VC and Angel Investors and brought Sonico to Brazil, the largest consumer market in Latin America.
2010: Monetizing traffic and strategic acquisitions lead to a perfect position
By the end of 2010 Fnbox had 75 million users across Tarjetas, Sonico and Recarga, a prepaid phone recharge platform launched that year. It was time to focus on monetizing this traffic. In 2010 Fnbox bought
a coupon site to offer daily deals
to new and existing customers and launched an online advertising service to help businesses reach targeted audiences. Thanks to the team’s intimate knowledge of
the regional market and technical expertise, Fnbox has a strong
history of making consumer internet technologies accessible for Latin American audiences. Each business unit has its own easy-to-search website with home pages that resemble landing pages in their specificity. Customers can navigate to the purchase page in three clicks or less and feel secure using their credit card thanks to Fnbox’s time-tested anti-fraud security.
2012: Sharing wealth and expertise throughout North and Latin America
Moving forward Fnbox will leverage traffic and regional e-commerce know-how to attract Latin America’s 355 million mobile phone users, 115 million registered social network users, and 35 million online shoppers. Fnbox is ramping up marketing efforts in Brazil, a market of 40 million internet users, with
the region’s highest penetration of coupon site users and the second highest penetration of online shoppers. Given these dynamics, and the opportunities for cross promotion among Fnbox products, Fnbox is positioned for even more explosive growth in 2013 and beyond.
www.fnbox.com