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Sabeer Bhatia's next 'hot' product

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CIOL Bureau
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BANGALORE: Hotmail founder Sabeer Bhatia unveiled InstaColl, an internet collaboration tool that converts mainstream desktop productivity tools like Microsoft Word, Excel and PowerPoint into real time collaboration platforms. Bhatia said that the product was completely made in India and is the only peer-to-peer collaborative tool in the market.

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Bhatia informed that he had made significant investment into the Bangalore based start-up but declined to reveal the value of investment. The product is currently in its Beta version and is slated to go commercial next month. IBM will be providing InstaColl in its new x-series of computers. The tool would be available as a managed hosted service on a pay- per-use basis or one-time fee based on number of concurrent users.



The company was co-founded by Bhatia along with two other co-founders - CEO Sumanth Raghavendra and COO Kaushal Cavale.



"With the single click of a button, one can share documents and information across various locations. It doesn't need the user to learn a new tool and we will be making sure it is priced within the common man's reach." He also added that InstaColl bridges the shortcomings of e-mail thanks to its immediacy, simplicity and affordability.

When asked if InstaColl would pose as competition to real-time collaboration products like Microsoft Livemeeting, Bhatia said that it doesn't conflict with Microsoft's offering since no separate application is needed for InstaColl unlike LiveMeeting. Currently, InstaColl is not compatible with Linux or Mozilla Firefox.

Bhatia said that he would shortly become the board member and chairman of the company.





Besides InstaColl, Bhatia has also invested in two US based companies-Naveen Communications and Hotseasons.com. Naveen's product Telixo enables PDA like functionalities to mobile handsets while Hotseasons is a search engine for the travel and tourism segment.

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