We recently got a chance to sit down with Jon Medved, a rock-star in the Israeli tech world, to discuss his new startup. This interview appeared as part of our new subscription newsletter, Israel Opportunity Investor. You can find out more about the product and the opportunities we cover at www.israelnewsletter.com

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Jon, can you tell us what Vringo’s all about?
Jon Medved: It’s not just a company story; it’s a story about trends. The trend is personalization 2.0. The big bonanza which most investors missed, myself included, was ringtones. If you were pitching VCs a ringtone company in 1999,you wouldn’t have even been able to get a meeting. You would have been shooed out. The ringtone business has been a goldmine for those investors who got it. Now, it’s a $6 billion business worldwide. It’s becoming a major source of revenue for the music labels. Take Universal Music Group, for example. Music star, Akon, recently sold a batch of 11 million ringtones. And unlike iTunes, which sells songs for $.99, these ringtones go for $2.

It’s the drive for human expression to want to stand out in a crowd, to personalize things, to make them mine. Just like Jibbetz does for Crocs shoes, allowing you essentially to pimp your shoes, like wearing a T-shirt with a slogan on it, or slapping a bumper sticker on your car — Vringo is doing the same thing for the phone. (Continue »)

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