UPDATED 12:21 EDT / JULY 20 2011

Tango Raised $42M, Expands to PCs

With Android and Apple’s continued feud, Tango, a mobile video calling app, has been uniting users over VoIP with mobile support.  It only took $14 million of venture funding to acquire more than 17 million users, and has just raised $42 million through series B financing from Draper Fisher Jurvetson, the same VC firm that first invested in Skype, along with Len Blavatnik and Alex Zubillaga also part of Tango’s latest funding round.

Though Tango is focused on the mobile end, their fresh funds will enable them to expand to PCs.  With this move, Tango is hopeful that this will bring in more users, but will also make it more competitive with dominant services like Skype.  The PC app will enable users to sign in to different devices simultaneously so when someone calls then, they have the option of answering with their PC or their smartphone.

Eric Setton, CTO and co-founder of Tango, said in a phone interview that there are about 1.5 billion PC users worldwide, which is a huge addressable market. Not just that, but PC availability has been the #1 requested feature from its users.

Aside from expanding to the PC realm, the funding will also be used to increase their employee base.  The company currently has 60 employees.  The additional workers will result in an increase of support for their platform and mobile devices, while others will work on their software that will integrate their devices when they do launch in the market.

With the Facebook and Skype tie-up and Google+ Hangout, Tango will have to work fast, as more video calling features are becoming available in the PC market.  If they wait too long, people will just see them as “another Skype wannabe.”


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