The Official Poken Blog

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

We at Poken are starting the year in high spirits, and hope to share with you some of our energy and enthusiasm.  First, of course, I would like to wish you all health, happiness, and much success for 2010!

As an introduction, let me say that Poken’s current product offering, including the ever popular pokenSPARK^TM , the new pokenPULSE^TM, and our redesigned member site pokenHUB^TM are only the tip of the iceberg, as relates to what we’ve been working on to continue offering the most innovative, fun, and useful technologies for real world social networking.

Poken recently launched its new pokenEVENT^TM and pokenAFFINITY^TM products, offering a small preview of the nature of our business beyond social networking / fashion accessories.  An increasing number of corporate partners, including big names such as KPMG, IBM, BMW and Mobistar are turning to Poken to answer a need that marketers have long sought to fulfill: Bridging the gap between your online and offline worlds.

Some highlights of our year included the growing success of events, both of a social and of a corporate networking nature, delivered by our partners and affiliates worldwide.  Over 50 dedicated people in our network of committed partners have helped spread pokens to over 40 countries this year.  Our core team, based in Lausanne and San Francisco, has grown to 22 as we continue to strive to deliver better, faster, and more fun-filled services to Poken’s growing fan base.  Check out the creative user-generated videos in the fan section of our website to see what wacky (and awesome!) people we work with.

As an illustration of the successful businesses being built around Poken’s products and services, Poken Germany continued to add value to networking events hosted by such notable corporate customers as IBM and BMW.  Using Poken as a means of improving the networking at their service partner gatherings, these customers also pioneered the use of our (soon to be released) pokenDOME, to gather statistical data about participant’s attendance at training sessions and facilitate the distribution of digital course material.

The new pokenPULSE introduced in Sept '09

Poken Belgium made a musical splash in mobile shops with interactive booths in Mobistar retail outlets, in partnership with Tempo Music.  Poken South Africa, Poken España, Poken Italy, and many others continue to help local fans meet, connect, and stay in touch, at hundreds of events that cater to micro-communities that love to get together “for real”, and enjoy fun times.  Poken Japan has been exceptionally busy, selling through Amazon, Yodabashi Camera, and an expanding network of lifestyle shops, hosting reseller workshops, and over-crowded meet-ups in “the smallest bar in the World”. Music events are regularly pokenized through marketing parnterships with Twitter, Skype, CNET and Eye-Fi.

Poken Spain got great TV coverage for its work at spanish blogger events, and created a whopping success amongst students and professionals at ITEduWorld in Barcelona, providing fantastic prizes for the best networkers. In France and in the USA, university students were the target of broad-based campaigns by KPMG and Cox Communication, strengthening their image as innovative work places seeking to hire the attract youthful minds.  Custom poken design contests in Germany, Japan, and the Netherlands proved a great way to get widespread design input from Poken’s multi-cultural fan base, and Japan’s winning design was the source of fundraising for the “One Love” charity.

Dozens of partners and resellers form the Poken Ecosystem, through which, in 2009,  we learned a lot about what consumers want from our products and services.  This has helped form a 2010 strategy that is focused, and promises to be effective at supporting the growing spread of the new way to connect, in micro-communities worldwide.  This focus will enable us to commit to improving the support level both to key partners, and to our users.

Beyond physical products, this year Poken’s capabilities will extend to advanced web and mobile technologies.  An oft-recurring comment regarding the use of cell phones as a logical part of  complete contact-sharing ecosystem highlights the importance of treating mobile as part of any business strategy.  Do not underestimate Poken’s visionary stance relating to mobile apps: We are set to capture the right opportunities, that provide true usability and value to our customers, and strategically await the proper timing with leading-edge cross-platform applications and license-able technologies that will be game changing.

Our new member site, the PokenHUB introduced Oct '09

This is a critical time in the short but feisty life of Poken.  Opportunities for business abound, revenue is growing, and the team is strong and functions well.  2010 will be a successful year, and it will be far surpassed by 2011: Poken’s product roadmap extends well into the future as we seek to keep innovating to provide the leading networking and contact exchange services.

I hope that this little glimpse into Poken-around-the-world has whetted some appetites for checking out what’s new and fresh at Poken every day.  I encourage you to follow our blog, and our fan pages where creativity, fun, and enthusiasm abound.  In the meantime, I wish you all great adventures in social networking, and extend an open invitation to visitors to our Lausanne, Switzerland home base!

Stephane Doutriaux
Founder & CEO