By Robert Mullins, The San Jose Business Journal

June 17, 2005. How many times has this happened to you? Your cell phone is run over by a truck and all your contact information is flattened on the pavement. Or you want to download the new “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith” ringtone but have to delete “Green Acres” to make room for it.

Proving there are few problems that can’t become the business model of another Silicon Valley entrepreneur, Lumitrend, a San Mateo-based startup, will launch a service for wirelessly managing cell phone content on Monday June 20.

Privately-held Lumitrend’s software is downloaded onto a cell phone, enabling the user to back up their data onto Lumitrend’s Web site. Another product synchronizes with popular contact management systems like Outlook Express and Yahoo Contacts. A third product provides added storage capacity online for storing ringtone and wallpaper files that don’t fit on the phone. Users can manage their data through the Web browser on any computer.

“It’s intelligent, easy to use and affordable,” said Rob Meadows, co-founder and chief executive officer of Lumitrend.

And it creates recurring revenue for Lumitrend, which will charge $1 to $2 a month per customer for the service, Mr. Meadows said.

An industry analyst says Lumitrend’s service might be useful, but the monthly fee could be a turnoff.

”Monthly fees are driving me crazy. Everybody wants an extra $1.50 from me every month,” said Kenneth Dulaney, mobile and wireless technology research director in the San Jose office of Gartner Research.

Carriers and their partners are always thinking of ways to get subscribers to buy more minutes, but that strategy can fail, Mr. Dulaney said. Carriers offered camera phones believing people would e-mail photos right from the camera, but most people just copied the pictures to their computer and emailed them from there.

But Mr. Meadows and Garrett Larsson, Lumitrend co-founder and vice president of business development, think several wireless trends bode well for them.

Lumitrend targets the growing “tweens” and teens segment of cellular subscribers, young people age 10 to 18, said Mr. Larsson. For many, their cell phone is their only phone and they are accustomed to living wirelessly. They enjoy the novelty ringtones and expect their technology to be easy to use.

”It’s definitely a tween thing,” said Mr. Larsson, of their service. “We don’t want you to have to read an instruction manual.”

Industry research shows 47 percent of cell phone users – including both of Lumitrend’s founders – say they suffered a catastrophe at one time where all of their contact information was lost. A Zelos Group study estimates that 15 percent to 20 percent of cellular subscribers might buy data backup services.

The worldwide subscriber base is expected to hit 1.6 billion this year and 2.5 billion by 2009. And because of new features such as cameras, games and music, the average life of a cell phone is only 18 months before customers upgrade to a newer model.

The worldwide cell phone content market is expected to generate $25 billion in revenue this year, according to Merrill Lynch, including ringtones, music, and specific software applications.

But while there is more phone data to be managed, there are already options available. Owners of PDA/phones back up data through a cable to their personal computers, or wirelessly via Bluetooth. Some wireless carriers’ phones contain a SIM card, which stores contact info. When someone buys a new phone, they simply transfer the SIM from the old phone to the new one.

Other companies offering mobile data backup systems include Future Dial Inc., of Sunnyvale; Intellisync Corp., of San Jose; and DataPilot fro Susteen Inc., of Irvine.

Future Dial sells through retail stores. “We are exploring that (wireless service) but it’s nothing we’re offering to carriers yet,” said Bruce Bunger, a Future Dial spokesman. Its product is not carrier-dependent so it can be sued on any cell phone.

Lumitrend depends on carrier partnerships for distribution but only has deals with small, regional carriers in the U.S. or foreign carriers in India, Peru and Mexico.

Lumitrend’s service is designed to run on phones using the BREW platform (for binary run-time environment for wireless) developed by Qualcomm Inc,, of San Diego. While BREW is a widely used standard abroad, most phones running on U.S. networks adopt the Java platform from Sun Microsystems Inc., of Santa Clara.

Lumitrend will someday expand to the Java platform as it seeks partnerships with major U.S. carriers, Mr. Meadows said. For now the company touts its wireless competitive edge.

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