ZTANGO, WIDERTHAN MERGE, EYE RINGBACK WINDFALL

Mobile Internet solutions provider WiderThan jumped the gun on this week's CTIA Wireless IT and Entertainment event in San Francisco by announcing late last week its acquisition of mobile multimedia and message services developer Ztango.

The Seoul, South Korea-based WiderThan, a sister company to Korean carrier SK Telecom, will acquire Reston, Va.-based Ztango in a stock swap, said CEO Sang Jun Park.

“Ztango has a huge product portfolio that's been proven in the marketplace,” Park said.

WiderThan and Ztango also share a history: The firms originally partnered in mid-2003, which afforded their merger a “running start,” according to Ztango CEO Vern Poyner.

“In the process of working together and learning about each other, we realized the companies fit nicely.”

Among the top priorities facing the firm now known as Ztango, a WiderThan Co., is the U.S. introduction of ringback tones, which allow users to download personalized music clips, voices or sound effects to replace the traditional switchboard ringing heard by callers. SK Telecom debuted ringback tones in Korea in April 2002 — currently, about 8 million of SK's 30 million total subscribers use the service, resulting in more than $9 million in revenue per month.

“All the major operators are looking into or ready to deploy ringback tones,” said Jonathan Kim, general manager of global marketing and business development at WiderThan, adding that official announcements of the service's U.S. launch would follow at the CTIA event.