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Singapore’s DropMySite secures partnership with Japanese hosting provider Paperboy & co.

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See the original story in Japanese. Singapore-based DropMySite, a startup providing cloud-based website and database backup solutions, recently announced that it has partnered with Japanese hosting provider Paperboy&co. as a solution provider. Paperboy is a subsidiary of Japanese internet conglomerate GMO Internet Group. For DropMySite, this partnership in Japan follows a previous partnership with GMO Cloud, another GMO service. We had a chance to speak with DropMySite’s CEO Charif El-Ansari in Tokyo, recently appointed to this position in late October. Before joining the team, he previously worked at Google as the head of its business development team in the South East Asian region. The Bridge: Congratulations on your taking up the new post and for the partnership with Paperboy&co. Why did the company change its CEO? Charif: Our previous CEO John Fearon moved to Gilcrux Holding, which owns multiple companies including DropMySite. He’s good at creating a new business from the scratch and raising money from investors. I was appointed since our business is in the growth phase. But John will be still involved in the business as a strategic consultant. John and I complement each other in terms of our skills. The Bridge:: A large company like GMO Internet…

charif_el-ansari_and_kentaro_sato
From the left: Paperboy&co. CEO Kentaro Sato, DropMySite CEO Charif El-Ansari

See the original story in Japanese.

Singapore-based DropMySite, a startup providing cloud-based website and database backup solutions, recently announced that it has partnered with Japanese hosting provider Paperboy&co. as a solution provider. Paperboy is a subsidiary of Japanese internet conglomerate GMO Internet Group.

For DropMySite, this partnership in Japan follows a previous partnership with GMO Cloud, another GMO service. We had a chance to speak with DropMySite’s CEO Charif El-Ansari in Tokyo, recently appointed to this position in late October. Before joining the team, he previously worked at Google as the head of its business development team in the South East Asian region.

The Bridge: Congratulations on your taking up the new post and for the partnership with Paperboy&co. Why did the company change its CEO?

Charif: Our previous CEO John Fearon moved to Gilcrux Holding, which owns multiple companies including DropMySite. He’s good at creating a new business from the scratch and raising money from investors. I was appointed since our business is in the growth phase. But John will be still involved in the business as a strategic consultant. John and I complement each other in terms of our skills.

The Bridge:: A large company like GMO Internet can develop backup solutions by themselves. Why did they choose yours?

Charif: We have acquired our own knowledge especially in this space. In comparison to development from the scratch, they judged it would be better to take our white-label service.

The Bridge: When I visited DropMySite headquarters in Singapore, John showed me a service called E-mail Insights, which was under development. How is that service coming along?

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Charif: Yes, E-mail Insights enhances our e-mail backup features, and helps you easier analyze how your employees are interacting with their colleagues and customers. This is very useful for management especially with the current BYOD trend where employees do work on their own devices. This service can be used as a sort of CRM solutions, where you can easily hand over an interaction with a customer to a sales representative, even if someone quits your team suddenly. Our backup solutions and E-mail Insights will come together to help companies in their business operations.

The Bridge: Are you currently working on anything new?

Charif: We’re currently a new service called DropMyMobile. It’s an Android app that is currently in the alpha stage, and we can introduce it publicly in the middle of December. This app will allow you to backup your history of sent and received calls, contacts, SMS, media, calendar, apps, and app data from your smartphone to our cloud. This will be also convenient when you buy a new handset and need to copy data from your old one. In contrast with DropMyEmail and DropMySite, we may be partnering with mobile carriers to promote DropMyMobile.


The company is developing their systems in Singapore, but has been working closely with engineers from Paperboy&co. in Tokyo and Fukuoka through a number of teleconferences. This kind of partnership with a big hosting provider will help the startup acquire more engineering and operational experiences. It is another good example in terms of a Japanese internet company helping a startup in the South East Asian region boost its business.