I have been using Xobni (for inbox spelled backwords) for a couple of days and I must say its an incredibly handy addon. It transforms the otherwise torpid Microsoft Outlook into a powerful email client. And for a feature rich add on like Xobni, it’s hard to believe that it’s being offered free. Started by Adam Smith and Matt Brezina in 2006, with investments from several reputed venture capitalists and a few angel investors, the company has created ripples in the recent months owing to $20 million acquisition rumours by Microsoft. Apparently, after a series of discussions Xobni walked off the deal.

Nevertheless, it is a clever software which integrates with Outlook and does clever things. Xobni’s viewing panel is a revelation. It features a lightning fast search option, people profiles, message threads etc. Xobni’s search is a million times better than the native functionality of Outlook. For every e-mail a user receives, it displays information about the sender including who else they communicate with regularly. It even scrapes sender’s phone numbers from their e-mails and also looks for their Linkedin profiles attached to that email. It displays all conversation threads between the sender and the user along with the attachments they have exchanged, making it easier to track attachments, a feature I feel is extremely beneficial, for I have always struggled to locate attachments in Outlook. Not just that, Xobni also acts a small email analytics tool which not everyone will find much use for. For example, it tells you the top ten people you communicate with, the time you/they take to respond to each other, the number of emails exchanged, average number of emails you get in a day, week, and month etc. You could say it is an Analytics version for the email. These features may be worthless, but its fun. To top this all, it doesn’t reduce Outlook’s functional capabilities or speed even a bit. Xobni has accomplished what other softwares haven’t been able to, to reside on the Outlook platform without eating up its resources.

Xobni also has tremendous potential as a software in the Social Networking Arena. Clearly, social networking is still in its infancy and how companies offering social networking align themselves will define the future. There are hundreds of networking sites out there, but Facebook seems to be running away with the crown. In the coming years, it is obvious for individuals and businesses to adapt to winning social networks, just like they did to Operating Systems of Microsoft and Apple and more recently to Search Engines, Google and Yahoo. Moreover, social networks have access to an incredible amount of user information, giving them the edge to serve advertising which matches an individual’s needs and tastes. So, Xobni’s ability to reside on email clients and disseminate information which not only helps the user but also helps them connect externally will undoubtedly be a winning feature. Unless companies which develop email clients, start bundling it as a package, Xobni has the headway. Xobni’s strength is its platform. Can its platform be replicated by companies which make these email clients? This remains to be seen.

But the issue drills down to one fact…why is Xobni free and why did it walk away from the Microsoft deal, although Microsoft clearly rated the software has top notch?!?! As I understand, Xobni has broader goals than being a plug-in company to Outlook. Xobni’s beliefs are based on developing platforms rather than developing plug-ins. The company is keen on developing similar apps for other popular email clients as well as web services which will also foster creation of new products, which will ultimately show the money. Reminds me of Google in the early days, when it went on to develop a search engine without focusing on the economic side. Today, Google has stood time. Good luck Xobni!