AvantGo was a

technology company A technology company (or tech company) is a company that focuses primarily on the manufacturing, support, research and development of—most commonly computing, telecommunication and consumer electronics–based—technology-intensive products and ...

focused on bringing a full

W3C The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is the main international standards organization for the World Wide Web. Founded in 1994 by Tim Berners-Lee, the consortium is made up of member organizations that maintain full-time staff working together in ...

-compliant browser experience to intermittently-connected

mobile devices A mobile device or handheld device is a computer small enough to hold and operate in hand. Mobile devices are typically battery-powered and possess a flat-panel display and one or more built-in input devices, such as a touchscreen or keypad. Mod ...

such as the

personal digital assistant A personal digital assistant (PDA) is a multi-purpose mobile device which functions as a personal information manager. Following a boom in the 1990s and 2000s, PDAs were mostly displaced by the widespread adoption of more highly capable smar ...

s (PDAs) and extremely early

smartphones A smartphone is a mobile phone with advanced computing capabilities. It typically has a touchscreen interface, allowing users to access a wide range of applications and services, such as web browsing, email, and social media, as well as mult ...

of that time period. Their browser could work with a live

internet connection Internet access is a facility or service that provides connectivity for a computer, a computer network, or other network device to the Internet, and for individuals or organizations to access or use applications such as email and the World Wide ...

, but their core

technology Technology is the application of Conceptual model, conceptual knowledge to achieve practical goals, especially in a reproducible way. The word ''technology'' can also mean the products resulting from such efforts, including both tangible too ...

was the ability to sync

web pages A web page (or webpage) is a World Wide Web, Web document that is accessed in a web browser. A website typically consists of many web pages hyperlink, linked together under a common domain name. The term "web page" is therefore a metaphor of pap ...

(including forms and

Javascript JavaScript (), often abbreviated as JS, is a programming language and core technology of the World Wide Web, alongside HTML and CSS. Ninety-nine percent of websites use JavaScript on the client side for webpage behavior. Web browsers have ...

) to the device, allow the user to interact with them even while off-line, and then forward any results (primarily

HTTP POST In computing, POST is a request method supported by HTTP used by the World Wide Web. By design, the POST request method requests that a web server accepts the data enclosed in the body of the request message, most likely for storing it. It is o ...

messages) the next time the device synced. Despite this, the company is primarily remembered for their proof-of-technology demo service, which allowed users to set up a free account and

subscribe The subscription business model is a business model in which a customer must pay a recurring price at regular intervals for access to a product or service. The model was pioneered by publishers of books and periodicals in the 17th century. It i ...

to web pages and "content channels", which they could then view offline. While the free service was quite popular, it was not successful in

marketing Marketing is the act of acquiring, satisfying and retaining customers. It is one of the primary components of Business administration, business management and commerce. Marketing is usually conducted by the seller, typically a retailer or ma ...

the technology to the intended customers. Eventually, AvantGo was acquired by

Sybase Sybase, Inc. was an enterprise software and services company. The company produced software relating to relational databases, with facilities located in California and Massachusetts. Sybase was acquired by SAP in 2010; SAP ceased using the Syba ...

, Inc. in a white-knight transaction; the free public service was never monetized profitably and was eventually shut down.

History

AvantGo was founded in 1997 and was based in San Mateo, California. It quickly grew to nearly 400 employees and went public on September 28, 2000. Its IPO price was $12 per share and it closed the day up $8 at $20 per share with a market cap of nearly $1 billion. On Dec 12, 2002, the company was sold to Sybase for $38 million, only a bit more than the cash it had on hand. Starting in June 2008, AvantGo displayed on their main page and on the device web browser that all synchronization and channel services would be shut down on June 30, 2009. In 2009, the AvantGo service was owned and operated by Sybase 365, a

subsidiary A subsidiary, subsidiary company, or daughter company is a company (law), company completely or partially owned or controlled by another company, called the parent company or holding company, which has legal and financial control over the subsidia ...

of Sybase, Inc. It became a managed ad insertion platform focused on SMS ad campaigns. Sybase was acquired by SAP in 2010; SAP no longer uses the AvantGo or Sybase brand names.SAP finally drops the Sybase name
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References

External links

AvantGo
Personal digital assistant software {{telecom-company-stub