Steve Wah is looking to partner F&B operators and other merchants who can benefit from his mobile application.

July 2009: Sick and tired of waiting by the phone to book a taxi, or making numerous calls to busy restaurants to reserve a table for Father’s Day? Soon you’ll be able to order your food for delivery from restaurants, book a cab or movie without even going online or calling.

Local startup Smoove recognised a gap in the market for easy, convenient mobile bookings. With that in mind, the company has developed Smoov, a suite of mobile applications that caters to the specific needs of F&B operators, hotels, airlines and other service-oriented industries.

To use this service, end-users simply download the software onto their cell phone via a link sent to them by the content provider. If a customer wants to make a taxi booking with this software, the customer can choose their current pick-up location, or their previous or new location by clicking on a series of tabs on their mobile phone. The same principle applies to food orders or other types of products and services.

Customers benefit from the experience by avoiding lengthy call queues, and retailers can use these applications to improve customer service, cut labour costs and gather market intelligence on their customers for more effective, targeted product advertising.

Steve Wah who heads Smoove Technologies, is looking at partnering with F&B operators, cinemas (for mobile bookings), hotels, travel agencies, airlines, and even social networking websites, for example, online dating sites. The aim is to help content and service providers reach out to mass markets.

“We are currently working with some taxi companies and Yellow Pages. Our mobile applications are predictive, which sets them apart from similar products on the market. Our solutions leverage on a context-aware engine, which pinpoints location, user preferences, behaviour, intentions and connections,” he says.

Smoove hopes to break into other English-speaking countries such as the United States, Canada, the UK and Australia. Down the road, the company will develop multilingual capabilities for these solutions to tap on business opportunities in other foreign markets.

More on Smoove Technologies

The company’s mobile phone service platform enables content and service providers to bring relevant and interactive content directly to the subscriber’s mobile phone at a low adoption cost. Advertisers can connect directly to the consumers using a non-intrusive and effective targeted approach, and generate a high return of investment.

Smoove was formed in 2007 by three 27-year-old postgraduate students who met while undertaking a Masters of Science course in Technopreneurship and Innovation, a joint programme by NTU and University of Washington. The three were Steve Wah who was from the mobile software industry; Zave, an IT service infrastructure manager; and Guang Hao, an analyst from the hedge fund company.

Apple's iPhone and Google's contextual search engine were the source of inspiration for Smoove's mobile platform solutions.