Enigmatic Zon Networks Renames as Hola! – Best Kept Secret in Israel?

Zon networks, an enigmatic startup led by the former CEO of Jungo, raised a $7 million round from DFJ with no product in 2008. Two years later, there is still little known about the company apart from their new name, Hola!

Two years ago, VC Cafe reported that Zon Networks had raised a $7 million round from DFJ. At the time, DFJ commented that Zon Networks is going to change the Internet the way that Skype changed VOIP. Fast forward two years… the company has changed its name to Hola! but there’s still very little known about it.

Poking around in the usual spots, here’s what I was able to dig:

From YouNoodle:

ZON is developing software in communications.  They plan to launch ZON 1.0 in the autumn of 2009. ZON was founded by Ofer Vilenski Derry Shribman, the founders of Jungo, and is backed by leading venture capital funds, including Draper Fisher Jurvetson (initial backers of Skype Hotmail), Trilogy Partners, Magma Ventures and DFJ TF Ventures.

From Hola!’s LinkedIn company page:

Founder and CEO Ofer Vilenski was previously the CEO of Jungo, provider of broadband home value-added service solutions.

We’ve been working on hola! for over 2 years now (previously ZON-Networks), and we’re almost ready to launch, so stay tuned!

We also know that HOLA! has been growing in the recent months:

From the Bloomberg Business Network:

Hola! develops network management software. Hola! was formerly known as Zon Networks, Ltd. The company was founded in 2008 and is based in Poleg, Israel.

From Crunchbase:

ZON was founded by Ofer Vilenski & Derry Shribman, the founders of Jungo, and is backed by leading venture capital funds, including Draper Fisher Jurvetson (initial backers of Skype & Hotmail), Trilogy Partners, Magma Ventures and DFJ TF Ventures.

A job board in Israel had long threads between engineering applicants, talking about the hard tests Hola! put them through… given the following code, implement the attrib_t struct and attrib_get function:

[gdocs type=’document’ id=’1XEGuhGWgDJ6wk91v9kRbCe0H8sKReSojaWughe3ihhM’]

It is rare to see such an enigmatic company in a small country like Israel. Do you know Hola!? Can you shed some light?

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Co Founder and Managing Partner at Remagine Ventures
Eze is managing partner of Remagine Ventures, a seed fund investing in ambitious founders at the intersection of tech, entertainment, gaming and commerce with a spotlight on Israel.

I'm a former general partner at google ventures, head of Google for Entrepreneurs in Europe and founding head of Campus London, Google's first physical hub for startups.

I'm also the founder of Techbikers, a non-profit bringing together the startup ecosystem on cycling challenges in support of Room to Read. Since inception in 2012 we've built 11 schools and 50 libraries in the developing world.
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