DabbleDB - 37 Signal’s Study Buddy Alternative
by Aner Ravon

Oren Friedman pointed me at Vancouver based DabbleDB, an Enterprise 2.0 service provider that takes a big step in the right direction. DabbleDB officially looks to “combine the best of group spreadsheets, custom databases and intranet web applications, and provide a new way to manage and share your information on the web.” (7 minute demo provided)

DabbleDB’s groupware is ideal for project management. The typical customer would be an outward facing, web educated, small business. It delivers an alternative and competitive offering to the one offered by 37 Signals. As a matter of fact, both companies seem to be sharing a lot of DNA as pioneers of the new marketing generation. They are both fast acting, customer supportive, user centric, opinionated. But if 37 Signals are the cool party boys everybody wants to hang out with, then DabbleDB are your ideal study buddies. They don’t use simplicity as the dominant theme but instead offer more features and require a better prepared mindset. Both companies offerings are extremely intuitive compared to any in-house traditional alternative.

They offering itself consists of project management, contacts, calendar sharing and data collaboration. Everything is web based, but unlike many other web 2.0 enterprise aspiring services, DabbleDB actually provides Backup, SSL encryption and more advanced features - such that fit an IT educated business environment. Another interesting angle is the pricing one. DabbleDB does not offer a free option. Instead it offers 4 pricing packages, ranging from $10 per month Personal edition) to $150 per month (corporate edition, up to 60 users).

I watched the demo and test drove the free trial. I was definitely impressed. DabbleDB has a very friendly and easy to grasp service offering. it doesn’t use hip names or cool taglines, but it does what it says and well. The fusion between the new web 2.0 elements and the traditional IT practices seems to be one of the better ones I’ve seen.

I am left with 2 open questions:

1. It is really possible to gain enough customers without offering a free option?

2. Are “better IT educated” businesses ready to embrace hosted, web based services for project management and data collaboration?

I guess we’ll need to wait and see although my hunch is that the answer is “yes”. I see good things coming DabbleDB’s way which are also echoed in the press they are getting lately.

For more information visit the companies’ blogs - 37Signals and DabbleDB

[written using Zohowriter]

Aner Ravon
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