Xobni Gets Cisco Investment

Despite VCs currently being gun-shy, particularly of Web 2.0 social networking stuff, the little e-mail software start-up Xobni, whose name is inbox backwards, has managed to close a $7 million B round in which Cisco, a new best friend, participated, besides existing backers Khosla Ventures, First Round Capital, Baseline Ventures and Atomico.

The money is earmarked for R&D that uncovers and leverages "all the amazing information and relationships locked up in our overloaded inboxes, particularly in Microsoft Outlook, the most underutilized inbox in the world."

 

Xobni, wouldn't you know it, is an Outlook analytics and organizing plug-in with its own relationships with LinkedIn, Facebook, Yahoo Mail and Skype, a clutch of favorable reviews, a demo by Bill Gates to its credit and no revenues to speak of.

Its A round was good for $4.4 million. And its widgetry went into public beta last May. It has reportedly seen 1.5 million downloads since.

Cisco of course recently bought Jabber, the instant messaging software, and PostPath, the e-mail and calendaring software so one might reasonably ask what Cisco is thinking.