Listen is a mobile application that issues a secondary phone number and layers features such as auto-responders, whitelists, mute, reminders and an integrated inbox for calls and texts. Users validate with their existing number, pick a new area-code specific number, and can forward calls or let them go to voicemail; the company is building porting capabilities that would be a paid service but would disable iMessage. Listen plans to keep basic calling and texting free while charging for services aimed at international users who want to keep a U.S. number abroad. The service runs on top of Twilio, which the company acknowledges could make sustaining a free tier challenging. The team is three people — CEO Lauren Leto, CTO Cam Hunt and lead engineer Austen Ito — and is part of Expa Labs; the founders have prior experience at Texts from Last Night, GroupMe, Bonobos and Kitchensurfing. Listen is currently available on iOS, with Android and web clients plus features like group texting, self-deleting texts and end-to-end encryption planned.

Total raised

$1M

Funding rounds

1

Latest round

Equity

Latest activity

Nov 2016