During 2008 Qype managed to raise funds totaling €8 million, obtaining another €6.5 million this year–half of the sum is provided by Vodafone. This move translates into Vodafone’s intentions of launching Qype in its main European markets – UK, Germany, Italy, Spain, Portugal, Netherlands and Ireland, raising doubts about Qype’s future as a single brand.

The existence of other numerous competitors on the market influences Qype’s position to embrace the option of joining a mobile operator, although Vodafone’s history tells that the company has not always been successful with such attempts, as in the Wayfinder transaction in 2008.

Still, Vodafone does not seem to face any financial tribulations, as they have just reported great profits for the first half of the year, their profit having increased by 56 percent.  These strong figures are attributed to the sale of Vodafone’s stake in Softbank stake for 3.1 billion pounds in 2006, and another huge return on investment is expected in April 2012.  Their expansion into local reviews is an interesting step, especially as many services are looking for additional ad revenue streams through local marketing measures.

On the local marketing end of things, Yelp has recently introduced check-in offers for businesses, improving on its existing check-ins update brought to mobile apps over the summer.   Participating businesses that put forward Yelp promos to users present special offers ‘for checking- in at their venues.  Yelp has introduced check-in offers in order to compete with Foursquare, Google Places and Facebook Places & Deals, the first and the latter being influential leaders in check-in applications.