[MARITEX] End Of Service Announcement

In 2007, with the idea of making international SMS much more affordable and easy to use, MARITEX International SMS Service was launched. From that time until now, MARITEX at it's peak has sent thousands of messages monthly, connecting family and friends in Japan and abroad.

When the iPhone was first released in Japan in 2008, that started the smartphone revolution. With the smartphone, came all types of over the top (OTT) services to send messages via applications, such as WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger. Person-to-person (P2P) communication via SMS has dwindled in the past few years as the popularity of these OTT increased. The usage of so-called carrier emails which is needed to register to MARITEX have also decreased in exchange for other types of web based emails, showing the changing times.

Within this trend, the usage of MARITEX has also decreased. Currently only 2% of the registered users of MARITEX are active users in some form or another.

Although perhaps less in the context of P2P, SMS as a whole is still very much used worldwide. We are seeing huge increases for demand within our EZSMS Messaging Platform and Xoxzo Cloud Telephony Platform services, for businesses and developers who want to communicate with their end customers and integrate SMS and voice into their applications:

The total number of SMS sent globally tripled between 2007 and 2010, from an estimated 1.8 trillion to a staggering 6.1 trillion. In other words, close to 200 000 text messages are sent every second. http://www.itu.int/ITU-D/ict/ After nearly 9 years, we believe that MARITEX has run it's course and it is time for us to move on an focus on what matters: The next generation of communication.

When will the service end?

MARITEX will cease to operate on the 11th of March 2016. With this announcement, we will not be accepting any new registrations for the service.

What about my points and data?

Points can still be purchased until the 10th of Feburary 2016. After that date, you will not be able to purchase anymore points. Any remaining points after the 11th of March 2016 will be lost and unrecoverable. If you require a refund of your points, it will be done as per our Terms Of Service.

Your address book and message history data will be deleted and lost forever after the end of service. Unfortunately, we do not have a tool to allow you to download these data. If you need your address book data, please print it out before the end of service date.

Your MARITEX assigned SMS Numbers.

Your MARITEX assigned SMS Number can still be used to receive messages until the end of service. After that date, these numbers will be lost forever and you won't be able to use it anymore.

What happens next?

For SMS message sending via the web, we have the EZSMS Messaging Platform which allows you to send many messages via a simple interface. If you also require voice or needs an API to send SMS and make phone calls, please try our Xoxzo Cloud Telephony Platform

We would like to thank you, our customers, who have been with us and encouraged us for the past 9 years. See you again at EZSMS or Xoxzo!