# I'm Working on a Startup

By Randall Degges · April 8, 2012 · https://rdegges.com/2012/im-working-on-a-startup/

> I'm building OpenCNAM with friends: a simple API that returns caller ID names for phone numbers, with a free tier of 60 queries an hour, no account needed.

![Monk Sketch][]


**NOTE**: I wrote this article years ago. OpenCNAM has since changed hands, and opencnam.com now goes to Neustar (part of TransUnion), so the free API I describe below is no longer available. The OpenCNAM links in this post point to an archived copy of the old site.

For the past several months, I've been working with some really great friends
of mine on a startup, [OpenCNAM][].  As some of you know, I have a lot of
experience doing telephony development: primarily building large back end
systems.

Since I started hacking telephony code (almost 4 years ago), one thing that has
always bothered me is how hard it is to find (and use) telephony data.  As
anyone in the telephony industry will tell you: the industry is huge, old, and
fragmented.

Even the simplest of all things: getting someone's caller ID name information
given a telephone number is tremendously difficult.  The way caller ID works on
the PSTN (public telephone network) is insane.  Caller ID information is
fragmented, stored in huge carrier databases, and there is no simple way to
extract the information.

For programmers (like me), this makes building telephony applications a
nightmare.  Frankly, we were tired of jumping through hoops to get simple
caller ID data, and decided to do something about it.


## OpenCNAM - Caller ID Made Simple

![OpenCNAM Logo][]

[OpenCNAM][OpenCNAM] is an API company designed from the ground-up to be as
simple as possible.  The main idea is to make getting caller ID information
easy--*really easy*.  No more negotiating deals with telco providers and
surfing through endless pages of Google looking for relevant information.

If you're a programmer looking to use caller ID information in your software,
and you can't get something working within 5 minutes of visiting
[our website][OpenCNAM], we've failed our mission.

In the spirit of making things as simple as possible, OpenCNAM also has a
generous free tier.  That's right.  If you're writing an application that does
less than 60 queries per hour, you don't even need an account with us!  All you
have to do is hit our API endpoint, and BAM, you get results back.  It's that
easy.

Need to do more than 60 queries per hour?  No problem.  Once we're out of beta
you'll be able to create an account, add some funds, and pay for exactly what
you use (with automatic volume discounts). 

**NOTE**: If you'd like to give our beta a try, send an email to
`support@opencnam.com` and we'll get you an API key.

With 17,717,475 successful queries and counting, OpenCNAM is already taking
off.  If you do any telephony development at all, I'd love to hear your
feedback.

Over the coming months, I'll be spending more time writing about my startup
journeys, so be sure to check back!


[Monk Sketch]: monk-sketch.jpg "Monk Sketch"
  [OpenCNAM]: https://web.archive.org/web/20120503212839/http://www.opencnam.com/ "OpenCNAM - A Simple Caller ID API"
[OpenCNAM Logo]: opencnam-logo.png "OpenCNAM Logo"