????Gyft聯(lián)合創(chuàng)始人兼首席執(zhí)行官文尼·林厄姆有一個(gè)目標(biāo)：淘汰塑料禮品卡。

????正是這個(gè)構(gòu)想激勵(lì)著位于舊金山的初創(chuàng)公司Gyft，該公司提供的一款同名移動(dòng)應(yīng)用程序讓用戶能夠購買禮品卡，然后直接通過智能手機(jī)贈(zèng)送禮品卡。用戶可以購買近150家零售商【包括亞馬遜（Amazon）、耐克（Nike）及蓋璞百貨集團(tuán)旗下的老海軍連鎖商店（Old Navy）】發(fā)行的禮品卡，而且可以把這些禮品卡發(fā)送給使用這款應(yīng)用程序的任何其他用戶。從理論上講，在手機(jī)上查看禮品卡上的未使用余額要比實(shí)物禮品卡更加方便。

????獲得谷歌風(fēng)投公司（Google Ventures）融資支持的Gyft還向那些早已購買塑料禮品卡的用戶提供一些額外的功能。用戶可以把現(xiàn)有實(shí)物禮品卡上的余額直接上傳到他們的賬戶里，甚至可以把一張禮品卡轉(zhuǎn)送給他們相熟的親朋好友。林厄姆說：“我們想讓Gyft成為數(shù)字錢包，人人都安裝在手機(jī)上，用來接收禮品卡?！边@家公司正式上線后的第一個(gè)月里，用戶把現(xiàn)有禮品卡上傳到這款應(yīng)用程序上的金額總數(shù)超過了100萬美元。

????Gyft應(yīng)用程序面市的時(shí)間正趕上假日購物季節(jié)，在該公司正式上線后的頭90天里，這款應(yīng)用程序的下載次數(shù)累計(jì)超過了50,000次。考慮到其中所涉及的資金，這么多的下載次數(shù)可謂是一個(gè)重要的補(bǔ)充信息。全美零售商聯(lián)合會(huì)（the National Retail Federation）最近進(jìn)行的一項(xiàng)調(diào)查發(fā)現(xiàn)，美國81.1%的消費(fèi)者在今年假日購物季節(jié)將購買禮品卡，總支出預(yù)計(jì)超過285億美元。通過其應(yīng)用程序每銷售一張禮品卡，Gyft可獲得禮品卡價(jià)值的10％至15％作為收入，具體比例則取決于發(fā)行禮品卡的零售商。

????但消費(fèi)者用禮品卡實(shí)際消費(fèi)多少并不是禮品卡行業(yè)所關(guān)心的問題——每年沒有使用過的禮品卡會(huì)留有數(shù)十億美元的未使用余額。維薩信用卡公司（Visa）進(jìn)行的調(diào)查發(fā)現(xiàn)，40％的禮品卡持有者沒有兌現(xiàn)禮品卡的全部價(jià)值，2011年禮品卡未使用余額總計(jì)超過20億美元。谷歌風(fēng)投公司普通合伙人喬·克勞斯說：“很明顯，有巨額資金困在儲(chǔ)值卡或禮品卡上。通過把禮品卡‘映射’到我們隨身攜帶的手機(jī)上，禮品卡的使用就方便很多了?！比欢?，零售商也無法從這些閑置未用的資金中獲利。聯(lián)邦法規(guī)禁止零售公司把尚未兌現(xiàn)的禮品卡的銷售收入記為營收，意味著零售商和禮品卡持有者都希望消除這種資金閑置浪費(fèi)的現(xiàn)象。

????Gyft希望從中給予幫助，方式是通過采取精確的方式來解決一個(gè)重要的問題。與諸如Giftly或Facebook旗下的Karma等其他禮品贈(zèng)送公司不同，Gyft專門處理禮品卡，最大限度地縮小在總體網(wǎng)購領(lǐng)域的著力范圍。但林厄姆以及聯(lián)合創(chuàng)始人麥克唐納和馬克·萊維特都希望避免公司過快擴(kuò)張。Gyft是林厄姆創(chuàng)辦的第三家初創(chuàng)公司。2003年，他與別人聯(lián)合創(chuàng)辦了搜索營銷公司Clicks2Customers，之后又在2007年創(chuàng)辦了網(wǎng)站建立服務(wù)公司Yola.com。這一次，他決定保持務(wù)求簡單的創(chuàng)業(yè)構(gòu)想和經(jīng)營理念?，F(xiàn)年33歲、在南非長大的林厄姆說：“那些非常有創(chuàng)意的人，尤其是創(chuàng)業(yè)者，他們面臨的一個(gè)陷阱是，在展望未來時(shí)往往看得太過遙遠(yuǎn)。使一個(gè)人成其為他自己的固有本性同時(shí)也是這個(gè)人面臨的最大敵人?！?/p>

????Gyft CEO and Co-Founder Vinny Lingham has one goal: eliminate the plastic gift card.

????That's idea animates San Francisco-based startup Gyft, an app that offers users the ability to buy and then give gift cards directly on their smartphones. Users can purchase gift cards from close to 150 vendors -- including Amazon (AMZN), Nike (NKE) and Old Navy (GPS) -- and send them to any other user of the app. Having the card balance available on your phone, so goes the theory, is more convenient than physical cards.

????Backed by Google Ventures (GOOG), Gyft offers a few additional features to those who have already purchased plastic gift cards. Users can upload the balance of an existing gift card directly to their account, or even re-gift a card to one of their contacts. "We want Gyft to be the digital wallet that everyone has on their phone for receiving gift cards," says Lingham. In the company's first month, users uploaded more than $1 million in existing gift cards to the app.

????Gyft hit the scene just in time for the holiday season, amassing more than 50,000 downloads in the company's first 90 days, an important footnote considering the money at stake. A recent study by the National Retail Federation found that 81% of holiday shoppers plan to purchase gift cards this year. Total spending is predicted to reach more than $28.5 billion, and depending on the vendor, Gyft receives between 10% and 15% of the value of each gift card sold through its app.

????But spending isn't the gift card industry's problem -- unused gift cards leave billions of dollars on the table every year. Research from Visa found that 40% of gift card owners fail to redeem the card's full value, leaving more than $2 billion in gift cards unused in 2011. "It is clear that there is a tremendous amount of value trapped in stored value cards or gift cards," says Joe Kraus, a general partner at Google Ventures. "[Gift cards are] so much more convenient by mirroring them into the device we carry with ourselves all the time." Retailers aren't the beneficiaries of this wasted cash, however. Federal regulations prohibit companies from listing gift card sales as revenue until the cards are redeemed, meaning both retailers and gift card owners want to eliminate the waste.

????Gyft hopes to help by taking a narrow approach to solving a major problem. Gyft, unlike other gift-giving companies such as Giftly or Facebook's (FB) Karma, deals exclusively with gift cards, minimizing its reach in the overall online shopping arena. But Lingham, alongside co-founders CJ MacDonald and Mark Levitt, wanted to avoid expanding too quickly. Gyft is Lingham's third startup: in 2003, he co-founded Clicks2Customers, a search marketing company, and in 2007, Yola.com, a website builder. This time around, he decided to keep things simple. "One of the pitfalls of very creative people, particularly entrepreneurs, is you tend to see too far into the future," says Lingham, 33, who grew up in South Africa. "The inherent nature that makes you what you are is also your biggest enemy."