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OpenTable is a local search engine that lets you make online reservation in partner restaurants. The number of restaurants it currently offers 8,500 and according to the site they will be having around 3 million diners seated at various restaurants using their web service.

The company has rapidly expanded and its current numbers show a 50% increase compared to that of the last year. The service does charge for the every reservation; $1 dollar for those made direct through them and 25 cents on every reservation made through the restaurants. According to Matt Marshal (VentureBeat); given its efficiency and the quality of service it provides along with the present number of users, the company generates millions in revenue.

OpenTable has facilitated its users by launching the mobile version of their site adding location based services with the aid of GPS. This in turn makes it far more effective by easing out the search for a desired restaurant within a locality, enabling the user to book a reservation on the go.

OpenTable, with only a handful of competitors lined up, it already appears strong plus the site also licenses software as well as hardware to the restaurants assisting locals to manage the client list. The difference as compared to other companies is that OpenTable also offers consumer-based services. The present partners it is associated to are CitySearch and Yelp; the purpose for this is to let users make reservations through them.

The quality and efficiency is maintained by OpenTable using the feedback from its members with confidential questioners allowing them to rate the particular restaurants on the services they provide. As spokesman Scott Jampol commented:

This is the first step to user generated content

The company’s plan of the mobile version isn’t new; it had attempted the same in 2000, but given the fact that barely anyone had WAP based phones so commonly as they do now. The present trend of smart-phones has given a boost and made the company utilize the technology that it had sidelined for eight years. The plan had been in pipe for quite some time but the iPhone’s release lately had triggered the company to finally announce the launch.