French hosting company OVH just updated its product offering for its Dropbox-like service called HubiC. Now, you get 25GB of storage for free, 100GB for $1.35 per month (€1), and you can opt for a whopping 10TB plan for $13.50 per month (€10).
Launched two years ago, HubiC has slowly but surely evolved into a full-fledged Dropbox alternative. It now provides a sync client on the desktop, mobile apps and an API. But it lacks mainstream appeal.
HubiC remains a newcomer, and when it comes to file hosting services nowadays, every big company has one. Microsoft has SkyDrive, Google has Google Drive, etc.
Dropbox has a powerful lock-in effect as well. Your files and photos are already on the service, you may have shared folders with other Dropbox users, and many apps now use the Dropbox API.
To differentiate itself, HubiC bets on its prices. The company doesn’t rely on Amazon S3 like Dropbox, it has its own server infrastructure and multiple data centers — the service probably has less operating costs.
TechCrunch Disrupt finalist Bitcasa is another service that tried to attract users by promising big accounts. For $9.99 a month, you were supposed to get infinite storage. But in November, the company had to change its plans. For $10 a month, you now get 1TB of storage, and the unlimited plan now costs $99 per month.
It’s not clear whether HubiC will be able to maintain the 10TB plan in the long run, but you can cancel any time. And maybe the NSA doesn’t know about HubiC yet.
