The company most recently announced that it has signed a deal with Sun Cellular, thus interconnecting its services to the top 3 mobile carriers in the Philippines.

"This brings our total network of carriers to more than 20. Aside from the Philippine mobile companies, we have partnerships with carriers in the US, Japan, Singapore, Hong Kong, Thailand, Malaysia, and China," said Junie Agcaoili chikka.com chief corporate communications officer.

He said Filipinos in the US now casually exchange messages through the networks of US giant Cingular Wireless, AT&T, and Verizon.

The company said its services benefit mostly overseas Filipino workers who can now easily communicate with relatives and friends via the chikka.com network. Chikka provides value-added service including free short messaging system or SMS to user.

It generates revenue through a revenue sharing scheme with carriers.

Agcaoili said chikka.com eventually hopes to create a global network of Filipinos interconnected through SMS, regardless of what carrier they are subscribed to.

"We are currently discussing with more international telcos on possible partnerships. The goal is to create a huge community of chikka.com users and interconnect them wherever they in the globe," Agcaoili said.

For its future plans meantime, the executive said chikka.com is aiming to establish a foothold in India and is talking with Indian carriers.

"We have an existing partnership with some Indian firms. But we want to sign up more carriers and hopefully build our business there," Agcaoili said.