Your software is often used in conjunction with zendesk, you say it yourself and they both use "zenX" branding.
To me that could easily lead to confusion as a customer might believe they are are part of a suite of SaaS offerings under the "zen" brand (i.e. zendesk branching out).
I make no comment on the rest of the story, just that specific bit.
[Edit]: Maybe I should have said 'low-ranking imps advocate' instead :p
> Yes, we both use the “zen” moniker as part of our names, yes both are SaaS. But we’re not targeting the same customers or solving the same problem.
> On the contrary: Both I and many of my customers use zendesk alongside zenbilling.
There is an overlap between what they do and both using 'zen' can easily be interpreted as affiliation between the 2 companies.
I don’t assume there is an affiliation between the zencoder and zendesk. Personally I wouldn’t think there was much overlap between Billing and Customer Support, either - and I would not be confused in the least. (From the names - branding could clearly connect the 2)
Plus the number of startups with Zen in their name is huge: http://www.crunchbase.com/search?query=zen (which is a bad query as it excludes zen embedded in the name like we are discussing - but good as the number of relevant results is still ~30. And it’s the best I could find on short notice.)
anecdotally, I don't use either, but i 've heard of zendesk, and would naturally associate zenbilling with them.
I believe they also had a problem with a company named FreshDesk which was a direct competitor.
I just see a company being bully here.
ZenDesk on the other hand cannot be said to do the same.