STHLM: Stockholm’s Tech Meetup

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On February 17th I went to to STHLM, Stockholm’s tech meet up. A pity I arrived late at the event, the door gift was a microchip!

When I arrived at the meetup, the first start-up has already began pitching, I have forgotten the name but the idea was quite good. It is to create a market where consumers will pay for images. Like how Spotify revoltuionised the music industry, the founder believe that his platform will revolutionise the image industry. People do not pay for the images they use even if they do not possess the rights. Many people just rip it off google image search, just like how a huge number of consumers were illegally downloading music before spotify came about. The platform allows consumers to use images legally such as design work or photographs by professionals with a minimal amount of money. What was really amazing is that the founder actually got Microsoft to integrate his platform on the upcoming version of powerpoint. Hence, users can just insert an image into their presentations through his plug-in in Powerpoint, how convenient is that. The investors were also very impressed that he had secured a brilliant distribution channel.
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The next 2 start ups are dating apps with somewhat creative ideas. One of them was 7 heaven which plans to solve the problem of people posting photos that do not look like them on dating platforms. Their workaround is too set a timing of 6 hours for the photo to uploaded after it is taken. Of course people can still edit their photos or choose a very good photo within 6 hours. The other was trice which wanted to do a snapchat version of a dating app where conversations can only be take place in pictures with captions. I felt that it was restricting it does not allow pure text to be sent over and just adding an image send to a dating app is just a small addition. However, one investor brought up an insightful point that dating apps are still hot as the market is always willing to accommodate more. Users of dating apps are desperate and they are willing to try new apps and most users use several dating apps at once.
All in all, STHLM was wonderful and I signed up for the next one on March 24th already. Next time I will arrive early for the door gift haha!

Uppstart: Gathering Tech Startups in Uppsala

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On February 11, I attended, Uppstart, my first start up event in Stockholm. It was quite a unique experience as it was held at the Uppsala castle; I have never attended a business event at a castle before.

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The event started off the panel of investors introducing themselves and giving some useful tips for start ups. There were quite a few insightful points mentioned.
First of all, the panel informed us that the investment environment is much different from 5 years ago. Investment rounds are now longer and investors are willing to fund longer projects. The investment environment is less hostile overall. Many investors will still continue investing even when some start-ups are not making profits for a period of time.
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One important tip for start-ups is to get funding when you can, not when you need it. The panels said that they have seen too many start-ups missed funding opportunities because they felt that they already have enough funding. Some came to regret it later. It is always better to have extra funds as the road of a start-up is very unpredictable.
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Another tip is to demonstrate what can a start-up do without or minimal funding. Investors are more impressed with what you can do in your current state than what you plan to do if you have the funds. Being able to do a lot of little funding demonstrates a start-up resourcefulness.
The panel at Uppstart said that they look at 4 main criteria when investing in a start up. Team, Attraction, Market and Barriers.
Team: A team should have the right talent to pull off the project.
Attraction: The idea should be attractive enough to the investor
Market: The market should be ready to adopt the product or service
Barriers: Barriers to entry to the industry is a critical factor. This includes current big players and the network effect. Some apps are only useful if they have a large number of users(network effect), even if the app is really better than the competitor, without the network effect it may not take off.
3 companies pitched during the start up event which I felt were not very good ideas. In fact, they did not make much of an impression such that I do not remember much about them.  One of the ideas to regulate the temperature of the heaters in the house to save energy, another one was an event manager app, I can’t remember the third one. The panel discussion was much better than the start-up pitching.

Innovation and Communication

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I recently listened to a really interesting episode of resumes podcast, featuring  Ola Ahlvarsson who is a swedish veteran entrepreneur. In it they discuss innovation, communication, how he perceives entrepreneurship and the future of technology. All relevant topics, well worth a listen.
Unfortunately it’s in swedish, so i guess this is only aimed at the swedish speaking student.

The Name

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I imaging that everyone has started with their venture project by now, deciding on what kind of service or product you would like to offer customers. Much of the focus is on how the product or service is going to be better than the competition or how it is going to satisfy the customers’ needs. This is all very important, but there is something else which might be event more important namely the name of your product or service. This is the first thing your customers is going to see or here when they meet your idea for the first time.

I found this interesting podcast episode where they discuss the importance of the name, since it is the name that will symbolize what you are trying to achieve with your product or service. So, should you go for an abstract or associative name?

 

Start-up events and workshop/conference

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Good evening folks,

Last week hosted several start-up meetings and events, and I though I would give a short review of each of them.

Tuesdag was the day of the Sthlm Tech Meetup, at Hilton Slussen. It was really crowded, not a chance to get a seat. The guest companies/investors this time among others included Bonnier Growth Media, a branch within the Bonnier Group relating to transform the editorial material to the new media landscape, briefly explained. Myself being a journalist since many years, working closely with especially Bonnier Magazines Group, it was sort of a nice touch to the evening. One of their main things to start is the KIT digital media platform, co-founded by a friend of mine, Robert Brännström. (Who unfortunately wasn’t present on the event…)

Other than that, there were three pitches presented, two of which included (remarkably similar) dating app services. And frankly, they both felt like less good competitors to Tinder, and not genuinely great ideas, to my mind. The third aimed to be some sort of Spotify service for images, but that also seemed to have a long way to be a worldwide success.

Thursday I attended a start-up event at familiar ground, here at KTH, where the Student Incubator (Student Inc) had a housewarming party in their new location at Lindstedtsvägen. A really nice place to mingle, have a beer and have a chat with one of the start-ups that have come out of KTH.

Oh, and the week before that, which I have forgotten to blog about, the startup event Uppstart, at the castle of Uppsala (my hometown) took place. A bit of a distance to travel, sure, but several of my friends in Uppsala University organisation Entrepreneurs Academy were present. However, not as crowded as the Tech Meetup… but maybe next time! 🙂

Right now, and this entire week, I am away on an industrial design engineering workshop/conference in Värnamo, in the southern part of Sweden. People from several schools, including KTH, Linneaus University and Jönköping University, gather for a week’s work and business cooperation. Hopefully plenty of good ideas will come out of this. Or, wait… They already have.

Therefore, you will not see me until next week. Have a good time back in Estocolmo!

Erik

Testing Automattic’s Simplenote

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Automattic was recently listed by the Wall Street Journals as one of the world’s 73 most-valuable startups. Funded in 2005 by Matt Mullenweg, it is mostly known for being the driving force behind WordPress.

WordPress is not their only product, though. Among them, there is Simplenote, a note taking app that values simplicity. I have been using it for a some time now, and I think it’s worth trying.

The app is free to use and it’s available on multiple platforms: iOS, Android, Mac, Kindle. It’s also possible to use it from the web.

It comes with a lot of good features: instant synchronisation across different devices; tagging; revision history (to go back in time and never loose changes).

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#STHLMTECH

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Yesterday I went to STHLM Tech Meetup and it was a really good experience. I really like the concept and how they carried out the event. It was a little bit like a talk show with a fun and outgoing host and his sidekick. They started of with some information about what is going on in the Stockholm startup scene and what media is writing about on the topic. It is great to summarize in a forum like this and highlight interesting and actual news.

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Then they smoothly transitioned to interviews where they talked to KnCMiner and their startup story. They also talked to Bonnier growth media and Dawn capital about what they are up to right now.

After the interviews three startups got the chance to pitch their ideas. The setup for the pitches was really interesting because the host interrupted and asked the jury what they thought so far, when only the basic outlines of the idea were given. It was interesting to see how the persons who pitched handled the situation and the input during the rest of the pitch. This way the pitches got interactive and the audience got a chance to understand what potential investors might think about during a pitch.

I had a really positive experience and can recommend a visit to the STHLM tech meetup which was fun and informative in a relaxed way.

The Modularisation of Entrepreneurship

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I just had a fantastic evening at the STHLM Tech Meetup, and what it featured was not only a series of interesting pitches (of launched and not-yet-launched ventures) but also a very compelling introduction to event supporters. One of these really struck my interest by the nature of what they do. It was a firm, called “The Service Corporation”, presented by the founder and CEO himself. They offer a global expansion It wasn’t the actual start-up which was compelling, but rather the thought that followed. By now, there are so many firms that do not directly produce any smart venture ideas, but rather fit into the start-up process of others.

It’s about the trend of “enabling entrepreneurship”, and that is done in a modular behaviour. We’ve seen ventures like this before. Rocket Internet (GER), which capitalise on ‘replicating’ successful business models from the US in Europe – and, thus, act as a “globaliser” to the original start-up. Or “The Service Corporation”, which offers to team up with start-ups and give them the resources needed to penetrate foreign markets. It’s not about incubating anymore; these ventures follow the definition of modularisation. If one thinks of four principle steps: Discovery, Validation, Creation, Building – one will realise that all these are somewhat modules, and the value propositions of these “Enabling” start-ups.

Likewise, one of the first guest lectures, Joakim Fohlman outlined that “Cubimo” bases on helping others discover and develop venture ideas (First Module; Discovery). Furthermore, “FundedbyMe” or “Kickstarter” fit in as the second module of “Validation”. These not only are tools to gain proof of concept status, but also enable the following step of funding. The next module (Creation) is given; players such as “TED” or “STHLM Tech Meetup”, which help reach the desired customers and offer growth opportunities. The fourth step is given by todays presenter, and inspiration to this; ventures like “The Service Corporation” enable growth into new markets.

This might not be too novel of a thought, but what I can identify are the two types of innovation; Product- and Process-Innovation. And from remembering the strategy lectures, Process Innovation follows Product Innovation – and that might indicate a lacking venture ideas in the entrepreneurs market.  I don’t hope that is the case, but it could rather be that we have exhausted current technologies. Perhaps, this can be derived from the fact that big, enabling technologies take a lot of time to develop – far more time than is needed to launch a bunch of start-ups that capitalise on them (especially with the popular lean start-up structure). I interpret it as a call for forward-thinking innovation – strategically going for product innovation when process innovation is “in cycle”.

 

On why I feel reluctant to call myself an entrepreneur

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I started my first own business at the age of 16, which is fairly close to the legal age of doing so. Since 2013, I’ve run a private limited company (or in swedish, Aktiebolag), and in many ways then, I could see myself as an entrepreneur. Not the world’s most extensive entrepreneur, but fairly more entrepreneurial than most of my friends. However, I feel increasingly reluctant to call myself an entrepreneur, even though I like running businesses and transforming ideas to viable futures. And there’s good reason behind this, mainly including the image that is connected to entrepreneurship.

I increasingly often from my friends hear the words ”I hate entrepreneurship”. And by the common meaning of it, I tend to agree with them. The word ”entrepreneurship”, together with ”innovation”, are word that are trending now – but they form a gated community. They come with a vocabulary that is easily noticed, you ”network” instead of make friends, you talk about ”venture capital”, ”business angels”, and a whole bunch of words that doesn’t applies to any other part of the world. And the people are predictably similar to each other in appearance. A friend of mine (who comes from the northern town of Timrå, and for the record also has his own business) put it straight when seeing the profile picture of an entrepreneurship student friend of mine on Facebook: ”He’s standing in sunglasses and backslick on the sailing boat of his father, he would get punched in the face as soon as he entered Timrå Municipality.” The verdict was harsh.

And it’s not only about appearance, I think it all comes down to whether you start a business purely for the money, or if you are genuinely interested in whatever you do within the business. The fact that half of the people I knew at the first lecture within this course quit the course after that lecture probably says the lot. It was a disaster. Confirming virtually all the stereotypes and prejudices related to entrepreneurship. I myself was on the edge of quitting as well, despite my interest in whatever could be described as entrepreneurship. I understand that the lecture of Joakim (if I remember his name correctly) was thought of as an inspirational lecture, but it worked in the diametrically opposite way. I’ve never felt so much as a part of an american presidential election, or, sometimes, a sect. When talking about ”making one million dollar by the age of 25”, or was it 10 or 100 million, I felt really, really out-of-place.

Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with making money, but the culture of ”entrepreneurship” needs to be more inclusive. Not only open to people with the talks and appearance of the far right-wing, talking in swedish political terms. Open to the people, like me, who would see creating businesses as a way of doing things you like to do, rather than just making money, people who see money as a tool to make good rather than the ultimate achievement. Producing a gated entrepreneurship community where these people are excluded is a drawback for society as a whole.

Erik

PS. While this entry focused more on the core looking and aura of the people involved in entrepreneurship, there is a more serious side to the problem as well, as highlighted by a Techcrunch article that recently drew my attention. Take a moment to read it through, here: Startups, A Rich Man’s Game

“The Internet of Money”

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I really enjoyed the Skype-lecture by Terry Beaubois we had on tuesday. Incredible that someone on the other side of the world who, im guessing, is a very busy person, takes time late at night to talk to us!

However, later that day I realized that there where a few questions that I would have liked to ask him, as being someone very much in the loop on what is going on in Silicon Valley at the moment. Basically, there are two technologies that I have developed a great curiosity for recently; namely Virtual Reality and Bitcoin (or ‘Cryptocurrencies’). Two technologies that, from what I have gathered from reading and listening to podcasts, could open up completly new markets and opportunities for business.

Now, I am pretty sure most people have some idea of what VR is, and Terry did touch on the subject in his presentation, but what do you know about Bitcoin, and cryptocurrencies? I am hardly an expert on the subject myself. I did not know anything about it a year ago, but then I heard this guy, Andreas Antonopoulos, explaining it on a podcast. It really was one of those MIND = BLOWN -moments. What stuck in my head was a quote when he talked about the potential of Bitcoin and how people call it “the money of the internet”, but he proposed that the adequate description would be “it is the internet of money“.  Now that is a powerful statement if I ever heard one. If you would like to know more about this technology and get an idea of its potential I recomend you to watch this clip of Andreas breaking it down in a crash course:

It is a fairly long clip, but it really explains it in a nice and accessbile way.

All the best,

Niclas