Sydney startup GoFar launches Kickstarter to help drivers save money on petrol

May 4, 2015, 2:53 pm

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If there’s one thing Australians love to complain about when it comes to driving, it’s the price of petrol - and for good reason. In spite of proposed initiatives like the Rudd Government’s fuel watch plan, the price of petrol has risen from an average of 80c around the country in 2000 to regularly hit $1.50 or above over the last few years. While it can’t do anything about prices, a Sydney startup modelled on Formula 1 technology is looking to change what drivers spend on each tank. GoFar, which promises to help drivers save up to 20 percent on each tank of fuel, is finally ready to launch to the public after two years of development and testing. So how does it work? Using a dongle plugged in under the steering wheel, a ‘Ray’ that sits atop the dashboard, and a smartphone app, GoFar tracks trips and energy released and used by things like accelerating, braking, and driving up and down hills. With energy released translating to fuel used, tracking this data allows GoFar to tell drivers where they are spending money and help them change their behaviour behind the wheel - often, inefficient driving like particularly fast acceleration or harsh braking mean petrol is wasted. The Ray emits a red light to signal drivers that they are partaking in wasteful or dangerous driving behaviours. The smartphone app allows drivers to tag each of their trips, which GoFar says can then help them test different routes or work out which type of fuel gets them further for less. GoFar has also gamified the driving experience, letting drivers compete against themselves or in leagues to see who is driving better and saving more. The startup travelled to Geneva earlier this year to take part in the Seedstars World startup pitching competition, which co-founder Ian Davidson said gave them an insight into the auto market and the potential place of GoFar in it. “We met quite a few fleet companies and an auto manufacturers, and learned how hard it is for them to adapt fast to the market. [There is] no way they they can go at tech company pace but they remain key players,” he said. The startup is lining up trial with large fleet management brands to see how far they can cut fuel bills. “We're not targeting the telematics, location tracking space - that's well picked over. We're much more focused on driver behaviour, giving drivers intuitive real time feedback and motivation in the form of gamification and incentives so that they treat corporate assets better than their own,” Davidson said. “The telematics industry approach tends to mainly benefit the company. Our approach is to start with the driver and ensure both sides benefit in terms of safety, emissions, morale, and financially by splitting the savings.” A partnership with the NRMA or another motoring services company would also seem like a natural progression; Davidson admits that it would be an “awesome partnership.” “I feel we have much in common with NRMA - it started as a crowd sourced solution to a tech challenge back in the 1920s. The small car driver community was at the bleeding edge of tech back then and banded together to help each other overcome the terrible roads and unreliable cars, and this formalised into a membership community, a bit like Waze or maybe GoFar if we play our cards right,” he said. With the current focus on its crowdfunding campaign, GoFar is looking to raise $50,000 to get the product shipped out by November. Early backers have been offered a dongle and Ray set for $89.

Related posts:

1. Sydney startup GoFar wins regional Seedstars competition and will now compete in World Final
2. GoFar looking to win big in Seedstars World competition in Geneva
3. Otto is an always-listening voice control app that allows drivers to call, email, and text without breaking the law

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Airtasker’s $6.5 million capital raise shows that Chinese VCs have a taste for Aussie startups

May 4, 2015, 6:52 pm

≫ Next: Startup CasaStudent wants to help international students find accommodation through trusted providers

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Sydney based startup Airtasker announced today that it has raised a further AU$6.5 million in capital in order to ramp up its product development, engineering efforts and customer support services, as well as prepare for a number of 'large scale projects' that will take place later this year. Airtasker is a community marketplace that connects people who are looking for help getting everyday tasks and errands completed, with a community of people who are looking to earn some extra cash. The startup was founded by Tim Fung and Jonathan Lui launching in February 2012. The round was led by Shanghai based Morning Crest Capital, the National Roads and Motorists' Association (NRMA), and Australian venture capital firms Exto Partners, Carthona Capital and Black Sheep Capital. While other media have begun labelling the investment by Morning Crest Capital as 'one of the first major investments by Chinese-based investors' in an early stage Australian tech startup, I disagree with those sentiments. Most of the Morning Crest Capital portfolio is currently Australian startups. In addition to being an investor in Tank Stream Ventures, which Fung is closely connected to, the firm has also invested in Pocketbook, GoCatch and SchoolPlaces. In fact Morning Crest Capital is setting itself up as somewhat of a bridging venture capital firm, giving global companies access to both Chinese funding and markets. “Morning Crest Capital’s expertise and advice will allow us to investigate a broader Asia strategy with Airtasker’s growth,” said Fung. Airtasker currently claims to have more than 250,000 users across Australia and processes more than $15 million worth of tasks on the platform per year. Fung says that the upcoming new services the company is preparing to release will be "revolutionary for the local services economy". A third of the workers on Airtasker are aged over 55, a group that is colloquially labelled the "grey army". They are using the platform to supplement their retirement incomes and 'keep busy' by putting their skills to use. NRMA Group CEO Tony Stuart said the organisation has been researching investment opportunities in startup businesses offering a range of services that can make members' lives easier by saving them time and money. “NRMA chose to support Airtasker, as it offers our 2.4 million Members a resource to easily find assistance with home and office tasks as well as offering an opportunity for casual employment,” Stuart said.

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2. Will the current INCUBATE class exceed their predecessors $1.1 million capital raise?
3. The Rise of “Micro-Entrepreneurism” in Australia

Startup CasaStudent wants to help international students find accommodation through trusted providers

May 5, 2015, 6:51 pm

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As an international student, finding suitable accommodation can be one of the most difficult parts of starting life in a new country. Trawling through real estate sites from the other side of the world is extremely time consuming, and it’s hard to know which listings can be trusted. This is why student services platform StudentVIP and shared accommodation site Flatmates.com.au have partnered to create Casa Student, a platform that helps students find rooms through official student accommodation providers. Thomas Clement, general manager of flatmates.com.au, said that with the two brands often targeting the same market, there is a synergy between the two that has seen them work together on various projects. The new venture came about as they identified a gap in the market. “Where Flatmates is designed for people who are looking to meet other people to live with through a peer on peer model, a large student accommodation property might have 200 or even 700 beds. The way that the business needs to interact with those customers is very different, and it's very frustrating for them to use Flatmates,” Clement said. “It became a natural opportunity for us to provide a service that works for not only providers, but also the students. By combining the large audience of Flatmates and the large audience of Student VIP, we've kind of come up with this product which is in the middle.” While there are platforms around the world focused on helping students find accommodation, Clement said Casa Student has been constructed differently. Where a similar British site may allow, for example, a London landlord to list their 12 room property, Casa Student is working with professional providers, such as Urbanest. With listing free, the majority of providers have already signed on to Casa Student. The site has already generated around 180 leads. “There's obviously big money in this industry, from the point of view that accommodation in Australia is not cheap. You know, one of these rooms can be up to $400 to $500 a week, many of them more on the $200 to $300 range. If they don't fill their rooms in the beginning of the year, it's going to be empty most of the year, or at least for the first semester. So there's an interest for them to get the rooms filled,” Clement said. “It’s also a great opportunity for students to view all the options in one place rather than having to go to five or six different websites. They might find services they weren't even aware of.” As high rents see more local university students choose to keep living with their parents in the suburbs, Casa Student is targeting interstate and international students. As well as advertising through flatmates.com.au and StudentVIP, the site has also been listed in Insider Guides, guides for international students. With backing from flatmates.com.au and StudentVIP, Casa Student should be able to make a name for itself. Having had to find accommodation for a year studying abroad myself, I think it will prove a useful service. However, students who want to live with locals in private accommodation in a small house rather than dorm-type buildings (which are often full of other foreign students) will be disappointed. It will be interesting to see whether Casa Student can fill this gap in the future; given its access to flatmates.com.au, the possibility is there. With Casa Student also free for students to use, Clement said putting a monetisation strategy in place - or finding investment - is not currently a key priority. “As we are already existing businesses, we have the luxury of not having pressure. But we're a small business and if options come up, we're always willing to discuss them.”

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3. UNSW Students Make Finals of International Business Comp!

Drone delivery startup Flirtey begins to commercialise its offering as it considers Series A funding

May 5, 2015, 7:46 pm

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Drone technology startup Flirtey was the world's first 'drone delivery service' to ever launch. In 2013, the startup was met with scepticism and ridicule by a pretty large portion of the media - including the startup media and this publication. In a previous article, I questioned the company's ability to legally operate drones in Australia. In fairness, the company, founded by Matthew Sweeny, Ahmed Haider and Tom Bass, largely existed off a working (very early) prototype and 'drone delivery' was a very new concept at the time. While some may call early press premature, in retrospect, it probably helped the company forge the connections in the space it has today. It's likely that consistent media mentions influenced Google and Amazon to begin talking about their own drone programs. It was also around this time that Flirtey was going through Australia's Startmate program, learning to become a laser-focused company that was sound in its mission to bring drone delivery technology to the masses. The company's strategy is to "develop scalable drone delivery technology," according to Sweeny. "The [technology is being developed] in our US office and the commercialisation [side of our operation] has started in New Zealand as a test bed for our technology. And the way we see the commercialisation role now is through a series of drone delivery trials that increase incrementally in degree of complexity." The way Flirtey has began rolling out its commercialisation strategy is by starting operations over unpopulated areas, then slowly expanding across populated smaller sites and eventually cities. The startup has learned a lot from New Zealand that it will be able to take and use as part of its strategy to roll out drone delivery programs across the world. After completing the Startmate program, Flirtey received a small amount of seed funding from BlackBird Ventures. Soon after that, it struck a major deal with the University of Nevada in Reno, a leading drone institute in the United States. "As part of Startmate, we went on a tour to Silicon Valley and whilst we were there, the Federal Aviation Authority of the United States announced six drone test sites nationwide, none of them were in California, the nearest was in Nevada which was not far from where we were in Silicon Valley, so we came over to Reno," said Sweeny. "We're the first company [outside the United States] that they've signed a deal with and they even brought us on campus and we've been able to hire top engineering talent and have got access to their indoor flight testing facilities". In fact, as I conducted the interview with Sweeny, I could hear faint sound of 3D printers in the background of the facility that were printing new design prototypes for the next generation of Flirtey's drone design. In addition to this major coup in Reno, the team at Flirtey has been able to build a number of other exciting partnerships. Flirtey is working with a professor from Georgetown University in Washington DC - a prestigious university yielding a lot of powerful alumni including Bill Clinton. This is undoubtedly placing Flirtey in a position to benefit from some of the first pre-approvals for drone delivery across the United States. The other partnership is with Virginia Tech, another of the six named sites that has been legally approved for drone testing. After those partnerships were put in place, Flirtey was able to raise additional seed funding from a global syndicate of investors Nevada, Silicon Valley, New Zealand, Sydney and Melbourne, who are passionate about what the company is doing. Flirtey has even begun to have some preliminary discussions with NASA who is working on traffic control for drones. This potential partnership with NASA would add to this once ridiculed startup gaining a shitload more credibility points than it has garnered in the last 12 months. Regulation of Drone Technology Right now Flirtey has completed its second generation of its drone delivery platform, which can deliver 2.5kg over a distance of more than 12 kilometres, and are starting to tweak design elements to produce the next generation of drones. But creating a great product is just one part of the challenge. Drone technology is regulated and that will definitely have an effect on how fast Flirtey can scale across a global marketplace. When searching the globe to identify the country with the most liberal drone regulations, Flirtey identified New Zealand as the clear winner. New Zealand has a really innovative regulatory environment across many industries; and Flirtey has been working closely with the country's Civil Aviation Authority and Airways Corporations. In essence, the use of drones is legal in New Zealand at the moment, making it the best environment to conduct real-world testing.

In Europe, all signs indicate that the use of drones is not going to be made legal until 2016. In fact, Flirtey was recently asked to submit a proposal to parts of Eurpoean Governments around the frameworks of how drone delivery could work across their countries and the recommendations that came out of that proposal were to adopt the framework that Flirtey suggested - which was a risk-based approach to the regulation of drones.

Then there's the United States; and based on how the FAA has been talking about drone technology, the best estimate is that it will start to become legal around 2017. There is a perception that Australia is also one of those countries that is behind when it comes to looking at drone technology. However, this is false.

Australia is actually quite ahead of the world having legalised commercial drones back in 2002, making it years ahead of the rest of the world in this space. It's worth noting though that regulatory innovation has slowed down in this space over recent years. In Australia, there is a distinction between "hobbyists" and "commercial operators"; this plays a major role in adding roadblocks to companies like Flirtey being able to really do the testing they need. As such, New Zealand has been the best place to launch operations from. 

"New Zealand's attitude is, it doesn't necessarily matter if you're a hobbyist or if you're a commercial operator. What matters is how risky your drone operations are and what policies and procedures and technologies you have in place to mitigate that risk," said Sweeny.

The likelihood of Australia catching up in terms of this type of regulation is high, especially as the European Union begins to roll out its framework next year.

One thing that's becoming increasingly obvious about Flirtey is that, from both a design perspective and a regulatory knowledge point of view, it is years ahead of what could be perceived as its closest competitors - Google and Amazon.

For starters, Google has reportedly 'canned' a lot of the work they have done after trialling their "Project Wing" drones in Australia due to coming to a conclusion that the drone design was inadequate. Amazon, who on face-value, seem to be a little more serious about the space announced they were going to trial "Amazon Prime Air" in India. A few days after the announcement, the Indian Government said it was banning the use of commercial drones.

Flirtey's strategy in working with government agencies to be part of the regulatory process is a strategy that has placed them in a more powerful position than other would-be major players in the space, something that should be getting far more attention than it is.

Transforming four main industries with drone technology

The vision at Flirtey is to transform four industries through the use of drone technology. Those industries are Humanitarian, Online Retail, Food and Courier Delivery. Initial commercial drone trails in New Zealand were a success; one was with TradeMe, one of the country's largest online retailers; and the other was with New Zealand Search and Rescue (LandSAR) where Flirtey demonstrated the company's ability to deliver urgent medical supplies by drone. "The thing we did, a delivery for two-way radios and first aid kits for NZ Land & Search Rescue, was at a location called Roxburgh on the South Islands. There's a river running up between it so a human being physically couldn't get access without going from car to foot, to boat to foot to get there. A drone just flies as crows fly and gets there within a couple of minutes, so in terms of scenarios where you have to deliver a defibrillator or a first aid kit or two-way radio or urgent medical supplies, I think that drones are uniquely placed to provide that urgent care," says Sweeny. When it comes to food, Sweeny revealed to Startup Daily that Flirtey has just signed a deal with a fast food company in New Zealand, although due to a confidentiality agreement, was unable to reveal the name of the company. Essentially, this means that Flirtey drones will start being used to deliver food items like burgers, fries and a coke from stores to customers in the local areas surrounding those stores. The roll-out will start in suburban areas before being available in cities - most likely because drop-offs will be easier to do at houses than apartment buildings at this stage. The business model that Flirtey operates on is by selling itself as a "drone delivery service" for the four above-mentioned industries. It is not the company's intention to sell drones; in fact, I couldn't imagine too many companies wanting to do that at all, especially because there would be insurance and maintenance costs that would be well above what business owners would be willing to invest. The startup thus provides drone delivery as a service on behalf of customers and manage the chain of events that go along with it, from picking up the package to delivering the package. While the drones are autonomous and run missions based on GPS, there is always a human operator in the loop from a central Flirtey control point. 

When it comes to the courier delivery industry, Flirtey's view is that drone delivery technology could be the next solution for postal organisations in Australia and around the world. It would certainly allow them to introduce a faster service to people who may want their letters or packages urgently for a premium cost.

Given Temando is a major player in the delivery space - Neopost invested $50 million into the company recently - and is an investor in Flirtey, I believe there will be some major developments that will happen in this space. This is also because New Zealand Post is one of the most innovative postal services in the world, and because Neopost is so heavily influential as a company across Europe.

In addition to its commercial testing efforts, Flirtey is also in the early stages of looking at a new investment round to help it keep up with its growth plans and compete on the world stage. The iteration of product and investor talks will most likely happen in parallel.

"We haven't disclosed exact numbers on what we are looking for," said Sweeny. "But when you look at the hottest drone startups in Silicon Valley, they're raising Series A rounds of around the $10 million mark."

Then, of course, there are other companies like Skycatch which also closed a $13.5 million Series A not too long ago. The advantage that Flirtey has above many of its other Silicon Valley competitors is it has signed customers. Without an extraordinary amount of funding, it has been able move beyond theory and testing to using the technology as a real-world application.

"I think that Flirtey and drone delivery technology is going to be transformative because not only will it save lives but it will transform lifestyles. I think we're at a point on the technology curve where this is just starting to become ubiquitous and I think that Flirtey is in a very exciting place to lead the world in that charge," said Sweeny.

Featured image: Matt Sweeny, Co-Founder, Flirtey.

Related posts:

1. Drone media hype creating false perceptions? | Flirtey partners with Geepers
2. The Australian startup that could end up beating Project Wing and Prime Air to market
3. Project Tripod is exploring how drone technology could enhance its platform for users

Zenefits raises $500 million for its HR software and insurance hybrid, beating off new customers ‘with a stick’

May 6, 2015, 7:22 pm

≫ Next: Chinese online sanitary pad startup Honeymate raises million-dollar pre-A round

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Zenefits, an all-in-one HR software service which only launched two years ago, announced today that it has raised $500 million in new funding led by Fidelity Management and TPG, valuing the company in the quad-unicorn realm of $4.5 billion. [Source: Pando.com]

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3. Apploi, A Job Hunting App, Raises Over $7 Million In Series A

Chinese online sanitary pad startup Honeymate raises million-dollar pre-A round

May 7, 2015, 8:22 pm

≫ Next: muru-D Class Two Demo Night: Over $2.6 million in revenue generated by the startups in the last six months

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Chinese startup Honeymate announced this week that it has raised a pre-A funding round of more than RMB 10 million (US$1.6 million). [Source:TechInAsia]

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3. Ridibooks raises $8 million Series B Round as it continues to focus on digital distribution

muru-D Class Two Demo Night: Over $2.6 million in revenue generated by the startups in the last six months

May 7, 2015, 8:35 pm

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On Wednesday and Thursday evenings this week, Telstra backed accelerator program muru-D presented its Demo Night to stakeholders within the Telstra organisation, potential investors, advisors and other individuals from Australia's startup ecosystem. Class Two of the program, which began six months ago, started with 11 teams. However, only 10 of those teams managed to complete the full program, hitting all the necessary milestones along the way. Although the name of the missing company was not mentioned on the Demo Night, a quick look back on earlier stories around the current muru-D contingent will reveal that the startup was Funetics. Where Funetics fell short was in managing to complete one of the milestones - such as the $5,000 Advisory Investment Program or on-boarding a paying customer, etc. - required in the program before the given cut-off date. This means that, as per the rules of the accelerator, the startup had to move on from being active in the current program and joining the muru-D alumni. Stories like this show two things; the first is that muru-D is serious about its framework; and the second is that the accelerator is preparing startups for the real-world where closing things like sales or investment by a certain date can mean the difference between keeping the dream alive or having to shut a business down. muru-D's Demo Nights took place inside the Telstra Customer Insight Centre in Sydney. I felt that these presentation nights, in comparison to last year's, had a deeper buy-in from Telstra. From the moment you stepped out of the elevator, there were ushers, hospitality staff and the muru-D team giving guidance on where to go and what to do. The startups were in constant presentation mode giving guests an opportunity to "play" with the products and services prior to the formal part of the evening. When that portion of the night came around, the set up of the stage was simple with full floor to ceiling projections creating an immersive experience from the usual rectangular "death by powerpoint" feel you get with most events like this. To say the achievements of the 10 presenting startups were impressive would be an understatement. As with any style of program, muru-D's Class Two had the benefit of the learnings that came out of the first program; and this resulted in the startups gaining more user traction, more sales and more regional opportunities, mainly due to the new focus on China this time around instead of the United States. Perhaps the most impressive statistic from this class is that the startups have generated over $2.6 million in revenue between them in the last six months. That is not projections either, that is actual sales that have been processed and contracts that have been signed. Another interesting factor was that startups like Tripalocal had already closed a seed funding round of $850,000 six months ago and is beginning to open their Series A already. While that seems fast by Australian standards, the Chinese angle of this intake has meant that a handful of the startups are moving at the pace that many high-growth tech companies in Asia do, and over there a six-month period between a seed and Series A round, is actually not considered unusual. The China focus and subsequent learning tour that has taken place within this program seems to have opened up a number of highly scalable and very profitable opportunities for this class of startups. [caption id="attachment_40568" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The CrowdSourceHire Team[/caption] CrowdSourceHire Founders: Desmond Hang, Ben Liau and Rajnish Kumavat. CrowdSourceHire's platform allows businesses to assess the technical skills of professional hires by crowdsourcing industry experts to vet and validate their candidates. While the difference between the free and premium version of the site could have been explained a little better, CrowdSourceHire have achieved global validation of their product and a move into the South East Asian region is on the cards for them. The startup has completed projects for over 124 companies so far including departments within Telstra and Sony as well as Grab Taxi, one of the fastest growing companies in Asia right now. [caption id="attachment_40573" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The founders of Disrupt[/caption] Disrupt Founders: Gary Elphick and Jason Rogers. The Disrupt team is customising sports equipment through technology, providing customers with 100% individual sporting equipment such as surfboards. So far, Disrupt has made $600,000 in revenue and announced exclusively at the demo night that it would be opening a European office next month. Disrupt is currently in the middle of raising a $500,000 round of seed funding for the business that will be combined with money from grants that it is also seeking out in various countries around the world. In addition to these achievements, Disrupt has been able to attract some recognisable names to its advisory board including Jodie Fox from Shoes of Prey and Matt Fayle from The Loop. [caption id="attachment_40576" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The founders of FanFuel[/caption] FanFuel Founders: Daniel Paronetto and Luciano Guasco. FanFuel's platform connects brands with influential athletes in order to create social media endorsements. Since going live in February, the platform has generated $17,000 in revenue and the startup is now working with Telstra and Sony. The startup also has "tier one" leads in the United States and the founders are currently on a plane and going over to pursue this opportunity. Right now there are over 3,000 athletes that have put themselves on the platform and the founders announced last night that they have opened up a seed funding round in which they aim to raise $380,000. [caption id="attachment_40577" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The founders of Freight Exchange[/caption] Freight Exchange Founders: Cate Hull and Martyn Hann. FreightExchange's platform allows empty trucks, ships, planes and trains all around the world to be filled, which saves shippers time and money in managing their freight. Since launching, the startup has made $24,000 in revenue and in its presentation forecasted $1.6 million in projected revenue over the next 12 months. It is important to note that this company concentrates on "line haul" and not "last leg logistics" which is a space that already has a lot of players in it. China represents a huge opportunity for the startup, especially in the space of importing and exporting between Australia and China - these features of the platform will launch in December this year. At the moment Freight Exchange is in the middle of raising a $560,000 seed round. [caption id="attachment_40579" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The Instrument Works team[/caption] Instrument Works Founder: Dr. Shane Cox. Instrument Works is developing a new set of tools for managing experiments in research and industrial applications. These tools focus on how users collect and manage data - think of it as an Internet of Things type approach to a laboratory situation. The company's first sensor production run sold out and the startup has closed two major equipment contracts with Australian universities so far. At the moment, Instrument Works is scaling up its manufacturing and distribution processes in China. The startup says it thinks its biggest opportunity will come from the SaaS tools it has developed to assist researchers. The team is currently trying to raise a $500,000 seed round. [caption id="attachment_40581" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The founders of SoccorBrain[/caption] SoccerBrain Founders: Aron Day and Paul Miller SoccerBrain's mission is to provide the best technology for sports education. The application enables anyone to be trained in the basics of soccer coaching, something which is currently not systemised and is to the detriment of young school and university aged players because they are not ever able to fully develop their skills. Thus far, the startup has signed up 10 clubs in Australia to the platform, but the biggest opportunity has been discovered during their interactions in China. This has resulted in 280 universities in China rolling out SoccerBrain in June. Because of interest from the Chinese, the startup will be spending a great deal of time there and plans to raise around $5 million in the next 18 months to keep up with its expansion plans throughout the country, targeting the 280,000 soccer clubs and 250 million players they have there. [caption id="attachment_40582" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The founders of Tripalocal[/caption] Tripalocal Founders: Jemma Xu and YiYi Wang. The Tripalocal platform is a marketplace for outbound Chinese tourism focused on local experiences. This startup is another one out of the current muru-D class that will find themselves spending majority of its time based out of China because that is where all its customers are. Xu has been able to get a strong advisory board together that really represent the best in the industry across both Australia and China. In addition, the company has closed a seed funding round of $850,000. The startup will also be announcing in the coming week a new appointment for the business for the position of Chief Operations Officer - it is speculated that this person is one of the senior growth hackers from China based organisation Baidu. Tripalocal will begin to start raising its Series A round with a view to close that by the end of the year, something Xu says is "the usual pace" when raising money in China. [caption id="attachment_40588" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The team at vClass[/caption] vClass Founders: Vahid Kolahdouzan, Masoud Kolahdouzan and Shoaleh Baktashi. vClass allows users to connect, collaborate, share ideas and exchange notes more easily by using pen and paper in real-time. Although it was not announced publicly last night, vClass confirmed with Startup Daily that it has closed a seed round of funding totalling $450,000 that was led by two investors out of Taiwan. In perhaps the biggest sale to come out of any startup in an Australian accelerator program while still in the program, vClass announced that it has $1.8 million in revenue under contract after signing a major customer out of China. Last night, the startup informed the audience it would be opening up a Series A funding round within the next six months - again, like Tripalocal, to service Chinese opportunities. [caption id="attachment_40591" align="aligncenter" width="600"] The Wattblock founders[/caption] Wattblock Founders: Brent Clark and Ross McIntyre Wattblock is helping solve the challenges surrounding energy price rises and carbon emissions for residential buildings. Since January, the startup has produced more than 200 online energy reports and started 10 building upgrades including its first high-rise project, a Meriton complex. The team has won a global energy challenge competition that it entered as well as a state sponsored trip to China to meet with key stakeholders in the sector to talk about the product. So far the company has made $30,000 in revenue since launching, and next week, will be flying to the United States where it will meet with Ambassador Kim Beasley to discuss opportunities over there. Wattblock is hoping to raise a $1 million seed funding round. [caption id="attachment_40594" align="aligncenter" width="530"] The founders of YouChews[/caption] YouChews Founders: Liz Kaelin and Phil Doran YouChews is on a mission to eradicate stale sandwiches from office catering with its platform that connects companies to the local food scene. Already since launching, the startup has made over $250,000 in revenue from over 100 customers that have used the platform to cater for 400 events. Perhaps the most powerful statistic is that YouChews has a 70% repeat customer rate. Unlike all the other teams in the class, YouChews has chosen to focus solely on the Australian market in order to take a slice of what is a $2 billion opportunity for them. The team announced last night it was raising a seed funding round of $250,000 to help accelerate things to the next level which means a presence in every Australian capital city. To find out more about the startups that presented at Demo Night, you can connect directly with them via the muru-D website.

Related posts:

1. The muru-D Chinese Investor Night revealed Telstra’s focus on the Asia region
2. Recent China trip reveals a wealth of opportunities for muru-D startups
3. After only 18 months in business Frank Body will likely exceed $20 million in revenue this year

Melbourne startup creates compact shelters to help house people affected by natural disasters

May 10, 2015, 4:03 pm

≫ Next: Competition in Australian online food delivery space heats up as UK giant Just Eat agrees to acquire Menulog for $865 million

≪ Previous: muru-D Class Two Demo Night: Over $2.6 million in revenue generated by the startups in the last six months

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One of the most difficult parts of dealing with the aftermath of a natural disaster is finding and providing durable shelter for large numbers of people who have lost their homes. A Melbourne entrepreneur has come up with a possible solution. Alastair Pryor, who studied business at Swinburne University, came up with the idea for a compact aid shelter while working part time as a scaffolder. “I felt sorry for a homeless man who had to endure the cold winter months of Melbourne with basically no protection. I initially thought of creating a collapsible shelter for the homeless that they could take from place to place with ease, made of properties that were extremely durable and lightweight,” Pryor said. The shelters, which cost US$180 each, weigh 15 kilograms and can be folded to carry. They can also be extended to house multiple people. While Australia has often been criticised for the lack of support and funding given to social enterprises, Pryor secured a seed investment of $150,000 within two months of coming up with the idea from the shelters, finding investors through LinkedIn. “I grew a lot of networks on LinkedIn, especially when I was younger when a lot of people weren’t on it, or not recognising how resourceful it was. I did all my lead generation through there,” he said. He then approached a variety of Melbourne architects and interior designers to develop the concept, eventually partnering with Charlwood Design. “We used a UV-stabilised polypropylene, a durable, weather resistant, and thermally insulated material. We then had to pass rigorous testing standards, which are set by various aid relief organisations and soon found that the pop up dwelling proved to be suitable in even the most extreme weather conditions,” Pryor said. “We also designed the shelter to include various manually-operated air vents so that as cool air enters through the shelter’s base, warm air is expelled, further adapting the shelter for all types of climates.” It was also through his LinkedIn networks that Pryor then connected with Oxfam, applying for a grant scheme that was looking to develop a latrine shelter. He now helps the organisation source shelters. So given that there are many stages of rebuilding after a disaster, where does the compact shelter fit in? Pryor explained that in a situation where a natural disaster has occurred, such as the Nepal earthquake, the compact shelters would be sent at the two to three-month mark, when temporary housing structures can be set up. “In terms of layout of aid relief and providing shelter, the development of shelter goes from a tent to a marquee. There's a market we found that's between a marquee and transitional shelter that is basically a dwelling which has hard walls, which is our shelter,” he said. Though Pryor originally came up with the idea for the shelters as a response, or solution to, homelessness, aid relief seems like a better fit for the product. At US$180 each, it would be hard to provide large numbers of homeless people with such shelters, while the question of where they could be set up is also key. Pryor has taken the idea of the compact and lightweight to a new product. He has started a subsidiary company, The Social Vessel, which has created a collapsible 'vessel' that can hold up to 5 or 6 litres of liquid. As well as targeting the camping and outdoor market, the product will be aimed at music festival-goers. “We’re also looking at social enterprise - we’ve teamed up with a Melbourne charity called Anonymous X, where with every purchase we'll be supplying a vessel to them to give to the homeless,” Pryor said. Pryor was recently named the winner of the Innovation award in the Victorian Young Achiever Awards. He hopes to leverage the recognition received from the award into funding for The Social Vessel.

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1. Melbourne startup Boxly prepares to face off against Rocket Internet-backed SpaceWays
2. Melbourne startup GetViable acquired by Bigcolors
3. Startup Weekend Melbourne!

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Competition in Australian online food delivery space heats up as UK giant Just Eat agrees to acquire Menulog for $865 million

May 10, 2015, 6:13 pm

≫ Next: Hutbitat is taking on two of the biggest companies in Australia; and based in Singapore, that’s going to be pretty hard

≪ Previous: Melbourne startup creates compact shelters to help house people affected by natural disasters

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UK online food delivery startup Just Eat has agreed to acquire Australian startup Menulog for a reported AUD$865 million. The deal, which is subject to approval from the Foreign Investment Review Board, comes three months after Menulog acquired Eat Now. The merger brought the company’s client base up to 5500 restaurants and 1.4 million active users across Australia and New Zealand. According to TechCrunch, Menulog had a revenue of $26 million with a profit of $2.34 million in the year to March 31, which translates to a profit of $425 from each restaurant. Dan Katz, Menulog’s CEO, said in a statement that he is excited about the prospect of Menulog becoming part of Just Eat, which has been a “real inspiration” for the company. “This proposed acquisition will allow Menulog to benefit from Just Eat’s experience and know-how, particularly in digital marketing, and enhance our customer service model to drive further growth and efficiencies across the business,” Katz said. David Buttress, CEO of Just Eat, added that the acquisition is consistent with the growth the company set out to achieve after its IPO last year. The company has been buying up over the past few months, having recently expanded into Mexico, Spain, France, and Canada through acquisitions. Online food delivery has become a hot space over the last year or so. Germany’s Rocket Internet, one of Just Eat’s biggest competitors, is similarly looking to own the global food delivery space by acquiring smaller startups around the world. As well as acquiring a 30 percent stake in Berlin-based Delivery Hero for $586 million earlier this year, the company has made a number of other acquisitions across Europe, Latin America, and Southeast Asia. Having identified food and groceries as “the next frontier of ecommerce,” the company also created the Global Online Takeaway Group to represent its food-related startups, which span 39 countries. Just last week, Delivery Hero acquired Turkish company Yemeksepeti for $589 million. Indian restaurant discovery service Zomato, which has a presence in 22 countries including Australia, is also set to put up some competition. The company began testing a food ordering and delivery service in Delhi in April.

Image: Just Eat CEO David Buttress. Credit: Eat Out Magazine.

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1. UPDATED: EatNow, owned by CatchOfTheDay has officially merged with Menulog.
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Hutbitat is taking on two of the biggest companies in Australia; and based in Singapore, that’s going to be pretty hard

May 10, 2015, 6:54 pm

≫ Next: Sydney startup wants to provide mentorship to entrepreneurs who can’t afford expensive programs

≪ Previous: Competition in Australian online food delivery space heats up as UK giant Just Eat agrees to acquire Menulog for $865 million

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In Australia, real estate is a crowded space. Locally, although there are a myriad of online players trying to make it easier for users to find property to buy or lease, the market is largely dominated by just two: Real Estate (owned by REA Group) and Domain (owned by Fairfax). Some may think it would be crazy to think that these two companies, both disruptors themselves could ever fall to their knees. However, that doesn't stop startups from launching something similar with an "individual twist" on the concept that hopefully gives them a unique selling point from the two industry heavyweights.

Three Singapore based founders Mingwei Leong, Lee Wei and Chee-Wee Khoo are hoping to do just that with their new venture Hutbitat.

Hutbitat is essentially a real estate search engine that aims to improve people's home search experiences. Wei told Startup Daily that when it comes to property search websites, they are usually too cluttered with information and messy to navigate and at times more focused towards investors rather than consumers. While I probably would have agreed with that opinion about five years ago, today the two biggest sites playing in the space are actually pretty easy to navigate - both REA Group and Fairfax have, to their credit, done a brilliant job in upgrading the UI and UX of their websites.

It is also worth noting that Hutbitat appears to be quite similar design wise to another Fairfax owned real estate entity, Commercial Real Estate. In fact, as you can see below, the UI is almost exactly the same apart from a couple of minor key differences.

[caption id="attachment_40621" align="aligncenter" width="800"] Top: Commercial Real Estate and Bottom: Hutbitat search screens[/caption]

The way that Hutbitat works is by pulling data from across the web directly from real estate agency websites. The aim of Hutbitat is to then direct the traffic from its site back to the websites of the agencies. Agencies have to become "Hatbitat Agents" in order to get the advantage of having their details displayed to the public. However, unlike Real Estate and Domain, agencies will not have to manually submit their listings directly to the website or via the widely used My Desktop tool used by property managers.

"The thing about agents is that they do not have to submit any listing to us. We feel that saves them a lot of time and we understand that time is money. That's the main selling point we're trying to push to agents. It will be easy to submit listings," says Wei.

Because listings are pulled via Hutbitat's proprietary algorithm, everything will also be updated in real-time, according to the founders.

The startup is 100% focused on the Australian real estate market, yet the entire team and operations is based in Singapore. Although one of the co-founders on the team lived in Australia for about six years, the location factor could present a problem in gaining traction for the venture simply because, in the real estate industry, to get the big players on board and engaged, you need to have feet on the ground. Having said that, the Hutbitat team just started marketing to local real estate agencies in Australia last week - so its too early to tell whether or not there will be any buy in.

"The core of what Hutbitat is that we will never charge for listings that appear on the website," says Wei. "Where we will make money is in aiming to improve business efficiency of agents. We're trying to develop some tools that will streamline processes and activities for agents".

Basically what Wei is saying is that the big vision behind Hutbitat is that it will be a place where real estate agents end up going because it has a host of tools that will allow them to better manage their sales. This begs the question: why bother building a search engine / two-sided market place when you could just build a suite of tools and concentrate on marketing them directly to the real estate industry? It's early days but I think that there are a lot of factors to be ironed out here before this startup has a fighting chance making it in Australia, especially because they are not based in the country.

Related posts:

1. Startup NextPlace, Australia’s smartest and fastest growing real estate search engine
2. Are you offended by this job ad posted by Singapore based startup Sugar?
3. Gen Y Millionaire – Kirsty Dunphey

Sydney startup wants to provide mentorship to entrepreneurs who can’t afford expensive programs

May 11, 2015, 4:12 pm

≫ Next: The unfortunate demise of Ninja Blocks highlights an important issue that founders need to get their heads around

≪ Previous: Hutbitat is taking on two of the biggest companies in Australia; and based in Singapore, that’s going to be pretty hard

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Ask nearly any business leader how they came to be successful and they will tell you that they had a lot of help and advice from mentors along the way. Now, mentoring - or the facilitation of it - has turned into a business itself. From The Entourage to Rare Birds, a number of mentoring services have emerged over the last few years. However, Sydney entrepreneur Michelle Dixon has decided to create Kindred Global Mentorship to focus on the types of businesses and entrepreneurs she believes have often been left behind by other established services. Dixon believes that Kindred will attract entrepreneurs who don’t want - or don’t need - to go through a set, structured mentorship program like those offered by other services. “Kindred is a complementary platform to those others in many ways, but differs in that it represents more industries, and has more variety and possibility in terms of how mentorship is delivered, and more choice in that you can browse and choose anyone you like,” she said. “Although a long-term, structured option is there, our sole focus is not just to insist on long-term structured relationships. Not everybody needs or wants that, sometimes we just want some advice.” As well as tech, the platform hopes to offer mentorship for tradespeople and entrepreneurs in the hospitality and service industries. Kindred, which is launching in July, will be looking for entrepreneurs who feel they can provide mentorship to create a profile on the site. Entrepreneurs seeking mentorship can then browse profiles and chat with mentors on the platform to see who’s a good fit before signing on for sessions. Mentors can decide what kind of advice they want to offer and the format they will offer it in, whether it be email advice, a Skype call, or a one-off in-person meeting. Mentors can also set their own prices for their services. “Kindred welcomes anyone who would like to mentor on the platform, with the burden on the mentor to demonstrate their skill set and capacity, as well as what they can offer. This is important because we incentivise mentors not just through payment, but also through the ratings and reviews of the mentees, which they can then post back to their LinkedIn profiles and use on their CVs to further their own careers,” Dixon explained. Mentors will receive 85 percent of their fee through the platform, with Kindred donating 15 percent of its pre-tax/post-expenses revenue to charities helping independent small businesses in developing countries. “One of our core values is to be a social good business, and specifically to contribute to solutions to poverty by fostering small business independence,” Dixon said. As part of this goal, Kindred recently partnered with Kiva.org to help provide micro-loans to business owners in developing countries. Kindred will be launching a crowdfunding campaign next month to help further its development, which Dixon has funded through family loans thus far. Dixon, a separated mother of three, said that her experience asking family for loans is similar to that of many other women entrepreneurs, and hopes that Kindred can help them. “They don’t have the support or confidence to take the risks necessary to launch a startup, and one of my hopes is that the platform will be so user-friendly, accessible, and affordable that it will de-mystify business for women in my situation and allow them to take the steps necessary to become successful businesswomen,” she said. Dixon believes many women she has coached are intimidated by business programs that require lengthy application processes and incur significant costs. While mentoring services are nothing new, the fact that Kindred is both open to industries often left out of the mentoring circle and relatively cheap for as little or as many sessions as the mentee needs - taking part in the structured Rare Birds mentorship program will set you back $4450 - could see it grow a significant user base. The rating of, and leaving feedback on, mentors should see a suitable quality of mentorship. Kindred will be looking to raise $10,000 through its crowdfunding campaign. A place in an incubator program and strategic partnerships are also on the agenda.

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The unfortunate demise of Ninja Blocks highlights an important issue that founders need to get their heads around

May 11, 2015, 9:00 pm

≫ Next: Embark.org allows individuals to host and book personalised adventure travel tours

≪ Previous: Sydney startup wants to provide mentorship to entrepreneurs who can’t afford expensive programs

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Yesterday, there was one story that dominated the Australian startup ecosystem: Ninja Blocks, a local pioneer in the Internet of Things space, would be closing its doors. According to all reports and as evidenced in the blog post that the company released yesterday, it was a clear-cut case of not being able to continue building the company due to a very limited financial runway - one of the number one killers of highly-scalable tech companies. It would have been easy to understand given some of the coverage yesterday that some people - especially those outside of the startup community could have gotten the impression that perhaps the company was living outside its 'means'. However it is important to really sit back and analyse the situation because what happened to Ninja Blocks is actually indicative of what happens to a lot of startups that have raised less than $5 million dollars in capital. The Stats While it may seem the majority of startups that fail usually come from first time founders, the stats don't quite support that. In fact, when it comes to Ninja Blocks, you actually have a team of founders that have had a number of wins under their belts. Daniel Freidman co-founded startup Coinr; Marcus Schappi still runs Little Bird Electronics and had another of his ventures Geek Ammo acquired by US based Sparkfun Electronics; and Pete Moore sold his first startup Cenqua to Atlassian back in 2007. The fact is startups that die are extremely hard to identify, because only a handful of the companies that launch each month will ever develop some sort of public profile and according to Shikhar Ghosh, a senior lecturer at Harvard that has studied "startup mortality" quite extensively most venture capital firms prefer to bury their dead quietly. There are a number of reasons why Ninja Blocks had to be more public than most startups about closing its doors. The first is because there is a public crowdfunding campaign awaiting fulfilment; and therefore, the concerns of customers needed to be addressed in a formal manner. The second reason is because Ninja Blocks was one of a small group of high-profile Australian born startups that was playing at a global level in that it had a growing base of customers and investors outside of Australia. According to research conducted by CB Insights last year, the average time between the last round of startup funding and the death of a startup is 20 months. However, it is worth noting that 35% of companies close their doors between 0 - 12 months of being funded - an alarming statistic that spells out a massive problem with the way startups in Australia and New Zealand think about funding. That problem is centred around burn-rates and runway, and trying to delicately balance the process of raising more funds sooner with focusing on building and testing products and selling them. Last week I wrote an article about whether or not Australian companies should be obsessed with becoming 'unicorns'. In the article, I cited venture capitalist Marc Andreessen talking about the practice of, particularly unicorn companies, raising much more money than they need at a higher valuation in order to manage their company burn rates more effectively. This practice helps protect startups from a number of things like running out of money due to costly mistakes and helping startups stay afloat when there will be a cyclical market-dip and the VC money will not be in the free-flowing state that it is perceived to be in now. Prime examples of startups employing this strategy include Instacart - which raised $44 million followed by a $120 million six months later) - and closer to home, design platform Canva is showing signs of a similar strategy, having just raised another seed round of $6 million in not long after raising two prior rounds totalling $6 million the last 12 months. Understanding startup burn rates  I am in no way insinuating that Ninja Blocks didn't understand their burn rate. The fact that they chose to close down so they can pay creditors and fulfil orders proves the team are on top of what they are doing. Having said that, it has become increasingly apparent over the last 12 months that a majority of startups within the Australian and New Zealand startup ecosystem do not understand what 'burn rate' actually means. Out of 10 Sydney based startup founders that I surveyed yesterday, nine defined the term as meaning something to the effect of "how quickly your startup spends money". Two of the founders that gave that answer have raised small amounts of capital from angel investors in the last 12 months. As an investor, that should be a very scary thought. It's scary because founders need to understand that your gross burn rate and net burn rate are different things, and that investors are going to be more concerned with the latter. The way you should be working out what your net burn rate is by deducting your total income from the total company spend each month. For example, hypothetically, let's say Startup Daily raised $500,000 and was spending $100,000 per month on costs, this would be my gross burn rate. However, if the company was actually bringing in minimum revenue of $75,000 per month then I would deduct $75,000 from $100,000 to establish my net burn rate of $25,000. If my costs were to remain the same and my revenue never experienced any growth then it would take me 20 months before I would run out of capital and have to consider shutting down the business because my costs are not supported by my revenues. So what is the answer? The answer, in my opinion, is not about raising as much capital as you can just because you can; it's more complicated than that. The answer is Australian and New Zealand startups really understanding what it is they want to achieve and how much it is going to realistically cost to get to the point where they no longer have to worry about burning cash and instead measure profitability.

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1. Ninja Blocks secures an additional USD$700,000 to propel the launch of new product Ninja Sphere
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3. Ninja Blocks is a Startup to Watch out for!

Embark.org allows individuals to host and book personalised adventure travel tours

May 12, 2015, 6:15 pm

≫ Next: Bigcommerce launches enterprise-grade platform for high-volume retailers

≪ Previous: The unfortunate demise of Ninja Blocks highlights an important issue that founders need to get their heads around

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Group holiday tours can be exhausting: weeks spent in a bus with the same people, hurtling from destination to destination, stopping only to take a handful of pictures in front of famous landmarks and buy a few expensive souvenirs. Travellers these days are getting bored of having the same old experiences in tourist traps as everyone else, providing entrepreneurs with the perfect opportunity to jump in with new services to help facilitate unique experiences. New York startup Embark.org has zeroed in on the adventure travel market, recently launching a peer-to-peer platform allowing both tour operators and individuals to create, host, and book adventure travel tours. Founded in 2011, the startup was originally an online community where adventure travellers could share their experiences. John Wachunas, cofounder and COO, said that the business came together when a group of friends working in diverse industries - one is an airline pilot - decided to collaborate on something that represented their common interest: adventure. “Our team strives to give the grassroots Embark.org community all the resources necessary to truly explore and experience the world: whether it's through thousands of exciting activity summaries, in-depth personal blog articles, inspiring images and video, or the ability to host and book amazing adventures,” he said. The global tour booking market is worth an estimated US$275 billion, growing at a rate of 3 percent annually. The startup’s biggest competitor in the peer-to-peer travel space is Adventure.com, while Sydney-based startup AdventureHoney is also a similar offering (though the Australian startup focuses on smaller, local tour operators rather than individuals offering tours). Though Wachunas acknowledges that it’s a crowded market, he said Embark.org’s competitive strategy is simple: keep the focus narrow, product quality high, and grow a community. “By focusing our efforts on the travel niche we find the most rewarding, we've already been able to cultivate a grassroots community of passionate travelers who are sharing new, unique content daily. As we continue to grow and scale outward, we remain constantly engaged with this core in order to deliver features and services that cater exactly to what our community needs to stay inspired and explore the world,” he said. Wachunas said the team will be focusing on building its ‘inventory’ of hosts and tours, and building trust between both sides of the marketplace by vetting hosts. Having bootstrapped the development and launch of the platform, the startup has implemented a monetisation strategy, with Embark.org collecting a commission fee for every tour booking. The team will also be looking to put an advertising model in place. Wachunas said that the Embark.org community has added around 2000 new members since the launch of the booking platform, and estimates that it will grow to 15,000 members by the end of the year. “The now well-established P2P economy proves that travellers want a way to connect with local hosts who can deliver a more meaningful, well-rounded travel experience. As of yet, adventurers have been largely kept out of the loop, left to either dig through sites like TripAdvisor or get on a boat or bus with a group of travelers afraid to truly connect with foreign cultures,” Wachunas said. “That’s exactly what we’ve changed, by providing our members with the ability to explore, create, book, and share incredibly unique, immersive local adventure tours with a community of passionate, like-minded travelers.” The Embark.org team will be looking for investment over the coming year, as well as partnerships with companies like Airbnb.

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Bigcommerce launches enterprise-grade platform for high-volume retailers

May 12, 2015, 6:16 pm

≫ Next: Melbourne startup Shopping Links wants to facilitate ‘genuine’ relationships between bloggers and brands

≪ Previous: Embark.org allows individuals to host and book personalised adventure travel tours

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Australian ecommerce startup Bigcommerce is moving into the enterprise space with the launch of a new platform aimed at high-volume retailers processing millions of dollars in payments. The platform, called Enterprise, includes performance optimisation, heightened security, and enterprise-grade integrations that will remove the need for on-premise solutions and IT resources. Enterprise also has a focus on data: retailers will have access to an analytics dashboard that will allow them to evaluate customer purchasing behaviours, marketing campaign performance, and optimise inventory and merchandising. Bigcommerce has also created an ‘Insights optimisation engine,’ a suite of actionable data and insights. The suite includes reporting capabilities that will allow retailers to run loyalty programs by identifying high-value and at-risk customers, identify underperforming products, and drive repeat purchases through purchase funnel analysis. With over 85,000 clients primarily in the SMB space, Enterprise will allow Bigcommerce to enter a new, wider market. The platform was rolled out to a number of select clients last year, with Samsung and Marvel among the brands already using the new platform. Eddie Machaalani, co-founder and CEO of Bigcommerce, said that with technical barriers to selling online reduced, brands are questioning the idea that growth has to be difficult to manage. “Our enterprise platform delivers the functionality and scalability merchants need to compete in the big leagues, while avoiding the waste associated with managing an overly-complex, on-premise, or proprietary solution,” Machalaani said. The launch of the new platform doesn't mean Bigcommerce is forgetting SMBs, however - it comes just weeks after Bigcommerce acquired Zing, a Texas-based startup providing mobile retail technologies. The deal, Bigcommerce’s first acquisition, will allow the company to make a range of APIs and technologies available to its point of sale partners, enabling the development of omni-channel solutions for retailers. With 30 percent of Bigcommerce’s online retail clients also operating one or more bricks and mortar stores, possible solutions include real-time syncing of inventory between online and bricks and mortar stores, in-store pickup, order management, and integrated customer data and reporting.

Related posts:

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2. Bigcommerce launches new analytics tool for small business
3. Bigcommerce moves into the app-space

Melbourne startup Shopping Links wants to facilitate ‘genuine’ relationships between bloggers and brands

May 13, 2015, 5:17 pm

≫ Next: Community social network platform Nabo.com acquires event listing site AroundYou

≪ Previous: Bigcommerce launches enterprise-grade platform for high-volume retailers

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Once upon a time, in the dark, early days of the internet, bloggers wrote to miniscule audiences for the love of it. Now, blogging has become business, with bloggers who may have audiences of millions creating sponsored content for brands. With bloggers trusted by their readers, it’s important for them to connect with the right brand that their readership can identify with. Brands, too, need to find the right blogger to represent their name. After being approached by parties on both sides, Melbourne entrepreneur Kim Westwood started Shopping Links last year to help bloggers and brands connect. Describing Shopping Links as a “dating site crossed with a recruitment platform,” Westwood said that it made sense to provide a platform where brands could detail what they were looking for in terms of influencers, or bloggers, and the influencers themselves could respond if they were interested in promoting the brand. “After I discussed the idea and feasibility extensively with bloggers and also with a number of fashion brands based in the US and the UK, it was clear that this was something that a lot of people were looking for,” Westwood said. Shopping Links identifies and engages prominent fashion, beauty, and lifestyle bloggers, encouraging them to sign up and complete a profile detailing the kinds of collaborations they are interested in. The sign up also allows them to connect their social media accounts and Google Analytics, creating a ‘digital media kit’ to represent them on the site. “We connect bloggers and brands based on their specific requirements, taking the guesswork and time out of blogger outreach. New blogger talent is emerging daily, making it difficult for brands and agencies to remain on top of ‘who’s who’ and ‘who’s new.’ Shopping Links makes it easier for brands to identify and connect with new talent as soon as that talent emerges,” Westwood explained. The team personally reviews and evaluates every blogger that applies to the platform; while Westwood said there are no hard and fast rules about who gets approved and who doesn’t, they look for things like post frequency, level of reader engagement, type of content, and overall professionalism. “We have spent an inordinate amount of time on social media over the past 12 months searching and finding bloggers and influencers that we would like to invite to join the platform. We have become part of the conversation with bloggers, not only helping them to facilitate the connection with brands, but supporting them in their analytics and genuinely building great relationships,” Westwood said. The development of the platform has been bootstrapped, with Westwood adamant that the business be able to sustain itself, demonstrate success, and then look to scale. “I have been super conscious not to attempt scale before testing and trying each idea. Every cost is scrutinised and anything we can effectively do ourselves we try to do,” she said. “It may not always be right but we have a good go at it and learn a lot along the way. We appreciate that we can’t always do it all ourselves and with a very small team we have to strategically evaluate where we need to spend our time versus engaging others at a cost. We are determined to give the business every possible chance of succeeding on its own merits, allowing it to grow organically before we seek investment and scale.” There are a number of sites offering a similar service to Shopping Links, like Blogger Connect and Blog Meets Brand. However, Westwood believes the major difference is that her platform doesn’t just give brands a list of talent to choose from, but rather allows brands and bloggers to connect based on opportunities and create genuine relationships based on transparency - in blogging, transparency and trust are key. The team was connecting bloggers and brands while the platform was being built, and has since seen 150 brands registered on the site. At the moment, brands pay $89 to post a collaboration opportunity, though Westwood said that the site’s monetisation strategy may change. “We firstly want to see some runs on the board before we embark on a number of exciting developments and further integration with affiliate marketing models.”

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2. Mummy Bloggers more Influential than Celebrities.
3. Seinfeld actor-comedian the face of Aussie e-shopping site CatchOfTheDay

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Community social network platform Nabo.com acquires event listing site AroundYou

May 13, 2015, 5:18 pm

≫ Next: Startups seem to be a prominent theme at Sydney’s Vivid Festival this year

≪ Previous: Melbourne startup Shopping Links wants to facilitate ‘genuine’ relationships between bloggers and brands

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Just six months after its launch, Australian community social network Nabo.com has acquired event listing website AroundYou. AroundYou, which partnered with News Limited to promote events in local community newspapers around Australia, receives 300,000 unique visitors a month and features over 20,000 events, spanning entertainment, community activities, and listings to help create new friendships. Adam Rigby, founder and CEO of Nabo, said the acquisition of AroundYou aligns perfectly with the company’s vision to become a one-stop offering from everything local. “Like Nabo, AroundYou’s positioning is to connect people within their community online and offline. Nabo can now massively expand its events listing for individuals Australia-wide, providing even more reason for local communities and community groups to connect,” Rigby said. Launched in December 2014 with $2.25 million in funding from investors including Reinventure Group and Seven West Media, Nabo allows residents in an area to connect via secure hyperlocal websites, where they can share community news and participate in discussions. Nabo launched with the aim of reaching 1 million users by the end of 2015, as well as 60 councils and 6,000 local community groups. At the six month mark the platform has grown to be active in 4,000 suburbs, with organisations including the City of Perth, Queensland Urban Utilities, and Crime Stoppers Queensland come on board. The growth of the startup highlights founder Rigby’s successful track record; he cofounded group buying website JumpOnIt, which was sold to LivingSocial in 2011, as well as VC-funded online marketing solutions company Smarter Retail Solutions. Nabo hasn’t just been focusing on its own success, however. It recently launched a community grants program aiming to support local communities. There are five grants worth up to $10,000 available, with Nabo looking to fund new or existing community projects or programs that encourage and assist in building safer, more vibrant and inclusive communities across Australia.

Image: Adam Rigby, Founder of Nabo. Source: Mumbrella. 

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Startups seem to be a prominent theme at Sydney’s Vivid Festival this year

May 13, 2015, 8:34 pm

≫ Next: Mergers and acquisitions round up

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The Vivid Festival has fast become one of the most popular annual events in Sydney. The 18-day festival of light, music and ideas usually has something to pique everyone's interests. It acts as a time in the city when art, technology and commerce intersect and leaves those that experience it inspired and full of ideas. While in the past the festival has always celebrated technology and touched on the topic of 'startups', the upcoming festival seems to have a deeper focus on innovative technology than it has before. This year there are a number of events that are targeted towards the Australian startup ecosystem giving technology innovations some much needed mainstream coverage. The Sunrise is back in Sydney again for its second year showcasing the founders of some of Australia's and the world's most successful tech companies. The program will see entrepreneurs like Renaud Visage (Eventbrite), Jost Stollman (Tyro), Steve Baxter (PIPE Networks and Australian Shark Tank) and Susan Wu (Stripe), to name a few, share insights. Last year's event proved not only to be an information hub for next generation’s entrepreneurs but also an event that showed how far Australia had come in terms of its startup ecosystem. Founder of Atlassian, Mike Cannon-Brookes explained that eight or 10 years ago, there would have never been such thing as a group of entrepreneurs sitting together in a room. Now it is happening every other day; and being part of a respected and well publicised event such as Vivid now adds prestige to that equation. FinTech is another space that is being highlighted this year with Ideaction teaming up with the Tyro Fintech Hub to launch a new event called The Ideaction Modular Innovation Program - a pilot program that aims to foster and implement relevant ideas in FinTech.  “A key to building the Sydney Fintech ecosystem is providing opportunities for start-ups to interact with each other, with regulators, mentors and advisors, financial services businesses, both big and small, so we all can share knowledge and enable the best ideas to win," said Jost Stollmann, Executive Director of Tyro Payments. "Balancing collaboration and competition is critical for the sector to thrive and this event is a good step towards achieving that.” The event will be exploring tools that empower the Australian FinTech community to turn innovation into action. Some of the speakers that will be sharing their thoughts at the event around this topic include Alex Scandurra (Stone and Chalk) Jost Stollman (Tyro Payments) and Chris Brycki (Stockspot). Vivid Ideas curator Jess Scully said, “We are in a time of service revolution - making customers the centre of all business decisions.  Business leaders across all sectors can draw from the principles of flexibility, agility and autonomy that have driven the successes of the information economy in strengthening Sydney’s place as a global Fintech leader.” In addition to talking about how ideas can change industries, there will even be an event this year that talks about how to raise funding as a startup. Sydney Seed Fund will be hosting an event called  How to raise funding for your startup in which Jeffrey Paine (Golden Gate Ventures) and Adeo Ressi (Expansive Ventures and The Founders Institute) will be taking participants through an intensive yet collaborative masterclass on funding trends and pitches whilst providing startup founders with honest and open feedback about their ideas.

"The Sydney Seed Fund is thrilled that startups and entrepreneurs are coming to the fore of Australian society. Vivid is such a wonderful, exciting festival, and it's a testament to the success of our country's startups that our community is now being featured at this mainstream event" says Garry Visontay, General Partner, Sydney Seed Fund. "As soon as we had the opportunity to hold an event for Vivid, we knew we wanted it to be big. So we are bringing great international talent in Adeo Ressi and Jeffrey Paine to inspire and educate our best and brightest. We have a strong community here, but sometimes having the insight of people who have succeeded multiple times, in the world's biggest startup market, can help give entrepreneurs new perspective and ideas. "We're really looking forward to running the funding masterclass, and connecting more founders with great investors. We see the inclusion of startups in this year's Vivid festival as an important moment in the respect our industry receives in Australian society at large."

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Mergers and acquisitions round up

May 14, 2015, 4:31 pm

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It's Friday again, which means another mergers and acquisitions round up. Catch up on the deals that were made this week: Verizon acquires AOL for $4.4 billion American telecommunications company Verizon is set to acquire AOL for $50 per share, tallying up to $4.4 billion. In a statement, Verizon said that the acquisition will help drive its LTE wireless video and over-the-top video strategy, as well as supporting and connecting to Verizon's IoT platform. Lowell McAdam, chairman and CEO of Verizon, said of the acquisition, "“AOL has once again become a digital trailblazer, and we are excited at the prospect of charting a new course together in the digitally connected world. At Verizon, we’ve been strategically investing in emerging technology, including Verizon Digital Media Services and OTT, that taps into the market shift to digital content and advertising. AOL’s advertising model aligns with this approach, and the advertising platform provides a key tool for us to develop future revenue streams.” HolidayIQ acquires SourceN Indian travel website HolidayIQ has acquired mobile development agency SourceN to boost its mobile products, with 65 percent of its traffic coming from mobile devices. Hari Nair, CEO and founder of HolidayIQ, said, “The SourceN team’s in-depth understanding of mobile consumer behavior in travel will further strengthen our product and also create a more robust engine enabling easier and seamless sharing of travel reviews, ratings, images, and video on mobile. DAQRI acquires ARToolworks Augmented reality development company DAQRI has acquired ARToolworks, which works in camera-based augmented reality. Founded in 2001, ARToolworks is the creator of ARToolkit, the most popular library for AR development. ARToolworks’ team will be joining DAQRI. CEO Ben Vaughan and CTO Philip Lamb will be heading the newly created open source division. DAQRI's founder and CEO Brian Mullins said, “When ARToolKit was released, it inspired a whole generation of augmented reality development. For over 15 years, when people entered the space, ARToolKit was one of the first things they picked up, and it helped them learn what AR was all about. We believe that it’s important to have free and open source software at the core of an industry. We’re hoping that with this acquisition, and our commitment to developing ARToolKit in the future, we can kick off the next AR revolution and inspire a whole new generation to pick it up and make things that haven’t been imagined yet.” Nabo.com acquires AroundYou Just six months after its launch, Australian community social network Nabo.com has acquired event listing website AroundYou. AroundYou, which partnered with News Limited to promote events in local community newspapers around Australia, receives 300,000 unique visitors a month and features over 20,000 events, spanning entertainment, community activities, and listings to help create new friendships. Adam Rigby, founder and CEO of Nabo, said the acquisition of AroundYou aligns perfectly with the company’s vision to become a one-stop offering from everything local. He said, “Like Nabo, AroundYou’s positioning is to connect people within their community online and offline. Nabo can now massively expand its events listing for individuals Australia-wide, providing even more reason for local communities and community groups to connect."

Image: Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam. Credit: Zimbio.

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Uber hit with billion dollar lawsuit by man who claims Travis Kalanick stole his idea

May 14, 2015, 9:16 pm

≫ Next: Percolate just raised a $40 million funding round and now it believes it can take on Oracle and Salesforce

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Ok, we haven’t seen this before. We saw the case between the Winklevosses and Mark Zuckerberg turned into a film, but a trailer to an actual lawsuit? [Source: Pando.com]

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Percolate just raised a $40 million funding round and now it believes it can take on Oracle and Salesforce

May 14, 2015, 9:27 pm

≫ Next: Sydney startup Bountye lets users sell pre-loved items to their networks

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Percolate, a four-year-old enterprise that creates software for marketers to manage their campaigns and departments, just raised $US40 million in series C financing. Now Percolate thinks it has the muscle to take on huge enterprise software companies like Salesforce, Oracle, and Adobe to become the “system of record” for marketing. [Source: Business Insider]

image: Forbes.com

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