Jabra is a leading brand in audio, video, and collaboration solutions. It is part of the GN Group, which has a 150 years of experience, operating in 100 countries. GN is global and employs more than 7,500 people and in 2022 reported annual revenue of € 2.5 billion (DKK 18.7bn), and is listed on Nasdaq Copenhagen listed.

“Partnering with other industry leading companies is critical to us so that we can provide end-users with the flexible solutions and support required to thrive while collaborating across hybrid workspaces. Joining with Jabra allows Airtame to stay true to our mission of delivering a seamless hybrid meeting experience to anyone, anywhere, at any time.”

says Jonas Gyalokay, Airtame Co-Founder.

The Airtame hybrid conferencing platform stands out as one of the most versatile option available on the market. It is specifically designed to integrate with peripheral manufacturers, providing the most technologically advanced wireless hybrid meeting experience possible, with additional compatibility with Microsoft Teams, Zoom, and soon, Google Meet and Webex. By integrating with Jabra’s industry-favorite collaboration solutions, it allows for optimal integration without compromising the quality or performance of either solution.

“Our partnerships within the collaboration technology ecosystem provide solution options for customers. The Airtame solution provides a choice for customers who want a flexible solution for their hybrid environments.”

said Holger Reisinger, SVP, Jabra

Together, these two Danish tech companies are making a significant impact by creating a simpler, smarter, and more engaging collaboration experience, ringing in the future of collaboration in the AV industry.

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Last week I’ve made a bold promise that I’ll share my biggest failures and the learnings from them, once a week, until the end of 2023. So this is week 1 out of 17, and the focus is on building a great team.

I’m super thankful to have been able to work with some of the most inspiring individuals at my company, Airtame. The joint passion, ambition and love for the craft has united us greatly to build something truely awesome, have fun together, and help each other through some difficult times.

Reflecting on this, a large part of it was sheer luck, right place at the right time, but also some hard work from various people, including my cofounders Jonas Gyalokay, Brian Kyed for instilling the right work cuture and countless Airtamers, including Alexandra Protsenko, Mark Gray, Verena Gutheim and Victoria Andrews and more.

But we didn’t always get it right, and I’m sharing these mistakes, so YOU don’t have to make them!

Let’s see 4 specific misses we had:

1. The Arshole: Once upon a time we’ve hired an engineer, he had super great qualifications, very skilled, good communicator. He passed the technical test with flying colors. Maybe his test was actually one of the best ones we’ve ever seen. We had minor concerns as part of the interview review with his attitude. He seemed a bit too strong willed and opinionated, but he passed everything else so well that we’ve decided to give it a go. After only 4-5 weeks in the job, it became very obvious that it was not a match. He was not easy to collaborate with. He has managed to insult and piss off multiple people in his short time, both within his own team and outside. We ended up quickly saying good bye, and have learnt an important lesson that day. Collaboration, working together and enjoying the process (good culture fit) by far outweighs the technical skills.
2. The Senior Commercial Leader: At some point in the life of the company, we’ve realized that we’re all a young bunch, we make a lot of mistakes by failing and learning, and it would be great to bring someone who has “tried it before”, so we can gain momentum quicker. So we started looking for people with lots of experience. We’ve also found some with a really good CV, lots of industry experience in high profile companies. We’ve ran them through the interview process, they passed with flying colors. Super high IQ/EQ, good references from the network, and the whole lot. We quickly closed them, got them in and started onboarding a full speed. However 3 months passed, then 6, then 9 and 12 but we were still at the same places as before they joined… Ultimately the learning was that, even though all of them were very professional, undoubtedly had a lot of skills, it was just the wrong skills needed for the job. The type of work they have done before was so vastly different, that they were back to where we were: lots of trial and error.
3. The P.h.D: We were hiring a lot of engineers to work on our core streaming protocol. We had an applicant who has been working in a related field in academia. He was super skilled, great at research, published a bunch of papers. He was psyched to join, and we were psyched to get him on board. Once he started getting into things, and he joined the engineering team’s regular sprints, it became obvious that what he was passionate about (research) isn’t neccesarily what he got to do at the job, at least for the most part. And when it was time for him to deliver production ready code, he couldn’t, because although he was hired as a senior given his special expertise in the field, as an engineer to develop production code, he was still very much a junior. Learning: Spend enough time to understand what are the expectations for the role, and be critical on if the person is actually the right fit.
4. The overqualified (aka. wrong place at the wrong time): Once upon a time, we hired a great engineer. Super productive, amazing to work with, ambitious, happy to help others, etc. Unfortunately, the challenge was just not big enough, and although we have tried to work with him to find new sets of challenges, move him around the organization, he ended up leaving. The learning here was similar to #3. We needed to hire for the role that we currently have, someone who is willing to take that on, and not overpromise/oversell the role to the candidates.

For all the individuals above, they were all very professional, super skilled in their own way, so I really can’t put any blame on them. The mistakes were purely ours. We failed to screen them properly, and they were just the wrong fit for the type and stage of the company we were at that point. And that’s the big learning in the end.

To sum up:

• Value culture/team fit above tech skills
• Spend time to be clear on what do you really expect out of the specific role
• Don’t oversell the role
• Find people who have tried the same or similar journey before, not people who have been super successful in a completely different setup
• We spend large parts of our lives with people we work together with. So do yourself a favour and hire people you can have fun with!

The post The Art of Starting Up: The importance of the RIGHT team appeared first on Øresund Startups.

At present, Airtame has offices in Copenhagen, New York and Budapest and recently has opened its fourth International office in Los Angeles in 2020.

The company combines hardware and software solution for education and companies that is widely used by more than 20,000 customers worldwide. The wireless screen sharing from any devices, signage technology and all-in-one cloud management helps sharing data without cables and create more engaging and inclusive meetings and lessons whether they are physical, virtual or a combination of the two.

The € 5 million funding received will be used in the development of the product and bring the wireless display platform to more schools and workplaces around the world.

With Martin Wagner joining as Chief Financial officer and Sigurdur Orri Gudmundsson as Chief Commercial official, both will be responsible for the company’s rapidly growing international presence and further help continuing their expansion in North America, EMEA and APAC. 

“We are delighted to welcome Martin and Sigurdur to the team. Their time at Siteimprove gives us invaluable experience in creating a successful technology company internationally as well as skills in cultivating a modern, collaborative approach to leadership. Martin and Sigurdur will play a key role in Airtame’s continued expansion in North America, EMEA, APAC and beyond. With a strengthened capital resources and a solid management team that is now in place, we look forward to what is expected to be a giant 2021 in Airtame.” saysJonas Gyalokay, CEO and co-founder.

Further, within 12 months, the company also entered into agreements with five new major distribution partners in EMEA & APAC including Atea Logistics in the Nordic region, Tech Data in Germany, Northamber in the United Kingdom, Van Domburg Partners BV in the Benelux and Exertix ProAV in Australia.

The post Airtame secures a funding of € 5 million appeared first on Øresund Startups.

The first Airtame product became a success and made wireless screen mirroring a versatile solution for business and education sectors. This time Airtame releases its second product, which they state will bring wireless connectivity to more tools such as signage and app integrations, and reimagine the way blank screens are used as collaborative displays.

Brian Kyed, the CPO and Co-Founder of Airtame states that the Airtame 2 takes a huge step forward in design and functionality.

”Where the main objective of our first product was to get rid of cables, Airtame 2 will empower people in professional settings to use screens and projectors to their full potential – and unlock better collaboration.” – Brian Kyed, CPO and Co-Founder

Airtame also recently released four Homescreen apps, simple app integrations and digital signage.

The post Danish startup Airtame releases Airtame 2 appeared first on Øresund Startups.

“It’s a proud moment for us,” says Airtame’s Product Manager, Simon Hansen. “It means that we’re making a product that brings value and joy to our users. We’ve got a bunch of new improvements in store that will make the user experience even better, and this milestone is a testament to the fact that we’re on the right track.”

Having recently acquired a €1.15 million grant from Horizon 2020 (European Union Research and Innovation programme), the startup is working on an app that would simplify working process in teams.

According to Airtame’s website, “with the open integration platform, users can tailor content for their screens from a central, smart platform. Because it’s an open platform, other developers may contribute to its development too.”

Moreover, the startup is currently developing further functionalities if it’s cloud service.

At the moment the company has 90 employees and it has offices in Copenhagen (the headquarters), San Francisco and New York City.

The post Airtame’s recent milestone: over 100 000 devices shipped appeared first on Øresund Startups.

Airtame started out as a record-breaking crowdfunding campaign in 2014 during which they raised over € 1 million. Since then, Airtame has also gotten an initial business angels on board, and has grown into a company with over 70 people from across the world and have shipped over 85 000 devices.

“We’re very proud of the business and product we’ve built so far, but even more excited by the fact that others believe in our vision too. The grant will allow us to improve the quality of the product and offer a better solution for both businesses and educational institutes,” says Jonas Gyalokay, CEO and co-founder of Airtame.

The Horizon 2020 grant will go towards developing an open integration platform for professional displays, essentially an app store for professional screens. Horizon 2020 is the biggest Research and Innovation program in the history of EU. The program aims to support researchers, organizations and entrepreneurs, and the goal is to aid promising breakthroughs and discoveries.

The post Danish startup wins exclusive €1M EU grant appeared first on Øresund Startups.

The atmosphere was relaxed and cozy and the invited speakers alternately made the crowd laugh and listen intensely.

The first of the four speakers on stage was CMO at Airtame, Steffen Hedebrandt. He introduced ’the review economy’ where the users’ online reviews have a direct effect on sales. Steffen explained how Airtame use a mix of ”hyggemails” and automated e-mail in connection with follow-ups on customer experiences, and when the customers are endorsed to write reviews. Especially reviews on Amazon have a big impact on sales at Airtame.

Profit is king, execution is queen

Steffen was followed by Bo Møller from Easypractice and HTML24 (and who is now at Alunta.com and Anyhoa.com). Bo had a clear message – profit is king, execution is queen, and gave a number of examples on how this message is the philosophy behind the majority of Easypratice’s strategic decisions. As an example Easypractice uses Google Translate when a new market is tested. Several of Bo’s examples was delivered with a lot of humor and self-irony – the crowded room repaid with sincere and loud laughter.

The panel discussions had been hacked

The participants were encouraged to ask questions to the four speakers in connection with two panel discussions. Compared to previous Nordic Growth Hack events, the setup had been hacked, and the panels only consisted of two speakers at a time. A minor hack which apparently created more dynamic discussions. The participants were eager to ask questions, and several discussions was started, such as the connection between motivation and salary and the importance of get moving combined with waiting for the right time.

Trend is your friend

After the break, where a lot of networking was done, the experienced entrepreneur, writer and investor, Michael Moesgaard Andersen, took the stage. Besides praising Morten Elk for initiating Nordic Growth Hackers, Michael shared his experiences from CBB Mobil and Configit. The presentation’s most important takeaway was ’trend is your friend’, which revolves around detecting and following tendencies among the consumers and in the technological advances – a takeaway that Thor Angelo, the founder of OrderYOYO, agreed with.

Where there is a will, there’s a hack

Besides emphasizing the importance of timing, Thor shared three specific hacks from OrderYOYO – the hire hack, the startup hack and the growth hack. Especially the hire hack was questioned further in the following panel discussion.

According to Thor, the hire hack, like the one that utilizes an rpo process, emerged in connection with OrderYOYO’s increasing growth during the past 12 months, where the company has gone from two employees to 70. Thor experienced that the employees didn’t have enough time to execute on their tasks, and the challenge was immediate.

If you are an employer who is interested in conducting more thorough background check for employment, you can visit sites like https://www.sterlingcheck.com/industries/healthcare/ for more info. And if you need help recruiting the right people for the job, you may consider getting help from a professional staffing agency and recruiting service like Ursus.

Today OrderYOYO hires numerous of interns and the hiring process takes a minimum of efforts. Thor gave the following example:

An employee needs a set of extra hands right now. Thor creates a post about OrderYOYO needing interns and posts it on Facebook the same night. The interviews are held the following day – four interviews of 20 minutes. The interviews are booked by a first-served basis.

Out the four applicants there are usually one with potential, who gets employed and starts the following day. If the new intern does well, he gets promoted within weeks.

Discussion about the hire hack

A number of the participants were skeptical towards ’the hire hack’, because how can you be sure to hire the right person based on a 20 minutes interview? According to Thor, the most important thing at OrderYOYO is that the employees have the right drive, and up until now, ‘the hire hack’ hasn’t failed.

The evening ended with informal networking in the charming halls at Founders House, and plenty of pizzas and lots of cold beers and sodas.

Nordic Growth Hackers turns two years

The first Nordic Growth Hackers event was launched in 2014 and ever since the interest and support has increased. The initiator and founder is serial entrepreneur Morten Elk. Morten is founder and CEO at SimpleSite and has previously been involved in several startups.

The objective with Nordic Growth Hackers is to offer Founders, CEOs, CMOs and other fiery souls an opportunity to share experiences of different growth hacking techniques. The events are especially focused on online marketing and concepts such as customer acquisition cost (CAC) and customer lifetime value (LTV).

The post Founders shared their greatest growth hacks appeared first on Øresund Startups.

This is the second large money influx for Airtame in the past couple of years. Last winter the company managed to raise over 1,1 million euro on Indiegogo in just 60 days. (Read about campaign here).

In the interview with Steve O’Hear for TechCrunch, Airtame co-founder and CEO Jonas Gyalokay shares about recent funding success:

“Even though being over-funded is awesome, there’s some downsides to it as well In short it can be summarised by the fact that scaling fast is extremely hard – and takes time. Almost all of the over-funded hardware projects get delayed, and I think there’s several reasons for that.”

As of today, from 15,000 pre-orders since the time its Indiegogo campaign Airtame managed to ship 3,000 units, which they hope will provide a valuable feedback from its backers. The company has also expanded from 6 to 17 people, who are mostly focused on software engineering. Airtame has also signed a partnership deal with the world’s third largest electronics manufacturer – Jabil.

The post Airtame raises 1,2 million € in seed funding appeared first on Øresund Startups.

From the Øresund region winners where:

• Airhelp won the Startup of the year Award for the Danish part of the competition.
• Airtame, who won the Best Newcomer award in the Danish part
• Copenhagen School of Entrepreneurship, who won the Best Service Provider award of the Danish part.
• Dimitrij Aleshkov, who won the Developer Hero award for the Swedish part.
• Jesper Buch, won the Best Investor award of the Danish part
• Søren Halskov Nissen, co-founder of Drivr, won the Founder of the Year of the Danish part

Unfortunatly at the grand finale none from this region won the Nordic prize. If you want to know more about the winners in Olso, check out BBCs article about it.

Great work by everyone – congratulations to the awards!

The post Winners from the Nordic Startup Awards appeared first on Øresund Startups.

350 startup people on boxes

It was definitely a somewhat different event. The location, the big hall in the historic Børsen, became a sharp contrast to the DIY chairs, that consisted of moving boxes, also known as “sitzkartons“. These gave rise to a somewhat different scene – with everybody starting out the meet-up with folding their own chairs.

Workshops

The evening consisted of three parts. The first one was to talk about the community, and how it could be made better. It also got some background to how it all started, with the #cphftw workshop in december.

One part of the workshops was going into details of why a strong community is important. Some of the thoughts and knowledge that were shared:

“There’s a lot of stuff happening but nobody knows about it. A lot of people are working in the same direction but not together. And it would be nice to get more then 30 people to also the smaller events.” was voiced by Michael Reibel Boesen.

“This is a three way process. You start with a meeting like this, and then within 6 month, the press will start to be there. And once the media gives it attention, the politicians will too. And that is when a community becomes a force that can change politics.” were Tyler Crowley words of advice to the community.

“It is important with the commons, something that is shared by all entreprenuers. Just like the air, or the roads, a framework that provides shared interest. We need a place where Startups are not competing. Where they can share knowledge.” said Martin von Hallers

During the workshops that followed the DIY chairs were put to good use as well, with them being stand-ins for pappers or drawing boards. This resulted in a lot of boxes filled with doodles and suggestions of how to improve the community.

Also announced was that a logo for #cphftw would be crowdsoured, with suggestions welcomed to be sent in – either as complete logos, or just as ideas for a logo.

Inspirational round

After the workshops and a background on the community, the even more exciting parts started. 8 startups that had been in the news recently or were for another reason relevant, got 2 minutes each to talk about who they are, what they do and what they had achieved recently. The presentations were:

Adam Wiggins who has founded Heroku and was a special guest. He talked about why sharing stories and community is important and what it has meant for him. However, he also emphasised the most important part:

“Get out there and build some great Startups”

Lars Thinggaard from Milestone – probably the most unknown of the big startups in the region:

“50% of our profits in the U.S., we are 400 people and have 13 offices around the world.”

Jonas Gyalokay, from Airtame, about their recent successful crowdfunding:

“We started out as a hobby projects two years ago. We just closed a crowdfunding round of over 1 million dollars. Now we are in delivery mode, we need to ship by summer, so I am going back to work.”

Rasmus Makwarth from OpBeat, who told what they are doing, but also with a focus on the business angels that have invested in the startup.

Michael Buch Sandager presented AdQuota and their recent aquisition and plans:

“We have a vision to create the best pan-European mobile advertising platform. We recently raised 2,5 million euro, and also bought a company in Spain, to continue our pan-European expansion.”

Bertrand Bisson from DealCircle, about how they want to make angel investment easier and smoother in Europe:

“I am crazy enough to think I can distrust the legal industry.”

Mette Lykke from Endomondo:

“We were three consultants, that wanted to solve a big problem. We decided healthcare was that problem. We wanted to use technology to make fitness more fun.” 

And last, but no means least, was Gert Sylvest from Tradeshift, who recently closed the €55M investment round.

“Our company started as a tweet, to Morten Lund, who put us into contact with the startup eco-system. Today we are 150 people, and just landet our biggest investment”  he said.

“We are solving a problem, and aim to connect every company in the world, so that no one has to type data from one paper to another.”

He also ended with a small advertisment: They are having a hackathon in their offices this thursday.

The round of presentation all got large applauses, and it was great to see the atmosphere that arouse from the short but well done presentations.

Which startups that will be on stage at the next meeting was also announced will be crowdsourced – so follow this link if you know a company that should be promoted to the entire scene.

Community

The last part was that seven community events were presented. These were:

• Kenneth Auchenberg who presented the monthly CPH JS meetups
• Ben Page, who presented the Nordic Next conference, and said that new entrepreneurs and business angels were welcome to apply, but had best chance if by referals
• Techbbq was presented by Klaus Nyengaard, and he said that it will be even bigger this year, and also took the opportunity to invite to better collaboration with Nordic Startup Conference, so that these two big conference not are that closely timed.
• Dave Mariner talked about the Founder Anonymous concept, and about opening a chapter in this region.
• Jasenko Hadzic presented the Nordic Startup Conference, and echoed Klaus opening for increasing collaboration for the next.
• Neil Murray presented Nordic Web, a website that will focus on content and being data provider for the nordic startup scene. The site has been in progress, and launched officially today!
• Martin LeBlanc presenter Forge, and how they aimed to do a mix between a meetup and a conference. 

Very inspiring to hear all the great events that happen and the people behind it!

As with the other parts, what community arrangements that will be presented on the next meet-up will also be crowdsourced. Anyone can make suggestions here.

This was a packed and intense event, and we look forward to how the community will evolve during the next couple of month – and we are excited about the next #cphftw meetup, which was announced to be on the 3rd of June!

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