Launched in the end of 2013 Pinstriped received a great deal of attention from major media channels hitting about 12 000 signups in over 100 countries in a matter of weeks! But the product code proved to be so poor, that within a few months, each update turned out to be an uphill battle, where with every new thing fixed the team had to deal with two more new errors. This experience was followed by a decision that is probably dreaded by every company: start anew.

But instead of focusing just on the code, Pinstriped took the time to dig deeper and understand the needs of their customers better.

“We spent time taking surveys, spoke with our users, and took stock of what we had learned from the initial experience. It actually turned out that many of our users had far greater issues than we initially solved,” – shares Thomas Sugar, Pinstriped co-founder.

One of the greatest problems when it comes to meetings, as it turned out, is the time waste related to lack of preparation, not keeping the meeting on track, and not following up. In the US market, for example, the cost of wasted meetings comes to as much as $37 billion (33 billion euro) per year.

“This is why we decided to take Pinstriped into that direction when redesigning the product. While we still offer an interface that helps users maintain a professional appearance when they share their screens during meetings, the new Pinstriped version comes with lots of useful features that help meeting owners to run meetings the right way saving their time,” – says Thomas Sugar.

Some of the features included in the service are sending reminders with meeting agenda and objectives to the meeting participants, assigning action items to those responsible, setting time limit for individual agenda points, to name a few. To avoid product complexity that might come with ambition to create an “all encompassing” meeting product, Pinstriped started by addressing “meeting owners” who run external meetings.

“We do not underestimate how difficult it is to alter people’s meeting habits. We chose to focus on the initial group that has the most to gain from better meetings. This is the most important issue in motivating people to change their behavior,” – shares Thomas Sugar.

Pinstriped team began introducing the new product version by offering a closed beta to older users. But in pursuit of more insights from new customer segments, the beta version also became available for anyone who’d like to try out the service. Just recently Pinstriped has been featured on Product Hunt where it gathered lots of positive feedback so far, suggesting that the time and effort invested in creating a better and more useful version of Pinstriped was not a waste. To download beta version of Pinstriped follow this link.

Read the entire post here: Starting anew: Pinstriped launches new beta

The new location, at Islands Brygge, will thus form a new innovative tech hub – dubbed the Startup Village Copenhagen.

Old warehouses turned into startups heaven

Islands Brygge’s historic warehouses marked by experts you can aslo hire if you click here used to be the headquarters of FDB, who stored and transported products to all of Denmark via direct tracks to Copenhagen Harbor. In recent years, the area has increasingly become the home of tech startups, and now that is accelerated. As of this summer, the area in Njalsgade will be the frame around Copenhagen’s biggest concentration of fast-growing startups, including the estabished startups Vivino, Opbeat, Graduateland and Autobutler, as well as over 15 other both early and later stage startups!

A real hub for startups

Having all these ambitious startups with offices side by side increase knowledge-sharing and in turn speeds up growth of the individual companies. All serious tech startups are welcome, both to take up offices at Njalsgade, now called Startup Village, and to join the many tech events and social stuff arranged so people can network, do business and have fun. Founders House will with it’s move also expand, so talk to them if you are a smaller startup and want to be part of their co-working area.

A grass-roots initiative

The entire idea behind the Startup Village comes from the community itself. In contrast to many other projects, this is not a government sponsored place or initiative, but rater it is the different startups realizing that they could create an area that they would love themselves. This is a similar trend seen elsewhere, with Berlins Factory (also to be opened this summer) being a similar initiative.

With both the established startups being there, and Founders House with its often earlier stage startups as well as smaller startups in their own offices, the Village will be a space for both startups that are just getting going, as well as later stage ones that have raised a successful series A or even a series B investment. The Village will also be a natural place for international startups establishing a Scandinavian presence to be located – something that already is apperent on the list of the initial startups forming the Startup Village!

All in all, a great step for the community to have that much knowledge in one place!

Startups present

The spaces are being put in shape now, and the inaugurations is set for the 29th of August. The following startups have said will be part of the Startup Village CPH when it starts:

• Shape
• Vivino
• Conferize
• Opbeat
• Graduateland
• Birdback
• Nabby
• TightDB
• Boligsurf
• Anker Studio
• Everplaces
• Kirkeweb
• Codeable.io
• HelloWorldMobile
• Labster
• BodyBarista
• MeeWee
• Riidr
• Pinstriped
• Pocket Risk
• SNIPS
• 8pen
• Bellmetric
• Autobutler
• Planday
• Hello Monday
• Driversnote

Read the entire post here: Copenhagen Startup Village revealed!

Winners from the entire region

A part of the startup section was a startup competition, which had four winners. The winner were from all over the region – both Copenhagen, Lund and Helsingborg. An interesting mix:

• Fieldly – Online-based task management tool.
• Pinstriped – Branding laptop desktops.
• Sensefarm – A precision farming tool.
• Swiftcourt – A new way to settle out of court.

Except that the winner where in different business areas as well as from all over the region, wwo of the winning startups are part of the THINK lean startup incubator – an achievement they were proud of.

Deep dive into the startups

Fieldly:

• Created 8 month ago Daniel Krusenstråhle (previous co-founder at FOAP) and Sven Paulin with office in Helsingborg
• Created an interface in cooperation with construction firms that allows to monitor the construction project
• Workers can download an app to log in and out of work and communicate with their coworkers
• Project manager can see life shipping, progress, pricing etc
• Clients can also oversee the construction process
• Their goal: to be a standard for the industry

“Fieldly has the vision to simplify the work in the industries that have staff on the ground. Our first version is aimed at the construction, plumbing and installation company, and consists of a web interface for staff in the office and apps for field staff. Our aim is to facilitate communication, make time tracking easy and do construction projects even more successful” said Sven Paulin from Fieldly (pictured above)
 

Pinstriped:

• Started in november 2013, based in Copenhagen
• 10.000 sign-ups to their service so far
• Of those are 6.000 users (because it is MacOS only for now, the others are waiting for the Windows version)

Sensefarm:

• Created 2011 in Lund
• Initially consultancy project for Nordic sugar
• Measures temperature outdoor, water, soil
• Helps farmers to farm more economically and ecologically
• Senseform can help cities to save energy, such as: L.A. 10.000 trees planted would lower city temperature by 2-3 degrees

Swiftcourt:

• Started in summer 2013 by law-students in Lund, now based in Helsingborg
• A new standard clause enables plaintiffs to settle out of court, cheaply
• Won the regional finale at Venture Cup
• Just launching the first version of their service

Good luck to all the winners!

Image credit: Marcus Ngo

Read the entire post here: The 4 finalist from Internet i Fokus startup section

Pinstriped team has recognized market need and timely picked up the opportunity. More and more international attention is drawn to the company. This weeks publications in The Next Web and lifehacker make the point. Of course, good marketing is essential, but instant increase in sign ups by thousands of users also speaks for itself. Greetings on the new achievements!

Read the entire post here: More media attention and more users! Pinstriped gets more recognition

During the first couple of days after the release Pinstriped has already received some positive feedback and increasing interest among laptop users. No wonder, since Pinstriped helps not only to look presentable but also adds cool personality to your laptop screen and more importantly to your brand.

“We think the potential for Pinstriped is massive. There are a lot of meetings and presentations out there. A lot of companies and individuals who care about their brand, appearance and about looking professional. Our vision is to set a new standard,” shares Thomas Sugar, Pinstriped co-founder.

In light of recent developments Pinstriped’s team has expanded. The company’s founders, Martin Andersen and Thomas Sugar, were joined by two other members who will focus on analytics and online marketing. However, there are still some remaining challenges with regards to development.

“We are still on the lookout for a founding CTO type person. We have a lot of features and improvements in the pipeline and are looking for someone who can take the lead on all development so that we can focus on marketing, sales and business development,” says Thomas Sugar

At this point Pinstriped team is trying to learn as much as possible about their users, test everything to see what actually works and consequently develop a winning businesses formula.

“Curently we are solely focusing on acquiring users and are therefore not charging a subscription. At this point users equal individuals Via them we aim to get into companies and larger corporations. We will then introduce paid business and enterprise versions of the product with features aimed towards them. So basically it’s a classic freemium/enterprise business model,” shares Thomas Sugar.

In the day and age when computers have become a part of both personal and professional lives having something like Pinstriped is really awesome. To join in on the beta testing bonanza sign up via Pinstriped homepage. Because Pinstriped team is aware that meetings and presentations are not exactly the best time to encounter bugs and glitches, they have developed beta version a few steps further than your average minimum viable product.

Read the entire post here: Always professional, always organized: Pinstriped launches its beta version