Where are you in the Cash / Profitability Quadrant

JCAL and Molly shared 2 amazing quadrants with cash on the y axis and profitability on the x axis .

In which quadrant are you? 

As my mentor Allen Pathmarajah and friend Alan Miltz says

“Revenue is vanity Profit is sanity And cash flow is king and queen “ 

https://youtu.be/KlfN_imtve0

Female Founders Kicking Goals Globally

Thanks Simmie Swil for sgaring with us female founders  who have recently raised funding across fintech, healthtech, sustainability and even digital fashion!

 💳 Mexican fintech Stori became a 🦄 after raising $150m in their Series C round at a $1.2bn valuation. Stori is focused on improving financial inclusion by offering consumers access to credit history building and credit card products on their smartphones. Co-founder Marlene Garayzar  is the first Mexican woman to have founded a tech unicorn in her home country. Round was led by BAI Capital, GIC, GGV Capital | Bin Chen Guangyu (GY) L. Sherman He

💸TomoCredit raised $22m in Series B at a $222m valuation to provide access to credit without relying on a credit score, backed by Morgan Stanley's Next Level Fund and Mastercard. Originally designed to support international students in the US, Tomo now also helps domestic students and SMBs | Kristy Kim Dmitry Kashlev

🥔Julia Kay and Jordy Kay raised A$24m in Series A funding for their biodegradable packaging business, Great Wrap, to produce stretch wraps from potato waste. The round included equity from Darren Thomas, W23, the Grill'd Innovation Fund and Simon Griffith  from Who Gives A Crap; plus non-dilutive capital from Rabobank's DLL Group.

💊 Georgia Vidler and Kate Lambridis raised A$10.15m for their personalised healthcare business, Human, which aims to make it easier to access medical information from research and the experience of others. The team met originally at Canva and the round was led by Canva investor AirTree (Elicia McDonald) with additional investment from Skip Capital

🚨Sage raised $9m to modernise elderly care with their operating system for caregivers and nursing homes to prevent emergencies, improve quality oflife and replace the “nurse call” button. The round was led by Goldcrest Capital | Ellen Johnston Raj Mehra Matt Lynch

💊iLoF - Intelligent Lab on Fiber raised $5m in their seed round to accelerate the future of personalised drug discovery with a digital library of disease biomarkers and biological profiles to fast improve the speed and efficacy of clinical trials. The round was led by Faber | Mehak M. Paula Sampaio Luis Valente

❤️The Lowdown raised £2m for its sexual and reproductive health platform, providing women with consultations, reviews and digital tools regarding their contraception options, with 70,000 women using it each month. The round was lead by Speedinvest| Alice Pelton

💃🏽Daniella Loftus raised $1.5m for her digital fashion platform, Draup. The founder of This Outfit Doesn’t Exist plans to streamline the process of owning virtual styles and has been backed by Variant Neon DAO, Flamingo DAO as well as firstminute capital.

 

Flagship - bringing data to bricks and mortar retail - another Unicorn 🦄 in the family

Simon Molnar (brother of Afterpay Nick ) has got big shoes to fill …. And he’s filling them fast …. Founding FLAGSHIP with a bunch of smart cofounders and friends  - building “the smart store of tomorrow” from the basement of his mum’s house! 

Flagship is a retail-tech company, providing data to  retailers! 

• Imagine if you can track how many times a product is touched, tried on, or looked at 
• Imagine if you can track inventory levels and conversion rates in real time 

This can be done by FLAGSHIP with tags (powered by beacons around the store tracking items (currently apparel) around the store !

Is Bricks and Mortar retail here to stay ?

The question that is asked - isn’t everything going online !!!! There is something intuitive happenning says the “All-In”  industry veterans, degenerate gamblers & besties Chamath Palihapitiya, Jason Calacanis, David Sacks & David Friedberg who cover all things economic, tech, political, social & poker. (Google them) 

As a result of people working from home - and the covid fear of isolating wanes  - bricks and mortar retail is set to boom… 

People need people - the feeling of face to face is important - the feeling of being part of a village and seeing each other …. being able to touch other people …. The feeling of chatting to your neighbour …. The feeling of being part of a community and not being invisible .

Bricks and mortar still represent 70% of retail sales 

The Pain 

Simon diagnoses the pain 

“The goal was: how do we bring more of that e-commerce world into brick-and-mortar; the visibility, the data points, the control?”

“How do we bring that into this world and give more visibility into what’s happening before the item actually sells?”

Stacy Young talks to Paul Greenberg’s Nora network about the power of data in retail 

How Flagship Works 

A tag is attached to each SKU and, when moved throughout the store, sensors pick up its location, allowing for the tracking of their whereabouts and usage in real-time.

This data can then show when an item has been tried on and subsequently purchased, which items have been left in the change rooms, and how much inventory of a certain item remains. (Could this tech morph into a cheap rfid chip - that is tracked out the store using 4G or 5G technology - Maybe Laava on Steroids (Tony Surtees??? ) 

Imagine placing your basket on a counter, and every item is billed immediately by a sensor tracking all items in the basket ! 

Imagine tracking items that haven’t been “paid for”  at the counter !! Could this reduce pilferage? 

“Flagship will provide data - real-time - that will  improve efficiency, improve processes, and save retailers cost by not having to spend too much on manpower.” Simon Says 

Family Support 

Simon and a group of his mates have been working in the basement of Nick and Simon’s mum’s house - creating battery powered illusory beacons, which helped “prove the concept” - with Nick and his advisers backing mentoring and advising

The founding Team - each one a legend 

• Simon Molnar 
• Marcel ninio 
• Ben rohald
• Ryan lonstein 
• Adam Goldberg
• Deena Metz 
• Roger Q
• Mark Lazarus 
• Fabio De Carvalho 
• Luke brooks  

Inspired by smartcompany 

Redbubble - Powering Ahead

We are very proud to have played a small part in the journey of Redbubble 

It posted  3rd Q sales  $384 million with gross profit of $144 million and an Operating EBITDA was $4.5 million. - in line with expectations. 

Customer retention - 47 per cent of marketplace revenue coming from repeat purchases – the highest level since the company was founded.

It’s all about  the artist and consumer experiences, our goal is to improve loyalty and retention and provide outstanding customer service - this will create growth - said Michael Ilczynski, CEO.