Digital startups meet new customer demands during Corona

Despite big challenges for some companies, the changes in consumer behavior as a result of the pandemic, present a large opportunity for others. This trend is apparent among the twelve companies who today are welcomed into SSE Business Lab

When the application period to the incubator SSE Business Lab started and applications started pouring in, a distinct pattern appeared as to which type of companies had had the possibility to grow in spite of the Corona pandemic.

“It is primarily companies whose business is based on digital sales and a DTC model [direct-to-consumer], as well as companies who benefit from things becoming increasingly data-driven and digitized” says Julia Delin, CEO at SSE Business Lab.

Sebastian Knutsson, chair of the SSE Business Lab Advisory Board and founder of King, agrees with her.

“Large societal shift present large opportunities for those who are quick-footed enough to take advantage of them. In the teams who start their journey with us now, we can without a doubt see a large potential to grow on markets where consumers and companies are quickly changing their behaviours”, he says.

An example of this among the new SSE Business Lab companies is Team Together, who enable people to donate money to a charity of their choice with no added cost, when shopping online. They benefit from consumers shopping online more and more since the start of the pandemic. Digmak, who will help digital nomads with international tax issues, are also benefited by some of the changes the pandemic has brought about. Increased digital, project based, and agile work leads to more digital nomads, as people can fork for international companies and projects from home.

Another company which benefits from increased digitalisation is Madden Analytics, whose data driven-driven SaaS platform [software-as-service] simplifies collaboration between brands and retailers. The founder, Axel Jacobsson, is with this company back at SSE Business Lab where he six years ago started his journey with his well-known and successful company Nividas Eyewear.

“This is the second time we are admitted into SSE Business Lab and I believe and hope that this time will be just as valuable for the development of the company as last time was. I particularly look forward to being part of the ambitious and inspiring community which the lab has”, says Axel Jacobsson.

Madden Analytics is just one of multiple newly admitted companies with impressive founding teams. Among the other companies there are not only experienced entrepreneurs, but also stress researchers and an engineer studying at Harvard University. The teams who today start their journey in the Activate program have eight weeks ahead of them where they get help and support to go from idea to reality and enter their respective markets. The new Incubate companies on the other hand look forward to up to 18 months in the incubator where companies like Klarna and Voi Technology got their start, to grow and scale their businesses and expand internationally.

If you or a team member of yours is a student, alumnus or faculty member of the Stockholm School of Economics, you can also apply. More information is available on SSE Business Lab’s website, ssebl.com.

The following companies have been admitted:

Incubate:

OMIT: An interdisciplinary team of stress researchers, designers and engineers have collaborated to create the OMIT INSTRUMENT. The innovation is an analogue tool and platform for stress recovery, experienced individually in short sessions.

AWAN: A tech-driven and circular direct-to-consumer fashion brand creating a new generation of comfortable clothing for women, versatile enough to be used anytime and anywhere.

LEANalyser: LEANalyser provides a self service analytics tool compatible for big data. The tool is suited for any business who is in need of analysing large quantities and does not require any previous analytical expertise.

Team Together: Team Together enables e-commerce shoppers to, with their online purchases, donate to their charity of choice without paying extra.

Scrintal: Scrintal is an AI-powered cloud platform that helps researchers save time and improve their productivity when transcribing and analyzing interviews. It has been developed with the help of researchers addressing their key needs.

Madden Analytics: Madden offers a B2B SaaS platform for shared data & analytics between consumer brands and retailers, that helps minimize overproduction, reduce missed sales from stock-outs and streamline brand-reseller collaboration.

Bemlo: Bemlo wants to improve working conditions and create industry transparency for doctors and nurses in healthcare staffing. They do this through an online platform, like Glassdoor, that enables professionals to review their employers, read public procurements, salary statistics and receive job offers from the best staffing agencies.

Activate:

EBIE: EBIE replaces the need for deposits, an archaic system which creates exclusion for tenants and requires effort by landlords, with a more sophisticated way of satisfying the need for deposits. EBIE works as a middleman, offering the reassurance landlords want and giving tenants access to affordable housing without the need for a deposit.

Leconery: Leconery is an e-commerce and consultancy focusing on sustainable vegan leather products, such as shoes, bags, jackets, accessories and more. Their values are sustainability, cruelty-free, innovation and design.

QLVR: QLVR provides flexibility in the housing market through a PaaS-solution, sign up to all housing queues in one place!

Digmak: Digmak aims to provide the basic tools for digital nomads in terms of taxation and bring along with it an easier access to understanding the international regulations.

JOYNR: Joynr is a matchmaking platform which allows online gamers to find teammates based on individual preferences through a website and smartphone based search engine.