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How Sampler Brings a Personalized Experience Right to Your Doorstep

Today, brands spend between 5–50% of their annual marketing budget on product sampling (Sampler Research). However, brands have been blindly distributing samples, unable to effectively target consumers and measure ROI on traditional product sampling strategies.

The solution that helps large Consumer Packaged Goods companies get their products into the right hands, while providing a personalized and memorable experience for consumers? Sampler.

Sampler is a Direct-to-Consumer product sampling platform that allows brands to target, track, and measure their sampling program from start to finish. By targeting the right audience, gathering information about the consumer’s profile, sending samples directly to homes, and gleaning feedback from the data collected, Sampler helps brands gather the insights they need to build one-on-one relationships with consumers. Having worked with over 400 brands such as industry giants L’Oréal and Nestlé and reaching over 50 million consumers globally in 24 different countries, it is clear that Sampler is on to something.

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Crosschq Announces New Round of Investment from Tiger Global and Rocketship.vc

 Crosschq, pioneers of a new software category for the recruiting industry called Human Intelligence Hiring™, announced today a new round of financing that includes investment from Tiger Global Management and Rocketship.vc. This latest round comes immediately following a strategic financing from Slack and SAP.iO in June which also included re-investment from GGV Capital and Bessemer Ventures.

“We are proud to be partnering with these two great firms as we enter the next phase of our growth,” said Mike Fitzsimmons, CEO of Crosschq. “If we have learned anything from the last several months, it is that the future of work is ripe for disruption. Our use of human intelligence is becoming a foundational element of modern company building.”

Crosschq brings speed, efficiency, accuracy, transparency and accountability to the obsolete, manual process of vetting new job candidates. The new investment comes as Crosschq crosses the 100 customer milestone with customers including Dish, NBA, Upwork, Snowflake, NerdWallet and Glassdoor using the platform to enhance recruiting and make better hires.

“SAP strongly believes that the future of work is inclusive and diverse, and that starts with removing biases in the candidate experience,” said Ram Jambunathan, SAP senior vice president at and managing director of SAP.iO. “Crosschq will bring increased objectivity and consistency to the candidate reference checking process, thereby improving outcomes for both candidates and SAP customers.”

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Enterprise-Tech Startups Focused on Risk, Security, Attract Venture Dollars

Security startups among the most-funded in New York City’s tech scene

Risk-management and security startups are in the spotlight among venture capitalists in the wake of increased remote work and a rise in high-profile cyberattacks.

And while current lockdowns and economic conditions may interfere with traditional deal making, a recent report tracking New York City-area startups reveals a surge of new funding.

These New York startups, which include BigID Inc., Payfone Inc. and BlueVoyant, offer software for cybersecurity, data governance and other risk-management functions.

Business interest in such technologies has intensified in recent years as companies seek ways to better manage risk-and-compliance issues associated with an explosion of user data, said Ram Jambunathan, a managing director of SAP.iO, the early-stage venture-capital arm of business software maker SAP SE.

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Mobile Robotics Startup Powers Warehouse Productivity Safely

When Rahul Nambiar, co-founder and CEO of Botsync, transformed his passion for robotics into autonomous mobile robots with three other co-founders, little did they imagine their efforts will become key in the new reality of business today.

“As a company, we want to resolve the mismatch between consumer demand and limited labor supply in the logistics and manufacturing sectors,” said Rahul. “It is estimated that by 2028, there will be 2.4M jobs unfulfilled in these industries. So, we knew there will be a definite demand for the autonomous mobile robots we are building. What we hadn’t expected was how quickly this demand would evolve.”

In today’s new normal where businesses resuming operations are facing new restrictions due to COVID-19 infection risks, the logistics and manufacturing sectors are finding it challenging to operate. They face mandatory sanitation measures, safe distancing rules, and a manpower crunch due to restrictions in travel. This has seriously affected productivity levels.

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Supporting Innovations to Reduce Risk for Critical Infrastructure Essential Workers

Across the world, individuals, communities, and businesses are struggling with changing regulations imposed to counter the COVID-19 pandemic. From lockdowns followed by the easing of those measures to renewed restrictions as new infection rates spike, a hodgepodge of rules and guidelines are creating confusion on how businesses should resume operations, and “who’s allowed to do what”.

Fortunately, this same set of conditions is inspiring rapid and important changes on a global scale. Amid this environment, SAP.iO has been delving deep to support startups that can help businesses and the world adapt. We’ve been building a space for collaboration to back relief efforts for COVID-19. And we’ve been amazed and humbled by the incredible amount of creativity and good work we are witnessing.

Alleviating risks for essential workers

One of the efforts we are excited about stem from HyBird, a startup we are supporting as part of the SAP.iO Foundry Singapore Industry 4.0 program. Its platform, Clarity, helps alleviate health and safety risks for critical infrastructure workers.

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How Innovation Can Help Industries Emerge Stronger From The Crisis

As the crisis slowly ebbs and economies round the world tentatively re-open, it’s time for organizations to regroup and plan their next act. At the beginning of the crisis, companies needed to rapidly innovate to maintain business continuity, ensure liquidity, support remote work and focus on employee safety.

The next act will require organizations to refocus their innovation efforts on their core businesses in their specific industries, to recover in the short run, and set them up for growth in the long haul.

Whether it is Amazon’s latest acquisition of autonomous driving startup Zoox for potential contactless freight delivery opportunities, or Lululemon acquiring ‘at-home’ fitness startup Mirror, some of the smartest innovation continues to emerge from the startup open ecosystem.

Popwallet for mobile contactless consumer experiences, Pecan for AI based revenue growth management, TVPage for online influencer marketing and ClearMetal to fortify supply chains with ML based freight tracking, are some of the latest innovations relevant for industries to rapidly recover in these pandemic times (Source: SAP.iO Fund and Foundries).

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SAP.iO Supports Employee Experience Management Tech Solutions

SAP.iO recently announced its investment in workforce optimization software company Andjaro. The company, based in Paris and founded in 2015, provides a unique marketplace dedicated to helping organizations post staffing needs directly on its real-time workforce optimization platform. The solution—available for purchase at the SAP App Center—allows businesses to reallocate available and voluntary internal staff from other locations within the organization. This not only minimizes HR costs but more importantly, improves the employee experience by offering them the chance to work at other parts of the organization and get compensated for a temporary relocation resulting in a more interconnected and happy workforce.

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Sampler Raises $4 Million as demand spikes amid pandemic

Sampler has raised a $4 million round in funding. The round was led by existing investors StandUp Ventures and BDC Capital with participation from EDC, Factory LLC as well as new investors from Calgary-based ​female-led financial platform​, The51. The closing was managed by Chase Irwin, partner at Dentons Canada LLP, and brings Sampler’s total amount raised in equity financing to $10.3M since its inception in 2013.

The product sampling platform, which helps CPG brands distribute product samples to digitally targeted consumers direct-to-home, saw a spike in demand as in-store sampling, trade shows, and events were cancelled worldwide as a result of COVID-19. The company experienced a 300% increase in sales in Q2 2020 compared to the same period last year and user engagement doubled during the months of March and April as consumers looked to discover new products from home.

“We’ve been working on Sampler for seven years and built a unique platform that connects brands and consumers through in-home product experiences. Though we could not have predicted the sudden shift in the market, we were ready. When the pandemic hit and in-store demos, events, and trade shows were brought to a sudden halt, brands had to quickly rethink how they were going to deliver such a crucial element of their marketing strategy as product sampling in a socially distant world. Our company’s growth accelerated quickly and we’re thrilled that this investment will allow us to continue carrying our vision forward while driving new product offerings that will change the way retailers, trade shows, and events conduct product sampling forever.” said Marie Chevrier, Founder and CEO of Sampler

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Carsten Maschmeyer investiert in ein Startup, das Maschinenbauer wie Bosch, Siemens und Co. fit für die Zukunft machen will

Starinvestor Carsten Maschmeyer hat sich an dem Berliner Startup Zksystems beteiligt.

Nach Informationen von Business Insider flossen bei dem Deal, an dem noch andere Investoren beteiligt waren, insgesamt drei Millionen Euro.

Zksystems entwickelt Software für die vernetzte Fabrik. Die Gründerinnen sind überzeugt, dass Maschinen künftig im Abo-Modell mit intelligenten Zusatzfunktionen angeboten werden.

ScanTrust and SAP to enhance food traceability

Over the last ten years, large, global food producers have been steadily losing market share to smaller, local brands mainly due to the loss of trust in the food industry. Addressing these challenges, ScanTrust, the developer of patented QR-codes and the global software solutions provider SAP have partnered to develop end-to-end, farm-to-consumer material traceability solutions for the SAP Logistics Business Network.

The solution enables brands to collect and trace batch-level information on raw materials, ingredients and finished products. Among other benefits, brands can use this to identify which products are affected by product recalls instantly. 

Thanks to the integration with the Scantrust connected goods platform, this data can now also be linked to a unique ScanTrust QR code, which is printed on product packaging and made available directly to end consumers. Scanning codes with a smartphone enables brands to deliver compelling stories around the provenance of their products, gain valuable data and insights on consumer behaviour based on QR codes and create a direct communication channel with consumers.
With the integration and the combined solution offering, ScanTrust and SAP together accelerate digitization in the food chain. It is expected that as more projects come online, the benefit of being able to connect directly to consumers will pay for itself, both as a win for brands and for consumers.

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SAP.iO Foundry Accelerator: Helping Startups Turn Untapped Data into New Business Opportunities for SAP Customers

The world is constantly evolving, whole industries are emerging in revolutionary ways — all because of increasing amounts of accessible data which is changing the way we use and allocate resources. As a result, now more than ever before, there is a tremendous opportunity for enterprises to capture numerous sources of previously untapped data, which can then enable predictive decisions, and even drive or create whole new utilizations. If you’re anything like thousands of SAP customers, you know how valuable innovation is and the advantages of adopting groundbreaking solutions, early.

Startups innovate at lightning speed and have made their mark on the B2B space with their disruptive business models and daring technology-fueled visions. Yet, what they lack is the reliability, market recognition and proven track-record. This is why the SAP.iO Fund and Foundries were created, to act as a bridge between SAP customers and startup innovations within the larger and thriving SAP ecosystem. The unit’s mission is to invest, accelerate and incubate startup innovation that strategically expand the SAP ecosystem to create value for SAP customers.

“Our mission is to empower the innovators that will simplify and transform the way business operates. To execute against our mission, we accelerate startups that are changing the face of enterprise software,” said Alexa Gorman, SAP.iO Foundries EMEA Head.

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SAP.iO’s Accelerator Program is Looking for Startups With Solutions in the Utilities Industry

SAP.iO Foundry Tel Aviv, SAP’s startup accelerator program, is opening its next cycle and looking for startups that help solve some of the biggest challenges facing the Utilities Industry, as well as startups that are looking to break into the Utilities field.The Utilities Industry has a staggering effect on our daily lives, and energy companies have a large responsibility to bring a constant supply of energy that will support our modern way of living. Looking ahead, this responsibility will only grow. With international pressure to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and the increasing demand for alternative energy sources, energy suppliers will be tasked with upholding existing regulations while facing several new challenges and updating regulations.

Original article here…