Once I wrote an article about creating a pitch deck that gets you to a top start-up accelerator. Now it is time to share with you some of the start-ups that took my advice and got into the third batch of ReaktorX, the pre-accelerating program for first-time founders.
Start-ups for children
“All you need to do in life is to answer one extremely important question; What do you want to do?; and then start doing it.” This motto is from a classic Polish movie, as well as being the mission of GOAP. Its founders believe that everyone should have a chance to discover their own passion and purpose in life, however they also know that it takes many attempts. GOAP is an application that enables children to choose extracurricular activities and pay for them with their pocket money. It results in happy children and happy parents – GOAP kills two birds with one stone.
Chasing your passions can be stressful, that is where Stress Hero comes into play, a start-up that knows how to deal with children under stress with the help of a wearable band connected to a smartphone. Stress among the youngsters has increased by 45% in the last 30 years and has become a disease of civilization, which we become a victim of at a very early stage of our lives. The band measures the level of stress in the child’s body using a special algorithm and the application connected to it helps the child (and the parent) to cope with the stress once they understand its source.
Blockchain (and not only that) to beat monopolies!
It’s not a start-up accelerator these days if it can’t boast at least a few start-ups changing the world via blockchain technology?
Cabcoin intends to insure Uber drivers and passengers as well as other participants of the so-called “sharing economy”, using blockchain to preserve decentralization (which enables participation of many insurance providers without a single one controlling the whole market) and transaction transparency. Jaroslaw Stankiewicz, a former Uber driver himself, had first-hand experience of the problem when he lived in London for a year driving a car for a living.
Seungki Yeo comes created FreelancerCoin which solves the problem of the lack of transparent rules in employing freelancers for projects. Seungki has already collected almost one million dollars in ICO. The service soft-launched in April, and currently actively recruits specialists in Warsaw, while helping freelancers get gigs anywhere in the world.
iLokum does not use blockchain (for now!), but it still has a chance to disrupt the real estate market. Creators of this start-up intend to transfer to Poland a concept known in UK – an real estate agency operating on a flat fee instead of the percentage-based commission on each sale. A trial version of the service is already online.
Borys Musielak
co-founder of Filmaster, a personalization service acquired in 2015 by Samba TV where he is currently building the European branch. He also runs ReaktorWarsaw, a hub for startups to work, collaborate and network, and co-founded Startup Poland, a foundation that became a voice of Polish startups.
Prior to founding his own projects, Borys worked as a consultant, programmer and team lead for both for startups and large corporations in Poland, Germany and United Kingdom.
He graduated with distinction at Polish-Japanese Institute of Information Technology with a degree in software engineering. Listed as one of 50 most creative Polish entrepreneurs by BRIEF. Mentor at Founder Institute Warsaw. Film buff. Thibodeau-era Bulls fanboy
Martech and e-commerce
If you have ever needed anything under the label of a “marketing service”, you know how difficult it is to get to the bottom of similarly looking services, agencies, and startups. Briefly24 is there to help to organize this market by helping clients to choose a platform or marketing service that suits their specific brief best.
One of the services in the crowded market of martech are gift cards and various types of loyalty programs. Difficult both for customers (how many times have you lost a pretty crumpled card with 9 stamps waiting for free coffee?) and for shop owners (huge choice, high implementation and service costs). Digifted wants to help both sides by offering a platform created by the e-commerce expert Władek Korecki, thanks to which the sale of gift cards can be added to your online store as simply as a Google Analytics script.
And now for something completely different!
If you’re waiting for the waiter aren’t you the waiter? Not anymore. With Comer you will never have to wait in a restaurant ever again! How does it work? You can order food even before getting to the restaurant, pay with your smartphone! The meal is then delivered to your table by a drone, welcome to the future!
The future can be surprising, though, especially when you run a business. Financial Forecaster is a service that will help software houses and other companies that provide services in the agency model to manage their cash flow, making sure the company has enough funds to survive the upcoming month.
Making money 24/7 makes it difficult to take a good care of your skin. Fortunately, there is Skin.eo, a mobile application that recognizes your skin type based on a picture and proposes a personalized selection of cosmetics. We already had a start-ups in ReaktorX created by a physiotherapist, architects, and furniture designers; now it’s the cosmetologists turn!
What’s next?
The third edition of the program has just begun. If you are interested what lies ahead of our start-ups, I recommend tracking their progress on the angel list and subscribing to the program newsletter. Additionally, mark in your calendar the evening of July 2nd and show up at the demo night, during which start-ups will present themselves on stage in front of an audience of 100+ investors, technology journalists, and corporate representatives. I do not know about you, but I’m already excited!
