Startup Q&A: Thor Olof Philogène, CEO and Co-founder, Stravito

Stravito was founded in 2017. It counts the likes of Danone and Carlsberg as clients and has bagged €8 million in funding from European investors. RTIH met up with Thor Olof Philogène to get the lowdown on this fast growing startup.

RTIH: Tell us about Stravito

TOP: Global organisations in the retail and FMCG sector use our application to store and share all their market intelligence and insights. Our AI-powered search has been built and trained to gather reports and research in one place, making them searchable by teams everywhere. 

We reduce the time teams spend looking for internal information - which has been reported to take up as much as 20% of business time - instead allowing them to find the answer to any business questions in minutes. The solution prevents organisations from purchasing duplicate research, which can save millions of pounds in research budgets.  

Most importantly, Stravito ensures company decisions are informed and data-driven, instilling confidence and removing guesswork. We launched in 2017 and are already proud to count world leading brands such as Carlsberg, Electrolux and Danone as customers.

RTIH: What was the inspiration behind setting the company up?

TOP: While in previous roles, my co-founders and I were witnessing the daily frustration of consumer insights teams. How confusing it was to manage mountains of data. How time-consuming global collaboration had become. And how difficult it was to implement a customer-centric organisation effectively.

We wanted to find a better way, and together brought decades of market research and technology experience. Two of my co-founders (Anders Örbom and Andreas Lee) ran NORM, a research agency for 15 years serving the world's biggest brands - that company was sold and is now owned by IPSOS, one of the world's largest research companies. 

My other co-founder (Sarah Lee) and I worked at iZettle. Here, I was Vice President of Growth and Chief Revenue Officer, and Sarah was Business Lead for Card Payments and Commerce. Our combined skills complemented eachother. So, in 2017, we left our jobs and began working with progressive global companies to understand what 'better' would look like. 

Together, we developed Stravito, a purpose-built tool to help global organisations unleash the power of their insights.

RTIH: What has been the industry reaction thus far?

TOP: The industry reaction has been fantastic. We've grown at a rapid pace, tripling our 2018 revenues during 2019, and late last year Accel recognised us as one of the top 100 SaaS companies in Europe and Israel. 

Today, world-leading companies, including Carlsberg, Danone and Electrolux, are using Stravito's application to power their insights and bring knowledge to their employee's fingertips. 

RTIH: What has been your biggest challenge/setback?

TOP: Our application provides employees at enterprises with a consumer-like experience. We offer a level of simplicity and usability, similar to Spotify, Google, and Netflix. Usually, this doesn't exist in traditional enterprise software, which means explaining the demand can be a challenge.

Particularly as a great user experience is not a feature that is visible in a feature comparison chart. But just as Apple proved, core experience is fundamental to adoption. We truly believe there is no point in being feature-rich if your user experience is poor and our customers agree. 

“We offer a level of simplicity and usability, similar to Spotify, Google, and Netflix. Usually, this doesn't exist in traditional enterprise software, which means explaining the demand can be a challenge”

RTIH: What are the biggest challenges facing the omnichannel retail sector right now?

TOP: From our perspective, finding technology that can power customer-centric strategies is the biggest challenge facing the omnichannel retail sector. Research from PWC showed more than 60% of retailers said business silos were having an impact on their omnichannel fulfilment strategies. 

Identifying the exact purpose and function for each channel in an omnichannel strategy requires a thorough understanding of a consumer's behaviour and drivers. Businesses need to have a single view of their customers and be able to analyse insights that can deliver a tailored customer journey. 

To achieve this, teams need to work together to harness their insights so they can provide the most seamless experiences.

RTIH: What's the best question about your company or the market asked of you recently by an investor and a customer?

TOP: An investor - Why isn't Google doing this? The answer: Although they have some of the world's best technology, they are ultimately about solving widespread problems for everyone and are unlikely to focus on solving narrow problems for specific companies or verticals. 

Stravito has been built specifically for employees working for global organisations, particularly those in the FMCG and retail space. We're focused on providing each with a great user experience through great technology (and search), but also a highly tailored experience.  

A customer - Can we invest in Stravito? That's an actual question we have received from a customer we currently work with.

RTIH: What can we expect to see from Stravito over the next 12 months?

TOP: In almost three years we have come a long way in raising the bar for knowledge management solutions: allowing employees to get up to speed, keep up-to-date, and make better market plans no matter what their business is.

Today, we are proud to serve some of the world's biggest companies, and we are in the process of onboarding many more. Now that we have caught up with others in this space, we plan to accelerate away and set ourselves apart. Remaining focused on our core mission to help organisations in the retail, consumer goods sector, and beyond, unleash the power of their insights.