Change Ventures leads seed round for Interactio, the Lithuanian startup that is re-inventing simultaneous interpretation
Ever attended a conference where there are speakers in multiple languages and had to use one of those clunky headsets to get an audio stream in your language? You might have had to wait a long time in line to pick up the headset, often the quality is variable and the event might even run out of headsets. On the event organizer side, these systems have many drawbacks. Having to forecast how many headsets you need is usually impossible, leading most events to over-stock hardware. And unless someone gets up from their seat and complains, the organizer has no idea whether the listeners are getting high quality audio streams.
Enter Interactio, bringing simultaneous interpretation to the 21st century. A simple app that attendees use to select an event, the language they want to listen to, plug in their headphones and listen. Choose whether to connect over the venue’s WiFi, broadband data service or using a call-in number. For the organizer, the advantages are tremendous. No need to bring or distribute any hardware, since every attendee these days has a smart phone. Real-time feedback on audio quality for every single listener. For the interpreter at the event, all they need is a computer that plugs into the internet.
I met two of the founders of Interactio, Henrikas and Simona, during my mentoring sessions at the Login Startup Fair in April 2016. Energetic, engaging, sharp, and obviously committed to the business, they had worked on the idea with the third co-founder Domas for a few years and made pivots to position themselves for the right target market. They fit the profile of founders with “grit” — a combination of passion and perseverance. Further, they had identified some sizable niche market segments that were suitable for their solution and had already established some success in those. The first was churches, including US megachurches, where reaching out to non-English speaking attendees is an avenue for growth. The second is multi-level marketing companies like Mary Kay, which run many multi-lingual sales training and evangelist events. This matched one of the regular pieces of advice I give to startups when thinking about focusing the business: select specific market niches that are part of a clear larger market.
Another good fit with Change Ventures was the early focus on the US market, where our fund has a deep network of contacts and experience. We are actively helping the business grow there through introductions and advice.
By May 2017 we closed the investment round, our first investment from the fund. Joining us in the $580k round were our Lithuanian friends Practica Capital as well as Paris-based Kima Ventures. We are delighted to also work with the angel investors Mindaugas Bružas and Mantas Mikuckas (the latter also co-founder and COO at Vinted).
Interactio has a bright future ahead. We can’t tell all the secrets, but suffice it to say that merely swapping out the redundant hardware in the world’s live multi-lingual events is a massive opportunity in and of itself. For the rest of the upside you will have to wait and see.
Andris K. Berzins
Managing Partner
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Change Ventures is a seed-stage venture capital fund backing ambitious Baltic founders. We invest primarily in B2B and SaaS technology startups. Find us at changeventures.com.
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