Betting Big on Awesome Founders: Why Eniac Co-led Seed Funding in Shine
I fondly remember the first coffee meeting in Chelsea, NYC on December 11, 2015. I met two amazing, ambitious young women who had the vision to create the next massive community, focused on serving professional millennials over messaging. They had not left their previous jobs yet, but I was intrigued and agreed to meet them regularly over the next year or so to see how we could help.
Fast forward to this past Tuesday, April 18, 2017, 494 days after our first meeting, and the community they had envisioned is over 500,000 members strong and growth is only accelerating. It’s the one year anniversary of launching the coveted “Shine” service, and their hard work has led to a new $2.5M round of funding co-led by our firm, Eniac Ventures.
So, why did we invest?
The co-founders of Shine, Marah Lidey and Naomi Hirabayashi, represent everything we look for in founders. At Eniac we love to reach founders early in the process, where we can use our experience to make a real impact, and these two women repeatedly out executed their own goals and our expectations. To reach their levels in just one year is uncommon and represents the work ethic and resiliency of teams we seek out. Since the first meeting, we have continually admired Shine’s ability to break through walls and constantly raise the bar in their own plans and execution.
Messaging as the new app
As we recently announced with our new Fund IV launch, we are bullish on conversational user interfaces, specifically services that communicate with users over messaging (SMS, FB, Whatsapp, Wechat, Line, etc) in addition to voice. Services like Shine boast a 95%+ read rate over text which leads to a high conversion rate on clickthrough and user actions. Apps inevitably have significantly churn after install, whereas messaging does not.
A return to empathy
Technology has arguably created more space for apathy in our lives. Kids watching Youtube at the dinner table, teenagers on Snapchat in the corner of rooms at parties, adults constantly engrossed in liking photos on Instagram and Facebook. However, there are technologies that can combat all the negative behaviors and bring back empathy. High friction human interactions can be eased with technology like messaging, adding value to your daily life as well as re-connecting you with humanity. Interactions such as meditation coaching, professional or personal coaching, and therapy, can be made quick and easy over messaging. Shine is bringing together hundreds of thousands of humans that are looking to get re-inspired and re-connected, which will inevitably continue to grow. A simple message of encouragement or a reminder to strive for self improvement every day, as the wedge to a much larger platform, can go a long way.
Now make your life better!
The easiest thing to do is to sign up for Shine here. It’s free, fun and fast and will make your life better. It already has, for me and the other Eniac Ventures partners. We are so proud of the Shine team and we can’t wait to see what the next year brings.
