Why We Invested in Zowie
Every year, billions of dollars are lost due to poor customer service that is not delivered on time. Zowie, our newest investment, helps companies to automate the majority of their support desk tickets and increases customer satisfaction. Maja and Maciek are ambitious founders with a grand vision and dedication to take their product to the next level. We couldn’t be more excited to partner with them.
Customer support can make or break a company. 90% of Americans take the service into consideration while deciding whether or not to make business with a company. At the same time, earning a new client can be between 5 to 25 times more expensive than retaining an existing one. With an increasing amount of channels that companies use to communicate with clients, it becomes a challenge to deliver quality support at a proper speed.
Zowie automates customer support requests and aims its solution at enterprise clients. The installation does not require involving an IT department and enables clients to plug and play within 24 hours. Zowie can be connected to existing customer service channels via an API. Currently, the company supports Zendesk, LiveChat, Intercom, Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, Shopify, and more.
Maja and Maciej have started Zowie a 1.5 year before our investment and impressed us with strong traction from day one. Within that time and as an entirely bootstrapped business, they managed to triple their monthly recurring revenue (MRR), reached an ARR of $500k, and successfully managed to upsell their products to enterprise clients.
In those first 18 months, Zowie has managed to attract global brands such as L’Oreal, Yves Rocher, and Aviva to use its product. The latter has automated 60% of its support tickets within 3 months, and currently services around 14,000 engagements via Zowie.
Such results are an outcome of a strong focus on the product, which is a key element to every successful company and a strong indication for us, as investors. Zowie’s founders are nearly obsessed with delivering value to its clients, which is why they recognized that speed and ease of implementation is so important.
According to LivePerson, recent developments in automation technology have increased the market value from 40 to 60 billion, which presents a substantial growth opportunity. With its focus on the product and strong drive towards business results, Zowie is uniquely positioned to profit from it.
No founder comes with all the skills required to lead a global company, but very few have what it takes to get there. Maja and Maciek have proved countless times that they are willing to move quickly, learn, and develop based on the feedback and ready to make hard decisions. The first board meeting of Zowie was one of the best I have ever participated in, and by far the best for a company at this stage.
There are very few companies that present such strong results without outside funding and in such a short time. Zowie has what we always look for in startups: a very ambitious team that is willing to learn and develop, a huge market opportunity, and a proven value for its clients. We’re beyond happy to welcome Maja, Maciej, and the team to our family!
Inovo Venture Partners backs early-stage, post-traction startups that can grow 100x. We partner up with ambitious founders like Stefan from Booksy, Maja from Zowie, or Piotr from Infermedica. We invest between €0.5–2M in startups from Poland and the region.
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