Meeting recap

Iratel Ventures Breakfast Series #12

We had the privilege of hosting an informal gathering of local and global entrepreneurs, investors and active ecosystem players at twelfth Iratel Ventures Breakfast Series event. At our next few sessions, discussions will be based on 20 emerging technologies. The technologies for this event were:

eCommerce & Omnichannel Retail
Media, Entertainment and EdTech

You can find the full list of technologies we’re tracking here.

During this session these topics were discussed:

1. Product discovery and mobile shopping. How do we offer the right product at the right time to the right costumer?
2. Social commerce. Where are we now and what are the potentials?
3. Convergence between offline and online — is offline first or online first more optimal?
4. Is the potential for Media and Entertainment startups in Iran big enough to overcome their challenges?

The group discussed the lack of trust especially for mobile shopping through channels like Instagram. There is a need to create rules which is done through eNamad but is lacking for mobile shopping. Merchants can also do this by providing user reviews. Inviting key accounts for promoting social commerce was also a good way of achieving scale and trust at the same time. As for convergence of offline and online, word of mouth was mentioned as the key driver for this convergence. For the media topic, the discussion was more about the cultural nuances that need to be implemented for our ecosystem and many of the current strategies are just trial and error without a systematic approach.

Finally, it was decided to keep the discussions going in a semi-open environment and build a support platform for entrepreneurs which would become Breakfast Series’ digital twin. It was agreed that a semi-open Slack team would be the primary communication channel post events. Invitation to the Slack channel will be sent to the participants who provide their email address at the Breakfast Event and show an interest in being part of the discussions on the Breakfast Series Slack channel within a more selective Iratel Ventures Community.

The next event will be held on Monday 3 April and will be an عید دیدنی. The technology topics to be discussed are:

ADM (Application Development & Maintenance)
Big Data Sciences, Advanced Analytics, Information Infrastructure
Cloud Services

We believe the more open the dialogue, the better it will allow innovation and bringing different disciplines including investors together. These series were started to increase the dialogue opportunities among ecosystem players and especially to bridge the gap between those who are willing to know more about Iranian startup environment and meet up with other ecosystem players. This will increase openness and transparency.

Finally, if you’d like to be added to the breakfast mailing list, please sign up or follow us on LinkedIn.

This is the thirteenth in a series of posts about Iratel Ventures Events. We’d love to hear from teams with crazy (but commercial) startups. Get in touch or attend our breakfast series. Finally, don’t forget to get your IV Score or talk to our FundingBot to prepare for your next VC meeting.

Thanks to Nader Dadkhah, Meysam Jahani and Ali Moghanchi for their contribution.