What Maria 01 Startups Are Up To This Summer
By Kim Oguilve
If you are based in Finland, by now you will have already gotten used to how the seasons work around here: 6 months of darkness and extreme cold, 4 months of rain, 2 months of nice summer sun. People around here, hide in their homes during the winter and come summer, streets look like a summer fest all season long. However, Finns are prepared for any season, and neither rain nor snow can stop them. The “ there is no bad weather, just bad clothes” saying is pretty popular around here.
During Summertime, things start to look pretty dead and most workplaces start to get empty already in the middle of June. July is defintely the lowest business month as this is when most people in Finland will have their summer vacation. We got curious, to find out how startups manage their summer holidays around Maria 01. Do they look for funding? Do they go on vacation?
We know for a fact that already established companies or corporations, with their HR departments, have sorted the “who does what in July”. However, we couldn’t help but wonder how do startups and their founders prepare for their summer holidays. We spoke with three startup founders at Maria 01 to share with us their summer plans.
Simo Sorsakivi, CEO, and Founder at Inscripta
Last summer was spent in due diligence processes and a pre-seed funding round. Before that, I was ramping up other projects so I had no vacation. This summer we are hiring 15 more people and we just landed a 1.5m euro deal, making this time of the year quite busy. We are getting two new hires after the summer period for our core team. However, we don’t need to be developing anything intensively during summer and remote work is also possible. Having no vacation hasn’t been a waste because this is where we are at now.
Natalia Rincón, CEO, and Founder at CHAOS Architects
We have planned our summer vacation in a way that we are overlapping holidays so there is always someone at the office. We need to keep in touch with our customers to retain them during the summer, so we are trying to get creative. Summer is a good time to get our backlog up and running, so we are hiring some interns to help us with that. We will be preparing for a funding round and autumn strategies. Funding takes a lot of work to prepare for, but everyone needs to know already what’s next.
Daniel Katzenellenbogen, CEO at Zoundio
We are doing vacation in different periods in case something happens. This July, I’ll bet off the grid in Botswana with almost no connectivity. We need to launch before July and make sure this app version is very stable to avoid problems while people are away. If something would happen, someone from the team will take care of it so doing vacation intervals is ideal. Part of the deal of being in a startup is that you can’t really get away and you have to step up when it’s needed. However, everyone in the team is very passionate about what we are doing and they look forward to seeing our product in the next shape version.
Clearly, all these amazing founders and their teams have it all sorted out for the upcoming summer holidays. While startups are undoubtedly busy throughout the year, the entrepreneurial spark doesn’t go off (even during summer holidays). Then again, when you think about it, summer holidays also act as the revamp for the upcoming autumn season which we know, starts to get busy. Hint: Slush 2018!
If you read all the way here, stay tuned with our next post as our team will share with you some hidden gems (recommendations) for what to do this summer — only, if you’re on vacation!
Maria 01 is a community and space. A League of tech entrepreneurs and investors building the future. We provide the home-base and the network to get better and compete. The old hospital acts as the top meeting spot for hundreds of tech meetups and entrepreneurial get-togethers.
