Cathy Han, Co-Founder and CEO of 42 Technologies, calls the Canadian Digital Media Network’s (CDMN) Soft-Landing Program a “super awesome experience!” Of course, the opportunity to go to Milan, Italy and London, England to explore the star-studded world of high-fashion was a dream come true for the style-focused online platform. Not only was 42 able to build great relationships in Milan and London that they’ll build on in the future—the company is also planning to hire 2 to 3 new sales people and 2 developers to support this growth within the next 6 to 12 months as a direct result of their Soft-Landing.
42 Technologies uses a big data technology, known as predictive analytics, to categorize shoppers into core groups and leverage point-of-sale data to help brands personalize the retail experience. And ever since they launched their company on the runway at New York Fashion Week in February of 2013, 42 has been aiming high. The start-up even earned the honor as one of TechCrunch’s 30 most disruptive companies.
“Through working with Ryerson’s Digital Media Zone (DMZ), we learned about CDMN’s Soft-Landing Program. This program gave us the rare opportunity to go to Milan and London to explore the market that we always knew we belonged in,” says Cathy. “During our time in each city, we learned a lot, both good and challenging, when it came to establishing ourselves in the European market.” Kevin Tuer, Managing Director, CDMN described the 42 Technologies results as representative of the true value of the CDMN Soft-Landing Program. “We’ve helped 73 companies benefit from landings in 17 countries, and we’re just beginning,” he said. “Through our national network of hubs, great Canadian companies can grow at home by connecting with markets around the world.”
Starting out in Milan, in October, 2013, 42 kicked off with a 400-guest forum, which including notable contacts like the Tech Editor of Vogue Italia, the editor of Tech Crunch, the owners of Diesel, and the owners of PITTI Immagine, a men’s fashion magazine.
“We were very fortunate to be in contact with a number of key players in the fashion and tech industry, in a very concentrated amount of time,” explains Cathy. “Thanks to the forum in October, we were able to meet so many people that we wanted to meet, and find out how business worked in Italy and how to make those initial and valuable connections that allowed us to set-up follow up meetings to find out if companies already established in the market were open to a product like ours.”
“It’s pretty great to learn these lessons, talk to the locals and brands we wanted to work with, and relieve our anxiety around entering an international market with the aid and encouragement of the CDMN Soft-Landing Program vs. what the experience would have been with the limited funds of a start-up,” says Cathy.
Milan was an ideal fit for 42. Not only did the Soft-Landing Program put the team on the radar of global, luxury-tier brands, like Gucci, it enabled the type of meaningful physical connections that business depends on in the European market.
“Conducting business in a city like Milan is a lot more conservative than it is in North America or even London, England,” says Cathy. “If you want to talk to someone here, you just email or call them and hope they respond. In Milan, it’s not easy to do that without an existing relationship. The forum was a good introduction to brands we were specifically targeting. It helped us learn how the brands operated, what their attitude was toward technology and innovation, and even though [initially] some brands were hesitant, our Milan contacts were open to the product that we were building and wanted to test it.”
The Soft-Landing Program took 42 from Milan to London, England, where the market was a lot more open to foreign start-ups. In London, 42 found several new technology partners at Rainmaking Loft, a technology space located right beside the city’s famous Tower’s Bridge, as well as through friends at Startupbootcamp, both city-based accelerators.
At Rainmaking Loft, the team met a group of entrepreneurs who opened their eyes to a different business model in the tech-fashion industry. Introductions led to a few potential partners, who were interested in exploring the North American market. One of the connections made was with a London-based start-up called FarFetch, which ran a website that gathers various fashion brands and retail websites together on one platform.
“[FarFetch] has existing partnerships in Europe that we can leverage in return for our existing connections in North America. “We’re hoping to partner with them at some point this year,” she says, “with the potential to make 2-hundred-thousand dollars in European partnerships down the road!”
She credits involvement in the Soft-Landing Program to several fortuitous events that provided 42 with serious market validation. For instance, in Milan, 42 was invited by The Family, a co-working space, to speak at a Paris conference called Hackers On The Runway, in July, which will include notable brands like Alexander McQueen and Louis Vuitton. Cathy also revealed 42’s invitation to a German conference called CeBIT2014.The week-long tradeshow will host 50 top companies from around the world that are less than 3 years old in the big data space. Better yet, the conference, which takes place March 10 to 14, will feature big guest speakers in the tech sphere, like Steve Wozniak (the co-founder of Apple Computer) and Jimmy Wales (the founder of Wikipedia).
When asked what’s next for 42, Cathy can’t help but reflect on the evolution of the company post-Soft-Landing Program.
“I think the coolest part about our involvement is that we’ve made 42 global at a much earlier stage than we could have done on our own,” she says. I love that organizations like Ryerson DMZ and CDMN exist and are willing to support and fund our desire to go explore foreign markets. We figured that was our own financial burden to take care of. But at such an early age, they placed so much faith in our ability and supported us so that we could strike out and explore our chosen markets…and that is just awesome!”
To learn more about the CDMN Soft-Landing Program and how to qualify, contact Lisa Cashmore, Soft-Landing Program Manager for CDMN, at 519-804-2980 Ext. 1075, or at lisa.cashmore@cdmn.ca.