By JUAN MONTOYA, CO-FOUNDER, ROKK3R LABS; MANAGING DIRECTOR, ROKK3R COBUILD
ELEVATOR PITCH
Rokk3r Labs is the platform where entrepreneurs partner with our strategists, creatives, and engineers to co-build and launch exponential companies that leverage the business opportunities created by the new technologies and fundamental societal changes resulting from this new environment.
PRODUCT/SERVICE DESCRIPTION
Rokk3r Labs is a unique business model and a platform where entrepreneurs partner with our strategists, creatives and engineers to co-build and launch companies that will transform industries. Our higher, aspirational purpose as a company is to harness global collective genius to co-build companies that change the world.
Co-building is our core philosophy that acknowledges the fusion of entrepreneurial vision and professional execution transforming ideas into companies through collaboration. It is the art and science of the collective genius. Collective genius has overtaken the solitary entrepreneur success story. Through the co-building approach (Rokk3r Source, Rokk3r Think, Rokk3r Cobuild, Scale, Fuel and Growth), ideas evolve into companies that transform industries.
FOUNDERS’ STORY
Rokk3r Labs was co-founded by five partners who collectively understood the importance of building a platform to serve the information-enabled, global economy. With my experience as an economist and management consultant in Boston and Washington, DC, I primarily dealt with big data and tools to drive data-driven decision making. It was through this experience that I saw firsthand how entire industries were reinvented for an information-based economy, and the many business opportunities that would likely evolve from these important changes.
Meanwhile, my co-founders were experiencing similar breakthroughs while running their own businesses. German, a Harvard grad with strong experience at McKinsey and other management consulting firms, had started his own firm helping traditional ad agencies develop solutions for the growing mobile market. Nabyl, Brian and Charles had an exciting startup with a proprietary technology platform that leveraged cloud technology to build web and mobile products.
Through networking and introductions, after a single meeting, we immediately recognized a shared sense of understanding about the way technology would impact the world, and how we could provide entrepreneurs with the right platform to launch industry-transforming ideas.
MARKETING/PROMOTION STRATEGY
When it comes to marketing and promotion, I always love going back to the beginning when we first started Rokk3r Labs in early 2012. After searching endlessly for our first entrepreneur, we met Rodolfo Saccoman, founder of AdMobilize, an Internet of Things startup that is taking the world by storm. He was winner of the first season of Shark Tank, and had the most infectious and positive personality, with a tenacious work ethic. We knew right away that Rodolfo and Rokk3r Labs would be an amazing partnership. To date we have raised almost $3 million in funding, partnered with global institutions and increased our presence in cities beyond Miami. The success of this partnership was the only marketing and promotion we needed. Right away, we started receiving phone calls and visits from across the nation and even globally.
A short while thereafter, we instituted the Rokk3r Labs Source team, whose prime objective was, and continues to be, to evangelize the Rokk3r Labs platform and offering. Led by a strong team with experiences in startup, mid-market, and enterprise worlds, and with a profound understanding of entrepreneurs, our Source team determines the right relationships for Rokk3r Labs with respect to ideas, entrepreneurs, corporate partners, and investors.
We also market and promote ourselves by participating in and sponsoring key, targeted events that we determine to meet our objectives and target markets. Recently, we presented a key panel at the Entrepreneurship Forum in London, one of the UK’s most exciting startup events, co-sponsored by the Deloitte Institute of Innovation and Entrepreneurship and London Business School. We were also a sponsor of the prestigious TEDxMiami Youth event to foster a passion for innovation. Additionally, we have developed key partnerships with global organizations and enterprises such as the Knight Foundation, DLA Piper, and DDB that help to further promote Rokk3r Labs’ offering.
https://vimeo.com/110266503
MARKET OPPORTUNITY
I believe Rokk3r Labs has truly found a niche in terms of its unique platform offering and service.
During 2013, an estimated $21 billion was invested in Seed and venture capital funds to startups nationwide. Exits from these investments amounted to an estimated $43 billion dollars. These levels of activity are the highest since 2000, when these types of investments reached $120 billion. Multiple sources agree that these levels will only continue to increase.
Rokk3r Labs management’s view focuses on the understanding that the world is fundamentally changing sociologically due to technological advancements and technology penetration levels. This change, initially palpable through increased social participation and mobile software and hardware permeation, ultimately proves to be fertile ground for new ideas, products, services, and companies that are better poised to meet the new demands of a modern world. Specific benefits of the new world include:
- Lower cost execution of technology ideas
- Frictionless transactions
- Significant expansion of potential markets
- Very high digital device penetration levels
- Real-time consumer and market feedback
- Big data opportunities
And though ideas and insights may germinate, many are still lost, inadequately framed and ultimately fail before having a real chance to succeed. In our estimation, the current offerings available to entrepreneurs from accelerators, Seed investors, incubators, and venture capital firms are often broken, fragmented, unleveraged, risky, insufficient, and generally result in low success rates.
It is within this context that Rokk3r Labs was founded in 2012 with the mission of becoming the premiere technology company ‘co-builder.’ Leveraging sound business practices and entrepreneurial experience with a proven and profound understanding of the modern digital world, our specialized team of engineers, creatives, and strategists propel ideas into successful companies; all of this within a structure designed to mitigate risks and maximize business opportunities.
The natural Rokk3r Labs partner (we do not have clients) is an experienced entrepreneur with a disruptive digital business idea, a proven track record as a businessperson and leader, and the means to fund and lead the transformation of an idea into a viable company. By joining forces with Rokk3r Labs, this entrepreneur seeks to:
- Validate and substantially improve an idea
- Mitigate technology reduce time to market by gaining access to a full team of experts
- Mitigate operations and scaling risk by leveraging our resources and expertise
- Be a part of a growing startup ecosystem that includes like-minded entrepreneurs, complimentary businesses, and opportunities for collaboration, knowledge sharing, and additional funding
HOW WE’RE UNIQUE
We differentiate ourselves through our co-building approach, which focuses on partnering with the entrepreneur in building not just a product, but a functioning company, accompanying them as it grows and matures into an established business. We leverage our past experience, talent pool, and networks to create the best possible teams and support them in launching products and creating companies.
BUSINESS MODEL
Our business model consists of a hybrid approach, where we co-invest with our entrepreneurs, sharing in the initial cost of developing the product. Ultimately, we seek to profit from the value generated by our equity participation in the companies we co-build.
CURRENT NEEDS
We are on the lookout for talented individuals to join our co-building ecosystem at every level. We seek passionate and capable entrepreneurs to lead companies in our portfolio, experienced and creative software engineers, product architects, and startup partners to create amazing teams, and investors looking to fund great ideas to join us in our journey to create companies that can change the world.
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HEADQUARTERS: Miami Beach, Florida
WEBSITE: www.rokk3rlabs.com
FOUNDERS: Nabyl Charania, German Montoya, Juan Montoya, Charles Irizarry, Brian Sanchez
INVESTORS: Scout Ventures, private investors
YEAR FOUNDED: 2012
TWITTER: @rokk3rlabs
FACEBOOK: facebook.com/rokk3rlabs
CRUNCHBASE: crunchbase.com/organization/rokk3rlabs
ANGELLIST: angel.co/rokk3r-labs
