Nathan Klarer, CEO at Bridgecrest Medical. Nathan’s building a B2B SaaS company that uses wearable technology to minimise accidents in mines and oil rigs. He’s 25 years old and has already raised $1.3 million. Tune in to hear about what’s next for wearable technology, how Nathan’s driving sales, and why he wishes he’d started sooner.
Famous 5:
Favorite Book? – Influence
What CEO do you follow? — Larry Ellison
Favourite online tool? — Nova
Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No
If you could let your 20 year old self know one thing, what would it be? — To have more confidence in myself and start earlier
Time Stamped Show Notes:
01:10 – Nathan’s introduction
01:50 – Welcoming Nathan to the show
02:17 – Before Bridgecrest, Nathan worked in equity finance
02:51 – Bridgecrest is a B2B SaaS company that incorporates wearable technology into a platform that helps heavy industries prevent accidents
03:38 – Currently using wearable technology to minimise the fatigue risk of oil rig operators
04:20 – Sell directly to the operations or tech managers of oil and gas companies
04:50 – Annual contracts are in 5-6 figures
05:12 – Customers pay monthly
05:37 – Companies take 3 or 4 year contracts
06:02 – Nathan’s background is in engineering - he saw wearable technology being used for health and decided to bring it onto heavy industrial sites
07:10 – Nathan is the sole founder but has given equity to important team members
08:10 – Have raised about $1.3 million in total
08:36 – “We needed to raise that capital to build the product we wanted to build”
09:07 – Most of the costs are engineering for analytic software
09:34 – Launched the product last year
09:48 – Currently have 10-20 customers
09:40 – “We’re looking to build deep relationships with our customers” - no one has churned yet
10:50 – Sales can come through a single site in heavy industry - followed by upsales at the corporate level
11:30 – Launched in the last quarter of 2015, and made less than $1 million
12:40 – Keen to be adopted by big industry players in 2016
13:45 – As the CEO, Nathan now spends more time working on sales than engineering
10:30 – Connect with Nathan on Twitter
15:20 – The Famous Five
3 Key Points:
If you’re building a product, raise enough capital to get it right
Getting the right team around you is all-important. Make sure your founding team complements your weaknesses and buys into the company’s vision
Have confidence in your skills and your abilities. Start your company sooner.
Resources Mentioned:
Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for cheapest price possible.
Freshbooks - The site Nathan uses to manage his invoices and accounts.
Leadpages – The drag and drop tool Nathan uses to quickly create his webinar landing pages which convert at 35%+
Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he's driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5 hour drive) to listen to audio books.
Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives