Rikke Rosenlund - Building a Pawfect Marketplace!

Rikke and I decided not to go anywhere for our interview but instead stay in her astroturfed dog friendly office with Lady (see below)! Rikke is the Founder and CEO of BorrowMyDoggy and is three years in to her entrepreneurial whirlwind journey. BorrowMyDoggy is a peer to peer marketplace for dog owners and 'borrowers' - hooking up the dog deprived with owners who need a break from the pawprints for walkies, playdays, sleepovers and happy holidays! A doggy lover who could never own one as a child because of her mother's allergy, Rikke came up with idea when she was looking after a friend's Labrador. In the interview we talk about the inspiration and evolution of the company to date, raising finance and the struggles building a marketplace. 

Meet Rikke

Current Job CEO and Founder of BorrowMyDoggy

Education Double bachelor in Business and Economics from The American University of Paris. MBA, INSEAD.

Go to meeting spot There’s a little Italian Cafe around the corner from here that I love, so I spent a lot of time having meetings there.

Favourite book/podcast There is a great Ted Talk by Simon Sinek about how great leaders inspire and it was the foundation for BorrowMyDoggy.

Necessary extravagance Chai lattes

Favourite productivity tool/app Evernote

How do you switch off Spending time with friends, family or going for a long walk. 

Female inspiration in business Reshma Sohoni

Hottest UK tech company (apart from BorrowMyDoggy!) Property Partner

The Journey

Tell us about BorrowMyDoggy - can you briefly explain the concept and the motivation behind founding it? 

BorrowMyDoggy is an online platform connecting dog owners to local dog lovers (borrowers) to help them take care of their pooch! It allows the borrowers to help take care of the dogs when the owners are busy, this can be for a walk, a weekend or a whole holiday. Our members are everyone from the retired, families with kids, students etc...we have all demographics in our database! 

Our mission is to leave ‘Pawprints of Happiness’ on the lives of dogs and humans 

I borrowed a very cute brown Labrador called Aston over three and a half years ago and I spent all day in the parks with her and I remember thinking why are people spending so much money on dog walkers or kennels or leaving their dogs alone when I would love to take care of the dog for free - everyone could benefit. This was the inspiration for BorrowMyDoggy - I shared the idea with my friend who said it was a good concept and that I should pitch it at the Lean Startup Machine. 

What is Lean Startup Machine and can you share your experience being part of it? 

Lean Startup Machine is an intensive three-day workshop which teaches entrepreneurs and innovators how to build disruptive products. The workshop kicks off with a series of product pitches that help attendees organise into teams. I pitched BorrowMyDoggy and it received the most votes from the 60 attendees! So I had a lot of people wanting to be on my team for the duration of the weekend. I ended up putting together a team bursting with different skills. Each team then develops its problem hypothesis, solution hypothesis and a series of assumptions which are core to the success of the business. We set about creating a minimum viable product with the goal of going to speak with real customers to obtain validation for the idea. The process promotes a problem-centric approach to business ideation. By continuously validating and invalidating assumptions, teams are forced to pivot their solution (and even problem) toward a true customer pain; rather than creating a solution and after-the-fact seeking customers with a problem.

We built a basic landing page and we also put up posters in various different places in London. Within three days 85 people had signed up! One of the questions we asked these potential customers was their reason for signing up and the responses were overwhelming - some people literally wrote paragraphs! There was an old man in Cornwall who had just had an operation and said how lovely it would be if he could make some new friends with people who could come take his dog for walks, there were families wanting to test a dog with their kids and even an Australian student who missed their dog from home. After hearing these we realised that there was a genuine demand here and not just from professionals in London - they gave me the impetus to continue with BorrowMyDoggy after Lean Startup Machine ended. 

What is the best piece of business advice you have been given? 

Create something that solves a problem, not just for you personally, go out and validate that a lot of other people face the same problem. 

BorrowMyDoggy

What has been the evolution to date of BorrowMyDoggy and what is the most exciting thing you are currently working on? 

It all seems to have gone by extraordinarily fast! Right after we set up the landing page a friend tweeted about us and it led to a small article in Emerald Street...within 24 hours we had a 1000 sign ups and it kind of snowballed from there! We did our first round of funding which allowed us to build the initial automated matching system instead of me manually filtering through everyone trying to figure out who lived in what postcode - it took about 55 emails to get one match! We have also launched our mobile app and have been growing our community, working with partners and expanding the team. 

What were the largest obstacles you faced when launching BorrowMyDoggy and what is the biggest challenge today? 

To begin with our biggest challenge was manual matching. We didn't have an automated system and relied on me going through and matching the owners and borrowers (not very scalable!). Other challenges have been raising capital partially because what we are doing is very different to the existing solutions. We also faced obstacles educating our two-sided marketplace about dog safety. Today, our biggest challenge is hiring quality tech talent to help us scale faster. 

What are the future ambitions for the Company? 

Do more of the same in more places. There are somewhere between 9-10 million dogs in the UK and Ireland so we are really just touching such a small % of that right now. We will also continue to evolve and improve our product - one of the exciting things we are currently working on is making our messaging platform a lot more seamless and better to use. 

What advice do you have for others building a two sided marketplace? 

I recently read a Forbes article talking about the difficulty of building two sided marketplaces and the chicken-and-egg problem of supply and demand. For example, it took Wattpad, a community for readers and writers, three years to get to 300,000 uploads; then it only took another three years to reach 10 million! 

It is about getting that local liquidity in the various different areas. I think it takes a lot of focus and perseverance because marketplaces do just take longer. My advice is to speak to other entrepreneurs steeped in marketplaces and solicit their input. 

Women in Tech

What advice do you have for women looking to start their own business and raise capital? 

Find something that you are genuinely incredibly passionate about and know that there is a problem for you to solve. The reason this is so important is that when the going gets really tough it will keep you going! It will also help when you fundraise. I was on a panel recently and a women said that she had had 98 rejections so far from investors...Also make sure that you are really ready to speak with investors before going out and spending a lot of time fundraising.

What business support networks do you value? 

1. ICE - I hugely respect and appreciate all of their advice and help along the way 
2. Seedcamp family - they are amazing with regards to mentoring, opening up investor networks and just so many learnings! 

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Vanessa Gstettenbauer - Investing in our Future Founders!

Over an early breakfast at The Wolseley I was dazzled by the energy, passion and vision of Vanessa! We met at an investor networking drinks where we were able to discuss a little about women in VC and the future of investment but I was excited to hear her full account! Vanessa is a senior investment manager at Founders Factory (more on that later) and has been trailblazing the investment eco-system ever since leaving her graduate investment banking job. She is passionate about education and health and the opportunity for technology to have an impact in these arenas. Enjoy her honest and fascinating reflections! 

Meet Vanessa

Current Job Senior Investment Manager at Founders Factory 

First Job Research analyst at Simon-Kucher & Partners (strategy consulting) throughout my three years at University. I worked with them c10-15 hours/week doing everything from excel jobs to pricing models. 

Go to meeting spot It was Campus London but now my office is West so I have been frequenting the Blanche Eatery

Favourite book Hooked by Nir Eyal 

Necessary extravagance Barrecore classes! 

Favourite productivity tool WorkFlowy 

Favourite place in London Archer Street - I grew up doing lots of Musical Theatre, especially at University, and absolutely love the atmosphere in there. Best place to have a few drinks and get into a great mood!

Female inspiration in business Martha Lane Fox 

Top networking tip It's not about 'working the room' and artificially instigating as many conversations as possible. It is to start conversations until you find someone you genuinely click with and actually enjoy talking to. That will form a much deeper bond and the chance of you staying in touch is infinitely higher.

Most interesting tech startup in London right now The Skills Academy 

The Journey

How and why did you enter the investment paradigm? 

I studied chemistry and grew up in DaimlerChrysler city in Germany so I imagined going into business meets tech/engineering. But upon moving to the UK I was hit hard by the bank propaganda, and was led to believe that I would learn the most starting my career in banking. After only 6 months I realised I was unstimulated and bored.

I wasn't targeting to get into VC but I happened to come across a job spec and everything it said I wanted to do! There were so many synergies between my passions/background and Holtzbrinck Digital as they focus on edtech and science software, I think this is ultimately why I got the job over the third year analysts they were initially seeking. They were very patient and so I finished a year at Bank of America Merrill Lynch and I joined them in summer 2014. I was an analyst for 6 months before being promoted to investment manager of the education fund - an incredible baptism of fire. I then made the leap to Founders Factory upon the deal between Holtzbrinck and FF.  

What is your motivation? 

My ethos is that tech can do so much good for the world, I feel we have only begun to scratch the surface of tech's potential to revolutionise. Currently there is still a bit of a money race chasing after valuations and not enough money and focus is being directed at the big problems facing society (Magic Leap is valued at $4.5bn with no product! If there is this much attention and investment into a VR game imagine the advances we could make if more was aimed at addressing health/refugees/education). I love the Founders Pledge for this reason - it allows entrepreneurs to make a difference and commit to donate 2% of their personal proceeds to a social cause of their choice following an exit. 

What is the most exciting thing you are working on right now? 

At Founders Factory we also build our own startups in the incubation side of the business. The concept is to launch a new company every 6 months in each of the identified sectors. There will be 6 sectors and we will work alongside a relevant corporate for each to help us figure out the trends and pain points. FF have partnered with Holtzbrinck for education and The Guardian for media and we will announce the partners for fintech/beauty/telecoms and retail imminently! 

So it was very exciting for me to chair the latest edtech ideation workshop with Holtzbrinck! We had 5 of the most knowledgeable edtech sector experts in the room resulting in a huge outpouring of ideas. We prioritised and begun doing more research into market sizes and where we might have the best advantage in the Factory to build upon. 

What has been your biggest challenge? 

Being a woman you are naturally quite emotional and I do find it hard to work with people who are seemingly incredibly confident all the time. I am a very secure person too but also prone to doubt and question if I have done the right thing. This is particularly challenging in VC where no one is checking your work. However, after a year and a half I have more perspective and I am more forgiving on myself if I do make mistakes - we are just human after all! 

What are your future ambitions? 

I want to start my own company eventually, likely in edtech or healthtech! I have numerous unfinished ideas: reskilling individuals whose jobs won't exist in the future or addressing fair salaries for women. In the long term however, I am passionate about being a smart money investor as I love the variety it offers. 

Founders Factory

Tell us about Founders Factory and your role there

We're a new model in business creation with extraordinary ambition and breadth. Together with our blue chip corporate partners, we build and scale early stage technology companies across multiple sectors.  We invest capital and resources in building the next generation of breakout technology businesses at an unprecedented scale. We will build and scale 200 early stage technology companies across multiple sectors in the next five years. We are born out of the Founders Forum; the top network of entrepreneurs and business leaders, giving us unparalleled access to corporate partners, audiences, and access to capital. 

I reside in the corporate development team as well as doing business development - so I am involved in both the acceleration and incubation parts of Founders Factory - it is a wonderfully varied role! I am heavily engaged operationally with our companies - I help them set goals, track performance, help with their pitches, business plans and partnerships right through to the fundraising. I also develop close relationships with the VC eco-system to ascertain the best mutual fit for our startups. We try to be very bespoke in this regard and perfect the matching of startups and VCs always aiming for more intimate connections rather than large-scale reach outs. 

Do you have an investment thesis? 

Because of our world class team of experienced operators and global network, we have the ability to attract the best ideas and talent. It’s more of a mutual attraction. We’re looking for ideas that will change industries using technology and entrepreneurs behind those ideas that are attracted to our unique proposition. We are getting involved with very early stage companies, hence there aren't always huge number sets to base decisions on - that actually makes it more interesting I believe. It's about the team, their ambition and in the end the trust you have in them delivering on their promises.

What technology trends excite you right now?

Definitely virtual reality! For example, Viorama a Berlin based VR startup recently launched Splash - A VR video sharing platform that aims to make capturing and publishing 360 videos easy - all from your smartphone without any VR hardware. Such innovation taking place! 

Women in Tech

What advice do you have for women looking to start their own business or enter the investing landscape? 

If you have an idea there are some incredible incubators and accelerators to help you get it off the ground. Founders Factory are also in the process of launching a different kind of program called Founders of the Future. Selected members of the Founders of the Future community will enjoy quarterly events, access to a group of exceptional peers and Founders Forum members, funding and career advice, and key guidance towards the challenge to work on making a positive impact on the world. Lastly there is a great emphasis on women in tech so leverage that. Go to lots of meetings and convince as many people as possible of your vision - you never know what could come out of it. 

We are increasingly moving to a new working order yet so many of the brightest graduates continue to go and work for a big bank or consultancy. What would you say to them to cut through that rhetoric and consider joining a startup? 

You almost get manipulated into thinking that banking and consultancy are the only routes to learning a skill set - but it is a complete farce! I have learnt infinitely more after a year in VC and 6 months in the Factory with more responsibility than my equivalents in the banks. In banking you are close to your associate who is close to their VP etc etc - everybody checks your work so you have no accountability. Counter to this, when you are creating what is going to drive the deal that will make you learn anything. Furthermore, the sleep deprivation makes you more dumbed down - I was slower and not excited about anything. Yes startups fail and yes the banks and consultancies pay more initially, but the difference in earning potential 10 years later is huge and it is a lot more enjoyable to be intellectually stimulated on a daily basis, working with future technologies and incredibly passionate entrepreneurs. 

What business support networks do you value?

I like to be friends with my team and get to know them beyond colleagues - it makes me want to do my job every day! I have also kept a lot of my previous bosses as mentors. I also co-founded the London VC Circle which organises networking events based primarily around activities. We have done a polo and a golf day and have an upcoming clay pigeon shooting event. These kind of events really facilitate a bond and help you build a network in the industry - you need that emotional connection. 

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Elena Sinel - Ed Tech Social Entrepreneur!

Over coffee and cake at Iris and June Elena helps you realise that making a difference is perhaps the most important thing we can do, and she lives by this ethos. She is the founder and CEO of Acorn Aspirations - a social entrepreneur making a huge contribution to young people. Through her hackathons she is able to inspire, engage and introduce technology to 11-18 years olds, facilitating relationships with experienced industry mentors. To mark International Women's Day Acorn Aspirations is organising a TEDx-style event at Google Campus on 8th March, where female founders, entrepreneurs and software engineers will be sharing their journeys and stories with the mission to inspire the next generation of female tech entrepreneurs. This will be followed by a 2-day hackathon on 12-13th March, where girls will be creating their own digital businesses. Hope to see you there! 

Meet Elena

Current Job Founder/CEO, Acorn Aspirations.

First Job Aged 18, Interpreter, British Council, Aral Sea – my introduction to poverty and systemic human rights abuse.

Education MA Conflict, Security and Development, King’s College London.

Languages spoken Russian (native), English, French, Macedonia, Arabic (just because I didn’t think it made sense to learn Amharic in Ethiopia!)

Favourite book The Gadfly by Ethel Voynich had a profound effect on me as I was growing up and nurtured that revolutionary and constantly-challenging-the-status-quo spirit in me.

Necessary Extravagance Tango! I am obsessed with Tango music and dancing – my secret indulgence! 

Favourite productivity tool Gruffalo calendar, of course – just waiting for an app version!

Female inspiration in business My daughter says Megan Smith is "cool". For me it has to be the trio: Megan Smith, Sherry Coutu (because she is doing an amazing job at inspiring children into the world of entrepreneurship with founders4schools) and Martha Lane Fox. 

Top networking tip As a single mum with 2 kids I am very selective about events I go to. I research well and attend events of strategic importance only, then connect and follow up with people immediately.   

 

The Journey 

Can you tell us about your background prior to founding Acorn Aspirations?

Prior to founding Acorn Aspirations I spent about 10 years travelling, volunteering, living and working in some of the most deprived and corrupt places in the world: Uzbekistan (where I originally come from), the Balkans, Ethiopia and Chittagong Hill Tracts in Bangladesh, hoping I would make a difference in the lives of ordinary people, until I had a wake up call and realised the international system was deliberately created and structured in ways that perpetuated conflict, deprivation and underdevelopment. I witnessed corruption at the levels of the UN, World Bank and International Politics, foreign aid being thrown at dictatorships due to vested geopolitical interest, innocent people abused just because they dared to question the status quo and people suffering at the hands of their own governments.  

What were your biggest takeaways from those experiences? 

My biggest takeaway was the realisation that "development" has to come from people themselves and not us, consultants trying to impose our own solutions to the problems we do not fully comprehend. I would like to think I have helped some people find their way out of poverty: when their lives no longer mattered to the governments (like disadvantaged women in the Aral Sea), or when I co-founded a Business Without Borders network in the Balkans and watched young people across 8 countries communicate through trade and entrepreneurship, whilst their respective governments were having political “disagreements”, or helped inspire and empower local craftsmen in Ethiopia and Bangladesh.

At the same time, my experiences have informed my current work and the social mission I am furthering: provide teenagers and those at risk of becoming NEET (Not in Employment, Education or Training) with opportunities to embrace technology and consider entrepreneurship as a viable career choice. I am placing teenagers themselves at the very core of their own development by offering them the tools that could accelerate their growth as individuals and professionally and an opportunity to transform their own lives – there is nothing as rewarding as knowing that you have made a real difference in people’s lives.

Tell us about the inspiration behind Acorn Aspirations

Acorn Aspirations was born at a time when I realised I could no longer "save the world", something I idealistically dreamed about from a very early age (dosed up on a lot of Russian classical literature, I suppose), and that I should instead focus on something more tangible and something that will make a real difference to people's lives in the long-term. I came to settle in the UK, broke away from an abusive relationship and decided to it was time to build my very own something, something I would be very proud of and something that will make my children proud as they grow up.

Education was a perfect challenge: it has not changed in more than 60 years, it no longer reflects the current job market and it simply is not equipping school leavers with skills that really matter in this ever so digital and technology oriented world we live in. At the same time, entrepreneurship was something I have been passionate about since age 18 working in the Aral Sea when I witnessed a real transformation in women who lost everything, but who were empowered to create change for themselves and their families through entrepreneurship. 

Fusing technology, entrepreneurship and education was just an obvious choice when I was deciding about what to do next and this is where Acorn Aspirations was born. 

What is the mission of Acorn Aspirations? 

Acorn Aspirations is pioneering a new approach that puts teenagers aged 16-18 in a position where they are empowered to build their own future. We do this through hackathon/start-up weekends where teenagers collaborate with software engineers, designers and entrepreneurs to build digital businesses of their own based on the problems they want to solve or passions they have. By the end of the weekend they will have learned how to code, have some basic understanding of branding, digital marketing, user experience, and business models, as well as learnt soft skills such as teamwork and communications skills.

Following the hackathon, teenagers will continuously be mentored by software engineers and business mentors, attend free workshops and events in coding, IP law, marketing, branding and network with entrepreneurs and peers embarking on the same journey. At the same time, we are building a digital platform that will encourage teenagers from across London, as well as outside of London to showcase projects they work on, seek expert support online and fundraise to take their businesses to the next level. Powering this with online courses and offering work experience incentives would make this one-stop shop for teenagers that are looking for something other than a traditional route to university or employment.

What is the single best piece of business advice that helped shape who you are as an entrepreneur today?

It would not be business advice, but a book (How the Steel was Tempered) I read in that highly impressionable age of 13 that somehow left an imprint in my mind and defined what I do in life and in business: 

Man's dearest possession is life. It is given to him but once, and he must live it so as to feel no torturing regrets for wasted years, never know the burning shame of a mean and petty past; so live that, dying he might say: all my life, all my strength were given to the finest cause in all the world…

To me, this cause is very simple: make a difference in people’s lives.

Acorn Aspirations

Tell us everything about your upcoming event #ACORNHACKGIRLS !! 

#ACORNHACKGIRLS is very much a passion project, but could well open a very special chapter in the core business of Acorn Aspirations, although I have never intended to have a specific gender-focused business agenda. A number of things have happened that made me want to do something in this space: In January in a conversation with my daughter's teacher with regard advice on GCSE subject selection, she mentioned the usual core subjects. I asked about Computer Science, which she simply brushed off with,  "It is not what the government considers as important or necessary, besides, she is a girl".

A few weeks later, I was invited to a private viewing of "Debugging the Gender Gap" which highlighted the shockingly low numbers of women in tech jobs, the gender pay gap and the stereotypes about what girls should or should not study. I will never forget my daughter's reaction after the film: "Mum, I remember this woman from the film, we met her in Parliament [Megan Smith, CTO of USA] you never told me she was THAT cool!" I wondered: "If a 40 min film had such an impact on Victoria, what would happen if ..." And this is how #acornhackgirls was born: a 2 part event where girls first hear inspiring stories from 20 powerful female founders, CTOs and software engineers, followed by a hackathon/start-up style weekend where the same girls get a chance to transform their lives and potentially, lives of many people around them.

What were the highlights of your previous hackathon event - #MakeItHappen? 

#MakeItHappen was an incredibly proud moment of my life: I did not imagine I would be able to bring together entrepreneurs, designers and developers with the sole purpose: to inspire the next generation of entrepreneurs. It was amazing to watch the transformation of our young participants and watch them grow within just 2 days, embracing the challenge and confidently pitching ideas they truly believed in in front of some very accomplished entrepreneurs and CEOs: Mike Butcher (Editor-in-Large, TechCrunch), Neeta Patel (CEO, New Entrepreneurs Foundation), Stewart Niblock (CEO, Autotorq), Will King (CEO, King of Shaves), Nancy Fechnay (Flight.vc; Interim Director, Techstars) and Amali de Alwis (CEO CodeFirst:Girls). I wanted to create something big and for people to notice how incredibly important entrepreneurship was and how, if injected from an early age, it could transform lives.

What is the vision for Acorn Aspirations? 

The vision is very much global - Acorn Aspirations has big plans and our vision is to connect young people from across the world to opportunities that would accelerate young people’s potential and turn them into change-makers and confident leaders.

Women in Tech

Which business networks do you value? 

I am incredibly proud of being part of women-in-tech networks such as Ada’s List, Girls In Tech and Women Who Code and a very active pioneer of women’s and young girls’ right to be part of global technological revolution, not only as consumers but as active creators. 

How do you handle being a working mum - any advice for others? 

Embrace it! Children transform us in ways we never expect them to – life is never the same again, and yet life is unimaginable without them. It is a challenge, but a challenge I enjoy: I had my daughter Victoria when I was very young, she travelled since birth and has always been part of everything I have ever created. I try to involve her in my work, I discuss projects with her and make her and her friends part of all events and hackathons I organise. My son is only 2.5 and an absolute joy of a little boy – he has been coming with me into lecture halls since only a few weeks old! 

How can we do better to attract and retain women in technology? 

Immersing girls into the word of technology and entrepreneurship needs to start when girls are still in primary schools. Coding should be embraced and become compulsory, just as English or Maths is, because girls should understand how technology transforms the world around them and become creators rather than consumers – there is no reason why such entrepreneurial spirit cannot be injected from an early age as children by nature are incredibly creative. 

What you cannot see you cannot be - so make female software engineers and female CEOs visible, precisely what we will be doing during our AcornHack:Girls events; nurture intra-generational mentoring relationships, create and reinforce role models and make work flexible, particularly when family becomes an important consideration.  

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