🐳Swelly for Y Combinator S17 — Our 6th try 🙌

Dear reader, I hope this inspires you to keep trying to get what you want.

Also If you think of starting a project in the bots or A.I. space, stop thinking and start doing. The time is now 🚀

COMPANY

Company name: dvel Inc.

Company url, if any: http://www.swell.wtf

Online demo: https://youtu.be/tXYQlNw7mv4

Describe your company in 50 characters or less:

Swell connects vote-minded people

What is your company going to make?

Swell is a Social Network on top of Messaging platforms. It’s bots connect people who share similar opinions across all platforms. You can ask any A/B question and ask the community for their opinion, based on people’s choices we match vote-minded people.

Which category best applies to your company?

Consumer

Is this application in response to a YC RFS? Yes

If yes, which one? A.I.

Where do you live now, and where would the company be based after YC?

(List as City A, Country A / City B, Country B.)

Los Angeles CA / Los Angeles CA

CONTACT

Email address we should contact you at: pete@swell.wtf

Phone number(s):+13024657745

FOUNDERS

@Pete Peter Buchroithner:

@Fred Manfred Strasser:

@Phil Philipp Holly:

Founder Video: https://youtu.be/xPJgvfe02C4

Please tell us about an interesting project, preferably outside of class or work, that two or more of you created together. Include urls if possible.

We cooked & eat Schnitzel every day to convince Arnold Schwarzenegger (ArnoldSchnitzel) to join & become our ambassador: fb.me/thedailyschnitzel

We did 153 days, invited new guests every day for networking since we are new in LA and it only takes an hour lunch break. We got in touch with his investment manager :)

Watch the videos here:

The Daily Schnitzel

How long have the founders known one another and how did you meet? Have any of the founders not met in person?

Pete and Fred met 12 years ago, lived together for 7 years and worked together on a previous startup. Phil joined in Dec. 2015 when we where looking for a CTO and moved with us from Vienna to LA.

PROGRESS

How far along are you?

we launched our Swelly chat bot on 5 platforms including Messenger. Got featured by kik and FB and had 2.5M+ people trying it.

How long have each of you been working on this? Have you been part-time or full-time? Please explain.

for 2 years, all of us full-time

Which of the following best describes your progress?

Launched

How many active users or customers do you have? If you have some particularly valuable customers, who are they?

XXX DAU, XXX MAU,

a group of X people used our product for longer than 3 months.

Our Influencers — Swell Heroes — use our product to get feedback on which videos they should do next on YouTube, etc. we have 300 of them

Do you have revenue?

Yes

What was your revenue last month?

NOT GONNA SHARE THIS HERE. It’s 5 figures / month though :)

Anything else you would like us to know regarding your revenue or growth rate?

We’re getting featured by Viber, Google Play and Facebook which will give us another big boost in the next 30 days. Also we hit 100k in Sales this month.

How much money do you spend per month?

NOT GONNA SHARE THIS, Investors feel free to ask :)

How much money does your company have in the bank now?

NOT GONNA SHARE THIS, Investors feel free to ask :)

How long is your runway? (e.g. 5 months)

NOT GONNA SHARE THIS, Investors feel free to ask :)

If you’ve applied previously with the same idea, how much progress have you made since the last time you applied? Anything change?

grew from 450k to 2.5M users, built the whole App into Messenger (webviews, etc.) established strong partnerships with Facebook, Viber, kik and Google Play. Our approach changed from decision making to collecting opitions and matching vote-minded people

If you have already participated or committed to participate in an incubator, “accelerator” or “pre-accelerator” program, please tell us about it.

we haven’t

IDEA

Why did you pick this idea to work on? Do you have domain expertise in this area? How do you know people need what you’re making?

Pete had his own fashion stores, found out that number 1 reason why people don’t buy is they can’t decide. We started interviewing 1000+ people to build an MVP and people loved it.

What’s new about what you’re making? What substitutes do people resort to because it doesn’t exist yet (or they don’t know about it)?

Swell can be reached without downloading an app, it’s faster then any other tool. People use whatsapp/kik for private questions or Twitter/FB for public.

Who are your competitors, and who might become competitors? Who do you fear most?

Competitors: Quora, Whale, Sigo, Wishbone, etc. we don’t look at competition;

@fear most: We’re focusing on partnerships with potential big competitors+ grow big on every other platform we work with (line, viber, kik, telegram, slack, skype…)

What do you understand about your business that other companies in it just don’t get?

people are looking for fast responses on quesitons and want to make new friends outside of their networks. chatbots are not about A.I. (yet). Chat is a new browser that helps companies grow. We leverage that to build a multi-platform network.

How do or will you make money? How much could you make?

(We realize you can’t know precisely, but give your best estimate.)

Market Research; think ask questions + get answer within 24h (quantitative feedback) in a SaaS tool. Additionally send survey to top influencers in specific field to get qualified feedback.

How will you get users? If your idea is the type that faces a chicken-and-egg problem in the sense that it won’t be attractive to users till it has a lot of users (e.g. a marketplace, a dating site, an ad network), how will you overcome that?

1. People invite friends so they can share private questions. (30% of growth)
2. We work with influencers who become our experts: pay them initially; CPI < 1$; keep them by growing an audience for them
3. Getting Featured (currently at Messenger + viber + google play)

EQUITY Have you incorporated, or formed any legal entity (like an LLC) yet?

Yes

What kind of entity and in what state or country was the entity formed?

(e.g. Delaware C Corp)

Delaware C Corp

Please describe the breakdown of the equity ownership in percentages among the founders, employees and any other stockholders.

NOT GONNA SHARE THIS, Investors feel free to ask :)

List any investments your company has received. Include the name of the investor, the amount invested, the premoney valuation / valuation cap, and the type of security sold (convertible notes, safes or stock).

NOT GONNA SHARE THIS, Investors feel free to ask :)

Please provide any other relevant information about the structure or formation of the company.

we bought our Austrian GmbH (limited company) in order to hire & transfer Austrian talent to the Inc, including us founders, got E2 visa.

Inc. owns IP.

LEGAL

Are any of the founders covered by noncompetes or intellectual property agreements that overlap with your project? If so, please explain.

no

Who writes code, or does other technical work on your product? Was any of it done by a non-founder? Please explain.

yes, by 4 employees who signed company contracts

Is there anything else we should know about your company?

(Pending lawsuits, cofounders who have left, etc.)

no

OTHERS

If you had any other ideas you considered applying with, please list them. One may be something we’ve been waiting for. Often when we fund people it’s to do something they list here and not in the main application.

Heroes.ai — Chatbot Builder for influencers to create a bot in 5 min

Waves.ai — Ad-Network that helps bots monetize and brands leverage chat for research

Please tell us something surprising or amusing that one of you has discovered.

(The answer need not be related to your project.)

Justin Kan has good taste in company logos 🐳

CURIOUS

What convinced you to apply to Y Combinator?

my friend Effrat from Bonobo.ai

How did you hear about Y Combinator?

by friends

Any questions please reach out: pete@swell.wtf