Beekeeper : From pivoting startup to disrupting scale up KAIST College of Business, KCB Beekeeper : From pivoting startup to disrupting scale up Haerin Shin, Adam Schwarz, Jaewon Lee, Jason Han

Key issues Not targeting the right industry Inefficient external and internal communication channels Too fast expansion and growth

Improving the integration channel Recommendation Improving the integration channel

Analysis : External Analysis Hospitality Manufacturing Retail Deskless or Non-Desk Jobs = No Computer Significant efficiency generated by communication Beekeeper focused on connecting internal communications Helping companies revolutionize internal communications

Analysis : External Problems Beekeeper Target market is too broad Too many customer needs Expanding too fast; spreading too thin Different geographic needs “80% of the staff is non-desk – they do not have access to a computer … which prevents digital communication”

Analysis : Internal Analysis Zurich San Francisco New London Office New Berlin Office Founded in 2012 Attracted $13 Million in Series A funding round 118 Employees: 13% engineers, 87% other roles Offices in US & Europe

Analysis : Internal Problems Beekeeper Revenues covering 65% of costs Growing pains across offices Sales Vs Engineers Lack of Leadership and Central Mission “The Sales people are selling things the engineers can’t produce”

Alternatives Goal Feasibility Cost Sustainability Unfav Fav Spin-off by services Unfav Fav Remove certain business sectors Consolidating office Hierarchical organizational structure Organizational integration channel improvement

Implementation : Core Integrational role CEO One directional Communication channel Business unit R&D

Implementation : Core Integrational role CEO to decide the service area to focus on Focused service area to share same purpose and goals Shared goal to remove confusion and promote coordination

Implementation : Integrational channel structure Sales Customer Commercial R&D Service owner Team of Engineers Bi-direction Communication channel Service Guide

Implementation : Integrational channel structure Discuss with the service owner about technical feasibility Lets R&D know about customer requests through the service owner Sales Hold ownership of the service being provided Keep the list of customer requests to be fulfilled Service owner Decides technical alignment Defends the provided service Constantly discuss with service owners about the list Service guardian

Implementation : Integrational channel structure Well established communicational channel between sales and R&D Stops the service from growing without the core business model and direction

Implementation : Integration process Adopt the agile process 2~3 week process Frequent feedback Service request list List of customer requests Cycle backlog List of task to be performed within the cycle Implementation Engineers only focus on implementation Delivery Minimal service to be used by customer Retrospective and feedback

Implementation : Integration process Frequent response to customers to deal with ever changing market situation Frequent retrospective for improved service Customer request management to improve customer satisfaction