1. Jen McGann, Andrew Lee, Luis Suarez & Becca Wolfe February 7, 2017

2. “The Internet of trust. Powered by you.”
Company Overview
Founders
Started in 2012, new form of credit score to empower people.
4.5M users in 2014 (for a Facebook led version of the service) (1).
Algorithm uses non-credit like data to determine people’s trustworthiness. (eBay, AirBnB profiles, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.)
3 co founders, MBA, PhD, and Engineer in Computer Science
Team of 12 across Madrid, US, UK, Budapest, and Australia
Major benefits – People with non-traditional jobs get access to financial services, rating travels across countries
Financing
Raised 3 rounds of financing
Small accelerator round (2 investors)
$700K, Larger round (3 investors)
$4M, Series A (5 investors)
Also have 4 Angel Investors
Will start to look for additional funding in the company months
(1)

3. Appreciating people’s reputation in context
Identity
Proof that you are who you say you are with social network verification
Facebook account
Mobile phone
Passport (soon)
Behavior
Information about you taken from “social metrics” in order to create a “page rank”
E.g. Who follows you on Twitter. Having 5000 fake followers will raise a flag
Endorsement
Pulls your reviews from marketplaces such as eBay or Airbnb
Does not need to be purely online
Endorsements from friends and colleagues

4. Using blockchain to power Traity’s platform
Consumer driven
Authenticate using blockchain
Traity driven
Rent Airbnb
Traity Engineer
Lender driven
Receive review from host
Compile social media reviews
Use Uber
Purchase on Ebay
Generate reputation rating
Customer
Insurance Company
Signs up for Traity
Add to blockchain identity card
Match parties
Create requirements
Traity Platform
Landlord

5. Race to win reputation-based platform
Company
Description
Funding and Round
Create a world where we can trust one another, building a reputation standard
Total: $4.7M, 2 rounds
Most Recent: $4.7, A, 07/04/014
Dedicated to creating trust online, through our consumer product miiCard and our business product DirectID
Total: $9.15M, 5 rounds
Most Recent: $3.5M, A, 12/01/2014
Online reputation and reviews solution for sellers on an eCommerce platform
Total: $1.8M, 2 rounds
Most Recent: $1.7M, Seed, 01/19/2016
Increases personal reputation online
Total: Undisclosed, 1 round
Most Recent: Seed, 04/05/2016
Identity verification and background checks for marketplaces
Total: $600K, 2 rounds
Most Recent: $100K, Seed, 08/2014
*Source: Crunchbase

6. Will Traity succeed as the credit score of the future?
Key Challenge: Unable to match early user growth with sign-ups of key partners
Financial Health
In 2014, users skyrocketed to over 4.5 million
Important service providers like Airbnb and Uber don’t adopt Traity’s API
Less value and incentive for users to use their Traity profile than anticipated
Shift to targeting smaller sharing economy startups with larger need for aggregate reputation data
Funding left from Series A, plan to start raising Series B in next few months
Not currently profitable: no fees earned from startup partners
Business model hinges on success of insurance and fintech partnerships still in very early stages
Company Pivot: Moving focus towards credit and insurance industries
So do we think Traity will succeed?
The company suffered from early growth as their platform went viral and they successfully signed up over 4.5 million users
Don’t charge fees for integration of traity’s reputation API b/c Traity gains value in terms of data in exchange for each marketplace sign-up
Unfortunately the demand on the startup/service provider was not as high as anticipated
Big companies like uber, Airbnb didn’t sign up b/c see their reputation information as a competitive advantage
Traity can get around this somewhat through oauths that pull in some of this info, but still without these large marketplaces using the their API they found that there was less value and incentive for users to use their traity profile
They’ve since shifted their sharing economy focus towards targeting smaller sharing economy startups with more need for aggregate reputation data
But the real shift in focus has been towards targeting the credit and insurance industries
See this as area where reputation is most important, moral hazard in part of user comes into play
Starting with tenant guarantees and rental insurance for landlords – providing access to people without good credit scores, discounts
See this expanding to all types of insurance and some financial services and are actively looking for partners
From a financial perspective
Still have funding left but plan to start raising next round in next few months
Aren’t currently profitable b/c the startup partners aren’t charged any fees so therefore the success of their business model lays on how successful their current beta tests go with DAS and whether they’re able to attract the right partners
All in all, Traity has a lofty goal to be the credit score of the future. This will require not only the right partners, but the ability to aggregrate the right data to serve as an acceptable substitute for the reputation data used today. And even with this, it’s too early to say if there will be mainstream adoption of this, and we also worry that since the Traity repuptation data is owned by the user, there may be selection bias in terms of who uses this, and also down the line what people share as a means to maintain a positive reputation (think Black Mirror).
Final Thoughts: Can Traity attract the right partners? What about the right data? Will there be mainstream adoption? Or a selection bias in who uses Traity?
First partnership announced late 2016: offering tenant guarantees and rental insurance for landlords with DAS Spain
Actively looking for insurance and bank partners, taking new proofs of concept