1. 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

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

3. Improving the integration channel
Recommendation
Improving the integration channel

4. 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

5. 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”

6. 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

7. 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”

8. 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

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

10. 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

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

12. 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

13. 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

14. 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

15. 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