2018 is right around the corner and I thought I’d start celebrating the great year 2017 has been a list of the most promising startups in tech that you should look for in the coming year. And before I start dropping names left and right, I do want to point out that this list is purely biased and strictly based on my uneducated opinion. So without further ado here are the top 7 tech startups I’m looking forward to seeing in 2018.
1. Zentoshop
Zentoshop is a Magento based e-commerce Saas that allows store owners to go online in a matter of minutes and the guys behind the product have managed to solve one of the biggest issues I had with Saas E-commerce platforms and that would be scalability. Normally, a store you build on a similar platform would work (probably great) for the first few months, maybe a year, but the minute you hit big traffic numbers, orders or have a lot of products, the platform would crumble under its own weight. Zentoshop having Magento under the hood solves this issue, allowing the user to take advantage of all the benefits of having a Magento shop without any of the drawbacks, which are mostly the technical issues that force Magento store owners to hire one or more developers to do regular maintenance and updates on the system to ensure everything’s running smoothly.
2. eDrone.me
The app is positioned as a CRM but my experience in the e-commerce field makes me look a bit further behind curtains, at the “magic behind eDrone”. The amount of data that the system handles and the process is impressive but then they’ve created a machine learning algorithm that provides insight and allows you to take actions that increase the LTV of the customer through a number of – simple to use and integrate – tools. It has about a gagillion integrations already, from Magento, Woocommerce to Shopify and Opencart.
Oh, did I mention you can start using the app for free, so yeah, I’d strongly suggest keeping an eye out for these guys, they are definitely on to something!
3. TypingDNA
By this point, the phrase: “the future is AI” should ring true just like the notion that the earth is round which is an undeniable truth, regardless what some may think or share on their social media accounts(looking at you: B.O.B!). The Romanian team behind TypingDNA are trying to shape the future in their own way by using machine learning to develop behavioral biometrics solutions. I know! That sounds soooo fancy but the applications for something like this are countless. Imagine not having to remember a password. Ever! The system can check if you are authorized by your typing patterns. There’s an interesting case study, published on their site that will help you get a better idea of what they are doing
4. SwiftKey
This is no new startup but they have been killing it the past year and have plans of introducing a number of new features in the coming year. I myself have been using SwiftKey for about a year now on all my mobile devices and it works so effortlessly across 2 and even 3 languages without having me to configure settings or change parameters. I look forward to seeing what they have in store for 2018.
5. Snips.ai
There have been multiple similar products with big promises but deliver so little. Snips offers a powerful NLU which is short for Natural Language Understanding system that runs on the users device as opposed to the Cloud like all the other similar system do, which provides better security and privacy and coming next year, when the GDPR will become many companies worst nightmare, Snips is going to have no problems as it has been compliant since day 1.
6. Hundred5
Hundred5 is a hiring platform created by a small Estonian team. The recruiting tool automatically screens candidates’ abilities for the job as a first-pass filter. It makes sure the people you interview have what it takes to be successful in a remote work environment and in the role that you are looking for.
With that in mind, Hundred5 has ditched CV as the main screening tool and replaced it with skill assessments. Besides saving tons of time, those tests also strongly predict success in real work and tell you something you can’t learn from resumes. CV’s are more about how someone is able to present themselves rather than a demonstration of their abilities, which might lead you to select the wrong applicant.
7. Teamweek
Teammweek is project management software and a team calendar. The intuitive platform enables the project manager to assign tasks on a timeline and helps the team stay in the loop with what everyone is up to. Just like Hundred5, Teamweek is also based in Estonia. The company was originally founded by Toggl, but it became a separate company on its own this year. Teamweek is a successful bootstrapped product that you should definitely keep an eye on in 2018.
These have been only 7 companies that have caught my attention in the last few months and even if the list could have gone on for quite a while, I’ll stop here and keep providing updates in the coming months.