CINCINNATI -- What Downtown software company enosiX does sounds so simple, you wonder why no one has done it before.
But then you learn that it’s not so simple to make the programs of two of the world’s most popular software vendors work together, as enosiX does.
Who are the vendors?
They are Salesforce.com and SAP.
San Francisco-based Salesforce.com makes customer relations software that sales people use to manage opportunities, leads and new prospects.
Walldorf, Germany-based SAP makes software used for back-end processing, typically for tracking shipments of products.
EnosiX, whose name is derived from a Greek word for simplify/unify, unites the companies’ programs to give sales people a 360-degree view of the customer, co-founder and CEO Gerald Schlechter said. And it does this on mobile devices.
That’s helpful, for example, because one of the first things customers want to know from their sales reps is, “Has my previous order been shipped?,” he said.
What’s Schlechter’s story?
Born on a dairy farm in Austria, he came to the U.S. while doing diligence for a company that was buying an Oakley-based company. In Cincinnati, he met a local woman that he married, and they settled in North Avondale.
He has started two other companies -- a small consulting company that he sold, and then Cincinnati-based Consulting Network Business Solutions, which he said does business-to-business e-commerce and payment solutions, which he still owns.
He started thinking about creating enosiX about three years ago, and in 2014, the company received $4.25 million in a funding round co-led by Cincinnati-based Allos Ventures.
Altogether, the company has raised a about $8 million from investors, Schlechter said, and plans to close a B round of funding early next year -- though he declined to say how much it hopes to raise.
Do they have customers?
Yes, including Yeti, an Austin, Texas-based maker of premium coolers and drinkware.
Schlechter declined to say how much money enosiX is making, but added that it’s on target to have $1 million in software subscriptions by the end of the year.
How about employees?
There are 17 now, and Schlechter expects to hire eight to 12 more by spring 2017.
Finding good employees has been difficult, he said, because at this point, the company can’t offer what big, local employers like Procter & Gamble can. Employees do get stock in the company, he said, and the chance to work with new, disruptive technology.
Earlier this month, enosiX signed up as a strategic adviser Steve Millard, owner of Aquila Growth Advisors in Centerville, Ohio, to help enosiX manage its expected growth.
Millard formerly worked as general manager of the Americas for Redwood City, Calif.-based data company Informatica.
It’s rare to find a startup in this area that has created tech software that can disrupt a captive marketplace, he said.
“Gerald is a really savvy entrepreneur,” Millard said. “His challenge will be to really take this technology to market as fast as possible and as aggressively as possible, while, at the same time, managing that growth curve.”
What’s next?
EnosiX plans to use its Series B capital to expand nationally and internationally, Schlechter said.
The product fills a very tight niche in the market, Millard said, “but it’s also a very large marketplace as well." The company’s competitors do some of the things enosiX does, he said, but not very well, not cost-effectively and not with a mobile app.
It’s really rare to have such a revolutionary approach to solving an IT problem, Schlechter said, because so much has already been done.
“Everybody tries to solve IT problems, right?” he added.
Schlechter expects that one day, some large tech company will buy enosiX, but hopes that won’t happen for a while.
“As long as we can keep growing, the value of the company keeps going up, and that’s good for the shareholders and employees,” he said.
