Dominoes Are Falling in the Tech Repair Industry - and I'm not talking about pizza
Wow! In the last three months the TECH repair industry has seen some pretty big dominoes fall and I predict that 2017 will be a breakout year for the industry.
It all started back in mid-August when a company most people had never heard of managed to pull down $15 million in series A funding, led by Carmel Ventures, with Sequoia Capital (a kind of serious name in investing) also participating - after seeding CellSavers with $3 million this past December. An $18 million invest in a less than one year old company kind of says something about the tech repair industry don't ya think?? Down goes a domino.
August 22, 2016 | Israeli startup CellSavers, which provides an on-demand repair platform for smartphones and other mobile devices, has completed a $15 million financing round, led by Carmel Ventures, with participation of Sequoia Capital Israel. The current funding follows the company’s $3 million round in seed funding led by Sequoia Capital in December 2015. CellSavers’ platform is based on an end-to-end technological and operational solution, which enables the company to match consumers and skilled professionals in real time. CellSavers was founded in 2015 by CEO Eyal Ronen and president Itai Hirsch.
Then a bunch of us repair folks headed off to Vegas in September for the 3rd annual Wireless Repair Expo to learn stuff, make new connections, find new vendors and have fun with some GREAT people. Did I mention it was the THIRD Expo?! That's important because it's one for the money, two for the show, three to get ready ... (more later). Another domino!
Now we're into October and it hasn't disappointed yet because two big dominoes have fallen in just the last few days.
The beginning of the week had AT&T and Asurion (you might have heard of these companies) announced that starting on November 15th they will be using 3rd party on-demand repair companies to come fix your phone in select cities (as David Letterman used to always say, "Let's hope your city was selected") with additional cities rolling out in December. This is HUGE news for the repair industry because Asurion is by far the biggest handset insurance provider in the country - maybe the world. Boom goes the domino!!
Then today, we learned that one of the biggest retail repair operators, uBreakiFix, has partnered with a small company called GOOGLE to become the exclusive repair partner for the new Pixel phones in the US and Canada, eh. This is really big news on many different fronts but for the Tech repair industry it is further validation that we can do some pretty big things if these bigger companies are willing to work with us. Another big domino falls!!
Listen folks, big huge corporations like AT&T, Asurion, Google and others move at glacial speed when trying to adopt to new things. 4-5 years ago when I approached people at these big companies there responses were that people just don't get their phones fixed. Then they would try and convince people that it was OK to wait a few days for the repair/replacement - but us smart ones knew different didn't we?
And FOUR to GO!
Friends, we have built a new industry out of nothing struggling to find parts and specs and sometimes tools. But now that hard work is about to payoff because I believe more dominoes are about to fall followed by many more in the months to come. Carriers always follow suit, so Verizon, t-Mobile, Sprint and all of you others knock down that domino. OEM's like Samsung, LG and Huawei want to be direct to market but lacked the support network -- Hello guys we've got a lot of repair people who can help, oh and HEY Samsung, again, we could have been there for ya! Just touch the domino and we'll take care of it!
2017 will be a breakout year for the tech repair industry! And it's not just handsets. There is so much Tech hitting the market right now and who is going to fix it (#Whosgonnafixit)? We are!
Now enjoy a little Van Morrision then get to work!
It all started back in mid-August when a company most people had never heard of managed to pull down $15 million in series A funding, led by Carmel Ventures, with Sequoia Capital (a kind of serious name in investing) also participating - after seeding CellSavers with $3 million this past December. An $18 million invest in a less than one year old company kind of says something about the tech repair industry don't ya think?? Down goes a domino.
August 22, 2016 | Israeli startup CellSavers, which provides an on-demand repair platform for smartphones and other mobile devices, has completed a $15 million financing round, led by Carmel Ventures, with participation of Sequoia Capital Israel. The current funding follows the company’s $3 million round in seed funding led by Sequoia Capital in December 2015. CellSavers’ platform is based on an end-to-end technological and operational solution, which enables the company to match consumers and skilled professionals in real time. CellSavers was founded in 2015 by CEO Eyal Ronen and president Itai Hirsch.
Then a bunch of us repair folks headed off to Vegas in September for the 3rd annual Wireless Repair Expo to learn stuff, make new connections, find new vendors and have fun with some GREAT people. Did I mention it was the THIRD Expo?! That's important because it's one for the money, two for the show, three to get ready ... (more later). Another domino!Now we're into October and it hasn't disappointed yet because two big dominoes have fallen in just the last few days.
The beginning of the week had AT&T and Asurion (you might have heard of these companies) announced that starting on November 15th they will be using 3rd party on-demand repair companies to come fix your phone in select cities (as David Letterman used to always say, "Let's hope your city was selected") with additional cities rolling out in December. This is HUGE news for the repair industry because Asurion is by far the biggest handset insurance provider in the country - maybe the world. Boom goes the domino!!
Listen folks, big huge corporations like AT&T, Asurion, Google and others move at glacial speed when trying to adopt to new things. 4-5 years ago when I approached people at these big companies there responses were that people just don't get their phones fixed. Then they would try and convince people that it was OK to wait a few days for the repair/replacement - but us smart ones knew different didn't we?
And FOUR to GO!
Friends, we have built a new industry out of nothing struggling to find parts and specs and sometimes tools. But now that hard work is about to payoff because I believe more dominoes are about to fall followed by many more in the months to come. Carriers always follow suit, so Verizon, t-Mobile, Sprint and all of you others knock down that domino. OEM's like Samsung, LG and Huawei want to be direct to market but lacked the support network -- Hello guys we've got a lot of repair people who can help, oh and HEY Samsung, again, we could have been there for ya! Just touch the domino and we'll take care of it!
2017 will be a breakout year for the tech repair industry! And it's not just handsets. There is so much Tech hitting the market right now and who is going to fix it (#Whosgonnafixit)? We are!
Now enjoy a little Van Morrision then get to work!
What's their interest in Repair? phone screen repair
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