Since 2015, the Munich startup Alyne tries to take the regulatory issues to a halt. Co-founder Karl Viertel describes the company as a command center for employees in companies that have to prevent damage from the organization. RegTech provides its customers with software that gives them an overview of the regulatory and legal requirements they currently have to fulfill. Alstin Capital and Hannover Digital Investment invested around 3 million euros in the Munich startup at the end of last year. A total of 4.2 million have flowed into 4.2 million euros. Currently, the young company is trying to gain a foothold in the US. In an interview with deutsche-startups.de Alyne Macher Viertel talks about false security, app case and decision making.
How would you explain to your grandmother Alyne?
Alyne is the command center for corporate employees who need to keep damage from the organization. That’s really just the grandmother answer. Cyber security management, internal control systems or operational risk management can no longer be explained to most grandmothers.
Has your concept changed somehow since the start?
Basically no. Of course, we respond to new data points and things we’ve learned and adapt accordingly. Everything else would be as start-up arrogant and fatal. However, our concept and business model have basically been preserved.
How exactly has Alyne evolved since its founding?
We have continued to evolve since our launch in the summer of 2015 and the Go-Live product in the spring of 2016. We have been able to continuously develop our product, acquire new customers and recruit more employees at several locations. Of course it was hard work but we have always been able to achieve our goals.
But once butter with the fish: How big is Alyne meanwhile?
We currently have 28 employees as of February 2019. Our team has grown significantly in recent months, following our Series A round. We have opened two more locations and are now represented in Munich, London, Melbourne and New York. So far, we have at least quadrupled our sales year on year.
At the moment, you are particularly driving expansion in the US. What are your expectations for the US market?
The US offers a concentration of target customers and decision-making that is unlikely to exist in any other region. Of course, success can not be guaranteed in advance, but we are convinced that we have developed the right organizational foundations to be very successful in the USA too. I expect very exciting deals in the coming months and look forward to this next phase of development of Alyne.
Please take a look back: What has gone so wrong in the past few years?
We are a very experienced founding team – and above all with four founders well staffed well equipped. I think so far we have been able to save ourselves from major missteps. Of course, we once again stopped working with a partner because the expected results did not materialize or we adjusted our pricing model to optimize sales processes. However, I do not want to weigh myself in false safety – and remain vigilant.
And where have you done everything right so far?
In particular, our technology decisions have proven to be very successful. A combination of scalable platforms, affordable entry level pricing. And the depth of vertical integration has allowed us to produce little app case, keep operating costs low, and deliver outstanding performance for our customers. For example, our availability in 2018 was 100%! I think we have also made good decisions with our investors Alstin and Hannover Digital Investments. The cooperation is great and we can take extensive support.
Where does Alyne stand in a year?
We want to continue our revenue growth, significantly more than 50 employees, and serve several major customers in each of our core regions Germany, UK, Australia and the USA.
Also published on Medium.