An office building above the Oktoberfest. A lounge in the entrance area with a PlayStation and a comfortable couch. A long hallway with quite a few framed customer logos. The company's core values are painted on the wall opposite the fruit bar.
We are visiting Testbirds, a Munich-based startup that uses crowdsourcing to offer realistic testing of software such as mobile apps or websites for B2B customers.
A visit to the Nest shows that the three founders' idea is taking off. The first customer arrived in 2011, and in 2012, Philipp Benkler, Georg Hansbauer, and Markus Steinhauser officially founded Testbirds GmbH.
Swarm intelligence for companies
The tester crowd now numbers 100,000, ranging from students and trainees to businesswomen and even grandfathers. The diverse profiles and devices of the test subjects make usability testing and troubleshooting so attractive for companies like Allianz, Audi, and Henkel. Whether mountaineer or nerd, 25 or 50 years old, tablet or smartwatch user – the startup finds the perfect tester crowd for the product, company, and requirements.
Crowdtesting has established itself on the market in recent years as a complement to traditional software testing methods. And Testbirds was one of the first to enter the German market. Keywords such as Internet of Things, Smartwatch Apps or Smart TVs are becoming increasingly relevant.This will gain more and more momentum, and we want to develop even more strongly in this direction,” says Markus Steinhauser, co-founder of Testbirds. The testers find it exciting to try out new products and apps before their official market launch. Recently, a perfectly matched crowd of mothers and fathers tested a baby monitor. For the company, testing in a real-world application offers greater added value than a laboratory test.
At first it wasn't about money
“At the beginning we did projects with other startups. It wasn't primarily about making money, but about gaining experience. After four or five months, the bigger clients came along." Markus explains. The expansion of the tester community also took a while at first – now Testbirds is adding 3,000 international testers every month.
Of course, this exciting business model also faces competition – Testbirds aims to differentiate itself through a clear service philosophy and high quality. The startup also occasionally develops new products based on customer requests. For example, TestChameleon. How did this come about? A customer wanted automated tests in addition to crowdtesting, but couldn't find a suitable solution on the market. This led the three founders to develop a new product with TestChameleon.
Structured tests with employees within the respective company – based on the motto "Bring your own crowd" – have also been developed as an additional service at the request of customers. And the three founders are already working on expanding their product portfolio – but don't want to reveal any details at this time.
Don’t take it easy, but be there from the start
With the start-up financing from the EXIST Start-up Grant The young company was launched through the LMU Munich. Initially, the founders specifically attended events to make contacts and expand their existing network. Soon, evobis, today's BayStartUP, the first round of financing. The investor, Walter Beteiligungen und Immobilien AG, was a good fit, and both founders and financiers quickly agreed. The young company used the seven-figure investment sum to expand its team.Because crowdtesting was starting to gain momentum – and we wanted to be part of it right from the start,” says Markus today.
In 2014, the startup decided to expand in order to be present in the target market. Seventure Partners provided 2.1 million euros for internationalization in the second financing round, a venture capital firm from France. The VC qualified as a suitable partner, among other things, because it gives the founders a great deal of freedom in making decisions regarding personnel, services, and products.
One of the biggest challenges is growth
When asked about challenges, Markus adds the medium-term vision, “that we establish ourselves as the leading and most innovative crowdtesting provider in Europe." The associated challenge is growth. In Munich alone, Testbirds has already undergone three moves, and the current office is currently being expanded. Founder and Managing Director Philipp Benkler, responsible for sales and internationalization, also frequently travels to England and Holland, where he is setting up offices in London and Amsterdam. Stockholm and the Scandinavian market are following suit. A franchise is located in Hungary.
Growth influences internal structures, internal communication, and processes.”We initially established an update breakfast. It was fine with ten people, okay with 15, but with over 20 employees, it took two hours – and no one was interested anymore. That was no longer the right way to stay up to date.…”, Markus gives as an example.
The company now has over 60 employees and is working hard to optimize its processes. "As a startup, you think you don't need structures, but at some point, team structure or quality suffers. Then it becomes an issue." And the search for employees is also influenced by the strong growth.”With three employees, everyone still has to be able to do everything; now we're looking for specialists."
So what are the success criteria…
The question always arises: What makes a startup successful? The business idea? A complementary founding team? Or is it a financial injection at the right time? In Testbirds' case, it was certainly the mix. With a business graduate, a business information systems graduate with a master's degree in finance and information management, and a communications specialist, the founding team is well-positioned.
Markus explains that at the beginning there were usually two or three different perspectives, from which many innovative ideas emerged during the learning process.In retrospect, that was very helpful,” says co-founder Markus today.
… and what are the three top learnings?
- Don’t sit in a quiet room and plan, but go out and tryIt's labor-intensive, but it quickly reveals what's really interesting. Ideally, it saves you detours.
- Listen to the market, Things implement quickly.
- Learn from mistakes – and everyone is on the same level.
There was never any question of going somewhere else
The founding team chose Munich for both personal and business reasons.Munich is simply a cool city; you can get to the mountains quickly. Our private environment is also in the south of Germany. There was no desire to go anywhere else." says Markus.
From a business perspective, there was never any question of starting up in another city. The founders had a good network from the very beginning, for example through professors or through the Munich Business Plan Competition, in which they took third place in 2012.
Offices, general support, network – there were always plenty of options and great support. Markus says: "For the average citizen, it's simply not as present as in the capital, where there's a lot of buzz. But there were always people who gave us tips." Last but not least, the many large industrial companies in the automotive and media sectors are attractive to B2B companies like Testbirds. Munich is also a good place to look for investors or employees.
A look out from the narrow crowdsourcing tunnel
The founders of Testbirds are never bored. However, it's also important to them to offer perspectives. This recently resulted in a "Code of Conduct for Crowdsourcing."
Update from May 2017: Read here Interview with Philipp Benkler.
