Munich Startup: What does your startup do? What problem does Lotaro solve?
Julia Kupke, Lotaro: Every company strives for high-performing employees. Over 90 percent of everyday work involves soft skills such as communication, sales, leadership, motivation, and time management. Therefore, it is crucial for companies to strengthen these skills. Current solutions such as in-house or external training are time-consuming and expensive. And e-learning providers don't offer a satisfactory solution because the format doesn't deliver the desired results. How can you improve "people skills" if you don't practice them practically with other people, but simply watch videos at double speed and answer emails at the same time?
For this reason, we have developed a solution that, on the one hand, offers a format that enables an enormous learning effect in the shortest possible time, and on the other hand, can be easily integrated into everyday work.
In short: Lotaro is a live training platform for people skills, which is used company-wide. Every employee has access to interactive live training sessions, which last a maximum of two hours daily in small, mixed groups of approximately ten people with one trainer. Typical courses cover topics such as "Structuring 1:1 Performance Reviews," "Coaching Skills for Executives," "Learning Negotiation Tactics," and "Storytelling in Sales," among many others.
Lotaro: Team comes first
Munich Startup: But that has been around for a long time!
Julia Kupke: There's already a lot of content on the market, especially in the e-learning sector, with countless videos with impressive effects. Here, much more emphasis is placed on quantity than quality: even more videos, larger groups, more well-known presenters from renowned companies. But the learning effect for the individual falls by the wayside.
Munich Startup: What is your founding story?
Julia Kupke: It was important to me that the team came first. Ideas change, the market evolves, but working together as a team in the first few years and complementing our skills in a meaningful way are crucial to success. That's why we first came together as a team and then navigated the ups and downs together until we were able to launch our training platform.
Challenge: get up again
Munich Startup: What have been your biggest challenges so far?
Julia Kupke: To get back up again. Before developing our training platform, we had some ideas in mind and had even generated promising revenue. However, all of these ideas lacked the feeling (and the metrics) that we were solving a problem better than others, or that a significant problem even existed. We might have been able to make money with it, but we have high expectations of ourselves and the potential Impactthat we want and can achieve.
Munich Startup: Where would you like to be in one year, where in five years?
Julia Kupke: Our idea was born six months ago. Today, we have a technically flawless product, a truly great selection of trainers and courses that have a customer satisfaction (NPS score) of over 60, and customers who have already fully finance can. Things are going very well in this current phase. Nevertheless, it is naturally a challenge to initially sell additional costs in the current economic situation, in which companies are having to lay off talent.
In five years, I would like to see a candidate proactively ask during an interview whether the company offers Lotaro memberships to enable them to further their education – it should be a matter of course for employers to offer this opportunity.
Impressive helpfulness of the scene
Munich Startup: How have you experienced Munich as a startup location so far?
Julia Kupke: I've been living in Munich for over ten years. So, naturally, my network is here, which consists almost exclusively of founders. It's always impressive how helpful everyone is. Whether it's in acquiring pilot customers, establishing contacts with potential customers, exchanging ideas, or simply being there to listen when things aren't going so well. I'm very grateful for this support.
Unfortunately, Munich doesn't really offer any meaningful financial support for office space. Even if you're rarely in the office five days a week these days, it's still important to get together as often as possible, especially in the initial phase. However, the so-called "startup offices" are usually labeled with the logos of large companies and are usually empty or used as "innovation space."
Munich Startup: Quick exit or long breath?
Julia Kupke: Our primary goal is to create something that truly helps employees develop both in their current role and personally. We communicate, sell, motivate, and lead for life. Therefore, our impact is enormous. We want to offer this opportunity to every talented individual. This is our top priority. Whether an exit will help us realize this vision is not yet foreseeable.
