
This is software (AWS) generated transcription and it is not perfect.
sure. So the way that I got here has probably been a journey in the making for the last 16 years. I would say, you know, since 2004 but really, I mean, to be honest since 1999 when I was in college. So in 1999 I was working for a local start up here in San Diego. They had raised about $70 million. We called college club dot com, and, uh, it was a very hard company at the time. It was the world's largest social networking platform for college students. They even have live webcams at the time. I mean, this is documented and then which they were way ahead of the pack. And so in many ways, I really caught the entrepreneurial bug. I feel like a better words. And when I was there, uh, 2000 came along and they had found to go, I po they pulled it because they're requiring under the company. And then right when they did that you have the dot com crash occurred, and so they were unsuccessful in going AIPO. Eventually they got sold off in chunks. Two different entities on bats, really where I first, you know, caught this interest of being part of a startup. And until then I had no idea what a startup was or what it meant. But in terms of what I really believe each person has toe have is genuine curiosity. I remember back in 96 when we had just moved here to San Diego from Sweden. One of the things that I was struggling with was I was reading books of Night and I would have the nightlight on. And I was sharing my bedroom with my two brothers at the time, and they would get annoyed because the night light was on. And so I actually designed on auto cats. Sort of like, uh, you know, like a tablet for, like, a better words, like a device that you would have. It would be a screen you would put in a floppy. This this is for those who would flop this fine to be able to read books and then you wouldn't need a light anymore. I didn't do anything with it. And then I walked into Costco In 99 or 2000. I see a device this is pre kindled by the way I see a device that looked eerily familiar to the one that I had designed, and my dad looked at me and said, This should be a great lesson for you. If you have something and you believe it's a great idea, you should go and and get a validated and see if you can bring it to market. And so that combination with how was brought up my genuine natural curiosity and being part of a start up so early on in my life really is what sent me on this path. Thio, where have come today?
which is the way that this idea was come upon, was really through my co founder, um, and my co founder. His background is actually, he was a rocket scientist for the Department of Defense, straight out Stanford. And then from there he went into executive roles at Disney HP Gateway. He had his own startup. He sold, and then he was in the retirement benefits industry. So it was during his years leading retirement benefits industry, where he assembled upon this problem. And the problem is the 41 k compliance industry. Every year there is about $12.5 billion that it spends, if not more, to be able to remain compliant. Out of that, full of 12.5 billion more than $10 billion is being spent and trying to wring compliant by paying for services where they come in audit you. The problem, though, is that out of that 10 plus billion that's being spent, over 70% of audits fail, and these audits Onley happen retrospectively, which means once a year has ended, they go back in the previous year. They look at where the failures happen, and then they try to fix it, but more often than not, they end up paying the fines on those fines add up to being over $2.5 billion a year. And so what we have built is way built a series of algorithms on. Then we built a platform based on these algorithms that is always on constant monitoring throughout the year. And it can project into the future based on past historical data and based on current data where they are, and tell them if they're going to be compliant or not. And so the elevator pitch that I would say enough you know, the typical 15 2nd is we are the were the Google maps for the 41 k record, uh, industry.
sure. So the first three weeks, it was really just having conversations. I mean, it really started with Jerry and I on Guy was advising him from a product perspective, um, mid last year. And that's because I I you know, after my own startup, I started working on the side, you know, doing product consulting. And so he sought me out. We've been friends for a number of years. He wanted some advice, and then that advice turned into Let's, uh, you know, have ideas and he would throw ideas. What do you think about this? And, you know, and of course, he had other people that he spoke with part of the industry as well. But I became very interested in his initial idea. And as that evolved, we arrived in the month of January of this year, and that turned into a much longer conversation where, uh, I was very gung ho, and I joined Jerry as his co founder. Um, and, uh, that, you know, the first three weeks is, you know, just I mean, it was a long process. If you think about it, it wasn't just okay. The idea was started and then the first few weeks happened, it was more like six or seven months of conversations on gun. After that. Once we got officially started in February, it was really Thio go through the typical five wise, you know, product management. Why? Why existent This way. You know, how has this been done before? It's and and so forth to try to drill into really understanding. Are we trying to sell them? Ah, whole. Or are we trying to sell them the drill, so to speak? And so, um, as that evolved, you know, we started, uh, creating the prototype, which was initially was creating the US architecture er creating the workflow of how things should work. Testing the hypothesis, uh, using our algorithm. And then once we were able to see that there was something there and running a by people in the industry, we started committing, uh, that work to code on dso When we started committing that to code, there was essentially built a platform, built the back end, build the front end on, then do the designs, and we were able to ship the product probably two months ahead of time. We have also incurred $50,000 of revenues. We have secured a partnership with a company that's been in the end, this industry for close to 20 years. They have 11 million participants. That equates to about half a billion dollars in assets under management on DSO, we now have access to some really big record keepers as well as tear to record keepers on DSO. The selling process has turned into a much quicker turnaround because in this industry, to sell in into record keepers takes it typically about 18 months. But with the record keepers that are part of our partner, that that goes down to nine months, eso Now we have three contracts out there that are being reviewed. We also have a Tier one label that has put us under vendor review, and this is they were the ones who actually proposed it to us, which was amazing and validating really validation of what we're working on. So