At a time when ever more meetings are being held digitally, the IT company Synergy Sky is offering a solution that makes videoconferences simpler. This unique cloud solution works across platforms and national borders, and 95 per cent of its income comes from exports.
Digital meetings and videoconferences can be challenging if you are on different technical platforms and include physical rooms. Incompatible solutions place great demands on organisers and users, and often lead to delays and security challenges.
The Oslo based company Synergy Sky stitches together other people’s digital conference room solutions such as Microsoft Teams, Google Meet, Zoom, and Cisco’s Webex. It also optimises the physical conference rooms that are used for videoconferences. According to these entrepreneurs, at the moment it is the only player that does not have its own conferencing platform and thus it becomes a partner instead of a competitor.
It has along customer list with about 500 customers, including well-known companies such as Société Générale, Ericsson, Dell, Storebrand, and Tieto.
NOK 21 million innovation loan
When it received its first innovation loan from Innovation Norway in 2015, the company already had a well-established turnover but applied for capital in order to strengthen the product and market development at an international level. With a grant for an innovation contract a few years later, it was able to further develop its communication platform.
"The funds from Innovation Norway have without doubt triggered an ability to expand globally," says Ståle Reitan, founder and CEO at Synergy Sky.
The NOK 21 million innovation loan that it received in 2021 is contributing to further international growth. Commercialising the solution allows it to help many millions of existing systems to work across video platforms. The loan from Innovation Norway is important for both the size of the project and the pace of implementation.
“Synergy Sky has utilised several of Innovation Norway’s services and it has demonstrated great capacity for innovation and execution. It is already a leading global player, and Innovation Norway was therefore also able to approve a loan for further scaling,” says Benjamin Bækkelund Haskel, funding adviser at Innovation Norway Oslo Viken.
Saving time and costs
The company is not as interested in helping companies increase their return on investment (ROI) as it is in helping them reduce their waste of time (WOT).
“Enterprises spend an overage 12 minutes to set up a videoconference. The Norwegian Welfare and Labour Administration has more than 1,000 conference rooms. It could save a lot by streamlining videoconferences,” says Reitan, adding:
“With Synergy SKY CONNECT, users get a simple interface and can more easily communicate from one physical room to many digital audiences in different countries. You avoid delays and time wasters, save on travel costs, and optimise the use of expensive premises.”
Customers on all continents
Most of the customers are in the US, UK, and Scandinavia. Synergy Sky has built a distributor structure with 60 partners, which sells the company’s products to its customers, and also has Microsoft and Cisco as distributors, which in turn sell via partners. The Oslo company has sales offices in the US, UK, and Sweden, and even more are being planned.
The Covid period has been difficult since companies have used physical videoconferences less and new sales in the market have been difficult. As the pandemic is receding, the market potential is regarded as large and growing.