Eyal Ronen is co-founder of CellSavers, an on-demand smart device repair service whose technicians fix your phone anytime, anywhere.  Ronen is a seasoned executive and entrepreneur (founder of Gotigo and CMate, which was acquired by Oberon Media), with has extensive experience in product life-cycles from inception, design and development to marketing and sales. CellSavers recently raised $15m to expand their service.
What are the key trends in your industry?
Consumers are getting used to services being delivered on the spot, very efficiently and exactly when they want it. Just compare how we were used to hail a cab in the rain 10 years ago vs how simple it is to get a ride today with a click of a button. We expect services to be more efficient, act quickly and deliver an exceptional experience. We see the same behavior in many industries. In our case, users are dealing with retail stores and local providers that are offering an “old fashioned” service. We rely on our unique matchmaking technology and wonderful team of ‘Savers’ to offer an amazing repair and support experience in minutes and not days, and in a transparent and efficient way to the consumer. Our goal is to utilize our core service DNA on any repair and support verticals in our day to day life. Users demand a better experience.
What is the biggest challenge for your business?
Any time you revolutionize an old status quo, you have to educate the market about it. Bringing a new type of service which is very different than the current one, even a one delivering a leap in quality (i.e standing in line at your wireless carrier or local repair shop, handing your device to a stranger in the back of a store) is a unique challenge. We are used to having our time spent waiting on service technicians, and never knowing what price we should pay. Trust or lack thereof is a huge factor here as well.  Today, this is a completely backwards experience and we aim to change it. The other big challenge is matching supply and demand. An experience like ours, which is based on matchmaking between Savers, skills, parts, consumer and time/location are all about finding the right balance between supply and demand. If you have many consumer asking for a service and not enough technicians to serve them, or not enough spare parts or skill, you get frustrated customers. On the other hand, saturated market with too many ‘Savers’ ready to work, but with no service calls, will create a frustration on their side. Finding and growing the right formula, as we expand, is a massive challenge for every company. We take great pride in creating a community for technicians and investing in their success. We know, that by making the experience for both the consumer and the provider excellent, we will succeed.
What will be the biggest driver of growth going forward?
As we continue to rapidly grow our business, we are focusing on 3 major growth engines: additional services around the lifecycle of devices (upgrade, support, repair), expanding into additional markets (covering the US to start with and going internationally afterwards) and expanding into additional repair and support verticals. Each one of those growth engines, has a tremendous expansion potential. We are working very hard on finding the right way to grow correctly.  It’s not only about growing our revenue and service, it’s also about maintaining our core service DNA.
What advice would you offer other growth companies about how they finance their business?
First and foremost, finding the right investors to your company is key. The right team of investors can help open many doors, and assist in the thinking process. Make sure you find people you enjoy working with and that’s their opinion and experience you value. We have partnered with Kreos earlier this year and find the relationship and people extremely supportive and helpful. We found that growth debt was extremely helpful for continuing our company growth in parallel to achieving our new equity rounds goals.
