Nigel Malkin knows that if theres one thing most urbanites wont leave home without, its our smartphone. Well tuck a bank card or $20 bill in our pocket and walk out the door clutching our lifeline to both the outside world and our network of friends and family.
But lets say our destination is the Milano café in Gastown. Well get there and then curse that in our quest for travelling light we left our reward card in our wallet. Curse no more, Malkin says. Simply take out your smartphone and scan the QR code thats printed on your receipt for a soy latte. It will record your purchase and put it towards the tally that eventually leads to a free cup of coffee.
The idea seems so simple that a few years from now, when QR codes on receipts are ubiquitous, well think theyve always been there. Well forget that someone had to come up with the brilliant idea. And that then they had to find a way to make it work, brand it and sell the idea to all those stores and coffee shops that want to earn our loyalty.
That someone was Malkin and his partner Jeff La Porte, the founders of RewardLoop which, in 2011, won the BCIT Most Promising Startup award as well as $57,000 for coming in second in the BCIC New Ventures competition.
Its starting to percolate all over Vancouver, says Malkin. We have inquiries from all over the planet because finally theres a critical mass of smartphones [to make the technology appealing to companies.] I wouldnt be surprised if we opened offices in Europe and Asia.
RewardLoop is currently in negotiations with a multinational hardware manufacturer that will make their goal of going global seem less than a pipe dream of two entrepreneurs who wanted to develop the next big thing and more like their natural destiny.
Malkin was born in Vancouver but moved to Santa Barbara with his parents. He stayed to go to university there and started working in the film industry. It was fun when there was work, worrying when there wasnt and pretty hard all the time when it came to building meaningful relationships. He moved back to Canada and built a film studio on the North Shore that was home to two $100-million feature films. At the same time he started The Specialty Gourmet (which later became Licious), which delivered diet meals to peoples homes. (Think of it as Weight Watchers on wheels.) After he sold both he founded Brand2hand Media which better leave the description for tech geeks.
Geek-speak is also what you get when you describe LaPortes earlier career. He led the technical direction of the VX 2010 Showcase of wireless, new media and digital industries during the 2010 Olympic games. Prior to that he was a whole bunch of acronyms: CEO of EQO which helped pioneer VOIP at something called DEMO. (Dont ask for a translation.) But one acronym that does matter is the TR35 award he got from MIT Technology Review in 2006 for being one of the top 35 innovators under 35.
The two of them started talking about the fact that everyone forgets to carry their reward cards with them. If their smartphones could read QR codes why not find a way to store all those points in their smartphone? It would solve a problem for consumers but also for merchants who would no longer have to worry about printing and distributing the reward cards.
Malkin and LaPorte both knew how expensive and time-consuming it is to open a new office so they applied for one of the spaces at WaveFront, an amazing technology incubator found in one of downtown Vancouvers office towers. Funded by the provincial and federal governments, with support from the City of Vancouver, WaveFront offers start-up wireless companies free office space (with fabulous views) for a year. Better yet, in one of the glass-walled cubicles there are shelves filled with 350 different kinds of smartphones so if you want to test your new technology on one of them, you dont have to go out and buy it. Right now, Rogers is currently building a new innovations program as part of WaveFronts facilities. And where else can budding tech entrepreneurs have face-to-face meetings with Sony executives who can help take their product to the next level?
WaveFront gave Malkin and LaPorte the financial breathing room they needed to develop RewardLoop. Since they lived off their savings for the first year, it meant a lot not to have to worry about buying desks or paying rent. It really sent us on our way, Malkin says. Now that the business is becoming successful, RewardLoop has five staff members and is hiring more. Its also started paying rent at WaveFront.
The provincial government is really investing in creating a digital knowledge base, says Malkin of Vancouvers growing reputation as a tech hub. Colleges and universities support the demand for trained staff by setting up tech programs that produce talented and innovative graduates. WaveFront then adds its resources to the mix to make it a national centre of excellence accelerating the growth and success of wireless companies in Canada by connecting them with critical resources, partners and opportunities.
Its little wonder that Vancouver is earning the loyalty of so many tech firms.
