Cooperation Interview: PropTech MATEO and partner Hildebrandt & Hees
In the video interview with Ambivation CEO Christoph Baier, Sebastian Frederik Jacobsen, founder and CEO of MATEO Estate GmbH, talks about the startup’s solution and its added value for the cooperation partner, Hildebrandt & Hees GmbH from Mannheim. He also gives valuable advice for the cooperation between startups and companies, and gives an outlook on the future of MATEO. Here you can watch the interview in full length.
Christoph: Welcome to the Proptech and ConTech video interviews on collaborations with the real estate and construction industry. Today I have the honor, I’m happy to welcome Sebastian Frederik Jacobsen from MATEO. A warm welcome to you all! Maybe first of all why we are doing the interviews is to show how companies, startups and also software providers can work together, what the added values are and how you can build the bridge between the two, so that there are collaborations. Perhaps right at the start Sebastian, tell us who you are and what do you do?
Sebastian: My name is Sebastian Frederik Jacobsen. I am one of the CEOs and also founder of MATEO. At MATEO, we have a mission to really create the best possible rental experience for property managers. Managers are mainly property managers in the DACH area, but also across Europe in the future. How do we achieve that in the end? We rethink the interaction between the manager, the tenant, the owner, and also the service providers, for example, tradesmen or cities, that’s also a lot of processes that involve authorities, and the interaction between those parties, we rethink that completely from scratch. How do we do that? Through the MATEO Autopilot, which we have developed over the last few years and months. Where we automate quite a lot, standardize quite a lot of processes and interactions, but still, and this is very important to emphasize, still it remains personal. And that is our really big advantage, which is why many customers love us, because despite the automation, we are still very human on the road and also very personal, which is very important, especially in the area of communication and interaction.
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Christoph: Now I have to ask, because you emphasize it so much, what makes this personality?
Sebastian: Yes, I mean everyone knows that, you probably do too. When you call a mobile service provider’s hotline or click on a chatbot on the website, you’re simply told what to do by a robot. Personally, I think I really just want to talk to an employee, because the robot doesn’t understand me. I think a lot of people feel that way. And I think we’ve done a pretty good job of making this robot, which we nevertheless have, this autopilot, different and able to recognize your needs and communicate with you accordingly. There are some cases where a human being has to look at it. We don’t say we’re automating everything, because that’s the wrong approach. Many competitors do that, but I don’t think it’s really effective. We believe that it is useful to deal with standard inquiries such as “When can I give notice?” or “I’ve lost my key,” routine inquiries, so we standardize the processes behind them and automate them with our autopilot. And then we just have the process on top, where the issues then escalate, where a human has to look at it, because they are more complex. We then forward them to a real employee. These are then messages that a real person looks at. The answering is then guided by our autopilot, so it is very structured for the employee, but he simply has a guidance, a process that he can follow. In the end, the goal is for the employee to be more efficient and the tenant to be happier. Because happy tenants also lead to happy administrators, quite simply the equation. Exactly, that’s a bit of why we think it can work quite well with such an autopilot.
You can get more information about the MATEO-autopilot in this video.
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Christoph: Sounds like a good division of tasks. Sebastian, when we talk about the added values of MATEO, can you give us an example, for example at Hildebrandt & Hees? What are the added values and how does the customer benefit from your solution?
Sebastian: A very big added value is definitely that we automate the interaction between the manager, in this case Hildebrandt & Hees, and then also the tenant, i.e. those who live there in the end, and the natural service providers. And the processes are also streamlined in a certain way, i.e. straightened out and standardized for the most part. Then it’s all still very personal. That is very important. Specifically with Marcel and Hildebrandt & Hees, we managed to put the system live within a few weeks and optimize the processes, bring in a high level of automation, and at the same time make the quality of the inquiries even more personal and increase it. So that’s really a cool added value. Because in the end, Marcel, you’re going to say a few words about this in a moment, it just really helps a property management company to break into the new age and also to scale, to grow and to become better. That’s always important to us at MATEO and that’s where we’re excited to take our customers on this journey. As I said, Marcel was one of our first customers with whom we really tested and built the solution very intensively in terms of co-innovation, and now it’s live and we see really great added value there. But Marcel, you can certainly say more about that!
Marcel: Yes hello, Marcel Hauptenbucher, Mannheim. We are a local portfolio holder here. We actually manage all of our properties ourselves and have about 1,000 apartments that we currently manage. Ultimately, our goal was to find a simpler solution for both our staff to communicate with the tenant and for the tenant to have a faster, less complicated way to communicate. So, we’ve been working together since the beginning. We’ve also been a bit of a co-developer, getting into the into the problem, with what issues are popping up. Also in terms of requests. What are the inquiries that come up again and again? What is also important information for the tenant? We then discovered that a large part of our inquiries can ultimately be answered in a standardized way. At the end of the day, this means a significantly faster result for the tenant, and a significant reduction in work for us, because we don’t always have to answer standard questions that can be automated. A big advantage for us, of course, is that all employees are less busy with standard stuff and can focus on what’s actually exciting. For the tenants, a big advantage is that, of course, communication is much faster and the tenants are served in a more relaxed way.
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Christoph: Great, that sounds like added value for both you and the tenants, a good case study. Marcel, first of all, thank you very much for your time. Then we’ll move on to the next question. Sebastian, can you tell us about an example of cooperation where you work together?
Sebastian: We would be happy to, we brought in our first VC, that is venture capitalist, that is an investor, that is a financier, at the beginning of this year. Their name is Styx Urban Investments from Mannheim. And one thing that was very important to us was that, in addition to the pure money, this is also a strategic partner for us, who helps to support us and also brings a bit of industry experience. Because we believe that it is very important to develop solutions that are really close to the problems and challenges of the customers. That’s why we did this together with Styx Urban Investments, as I said a VC from Mannheim. They have what is known as the Styx living Lab. This Styx living Lab is basically a test environment with real tenants and real houses in Mannheim, consisting of about 1,000 residential units that we have available. There we can really test and further develop our software in real time, which I believe is unique in Germany. So for every feature that we build, for every function, for every business process, whatever it is, we know directly that it works and that it is needed. Because we have the background of this Living Lab, which is really unique in Germany. And I can only recommend to everybody who has a startup to tap into this Living Lab if it’s possible.
Christoph: That’s a great value proposition for you from the investor. And on the flip side, of course, it’s also a great testing ground to get innovation out on the road and try it out.
Sebastian: Yes, exactly.
Christoph: Exciting, let’s move on to the next question. Topic tips and tricks for collaboration between companies and startups. What is your experience, what are the challenges and do you have one or two best practices? Or where do you say you should pay attention to, that is important for a successful collaboration?
Sebastian: I think what is always very important in cooperation is that the fit is there. That both the company and the partner or the investor, whoever it is that you’re working with, there are often a lot of parties, that there’s simply a fit and that you complement each other well in the end. That it doesn’t feel forced or that you’re somehow compulsively trying to enter into a partnership in order to win customers. When it’s actually already clear that the parameters aren’t right because the parties are looking for something different than they can actually give themselves. I like to compare this with dating. It’s the same with dating these days, with Tinder, Bumble, and everything else out there. The best date is the one where there’s a fit somehow.And I think that fit, for us at MATEO, is definitely often a feeling and gut thing. Maybe there are a lot of parameters that you can look at, but in the end I think it’s very important to look at that human empathy ability and understanding. To say, hey is this a customer that fits, is it a partner that fits, is it an investor that fits. And that’s where we have good experience with and have, really very good partnerships at MATEO, because the whole thing just fits perfectly from front to back.
Christoph: Empathy and communication in particular, that’s what I see day in and day out. Then you also solve difficult problems, and the difficult times usually come in the startups.
Sebastian: Always, there are difficult times every day, and you only solve them with good communication.
Christoph: Cool, let’s move on to the next question: What does the future hold for you? What can we expect from you?
Sebastian: In the future you can see us more often and expect a lot. We are currently looking towards Europe, which means we will expand. Currently we are in the DACH area on the road, so Germany, Austria and Switzerland. And we will now expand in the direction of Europe, that means above all with a focus on Spain and Portugal, those are our focus countries, because we see a very large market potential there. But of course the Nordics, the Nordic countries in the direction of Sweden, Denmark, Norway, but also Finland, for example, are very interesting markets for us. And that’s where the journey will take us. We are building, let’s say, the leading immobilien.com for Germany and hopefully soon for the whole of Europe. And then let’s see where it goes.
Christoph: Good vision, I think. Great, maybe the follow-up question then also, how would you describe your perfect customer? So, if there’s one of the audience out there saying, that sounds interesting, but is that actually something for me?
Sebastian: Yes, definitely. The perfect customer for us is property management companies that manage anywhere from 500 to 10,000 units. If you look at the market, that’s a relatively large number, because the market is quite fragmented. Especially in Germany, Austria or Switzerland, but also in the rest of Europe. And in this portfolio size, 500 to 10,000 units, that’s really our perfect customer. That’s where the fit is very good. But of course we also do smaller customers. We also currently have customers who manage less than 500 properties and for whom this is also an exciting solution because it simply has hardly any implementation time. The solution is really simple. Many people in the industry are not used to it being almost click-and-start. People always like to say, hey, the solution is here, and a few days later it’s up and running. And that’s why it’s exciting for smaller customers. Of course, people who only have one to ten units now might say they’d rather do it via WhatsApp, or e-mail. That’s completely understandable. I myself would not necessarily use MATEO for such a small number of units, but from ten units upwards it becomes exciting. As I said, it gets really exciting for customers with 500 to 10,000 units.
Christoph: Great. You have just mentioned a unique selling proposition, that you are immediately ready to go, so one can start immediately with you. Do you have one or two more points that are important to know about you?
Sebastian: Yes, as I said, that is a unique selling point, in any case, that the go-live time is very short. So the time from the first self-talk in the first contact, to the system is productive there. I don’t think there are many companies in the industry that are faster. And the other factor where we also get very good feedback from customers is that the solution simply looks very empathetic and very nice. And now that sounds like, “Okay, what’s the point of beautiful for me?” If you know the systems that the employees have to deal with on a daily basis, and there’s also a certain talent shortage in the industry right now when you want to hire new people for property management, that’s already a big factor. They are used to the solution also working like WhatsApp, Instagram or Facebook. In terms of user-friendliness and how quickly things work, we’re way ahead of the game with this solution. And of course, we have this autopilot in it. If you really look purely at the business, purely at the numbers, we can simply make a process more efficient extremely quickly. And with that, a property management company can grow in the end. That means we can manage more units with the same staff, and I think that’s almost unique.
Christoph: That’s a convincing argument. And if I imagine how the employee perhaps spends a large part of his working time on such platforms, then user-friendliness is of course also a fundamentally important argument. Sebastian, if people want to reach you now, what’s the best way to do it?
Sebastian: We are represented across all channels. We see that many of our customers are on Facebook, which means that you can easily find our MATEO Estate GmbH on Facebook. We have a Facebook page, a company page. You can actually find me personally everywhere, on Xing, on LinkedIn, you can also find me on Instagram, on tiktok. Just google Sebastian Frederik Jacobs and you’ll quickly find me or MATEO. And then you can also always request a trial version directly. So hopefully you can find us.
Christoph: Perfect, great. Thank you very much for the introduction from my side, and that you took your time. After the video there is a short demo of the product. All viewers now know how to reach you. I wish you continued success on your journey and see you soon.
Sebastian: Thank you very much, and have a nice day!
Click here to visit the website of the MATEO Estate GmbH.
Click here to visit the website of our cooperation partner Hildebrand & Hees GmbH.
Click here to visit the website of the immobilienmanager.
About Ambivation
Ambivation connects innovative companies and startups for cooperation and innovation partnerships. As an innovation consultancy and matchmaker, Ambivation promotes cooperation between established companies and startups within the framework of concrete customer, supplier and research partnerships. We support companies in the identification of needs, startup identification, startup evaluation and cooperation initiation with startups. Formats such as research on relevant startups, startup monitoring, strategic cooperation consulting or event formats such as startup tours serve this purpose. Our monthly newsletter also provides information on current examples of cooperation and events.
