Hello MOD community,
Some weeks ago I made a post here in the forum mentioning we might soon have some great news for you.
As expected, we do. And the news are indeed very good!
There has been a lot of activity here at MOD HQ in the past months that has started to materialize in the last weeks and will keep bearing fruits in the months (and years!) to come. I’d like to share with you the news and also bring some answers to questions that have recently been brought up.
We have finally managed to successfully close a 400k€ fundraising round. This means that, after months of working with tight constraints and limitations, we will now be able to execute a proper business plan with an adequate budget and team. Having this stability is going to result in a smoother workflow for us, which ultimately means that we will be able to provide better service to you, our users.
In the last couple of months, due to the lack of funding, we have been plagued with many of the ups and downs of startup life: cash flow limitations, production interruptions, random fires to put out while understaffed, etc. I’m sure some users here felt the downsides we’ve been through. The later absence of @falkTX - who is not a full time member anymore but still contributes as a freelancer - is a great example of the symptoms of such a situation.
But I am very glad to inform that things are changing for the better.
One of the great luxuries of being funded is being able to hire. All this journey we’ve been through is a constant transformation and, as the requirements of the company evolve, our daily activities change from phase to phase and this can have a negative impact on the team. The ability to hire enables us to bring new people to fill new roles as well as lets the old team members focus on what they do best.
That said, we’re consolidating the team and even relocating people to Berlin. The old pillars of MOD Devices are still here and with better defined positions: the mighty @ricardocrudo is our electronic hardware and embedded software expert/dictator, @acunha handles the platform software and cloud services, @dwek is focusing on communications, @jesse is our plugin gatekeeper and audio specialist, and @autostatic is our sysadmin.
The “no-need-for-an-introduction” @faltTX, as well as @asa - the original coder of the mod-ui - and the very creative @nino - creator of the famous Shiro plugins - reinforce the technical team from time-to-time.
On top of that we have some exciting additions that I’d like to introduce to you.
The outstanding @Adriano Eliezer, our CMO. He’s been with us since November and has been devising a beautiful strategy to take MOD to new heights. Adriano is a multi instrument musician, heavy MOD Duo user and with more than a decade of experience in the marketing field, he understands our products extremely well and will bring a lot of value to this distinguished community.
He’s assisted by Camille Lieser, our new and talented marketing administrator and a musician herself, playing piano and keys.
Our recent great interns, @Jan and @Jarno are both finished with their internships and are both in the process of joining the team - as hardware and plugin programmers respectively.
Last, but certainly not least, for myself I have come to realize that my best contributions are on the product side, driving our innovation process and bringing new products and features to life. The current phase of the business growth requires other skills in which I do not excel, so I made the decision to pass the CEO torch to a person with a profile that is more appropriate to the moment we’re entering now.
I’d like you guys to welcome our new CEO, Ronny Krieger.
Some of you may have heard of him. He’s been involved in the music and music tech business for more than 25 years (at EFA Distribution, Beatport, Native Instruments and various music labels) and also used to be a musician himself in the late 80s and for the most part of the 90s. I consider Ronny to have “a very particular set of skills” that will enable MOD Devices to take shape as a healthy business around this exciting ecosystem we have conceived and given birth to.
Ronny is working with us since January and there have been a lot of very positive changes to our organization. This will start showing progressively in all of our actions from now on. This will also result in a more coordinated activity from all of us, which means that we will be able to advance faster toward our goals.
I’d like to think that in this coming year, we will be growing up as a company but I also want to make sure that you are all going to be by our side along the way. MOD is not a toddler anymore.
There will still be growing pains, but with a dedicated community such as ours, we will ultimately be on the path to success.
From now on you’ll all be hearing from us more and more.
Rock on!
Gianfranco Ceccolini - CPO & Founder
I still love my Mod Duo - there truly is nothing out there like it!