Spontivly is aiming to help build more community-led companies through a newly announced partnership with Rainforest Edmonton.
By using Spontivly's platform to host its community, Rainforest hopes to gain insights by collecting data from all the tools they currently use into one platform. The partnership will also help Spontivly better understand how community-led companies are built.
"Rainforest’s previous experience and expertise in the tech space, as well as their business knowledge, will serve as the perfect feedback loop to help us understand our customer's needs. To us, this partnership is the start of a larger vision - building up a strong community in the tech ecosystem," said Anthony Nagendraraj, CEO of Spontivly.
The move marks an important step forward for the company, which pivoted during the pandemic to focus on B2B solutions.
"Our vision has been the north star throughout the pandemic. When building up a business, your mission can act as a compass, guiding you along while you make crucial decisions. The mission, along with our passion for community, is what helped the business thrive during the pandemic," Nagendraraj said.
Spontivly is aiming to help build more community-led companies. (Supplied)
Spontivly began as a B2C app that could notify university students of events near them, with the goal of connecting people to their community through campus activities.
"However, we noticed that the true problem we were looking to solve (a lack of community engagement) was not a B2C problem, but took place at the organizational level: B2B," Nagendraraj said.
The company began conducting research on building out a B2B platform that could help organizations gain insights into their communities, and in the process was able to use the app it had already built to show where grocery supply was available at the beginning of the pandemic.
"We wanted to use our platform to demonstrate the various use-cases for the community and to showcase the many ways people can bind together in times of need," Nagendraraj explained.
Spontivly's innovation during the pandemic hasn't gone unnoticed, with Nagendraraj recently being selected as a recipient of the On Deck Community Builders Fellowship. The company was also selected for the North Forge Technology Exchange accelerator program last fall.