We are sure that many of you have ideas for starting a business. Some may even develop a plan, but few dare to actually embark on the undertaking of realizing the idea. The startup concept is something that has been in operation for a long time, and the startup culture is in constant development.
Over the past few years, Montenegro has spawned several innovative businesses that aim to improve the lives of people who will use their products or services. In addition, Montenegro has witnessed (and inspired) an enviable number of creative ideas: from platforms for investing in renewable energy sources to programs that interpret contracts. We ourselves recognized and supported some of these ideas through the "Spark.me startup adventure" competition, in order to provide mentoring and financial support to young and creative teams in Montenegro to realize their startup ideas.
In this text, we have singled out some of the most interesting startups that Montenegro can boast of and that have significant potential for further growth.
Uhura – Software that reads and interprets contracts like a human
Imagine software that is based on artificial intelligence, and reads and interprets contracts just like a human being would. Sound like something made in Silicon Valley or New York? Not really! This fascinating idea actually comes from a talented team from Montenegro.
The software in question is uhura, and the team is called Uhura Solutions. Using technologies such as cognitive automation, natural language processing and image processing, Uhura accelerates the decision-making process in financial institutions by automating and reducing the time spent on documents from hours to minutes.
Having received 400 thousand euros invested for the scaling of its software, Uhura Solutions justified the trust placed in it. Namely, their clients process their documents 95% with an impressive 90% accuracy. Wherever data is manually processed, Uhura can help.
RENERGY Montenegro – A platform that helps invest in renewable energy sources
RENERGY Montenegro is one of the two teams that were declared winners of the first cycle of the "Spark.me startup adventure" competition. This team developed and presented the idea of a platform that helps to assess profitability and simplify investment procedures in renewable energy sources.
Montenegro has a huge potential of renewable energy sources, which is not talked about enough. The main motivation of this team is to raise awareness about the available potential and benefits of renewable energy sources. Through their platform, all citizens can get to know the benefits of investing in renewable energy sources completely free of charge.
This platform is for those people who want to invest in solar energy but are not sure if it is profitable. The platform makes it possible to assess the cost-effectiveness of solar energy conversion through a few easy and intuitive steps. In addition, through the platform, citizens can also request an offer from partner companies that enable them to participate in the first national market for design and construction services.
Flourish – An application for increasing emotional intelligence
For success at work, not only "hard", technical skills acquired through formal education and professional experience are important, but also "soft", personal skills. These skills include creativity, adaptability, time management and the like.
One of those skills is called emotional intelligence. In addition to "ordinary" or cognitive intelligence, emotional intelligence also affects success and job satisfaction. Emotional intelligence allows us to control our emotions, and to recognize and understand emotions both in ourselves and in other people. With greater emotional intelligence, we resolve conflicts more easily, cope better with stress and communicate more effectively with people.
Emotional intelligence is therefore very important. It is logical then that we need to find a way to measure it and - even more important - to increase it and work on it. In response to this challenging question, Flourish, the so-called "assistant for smart growth of employees", focused precisely on the emotional intelligence of employees.
Flourish works by measuring and improving an employee's emotional intelligence using video games, quizzes and a digital emotional coach of sorts. All this allows the employee to advance his career, contribute more to his team, and be satisfied with what he does.
ProfitApp – An application that earns you money while shopping
ProfitApp is a mobile app where everyone wins when they shop. When making a purchase, part of the money is returned to the users and they can use that money again in the purchase. What's more, when they spend that money, they can get a refund or pay their electricity, television, internet, insurance bill through the app. And all this without commission. It sounds like it came from the American metropolis, but this application was actually designed by a talented team from Montenegro.
How is ProfitApp used? Very simple: When making a purchase, if you pay in cash, you first start the application. Then, emphasize that you want to pay using ProfitApp when you come to the counter, show your phone and an employee will scan the code for you. Immediately after the purchase, you are rewarded with a refund of part of the money, and this money is immediately available to you for further purchases.
And what business model enables something like this, you ask? Well, companies that decide to cooperate with ProfitApp are thus included in a new type of marketing for free. By doing so, they acquire new clients and generate more income.
BeBeep.me – Carpooling platform
And now let us present to you another team (in addition to RENERGY Montenegro) that was declared the winner of the first cycle of the "Spark.me startup adventure" competition.
Although the distances between cities in Montenegro are relatively small, moving from one city to another can be quite frustrating. Trains and buses are uncomfortable and often late, and taxis are too expensive for us to use regularly.
The team behind BeBeep.me, while talking to people who have to travel frequently (or even daily) from one city to another, noticed that transportation significantly limits them. Therefore, they developed carpooling a platform that enables simpler and more comfortable transportation, as well as saving money on intercity trips, by sharing the travel costs with one or more other users. With BeBeep.me, you can find your ride to share with a user of your choice.
In this article, we have singled out five startups from Montenegro that we found most interesting and that have significant potential for further growth. Of course, there are more such startups, and we hope that there will be even more of them! For the coming days, we can only observe and wait to see which new startups will surprise the Montenegrin market with creative ideas.
This article is part of the socially responsible business of the company doMEn, which for years has been making efforts to bring the Internet and new technologies closer to Montenegrin society, especially to young people. During 2019, the company also launched the www.stemedukacija.me portal, where you can find out about all the projects intended for young people in Montenegro that are implemented by the doMEn company and in which you can participate for free.
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