[man 1] This is everything. It's what gets me up in the morning.
It's my life's work.
It's what I want people to see
of the value that I added, ultimately, to society.
[man 2] We have this opportunity to achieve massive success
that most people around our age are not experiencing.
[man 3] Pitching is something that I've never done before.
So it is a little bit nerve-racking, but it's also really exciting.
It would be fantastic to get funding,
because we'll be able to turn into a real business.
[Zane] You have four advisors down there.
It's about making sure they understand how passionate you are.
You have 60 seconds on the escalator
to get them to choose to be a part of your project.
You'll know because at the end of your escalator ride,
they'll either go green or red.
If you get four reds, you go home.
But if you have at least one green,
you'll get to continue your pitch and tell the story of your app,
in the hopes of partnering with one of the advisors.
If that happens, you'll spend the next six weeks honing your app
for a chance to earn a share of over ten million dollars
in venture capital investment
and featured placement on the App Store.
[pulsing techno theme]
[bell rings]
[man on PA] All right, everybody. Stand by.
-Hey. Kyra. -Nice to meet you.
-Hey, Ben. -Hey.
[Zane] How'd you guys meet?
So I was coming back from a meeting. Super out of breath, about to go to class.
And I ran into Ben, who I did not know.
-Literally? -Literally.
Being a cofounder with somebody is like getting into a marriage.
But, like, without all the good stuff.
So it could be-- It could be really difficult.
[Kyra] Me and Ben are two totally different people.
But we complement each other in a beautiful way.
And when people are around us, they feel the energy.
-Do not do that-- -Do you have makeup on?
Every time I put on makeup the past four days, you ask me if I've--
Guess I'm looking at your face more than usual.
[man on PA] In 3, 2, 1. Doors.
[Ben] If you've been to a bar or nightclub before,
then chances are you've had a frustrating experience closing your tab.
It takes too long to close out,
and people forget their credit cards all the time.
TABu eliminates these frustrations by shifting the payment process
from cash and credit cards to your mobile device.
By strategically combining point-of-sale system integration
and geolocation technology,
we simplified paying your bar tab to the touch of a button.
So who's ready to go out and get some drinks with TABu?
[tense, pulsing music]
[Gary] All right, guys. Congrats. Two of four.
Let's see the app.
[Ben] Let's do it.
[will.i.am] Oh! I get it now.
Open tab.
-TABu. -You got it.
-[Kyra laughs] -[will.i.am] Oh!
Okay. So, you walk into a venue and you simply hit "Open tab."
This button triggers geolocation technology
and POS integration.
Your tab is automatically opened on the venue's POS system
with your name completely displayed on it.
So if I'm a customer in a bar, I go up, I say,
"Hey, I'm Ben Marans.
I have a TABu tab. I'd like to get an old-fashioned."
You select your tip amount
and you simply hit "Close tab."
And your tab has now been closed with the touch of a button.
Oh, cool.
So what we pride ourselves on
is having the most seamless point-of-sale integration
that any other apps that have tried to do this have had.
But are these POS systems in restaurants, or are they in retail?
So how we figured out what POS systems we're gonna target
is that we literally called about 1,000 venues in New York City,
asked them what POS system they're using, and figured out how to target them.
Good hustle. Good, real hustle.
-Is it drunktified? -Yeah, it is.
Say for example, I'm just, like, zooted.
Liver's polluted. I'm, like, dizzy, spinning.
Can I, like, make it--
Can I use it still?
If you don't close it out,
it's automatically gonna be closed an hour after the venue closes.
When we onboard our venues, we know when they close,
and it'll be closed at that time to make sure they get their money.
Wow. I like you, Kyra. You got an answer for everything.
She's got all the answers.
-[Kyra chuckles] -She's the boss.
How are you gonna get the bars to buy into this?
It will be the biggest challenge.
And the way we want to overcome that challenge
is by focusing on big hospitality groups.
[Kyra] So promoters have networks right now
with people that they're sending to venues every week.
So we want to incentivize them
and give them a little bit of extra money
to also send those users to those venues as well, but use the platform.
How much are you looking to raise?
So right now we're seeking a 300k seed round.
-Where does your revenue come from? -So we have two streams of revenue.
The first one is a service fee that we call a TABu tip.
So how that works is we take 2.5% of the bartender's tip.
And then we have a flat monthly subscription fee for the venue.
You're going after the employees of the venue?
Like, you're looking to skim off them?
The main reason why, it's actually more valuable for them,
even though they think they're getting less tips--
You're gonna teach them a macroeconomic issue?
[stammers] They're not gonna see your way.
They wouldn't, but they don't make the decisions, the owners do.
No. That's crazy.
-[Gary] That's-- Yeah, that's a-- -What do you mean?
These bartenders live off of their bartending.
[Jessica] That's how they make their money.
[will.i.am] That's how they make their money.
But the point is we are going to be increasing
the amount of money that's going into their pockets.
They don't have to hand over their credit card.
They don't have to swipe it. They don't have to print receipts.
On average it takes about three to five minutes to close out a tab.
That translates to five hours closing out tabs on a given night.
If somebody's gonna make more money, then let them make more money.
And you, as the business, figure out ways to monetize that.
Don't tap into the people that are out there trying to survive.
So, from that perspective, like, I can't support--
I have to go to green to red.
All right. That leaves me.
What I'm trying to figure out is this just gonna be a little too early
compared to the things that I wanna go at?
I am not pumped with the last three or four years of payment apps whatsoever.
[Kyra] We are at the hustle phase.
I... absolutely do nothing
other than find everything that I can at this particular moment,
regardless of stage, to figure out how to get to the next one.
[Gary] Listen. Listen.
[sighs]
I promised myself that I would bet on a couple of jockeys in this game.
I-I-- I just don't-- Um--
I just don't know how I get to say no when I see jockeys like this.
So, with that, I'm gonna stay in.
And, if you would have me, I'd love for you to be on my team.
Let's go, Gary.
[Gwyneth] Gary! I'm so happy.
[Jessica] That was the nicest thing he's said.
We love it. You don't understand how big of fans we are of you.
You had me at 1,000 phone calls.
[Kyra] I'm gonna tell you right now.
The lock screen on my phone is one of your quotes.
And it is, "Hustle is a pillar of success."
I love it. Congratulations, guys.
-[Gary] Yeah, man. -Nineteen years old.
[Gary] She was fighting. She fought for that.
-Nineteen years old. -[bell rings]
[Zane] TABu partnered with Gary.
But not all of the developers managed to impress the advisors.
Surprisingly, there's no digital platform for the entirety of the LGBTQ community.
So we developed B-OUT,
a mobile app that gives our community a home.
I think what you guys are trying to do is so necessary.
I just worry--
I don't think the model is defined enough.
For today's teens, it's all about social media stars.
We're gonna allow millions of fans from around the world
to meet, virtually, their faves every day.
[Gary] Guys, I'm so sorry.
With four noes, that means we're gonna have to move on.
But I'm sure I speak for the rest of the advisors.
We wish you tremendous luck.
[bell rings]
Man, that's tough.
-Hey, Thomas. -Yes?
-Hey. -Hi.
-Good to see you. -Good to see you.
-How are you? -Doing really well. Thank you.
Can I ask an obvious question? How old are you, Thomas?
-I'm 17. -Seventeen years old. Wow.
You're just a kid. You know what I mean? How do you have fun?
[Thomas] My friends and I have always loved playing laser tag.
And one day, when we were out playing, I thought,
why do we have to go to a dedicated space to play this awesome game?
So that's really where the inspiration came from for WiTag.
I'm nervous for the pitch.
But I have been practicing on escalators in the mall to--
to prepare for this.
[bell rings]
[man on PA] In 5, 4, 3, 2, 1. Doors.
My friends and I have always loved playing laser tag.
And one day I thought,
why do we have to go to a dedicated space to play laser tag?
What if we could go anywhere: at a park, on the beach,
or even in a swimming pool with a water resistant iPhone 7?
So I created WiTag: smartphone laser tag.
WiTag works by utilizing the sensors found in modern smartphones.
It's very similar to PokГ©mon Go
in that it gets people out of their homes and into the real world
to connect with each other.
I have been working on WiTag for over a year,
out of my bedroom and garage.
But I would really appreciate your help taking it to the next level.
Thank you very much.
[tense, pulsing music]
[Jessica] Wow, Thomas.
Four greens.
Tell us about yourself.
I'm a software developer and a hardware engineer.
I'm just really fascinated by computers and technology. So--
How old are you?
-I'm 17 years old. -Whoo-hoo!
[Jessica] How long have you been a developer?
I've been developing since I was about seven.
Dope!
-That is so impressive. -[Gary] What do you code in?
I code in Swift, Objective-C, and a few other languages.
-Whoo-hoo! -[Jessica] Cool.
Do you have a business partner, or are you a one-man show?
-Just a one-man show right now. -Okay.
Can we see how it works?
Uh, yeah.
So, generally, when you play laser tag, you have to go to a dedicated facility.
You have to pay a lot of money, um,
put on a clunky vest, clunky helmet.
So what the smartphone allows us to do with WiTag
is actually go anywhere we want.
Everyone would meet up,
at a park, of course, or wherever.
And then you pretty much just go around, running around, um--
Of course, lasers don't fire out of your phone.
This is just to illustrate it.
Thanks for the clarification.
How do you know you're hit? Is there a sound?
Yes. Your phone buzzes,
and you also get a notification of who hit you.
How does the phone pick it up if a person got hit?
Is it proximity? Like, what's going on?
[Thomas] All of our phones have GPS.
We also have compass, so that tells you where you're aiming.
And with those two, we can actually tell who is hitting who.
How are you gonna build the brand, to get this game actually out there?
There are a few different ways, actually. WiTag on its own is laser tag.
But there are--
We could also provide a white label to other filmmakers or film studios.
Or Nerf or laser tag itself.
Or Star Wars or Harry Potter.
Do you see yourself as a B2B play 'cause you feel more confident in the tech
than you do in the actual brand building and getting user adoption?
No, I don't think so. I--
First and foremost, this is about laser tag.
How much money are you trying to raise?
That's-- I'm unsure about the exact amount.
But with the money, I would like to hire developers
to build a indoor positioning system,
and then also make sure that we have enough servers spun up
to handle tens of thousands of players on day one.
You don't know how much that would cost, or--
I mean, we would just--
We would probably just hire a few developers. It just--
-That's something I would like to-- -Who's "we"?
-Sorry? -Who's "we"?
You and I.
[Gwyneth laughs]
That's amazing.
You're great.
[Gary] Thomas, at this point,
I see more developer than-- than app entrepreneur.
And, um, not having an answer for the funding--
There's enough holes for me to be out at this point,
but I wish you well, my friend.
That's okay. Thank you. Thank you so much.
For me, you know, you are an executor.
You are a dreamer.
Will you be able to manage people and run teams on a day-to-day
and get them focused and get them to hit deadlines?
I worry about that.
So I-I-- I'm out.
Well, thank you for your feedback. I really appreciate your input.
You are really an exceptional young man.
And you are solving a big problem for me,
which is you're getting my son off the couch and outside.
That's really compelling for me.
Um--
I just don't think I can help you with this.
And for that reason I'm gonna be out.
[will.i.am] I like everything that you've done today.
You've handled rejection calmly.
You know exactly what it is you want to accomplish.
You don't necessarily have to have all those skills. You're 17.
Yes.
So I don't expect you to be, you know, the biz whiz.
But more importantly, you're a symbol of what 17-year-olds should be doing.
[Jessica] Yeah.
They don't teach that in our schools mandatory.
I see something in you.
Like, if you were to see
Steve Jobs and Bill Gates and Michael Dell at a early age,
you'd say, "Wow."
Here we are, looking at Thomas.
This is a cool little game.
Maybe it turns into a big business.
Maybe it inspires a whole bunch of kids to want to develop.
So, with that--
Do you wanna partner with me?
-Let's do it. -All right. Cool.
-[Gwyneth] Yay! -[Thomas] Thank you.
[applause]
Thank you so much.
[Jessica] Oh, my God. That's amazing.
Gary, that's Steve Jobs, bro.
[bell rings]
-How you doing? -How are you, man?
I'm good, good.
So you invented the Internet.
Then you worked for the CIA, and you work for NASA.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm a legend in my own mind.
Can we talk about the CIA, or is it classified?
I have no recollection.
My name is Bill Barhydt.
I'm originally from New York City.
Live in Silicon Valley now.
I'm a computer geek through and through.
I wrote my first code, I think, when I was in the fourth grade.
So that's why the CIA originally hired me, when I was a kid.
Later on, I joined the group that managed the early Internet.
And then after the earthquake in Haiti,
I started a foundation to provide mobile banking services
and wanted to scale that all over the world.
[man on PA] 5 seconds. 4. 3 seconds.
Did you know there isn't a single app in the App Store
that will let you send real cash
between any two phone numbers in the world?
Over one trillion dollars will be sent globally this year,
mostly by immigrants supporting their families back home.
The fees are really high,
and the wait time to receive money can run into days and weeks.
Abra has fixed this
by creating the world's first digital-cash money transfer network.
Sending money is just like sending a text message,
and the recipient can receive any currency they want
directly via the Abra app.
There's no middleman,
which effectively eliminates all fees in the system for sending money globally.
We believe that Abra is about to change the world for over a billion people,
in a way that they could never before have imagined.
Thank you.
[tense, pulsing music]
-[Gwyneth] Wow. -[Gary] Nice.
[will.i.am] You got three greens and one red, so show us the app.
[Bill] Sure.
Okay. So you see two phones.
On the right is Joey.
Joey's got his Abra app on his iPhone.
But he needs to add more money.
So he's going to find an Abra teller, like a small business owner.
He's gonna hand them cash,
and as soon as the teller says on their phone, "I've received the cash,"
their phone will push the digital cash in real time to the buyer's phone.
We've turned people into an Uber-like network.
We call them Abra tellers.
So now every iPhone can effectively become an ATM machine.
So it's cash only. I'm not transferring it to my bank?
You can. So-- So--
If you're in the US,
you're just actually buying digital currency from your bank account,
sending it to a phone in Mexico.
They find a teller, 'cause they don't have a bank account.
And when you send that money to any other phone number in the world,
the money is converted in real time
to whatever currency the recipient expects to receive
without any banks in the middle of the transaction.
And that's what eliminates the fees.
You've heard of other apps like Venmo in the US and WePay in China.
Abra, for the first time,
makes it possible to send money globally with a single application.
-So show us what happens-- -[Bill] Right.
-So now I want-- -Let's start over.
I need to add money.
And it's gonna remind me how to find a teller.
And it's just like finding an Uber driver.
So now, when we meet,
the teller can process a withdrawal for the consumer.
Or I can process a deposit.
Press "Process deposit."
Type in that I'm going to deposit ten dollars.
So now I've confirmed that I've received the cash.
So what you've just seen
is the world's first bank-less deposit
from one phone to another,
with no middleman, published directly over the Internet.
And Abra takes a tiny piece of the teller's fee,
just like Uber takes a piece of whatever the driver makes.
What's that tiny piece?
Twenty percent of whatever the teller charges.
If the teller charges zero--
Like, a church might do it
or a nonprofit might do it in a disaster relief zone--
We don't make money on those transactions, for example.
And 20%, by the way, is way less than what Uber takes.
Mm-hmm.
This is as big of a play as we've seen.
And if you are actually to accomplish this,
you need bodyguards.
Because you've made it very painful
for some of the biggest businesses at the global level.
Oh, absolutely.
I think the thing is, we've been living in a banking system forever.
-Yeah. -All the fees that are in the ways,
on the pipes and the banks and the brands--
This lowers that dramatically
and leaves more money on both people's pockets,
on both sides of the equation.
And helps all the transactions
that have so much friction in the ecosystem
in the global economy that we're going to.
-Right. -And how could we possibly help you
take this to the next level?
The single biggest issue for Abra is consumer awareness.
A hundred percent.
I need four billion people to know that Abra exists
and they should put it on their iPhone right now.
-[Jessica] Could you let us know-- -Jess, have you changed your mind?
You're very red.
I know I'm red.
I appreciate that.
How long have you been around? What's the state of the union?
We took two years to build the platform.
It's extremely complex.
And we've raised 20 million dollars already.
-Twenty? -Twenty million.
We're 30 people now.
We'll be double within a few weeks.
How much are you trying to raise here?
So we'd like to raise a Series B
between 15 and 25 million to scale to the next level.
And, you know, that's our goal.
Okay. Where do you stand, Gary?
I want to be your advisor very badly.
Seven years ago, I rode an angel investment
into a company called Venmo.
This is something that I was very comfortable with back then.
I understand the marketing challenge. I understand the technology.
And I feel very comfortable that I can translate what you're trying to achieve.
So I would adore to be your partner.
Okay. Thank you.
I have... an incredible respect
for what you're doing underneath all of this,
which is giving people agency and giving people autonomy.
Financial institutions and banks have far too much influence, and--
What I can bring is just help on the marketing side,
helping you get the word out.
I'm just so impressed by you.
Thanks.
[will.i.am] What you're doing here is so important,
both on a traditional, you know, money exchange,
but the places where people need it the most,
like Haiti and Philippines and sub-Saharan Africa.
Absolutely.
So yeah. You could do marketing, and make it marketing, marketing,
marketing, marketing, marketing, marketing, marketing.
And then it's culture, people, heart.
If it's solving a problem on people in need during these turbulent times,
then everybody will get behind it.
So I would love to help you with that.
-Wow. -[Gary] Jess?
I understand culture, obviously.
I understand social justice.
It's what I built my company on--
I believe everyone should have access
to products to live their healthiest life and education.
-Right. -I think we're all very, very different.
And we can all offer you something very different.
So I think it's really up to you to choose now
who you think would solve your need here.
Uh--
[sighs]
Gwyneth, you used some phrases
that surprised me in a really positive way.
When you talked about agency and how the banks work,
that really meant a lot.
I'm gonna go with Gwyneth.
Wow.
-Oh, my God. -[Jessica] That's amazing.
[clapping]
[Jessica] Wow. That was a huge surprise.
Gary thought he had it in the bag.
[Gary] I'm really upset.
[Gwyneth, Jessica laughing]
We just saw history here.
I know.
-[man] All good, everybody. -[Gwyneth] We're done.
[Jessica] Done-ski.
[man on PA] Advisors stepping out. Thank you.
[man 2] Advisors are clear.
[Zane] Once a developer partners with an advisor, the hard work begins,
as they enter six weeks of accelerated incubation.
Thomas heads to the i.am+ headquarters
to go over WiTag's design and user experience with Will.
[Thomas] Go ahead and tap on WiTag.
And what we can see is this interesting blurred camera view.
So if you move the phone around, you'll see it.
And now you've joined.
What we should be able to do is aim at each other
and send out a laser pulse.
Which right now is not working too well 'cause we're indoors.
But, yeah. Definitely outside, it's going to be a lot more accurate.
Is the laser...
-It's going through-- -...using Wi-Fi?
Yeah, it's utilizing Wi-Fi, so it might be slowing it down.
How do you improve it to where it could work indoors?
So I've been doing a lot of research into what's called IPS,
-Indoor Positioning Systems. -Mm-hmm.
That's one way to do it. Bluetooth is another way to do it.
Same kind of idea, where you have beacons set up.
Apple already has iBeacon technology, so we might be able to use that.
Right now, Thomas's app isn't working 100%.
So the realist in me is worried for Thomas.
Because if it's not ready for the VC,
then he's definitely not gonna get the investment.
What's this?
[Thomas] Hmm?
-It's stuck on that. -Oh.
That's odd.
It might be a bug.
What are you doing to clean the bugs?
You don't have that much time.
[phone rings]
[Zane] Gary meets with bar tab payment app TABu
to discuss their go-to market strategies.
What do you have right now? How many venues do you feel you have?
We're working-- completely integrated, live...
-Yes. -...with a single venue.
But we have partnerships with about four others.
-And those four fall when-- -[Kyra] When we get the money.
When we get the money to do it.
-How much for those four? -1,000 bucks each.
-$4,000? -Yeah.
So literally 4,000 gets you to five places.
Right? So, you are in fundraising mode right now.
[Kyra narrating] I don't come from a particularly wealthy background.
Nothing was ever handed to me.
Nothing was ever... waiting for me when I got home.
I've had a job since I was 15.
I'm not afraid of fighting for the money.
You have to meet with everybody in the New York club scene.
Get to them. You biz dev.
Because not only are you accomplishing your short term $5,000 and $10,000,
you're gonna make an impression, just like you did on me.
And that will lead to six people wanting to invest.
All of a sudden, you've got $44,000 of strategic money.
'Cause not only do you get the money, you get the venue
and the insights for your product and the distribution for your product.
It's $4,000. Just make it happen.
Got it?
-Absolutely. -Good.
And that's it, my friends.
I think these two should be knocking on every door they can find.
Period. End of story.
Because otherwise they will go out of business.
[Zane] Gwyneth has arranged a FaceTime call with Brian Chesky,
cofounder, CEO, and head of community at Airbnb,
in the hopes that Brian's insights will help Bill hone his payment app, Abra.
[Gwyneth] The reason I wanted to call you is because
I was flashing back on something that you had said to me,
which was that Airbnb was actually around for a couple of years
before you got any traction.
[Brian] So just to give you a point of reference,
over New Year's Eve, this past New Year's Eve,
we had two million people, on a single night, staying at an Airbnb.
-On one night. -That's unbelievable.
So we got 150 million people total. So that seems really big.
But to put that in perspective,
two years into Airbnb,
we were lucky if we got 100 people a day using it.
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Like, the first couple years were incredibly small.
And I see you have, like, 73 people a day-- daily active users.
The first thing I would tell you: You should feel liberated,
the fact that you only have 100 people a day using your app.
It means you have the ability to talk to almost every person using your app.
This is the only time in your history you'll be able to do unscalable things.
And the most important thing I think you can do
is talk one customer at a time,
figure out the product they want,
so exceed their expectations--
They literally tell everyone about your product.
Airbnb, they weren't worried about having 5,000 people
have a great experience in the early days.
They were worried about five.
That is such great and profound advice that I really need to make sure
that that comes across perfectly to my team as well.
'Cause it's not just me going out there and talking to users.
It's everybody in the company that needs to be doing this.
-Thank you so much. -Thanks, Brian.
-We're both in SF, so-- -You're the best.
-[Bill] Yeah. -Bye.
[Bill] Can't thank you enough. Thank you.
[Kyra] We have an issue with our revenue model.
So now what?
What we did now is reduced it to 1.5% service fee on top.
And then if you forget to close your tab,
and we close it automatically,
75 cents on that.
The problem is your primary revenue source is minimal.
I'm telling you right now,
the VCs are not gonna love that.
Good morning.
I think Abra has to work. It is my life's work.
It is the culmination of 20 years of sweat and pain.
That's amazing.
My mom, if I send her money to Mexico,
she actually has to go to a bank, walk--
She has some trouble doing that.
I can use this app, so I can help her like this. It's just so good.
It feels awesome to get that kind of feedback.
-[will.i.am] Hey, guys. -[all] Hi.
What's up? Good to see you guys.
Thomas is 17 years old.
And I want the kids in my school to see what their peers can create.
-[girl] Wait, Liz. Let me-- Let me see-- -[Thomas] Do you wanna play?
I'mma watch. I'mma watch you guys get down.
[Thomas] But make sure you're spread out.
I need to show Will what I'm capable of
and that I have a real drive to keep pushing WiTag forward.
[girl] The game is finished. That's cool.
-So do you wanna do teams now? -Yeah.
-Yes. -All right.
[Zane] After six weeks of intense incubation,
Abra, WiTag, and TABu
head to one of the world's premiere venture capital firms.
Lightspeed was the first investor in Snapchat,
and currently has over four billion dollars under management.
[Gary] Okay. Here's the thing. You go in there with offense, offense, offense.
Most importantly, you will be destroyed
-if you try to [bleeps] them. -Okay.
And talk about the momentum of your progress.
-[Kyra] Okay. -Are you guys ready for the pitch?
-[Ben] Absolutely. -Let's go.
[tense, pulsing music]
So, guys, this is Kyra and Ben, and they're the cofounders of TABu.
I've been really enjoying mentoring them along the way,
and so I'm excited to introduce them.
So, we're going to tell you
why the nightlife industry needs mobile payments,
and why TABu is going to be the platform that powers it.
So 2016 was the first year in history
that credit card transactions exceeded cash transactions worldwide.
This is creating a new generation of problems
that you and I are facing every single day,
whether we realize it or not.
My first experience with these problems was while working as a hostess
at one of Mario Batali's restaurants in downtown Manhattan.
I was getting a call almost every single shift from a customer,
telling me that they forgot their credit card at the bar.
-That would've been me. -[laughing]
Yeah. It happens way more often than you would think.
-I totally-- I sympathize. -Great.
So TABu is streamlining this payment process
by allowing customers to open and close their bar tab from their phone.
We're seeking 500K for a seed round and funding.
This will be used to bring on our next 100 venues,
add additional POS system integrations,
and also do some growth and marketing campaigns that we have planned.
To build marketplaces like this, you have to do it at a local level first.
So, talk a little bit about that.
We have three main strategies that we're using to acquire venues.
The first is based on the statistic
that 91% of B2B sales are influenced by word of mouth marketing.
So what we're doing is we're building out a venue referral initiative.
What's the incentive?
If they refer, we do a TABu pub crawl/marketing for them,
where we basically bring all the users to them,
and we give discounts out to those users.
And you guys fund those discounts as a marketing cost?
Yes. Absolutely. Absolutely.
Okay.
Strategy number two is focusing on hospitality groups,
as opposed to individual venues.
And the long term play is actually building sales forces
out of the POS system teams themselves.
How many venues have you signed up using these three strategies?
Live, right now, we have about five.
That's just in a private beta.
In terms of signing on, we've signed on Mario Batali's restaurant
and JosГ© AndrГ©s's celebrity food group.
So let's talk about that.
Because this has always been the crux for businesses like this.
The very first start-up I worked for, back in the mid-90s, was Citysearch.
-Yes. Yes. -And we were selling websites door-to-door
to businesses, to restaurants, to bars, to clubs.
-It was frickin' hard. -Yeah.
But just getting to the person who could make a decision
-was so difficult. -POS. POS. What is dif--
POS-- What POS allows you to do is to smooth the integration.
But you've still gotta get the manager or the owner, whoever can make the call--
A hundred percent.
Why don't we talk a little about revenue model,
to give us a sense of if you can afford to scale this sales team.
So right now, TABu's revenue model is twofold.
We have a 4.5% item upcharge
on each item that is added to the customer's digital tab.
And then a monthly subscription fee that is paid by a venue,
starting at $50 a month.
We've created a revenue model
with a foundation that will allow us to also grow.
We have not yet launched fully
and made a huge scale to get users on board.
And that's why it's really an opportunity here,
because we've built the foundations of this company
in less than a year, while still being in school.
We're sophomores.
And imagine, honestly, how we could execute and what we could do
if we actually have the right people and the right resources supporting us.
You guys are clearly hustlers and very impressive.
I certainly was not doing this at your age.
I think there is definitely an opportunity here.
I mean, Uber has created this frictionless paying experience that customers love.
And there's no reason
why it shouldn't be done in restaurants and bars as well, right?
Absolutely.
[Jeremy] This is such a hard category,
trying to roll out sales to merchants on a local basis.
It will exist. I do believe that.
The question is, are we believing in traction? Not yet.
Are we believing in product? Maybe.
Are we believing in team?
These two kids are pretty impressive.
I just have so much personal scar tissue from go-to-market at the local level
that I'm probably wrong here--
So much has changed, but
it just gives me headaches
thinking about how difficult it was to sell to local businesses.
I love the passion you guys have.
I love the fact that you're still in school.
But this is a really hard problem.
And it's really expensive to scale sales at a local level.
I do want to believe the best product experience wins.
And you guys might be able to do that.
But at this time, we won't be moving forward with an investment.
[Ben] All right.
Thank you. We really appreciate the time, the feedback.
It's been very valuable.
And we really, really look forward to hopefully proving you guys wrong.
[chuckles] Well said, Ben.
Nothing would make me happier.
-[Ben] All right. -[Gary] Thank you, guys.
-Thank you so much for your thoughts. -[Nicole] Thank you, Kyra. Thank you, Ben.
[Gary] How you feelin'? Pissed?
[Kyra sighs] I feel frustrated.
The VCs can say that they've been there, they've done that.
But you have not done exactly what we've been trying to do.
And it's hard when you're young and you're new for them to trust that.
You okay?
-Yep. -Good.
My entire life, I've just been seizing every opportunity that came to me.
The work ethic and the drive comes from internal motivation.
So, we're gonna keep doing everything that we're doing,
regardless of the outcome that we had today.
[tense, pulsing music]
[Gwyneth] I want to introduce you to Bill.
Bill is the founder of Abra, an incredible app
that has the potential to be as disruptive and giant as something like Uber.
So, I will let him describe it to you.
So Abra is the world's first global digital-cash-based
money transfer application,
whose goal is to make it possible for the first time to move money
between any two phone numbers in the world,
regardless of where those two phone numbers happen to be.
The consumer sees a very familiar, bank-like interface.
They can store dollars, euros, pesos, yen,
send money between any two phone numbers.
The network deals with foreign exchange.
So when you actually move money--
If your phone number is in dollars, Jeremy,
and your phone number is in euros,
you don't even know that the person sent you dollars.
You just get euros.
There's no banks involved in the transactions whatsoever.
Wow.
That is the biggest idea that I think we've seen so far.
How much money are you raising?
We've raised seed and Series A totaling 25 million so far.
We have 16 plus in cash right now.
We closed a six million dollar note,
which we would like to convert to a $25 million Series B.
And the six million note, is that included in the 25 for the B?
-Yes. -Okay.
So you're raising net 19 million of new capital in this round?
Think about it in the context of consumers sending money to each other.
You're talking about a trillion dollars today.
You actually have enough cash today.
Why are you raising now?
Because I think we can go faster, to be honest with you.
I think we can acquire customers faster.
I would love to scale the engineering team faster.
This is all about velocity now for Abra.
We simply have something here that I think we can scale faster.
And it's a word-of-mouth business, right?
So if it's working really well for somebody,
and they tell their friend who's in a different country--
We want them to be able
to download the app when they receive it and get operational.
Right.
Gwyneth, you've been working with the team,
Bill and the team, for quite some time now.
So what would you say are their strengths and weaknesses here?
Well, as you can tell probably from his presentation,
he's a real moron.
-[all laugh] -So, um--
I appreciate the sarcasm.
[Gwyneth] You know, Bill's strength is his brain.
But there's a whole other side to Abra,
which is what really drew me to it,
which was... this incredible humanitarian aspect.
So if you can imagine somebody's in Los Angeles,
and they are sending their paycheck to Mexico every week.
They're sending their money home.
And they're being charged $20 or $40.
They're subject to terrible exchange rates.
This says, "Keep your paycheck. Keep it.
No financial institutions are going to pull your money out.
This is your money."
-Yeah. -And--
We did focus groups watching people practically in tears,
talking about how this could change their lives.
I mean, it was pretty emotional.
And help me better understand why Venmo won't do this in the future.
When you're holding the Venmo app in your hand,
what you're actually looking at is a balance, I believe, at Wells Fargo.
Okay? So for them to do this in 150 countries,
you have to basically repeat that in every country in the world
and then tie them together.
So I said, "There has to be a better way."
The better way is to never touch the money.
And that became this. And so--
I think that all of the domestic solutions that are out there,
that are tied to the banking system, have to start over...
-[Aaron] Okay. -...to do this.
I think what you're doing is quite impressive
and one of the first examples in the market we've seen
that has the potential
to change the way money is shared and transferred around the world.
And listen, the future of money, the idea here, your vision--
It's incredible.
I do worry about the risks here.
The big question for me--
Will the users come?
I'd just be curious to know-- why not wait a little,
prove that you can actually drive the usage,
and raise at a point where you have much more traction and a higher valuation?
If we can acquire 4X the amount of customers, right,
because we're able to go faster--
That's worth something to me now.
We know we have a first mover advantage here
that could potentially go into the-- couple of years, at least.
The market size here is enormous.
The check that you're asking for is also very large.
If we can see you, over the next few months,
deploy some of the capital that you have
to demonstrate that you can drive volume
of senders and recipients using Abra,
we would be more than happy to talk to you
about a larger round at a higher price.
But until then, we'll be waiting on the sidelines.
-Thank you, and good luck. -[Nicole] Thank you.
-[Bill] Appreciate the feedback. -Thank you. Really appreciate it.
-Appreciate the work that you do. -[Alex] Take care.
[Bill] That's the way it goes.
-[Gwyneth] You're not gonna get rid of me. -No.
[tense, pulsing music]
-Hello. -[Thomas] Hello.
-[Nicole] Hi, Will. -[Thomas] Hi. Good to see you.
My name is Thomas Suarez.
I'm really proud of this dude.
-Seventeen-year-old whiz kid here. -Thanks.
-Wanna ex-- tell them the app? -[Thomas] Yeah. Let's do it.
How many of you have played laser tag before?
-All right. I love it. -[Nicole] Good audience.
Laser tag is awesome. It's a lot of fun.
But there are some problems with it.
So, we're here to change that
with something that we have in our pockets every day.
WiTag is smartphone laser tag.
You can download the app and go out with a bunch of friends
and actually play laser tag using just the sensors in your phone.
You don't need any external equipment.
So, Thomas, what do you need from us? Like, how much money do you think?
So right now I'm seeking $1.1 million for 18 months.
1.1 for 18 months.
Talk us through how you're gonna spend that.
Yeah. Really scaling up developers
to make sure the server scale and AR is fully implemented.
How many people do you need on a team?
So, from here to launch, we need to add about three more devs.
Are they ready to come on board with financing?
-'Cause it takes time to hire people. -Yeah. Not-Not quite yet.
Will, do you know who these people are?
I think Thomas knows exactly the product that he wants to do
and knows how to get and bring the talent on board
to help him see this idea through.
I'm blown away by this guy.
So, I would never second-guess Thomas.
Can you elaborate on what's the algorithm that allows me to play?
It's GPS, along with just a compass heading.
We do a little bit of speed calculation,
because GPS is only accurate to about three meters at best.
Maybe describe the technology stack behind it.
So when I log onto WiTag,
the first thing that happens is I connect to a main server.
Then it pushes me off onto a player server. Um--
Then we're transmitting location data every second, um--
-Every second? -Every second.
That's pretty laggy.
So if it's every second, and it can be up to three meters off,
I could point over there and hit you.
In some instances right now, it is doing that. Um--
-So it's more shotgun than laser. -That's where the speed--
It can measure where it thinks you're going to be, maybe?
[Alex] Yeah.
I think the key question is whether or not you can make it work.
There's just something fun-- We all remember how fun laser tag is.
It makes me smile just to think about--
There's something here that might work.
Aaron, I've got one key concern here. The technology is just not there yet.
The one second that you identified,
it's just not acceptable.
And the fun element is heavily diminished
if you have that one-second lag.
What do you think on that?
I'm working on more efficient algorithms to do that.
But as of right now, it's more like speed over time.
[Alex] The question is, laser tag, as a game--
You have to physically be in the same place with another person.
So the friction to actually using this app
is significantly higher than something like PokГ©mon Go.
Yeah.
So that just creates another adoption barrier.
[Aaron] Listen. I think you're exceptional.
I think we have a short amount of time to prove the mechanics can work,
that we can turn it from a prototype and an idea
to something that is fun and exciting
and has a potential to scale.
That said, I think we'd like to work with you on this app.
Oh, wow.
To take what is an idea, over the next few months,
to see if we can turn this into a reality.
What we'd like to propose is 100K
for ten percent of the business.
Wow.
Do you accept that offer?
I think--
I think that'd be great, Aaron. I would love to partner with you.
-Awesome. -[Alex] Awesome.
-[Nicole] Great. -[Aaron] Let's do this.
All right. Awesome. So excited.
-Congratulations. -[Thomas] Thank you so much.
-Great, Thomas. -Oh, man.
-[Aaron] Excited to work together, man. -[Thomas] Thank you, Aaron.
[Thomas narrating] My first VC pitch I would say is a success.
The whole experience has just been awesome.
[Thomas] Oh, wow. I'm pumped.
[will.i.am] See? Told you they were gonna go.
[Thomas] Yeah.
[Zane] You've heard Thomas's story. Now's your chance to tag your friends.
Download the WiTag app on the App Store now.
You can also download TABu,
Abra,
and all of the apps featured in this episode
on the App Store.