Last Friday Inchoo attended the first official meeting of a newly established association of Croatian independent software exporters – CISEx. The meeting was held in Zagreb with 40 odd members of the association present.
Here in Croatia we like to brag about our achievements (especially when it comes to sports) more than may be the case in some of the “bigger” countries, which I guess comes with the package when having an entire country population the size of a mid-tier city in India or China :), but as always, it all comes down to individual and team efforts when trying to achieve something.
And we do have some great potential in IT industry with a huge number of export-oriented small businesses.
How it all began?
A really good initiative was started two years ago by a couple of guys from Zagreb who initially created a LinkedIn group for Croatian software exporters.
They figured there’s a lot of experience and specific knowledge in this sector (in particular in working internationally) spread across a number of small businesses who aren’t even aware of each other – so why not do something about it and try bringing them together.
Enter CISEx – an association formally established in January this year with 50 members so far. Last Friday we had our first meeting where two success stories were presented.
Vedran Klanac of Ocean Media presented his journey into entrepreneurship and gaming industry together with all the challenges he faced (and still is) in the process, and if any of you guys enjoyed playing Serious Sam – Vedran was a part of the original team that created this great game.
Toni and I then presented a short story about Inchoo, with emphasis on our focus on international markets and Magento in particular.
The stories were aimed mostly at getting to know some of the members, sharing the knowledge and some of the problems every Croatian company working in IT and focusing on exports has in common.
Through the eyes of a VC
And what would an IT sector meeting be without investors? We had a surprise visit by Jonathan Cooper, a serial entrepreneur and investor in the region who shared some insights into a mind of a VC and the process of raising these types of funds for business growth.
We got to know some really interesting people, even got in touch with some Magento developers – so, there may be some business opportunities on the horizon for us as well.
What’s in it for you?
We can safely say that, if you’re looking for an IT solution partner (not necessarily just Magento related), this association would be a really good place to start.
There are teams designing and developing amazing solutions for ERP integrations, ecommerce, mobile apps, CMS, audio/video streaming, micro payments etc. across a number of industries. Most of them have a proven international track record, so don’t hesitate to get in touch and get connected with some of the CISEx members.
