Hindsite raises $3.25 million for the “YouTube of hands-on skills”

Aussie startup Hindsite has raised $3.25 million in seed funding to build out its edtech platform for the skilled, on-site workforce.

The raise values the Brisbane-based startup at $18 million. But founder and chief executive Doug Hastings has bigger, unicorn-sized ambitions yet.

Founded in 2017, Hindsite creates wearable tech allowing skilled professionals to record exactly what they’re doing on site, creating content that can be passed on to trainees.

It allows for remote learning and what Hastings calls ‘micro-learnings’, offering an efficient way to share best, and safest, practices.

Speaking to SmartCompany, Hastings calls Hindsite “the industrialised YouTube for hands-on skills”, with applications in anything from construction and manufacturing to utilities and healthcare.

It already has global reach, with customers in Europe, the US, the UK and Africa, as well as throughout the greater Asia-Pacific region.

Since 2020, the business has seen almost 600% revenue growth, the founder says.

“And we’re not slowing down.”

The round was led by a group of angel investors, including 360 Trading founder Matt Kuppe and Ironbridge Capital joint CEO Greg Ruddock.

Sci-fi in real life

Hindsite had been in the making since Hastings was a 19-year-old builder’s labourer. He didn’t feel he was necessarily being trained correctly or learning best practices from colleagues on site.

Soon after, he hit another pivotal moment in his life and career: watching The Matrix for the first time. The scene in which Keanu Reeves is able to access kung fu skills on the spot may remain in the realm of science fiction, but it struck a chord with Hastings.

“That whole concept of installing knowledge in the person that needed it at the right time never really left me,” he says.

Hasting went on to build a career in Software-as-a-Service, working at RedEye Apps and edtech unicorn Go1.

Eventually he “sort of joined the dots”, and the concrete idea for Hindsite took form.

Tackling the skills gap

This tech is partly aimed at helping close the skills gaps in various skilled work sectors.

It’s a gap that has been growing for the past five years, Hastings explains. But the COVID-19 pandemic exacerbated things.

The way we work changed almost overnight, he notes. But there are also huge groups of very experienced people who retired or were made redundant, or who were unable to continue working.

There’s a new generation of young workers coming in, but few available to train them. It’s becoming more important than ever to make sure they’re trained properly, and can do their work safely.

Hindsite was always built to capture skills and knowledge from the current generation to transfer to the next, Hastings explains.

“We just got accelerated dramatically.”

A new unicorn?

This funding is pegged for onboarding more staff, Hastings says, including the recent hire of new technical co-founder and chief technology officer Dominic Williamson, formerly an early employee working on Microsoft Teams.

Hastings is also eyeing new verticals and new opportunities.

The vision is to be the “single point of truth” for hands-on skills, globally, he says.

Where Go1 offers skills for office workers, Hindsite will do the same for other sites. That puts some 500 million potential users in its immediate market alone.

Go1 recently became one of Australia’s latest unicorns. And Hastings believes Hindsite will get there too.

“We’re already on the charge to make that happen,” he says.