“An immense thirst for success”: Maestrano’s Stephane Ibos on why a great team is key to growth

In August last year cloud-based business app provider Maestrano had just closed a $1.5 million capital raise, which brought the company’s total funding raised to $2.5 million. Over 1300 businesses were using the product and Maestrano  had its sights set on international expansion.

Now almost 15 months later Maestrano employs 28 people and has offices in Sydney, Seattle, San Francisco, Dubai, Singapore, London, and will open one early next year in New York. There are now more than 6000 businesses using Maestrano’s platform from 17 countries.

Maestrano co-founder Stephane Ibos chatted with StartupSmart about what’s happened to the startup since closing that bridging round last year.

What where the major developments and disappointments that occurred over that 15 month period?

“Our partner program has really taken off with more than 100 partners and affiliates globally to date,” Ibos says.

“The launch of Maestrano Enterprise was instrumental in the acceleration of the growth of the company and has allowed for rapid scaling – as demonstrated by the opening of five global offices in just 12 months.

“We’ve had very few major disappointments along the way, save the classical startup hurdles that every fast-growing company encounters.”

What have you learnt over the past year?

“Being the CEO of a seed-stage startup and the CEO of what is now a global group, albeit still small in terms of number of employees, are two completely different jobs, each coming with their own challenges,” Ibos says.

“If anything, this journey has confirmed that having an exceptionally committed and motivated team is an absolute key factor to creating and maintaining a positive trajectory.

“We are fortunate to have very robust, senior people managing our various geographies, all with a great executive leadership background, coupled with an immense thirst for success.”

How would you rate your own performance as founder and CEO?

“We’re excited by the results we’re achieving, we have a great team. I think I’m doing ok, but every day has new learning and new opportunities for improving,” Ibos says.

What’s next for Maestrano?

We focus massively on improving further our offerings to ensure that our customers keep benefiting from what’s best out there,” Ibos says.

“In the coming 12 months, Maestrano will develop more key and strategic partnerships globally with large players in our market, thus ensuring that the high-quality ecosystem our clients deserve keep going.

“From a technology point of view, we have plenty of exciting developments in progress, mainly centred around artificial intelligence – but I do not want to say too much at this point in time.”

What about you personally, any dreams or aspirations for yourself or the company over the next 12 months?

“My current dream is to really set Maestrano as a key player both on the SME market and in the enterprise space. We strongly believe we can make a difference to all the SMEs out there and also help the large corporations serve this market better. That is all I am about at the moment.”

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