How Flowcase (formerly CV Partner) CEO Erling Linde grew to $5.5M revenue and 400 customers in 2024.

guys CEO earling is an entrepreneur and engineer by trade launched in 2012 with no Revenue took him five years to break a million dollar run rate in 2017 but now today doing 5.5 million bucks in Revenue up 47% year-over-year from 4 million a year ago a year ago in 2023 they actually raised their first outside Capital $3 million seed round at somewhere between a 20 and 30 million valuation now they're focused on growth they help you add case studies and team member profiles resumes quickly and easily to your proposals they play nicely with get accept panck and other do signing tools their team of 40 today with 12 Engineers is now looking to scale into the US hey folks my guest today is erling Lind after completing an Ma and computer science from the nor Norwegian University of Science and Technology he held software development and consultancy roles at Hydro is partner miles as thoughtworks and Ford internet group with his comprehensive IT background in 2011 he presented with Nikolai neelen to found CV partner that CV partner.com if you want to follow along all right erling you ready to take us to the top yes all right what is what is CV partner who are you guys selling to what's the product do yes so uh CV uh CV is uh that's Latin for resume so as you call it in the in in in in the states so um our clients they are professional service firms uh so that means it consultancies like uh Cap Gemini or CGI it could be management consultancies like uh b or PWC uh it could be engineering firms like wsp uh and even law firms like da Piper uh all those logos are clients in some geographies um and um they all typically often share a uh a challenge when it comes to winning work so they they essentially get a lot of their work from from winning uh public sort of tenders so they bid for work and in order to win that work they need to present their people so they're Consultants or Engineers or lawyers and they need to present them in the best possible way uh so highlight the relevant experience and also include a lot of experience to make sure that they take off all the requirements in the viid uh and further they often also have to format it so in the EU there's like standard uh formats that keep changing all the time the same like in the Nordic where from that like the government issues different resume templates that you have to adhere to and the same in the US like US Government forms and typically would have these reses without our res solution the reses would be in a share in Word documents it could be on someone's laptop so you just give them a tool a B2B Niche sell solution to gather all this information uh so they can search find the relevant Consultants with the right amount of experience the certification Etc uh put them together uh highlight the relevant experience and Export it into these templates so they they save a lot of time in this process reduce the burnout of their bid and proposal teams um and they increase their chances of winning more work uh so yeah let me just let me just jump in real quick so so to try and simplify this real quick let's D Piper has 50 lawyers uh they have a startup that needs help with a lawsuit related to fintech Da Piper would use your software to find which of their attorneys is best suited for that fintech legal case that this that the software company needs and then they will send that proposal to the software company using your tool is that right yes that that would be a a good example uh but uh I I would say possibly a more typical example would be let's say uh wsp is bidding to build or like support a huge project and they need to prove that they have 100 Engineers that have participated in designing a large Bridge or something with specific requirements in the past and they need to put all these together and send it off them then they they would be able to search fine but also actually make sure that uh they perent the best possible these big law firms then those are the ones paying you as customers like the da Pipers the world Etc yes yes I see how do you price this and sort of on average what's the average customer paying you per month or per year to use the technology yeah we are kind of targeting two segments now so we go for midsize which should be like 15 to 50K USD ARR and then we have the kind of Enterprise motion which is like 50 to 500k uh US dollar AR and that yeah we we have DS in both of L boxes um MH how how many folks would you categorize in your Enterprise segment today uh I would say we have probably 30 to 50 Enterprises and is that where you started and now you're selling you're going down Market or did you start down Market going up uh we started down market so our first client was probably 60 employees or something like that small small deal and then we've gone up Market since tell me tell me that story when did you close your first customer um so we started when we started out uh we had this idea that we could uh help consultancies solve this problem I called everyone I knew in the consultancy business and they all said they had the same problem um and then I asked him like if I solve it will you pay for it and all of them said yes um but then I started building when was that what year 2012 uh was probably when we started building yeah and uh I think uh started building we had some pilot customers that gave us great feedback uh um one of the Fe one of the feedback was like you know this is aesome functionality it save us a lot of time but it looks completely so that's when I got my co-founder niai to join me and we sorted out the user experience and after number of demos we finally had one client said we're ready then there the contract and we looked at each other it's like do we have a contract and then was that that first customer I think was 2013 okay so 2013 you sign your first customer what did they pay probably 10K or something yeah okay so they pay 10K for a year for you said 6 Z seats yeah I try to remember they could be in 5K 10K some some somewhere in that range yeah got it and then so that was your first customer right scale up you know take us up to today right how many customers are you serving today and how are you growing yeah so uh today we have more than 400 customers um and we grew around 47% last year so just to be and just to be clear you said average price point earlier uh you had midsize Enterprise but and you gave me two very different ranges but was the average customer paying something like 15K uh per year yes yeah yeah I would say so that's the ACV at the moment but it's shifting upwards as we're going more up Market okay so can I take 400 paying customers times 15,000 ACV average that would put you at about 6 million run rate today yeah that's that's correct five between 5 and six that's uh the current ER that's great and so if you grew 47% to year year that means you were doing what about you ended about a year ago at four million run rate yes yes that's great growth where's most that growth coming from expanding seats in current customers or adding new customers Al together uh so we have our nrr was like 115% last year but uh we are we're definitely changing new logos and and and going through a geographic expansion at the moment so how are you Landing new logos what's your motion do you have inside sales reps is it organic SEO what is it uh we got some we we do get some from from SEO inbound uh that's more in the markets we're more established and as we're breaking into new markets it's more Outreach going to a lot of events uh conferences they start MH okay so I guess you added a million and a half of Revenue over the past 12 months where would you say the majority of those customers came from was it a big conference you went to or something else uh it's a mix it's a mix of uhing pick your I'm asking you to pick your most successful growth channel so the answer cannot be it was a mix what was your most successful Channel um I I I I would say uh it's still probably growing uh word of mou from yeah customers that uh come inbound uh but um okay how but how do they find Word of Mouth doesn't just happen in nor ases inbound So when you say inbound how do they find you what do you do I mean your organic rank on ahra from a domain rating perspective is 26 so you don't get a lot of traffic from just random inbound SEO how are you getting inbound no it's it's it's typically uh people that have used Us in other companies and change jobs and they come to us that's a obviously very successful but uh uh in order to bre into to New Markets we are so you need people you need people to get fired not necessarily fired but accepting new jobs perhaps yes yeah who would you say what are the other two or three firms you're competing with in the space what are their names um so we are uh I would say we're competing against like you know them doing building it themselves uh we have we competing against people only using this in SharePoint uh and then it's it's uh it's typically uh maybe companies that are coming this from a more like like a managing like digital Asset Management like document management more like more generic tools uh and then there's uh some sort of crms that have added the the functionality that we provide as an add on but maybe not at the at the depth that we we go into I mean would you put people like Conga composer proposify lupio in in in your competitive Suite or no no no those are more uh for us those are more partner potential um so so we they they uh they would typically like when you a proposal can consist of multiple parts and multiple documents and and and and typically like there would be some intro about your companies and financials how you would solve it but then there's like this the resumes and the case studies uh and that's the two part that we sold really well we go super deep there uh so I would say these other tools uh they could partner with us when they need a more specific specialized solution in that area so we don't see those as um as competitors more like you know partners partners okay so four million is what you ended uh with it call it June last year so year-over-year growth brings you to 5.5 million today what year did you pass a million Revenue do you remember uh no it must have been 201 17 perhaps okay hey folks if we haven't met yet my name is Nathan ladka I launched and sold my first software company back in 2015 and went on to write a book about it which you guys made a Wall Street Journal bestseller purchasing over 30,000 copies thank you so much for that after the book I launched this show and went went on to create founder path.com I raised a large fund to do non-dilutive deals with B2B software Founders so far we've invested in over 400 software Founders totaling $150 million here in 2024 we're doing three to four New Deals per week so if you're looking for Capital and don't want to give up Equity go sign up at founder path.com for free to get your offer all right let's jump into the interview how did you guys sustain the business from 2012 to 2017 with under a million of Revenue you just keep the team really small yes so we we basically bootstrapped for 10 years until we raised our first uh round uh last year in September so so what was that size size of that round uh around 3 million okay and why I mean now is a terrible time to be raising why did you decide that you need to go raise Equity right now um so I I guess we had been do trapping for 10 years as I pointed out and we had we had a decent grow growth and uh for us it's also been a a Learning Journey uh of course but we were kind of getting to a point where okay we we think we have something that we can accelerate and we think this time is now uh so yes obviously maybe we should have raced in 21 or something like that but when we decided to to to consider racing we started talking to to potential investors and uh in the end we we got uh we got a deant enough valuation that you know this makes sense to do and we want to use this to go faster now it's a so it's more maybe it was an ideal timing in terms of the market but it was the right timing for us as a company most folks in their seat are selling something like 20% of their company were you around there uh less than that yeah okay got it so I mean is for to say between 15 and 20 or were you under 15 uh I would say under under okay great around around around that yeah yeah well any if you sold if you raised 3 million and you sold between 10 and 15% to your company right that put you somewhere between a 30 and a $45 million valuation right yeah it's on the lower end of that but yeah yeah I the reason I bring up the timing is because by all I mean for a seed round you have four million of ARR right 30 million valuation represents a 7.5x multiple there are others slightly lower than that was slightly lower than that but okay okay so my my my point is the same though you raise it under 7x Val you know multiple when folks in your same position in 20121 we're raising at 40x multiples yes this is very dilutive for you I mean why couldn't you keep bootstrapping to preserve your Equity why didn't you want to do that um I I I guess we were coming at at the point where that Equity could speed up um the growth of the company a lot faster than we could have done by continuing bootstrapping but but how where would you put the money because when I asked you about growth channels all you told me was well it's Word of Mouth which it's hard to fuel that with paid with paid marketing no I I I think uh we uh have gotten a really good market share in the nordics where we are based uh but we have offices in the UK and now we started an office in Toronto Canada uh to spare ahead the North American expansion and I guess we were seeing uh more traction in North America or and also a huge Market of course of course for us uh so um and the although we were able to successfully sell uh to clients from from Europe we uh there is obviously a time zone issue here and the team was working longer and longer hours and I think we just needed to to scale up that um uh got it's North American expansion yeah why why I mean I assume you know Samir and get accept well I'm sure you know Makita do I mean these are you are a very natural bolt-on acquisition to any of these document signing platforms and I imagine many of them would have been willing to pay a price greater than the multiple you just raised VC at did you look at any acquisition offers last year along with the VC round um I think we consider that but uh I think coming from uh a bootstrap company where we originally we didn't have any plans to to raise anything we our plans was to continue boost trap being being employee owned company making that sort of transition uh we wanted to do it in a in a I guess stepwise way and that felt like the most sensible Way Forward for for us and the company that's what we wanted to do that was what excited us to keep building the company um Arling sorry but just to take a step back so you've been doing this for over 10 years if someone willing was willing to pay you 40 million all cash UPF front which is 15 million more than the valuation you just raised at what you're saying is that didn't feel like a natural Next Step you wanted to take the the delution and raise 3 million of equity and hope to get an exit later on for for you and your early teammates yeah I'm not sure we got that offer but I think for us we we wanted to we we're not doing this only for the money we we we love building a company and love The Learning Journey as we grow uh and continue so uh so I guess for us that that was uh that was the step we wanted to do who who led the round which VC uh they're called ID Capital uh the we and DC ID Capital very cool and tell me more about your team how many folks are fulltime today uh there are almost 40 now in five countries wow how many Engineers 12 I would say well are you engineering by trade yes yes ah nice are you the so founder or you have co-founders uh I I guess I started in but then uh NC is the the ux person joined very uh soon after that and then Jo our CTO uh who's London based going maybe year after that and then Andre has been the early sales person joined after that so that's kind of the four of us that that we consider when did the last person join what year of those four I have to remember that uh 2016 probably okay so it was before you were doing a million a year in Revenue yeah yeah yeah very cool well anything I missed about the company you want to make sure audience knows uh no I I guess I um so I'm based in Oso Norway uh on Monday I'll be in London on boarding our new V sales there but in August I'm moving to Toronto Canada and with my family and um going to be there for the next years to to to Really expand the uh uh to to North America so I'm very excited about that so uh so I guess I'm looking very much forward to to learning a lot more about that market and hoping to meet and connect with people so if anyone wants to meet up or connect up there you go if you guys are listeners in Toronto a Founder in Canada reach out to earling just look up earling CB Partners on LinkedIn check them out earling let's wrap up here with the famous five number one your favorite Business book oh I got it there this one the revenue architecture the new Bible good one by yako and is winning by design team number two is there a CEO you're following or studying uh feel like there's lots of them uh but I'm getting a lot of inspiration from uh Eric boar who's CE a company called Ardo uh is's in the same portfolio as us and um um very helpful yeah number three is uh what's your favorite online tool or what online tool do you spend the most money on oh uh I guess it's probably a hub spot at the moment that we spend the most on but uh I also spend a bit of time I'm in V these days so yeah number four how many hours of sleep do you get every night oh I have two small kids so that varies a lot uh let's say six okay six so married with two kids you said yes and how old are you uh I'm 40 40 years old last question something you wish you knew back when you were 20 uh uh oh that's uh that's that's a very good question um uh oh can I answer that there's so many Lessons Learned starting this company I guess uh it would be fun to know uh the journey I've had so far and what's possible and uh yeah that uh yeah and I'm super excited that Adventure can still sort of continue these days by looking forward to to making the move to Toronto for example which I thought I would be able to do in my forus but um now that we're doing that that's super EXC guys CEO earling is an entrepreneur and engineer by trade launched in 2012 with no Revenue took him five years to break a million dollar run rate in 2017 but now today doing 5.5 million bucks in Revenue up 47% year-over-year from 4 million a year ago a year ago in 2023 they actually raised their first outside Capital $3 million seed round at somewhere between a 20 and 30 million valuation now they're focused on growth they help you add case studies and team member profiles resum��s quickly and easily to your proposals they play nicely with get accept pan other document signing tools their team of 40 today with 12 Engineers is now looking to scale into the US erling thanks for taking us to the top thank you so much s