Test★Market
Estonian start-up stories by Toivo Tänavsuu
It’s something that a number of people have thought of. But in February, a group of people met at the Garage48 public services design competition and actually did it – visualized the Republic of Estonia’s budget.
Coloured spheres that open on MeieRaha.eu shows the structure and proportion of the revenue and expenditures in the state budget. The MeieRaha.eu page not only shows where the state earns its money and what it spends it on. It is also possible, in an entertainment-oriented yet very business-like fashion, to “play around” with various revenue and spending items to get an idea of how they affects budget balance.
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- Tags: Garage48, MeieRaha.eu, Skype
The winner of the Garage48 public services competition 112 Mobile allows emergency calls to be placed without calling the dispatcher centre. The new service is characteristic of a trend toward more innovative solutions in emergency response centres and in the area of administration of the Ministry of the Interior in general.
The prototype for the 112 Mobile service was developed by a five-member team comprised of Maarja Mõtus, Mihkel Güsson, Jens Kasemets, Tanel Ainla and Steve Perkson. The service consists of an alternative to calling an emergency dispatcher – now visually and hearing impaired people can also get help by sending a message to the emergency centre or pressing a big red “panic button”.
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- Tags: 112Mobile, Garage48
Born and bred in Estonia, the British start-up Transferwise exchanges pounds and euros at a rate a cut better than that of banks. Dubbed the “Skype of currency exchange”, the company is now trying to make inroads on the US market, where the US dollar, still the world’s favourite safe haven, promises to increase business volumes explosively.
One of the founders of the start-up, a former key figure in Skype, angel investor and “citizen of the world”, Taavet Hinrikus (pictured below) says that Transferwise will bring lower prices and greater transparency to the world of currency exchange.
The way it works is simple. If you want to exchange, say, 1000 euros into pounds sterling at a favourable rate, just visit the site, register as a user and enter your request. Then transfer the money to the Transferwise deposit account. The company will pair another user who wants to exchange money with you.
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- Tags: Skype, Transferwise
CHALLENGE: Is mSchool a solutions to the problems of eSchool?!
In: Companies|Design|Mobile|New start-ups|Social Media|Software
14 Mar 2011
Something noteworthy happened at the previous Garage48 event in February: a team of five IT enthusiasts took on the eKool (eSchool) academic information system – which has been in wide use for years in Estonia without a true competitor – mapped some of its major shortcomings and offered a new, more attractive solution – the mKool (mSchool). The gauntlet is down and it remains to be seen how the owners of eKool (led by Üllar Jaaksoo) will respond.
The web-based mKool application prototype was developed in 48 hours based on an idea conceived by a student Markus Villig, in conjunction with Indrek Vain, Henrik Peinar, Rene Reose, Rene Rebane and a number of IT specialists. The mKool team reached the conclusion that the eKool environment, which is used actively by students, teachers and parents and which ranks third in Estonia in number of visits per week with 240,000, is above criticism in some respects. To name just a few problems, eKool has reliability and connection speed issues, students cannot enter data, and the tools for social networking are primitive and are not used.
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- Tags: eKool, Garage48, Koolitööde, mKool, Üllar Jaaksoo
The top prize at the Helsinki Garage48 start-up project competition went to LapLab – a Web application for amateur race car drivers that allows them to improve their best lap times and car configurations. While undoubtedly a niche product – there might be only five million users in the world – LapLab will hopefully hit the markets this spring.
The originator of the idea is Sven Tiirusson. A veteran figure in car racing circles who is no longer involved in the project, considers the prospects of LapLab being very good.
Lap times are key in the world of track racing. Consistently fast lap times are the sine qua non. There are a number of possibilities to do so. For instance, to just be a talented driver and own a fast car. Or make a car even faster, which is the most expensive way. The easier path is to simply drive and practice.
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- Tags: Garage48, LapLab
TrackLog shows race progress in real-time
10 Mar 2011
The latest Tartu ski marathon saw a fresh new start-up called TrackLog make its debut. GPS devices were attached to 20 skiers to track their progress in real time.
TrackLog, spawned by Kalle Volkov (pictured) and Peeter Mõtsküla, bills itself as a use-friendly tracking platform aimed at outdoor event organizers. The service consists of SIM-card-based GPS devices that can be hired, and a Web environment that allows the organizers and spectators to track the competitors in real time. The events can be experienced more vicariously – gone are the days when the spectators were clustered only at the start and finish, in the dark about how the race was progressing. Now it is also possible to replay the action, as the data is saved. Read the rest of this entry »
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- Tags: Ajujaht, PosterBee, TrackLog
The brothers Kaur and Kaspar Kallas have developed, together with the USA camera producer, Silicon Imaging, probably the world’s first stereoscopic video camera that is able to record a three-dimensional image.
This wonder gadget has already drawn the attention of many of the world’s top directors, including James Cameron and Werner Herzog who used it for shooting his latest documentary last summer.
The Kallas brothers have successfully busted the myth according to which the making of a 3D-film takes a truckload of special equipment, at least three technicians and that setting up a scene takes half a day.
The Garage48 start-up project-building competition in Helsinki gave birth to an inventive mobile application called Ordimo that potentially makes service in cafes and restaurants a more pleasant, smoother experience.
Imagine you go to a larger dining establishment during the lunch rush and manage to find a table. It turns out you wait ten minutes before someone brings a menu. Or if the menu is already on the table and you have made your pick, you have to wait 20 minutes before someone comes to take your order. All of the waiters are buzzing around and it seems that everyone else is being served but you.
So be it. When the food is finally brought to the table and you have finished your meal, you might want to order a cup of coffee or a bit of dessert. Once again the server is busy doing something else.
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- Tags: Garage48, Ordimo
The Garage48 competition traditionally produces a variety of strange cell phone games, albeit ones with distinct commercial potential. After all, people are thirsting for virtual entertainment that may be somewhat lowbrow but crinkles the corners of their mouth.
Last year’s Tartu Garage48 resulted in the ultimate anti-game – Smashr, which measured how fast players could smash their phones against the ground, and determined who was Chuck Norris or Rowan Atkinson, as it were. This January’s Helsinki Garage48 brought Blow’em – “The game that does not suck” – into existence.
“Have you ever wanted to smash a tomato on one’s face?” ask the developers. “Or lacked the courage to express your feelings for a sweetheart? Now is your time to act, no need to pretend! This is a chance to express yourself! We empower you to Blow’em!”
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- Tags: Blow'em, Garage48, Nutiteq, Smashr
Imagine that you are rich and want to give a poor African nation a library with an Internet hotspot to improve the local quality of life. You make a large donation and six months later the site is up. An honorary plaque with your name on it goes up.
Then it turns out that two other similar centres were built in the same small town at the same time, financed by other wealthy people from the same industry as yours. Now there are three libraries with public Internet access in the town but the next town a couple hundred miles down the road has none!
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- Tags: AidBook48, Skype
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- mihkel: The red button is only a presaved message - not a system to make a emergency call without a voice! [...]
- adspedia: Did you see http://www.redpanicbutton.com ? [...]
- Vladimir: Update: Blow'em game is released! It looks better than ever and features 3 weapons :) Checkou [...]
- Scott Williams: My organization has been using Posterbee for close to a month now and find it to be indispensable. M [...]
- Leo: Nice one Toivo. Happy birthday ! [...]
- MeieRaha.eu – making murky budgets more transparent
- 112 Mobile – the race to an innovative emergency response service begins?
- Transferwise, the “Skype of currency exchange” targets US market as its Grand Goal
- CHALLENGE: Is mSchool a solutions to the problems of eSchool?!
- LapLab helps race car drivers improve their lap times
- TrackLog shows race progress in real-time
- Estonians target Hollywood and Bollywood with their novel 3D-camera
- Mobile waiter Ordimo looking for innovative restaurants
- Blow’em – yet another bizarre but fun mobile game made by Estonians
- Developers of the “Facebook of Humanitarian Aid” come calling at UN Headquarters