TUM Founder's Talk: VESTIGAS

What problem do you solve with your product? 
Many supply chains are still linked only by analog paper delivery bills, which results in considerable additional manual work in processing and storing them and in invoice verification. The administrative processes that have to be carried out as a result cost a medium-sized company high six-figure sums per year. With VESTIGAS, we can save these costs completely by digitizing and automating all tasks and processes.

What is the technology behind the product?
VESTIGAS completely replaces paper delivery bills with structured data records. This is made possible by a newly developed cryptographic certification algorithm. Central to this is that it is not just a simple digitization (e.g. in PDF form) in the conventional sense. Instead, VESTIGAS processes purely machine-readable data and uses electronic signatures. If changes to the supply data take place at any point in the supply chain, confirmation is requested from all parties involved - similar to what happens with a blockchain.

How did you come together as a team? 
Paul and I (Julian) met on the first day of our studies almost 10 years ago. After many years of working together on various projects in the student consultancy Academy Consult, we ended up in the construction industry almost by chance. Once there, we discovered the potential in the topic of delivery bills and subsequently validated it as part of a master's thesis. Shortly after, Nicolas and Yannick joined the team. Both were also at Academy Consult and complemented the team with their technological know-how.

What connection do your team members have to TUM? 
Each of the four founders completed both his bachelor's and master's degree at the TU Munich, which allowed us to gain all the necessary scientific foundations and practical experience. Paul and I (Julian) met each other (as already described) initially on the first day of our studies in the very first lecture almost 10 years ago. We are also actively supported by TUM students who, for example, are writing their interdisciplinary project (IDP) or master's thesis at VESTIGAS. There is therefore a deep connection with the TUM.

What makes your idea unique? 
Our idea is unique because we can completely solve a problem that exists to this day using state-of-the-art technology. We have conceptualized our product in a way that our customers can realize enormous savings without a large implementation effort. This combined with a very large market potential and unlimited scalability, forms the basis for our unique idea VESTIGAS.

What target group do you serve? 
At the moment, we are exclusively serving the construction industry as a so-called beachhead market, since in addition to the deep industry experience of the founders, a very high potential of the market could be proven. Specifically, this includes all companies involved in the supply chain of building materials. This includes suppliers, forwarders and customers (especially construction companies). In a later step, the technology will also be rolled out to other industries (e.g. chemicals, food/gastronomy).

What are the next steps? 
After the product was developed intensively in numerous pilot projects close to the customer, we were able to celebrate our successful market launch. The next step is to make VESTIGAS available to the entire construction industry, since the more companies actively use our application, the greater the benefits for each individual. Accordingly, the 10-person team is to be further expanded and external capital is to be raised in Q2/2022 for the upcoming scaling.