For Espresso founder and SSE International Bootcamp India 2019 alumnus Scott McKeon, the last three years have been an entrepreneurial escapade filled with highs and lows – and he wouldn’t have it any other way.
When asked recently to reflect on how far the business has come since it was launched, the founder described startup life as “an ongoing adventure,” adding that “with each new milestone or growth phase, the adventure changes and your role in the adventure changes, and ultimately that's what keeps it exciting and fresh.”
Like most great innovations, Espresso’s foundation product, the espressoDisplay, was developed to meet a very real need. Bemoaning a lack of a second screen for their laptops, university student Scott and his co-founders Will Scuderi and Matt Childs realised a gap in the market for a new style of portable screen, then set about producing what is now the world’s thinnest portable touchscreen monitor.
Fortunately, the young Australians weren’t the only ones who believed in the potential of espressoDisplay – the company successfully raised over $430,000 in just 40 days via a Kickstarter crowdfunding campaign in October 2019.
How are you continuing to innovate today?
On the road ahead, Scott said "we've got so many ideas, and our marketing and team and capabilities are getting better and better and better. Because we're a new company, we don't need to get every new customer to buy the latest iPhone, but it does mean we have a long roadmap to get market penetration, and it will take years for us to get that reach.
“So, it's really about ‘Okay, how do we continually add value to our existing customers through software’, so they’ve got new features, particularly around the touchscreen, especially now in a remote and hybrid world.”
What role did SSE play in your journey to this point?
Scott was emphatic about SSE's pivotal role in his journey as a startup founder and entrepreneurial thinker. “SSE was the catalyst for our actual idea when we were at university,” he said. “Creating the right environment, which for us at the time meant bouncing ideas off of each other within a context, but then also learning about the ecosystem, what's around” was really energising.
“Mapping out the entrepreneurial ecosystem, the landscape, the who's who and so on, was really interesting to know, because if you're a university student and you haven't been involved in entrepreneurship previously, you have no idea about incubators, accelerators, investors, advisors, co-working spaces, things like that.
“That pretty much sums up the value and role of SSE up to this point, to really help us make sense of what's available."
What advice would you give to aspiring entrepreneurs?
Entrepreneurship has to be treated like an adventure, because it is an adventure, and all adventures have highs and lows. But it's the journey itself that is the adventure. That helps rationalise the whole thing, right?
“The question that you always have to ask yourself is, ‘Is this the adventure I want to be on?’ If the answer's ‘No’ then do something different, but as long as the answer is ‘Yes’ then that’s exciting because it’s proof that your startup adventure is alive and well.”
While Scott is modest about the significant logistical and entrepreneurial challenges he and his co-founders have faced in getting the business off the ground since 2019, even without the curve ball of a global pandemic, to not only be solvent, but successful and growing, is an incredible tribute to him and his team. SSE wishes Scott and team-Espresso the very best of luck for the future!
Read Scott's graduate profile.