Virtual Sapiens— Technology To Amplify Human Connection
The Problem
Video has become a core component of how we connect and drive impact as professionals. Video provides a challenge in that most professionals have no way to consistently receive the feedback required to show up confidently and to excel as impactful communicators.
What The Company Does
Whereas other coaching technologies require a human on the other end, their SaaS solution, “Sidekick” is now in the hands of over 150 people, with zero human oversight. The Sidekick provides pre-call, real-time and post-call feedback and insights on the user’s body language on video. The Sidekick+ plan users get access to progress tracking dashboards that enable them to monitor their performance and watch trends based on time of day, meeting participants, and other metadata, in terms of their own body language behaviors. The Sidekick+ also includes a Learning Lab focused on the superpower of body language.
Business Model
Virtual Sapiens is a B2B SaaS business with a focus on annual recurring contracts. For direct sales, they license technology on a per user basis with a pricing structure that scales with license seats. Because of their extremely low overhead (due to client-side AI) Virtual Sapiens is able to have a very low entry point into the market. Pricing for the Sidekick is: $9/month or $84/year Pricing for the Sidekick + is: $35/month or $336/year For partnerships and integrations, Virtual Sapiens has discussed a revenue sharing model that would be a percentage of the partner’s total cost or a dollar cost per bulk license. This is still to be determined as they are just now entering pilots with a few partners.
Market
Primary target is B2B companies with growing sales teams who use video to connect with clients. Specific personas include customer-facing roles in Sales although use cases are present for customer success, hiring managers and leaders. While they sit easily within the $1,500/$2,500 spent on training per sales professional, conversational AI as an industry is set to increase to $55B by 2026.
Traction
To date, Virtual Sapiens Sidekick has 153 installations in the Chrome store and is a certified application in good standing. They have 15 paid individual users, which does not include the team pilots currently under way and they have not yet engaged in any meaningful marketing campaigns. Virtual Sapiens is in the middle of their first paid pilot and they have contracts/pilots lined up starting mid-June and July. Virtual Sapiens was selected as a finalist in the 2021 cohort of MassChallenge as well as the inaugural MassChallenge/IBM mentorship program. Rachel Cossar was just selected as one of the Female Founder Fellows with The Capital Network for 2022.
Founding Team Background
Co-founder and CEO, Rachel Cossar, is a leader in the field of nonverbal communication and leadership presence facilitation. As a former nationally ranked athlete and professional ballet dancer, Rachel has a knack of translating unique skills into relatable business skills and competencies. Virtual Sapiens comes as an evolution of Rachel’s combined work as founder of Choreography for Business, a nonverbal communication consulting firm as well as a faculty member with Mobius Executive Leadership and as a leadership presence facilitator with Ariel Group. Rachel has worked with leaders from GE, BCG, Pfizer, Accenture, McKinsey, HBS and more. Co-founder and CTO, Neal Kaiser, is a seasoned technology entrepreneur. He brings over 20 years of experience as a leader, advisor, and mentor. He has a passion for product development, strategy, team building, and culture. Previously, Neal was the Founder and CEO of Upshot Commerce. He designed and developed one of the first enterprise-scale eCommerce platforms which is in use by hundreds of mid-market and Fortune 500 customers. After a successful acquisition, his attention was focused on how to use machine learning to improve communication in the new digital world.
What They Need Help With
The Virtual Sapiens team is in growth mode and is looking for introductions to investors and companies that have an appetite for championing new technology. Ideal clients are SMB with strong and growing sales teams in the range of 15–200. Connect with the Virtual Sapiens team.
