UK-based Letstrack aims to give people the power of comfort, security, and productivity
Letstrack taps the potential of a company that makes IoT for its real-time GPS tracking and messaging app that can track your loved ones and vehicles.
Startup: Letstrack
Founder: Vikram Kumar
Year it was founded: 2015
Sector: IoT
Funding raised: Bootstrapped
Based out of: UK
Imagine a world without the GPS. From getting your favourite dessert delivered home to getting a much-needed ride within seconds wouldn't be possible. Much of what we take for granted today wouldn’t be possible. Apart from food and transport, GPS is also enabling innovation in other industries. It was using GPS that Vikram Kumar started Letstrack a GPS-based solution provider, to improve security and productivity.
The word tracking brings to mind images of sleuths and detectives, but Letstrack works on different principles.
“We believe in changing the world, and in empowering people by giving them the power of comfort, security, and productivity savings in the palm of their hand,” Vikram explains.
Launched initially in Stratford, East London, UK, Letstrack was started to make society “safer, happier and more productive”. The company recently launched its app and devices in India for both B2B and B2C consumption.
“It’s the way we present the information. As Steve Jobs used to say, ‘customers don’t know what they want until you tell them’. We are improving people’s decision-making, changing their lives by adding security,” Vikram says.
The beginnings
Having been in sales for 15 years, one of the biggest challenges for Vikram has been monitoring and managing the productivity of the sales team. Working for the likes of Airtel, Vikram had business across two continents and would find it tough to manage sales teams with different backgrounds and ethnicities.
He started Letstrack simply as a solution to help monitor employee productivity and management.
“One day I was chatting with my project manager in a hotel room, telling him that we provide solutions to a lot of clients so why can’t we do something for ourselves. As usual, he said ‘explain it to me and I will make it’. That is how the whole idea was born, and, since then, the product, company, and our vision have completely evolved. We believe there is much more to tracking than just knowing where things are,” Vikram says.
Since Letstrack already had an IT team and the thought of developing a software, it was easier to build the product. Once the product was ready, they went on hiring the best professionals in the market to take the best product to the consumer.
The team’s experience in the telecom industry gave it insight into the distribution network for Letstrack.
“We currently have over 200 employees across the country, but this is growing rapidly as demand surges,” Vikram says.
Building the product
Letstrack is an app-to-app and an app-to-web based platform and offers customised solutions for schools, logistics and financial services. The offerings include LetsTrack School, LetsTrack Safe, LetsTrack Delivery, LetsTrack Attendance, and LetsTrack Claim.
Vikram says their app gives you a quick overview of your assets or family; for “detailed reporting and analysis we have the web version”, he says.
The team adds that Letstrack goes beyond just finding the whereabouts, but also helps gather quality information that can help you strategise, plan, manage, and optimise things you do in your everyday life.
Citing an example, Vikram explains it could be tracking a child’s school bus or planning and managing your office teams’ better for higher profitability; protecting your car from theft and misuse by drivers; or sharing geo-tagged selfies and pictures with your friends or on social media.
The devices are available at prominent online portals, neighborhood mobile and accessories stores, and big electronic and gadget retail chains. The products come with 12 months of video tutorials, 24X7 customer support, and no data rental costs.
The team says to ensure the app is always functioning they use IoT to ensure that user data and information is analysed real-time using AI.
All information is analysed and sent to web browsers, smartphones, and e-mails in the form of push notifications, reports, updates and feeds through easy to understand infographics and texts for everyday consumption, so as to benefit from it.
The model
Letstrack works on a commission-based model for most B2B engagements. The team works on a gross margin of 10 to 15 percent. “We will recover most of our investments from the customer in two or three years through subscriptions,” Vikram says.
Denise Rueb, Research Director at Gartner, says, “IoT services are central to the rise in IoT devices.” Total IoT services spending (professional, consumer and connectivity services) reached $273 billion in 2017.
There are startups like SafeinCity, Axilor Ventures-backed Purnatva, and Leaf Wearables in the market. However, Vikram says that the focus of Letstrack is more on understanding and solving the different needs and requirements of the end user.
The team claims to have over 50,000 customers as of now. What’s the plan for the future? Letstrack is targeting sales of $1 million per month from April 2018.