Ayudarum: an Austrian crowdsourcing company in the Startup Chile accelerator program

Abstract

The founders of Ayudarum, an Austrian crowdsourcing company that is focused on connecting students with potential employers, joined the Chilean Startup accelerator ‘Startup Chile’ to help their young company expand outside its European roots. Startup Chile had provided Ayudarum with a mentor to help them understand how to grow Ayudarum’s number of users. Ayudarum’s initial business model, which had functioned well in Europe, involved partnering with universities. Universities made the Ayudarum site available to students who, in turn, logged in with their student email account. Once there was a large base of students onboard, firms were contacted to advertise jobs on the site. Now that the founders were trying to tap into the South American market, they discovered that students did not use their university email addresses and that there were distinct cultural differences in the way students worked, found jobs, and were paid. This difference may mean that Ayudarum would need to rethink the way its business model, how different markets should be targeted, and how the most value could be derived from its membership at Startup Chile.