Tylr Mobile's Marlin Scott and Ryan Nichols
Nov. 12 - 13, 2013
San Francisco, CA
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Tylr Mobile is part of a generation of business-focused startups that are fully focused on mobile.
Cofounders Ryan Nichols and Marlin Scott are veterans of the largest business software vendors. They met years ago at a Salesforce conference and discussed ideas to improve the way we work on the go. They hatched a plan to develop a startup, Tylr Mobile, and a ‘smart email inbox’ for sales folk.
It’s highly fitting that Tylr Mobile would raise $250,000 in strategic investment from Salesforce today and close out its $1.5 million seed round.
I first met the pair at Alchemist Accelerator, a Y Combinator of sorts for revenue-generating enterprise startups. Alchemist’s entrepreneurs aren’t cut from the typical Silicon Valley cloth. Most have relevant experience — prior to founding Tylr Mobile, Nichols held a variety of roles at Intuit, Citrix and SAP.
At Alchemist, the team developed the first product, known as WorkinBox, which is integrated with Salesforce. WorkinBox is the first in a suite of products that can make mobile workers more efficient.
Nichols describes it as a Google Priority Inbox that will eventually be hooked up to every enterprise system. The idea is that a salesperson wouldn’t miss a critical email, which is jumbled up with personal notes, calendar invites, and junk mail.
“We’re not building a new mobile CRM,” said Nichols in an email interview. “We’re turning your mobile inbox into a platform that will connect to lots of different systems over time.”
At Salesforce’s upcoming conference, Dreamforce, Tylr will announce plans to bring the WorkinBox service to more iPhone-wielding sales teams using Salesforce and Gmail. Tylr is also looking to partner with chief information officers at large companies.
The company expects to raise further financing early next year. It has already secured funds from the Alchemist Accelerator, Citrix Startup Accelerator, Salesforce.com, and a handful of angel investors.
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