Last May we had the chance to speak with CEO and Co-Founder of CELUS, Tobias Pohl, to learn about the company’s journey as a fresh-faced startup. Now, just over a year later, Pohl is back and excited to discuss CELUS’ progress in the last year – which has been quite significant!

What’s new at CELUS?

“There’s been some really big things happening over the past year for us here at CELUS. Arguably the biggest of them all is the public launch of the new CELUS platform which almost feels like forever ago now!” enthuses Pohl.

When we last spoke with CELUS, the company was in the process of testing its new platform before its official release, now that vision has become a successful reality. “We had been working with the original design platform for almost two years, which was successful itself. We had over 10,000 users on the platforms and various partners, but to move forward we needed something even better. Using the original formula, we could take all the learnings that we made, compile that all together, throw away all the boundaries, and make something completely new!” 

By taking the core principles and technology and combining it with everything it learned from version one, CELUS was able to deliver an entirely new and improved experience for its customers with version two. “V2 is a completely different experience that is based on the same principles and foundation we had originally,” explained Pohl. “We had the new version almost complete by the end of 2023, a closed beta in February which saw success, and then finally a public launch at embedded world in April.”

A whole new platform isn’t all that CELUS has been working on, Pohl was also excited to announce another big development at CELUS – the opening of its US headquarters. Last time we spoke with Pohl, CELUS was operating from its main office in Munich, Germany, and its product and technology centre in Porto, Portugal, yet as the company has expanded, so too have its offices. “The second big thing for us is on the organisation front, we have now launched our North America headquarters in Austin, Texas, with the goal being to create a commercial centre there. We hope that this headquarters will drive sales and will be the location that we can build our primary engagements.”

The last year of challenges

With the last year being such a critical phase in CELUS’ timeline as a startup, it’s natural that it came with some significant hurdles. Reflecting on these challenges, Pohl discussed a couple of key areas that stood out to him.

“The biggest challenge of the last year or so has, by far, been meeting the expectations of engineers from a pure product point of view. Making the product good enough to overcome the resistance to change and ensure its value to organisations is critical, meeting that bar is really hard,” explains Pohl. Whilst he is certainly optimistic, he is also being realistic and cautious in this regard, “I think it’s too early to say that we’ve mastered it and it’s complete, but we are certainly on the right track.”

Last year, Pohl highlighted that one of the biggest challenges was overcoming the resistance to change within the industry, especially in the area where CELUS operates. A year later, this is still something that rings true, “The complexity of our industry, and the service stiffness of companies within it is still a big challenge as well. They’ve been doing business in the same way for decades and it is something that we are now challenging. Crossing that barrier is daunting, nobody wants to be the first, and nobody wants to be the last,” he explained. For CELUS, looking ahead, this will be one of the key challenges to overcome in the remainder of the year.

Highlights along the way

On the flip side, there has been plenty to celebrate for CELUS over the past year. For Pohl, the biggest moment by far was the launch of the new platform, “I can even give you that exact hour it happened! The 9th April 2024, 10am. We flipped the switch to make the service live at embedded world and within an hour our six demo pods were full with a queue of engineers waiting to see the product. That kept going for all three days we were there, that was a really cool moment for us.” To see the product that CELUS had worked so hard on being so well received was a magical moment for Pohl and the team. “You’re sat there afterwards like… s**t! That actually worked!”

For Pohl personally, as a CEO and Co-Founder, a big highlight for him is seeing how mature his company has gotten. “It’s been fantastic, leaving for a month to the Austin office, and then coming back to Munch and everything is completely fine. Nothing went wrong, everything and everyone is okay, the teams are working, it's great!” Getting to see the fruits of his and his team’s labour has been a treat, and now he can push forward with confidence.

What’s next?

For CELUS, much of the big stuff is complete for now, and it’s just a matter of growth in the coming year or two. As Pohl explores, “We’re at a stage where we are really happy with our technology and product, and it's where we want it to be. Now it’s just about building strong partnerships and relationships within our industry and growing our customer base. We’re currently aiming for over 10,000 users before the end of the year, it would be a great milestone for us, so that’s what we are pushing for!”

This article originally appeared in the July/August issue of Startups Magazine. Click here to subscribe