🦄 Unicorner Startup of the Week:

Flite

✍️ Notes from the Editors

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Operating system for events

Flite is an all-in-one platform designed to streamline and automate the management process for event organizers. By integrating tools for event creation, team management, payroll, marketing, and ticket sales, Flite eliminates the need for multiple software solutions, saving organizers up to 70% of their operational time. It also offers features like instant payouts and multi-channel marketing, enabling organizers to focus on creating unforgettable experiences and scaling their events. Ideal for startups, small businesses, and student organizations, Flite simplifies event planning, reduces costs, and minimizes errors through its unified system.

🔗 Check it out: flite.city

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💰 Business Model

Companies that purchase Ren are charged per seat. In addition, Ren also offers an API that customers can use to integrate with their internal tools (like CRM software). The cost for the API is usage-based.

📈 Traction and Fundraising

• Raised $100,000 in pre-seed funding from Jason Calacanis as part of the LAUNCH accelerator

• Currently raising a seed round

• Partnered with Sean Kingston and many major artists 

• Nearly doubling revenue every month since July 2024

• Featured on This Week In Startups podcast with Jason Calacanis and Alex Wilhelm

📖 Founder Story

💼 Opportunities

• Creative Director

🔮 Our Analysis

The event management industry is rapidly evolving, driven by the increasing demand for seamless and efficient organization of events in a digital age. As event organizers seek solutions to handle the myriad of tasks involved, platforms that offer comprehensive, integrated tools are becoming essential. Flite stands out in this landscape by providing an all-in-one operating system tailored specifically for event organizers.

Flite excels in its user-centric design and features that event organizers really want. For example, instant payouts and multi-channel marketing empower organizers to focus on delivering memorable experiences and scaling their events. Additionally, Flite’s impressive traction, consistent revenue growth, and notable media features demonstrate its strong market presence.

For small businesses and organizations, this can be game-changing. At this rate, Flite is well-positioned to capitalize on the expanding events software market and support organizers in creating exceptional events—taking event planning to new altitudes.

📚 Further reading

• Navigating nightlife: How NYU students are transforming the party scene with startup Flite [Washington Square News]

• Negative Venture Returns, GM Kneecaps Cruise, and Finix joins the TWiST500 | E2059 [This Week in Startups]

Written by Arjun Raj Loomba

🎙️ Founder Q&A 

This Q&A has been reconstructed from interview notes.

Unicorner: What’s the story behind Flite? 

Suvir Wadhwa: We saw a lack of community, and demand for meeting people. Why don’t we start with organizing events in East Village (New York) and sell some tickets? We scaled to organizing events not only on campus, but on the east coast. We connected with nightclubs across New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia as well. 

We realized that ticketing was a small part of the process. To organize a full event, we’d bring on promoters, bartenders, DJs, and create content on social media. We’d do our payroll on QuickBooks, and use tools like Venmo, Zelle, and Cash App. For marketing, we’d use Beehiiv, Mailchimp, and Twilio. On the day of the event, we’d scan tickets at the doorstep using a Square terminal. Revenue on the backend was handled with Excel sheets or bar tap management systems, which are very expensive. After the event, to reengage with our audience, we used a lot of Instagram and Twilio. There are so many operational tasks when you organize events. Paying for software and hiring employees for each task can get super expensive and broken. 

That’s why we built Flite, a vertical solution for all of this. Because everything is now on the same platform, we’re able to connect marketing to team or finance. We find synergies between different elements involved in organizing your event, and build tools on top of that.

We launched it as juniors in college, and bootstrapped completely. We reached product market fit this July, and processed $100,000 on our platform, with $16,000 in revenue. In August, we processed $300,000 on the site, making $26,000 in revenue. In September, we processed $500,000 and did about $56,000 in revenue. In October, we processed almost a million dollars on Flite, and did about $100,000 in revenue. We’ve been scaling super strong with a 2-3 person team and are currently in the process of raising our seed round.

U: What’s your vision for Flite? 

SW: Let’s take an example: TikTok DJs are so good at what they do, but they might not be the best at marketing, handling, payroll, etc. This prevents them from creating experiences just because they aren’t able to handle things on the backend. We’re enabling creators to manage this with tech, without having to stress. We want to enable more people in the event space and help them scale. 

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Made with 💜 by the Unicorner team 🦄

Unicorner has been compensated by Qnetic for publicizing the offering of Qnetic’s crowdfunding round. Read the full 17(b) disclosure on our website.

Nothing in this email constitutes investment or legal advice. Readers should conduct their own research before making investment decisions.