Flic - Innovation at the push of a button
It all started with a KTH student who wanted to quit using snus. Now the multipurpose button Flic is sold on a huge scale and is associated with large companies like Spotify, Bosch and the international pizza giant Dominos.
KTH student Joacim Westlund got the idea when he wanted to quit using snus. He wanted to and register each portion he used in order to get an overview of how to cut down. Being the engineer that he is, he created an app which was essentially just a green button that he pressed each time he used snus. But descpite the app being incredibly simple he noticed how cumbersome he found the process of picking up the phone, unlocking it with the pin code, finding the right app and so on. He could have used a button to just press. That's how the Flic-button was conceived.
Milestones:
September 2013
First meeting with KTH Innovation. The idea was a bluetooth button that can control specific functinos in a smartphone and tablet.
October 2013
First prototype ready. The team is accepted to the KTH Innovation pre-incubator program (at that time known as Student Inc.). They pitch at an investment network breakfast for funding.
November 2014
The team took an accelerator program in San Fransisco during the summer. Back in Sweden they secure funding from Almi and continues development with the help of KTH Innovation. Towards the end of November they launch their first and very successful crowd funding campaign. When the campaign closes the team has raised 965 307 USD from 13 870 backers, which exceeded the target by 1206%.
April 2015
The KTH Innovations support is concluded and the Flic-team moves on to Things, a coworking space on KTH campus.
Visit Flic's room at Teknikringen 1
At Teknikringen 1, KTH Innovation's home on KTH Campus, you can find a meeting room named after Flic. There you can see this illustration, inspired by Flic's story in full size. The illustration was created by Jens Magnusson.
