2Shakes a Start Up to Watch

2Shakes has had such a busy month. We have loads of news to share with you in this month’s update.

Data Futures
2Shakes Grows
In the media
Meeting Auckland bookkeepers
What’s next

Data Futures

2Shakes – Catalyst Project

Great news! 2Shakes is delighted to be chosen as a Data Futures Catalyst project. Last year Data Futures sponsored 2Shakes along with around 20 other initiatives. This year Data Futures has again chosen 2Shakes as part of a group of three initiatives they are continuing to fund. 2Shakes is very honored and grateful to be one of the three, along with Data Commons and Manaiakalani.

Above: Bobby Brooks lets Ata & Mike know that 2Shakes has been selected as a Catalyst project.

When are you comfortable sharing information? Have your say on 3rd party access

Data Futures sits within Statistics NZ, and looks at how New Zealand could better use and share data. It was inspired by the data sharing that occurred after the Christchurch Earthquake; when organisations shared information in new ways so that they could help save lives! But for most of us – who are not saving lives – how can we know what data sharing our customers feel comfortable with? Data Futures is working on guidelines and tools to help you answer this, and we want to help too.

2Shakes captures client consent to access information during the sign up process. We want to know how New Zealanders view sharing their information with professionals like Bookkeepers, Accountants, Lawyers and Financial Advisers. Would you like to help us find out? Data Futures is piloting a way to measure this with 2Shakes. Watch this space as we will need your help to contact as many people as possible to gather feedback on this fascinating question, which centres on the balance between sharing information, and getting value from what we have agreed to share.

2Shakes Grows

We wanted to introduce you to some new faces who have recently joined the 2Shakes team.

Meet Lin – Our Intern

Caiwei Lin is a masters student from Auckland University who has joined us for 10 weeks as an Intern. Lin has got straight to work, creating functionality to help to uncover ‘who your customer really is’. This will help identify who the beneficial owners of company are – a key question to be able to answer for AML.

Above: Lin and Oliver take a quick break from developing cool new features for 2Shakes

Customer Researcher – Corey

Corey Hoggard has also joined the team to help 2Shakes with customer research. Cory will be talking to existing and new customers to find out what matters the most.

Above: Mike challenges Corey to paper, scissor, rock

Team Papa & Team Oscar

2Shakes was also selected to work with the real-world development of two teams of 3rd year IT students from Victoria University. Team Papa are looking at improving our website, and Team Oscar are working to improve the Profile set up process on 2Shakes.

Above: Team Papa from Victoria University prepare to design a SaaS website that sells

In the Media

2Shakes were happily surprised to be featured in a number of places this month:

Global Front Rooms blog listed 2Shakes as one of Wellington 5 Start Ups to watch. Read the full article here.
ACC listed 2Shakes on the new ACC website as another way to give someone access to your levy account.
2Shakes were listed in the latest issue or the Xero Users (XU) international magazine.

Meeting Auckland Bookkeepers

Mike from 2Shakes talked to Auckland Bookkeepers on the 24th July. He showed them 2Shakes and answered lots of questions. It was a great session, Mike got to talk to loads of lovely bookkeepers, and with many 2Shakes customers present there were lots of suggestions and advanced tips and tricks covered too.

What’s Next

AML Phase 2 – Adding Identity Checks

2Shakes is focusing on getting ready for the next round of Anti-Money Laundering legislation – AML Phase 2. Next year Lawyers, Bookkeepers and Accountants must meet AML before they can start to do work for clients. Meeting AML is challenging and expensive, even for banks with all their resources. So we will aim to make it as easy as possible for the many Small and Medium businesses using 2Shakes!

We will help with Customer Due Diligence checks, automating as much as we can, and making the rest as easy as possible. We have already started working on Identity Verification – the process of checking that the proof of identity someone uses is real.

Up and Coming Conferences – See you There

2Shakes will be attending the Xero Road Show in Wellington this week. We will be in our 2Shakes T-shirts, so if you are going look out for us and say hello – hope to see you there.

We also have a stand at the MYOB partner connect conference in Queens Wharf, Wellington on Friday 18th & Saturday 19th August. Are you going – come and visit our stand. We will be giving away handy Business.Govt.NZ resources, as well as super cool MisPrint notebooks, and will be having another giveaway of 12 months’ subscription to 2Shakes.