The 2023 Creator Economy: A new direction

“Holidays are a way for you to enrich your own life. It's about going out and experiencing things that you otherwise wouldn't experience in your everyday life, trying new food, meeting new people, and just learning more about the world in a first-hand way.” —Sarah Hilmy, co-founder of travel platform Oddysee.

As the creator economy continues to grow, expand, and evolve, we've curated a list of 50 exciting leaders to watch in this space. Influencers. Journalists. Operators at prominent creator-related platforms. Founders. These are the players—seen and unseen—who underpin the global creator ecosystem.

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"The future is not some place we are going to, but one we are creating. The paths are not to be found, but made, and the activity of making them changes both the maker and the destination." - John H. Schaar

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Antler was founded on the belief that people innovating is the key to building a better future. In our content series—”It All Starts with People”—we spotlight the exceptional founders we have the privilege of partnering with around the world. Each story is a window into their passions, motivations, and vision—the reasons they are building and the positive dent they are aiming to make on the world.

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This time we sat down with Stephen Scott to talk about why he decided to build his company with Antler in Berlin.

“People sometimes think the emotional and professional are conflicting, but what we believe is when people love their organization, the emotional value will actually make them productive. It will make them give their full self to the organization and make the organization grow for the long term.” —Sharon Li, co-founder and CEO of CHOYS

Have you ever wondered what is it like to be a tech startup founder and bring an idea to life?

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Founder Files is a series of conversations with founders in the earliest days of their entrepreneurial journey hosted by Antler Canada. Guests are founders of our portfolio companies and founders in residence, currently building the next big ventures. Learn about their experiences of finding a co-founder, idea validation and product-market fit.

Swish Goswami is the co-founder and CEO of Surf, a startup that helps consumers monetize their digital footprints through the world’s first extension that passively rewards people for everyday browsing. Surf has raised over $4M to date and also provides first and zero party data to enterprises like Netflix, L’Oreal, United Talent Agency, and Electronic Arts.

In this episode of Early Days, Swish talks about his decision to drop out of the University of Toronto to work in startups, how he honed in on Surf’s ultimate value prop for brands and customers, and his thoughts on the future of consumer data privacy. Tyler grills Swish on how he recruited AAA+ talent to his team at such a young age and how he validated product-market fit with Surf's early (paying) customers.

Businesses born from the global financial crisis have been hugely successful. Explore why, and how founders should think about startups today.

Our baby, UpMarket, is already two months old. It’s been an incredible experience from the point I joined Antler as a founder, only a few months ago, to now being ready to go live with our product and first customer. In this article I will share my experience on the rollercoaster that started with an idea I originally came up with during dinner.

India's approach to unbundle payments made the world look up and take notice. Now it's time to disrupt commerce with the Open Network for Digital Commerce or ONDC. In our latest Theory of Next deep dive we mapped, researched, and reached out to every network participant live on ONDC right now.

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And we're excited to share with you a comprehensive what could be India's next unicorn catalyst with inputs from Vibhor Jain (COO of ONDC), Sujith Nair (Founding member of Beckn Protocol), and founders building on ONDC!

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Co-authored by Nitin Sharma (Partner, Antler) and Gokul Kumaravelu.

Entrepreneurship can be a challenging and rewarding journey, but it is not one that should be taken alone. A co-founder is an essential element in building a successful startup.

We’re thrilled to bring day zero investing to Munich as we open the doors of our new office and host our first founder residency in September 2023. After having been in the DACH ecosystem since 2021, it was clear that adding an office in Munich would only be a question of "when"-not "if".  

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Antler's new Munich office will plug right into this dynamic ecosystem and be well-positioned to support the next generation of entrepreneurs in Central Europe. We look forward to seeing what exciting new ventures emerge from this city!

At Antler, we believe anyone with enough determination and grit can build a great business. But we also know the startup ecosystem’s playing field is far from level. This International Women’s Day, we spoke with five women leaders at Antler about why embracing equity matters so much to our work, and what advice they have to be more inclusive in our everyday work and lives.

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It's 2023. Women should be able to pursue any career they choose and have an equal playing field to thrive in it.

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While we would like to believe this is true, the reality is very different.

“India has about 70 million unique women borrowers, which, to put it in context, is about a quarter of our households. Any ease of business here, any ease of credit here, any advancement here is our best shot at becoming a prosperous country.” —Neha Juneja, co-founder and CEO, IndiaP2P

Lessons from a founder who's done it

Alexis Aaron, co-founder of Sortd, recently shared her insights on gender bias within the industry, overcoming prevention questions, and how reframing the problem you’re solving for can win over different investors

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Antler was founded on the belief that people innovating is the key to building a better future. In our content series—”It All Starts with People”—we spotlight the exceptional founders we have the privilege of partnering with around the world. Each story is a window into their passions, motivations, and vision—the reasons they are building and the positive dent they are aiming to make on the world.

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This time we sat down with Filippo Nigro to talk about his journey and why he decided to build his company with Antler in Berlin.

Cameo is the world's largest celebrity marketplace. With Cameo, you can access thousands of celebrities and request a personalized video message for any occasion from your favorite stars.

Arthur Leopold recognized the potential of selfies becoming the new autographs. He quickly joined Cameo as the first employee (COO) and invested in the startup's friends and family round. Arthur spent over 5.5 years with Cameo, serving as President through January 2023. While Arthur recently stepped down as President to start his own company, he remains a Senior Advisor and an ardent supporter of the team.

We recorded this podcast while Arthur was Cameo's acting President. In this episode of Early Days, Arthur talks about the first Cameo that started it all, combatting the chicken-egg problem in marketplaces, finding near instantaneous product-market fit with fans, and Cameo's distinctive celebrity acquisition strategy.

Have you ever had an idea for a really awesome product, but you get stuck because you don't know how to write code? Well, today's guest, Emmanuel Straschnov, is solving that problem as the founder and CEO of Bubble.io. Emmanuel and his co-founder, Josh, wanted to put the ability to write software at the fingertips of the entire world. In 2012, they started Bubble, and set out to build a no-code platform that equips anyone to write beautiful software. Listen to this episode of Early Days to learn how Emmanuel and Josh bootstrapped for seven years before taking external capital, building Bubble into a unicorn in the process.

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Our content series "It All Starts with People" delves into the passions, motivations, and vision of the exceptional founders we have the privilege of partnering with around the world. Bringing a clarity of vision to our latest spotlight is Piet Hein van Dam, co-founder of Clear, the award-winning digital self-help tool for diabetes patients.

How Antler works with & invests in startups in Australia

Four years and one Fund on, a lot has changed at Antler Australia.

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In this new series, the global early-stage VC reveals how it's working with founders from day zero, path to its first 100 Australian investments, introduces two new Partners, and announces some of the best terms for founders in the country.

A team from the Antler India Fellowship cohort, Cattle Guru is building a one-stop shop for Bharat farmers.

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We are thrilled to back 16-year-old Tejas Ravishankar as he builds a robust productivity and experience platform for open-source developers.

Despite growing calls to create a more inclusive venture capital ecosystem and remove the barriers to entrepreneurship, only a fraction of funding is raised by founders from underrepresented communities.

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The first step towards change is quantifying the challenge. While in-depth research has been conducted about women founders and founders from ethnic minority backgrounds, data has never existed about tech founders from the LGBTQ+ community—until now.

A look back at 2022, a record year for the leading day zero investor in Europe—showcasing investment activity and key predictions for the early-stage tech ecosystem in 2023.

Antler is proud to join forces with Microsoft for Startups to support rising entrepreneurs—starting with 23 non-dilutive grants to women founders in South Asia, Southeast Asia, and North America—and reduce the barriers to startup success. Meet some of these founders.

Our content series—"It All Starts with People"—delves into the passions, motivations, and vision of the exceptional founders we have the privilege of partnering with around the world. In our latest spotlight, we spoke with Tanika McLeod, one of the three co-founders behind MinuteSkill, a Toronto-based social micro-learning platform that uses bite-sized content and knowledge-sharing communities to empower the next generation.

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OnArrival is building simple, plug and play APIs that enable travel sellers (e.g. OTAs, corporate travel managers, travel agents, Airlines, hotels, etc.) bundle high-margin travel ancillaries (e.g. visa, insurance etc) in over a billion trips worldwide.

Antler's second annual ESG and Impact Report shares learnings on how VCs can focus on creating sustainable value from the outset, and celebrates our portfolio companies' work in this space.

Salad is building the future of how women take charge of their hormonal health.

Find out more into why we backed Novo, a Berlin-based company disrupting the energy renovation industry. NOVO automates analysis, planning, and financing of energy renovation for real estate, with the goal of decarbonizing homes and tackling climate change.

More than 25 operators at leading tech companies share their top predictions for the year ahead.

No matter what the macro-economic backdrop, there is no force greater—and more essential—than founders determined to make a positive dent in the world.

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A massive thank you to the entire global community—founders, advisors, investors, employees, and partners—who made the past year our best yet.

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Here’s a look back at our 2022.

Exploring the link between entrepreneurship and emotional intelligence with Rafael Urdaneta, DACH Head of Finance at Antler.

In the second installment of our multi-part series we dive deeper into the different layers of AI value stack and how future founders can find their cutting edge in this rapidly evolving ecosystem.

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Note: This is part 2 of a multi-part AI series. If you are interested in understanding why AI will be an era-defining technology and the key terms associated with it, please read part 1 (click here) before you begin part 2.

One of the hottest topics trending on social media platforms in 2022 exploded in recent weeks with the release of ChatGPT and DALL-E, prompting furious debate about the implications for people, careers, and industries worldwide. What’s at the heart of the controversy? Generative AI (Gen-AI)—systems that can quickly create new content such as college essays, songs, and digital pieces of art. These capabilities are impressive, but they also raise important questions about the future of work and the role of humans in an AI-dominated world. As generative AI continues to advance, it will be crucial to consider the ethical implications and potential impacts on society. What would happen if creative jobs were largely replaced by AI machines? 

Generative AI is opening up a world of opportunities and Hexo is building the underlying infrastructure to enable that. We are thrilled to partner with Vignesh Baskaran and Kunal Bhatia to help build and scale Hexo AI.

At Antler, we're proud to back more than 600 companies across six continents doing great things in the world. During this season of giving, we are excited to highlight a selection of Antler portfolio companies whose products and services—from tech-enabled beauty products to luxury fashion mystery boxes—are sure to impress the most discerning trendsetters on your nice list. 

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Welcome to the 12 Days of Antler Gift Giving!

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In this multi-part series, we explore everything from the origins and evolution of AI to the future AI landscape and how future founders can be a part of it.

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The 2nd installment of the series (click here) is also live for anyone interested in jumping right to how the AI landscape will pan out and what future founders need to know.

Our new content series—"It All Starts with People"—delves into the passions, motivations, and vision of the exceptional founders we have the privilege of partnering with around the world. In our latest spotlight, we sat down with Yaumi Fauziah Sugiharta, a brand builder and growth marketeer on a mission to make people more comfortable in their own skin through Base, a digitally native personalized skincare company based in Indonesia.

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A conversation with Samira Scheerer, ex-consultant who’s following her vision of founding her own business.

As everyone anticipates the next wave of ultra-successful companies in Benelux, what does it take to get there? What do the successful founders of Benelux unicorns look like? This report is an in-depth look at the Benelux startup ecosystem and its brightest stars. And above all, it is for anyone who is helping build the next 50 unicorns in Benelux.

The Angle is a new content series from Antler, featuring perspectives from our team members on the biggest events and trends impacting founders and early-stage investors today. Every article is that person's unique angle on a hot topic—what they see from their vantage point in one of our 25 offices around the globe—not Antler's stance. In our first edition, Jeff Becker draws lessons from the demise of FTX and turbulent tech moments in recent years. This article first appeared in Jeff's Monday Morning Meeting on Substack.

A conversation with Raj Kukreja, software developer, engineering manager and now working on finding the right solution.

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Sitting down with Viktoria Prantauer: digital marketing expert, breast cancer survivor, and now working on making her mark on the world.

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Our new content series—"It All Starts with People"—delves into the passions, motivations, and vision of the exceptional founders we have the privilege of partnering with around the world. In our second spotlight, we sat down with Jamie Bubb, co-founder of Twirl, a remote content studio powered by top-quality creators that helps brands scale their content engines rapidly and cost-effectively.

We are living two simultaneous realities: the uncertainty of the current downturn and the unstoppable wave of innovation disrupting every industry. Against this backdrop, Antler's Kevin Brennan shares perspectives on assessing your position in venture capital for the rest of 2022 and into 2023. Might 2023 be the best vintage for the coming decade?

Antler’s seventh Amsterdam residency has officially kicked off! Are you ready to meet them? Here is more about who we invited to join the residency and what you need to know about this group of exceptional people.

We are thrilled to lead the pre-seed round of Motif, a team formed at Antler India Residency as they transform the way SaaS is sold.

Antler was founded on the belief that people innovating is the key to building a better future. To honor them, we are launching a new content series—”It All Starts with People”—spotlighting the exceptional founders we have the privilege of partnering with around the world. Each story is a window into their passions, motivations, and vision—the reasons they are building and the positive dent they are aiming to make on the world.

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In our first spotlight, we sat down with Emilia Theye, the co-founder of clare&me—a mental health app that uses language-based AI to develop an innovative approach to virtual self-help.