Deliverect and Lightspeed Hospitality with Zhong Xu

Posted on by James Henderson

Zhong Xu created the first iPad Point-of-Sale (POS) in the EMEA region, ten years ago. This SaaS product has since evolved into the company known today as Lightspeed and is now available in over 100 countries. Zhong was Global Director of Lightspeed Hospitality until 2018, when he co-founded Deliverect – a third-party food delivery aggregator that integrates platforms with restaurant POS systems. 

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Data-Driven Customer Engagement and SevenRooms with Joel Montaniel

Posted on by James Henderson

Joel Montaniel is the CEO and Co-Founder of SevenRooms, a fully-integrated, data-driven guest experience platform for hospitality operators. SevenRooms is venture-backed by Amazon, Comcast Ventures and Providence Strategic Growth and has been named on Inc.‘s Best Workplaces and Forbes’ Best Startup Employers lists. The company’s clients range from independent restaurants to global enterprises including MGM Resorts, Mandarin Oriental Hotel Group, Topgolf and Live Nation. 

Joel’s experience is wide and varied from investment banking – dealing with Commercial Mortgage-Backed Securities (CMBS) – to global AI-powered messaging technology. 

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Exiting Impos and Developing Doshii with Sean O’Meara

Posted on by James Henderson

Twenty minutes before recording, Sean O’Meara’s first company, Impos, was acquired by Jonas Software –  but his attention remained resolute.

In true tech founder form, Sean started his journey in a garage but his recent company, Doshii, as been backed by Reinventure (Westpac) and Coca-Cola Amatil and aims to change how Point of Sale (POS) systems connect venues to the apps around them.

Sean is a big believer in conceptual design, testing and failing to learn as quickly as possible to solve problems.

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Twice As Hungry with Mark Calabro and Shannon Hautot

Posted on by James Henderson
  • 16 years on from starting the successful Australian point of sale system, OrderMate, Mark Calabro and Shannon Hautot have invested over $2 million in seed funding for another tech startup, HungryHungry.
  • OrderMate put Mark and Shannon in a strong position to understand the retail market providing point of sale software to over two and a half thousand Australian venues and has processed more than three billion dollars worth of food orders – that’s a lot of data. 
  • The subsequent knowledge that that’s brought, now has Mark and Shannon driving this new online ordering platform and QR ‘order at the table’ tech, with HungryHungry.
  • This is an interesting wave in mid-market retail at the moment, that previous guests Stevan Premutico and Kim Teo are also acting on. 
  • If you’re in hospitality retail – tech or ops – this is one to pay close attention to.  

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