young software-as-a-service companies from any sector that fit into a particular pattern. In their blogpost, Sosin and Beatty lay out the traits required to qualify as the kind of promising business they call a “trifecta.’’
First, such companies digitize and automate workflows, giving them an entrée into a certain cohort of customers. Second, their services accumulate important data sets that can be valuable to businesses beyond their original group of customers. Third, they can draw on their data to offer services to new market participants.
“They become the operating system of that industry,’’ Sosin says. “Others want to connect to that hub.’’
Menlo has already invested in three companies it sees as trifectas: Carta, whose cap table management software keeps track of the equity stakes of investors in companies; Indio, which manages digital insurance applications; and Qualia, a cloud-based system for the documents required for real estate closings.
Sosin says Fieldwire qualified as a trifecta. By making it easy for construction teams to keep records and photos of tasks completed, change orders made, and inspections done, it can create a “system of record’’ that becomes valuable not only to the construction team in the field, but also to the later owner of the building, for example. The construction firm could grant the building owner and operator permission to access the records, to better understand how the building is wired, and plumbed, and braced.
“It’s data that will ultimately allow Fieldwire to expand beyond stakeholders in the field,’’ Sosin and Beatty write in their post.
Photo credit: Depositphotos via snehitdesign
