HappyCo on the growth path as profits flow in Silicon Valley success story

ADELAIDE start-up success story HappyCo has tipped over 1.6 million units under management and is looking to spur the next phase of growth with a more strategic focus for the future.

Jindou Lee, centre, with HappyCo’s Adelaide team. Photo - Naomi Jellicoe

ADELAIDE start-up success story HappyCo has tipped over 1.6 million units under management and is looking to spur the next phase of growth with a more strategic focus for the future.

Co-founder Jindou Lee, in Adelaide recently to meet with the local engineering team, said the company had developed its products in part by responding to customer needs, but was now focused on a more planned approach.

“Lately we’ve been thinking about the business a bit more strategically,” Mr Lee said.

“We took a step back and looked at ‘what’s our purpose’, and that’s about building stronger, healthier and happier communities.”

Mr Lee said there were 45 million rental units in the US alone with an average of 2.3 people in them, meaning 100 million people were affected by issues in the rental housing market.

“We thought, wouldn’t it be really cool if we could create a platform where people are much more engaged, people feel safer, the economy’s strong, there’s a lot of trust,” he said.

“That’s where we want to head. It’s very lofty, but how it manifests itself is that we are building software to make that process more transparent, we’re building more software products that span across solving the challenges of managing renting property and eventually we’ll look at the physical spaces themselves – can we build so it’s more green, more sustainable.’’

The software has evolved from a tool used to help rental managers with rental inspections, to a much more powerful suite giving real-time insights into all units under management, net operating income, valuation and asset-tracking issues.

HappyCo’s Jindou Lee is now based in Silicon Valley. Photo - Naomi Jellicoe

Customers include Airbnb and US mortgage giant Freddie Mac. The company has three main apps - Happy Inspector, Happy Manage and Happy Insights.

The company, co-founded by Andrew Mackenzie-Ross, has raised $US11 million in funds since being created in 2012, with the last $US7.5 million raised in 2016.

But Mr Lee, who is based in San Francisco, said the company was now profitable and focused on growing organically rather than raising funds.

He said the evolution of the build-to-rent market in Australia was a growth avenue for HappyCo and there was huge scope to develop in the US.

The company’s customers were spread out geographically across the US, with almost 1.7 million units but with a market of 45 million there was huge upside. The company employs 17 people in Adelaide, where its engineering team is based, and another 31 in Silicon Valley.

“We kept to our promise to keep growing the Adelaide office and have a bunch of job ads out at the moment,” Mr Lee said.

“Engineering is always going to be core to this office.’’

He said finding appropriately skilled staff could be difficult locally and was keen to see the local industry develop.

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