Glints

History of Glints

The company was founded by Oswald Yeo (CEO), Looi Qin En (COO) and Seah Ying Cong (CTO), who met back in high school, Hwa Chong Institution. Aged 22, 21 and 21 respectively, they were the youngest entrepreneurs in the Joyful Frog Digital Incubator (JFDI) program. They realised that there are 75 million unemployed young people worldwide and many employers are struggling to fill entry-level vacancies. Glints sought to bridge this mismatch between employer needs and skills young talent have on offer. Glints had a relatively simple upbringing, They started by helping theirs friends source for internships by building up their career readiness through practical & real-world experiences. In August 2013 glints started of with 38 people in google spreadsheets and as of April 2015 it has grown to over 7000 active members. The trio have put their computer science degrees and scholarships on hold at Stanford, University of California Berkeley, and Wharton Business School respectively, in order to pursue the business. Glints' mission is to bridge the gap between education and employment by being a professional platform for young people focused on career discovery and development.

Funding

Glint is an alumnus of accelerator Joyful Frog Digital Incubator (JFDI.Asia). In 2014 Glints had received US$59,940 in pre-seed money from private business angels and JFDI. On October 20, 2014, Glints managed to secure $475,000 in an oversubscribed seed round from venture capitalists, led by East Ventures, with participation from 500 Startups, Infocomm Investments, Darius Cheung, John Tan, SPH Media Fund, 8 Capital and Pix Vine Capital. These funds will be used to grow its engineering team to develop the platform. According to co-founder Oswald Yeo, they have turned away about US$250,000 as they "didn't want to raise so much money right now".

User profile

Glints allows users to create profiles to showcase their relevant skills and experiences. Skills can be certified when users demonstrate proficiency in the skills to a minimum standard, although the feature is currently in beta as of May 2015. To complete the profile, users can upload their resumes and their own photos to aid in identification. The account can then be used to source for relevant job opportunities using the various available filters.

Job listings

Employers create job postings and describe their needs and skill requirements. They are segregated into different industry functions and could be filtered with the industry filter function. Users can further narrow their search down to four different types of position, namely, internships, full-time, part-time and project-based type of jobs. Prospective employers are then able to receive applications from users and review each application individually; Glints uses a mix of human and algorithmic screening to bring companies quality candidates.

Glints DNA profiling test

The Glints dna profiling test was developed by Looi qin en, one of the co-founders. The test helps in profiling the personalities of interns. The test was developed and a test group of 50 people were asked to take the test and then asked to do established personality tests such as DISC and the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator as well. The results were compared in order draw correlation and similarities. One of the key features of this test was that the number of questions were reduced from the usual 50-100 to 10.

Business model

On the business model side of things, Glints will only charge employers once they contact a potential match. Alternatively, companies can also pay a monthly subscription fee to access Glints’ entire database of jobseekers.

Future developments and expansion

The company is working on a key feature called the “dynamic skills tree”. It works by recommending career paths to users based on their indicated interest. Each career path comes with a "skill tree" that shows projects, internships, and courses he can take. Once completed, these stints will reflect on his Glints profile, which employers can discover and then reach out to the person for an interview.

Glints has plans to expand to the larger American market, with plans to settle in Blk 71 San Francisco as a member of the pioneer batch of occupants, using it as a base to further their venture through building their network in this space first.

Reception

Within the first three months, the firm has gained revenue of US$10,000. It has over 800 intern accounts and 200 internship petitions from companies. Line, Goldlion and Puma are hiring interns through Glints Intern. It is currently in talks with financial giant Goldman Sachs to discuss possibility of it using the portal to hire future interns as well. Glints Intern was one of the top 50 startups listed to attend Echelon Ignite in Singapore. The trio made a pitch at the Singapore Echelon 2014 Satellite. The team though missed the coveted “winner” rank, but it certainly has managed to catch the eye of investors. The company claims that it has been approached by angel investors who are keen to pool in seed capital into the company, mainly because of the traction and the vision of the company.