Good Tape is an AI-based transcription platform that enables users to convert audio and video recordings into text quickly, securely, and with high accuracy. Pulse 2.0 interviewed Good Tape co-founder and CEO Lasse Finderup to gain a deeper understanding of the company.
Lasse Finderup’s Background
Could you tell me more about your background? Finderup said:
“I actually have a background from, believe it or not, the travel industry. I started my first company back in 2019, which was an online travel agency which then developed into a proper travel company, focusing on mental health and sustainability. We sold large adventures to the younger gap-year segment.”
“I went full time in February 2020, and then with Covid19 showing its ugly face just 3 weeks later the years that followed definitely had a part of me being who and where I am today.”
“But said shortly; I’ve always loved startups and will probably never not be in a startup.”
Formation Of The Company
How did the idea for the company come together? Finderup shared:
“So, Good Tape was actually born in a newsroom – a Danish digital newspaper Zetland.”
“Good Tape’s Tech Lead, Jakob Steinn, who at the time was working in Zetlands IT department, had the idea when he was continuously hearing the journalists complaining about how terrible and stressful it was to spend +5 hours every week doing the robot-work associated with manual transcriptions.”
“He developed the core of what Good Tape is today and is an absolute vital part of the team.”
Favorite Memory
What has been your favorite memory working for the company so far? Finderup reflected:
“It’s not so much about specific events as it is about the everyday. We love what we do – so much so that people often come by even when they are on holiday. It’s the everyday banter; playing darts in the office, going for morning dips in the ocean and staying later – just because we like being here. But a favorite memory for me personally is at christmas time where everyone gets their christmas presents that have been bought specifically for them. Love that.”
Core Products
What are the company’s core products and features? Finderup explained:
“We provide a very simple tool for people initially: Automated transcriptions converting speech to text using AI.”
“We’ve gone a very specific way, where we are focusing on maintaining our focus on simplicity and security.”
“In a world of AI, AI, AI and more AI, we believe it’s nice for users to not have a tool that can do EVERYTHING but more so a tool that does one or two things VERY WELL. We’re slowly progressing into the next part of the user journey now though, with users being able to interact with their transcription in different ways (e.g., AI summaries, transcription chat).”
Challenges Faced
Have you faced any challenges in your sector of work recently? Finderup acknowledged:
“I think there’s the constant challenge of educating users in knowing what happens with their data. We have many competitors who will train their model(s) on user data, and we are stating very clearly that we will never touch user data. So the challenge of getting people to realize that you can pay for something with more than just your money.”
Evolution Of The Company’s Technology
How has the company’s technology evolved since launching? Finderup noted:
“We’ve built everything in-house. This makes us able to manage everything in our stack and switch out bits and pieces when we want to. For example when there’s a new, improved model available, we can quickly switch to that model. We now also host our own LLM, which is currently Llama v3.3 I believe – but it might not be next week. It’s a massive value for us as a company as it means we get to have the final say in everything – we don’t have to go by larger corporations’ ways of doing things.”
Significant Milestones
What have been some of the company’s most significant milestones? Finderup cited:
“I think some would be:
- Getting our user number 1,000,000
- Transcription number 10,000,000
- Being present currently at 160+ markets
- Moving in to our new offices
- Getting a proper espresso machine in the office (probably the biggest milestone to be honest).”
Customer Success Stories
When asking Finderup about customer success stories, he highlighted:
“Many! We have a whole page dedicated to customer success stories.”
“One of the ones I have been part of though, is that we are working with the Court of Santiago de Chile, where they have reduced the number of sick days for their judges as they now don’t have to take notes manually, which previously gave then small injuries (because they were manually writing down things all day, every single day).”
“They’ve now adopted Good Tape to automate this process and they are just super lovely people to work with in general.”
Funding
When asking Finderup about the company’s funding details, he revealed:
“Good Tape has actually never taken external funding, meaning we have grown to where we are today organically with our own growth. We have surpassed the golden number of $3 million in revenue and continue to grow.”
“An interesting fact is that about 40% of our revenue currently comes from Denmark, Taiwan and The Netherlands (our top three markets).”
Total Addressable Market
What total addressable market (TAM) size is the company pursuing? Finderup assessed:
“Speaking of the Total addressable market of transcriptions, it provides a huge venue of opportunity for us since it is expected to experience significant growth with 12% CAGR towards 2030.”
“And I know every startup says that, but we can see that the transcription need is such a homogenous need across many verticals. It’s a matter of how big muscles you believe you have and how niche you want to be – how many verticals do you want to try and cater to.”
Differentiation From The Competition
What differentiates the company from its competition? Finderup affirmed:
“First of all, I will die on the hill that Good Tape has the absolute best accuracy and quality of the transcription. This is the core thing users should focus on. Secondly, we build everything with an uncompromising approach to data privacy and security. We will never train on any data, process everything within the EU and provide a data processing agreement to all paying customers.”
“Additionally, unlike other competitors, Good Tape promotes the internationalization approach and provides its users with an opportunity to transcribe the texts in more than 100 languages, while easily handling diverse accents and dialects.”
“And then lastly, our interface and editor is just miles nicer than anything else you can find. It matters more than you think.”
Future Company Goals
What are some of the company’s future goals? Finderup emphasized:
“We just want to do more of what we are already doing. Grow in a healthy way, help more people, conquer more markets and get more colleagues. We are super excited to move into more creative aspects of the work that comes after a transcription is done. I really see a big space here for someone to do that part properly. Lot’s of tools out there that can do a lot of things OK, but very few that do one or two things really really well. We want to be that tool that is really really good for your work with qualitative interviews.”
“I am looking forward to doubling more or less every number we look at.”
Additional Thoughts
Any other topics you would like to discuss? Finderup concluded:
“I love talking about how we’ve built Good Tape, when we talk about culture. We don’t have that “more hours is better” approach. We work with a focus on output rather than input, creativity over hours and just feeling great and loving what we do.”
“It’s not talked about so much as it’s hard to put into numbers, but I just love how we’ve done things here.”
