2021: My Year of Relationships

We've all been getting them. Flooding our timelines over the past few days. Annual reviews. Some will find them annoying, a bit backwards-looking, and self-congratulatory. But from a tech entrepreneur's point of view, annual reviews serve an important function that we don't usually encounter in our daily work: They remind us that we should stop and look back at what we've accomplished and review our projects. This is something I often forget to do in my desire to move forward, get things moving, develop, and optimise as well as something I actually want to spend some time doing.

What have we achieved at Incari this year?

If I had to name this year at Incari, it would be?my year of relationships. I deliberately did not call it the?year of growth.

In the process, we have grown brilliantly this year – in every respect:

Our story begins in May, when Incari was spun off from its predecessor company CGI.?We opened our first office in Poland and could expand our team here and at our Berlin location. In addition to the structural level, we have primarily grown qualitatively and could bring new software versions to market maturity, which have serial interfaces, among other things. The increased performance that we have achieved here – be it the rendering engine’s performance or the improved loading performance of the Incari player – would absolutely justify talking about a "year of growth".

After all, this year, we also looked beyond developing the cockpit in automobiles and took a look at controlling aeroplanes and?superyachts. Here, new areas of application have opened up to our intuitive visual 3D approach, such as?the virtual representation of 3D construction plans on site, or in medicine, for example, with the remote control of a surgical robot arm.

But ultimately, it is not the visible successes but the underlying relationships that have brought us true greatness. And I would like to focus on that.?

We have entered collaborative partnerships this year. All of them, in their diversity and depth, make us very happy. With the?Strate School of Design, we have an incredibly renowned and enriching partner on our side that allows us to let Incari Studio shine with its practical expertise. Students in Bangalore are already using our software and sharing their experiences. Their feedback and enthusiasm encourage us and make us proud to have instigated a real change. The feeling of making things happen is incredibly motivating, and we continue to get that from our other new relationships.

In our development partnership with?Pi?ch Automotive, we developed the digital cockpit and the entire HMI for the Pi?ch GT in a record time of just six months. The unveiling of the prototype, which will be launched in 2024, was a highlight of our year, which wasn’t lacking in events. Our vision of the maximum user-friendly human-machine interface is becoming reality, and that is fantastic.

We are aware that it is a privilege to experience this feeling in another partnership we entered with?Design 1880. The combination of sustainability and the value of design with the most modern demands inspires us, and we are grateful to be able to realise our claim here, too.?

Another commitment we hope to realise and that fills us with pride is Emmanuel Macron's?'Scale-up Europe'?initiative. Strengthening the European start-up scene and finding a common European response to the challenge of digital transformation is a matter close to our hearts.

There is a saying that no man is an island, and this belief has been somewhat forgotten this year. A year marked by the pandemic, in which we have all become or remained distanced from one another, at least physically. This is another reason why I would like to use this year in review to focus on our relationships with others, and in doing so, also make it clear that no company is an island. We can endorse this statement ourselves as we are privileged to have a strong partner at our side in the form of our Series A funding round, which – if we’re sticking with the island theme – builds many bridges to the mainland.

I am proud to have not grown alone. I am proud to have reliable companions who inspire me, support me, and drive me. And I am grateful for this past year. That’s why I would like to take this opportunity to thank all our supporters, investors, friends, and families from the bottom of my heart.

The biggest and final thanks go to our team. Without you, this year would not have been possible. Your passion, inspiration, and strength drive us and remind us to pause for a moment because I know that you have my back. I am very grateful that we are walking this path together, not as an island but as a networked continent. Thank you for helping to shape my year. Here's to a successful 2022.