⏳ 8min read /✍ by Diego Gonzalez Bravo

 

 

Ignacio Gomez Portillo is the co-founder of EGG, he is the scientist-turned-to entrepreneur who created an algorithm that maximizes human collaboration and efficiency of any group of 3 people or more. His startup will revolutionize the way we interact with each other in Education, Enterprises and Government.

I had the chance to meet Ignacio and EGG two years ago. Besides being an extraordinary human being, “Nacho” is a world-class scientist and visionary entrepreneur.

He has a Cum Laude PhD in Physics from Universidad Autónoma de Barcelona, and holds a Masters degree in Physics at Instituto Balseiro (one of the most prestigious science institutions in Argentina). During his academic career he has been a researcher in CONICET and Professor at Universidad Nacional de Cuyo among other universities in Argentina and Europe.

 

Nacho has dedicated the past 12 years to understand and explain scientifically human society as part of nature. He based his Doctoral Thesis around the theory of human cooperation, transformed it into applied science and developed an algorithm that is core to his technology company EGG.

 

According to Nacho, Human beings exist and live because our parts cooperate. This also happens at a macro and social level, as we cooperate more, a better society we have. His algorithm connects people and analyzes their interactions and creates dynamics that enhance cooperation. This system allows you to organize ideal teams based on their profiles and creates metrics to improve performance.

He decided that the best place to test the EGG algorithm was in the field of education, however, this technology can be applied to any other activity that requires cooperation as a fundamental element at any scale of organization.

 

So EGG’s mission is: to build a social platform that allows people and organizations from all over the world to develop any type of activity with the help of the Human Cooperation Algorithm.

 

I was definitely impressed by Nacho, but then I met his co-founder Carolina Perez Mora and the rest of the team at EGG and my enthusiasm went to the roof! They were creating a startup emerging from Mendoza Province, with superlative execution and the capacity to attract world-class talent.

Note: how the company faced COVID and pivoted quickly to transform it into an opportunity for leapfrogging to remote education and collaboration, and consolidated their model and growth. But that story deserves an entire post!

 

Since that first meeting we followed EGG evolution and by mid 2020 we engaged in conversations to lead their Seed round.

The big question was: Will EGG be just another EdTech company with a good service for students and education institutions, or can they become an exponential startup that can really change humanity, boosting collaboration globally in all spaces – Education, Enterprise and Government – making more efficient and productive our interactions?

 

EGG’s product and vision is aligned with some trends we have been observing:

• The year 2020 made it totally evident that the linear Teacher-Student relationship is broken and requires a new facilitator role. Traditional education process needs to evolve towards a physical + digital dynamic, making it even more challenging to create engaging and compelling education. There’s a need for a moderation layer for the social interactions between students and teachers/facilitators.
• The same problem has permeated the work environment, the opportunity to create an underlying layer of coordination in current and future Enterprise Collaboration and Communication tools.
• New governance tools are emerging in the decentralized crypto communities which require moderation and maximization of collaboration in order to truly create engagement and participation between the stakeholders.

 

The more we knew Nacho, Carolina and the team, the more we were convinced that they were on the path of great things.

We share the vision that EGG can create the “Operative System” for human cooperation and see their API “connected” and running under any MOOC, Cohort-Based-Course, Enterprise Chat and Collaboration Tool, Video Call, Virtual Classroom or DAO! We might have a mega unicorn between our hands…

 

When Valentina Terranova joined Draper Cygnus’ general partnership she added more conviction regarding EGG to our team. No one knows more about EGG than Valentina! She has been one of their early supporters and investors with Embarca Accelerator, mentoring and shaping EGG to this moment.

We at Draper Cygnus are super excited to lead EGG’s Seed round and are convinced that this company will change, boost and improve how humans interact and collaborate with each other.

 

The best is yet to come!