Eugenio Bertino participated in the European Innovation Academy’s edition in Turin in 2018. Five years later, he launched his first startup, HAUSME. Here is his story of EIA and beyond.

What made you join EIA?

It was 2018, and I recall I was about to start my first year of Master in Management at ESCP in Turin. I did not know any alumni of the program at the time, so I started scouting for information online. When I understood what it was about, I did not have any doubt to go and try. Many foreign students from around the world, a variety of ideas that aimed to become startups, a nurturing group of mentors following us throughout the program, and most importantly, a great energy to learn and to try to launch our own startup. Those three weeks were amazing, and I am proud of the wonderful journey I undertook thanks to the program to this day.

How did participating in EIA help you in your entrepreneurial journey and in founding your startup?

During the EIA program, I joined a team named cEYEcle with four other guys from Italy, the US, and the Netherlands. Our startup began with a simple idea definition. We were all cycling enthusiasts, and we wanted to provide users with a tool to detect the quality of roads by constantly collecting data while riding. We knew how to implement the technology on smartphones, but we had no idea how to make a clear business plan or how to set up our product roadmap. In other words, we had the tools but no knowledge of how to test the interest of the audience or where to go with it. Thanks to mentorship and teaching at EIA, we gathered the guidelines and tools on how to lead our product to a first market test by building the initial community, drawing competitor analysis, and building our real product roadmap.

Due to the competitive environment of the program, insightful feedback, and real-life testimonials, we were able to go until the last round of the program, and we pitched our product in front of investors after only 3 weeks of work. Despite not winning the funding at the time, I have never forgotten the learnings I absorbed during the EIA program, and they continue to influence me in my next life experiences. I have never abandoned the dream of founding and developing a startup that could one day have an impact on everyone’s life. So, after graduating with an ESCP Master’s in Management, I managed to found and successfully launch my startup, Hausme, this time with more experience and knowledge, thanks to EIA.

What is the main learning from EIA that you are still using today?

Firstly, the knowledge that launching and shaping an idea in just 3 weeks is possible, gives me a lot of strength and confidence. The passion and the structure that EIA was able to transfer to its participants were so strong that it eventually brought me back to trying the same path 5 years after. The psychological boost was not the only value that still has an impact. When facing the initial challenges of idea definition, market fit, product roadmap, and user definition, I was able to go through these steps with much more clarity. I started immediately to build my product strategy and business roadmap, having in mind the structure I learned during EIA. All these learnings were essential to build Hausme. Launched in January, our MVP has already attracted more than 1000 users, with no marketing spending, but thanks to partnering with leading bloggers who advertise about us on their platforms. This, combined with tools such as heat-mapping, a centralized dashboard and admin panel, micro-event tracking, and especially real-time surveying, we could isolate multiple variables and quickly fine-tune the product, introduce more features, and improve UX & UI daily. Now Hausme could win its first round of investment, and I feel that I am about to complete the journey I initially started 5 years ago with EIA.

What are your future plans for your start-up?

Today, Hausme is a digital specialist for home renovation, providing users with access to a detailed view and report of the cost, time, deductions, and other aspects related to their house or a listing they find online in just a few seconds. In the future, Hausme will become an AI-powered marketplace for home renovation, accessing deep energy renovation projects and metrics. It will provide customers with an end-to-end vision of their house renovation process, suggesting technologies and macro-works that give the highest number of benefits, helping homeowners plan and execute their eco-renovation projects that will save energy and reduce CO2 emissions. Our vision is to bring on board all the key players in this market, including insurers, construction companies & suppliers, and credit institutions. By condensing all steps and stakeholders into a single platform, we are streamlining supply and demand into a single service, with both free and paid plans.