How do you build a global business from China? What are the opportunities and challenges for founders operating in multiple geographical locations? 

Today, we have with us Bertrand Schmitt, Co-Founder & Chairman at App Annie, a leading mobile market data and analytics platform with data on over 8 million apps and thousands of websites. Today, App Annie is one of the most trusted names in mobile data analytics.  

As someone who entered the world of analytics in the early 2000s, Bertrand is a strong believer in the role of data and metrics in helping businesses build the products their customers want. With the growth of mobile apps, the need for new analytics was the inspiration to launch App Annie. 

In today’s episode, Bertrand takes us back to the initial stage of development of mobile data analytics with the advent of the iPhone and App Store, and how he identified a problem that was yet to surface and started App Annie. We then dive deep into how he moved to China and ended up launching a global business from Beijing at a time when the company hardly had any tangible China market exposure.

Show Notes:

1:53 Introduction to Bertrand Schmitt

4:55 Early days of the mobile ecosystem and the problems within

6:28 Evolution of mobile operators' role in the industry

8:57 Centralization of content distribution in the mobile space

9:59 Apple vs Android ecosystem

10:59 Getting into the world of analytics and inspiration behind App Annie

12:26 Beginning of the China Story

14:55 Deciding to go into entrepreneurship in mobile analytics

16:30 Mobile analytics: Global problem or local (China) problem?

17:37 Perception of AppAnnie in the global market

18:57 Was China a critical element of success?

21:00 Experience of overseas fundraising from China

25:05 What triggered the move from Beijing to San Francisco

28:26 Learnings/ findings working across multiple geographical locations 

32:06 Instrumental roles that made a difference to the company

33:12 Critical moment of evolution in China’s mobile industry/ecosystem

37:00 Lessons for entrepreneurs

Many thanks to our guest  Bertrand Schmitt; host Oscar Ramos; producers Eva Shi and Sagar Chaudhary; editor David; organizer Chinaccelerator; and sponsor People Squared. Be sure to check out our website www.chinaccelerator.com

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