CEO Spotlight: Jerome Bajou, Co-Founder & CEO, CaptainBook.io and WorkFromNaxos.gr

Jerome Bajou, Co-Founder & CEO at CaptainBook.io and WorkFromNaxos.gr analyzes in CEOWORLD magazine the startup ecosystem in Greece, the difficulties that came up for startups during the Covid-19 pandemic, while he describes remote working as the “new normal” nowadays.

You have business activity both in Greece and abroad. Which are the main differences between running a business in Greece or in another European country? 

Jerome Bajou: Technicalities are pretty much the same everywhere in the EU. There are different tax rates and everything, but the game is the same. For me, the big difference resides in the community. Greek startups are doing incredible, and the support from the community is astonishing!

Whether it is for Greeks living in Greece, or Greeks from the diaspora, I’ve never seen such tight bonds anywhere else. Greeks (and after more than 10 years living in Greece, I will include myself here if I may) are very proud of their country and it is a strong dimension of who they are. I’m not saying everything is perfect, but, I can say that I see great progress (and this is also related to the pandemic by the way).

 You are Co-Founder at CaptainBook.io and WorkFromNaxos.gr. Can you briefly describe to us the objective of these two companies? 

Jerome Bajou: CaptainBook.io is building trusted local marketplaces for travel experiences across the globe. Our objectives are to disrupt the way online booking is working. Intermediates like Online Travel Agencies charge up to 30% commission on experiences, resulting in high prices for the customer, and less income for the supplier. Our model cuts this effect by 50% on average. CaptainBook is the first tech startup of the Cyclades and is raising a pre-seed round of 250K EUR. WorkFromNaxos.gr is not a company as it has no business objective. It is a community of tech-savvy people wanting to take Naxos further from a technical point of view. The first milestone is the opening of a co-working space on the island, the first of the Cyclades! Having that in mind, we are starting to give WorkFromNaxos a Web3 dimension, organizing ourselves as a DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization). This model helps us keep the community at the center of the project, and great things are coming…

How and to what extent did the COVID-19 pandemic affect the startup ecosystem? 

Jerome Bajou: The beginning of the pandemic was incredibly stressful for the ecosystem. A lot of founders had to pivot their business to not see their project just turn into dust. I’m amazed to see what came out of this. Founders’ strength resides in the fact that they are able to adapt to a given situation in no time.

Some will see a threat, founders will see an opportunity. The greatest impact in my opinion is frontier barriers being taken down: – For the first time in history, your location doesn’t define who you can work with anymore, and it’s only a matter of skills and personality. This raises new issues companies to have to address, drawing thinner lines between your personal time and your work time. – US VCs (and in general non-EU firms) are betting hard on EU-based startups. At CaptainBook we are regularly speaking with US-based VCs, and I’m convinced that it wouldn’t have been possible 3 years ago. I even moderated a panel of Angel Investors at the Growcent European Investment Summit 2021 in India, from my couch!

Is remote working the future of the labor market? 

Jerome Bajou: There is no doubt about this, at least in my mind. I’ve been working remotely since I left the United Kingdom back in 2010, and I see it as a “new” normal now. Again, new challenges need to be addressed, mental health is one of them, and we, as founders, will need to play our role in easing inequalities as well: working from home in a penthouse is definitely a different experience than working from home in a studio.

Companies are switching their investments, reducing the number of offices they hold, betting on their workers’ quality of life instead, and this is a good thing! Lots of companies are providing their teams with a budget or equipment to be able to work from home in comfort, very often accompanied by some kind of co-working space membership. Humans are creatures of relationships, and we will socialize differently. I don’t think remote work necessarily means loneliness. People will find new ways of interacting, this is very exciting!

Which are your business plans for 2022? 

Jerome Bajou: Well, WorkFromNaxos will organize as a DAO and mint a series of NFTs serving as a membership opening access to their services, while CaptainBook will finalize its pre-seed round helping it disrupt the things-to-do industry with incredible things coming soon! We are hiring, remote obviously!

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