Introducing Johannes Crepon, Co-founder and CEO of PDM Automotive

Sara:

I'm Sara Lindquist from FUSE. We're an early-stage venture firm based right here in the Pacific Northwest. And just like the founders in our portfolio, we are just getting started. We believe that founders deserve more: more urgency, more community, more expertise, more reliability - more of everything. And we aim to deliver. Join me as I introduce each of our portfolio companies in the FUSE family to date.

Today, you'll hear from Johannes Crepon, Co-founder and CEO of PDM Automotive. Join us as we fire through a few topics about the business, how it's been going and growing, and how PDM is changing the game in the automotive aftermarket. 

Let's get started!

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Sara:

Johannes, welcome. Thank you for being here.

Johannes:

Well, thanks for having me!

Sara:

Well, I appreciate you taking the time and I'm excited for you to share your story, the PDM story - and let's just dive in. So to kick things off, it would be great if you could share the quick overview of what PDM is and how you're serving customers today.

Johannes:

Awesome. Yeah, thank you so much. PDM is a data marketplace in the automotive industry and what we provide to our customers is technology on the one side, primarily to parts manufacturers. And connecting them with their customers, which are resellers, retailers. And when I say data marketplace, this includes at first technology for data providers, which are the manufacturers to generate their catalog content. And then have that be mixed in with pricing information and inventory information and connect them in real time with their customer base. And so that's what we provide to our customers.

Sara:

You're certainly coming in and tackling an industry that's probably been using the same tools for decades, huh. So it's an exciting, and also probably challenging feat at times. But I'm so curious, walk us back in time a little bit. When did you first have the "aha moment", where you knew, "Oh my gosh, I got to build this." Explain that a little bit.

Johannes:

Personal pain was the "aha moment", which it grew on me for quite some time. I started my first company 16 years ago in Germany, I'm originally from Munich, Germany. And that company, it's still around, but that company is an eCommerce business in Europe, selling parts for American vehicles. So if you look at Ford Mustang and Chevrolet Corvette and Ram pickup trucks. So that company serves vehicles that have never been officially sold in Europe. And therefore it's a niche market, but it's an exciting market to be in.

But one bottleneck in growth has always been the availability of content of data, the ease of connecting to your suppliers. And yeah, so it was again, the most pain that I felt of not being able to be as efficient as I wanted to be with Velocity, that's that prior company's name. And yeah, and then it dawned on me like Velocity cannot be the only company that has those struggles. So we were thinking about, or I was thinking about what could we do? And we built some tools internally and eventually said, "Okay, this is something that actually the entire industry could benefit from." And that's how the idea for PDM got started.

Sara:

Love it. It's always a fun story to hear. Living it and being your initial customer use case is always a good way to get started!

Johannes:

Exactly. Yeah.

Sara:

So that's awesome. And so you've certainly been building a solid team around you and that's continuing to grow. So describe a little bit why your team is specifically well suited to build this.

Johannes:

Well, it's a combination of industry veterans and really, technologists. Because as you said, automotive is an old industry, it's very relationship-based. Which is a good thing because we have great people on the team that have been in the industry for a while, and that always had the drive to innovate and change the industry for the better. So having them on board as evangelists and influencers in the industry is very powerful. And yeah, matching that with people that can build technology and really position us as the thought leaders is really what makes up the team and what makes up the company. So I'm very excited to work with such passionate people together.

Sara:

That's awesome. And as you've been growing the team and probably defining your values and all that - what would you say best sums up the culture at PDM?

Johannes:

Passion. That's really what it is. I mean, if you look at automotive ... well, I guess people that are not in the industry, to many, it seems boring. It's a car that sits in a driveway and you don't necessarily have an affiliation to it. But automotive is a very passionate industry. I mean, you got racing, classic cars. And even the side of the industry that is frankly boring, which is like standard brake rotors that you would buy at your local car parts, retailers. Still, people are passionate in this industry.

And that's what makes up this team as well. I mean, we're fully remote. So I started the company out of Germany and when I moved to the states - which happened early 2019 - Some of the team is still in Germany and even in other countries. And then also across the USA, we have our team distributed between Florida and Seattle. So we span the whole United States, but it's still amazing-

Sara:

You certainly do.

Johannes:

Yeah, it's still amazing getting people together and you have the gasoline talking, everyone is excited to be in this industry.

Sara:

Throwing the gas in the fire, brings a whole new meaning to that saying.

Johannes:

Yeah, we have a lot of metaphors around racing and it's always easy to find something to talk about that has some automotive relation. Yeah, for sure.

Sara:

Oh my gosh. What's the best car pun that you use? If you could think of one off the top of your head.

Johannes:

Well, we just recently started our PDM pit stop, which is a weekly series of customer introductions to new features. So they get to come into the pits and get a little bit of advice from our customer success team.

Sara:

Oh that's good. That's awesome. Keep them coming.

Johannes:

Yeah, and they still got to be renamed to the pit crew, actually. I don't know if they know yet.

Sara:

Oh, even better. It keeps getting better! Oh, the list could go on and on. Well, that's great. Okay, so my next question for you is about your personal journey so far. So being a founder and leader of a company is certainly hard work and comes with all sorts of challenges. Johannes, what has kept you going, perhaps even in challenging moments or areas where others have thrown the towel?

Johannes:

Yeah, you're right. And obviously anybody that has entered the entrepreneurial journey, it's not always roses. And not every day is a great day, but in the end, I not only work for, like I live for this vision. Like I live this dream that I say, "Okay, I want to really make an impact in our industry and change it for the better." Obviously I realize the opportunity that lies within from an economical perspective. But it's dear and near to my heart to really change the industry and help. Especially also smaller companies to benefit from technology and being able to survive, also, because there's, again, always keep coming back to automotive and being in this industry. But there are a lot of companies that are small, but that have big names associated to them.

Johannes:

And in the end, it's all about surrounding yourself with the right people. Like if you have people that share the passion. And that is not necessarily only automotive-related. Like a part of entrepreneur groups and so we share the challenges, we share the wins and that's always uplifting. And frankly, just to give some FUSE promotion here as well. Being around the team of FUSE has also been great. I mean, FUSE is our first VC investor. We do have great angel investors that invested last year. But having teamed up with FUSE has been an amazing journey and supportive in every way. So it's really what it's mostly about, surround yourself with the right people and that keeps you going.

Sara:

Well, I love that. And it certainly takes a village and gosh, we are so grateful to be a part of it, Johannes. So thank you for including us in the PDM family!

Johannes:

Yeah, for sure.

Sara:

So in closing here, one final question for you. What, right now, do you need more of? Any listeners tuning in right now, how can they help get involved?

Johannes:

Yeah. It's people, people, people. That's really where ... I guess, real estate is location, location, location. For us, it's people, people, people. Now we have a full pipeline on the sales side, we have a full pipeline on the development side. So we need really great people in sales, in data analytics, in customer success and obviously engineers. So that's what we are recruiting for at the moment. And yeah, anybody who is interested in big data, in marketplace and eCommerce, in automotive, we would love to talk to you.

Sara:

Awesome. And what's the best way for people to get in touch?

Johannes:

Our homepage, we have a careers home site on the website. So that is obviously an easy way. I mean also just the standard info@pdmautomotive.com. Will always make it to our team and you will be guided in the right direction.

Sara:

Johannes, thank you so much. Thanks for being here. Thanks for sharing the story. And we just continue to stay so excited and grateful to be a part of the journey. So onward, my friend!

Johannes:

Thank you so much.

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Sara:

Like Johannes said, it is people, people, people. Be sure to check out job openings right on the PDM website. Or feel free to check them out right here on the FUSE website on the careers and portfolio page. Thanks for joining us. And we'll see you next time.