Meet Simonas Rudaminas, the CEO of Copictures – a platform that connects photographers, media outlets and event organizers. Simonas reveals their platform has been steadily gaining trust by main stakeholders in Lithuania, and so he hopes to strike a major global partnership deal in the foreseeable future.

Hi Simonas! So how Copictures was born? How did you come up with this idea?

Simonas: First, I was a founder of We Love Lithuania (WLL), a popular Facebook page with beautiful pictures of our beloved country. Initially, WLL was simply my idea to show my foreign friends better pictures from Lithuania than the ones you might find on Google Images. However, this page grew in popularity as more photographers joined and were sending me their photos. Eventually, I realised that we get pictures from important events (such as the return of Meridianas ship in Klaipeda or the arrival of Independence LNG terminal to the port) faster than mainstream media. This made me call and meet an influencer from mainstream media: I asked him whether we would be interested in having photos fast from important events and whether he would pay for this. He said yes, thus proving my concept.

Only then I started to think how should I technically implement the exchange of photos between photographers and the media. And so eventually Copictures was born – it’s a platform that connects photographers, newsrooms, event organizers and, in some cases, companies.

When did you launch and how long did it take you to launch? What were the main challenges whilst building your current product?

Simonas: Our current product was launched about a year ago, and yet the idea and initial works started some three years ago, I have been pivoting quite a bit. In 2014, we first launched a stock photo platform, but it didn’t work out that well because we lacked some features that the market needed. Then we built a platform for event galleries, we tried being a platform for photographers’ portfolios… And yet eventually we started from scratch and first built an admin panel where our users can control events, pictures and photographers’ page. And now we’re continuing this concept – being a tool that connects photographers, event organizers and the media.

So how Copictures work? Could you please describe your product and its main features? What makes it different?

Simonas: Basically, Copictures is a SaaS platform where photographers can upload their pictures, media can grab them, and event organizers can manage and share their photos. We have features such as distribution lists and adding a press release for companies, event calendars for the media and many more. At the same time, we offer photographers an opportunity to create their portfolios, and our technology helps to upload pictures much faster under poor internet connection conditions.

We offer brand integration opportunities such as logos and watermarks. Also, our system is very flexible and adaptive, we can fully integrate it into customers’ internal systems.

Who are your target customers and what is your business model? How has the business been so far?

Simonas: We have pricing options for photographers and event organizers that correlate with their data/storage use. We’re still developing and constantly improving our platform, gathering feedback, so the number of our users grows sustainably, but we’re still in our first steps of monetization.

However, we’re in talks with some prospective partners such as Microsoft and we hope to grow by being included into their B2B marketplace. Geographically, the US market is of our major interest, and yet we’re happy to currently work, to test and to improve our product in Lithuania.

What are the main challenges you are currently facing and how are you overcoming them?

Simonas: Introducing a novelty, a new tool and a new technology is always challenging, especially in the media and photo industries. Here, people are used to particular tools, processes and principles that we want to change. However, we’re happy that our platform proves itself of huge value for most of people that start using it.

Can you introduce your team and your investors?

Simonas: I am the CEO, and our CTO is Dovydas Navickas. We have a team of 6 developers, as well as Eglė Strackaitė, our photographers’ manager. We’re backed by our advisors-angel investors: Vladas Lašas, Vygandas Vėbra and Algirdas Stonys.

So, simply speaking, what’s next?

Simonas: Though we don’t see ourselves as ‘Uber for photographers’, we have already built a huge network of reliable photographers and we plan to launch a feature to book photographers. Also, we’re in talks regarding major B2B partnerships. Stay tuned!

Thank you for your time Simonas!