Tech Tales (Part One) - We’re on a journey of a lifetime with all of you…
A company’s genesis often starts with people just talking and facing up to some enduring problems they have come across in their work. New thinking and ideas evolve and sometimes they go so far as becoming a brand new product - as was the case with development of WunderBox.
Multimedia app publishing has faced many headwinds and roadblocks since mobile stores were born in mid 2008. With close to a decade of experience of working within these new distribution channels, the three founders of Wonderz, and the collective thinkers behind the concept of WunderBox: Daniel Matzke, CTO Sebastian Wehner, CEO and Daniel Acht, Chief Evangelist came across these real difficulties at first hand . As content creators themselves they had insight into the work of independent IP production and as Daniel Acht put it - really wanted to create a laboratory “where you can try things out with customers and collect their direct feedback”
Later, they heard from book publishers, TV broadcasters and fellow producers that were spending way too much to set up their apps and had trouble technically supporting them. They saw that this led to less financial capacity and ultimately to the failure of digital first projects. For things to really change they believed that new storytelling structures had to be built, structures where the transitions between different content elements could be linked together. In the system they started to build, a content creator could publish a short film, a small game and perhaps an audio book telling a related story next to each other. So the user can just jump from one content piece to another giving them easy access to a true multimedia mix. WunderBox is “the content distribution platform, which lets kids get their favourite content directly from the creators “ as Sebastian Wehner succinctly puts it.
With the first set of clients now on board (Skyship Entertainment, WarnerMedia and Carlsen Verlag) these launch companies have all been pushing the development of the product further. With the news only this week, Wonderz believes the market has reached a sea change moment in subscription services and with more vital revenue going into the hands of the content owners there has never been a better time for going back to the app and reigniting a digital strategy for selling directly to the consumer.
Over the next few months the team will be working on simplifying the setup process for new users who want to prototype their WunderBox App autonomously to the point where it will be ready for submission. This will be accomplished with new editing tools, reference materials and an academy centre full of tutorials and helpful tips . Wonderz will continue to develop support for new content types, and look into the details of new privacy-friendly analytics features. Where in the world is WunderBox going? Well that’s obvious - “around the globe and back again, on the journey of a lifetime with all of you”, adds Daniel Matzke…
