Micket, a new Cape Town start-up, has developed a mobile ticketing solution that allows users to purchase tickets — and gain access to events — all using their cellphones.
The Micket.me website can be accessed from a PC or mobile device, with payment made via credit card or EFT, after which the mobile ticket — or “micket” — is delivered via e-mail or SMS.
Micket co-founder Riaan Nolan says tickets do not have to be collected or redeemed specifically and users will never lose a ticket because it’s always available on their mobiles.
The website was founded in 2010 by twin brothers Riaan and Winston Nolan, after meeting an event organiser who brought Christian metal band P.O.D. (Payable on Death) to South Africa.
Nolan handles the infrastructure and server side of Micket, while his brother, Winston, developed the site.
Before Micket, Riaan worked six years at Quirk eMarketing, helped start online retailer Zando.co.za and is currently senior technology manager for Africa Internet Ventures, a partner of Naspers.
Winston is a Magento developer and is behind a number of e-commerce websites, including spree.co.za, mothercare.ie and elc-russia.ru.
A mutual friend, Robert Adams, assisted with Java and Android development for Micket.
Prior to starting Micket, the brothers sold tickets for friends who hosted big electronic music festivals such as Vortex, Alien Safari and Groovy Troopers.
“When we met Menno Zweers, an event organiser from the Netherlands who was bringing P.O.D. to South Africa, we decided to create Micket, specifically for the ticketing industry,” says Riaan.
The start-up was bootstrapped by the brothers, but recently won Byte Orbit’s Startup Knight competition and received a R200 000 investment.
“Now that Byte Orbit is on board, they will help with development and marketing costs.”
Winning the Startup Knight competition has allowed Micket to work with top developers. “We have a tight development roadmap and amazing features that we’re excited to launch and now that we have some extra hands to help us code, we can stick to our releases.”
Riaan says Micket makes money by working with existing ticketing vendors who offload their mobile ticketing to Micket via their application programming interfaces. “We also do guest lists and private custom tickets or invitations via Micket.”
The company claims to have no competitors. “Even our perceived competitors like Web Tickets and Computicket can use Micket to offload mobile tickets to their customers. We just want to make things simpler and faster, and are not interested in competing with other entities. The market is big enough for all of us.” — (c) 2013 NewsCentral Media
