“We are trying to reinterpret how you can organize ideas and communicate them effectively and I think we can change the way people think about sharing ideas.”īraccia agrees explaining to TechCrunch that it’s time for presentations to change and innovate. Microsoft PowerPoint) are older technologies and there is plenty of room for disruption in the space. “People are freely choosing between services like Dropbox, Evernote, and other web-based products when it comes to productivity, and this trend is extending to online presentations.” He explains that traditional slide show options (i.e. Prezi CEO Peter Arvai explains that there is a big change taking place in the online productivity market.
While Prezi is known primarily for its online presentation software, Prezi also offers Prezi Desktop for offline editing, and Prezi Meeting for real-time collaboration. TED Conferences actually backed the company with an undisclosed amount of funding and Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey among its advisors. Prezi, which is cash-flow positive, has many organizations using its product, from the World Economic Forum to Stanford University and at companies such as Facebook, IBM and Google. So it’s not surprising that the mostly bootstrapped startup has accumulated a customer base of over 7 million registered users and a loyal following (my colleague Robin Wauters is a big fan). The app is now one of iTunes’ top 10 free productivity apps. The startup recently launched an iPad app, which allows users to use the touch-screen device to present Prezi presentations. And you can insert images, videos, YouTube videos, PDFs, and more files to make your presentation more compelling. Users can choose from templates or create their own storytelling boards. You can pan left, move right, zoom-in on a detail, or zoom-out to show the big picture, and all of these movements are sleek and unobtrusive.
Part of what makes the web application so unique is the ability to visualize your ideas with movement in slides.
The tool allows you to bypass classic the slide-by-slide presentations created by PowerPoint and create non-linear, story-telling visuals that are animated. Prezi, which was founded in Budapest, Hungary in 2009 by Adam Somlai-Fischer, Peter Halacsy, and Peter Arvai, essentially brings stunning visualizations into presentations and storytelling. Accel’s Andrew Braccia will be joining Prezi’s board of directors.
Cloud-based presentation software Prezi has raised $14 million in Series B financing led by Accel Partners with Sunstone Capital participating in the round.