Proptech Firm Synco Unveils Collaboration Platform, $5.5M Seed Funding

Synco, a proptech company founded by people who had sold their previous proptech businesses, announced “the commercial launch of a team messaging and collaboration platform built exclusively for the needs of the property management industry,” according to a press release.

The firm also announced a $5.5 million seed funding round from more than 20 “multifamily owner/manager/developers and their key executives;” “industry insiders such as Caren Maio and Adam Pittenger of Moved.com, other PropTech SaaS execs, and service/trade vendors – all of whom will foster integration efforts;” and a “single marquee PropTech VC, MetaProp, whose co-founders Zach Aarons and Aaron Block the Synco team have been friendly with since before the fund’s inception in 2015.”

“In 2019, after exiting the companies they previously founded, Synco’s founders zeroed in on another industry-specific problem that technology could solve. ‘With Aptexx and SiteCompli, we saw firsthand how property management teams struggle to communicate internally – using disjointed email chains and siloed text threads – and how it affects their productivity and morale,’” said Jason Griffith, a cofounder of SiteCompli and of the new startup. “While 90% of the Fortune 100 use modern messaging platforms for internal conversations, property management teams primarily use email and text messaging.”

The company’s description of the product on its website sounds like a combination of internal discussion boards and messaging as a way to move away from emails and texts. While that could be a difficult sell over existing general commercial products that perform similar functions, the company has aspects like using keyword labels to tag such familiar terms as properties, units, projects, and groups that might appeal to the target audience more than adapting an existing established software package.

“Constant follow-ups from higher ups asking “where are we on this?” and overflowing inboxes cause real frustration and lost productivity,” the release said, quoting Bill Evick, co-founder of the new venture and of Aptexx. “The need for transparency has never been greater, yet it’s so difficult just to find the right information, get answers, and give input in real-time across a distributed team. We validated these assumptions with some of the biggest names in property management, and decided to build something with their challenges in mind.”

The company CakeTech, which owns Synco, has a trademark filed on February 24, 2023 for group office communications and collaboration, according to data from the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO). However, Siemens has a building automation and control system by the same name and used to have a trademark on it, originally filed in 2006 and registered in 2008. But that trademark was cancelled in the U.S. because an international trademark was “cancelled in whole or part,” according to the USPTO.