A San Mateo, California-based company marketing itself as an animation content-creation platform for enterprise will soon be one of the newest additions to Fulton Market’s tech scene.
Vyond lets users create short animated videos from an assortment of templates and drag-and-drop options. Originally targeting solo entrepreneurs and small and medium-sized businesses, the company now works with a variety of enterprises to help them improve communications, including several in the Chicago area.
Companies can and have used Vyond to make animated videos for presentations, internal training videos and onboarding, and for recruitment, sales, content creation and marketing.
Vyond CEO Gary Lipkowitz told Chicago Inno that while the company has adopted a hybrid work model, he still wants the cloud-based video animation tool to have a physical place for employees to come together and work.
Vyond currently has six employees for the Chicago office but plans to hire aggressively in the area with a goal to get to 20 employees by April, according to Vyond CMO Van Diamandakis.
In fact, the availability of tech talent in Fulton Market is one reason Vyond was attracted to the neighborhood.
“We have customers there," Lipkowitz said. "We wanted a market that would be great to hire from both in terms of established business talent as well as proximity to great universities and timezone. We needed something that would be complementary to our being on the West Coast."
Vyond will be operating out of a Spaces location in Fulton Market with plans to expand into a bigger space as the team grows.
Lipkowitz said Vyond signed a six-month lease at the coworking space because the company likes to have flexibility when entering new markets.
"We have to accommodate for the rapid growth of the employment base," he said, "so it's hard to walk in and just sign a big lease on fixed-size office space. You need room to grow and continually upgrade when you're new in the market."
The office is located at 158 N. Sangamon St. and will open on Dec. 5.
