One of the reasons why building ventures in Central and Eastern Europe is so interesting and lucrative, is that many things happen quicker and better due to a lack of legacy systems and solutions. It’s called leapfrogging, and it’s exciting, because you get to build things for the first time, where there were none before. In Bulgaria, leapfrogging is why our internet is in the top 10 fastest in the world. But it’s also why in the past decade we’ve been seeing a second major wave of innovation, with so many great startups being launched.
I call it the second wave, because many of the founders we’re seeing and funding today are people who learned their trade and received their decisive business experience and insights in that first wave, which usually weren’t scalable, global innovations, but rather core local infrastructure companies, like telecoms and online media. Such was the case also for Dobrin Padalski, who started out as an HR manager in one of the up-and-coming telecoms in Bulgaria twenty-five years ago, and built a name for himself as one of the leading HR consultants and trainers in Bulgaria in the years and decades since.
About ten years ago, Dobrin first started wondering why the HR tech field is so fragmented, and why all the solutions out there are enterprise-level, while for mid-tier and smaller businesses, things were either limited or non-existent. “They always say that software is eating the world”, Dobrin says as we sit down in his office in Sofia’s Izgrev district. “Well, software has probably eaten it already, but I guess they left HR solutions for dessert, because somehow it’s an area where things are done in spreadsheets and even still with pen and paper today”.
And so by 2019, Dobrin decided it was time to start developing the solutions he lacked in the market. Christening the project Gravital.hr (Gravity for Talents), his idea was to build a complete suite for people management functionalities in one place, encompassing skills augmentation workflows, absence management, and performance tracking and reviews. “Today, there are already many solutions on the market that offer some of these functionalities”, says Dobrin, “but it’s all piecemeal and there’s still no one-stop shop for HR managers. With Gravital, we want to incorporate everything an HR professional needs under one roof”.
In 2021, Dobrin connected with Ivan Dikov, a fellow HR expert, who specializes in trainings and learning development frameworks, and Ivan immediately got excited about the idea, joining Gravital as a co-founder. The team started developing the first iteration of the product, helped by their old friend Valentin Valchev, who after a two-decade career in enterprise IT development, was ready to plunge into a startup challenge. In 2022, the company released the first version of the product, and Valentin left his job joining Gravital on a full-time basis.
Thanks to Dobrin’s and Ivan’s connections and stature in the HR industry in Bulgaria, the company quickly signed up several clients with a consulting-and-software business model, which helped the Gravital team to validate and prove a number of crucial product and UX ideas and propositions. In 2023, Gravital got recognized with an award by NOVA media group, for their ability to combine HR methodologies with tech.
Now, as 2024 is getting ahead, the company is at an exciting new crossroads. “We learned a lot with combining consultancy services with and offering to use our platform, and the time is ripe to release Gravital as a stand-alone software-as-a-service product (SaaS)”, says Ivan. The company is expanding with a fourth team member this month, a sales expert with a big track record in SaaS business development, and is pumped to see how the wider market reacts to the product.
“Outside our home market here in Bulgaria and the SEE region, there are now competitors who have great products, like Barcelona-based Fractional”, adds Dobrin. “What we want to do is offer a product that is tuned into the needs and realities of the non-Western markets, focused on firms with 20 to 50 employees, who still haven’t used software for the HR workflow. And as we develop along, we plan to add more modules, like payroll management”, And finally, on what sets Gravital apart, Dobrin and Ivan are quite clear: “As HR experts with a long track record, we know that the most crucial thing in a company is culture. With Gravital, we’ve built in elements that track and measure culture engagement. I guess you can call it our secret sauce, and we are convinced that it’s a killer feature that can bring high-level HR principles within the reach of ordinary small and medium businesses through our software”.