Katalysen Ventures invests expertise in Varannan Vecka, the co-parenting app for conflict prevention

Varannan Vecka (Directly translated to “Every other week” in English) is a Swedish startup that has developed the first conflict-preventing app for co-parents and their children. The idea was born out of the team's frustration over the lack of preventive support for parents after a separation and how this affects the wellbeing of their children. Katalysen Ventures has invested its resources and expertise to support the company on their market entry journey.

The number of custody disputes has more than doubled in Sweden since 2006 and research shows that children growing up in high conflict parenting relationships are more than 50 percent at increased risk of developing long-term mental illness. The number of those affected is growing quickly in both Sweden and globally. In Sweden alone more than 1 million Swedes, roughly 10% of the total population, live in a co-parented households. That amounts to roughly 65,000 children per year.

Increasing gender equality drives the increase of co-parented upbringing and shared responsibility of children after a separation. Yet these households are underserved and there exists a lack of proactive measures to simplify cooperation and everyday life for these families.

Linda Ljunggren Syding, CEO and co-founder of Varannan Vecka, comments: “Everyone who themselves, or knows someone who has, separated with children knows how complicated everyday life can become for all involved. As a lawyer I have devoted years of my life to helping parents handle guilt, stress and conflicts after a separation. I’ve seen just how reactive and ineffective the support to these households is. It is not at all adapted to parents who nowadays expect, and want help from digital services and solutions tailored to their specific needs”.

The strong co-founding team is composed of complementary expertise from within legaltech, fintech, child psychology and "co-parenting" researcher:

• Erik Scholander, CTO is a serial entrepreneur in fintech and has developed, among other things, the NGM stock exchange.
• Linda Ljunggren Syding, CEO, is a lawyer with a background from the banking and finance sector in sales, business development and marketing.
• Malin Bergström, is an internationally renowned child psychologist and researcher from the esteemed Karolinska Institutet medical university.
• Elisbeth Scholander, COO, is a lawyer, journalist and mediator with many years of experience of parent-child conflict.

“We launched our app this summer and have received a very positive welcome. We already have 15 large cooperation partners in our ecosystem that provide parental support, built with a B2B2C model. We quickly validated our B2C revenue model asparents are already willing to pay through buying an app subscription, and B2B companies are paying for their customers' to use the app.

Municipalities are another large potential customer group that we have only just begun to explore. Our goal is to become established in Sweden by 2023 and build a user base with at least 3000 paying subscribers, while we begin to explore which foreign markets we will launch next. By then we aim to have reached break-even with a monthly turnover of SEK 500 000” summarized Linda.

Varannan Vecka has joined Katalysen Ventures portfolio and will be supported with Katalysen’s hands-on expertise, competences and network resources. This includes for example customer research, UX design and further development of features in their app.

Peter Almberg, CEO and founder of Katalysen Ventures, comments: “Having a strong co-founding team with not only industry but also commercial expertise, we believe that Varannan Vecka is well positioned to build a value adding solution that not only benefits the wellbeing of parents but also greatly their children. In a post pandemic world we have all seen the impact and importance of mental health. Creating great grounds for happier children will surely have a long lasting positive effect on society as a whole”.

The company that develops the app, Happy Parents AB, is currently fundraising a pre-seed round and is looking for early-stage investors who share the company's mission of supporting conflict free co-parenting households, and thereby enabling safe and stable environments for children. The capital injection will be used to accelerate the firm's growth and strengthen market presence through marketing and sales operations. If you are interested in learning more and viewing the pitch deck, please reach out to Linda.