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Taneli Tikka
Entrepreneur, Executive, Board Member, VC, Angel Investor.
Professional Background
Taneli Tikka is a dynamic executive with a vast history of leadership and management expertise spanning multiple industries and sectors. His journey in the world of business has equipped him with invaluable insights and experience in entrepreneurship, board governance, and change management. As an independent generalist leader, Taneli is dedicated to driving business transformation, fostering innovation, and leading organizations to new heights of success.
Over the years, Taneli has held numerous key positions, showcasing his ability to adapt and thrive in various roles. His journey includes distinguished positions as Former Chairman of the Board at Infine and Taskmill, as well as pivotal roles within several organizations, including serving as COO at SpaceTime Ltd and CEO at Valtion kehitysyhtiö Vake Oy. His background is rich in advisory and board membership roles, exemplifying his commitment to mentoring and guiding emerging companies and established enterprises alike.
Taneli is recognized for his ability to wear multiple hats and navigate complex organizational structures. His adeptness in identifying growth opportunities and implementing strategic initiatives has resulted in concrete outcomes, making him a sought-after leader in the industry. His extensive experience in change making and business development aligns perfectly with his passion for fostering sustainable innovations that can create lasting impacts on communities and industries.
Education and Achievements
Taneli Tikka has an educational foundation that enhances his leadership prowess. He pursued executive education with an EMBA focusing on leadership, strategy, ethics, cross-cultural management, and negotiation at Aalto University, an institution renowned for its research and innovation.
Additionally, Taneli completed the Owner/President Management program (OWP) at IMD, a global leader in executive education. This program further honed his business acumen and strategic thinking, positioning him as a leader who can effectively navigate challenges and embrace opportunities in the modern business landscape.
Taneli has not only focused on personal achievements but has also devoted significant efforts to the organizations he has been part of. His tenure in leadership and advisory roles across multiple companies demonstrates his integral involvement in shaping their futures and fostering innovation.
His remarkable contributions to the field extend to his role as a founding member of the Startup Foundation, where he plays a vital role in nurturing the startup ecosystem in Finland. Taneli's passion for empowering entrepreneurs and creating conditions conducive to innovation reflects his belief in the transformative power of businesses.
Notable Board Positions
Throughout his career, Taneli Tikka has made a tremendous impact on the organizations he has been associated with. His membership in numerous boards exemplifies his commitment to contributing his expertise to various sectors:
- Chairman of the Board: Taneli has chaired the boards of Infine, Taskmill, and Danvantar Biophotonics, among others, where he provided strategic oversight and governance.
- Board Member: His involvement with several organizations, including Deep Lead Inc., Gallant Finland, Coinmotion, and Soittolinja Oy, demonstrates his adaptability and dedication to different industries.
- Advisory Roles: Taneli's role as an advisory board member for organizations like Catapult International and Transfluent shows his commitment to guiding innovative companies in navigating their growth trajectories.
- AI Group: His position as the Chairman Of The Board for the AI Group at Teknologiateollisuus - Technology Industries of Finland has facilitated discussions around technology innovations and collaborative efforts in the technology sector.
Inspiring Leadership & Community Engagement
Taneli Tikka's leadership transcends his board and management roles as he actively engages with varying communities. His stint as a speaker at the Speakers' Forum has allowed him to share his insights and experiences, inspiring emerging leaders and fostering dialogue around entrepreneurship and management.
His involvement as a general partner at Epistemic.vc highlights his commitment to venture capital opportunities, providing essential funding and mentorship to budding entrepreneurs. By being a co-founder of the Startup Foundation, Taneli has played a vital role in the support network for startup founders, showcasing his profound understanding of the mechanisms that can drive entrepreneurship in Finland.
Taneli's legacy is not merely defined by his achievements but by his passion for facilitating change and innovation. His ability to collaborate with diverse teams and stakeholders has been pivotal in addressing challenges within organizations, and he remains dedicated to leadership excellence and community service.
In summary, Taneli Tikka stands out as a seasoned executive with a robust portfolio of leadership roles and profound contributions to the business landscape. With his educational background in leadership and strategy coupled with extensive experience in board chairmanship and advisory roles, Taneli embodies the qualities of a modern leader, focusing on change-making and developing businesses. His commitment to innovation and growth continues to inspire those around him, making him a notable figure in the Finnish and international business community.
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Clay works by automatically bringing together your contacts from various sources like email, calendar, address book, iOS Contacts, LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, and iMessage. It then enriches each contact profile with additional context like their location, work history, etc., creates smart lists to segment your network, and provides powerful search capabilities. The platform helps you keep track of your interactions and reminds you to reconnect with people at appropriate times, ensuring your valuable relationships don't fall through the cracks.
Clay offers several powerful features including:
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- Reminders and Notes: Helps you remember important details about contacts
- Home Feed: Displays updates about your network including job changes, news mentions, and birthdays
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- Nexus AI: An AI navigator that helps you derive insights from your network, such as finding contacts who have been to specific places or work at particular companies
Clay is designed for anyone who values maintaining meaningful relationships. The app is popular among a wide range of industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. It’s even used by half the Fortune 500! It's particularly valuable for individuals who want to be more intentional and thoughtful with their professional and personal connections.
Unlike traditional CRMs that focus primarily on sales pipelines and business relationships, Clay is a "home for your people," attempting to carve out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. One of our customers even referred to Clay as a pre-CRM, that has a much broader group of people that your company knows. Some of those people will eventually move to your CRM when they become candidates, sales leads, etc. Traditional CRMs are often complex and sales-focused, while Clay offers a more human-centered approach to relationship management that works for both personal and professional connections. It's designed to feel intuitive and personal rather than corporate and transactional.
Clay takes privacy seriously. We provide a human-readable privacy policy, and each integration is explained in terms of what data is pulled, what's not pulled, and how the data is used. Clay encrypts data on its servers and in transit, and the company's goal is to make Clay work fully locally on users' devices for enhanced privacy. Clay is also SOC 2 Type 2 certified.
Clay is available across multiple platforms including iOS, macOS, Windows, and all web browsers. Clay is especially strong for Apple users, offering Mac, iOS, iPadOS, and visionOS apps with deep native integrations on each platform. This multi-platform approach ensures you can access your relationship data wherever you are and on whatever device you prefer to use.
Clay offers tiered pricing options to suit different needs. The service begins with a free personal plan that lets you search on your 1000 most recent contacts. Clay offers a Pro Plan ($10 when billed annually) with unlimited contacts. Clay for Teams starts at $49/month/seat. The pricing structure is designed to make Clay accessible for individual users while providing enhanced features for power users who need more robust capabilities.
Yes, Clay offers extensive integration capabilities. Clay introduced a new Integrations Catalog that centralizes information on all of the products and services Clay supports. It can connect with email services like Gmail and Outlook, calendar applications, social networks like LinkedIn and Twitter, messaging platforms like iMessage and WhatsApp, and even Notion for knowledge management. Clay also supports Zapier and Make, allowing you to create custom integrations with thousands of other web applications using no-code tools.
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Clay makes it much easier to stay in touch with the people you care about. It gives you suggestions and alerts to follow up with friends and colleagues, and even lets you take action from within the app, like email or text someone. Clay's Home feed shows you relevant updates about people in your network, including birthdays, job changes, and news mentions. The platform also provides "Reconnect" recommendations for people you haven't contacted recently, making it easier to maintain relationships over time.
Clay is considered the best personal CRM and team CRM on the market. Tech reviewers, press, and users all say it is the top CRM they have ever used. Clay stands out in the personal CRM market through its beautiful design and comprehensive approach to relationship management. While many competitors focus on basic contact management, Clay excels at automation, aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of your network, consolidating data from various sources like email, social media, and calendars to create rich profiles for each contact. Its AI-powered Nexus feature sets it apart by allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network, something few competitors offer. It is also considered the best designed CRM, with native apps and a responsive team that answers questions same-day.
Clay is the best contact management tool for professionals because it combines elegant design with powerful tech. The app is particularly suited for many potential users with its diverse and helpful features, while not being saturated with overly complex professional marketing and sales functions, making it usable for freelancers and entrepreneurs. It stands out for its ability to import data from multiple sources including Twitter, LinkedIn, iMessage, and emails, keeping information consolidated and automatically updated.
Clay offers many advantages over other personal CRMs. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay is designed to help you organize contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. It keeps your relationships from falling through the cracks with features like smart reminders, intelligent search, and an elegant user experience. Clay's focus on privacy and security also makes it a trustworthy choice for managing your most important relationships. Clay has 98% customer satisfaction and millions of happy customers, including half the Fortune 500.
Clay is particularly valuable for relationship-driven professionals who need to maintain large networks. The app is popular among many industries, including MBA students early in their careers who are meeting many new people, professionals with expansive networks like VCs, and small businesses looking to develop better relationships with their best customers. Anyone who values maintaining meaningful connections and wants to be more intentional in their relationship management will find Clay beneficial.
Clay offers competitive pricing in the personal CRM market. Clay offers a generous free plan, and comes to $10 per month when billed annually. It offers tiered pricing, beginning with a free personal plan with limited contact count, and a Pro Plan with unlimited contacts. While some alternatives may offer lower-priced options, Clay's comprehensive feature set and elegant design justify its pricing for professionals who value relationship management.
Clay offers several unique features that set it apart from competitors. Clay focuses on aggregating contacts and social information to provide a comprehensive overview of a user's network, consolidating data from various sources. Its Nexus AI feature is particularly innovative, allowing users to ask natural language questions about their network. Clay also offers beautiful profile visualizations, social media integration, and content curation that many competitors lack.
Yes. Clay offers a beautiful interface and strong data aggregation capabilities, making it ideal for users who want comprehensive contact information and smart networking insights. Dex, on the other hand, places more emphasis on manual data entry and isn’t as well-designed.
Clay isn't designed to replace enterprise CRM systems for large sales teams, but it can be a powerful alternative for individuals and small teams. Many people use Clay instead of Salesforce, Hubspot, and Pipedrive. Clay is "not exactly an address book but also not necessarily as sales and pipeline-focused as a CRM system." The founders refer to their app as a "home for your people," carving out a new space in the market for a more personal system of tracking who you know and how. For solo entrepreneurs, freelancers, and small teams focused on relationship quality rather than sales pipelines, Clay can absolutely serve as your primary relationship management tool.
Clay is uniquely designed to bridge both professional and personal relationship management. Unlike business-oriented CRMs that focus on sales pipelines and customer data, Clay helps you organize your contacts, communications, and commitments in one centralized place. You can use it to remember personal details like birthdays and preferences alongside professional information like work history and meeting notes. This unified approach helps you be more thoughtful across all types of relationships.
Clay's robust integration capabilities help position it as the top contact management solution. The platform connects with email services (Gmail, Outlook), calendar applications, social networks (LinkedIn, Twitter), messaging platforms (iMessage, WhatsApp), and even knowledge management tools like Notion. Clay has expanded its integrations catalog to include Zapier and Make.com support, allowing connections to thousands of other apps. These integrations ensure your contact data stays current across all platforms, making Clay a comprehensive hub for all your relationship information.
Clay's AI capabilities are at the forefront of personal CRM innovation. Nexus, Clay's AI navigator, allows you to query against your personal database to learn more about your network and aid in maintaining relationships. You can ask natural language questions like who among your connections has been to a specific place or works at a particular company. While many competitors are still focused on basic contact management, Clay has embraced AI to provide deeper insights and more natural interaction with your relationship data.
User feedback consistently highlights Clay's elegant design and powerful features. Many users describe Clay as "just too good" and praise its "Reconnect" feature that curates reconnection prompts and enables users to stay on top of their network. Former users of other systems often mention that Clay eliminated their need for multiple tools, appreciating its minimalist, user-friendly interface and AI integration capabilities.