Dealogikal: The Online Commodity Marketplace For Your Business

With rapid advancements in technology, it is becoming more convenient to execute tasks, such as hobbies, work, shopping, and trading through a smartphone or laptop. Among the most notable of these things is the integration of a physical commodity into a virtual marketplace for easier access, transparency, competition, and automation all in one glance. A prime example of this is Dealogikal.

Dealogikal is an online commodity marketplace where the procurement of commodities is lowered as much as possible. It makes the procurement of commodities easier by equipping businesses with the tools and automation to lessen manual tasks in order to improve time and effort spent, create savings and value for money, and promote competition and transparency. Its main goal is to empower the supply chain by injecting competition, automation, transparency, and automation in the procurement process. With this, why don’t you join me in learning more about Dealogikal with its Co-Founder and CEO, Ira Kiener.    

We have seen that you have had extensive experience in the field of business, energy tech, fintech, and in the startup ecosystem. With these in mind, what inspired you to dive into these industries?

The common thread between all these different industries has to do with my passion for capitalism, entrepreneurialism, and my experience in finance and economics. It started when I worked in the finance industry: I’ve worked for a hedge fund and many other positions related to finance. A lot of these involved trading. At that time, I was trading equities. However, when I decided to exit the corporate world and enter the world of entrepreneurship, I started a commodity trading firm based on what I loved to do before and based on my academic and career background. This time, I thought I’d do it in my own capacity. The low hanging fruit at that time was petroleum. Eventually, after getting into the world of energy, I began to learn about power as well like electricity, renewable energy, and other things of that nature. With regards to fintech, this ties into the experience that I had. It was serendipity and my proclivity for being in the world of finance.

As a founder yourself, what is a startup’s most important goal?

You have to look into the basic nature of a startup: it is a solution to a problem. You have to look at it from many different lenses: a social lens, an economic lens, and from the lens of the stakeholders who are involved in your business. You have to ask yourself several questions: What is the problem I am trying to solve? Is the problem I’m trying to solve valuable from the point of view of society? Is it valuable from the point of view of somebody who is investing into a business, particularly a tech startup? Is your solution, in the form of a startup, contributing to the success of your agenda? If you check all boxes, then I think you’re doing a good job.

What is Dealogikal and what is the main problem it aims to solve?

Dealogikal is often perceived as a marketplace for oil and gas. In a way, it is. However, Dealogikal is actually a fully integrated smart procurement platform for commodities. The easy way to think about Dealogikal is that it’s a reverse ebay but for commodities. If e-bay’s aim is to bid up the price of a product as much as possible, Dealogikal’s objective, using the principles of a reverse auction and competition, is to lower the cost of procurement of a particular commodity as far and as low as it can possibly go. As a fully integrated solution, we need to look at the entire value chain of physical commodity trade. This starts off with procurement and involves other things like trade finance, payments, logistics, and warehousing. This is pretty much the entire value chain. There are other peripheral things involved here like physical commodity trade, trade finance, and document automation. We focus on the main part of the value chain: the procurement of a commodity, getting the price as low as possible or the most efficient market price for the commodity through competition, offering trade finance, logistics, and warehousing.

What makes Dealogikal unique from other procurement marketplaces?

The reverse auction and competitive selection process during procurement. I believe that we are the only tech-enabling and commodity marketplace startup out there that incorporates a competitive selection process in procurement. These are the main distinguishing factors of Dealogikal.

As one of the Startup World Cup x Wildfire finalists, what was your experience like? How can this experience help your company grow?

It was an invaluable experience. The stakeholders that were involved during the event: the risk capital, corporates, academe, and even from the media made me realize that the startup ecosystem in the country is becoming more vibrant and robust. From this perspective, the entire ecosystem was there. Seeing this in person made me realize that the Philippine ecosystem has really developed compared to 10 years ago. This has brought exposure, networks, and relationships to Dealogikal. All of these were incredibly valuable for Dealogikal as a whole. For that, we shall always remain grateful.   

Ira Kiener is the Co-Founder and CEO of Dealogikal, a technology startup with a fully integrated automated procurement platform for commodities. Its overall objective is to digitalize the supply chain by integrating competition, automation, transparency, and automation in the procurement process. With profound experience in the fields of business, energy tech, fintech, and in the startup ecosystem, Ira has managed to create a competitive selection platform that equips businesses with access to advanced procurement technology.

Visit www.techshake.asia if you would like to know and connect more with Dealogikal.