Sports arenas and concert venues have a lot of moving parts to manage: thousands of pieces of equipment, expensive technology and hundreds of employees.
Entrepreneurs David Kaszycki and Ryan DeMars believed there had to be a better way for media and entertainment venues to manage all of these assets, facilities and teams than by using disjointed spreadsheets and outdated software. So in 2020, they co-founded Beam Dynamics.
“We ultimately help those teams manage all their resources that they need to have on-site to make that show go on,” Kaszycki said.
Beam works with about 30 customers, which include the Carolina Hurricanes, New York Mets, and the UFC. In addition to the teams and venues themselves, Beam sells its software to production companies, such as Amazon Prime, that broadcast sporting events. The startup has also expanded to Latin and South America, where they work with broadcast stations and sports production companies.
Beam’s overall target market includes broadcast facilities, film studios, convention centers, and even houses of worship that have audio and visual technology. These venues have tens of millions (and sometimes billions) of dollars in infrastructure they use to create and capture content, such as cameras, lighting, screen displays, and back-end streaming technology.
Inspiration and integration
Kaszycki and DeMars both worked for manufacturers within the media and entertainment industry, and they saw inefficiencies within existing management processes and software.
“I just continued to see the same problem everywhere I went. And that’s that engineers and operators are managing tens of thousands of different pieces of equipment from hundreds of different manufacturers and vendors, and they really had a hard time managing those assets,” Kaszycki said.
Using several software tools and spreadsheets together cost these operators “a tremendous amount of money.” Beam addresses this issue and enhances efficiency by combining all these processes into one platform.
To make transitions from their old systems to Beam, customers can take advantage of help from a team of 10 full-time Beam employees to help learn the new software and transition their data.
Beam’s solutions
Beam sells three software products: Beam Manage, Beam Integrate, and Beam Insights.
Beam Manage offers a single platform to help venues organize their teams, assets and facilities. This standardizes workflows, data storage, ticketing and scheduling.
Beam Integrate is a software tool designed for system integrators. These are the companies that build and set up technology systems. Rather than setting these systems up and leaving the customer to figure out the operations on their own, Beam Integrate helps these sellers pass along clear documentation and offer ongoing support through the platform.
With Beam Insights, venue management teams can connect to the manufacturing companies to pull information such as warranty statuses and software updates.
All together, Beam’s products reduce the number of tools that a team needs to use, which reduces user training, expenses, and time for configuration and setup.
QUICK BITS
Startup: Beam Dynamics
Co-Founders: David Kaszycki and Ryan DeMars
Founded: 2020
Team size: 23
Location: Winston-Salem
Website: www.beamdynamics.io
Funding: Raising Series A in next 12 months
The software helps drive a return on investment for customers, reducing service expenses on assets and reducing the number of employees required to manage the technology and facilities.
Kaszycki said existing customers grow their usage of the platform about 300 to 400% each year, and Beam as a company has grown 600% each year. The startup also recently joined the portfolio of GrepBeat sister company Primordial.
The name “Beam” comes from the idea of the platform as a beam of light, illuminating the task or tool needed amidst many different moving parts. “Beam” also refers to a foundational element, with the software acting as the core infrastructure for a venue’s management needs.
