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Panion

The Panion app combats isolation by connecting people through common interests.

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Highlights

1
READINESS We're adapting Panion to tackle the social consequences of the Coronavirus, tackling isolation and loneliness in quarantine.
2
OPPORTUNITY Loneliness used to be considered an epidemic but now with COVID-19, social distancing could make it a pandemic.
3
UNIQUENESS There are no friendship-based apps that allow you to find people through cross-referencing keyword searches and geo-location.
4
COMPETITIVE As we grow, our algorithm becomes more intelligent, our data more valuable, and our user interface more refined and customized.

Our Team

I didn't really choose this idea, it chose me. When I moved to Sweden in 2014 to research integration at Lund University I encountered newcomers on a daily basis struggling to meet like-minded people. I also struggled to meet people who shared my interests myself, so it became my mission to use tech to help people feel more socially secure.

Panion - Creating a world filled with meaningful connections

Panion was founded in 2018 – but our story begins long before that.

Melanie Aronson, founder of Panion, says she didn’t really choose to create Panion, the idea chose her.

As the child of three psychologists and someone who worked for a suicide hotline in high school, Melanie always felt like she didn't quite fit the norm, so she felt familiar with the experience of loneliness from an early age.

When our founder Melanie first arrived in Sweden, she realized loneliness was a bigger issue than she had thought.

In 2007, Melanie wrote her anthropology thesis on Couchsurfing, looking at how a digital community could lead to the formation of real world connections. In 2014 she then moved to Sweden on a Fulbright grant to research the integration of Syrian refugees into Swedish society and realized just how many people were struggling with loneliness.

Panion was founded with the objective to develop a technology-based solution to overcome the loneliness epidemic.

Melanie pitches Panion at the Fast Track Malmö Demo day in 2018.

Soon the idea for a keyword-searchable social app that connects people through common interests, values, and experiences was born. Users could tag their profiles with keywords allowing people to find each other in the same city or neighborhood. People could also propose spontaneous activities or find a new friend with a common goal (e.g. language exchange, gym partner or co-founder).

We are regularly hearing about new friendship success stories and can see that people are creating group activities on Panion.
“When I first started talking about my idea for an app to solve this problem, people started holding me to it. I would receive calls every few weeks from another person in Sweden asking if I had finished the product, because they were in desperate need for an app like the one I had described. Knowing I could solve so many people's problems and improve their overall feeling of well-being, motivated me to continue.” Melanie Aronson

Here is Panion’s first Promotional Video to present our product @ CES Eureka Park in 2018:

Getting Panion to where we are now has been an extremely interesting and valuable journey. Version 1.0 of the app was first released in January of 2019 for iOS and Android. Since then, we have put a lot of time and energy into understanding our users and building an experience that will keep them coming back.

Version 1.0 of the Panion app released in January 2019 for iOS and Android.

Panion is highly driven by customer feedback– we are constantly implementing new features based on user demands.

We are constantly improving the app, continuously testing and improving the user experience and design. This led to a complete redesign of the app in 2019 and the integration of new features.

For example, Personality Questions encourage you to answer fun fill-in-the-blank questions that help you start new conversations with people in your area.

People are complex, an attractive picture is not enough to build a friendship over – Personality Questions take Panion to a whole new level.

Or the Communities feature, helps already established networks like organization, schools, and companies build and maintain their own communities by providing a keyword-searchable social platform for their members – and track the trends of their community through an interactive dashboard.

The Community feature helps already established networks build and maintain their own communities by providing a keyword-searchable social platform for their members.

Panion’s journey began in The Nordics - but we won’t stop there.

We have reached critical mass in our home market (Sweden/Denmark) and gained noticeable organic traction in some of the largest markets worldwide (U.S., India, Nigeria). In the course of the past year we have seen as many as 800-1000 downloads per day and 30k monthly active users.

Over 115.000 panions are already finding friends they actually like on our platform.

With intentions to expand internationally, we have built a digital platform with the technical ability to scale as we take on new markets. And we have acquired over 100,000 users within less than a year from releasing version 1.0 of the app.

This funny ad shows how our users make friends they actually like on Panion:

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Our team has grown from 3 to 10 over the course of the year. Everyone brings a unique expertise and a profound commitment to our mission to the table so that we are ready to further scale our operations.

Having such a diverse team allows us to understand our users no matter where they are from or what background they have - and thereby creates a product that truly resonates with them.

Adapting Panion during the Coronavirus Crisis to combat social isolation

Normally, Panion encourages people to put down their phones and connect in-person for joint activities. In light of the Coronavirus outbreak, we have adjusted many of our features to encourage virtual connections based on location and interest.

We're adapting Panion to tackle the social consequences of the Coronavirus and to help combat feelings of isolation and loneliness.

We've built virtual gatherings and online communities around common interests and experiences related to the Coronavirus to create spaces where people can talk about life in quarantine and keep each other company while being isolated at home. By providing a supportive and relevant local space for individuals to stay social, we can prevent people from taking the risk to socialize in person, while also ensuring that the connections people do make can later become real life friendships.

In 10 years, we plan to be the go-to platform for making any type of platonic relationship, creating a world filled with meaningful connections.

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Overview