- Startup lands cash-injection after internal incubation process.
- Spinoff equipped with ElevenPaths patented tech.
- Group execs keeping close-eye on operations.
Legal tech specialist Shaadow became the second startup to emerge out of Telefónica’s in-house co‑investment unit Wayra Builder.
Shaadow, based in Madrid, Spain, went independent in late‑2020 after receiving an as yet undisclosed investment and “advisory support” from venture capital players Eleven Stones, Geoflows Capital, Global Apphaus, and Plain Concepts.
The startup’s Board of Directors comprises representation from each of the listed shareholders, as well as Telefónica Chief Digital Consumer Officer Chema Alonso.
Shaadow’s Chief Executive — hand-picked soon after the Group’s “Open Innovation team” deemed the startup’s solution (see below) commercially viable — is angel investor Isabel Hernández Ruiz, a former Telefónica research and development engineer and co‑founder of AWASI, an investment vehicle focused on female-led startups in their “seed and pre-seed phases”.
Shaadow’s purpose is to bring to market software that leverages patented technology incubated from within Telefónica Tech’s cybersecurity unit ElevenPaths.
It is said to prevent data leakages, and thus safeguard sensitive information. It does so by enabling clients to “generate invisible watermarks” on confidential documents that indicate who the copy belongs to. A purported USP is that “unlike existing technologies”, the application is able to imprint watermarks on both digital- or paper-based forms of documentation.
Hitting the ground running
The startup follows in the footsteps of blockchain-based solution provider Deeder in emerging from out of Wayra Builder (Telefónicawatch, #150).
Announced in November 2020, Wayra Builder aims to accelerate internal Telefónica innovations, patents, and technologies.
The unit is headed by the Group’s Head of Venture Studio Fernando Guillot, and falls under Telefónica’s Wayra Family umbrella, which encompasses Wayra’s digital in‑house innovation discovery units, including Wayra Next Trend and Wayra X (Telefónicawatch, #150). It appears to run in close collaboration with ElevenPaths, so accelerating cybersecurity solutions are of particular focus.
Sam Patterson is a Staff Reporter for TelcoTitans, contributing telecoms news analysis since September 2020 as part of the TelcoTitans and Market Mettle Editorial team.
