A creative project can be difficult to bring to fruition and finding others who share that vision can be tough. However, one innovative tech startup has emerged like an assassin in the dead of night to make the whole process easier in the form of talent discovery app Daisie, which was created by Game of Thrones star Maisie Williams.
Co-founded by Williams with film producer Dom Santry, Daisie allows users to connect and follow each other based on different creative endeavours from film to art and music to photography. And that expressive social proposition has earned the platform a $2.5m seed round, which took total company investment to around $3m, according to TechCrunch. San Francisco-based VC firm Founders Fund was the lead investor with a contribution of $1.5m, joining angel investor Niv Dror and VC firm Kleiner Perkins.
The investment has allowed the business to grow from a team of five to 18, with recruits from the likes of Deliveroo and Microsoft. With the bulk of users in London, Williams and Santry also want to bring Daisie to Berlin, New York and and LA, while it will look to raise a series A round further down the line, which shouldn’t be too much trouble given the evident popularity so far.
During the app’s beta invite-only release in summer 2018, Daisie crashed after a massive 37,000 downloads in its first week. Since then, Daisie has received an update to handle more users and has already reached a whopping 100,000 users after its public launch on Wednesday May 8.
Although she was able to put in the hours during the first quarter, Williams’ involvement with Daisie will be limited to high-level projects from now on while she continues her acting work. Speaking of her future role, Santry said he thinks Maisie will consider how best to improve Daisie. “Where does Daisie stand?,” he said. “What do we stand for? Who do we work with? What do we represent? How do we help creators everywhere? That’s mainly what Maisie wants to make sure Daisie does.”
Although the curtain may have fallen on Game of Thrones after eight years, Williams certainly seems determined to wear the crown within a sector that unites creators and helps them flourish. 
