Golden Gekko History

Magnus worked at Vodafone as a senior manager until December 2006 when he joined Golden Gekko full time. Magnus has over 7 years proven experience with mobile and broadband operators across the world with development and implementation of marketing strategies and due diligence of suppliers that have lead to the successful launch of industry leading products & services. Most recently Magnus has been responsible for developing the global product marketing strategy for Vodafone’s consumer services including services such as mobile TV, mobile music and casual gaming that generated more than €1.4Bn in 2006. Prior to this Magnus has worked in several marketing and strategy roles at Vodafone, Orange, Driftbolaget and Framfab. He is also the co-founder of three successful start-ups whereof one was sold in 2001, the second one went public in 2003 and the third one is currently under offer. Few other people in the mobile entertainment industry come close to Magnus knowledge and network in the business.

Daniel is responsible for global operations including delivery of all projects. Prior to Golden Gekko Daniel worked with the Software Engineering Research Group at University of Lund. His research included developer involvement in software process improvement, agile methods, maturity frameworks for software development, software quality, and project management. In his research he has helped companies such as Ericsson, ABB and Vodafone improve their software development and project management processes. During this time Daniel helped establish the Software Engineering Research Group at Lund University as one of the top research institutions in the world. He received his PhD in software engineering from the Department of Communication Systems, Lund University. Prior to and during his PhD studies Daniel also worked for as an engineer at ABB.

Michael has 3 years experience of delivering large and complex financial projects to international banks and government organisations at NFS. Since joining Golden Gekko Michael has built up and managed the sales and business development team as well as several of our major client accounts.

Early Days

Back in 2004, Daniel relocated to Phnom Penh, Cambodia, together with his wife on an assignment for UNICEF. He agreed to give up a job offer for a big corporation for a year to give the initial business idea a chance. Magnus who worked at Vodafone at the time helped organise a deal with the mobile content company Lechill Mobile to become the first customer on a revenue share basis. A proof of concept development project started with Lechill Mobile in May 2005 to deliver casual card games such as Poker and Black Jack to mobile operators throughout the world. A the time the project validated our worst fears of how difficult it would be to deliver applications efficiently across more than 100 different mobile phones from 10 different manufacturers but also gave rise to some early creative solutions that enabled us to successfully launch the games despite those challenges and this became the basis for the first version of our Mobile Media Engine platform in November 2005.

Changing focus of the company

In the fall of 2005 Jimmy Nordbeck joined the team with his vast experience from online marketing and connections to major brands throughout Scandinavia. For a short period of time the company was also joined by Lottie Svedenstedt, executive and more recently board member of some of Scandinavia’s most successful retail businesses including H&M and Stadium and Sven-Olof Bodenfors, one of Sweden’s most renown marketers responsible for the marketing and communication strategy of iconic brands such Ikea and Volvo. The team identified an enormous opportunity for interactive mobile marketing campaigns and initiated discussions with several of these brands. Due to conflicts of interest with other engagements Lottie and Sven-Olof later decided that they would not be able to commit to the business but would still be available as advisors. The short collaboration did however help Golden Gekko develop a new long term strategy for the company focusing on providing end-to-end mobile marketing campaigns to major brands in Scandinavia and a later stage throughout the world. We have never doubted the strategic direction of the company since.

First customers

The development team continued to grow and refine the platform during the winter and spring of 2006. To test the platform, prototypes of mobile campaigns were delivered to Ikea, Amazon, Ecovision and ICA. The mobile cookbook for Arla was commercially launched in the middle of September 2006. With a good reference customer signed up the next 4 contracts where rapidly closed with Sonet Film, Maconomy, Absolut Vodka and Novartis in a matter of weeks. As the years have passed since then Golden Gekko has delivered to hundreds of satisfied customers.

Where are we going now

In the midst of the mobile revolution with an industry leading technology platform, a vast reference portfolio of proven solutions within all areas of mobile solutions and a great mix of technology and creativity among our employees, Golden Gekko is positioned as one of the leading mobile marketing companies in the world.

To leverage our current leadership in technology and unique business skills we are rapidly expanding in all areas.