ADPList Has Raised A Total Of $1.3 Million To Move Forward.
Key Sentence:
- Sometimes anger brings success. At the height of the global Covid-19 crisis.
- Tech designer and tech entrepreneur Felix Lee were concerned about the prospects of his design colleagues around the world.
Today, the platform he launched to help designers empower. Each other opened a $1.3 million fundraising round as he continues to expand his global mentoring service.
ADP list was born out of a pandemic. When they started last year, Lee and co-founder James Bedworth just wanted to do something to support the design community as talented people worldwide lost their jobs. Their initial idea was to compile a list of people willing to offer support and advice to other designers struggling during the Covid-19 crisis.
However, Lee and Bedworth quickly discovered that one part of the table they created attracted more attention than the other. Designers who have access to their lists are more likely to seek mentoring services. And since then, the two saw an opportunity to turn their idea into a sustainable business – Amazing Design People List or ADPList for short.
What started as a tool for designers to provide peer support, share career opportunities, and offer mentorship has now organically grown into a platform of 2,500 mentors offering over 5,000 booked sessions per month. In addition, about 20,500 mentees have signed up for support. “We launched ADPList at the height of the pandemic, and the platform’s success since then has shown us.
That there is a global network of people ready to connect and support others in their communities,” said Lee.
“The current evolution of ADPList continues to be based on the belief that any mentor’s voice can turn people’s careers into agencies, and our platform provides them with a completely new, accessible, and exciting way to do that.”
The premise is simple. ADPList provides instant one-click access to a global network of mentors who have signed up to share their time and knowledge with others in the design industry. The nature of the online service means that geographic location is not a barrier – designers can seek advice from mentors around the world. Mentors who work for companies such as Spotify, Apple, Twitter, Linked In, Nike, Netflix, Twitch, and Coinbase have participated.
Mentors themselves indicate their availability on a shared calendar so mentors can select and plan virtual sessions. Video calls are made within the platform, along with feedback and ratings after each session. In addition to individual mentoring, the platform also offers to mentor for small groups, town hall talks, and other formats.