Most consumer brands have become “completely disassociated” from the manufacturers who actually create their products, says Keychain CEO Oisin Hanrahan.
“They don’t own anything except a brand and a set of marketing functions,” Hanrahan said.
That’s what Hanrahan is trying to change with Keychain. Brands can use the website to look up different products and see who actually manufactures them, then reach out to those manufacturers and potentially partner on future products.
To demonstrate the platform, Hanrahan looked up the granola and yogurt I eat for breakfast every morning. Once he found the manufacturers, he said a large retailer might then work with them to create a private label version of that same granola or yogurt, or a new brand might want to create something healthier or more environmentally friendly.
Hanrahan and Umang Dua previously founded home services marketplaces Handy, which was acquired by ANGI Homeservices, where Hanrahan served as CEO until 2023. After ANGI, the two of them started Keychain with Jordan Weitz.
In November 2023, the New York-headquartered startup announced raising an $18 million seed round led by Lightspeed Venture Partners, then actually launched in February. Since then, Keychain says big brands and retailers have already used the platform to fulfill $500 million worth of manufacturing demand.
Behind the scenes, Hanrahan said the company was able to use the unusually large round to build up its database of products; with some help from AI, the startup has combined data it’s purchased and gathered firsthand to index more than 763,224 products from 24,027 manufacturers (to use the precise counts currently displayed on the Keychain website).
Keychain recently opened an office in Austin, signed Carvel cake-maker Rich Products as a customer, and hired Mitchell Madoff, who previously led private label offerings at Whole Foods, as its head of retail partnerships.
In a statement, Kevin Spratt, Rich Products’ regional president for the U.S./Canada, described the partnership as “a strategic move that will empower us to drive greater growth, foster enhanced innovation and deliver even more unique value for our customers.”
Similarly, Paul Voge, co-founder and CEO of beverage company Aura Bora, said in a statement that Keychain has “significantly streamlined our supply chain” and “saved us countless hours and resources by eliminating the need to contact manufacturers individually.”
Hanrahan pointed to a variety of larger market forces that he said are driving demand for Keychain, from U.S. trade policy that favors domestic manufacturing to growing consumer interest in products tailored to various nutritional and allergy needs.
Ultimately, his goal is for Keychain to connect “anybody who wants to make anything” with “every single part of the supply chain,” from manufacturers to packaging.
“We want to build the software layer that connects all those pieces,” he said.
Source : Techcrunch
