Remote work may be increasingly mainstream, but there are holdouts like Zaarly exec Shane Mac, who recently opined that startups and distributed teams make a lousy combination. That’s news to the founder of successful startup ProoffHQ, which has been remote from day one.
When GigaOM sat down with Matt Barrie, CEO of Freelancer.com, to talk about online outsourcing, he expressed incredible optimism about the growth of his site and web-powered international hiring in general, but far less hope for niche platforms aimed at connecting workers with gigs.
An exec at jobs marketplace Zaarly pens an uncompromising post admitting he’s been converted to remote work skepticism and arguing that for demanding, idea-hungry startups at least co-located teams are definitely the way to go. Is he on to something?
Peer-to-peer marketplace Zaarly has secured some major support — from some of the tech industry’s biggest names. Zaarly has closed on $14.1 million in a series A funding round. In addition, Hewlett-Packard CEO and former eBay CEO Meg Whitman has joined Zaarly’s board of directors.
German startup Gigalocal has good backers and a name that seems inspired. But can its focus on a local market be enough to help open up a gap in the increasingly busy — but still relatively unproven — field of service marketplaces?
Zaarly, a new start-up that is launching today, is hoping to speed up the pace of local commerce with a new mobile application that helps bring buyers of services and goods together with local sellers and providers in real time.
