Lockerbox project was launched in 2014 to manufacture automatic luggage lockers and electronic key boxes. Lockerbox founder Alexei Vinogradov discovered the market niche by accident. Automatic luggage lockers were hardly present in Russia’s market, and Lockerbox’s example shows that even in the industries which may seem quite traditional, successful startups can be launched.
Prior to founding Lockerbox, Alexei Vinogradov had had some other business projects. First, he manufactured cell phone cases with the logo of his university (Bauman Institute of Science and Technology in Moscow) and that startup was called SteelCase. He then started Antiparking service of delivering vehicles from car impounds. At some point, Vinogradov got a call from a friend who said he saw a webpage of an online shop offering automatic lockers. Even though the webpage had been launched recently, there were plenty of orders for lockers. The two friends met and made up a plan of actions for finding a manufacturer in China, purchasing goods they needed, arranging deliveries.
As a matter of fact, there was no automatic lockers market in Russia in 2013 as nobody thought such lockers could be used for costs optimization and security purposes. The Lockerbox team launched an advertizing campaign in the Internet and started getting first orders. One of the most interesting orders came from a shopping mall owner who said he would pay anything for lockers manufactured in Russia while declining to buy Chinese products. The shopping mall needed special lockers for shopping trolleys at the bottom and small lockers for handbags at the top. Besides, the lockers had to have barcode access and a sensor monitor.
When the project was successfully launched, AKH Ltd. (Automatic Luggage Locker) was registered. At that moment, Alexei Vinogradov was still in his fourth year at the university.
Lockerbox’s automatic lockers are intended for safe storage of handbags, personal items, documents, etc. All processes are fully automated, including payments. Nowadays such lockers are used in many areas from transportation hubs to shopping malls. Lockerbox’s latest projects include automatic lockers at beaches in Crimea and in the new airport in Rostov-on-Don put in operation on the eve of the world football championship.
The company also manufactures electronic key boxes which make the process of keys handing out fully automatic with employees being able to collect a key trough identification with a card or fingerprint. The systems keeps record of who collected each key and when. Some limitations may be set for individuals to be able to only collect keys they are authorized to use.
A key box from Lockerbox was recently put in operation in Skolkovo technology park near Moscow.
By Christina Firsova