• 1994, Lund University, Master in Sciences, Chemical Engineering
Jonas Tellander studied Chemical Engineering. He started to develop his management abilities in Unilever, where he worked as a Product Manager. After an M.B.A, he worked for five years in the licensing finance area of Roche before he decided to fund his startup.
Jonas Tellander started Storytel with his partner Jon Hauksson in 2005 under the name of Bokilur. However, the company grew very little in the first four or five years. Storytel had to wait for a more mature market, which happened when the iPhone gained popularity, and the Spotify service began to be more used, which allowed increasing audio consumption.
In 2013, Storytel began to be a brand recognized by consumers in Sweden and began making substantial investments in marketing and advertising. Getting ahead of the audiobook trend allowed them to increase.
Currently, Storytel has 70% and 75% market share in Sweden, which is the most developed audio market in the world. The startup begins to expand in Spain, Italy, the Netherlands, and Mexico, in addition to having rapid adoption in small markets such as Singapore and Iceland.
Storytel has opted for a strategy where it avoids confrontation and seeks alliances with local publishers for the production of audiobooks. Also, it has acquired some publishers to expand their catalogs.
Jonas Tellander is also a regular user of his application and mentions having read 20-30 books in the last year, 70% of them being read in Storytel Reader, while the others were heard.
