Tag Archive | "Technology"

Nick Holzherr- Slick Nick; But is Holzherr the real deal?

Tags: , , , , , , , , ,

Nick Holzherr- Slick Nick; But is Holzherr the real deal?


[Editor's Note] Milos Bezanov is a second year student currently studying International Politics at King’s College London.

Many people are wondering who this new character that hit TV screens actually is? If it weren’t for his almost Boris Johnson type appearance, his initially unimposing demeanour would make it easy to let him pass under the radar. Yet it was Nick Holzherr who took control of some quite considerable egos (one candidate actually referring to himself as “the reflection of perfection”) and led the team to victory. His overconfident statement prior to the show’s start; “I’m a natural leader, I like to lead teams and I can lead (a) team into real success” most likely didn’t win him many fans. However it can’t be overlooked that, in the first task, he backed his claim, and he did it in style. Whilst this alone is not enough to back up his other equally confident claims, it nevertheless begs the question, is Nick as good as he says he is? Is he the real deal?

His childhood was split between two countries, having been born in the UK, his family then moving to Zurich three months later where he spent the next 7 years, after which his family returned. His entrepreneurial streak was evident early on in life, selling lost golf balls back to golfers at the age of 9. From there he continued to move through his education fairly swiftly; taking his degree at the Business School at Aston university. It was during this time that he developed his more entrepreneurial side; co founding SIFE (students in free enterprise), which aimed to get students involved in enterprise. It did this by enabling them to work on projects to improve economic development in the west-midlands region. Needless to say, it became an immediate success, becoming one of the largest societies, and partnering with Birmingham city council. So far so good.

It wasn’t just out of hobby that he began to explore ideas. In his placement year, he was stuck “in a glass building” at a global investment bank in Germany; “it was boring, I hated what I was doing”. Not having the best time, sketching business ideas became a form of escapism; “(during this time) I thought I could come up with some really interesting ideas”. It was here that he came up with his “go go coffee to go” scheme. Essentially what they do is sell the coffee to customers, but sell the cup itself as advertising space for clients “generating income from both sides” enabling cheaper prices for the same quality coffee. This ingenious scheme won the American-German Business club’s business plan competition. Confidence in himself was undoubtedly buoyed by success with SIFE, but success with the coffee scheme was a new step. What was present in this scheme unlike with SIFE was a tangible product, and shifting this belief from person to product gave him the courage to pursue it further.

It was from pursuing this business idea that his journey into enterprise began. Having ordered 20,000 cups from China, finding a spot to store this that was near their campus (their target market) presented quite a challenge. Nevertheless, they managed to find a friend at their university who was kind enough to store it. This experience showed him that, whilst it is difficult to find investors willing to give money, cutting costs by getting stuff cheaply, or free, is much easier. There was also another snag on the sourcing side; having rented office space in September, various delays in production and transportation meant that they didn’t arrive until January. Nick, looking back, almost wanted to quit; “We (and my business partner) had so many times last year when we thought; shall we just give this up”. However, having invested almost £40,000 pounds, they didn’t give up on the business, and started trying to think of different ways of making money from the advertising end.

From this, their idea for their latest venture was born. Using QR codes, which are 2D digital barcodes that can be scanned into your mobile, people can load up more information about the advert. The popularity of this idea quickly became apparent; “We had loads of people coming to us saying, guys, we really like this, can you do this for us”. However, expanding on the idea into a business is a skill in itself, and it was only through the experience he gained earlier that he was able to utilise it’s potential. In line with his “getting what you can for free” rule, he managed to secure free office space through the Birmingham E4F business incubator. Today, the initial idea has been transformed into a “content management system for mobile phones” where the user can scan the code on the business card and load up a profile, which links to the person’s Facebook, Twitter, Skype etc. All this wouldn’t have been possible if they didn’t keep at it when times were tough; which was something he didn’t learn in business school.

Nick has come a long way since selling those golf balls to (admittedly somewhat naïve) golfers. He now offers consulting and guest speaking services, is working on many other business ideas, while at the same time appearing on one of the UK’s biggest business shows. In particular, the claim that “I’ve got lots of ideas, I know how to whittle them down into ideas that will work and I’ve got what it takes to make them actually happen” succinctly captures what his learning experience. Since the age of 9 he hasn’t been afraid to explore these ideas.

At university, he perfected his ability to explore an idea to it’s fullest and come up with a concept that can work, winning him the competition. However, it was his initial failure with Go Go Coffee that taught him the difference between a good idea that works and one that doesn’t. Just like he backed up his leadership claim in the apprentice, his life experiences back up this one too. In short, Nick Holzherr is the real deal, and I’m sure we’ll hear more about him in the future.

[Editor's Note] Milos Bezanov is a second year student currently studying International Politics at King’s College London.

Posted in Entrepreneurship, Start-UpsComments (1)

Feeling Flattred? Introducing Flattr – A new micro-payment system

Tags: , , , , , ,

Feeling Flattred? Introducing Flattr – A new micro-payment system


Linus Olsson, a member of the Flattr team, explained that one of his biggest challenges was articulating exactly what it is that the business does; for such a simple concept it can initially be a bit baffling. So here goes nothing…

Peter Sunde, founder of Flattr, stated that the aim of the business was to “encourage people to share money as well as content”. The idea behind Flattr is to create a payment system so simple that people would donate a small amount of money for free content that they happen to like and therefore think deserves some kind of support. Payment systems are often long and extensive, which can deter people from paying for things they need online, let alone donating willingly; so here’s where Flattr comes in.

Flattr users pay a small fee every month, more like topping up an account, which they can then donate to various websites via a simple click of a flattr button, providing the website has one. At the end of the month the user’s fee is divided by the amount of clicks that they have made, and the money is split and transferred directly to the supplier of the ‘flattred’ content. Similarly, if you are supplying content online you can get your own Flattr button so people can donate to you! With a flat rate fee you can Flattr people – it’s that simple.

With a background in technology Olsson explained that it was not financial knowledge that led them to Flattr, but more an understanding of how humans behave. In that respect Flattr was created in order to help humans support the things that they find important, thus challenging existing economic structures.

Flattr, labelled by many as a ‘micro-payment’ system, has over 80,000 users since its launch in 2010, with the majority situated in Germany. Olsson is confident that Flattr will work wherever people care about supporting those who supply genuinely good content, but also believes that one of his principal challenges is implementing Flattr where it needs to be implemented. To overcome this he hopes to make the technology increasingly easier and find partners in order to help spread the word.

Sounds great, but how do they make their money?

Flattr takes a 10% cut of the money received by the suppliers of ‘flattred’ content, a figure which Olsson sees as a kind of necessary evil which he hopes to reduce in the future.

Although the Flattr team have not revealed the source of their funding, in February of this year they received a €1.6m in Venture Round Funding, which will hopefully give the team the boost they need to grow their business and spread the word: ‘Flattr’.

Information sourced from: http://flattr.com/

Posted in Entrepreneurship, Start-UpsComments (0)

Quick chat with Boxee’s founder and CEO, Avner Ronen

Tags: , , , , , ,

Quick chat with Boxee’s founder and CEO, Avner Ronen


Avner Ronen is the founder and CEO of Boxee, a freeware media player software platform.

Before starting Boxee, Avner founded and sold Odigo, an instant messaging service to Comverse for $20M in 2002 but stayed on with Comverse as the VP Corporate Strategy & Business Development until early 2007 and started Boxee soon after.

I had a quick chat with Avner to find out more about Boxee and the story behind it.

Can you give you some background information about yourself, were you the entrepreneurial type growing up?

I wasn’t an entrepreneur growing up, but I was working at a young age. Since I was 12 years old I was doing odd jobs like delivering papers, cleaning buildings, work in kitchens or restaurants etc.

My first real entrepreneurial experience was in the Israeli Defence Force, when I started an Intranet project in my unit.

Tell me about your experience working with the Odigo team during its early days and some of the key thing you took away from that experience?

Odigo was a unique experience. I believe I learned many important lessons, but I don’t think I was necessary able to implement them when I started Boxee.

Like with any start-up however, I learned a great deal about product, focus, raising money, building a team, etc.

Tell me how the idea for Boxee came about?

My friend Tom Sella and I were playing around with connecting computers and xbox media center to our TVs and we realized we were watching more and more stuff from the Internet rather than from the cable box. Our setup was complicated and very geeky though, and we decided there must be a better, easier way to do it. That’s how the idea for Boxee came about.

What are you trying to solve with Boxee?

We believe many peoples’ video watching habits have completely changed. Today, people are much more active in their video consumption. We are more on-demand driven, watching videos on our computers, tablets and phones, and discovering what to watch via social media, by following friends and influencers on Twitter and Facebook.

Boxee is a product designed with this new consumer behaviour in mind. Rather than pay $75 a month for 200 channels from which you only watch 6-10, with Boxee you can get the major broadcast channels for free and then get the rest of the stuff you want to watch from the Internet, like Netflix, Vudu, YouTube, etc. It is a more relevant, more affordable and better experience than what you’ll get from your traditional pay TV provider.

Talk me through the first few months of running the business? What would you say was the hardest part of starting the business?

I think like with any idea, the hardest thing is taking the plunge and deciding to really do it; dedicating yourself to it. Probably 99.9% of ideas never pass the stage of talking about them with your friends.

The next major hurdle is assembling the initial team and then getting started on building the product, especially if you need to raise money at that stage.

How were you able to fund the business?

Initially I invested some of my own money and then reached out to friends & family to do a seed round. That phase took a long time until we got venture capital firms to invest.

How has your market changed in the past few years? How has your business changed to keep pace?

The market has really matured favorably in the direction of the Boxee product and vision. Today it is not a question whether TVs will be connected and there is no question that premium content is/will be available over the Internet – there is real consumer demand for it.

This also means there is much more competition and that as a start-up, we need to continue to innovate and build our brand and products.

Would you say the initial idea for the company, or that your business model has changed since starting the company?

The original goal or the vision has not really changed much, which may be a reason for concern.. We didn’t have a clear business model when we got started and I think today we feel much more comfortable about how we are going to build and scale a great business around Boxee.

What would you say has been some of the most crucial that you’ve done to build the company to this level now?

I would say the most crucial thing we have done was to have a vision for the product that we stayed focused on and executed on it to build a brand and a fan base without spending too much on marketing.

Is the business profitable? What is your business model?

We are not profitable. We are going to get to profitability by converting Boxee users to premium, paying users.

What’s been your most memorable moment so far on your entrepreneurial journey?

Hard to tell one specific moment, but I think the greatest joy has been making my mother proud and happy.

What pieces of advices could you give to aspiring entrepreneurs out there?

I feel anything I will say has been said before… there are many paths to success and you can easily get great, completely contradictory advice on almost every subject, so probably most important is to follow your gut/heart and try to have fun along the way.

What can we be expecting from you and Boxee in 2012?

We have big plans for 2012, but at this point they are all top secret ;) Stay tuned…

Posted in Entrepreneurship, Interviews, TechnologyComments (0)

Helping You Get More From Your Technology With Soluto – Interview With Tomer Dvir

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Helping You Get More From Your Technology With Soluto – Interview With Tomer Dvir


From winning TechCrunch Disrupt to raising a total of $18.3M in funding. I invited Tomer Dvir, the CEO and Co-Founder of Soluto as he talks me through his entrepreneurial journey so far, especially how the idea for Soluto came about.

Tomer Dvir is the CEO and Co-Founder of Soluto, a web service that helps people to make their own PC and other people’s PCs better.

The full interview is below.

Photo by Louiz Green

Hi Tomer, Thanks for doing this interview with me. Can you give you some background information about yourself, were you the entrepreneurial type growing up?

When I was 7 years old, I got two rabbits as a gift. Quickly I found out that rabbits multiply every few weeks. That was my first business. I started programming at the age of 9. As a teenager I worked for various companies as a programmer and helped people with their computers, while also working on my own projects – such as a computerized home and various other projects involving hardware and software working together.

At the age of 18 I joined the army for 3 years, serving the air force in an R&D unit. The day I left the army I started a small software company with a friend from high-school. We loved programming but we were pretty bad at marketing ourselves – so we failed miserably. Then I joined a small start-up that developed a very cool medication dispensing system, where I grew to lead development as the company’s CTO.

After 5 years I decided it was time to move on and start something huge that would affect hundreds of millions of people around the world.

Tell me how the idea for Soluto came about?

The real Soluto story started back when I was a teenager, when I began helping people in my hometown with their computers.  At first it was just to help people and make them happier, but quickly I realized that I could make people all over the world happier by helping them enjoy their technology more.  A seed was planted and the idea for Soluto grew, to help anyone anywhere get more from their computers. In the beginning of 2008, together with Ishay Green, Soluto was born.

What were you doing before you started the company?

Before co-founding Soluto, I was CTO at MDG Medical, where I led the software and hardware development of medication dispensing products for hospitals. Before that I co-founded InetB, a web applications software provider.

What is Soluto?

Soluto helps you get more out of your PC. It’s a web-based service that lets you manage your PCs and help your friends, family and colleagues make their PCs better too, so that everyone will be a little happier with the technologies they use every day.

What are you trying to solve with Soluto?

We all use technology in our lives every day, in our offices, at home and even in our pockets as we move more and more towards a world of smartphones. Unfortunately many people are not naturally good with technology and this is where Soluto comes in. Our aim is to make everyone happier with the technology they use every day by allowing people to do more with their computer and also providing a simple way for friends, family and colleagues to help each other get more from technology.

Soluto currently works for PCs and we’re planning to support tablets, Macs and smartphones in the near future.

Talk me through the first few months of running the business? What would you say was the hardest part of starting the business?

When people think of fun-to-use, easy technology – PCs aren’t the first things that come to mind. We knew that people use PCs every day and that they are an amazing technology that can make people’s lives better and easier. We also knew that most people don’t know what to do with them or how they can get more out of their PC. We knew this, but the challenge was to convince investors and the market that there was a need for Soluto and that we could change the way people think about, feel towards, and use their PCs.

The hardest part of starting the business was taking an idea (that sounded great) and turning it into a real product (that proved itself) so others could actually see that we were really onto something. It was a lot of hard work, conviction, and not a lot of sleep or money. But our dedication and belief in what we were doing got us to where we are now.

How were you able to fund the business?

To date, Soluto has raised a total of $18.3M in three rounds. These were led by Index VenturesBessemer Venture PartnersGiza Venture Capital, and Proxima Ventures and also Chris Dixon, Michael Arrington’s CrunchFund, Eric Schmidt. For a complete list, see our Investors page.

How has your market changed in the past few years? How has your business changed to keep pace?

Over the last year it’s become clear that many of our users are supporting other people, either at work or as ‘family CTOs,’ helping parents, neighbors, even grandma with their computers. We realized that finding a way to efficiently help multiple people with their PCs was the real challenge for our power users. We decided that we could make it easier if power users could remotely help PCs from a web dashboard. That’s how the Soluto web-based service came to be.

Soluto, which was once a software application that helped people with their own PCs, has always been focused on helping people get more from technology. Now, our business has taken the next step in making technology better for everyone, by creating the web-based service that can help people not only get more out of their own PC but also help others make their PCs better too.

Would you say the initial idea for the company, or that your business model has changed since starting the company?

Soluto has always been focused on helping people get more from technology so the initial idea has remained the same throughout, how we can best do this is adapting as we learn from our users.

What would you say has been some of the most crucial that you’ve done to build the company to this level now?

We believe that technology should be easy, clear but also Fun. One of the most crucial things we’ve done is focus on our user experience and design. Soluto has reached the level it’s at now due to our team’s focused dedication to creating an easy-to-use, beautiful, and enjoyable product.

For us it’s crucial that we always find a way to make our service as intuitive and user-friendly as possible. We strive to give people only the information they need, and not overload users with tons of unnecessary technical data.

But in addition to that – we try to make any experience with Soluto as fun as possible. Our ultimate goal with every design and feature is to get the person who’s using the feature to smile.

Is the business profitable? What is your business model?

Soluto is not profitable yet. Soluto is free for use with up to 5 PCs. Users pay a monthly fee to use Soluto to manage more than 5 PCs.

What’s been your most memorable moment so far on your entrepreneurial journey?

Our most memorable moment was releasing our first public version and winning TechCrunch Disrupt in 2010. It was amazing to have our hard work and vision recognized.

What pieces of advices could you give to aspiring entrepreneurs out there?

Be ready to work hard, and really believe in what you are doing. Be prepared for some disappointments, challenges and unexpected hiccups along the way, but don’t lose sight of your vision and goals.
The start-up and entrepreneurial road is fast-paced and full of unexpected highs and lows, so be ready for anything.

Most importantly – Trust yourself wholly, and believe in your idea. Many people will be non-believers and will tell you that you have no chance. Always listen, but don’t assume someone else knows better than you.

What can we be expecting from you and Soluto in 2012?

You can expect Soluto to continue improving and embarking on new ways to help make technology better for everyone. Moving forward we are working on our PC Genome project. Soluto’s PC Genome project aims to make data about technology freely and publicly available.

Also, Soluto will become available on additional platforms and provide more and more value to everyone’s digital life.

Posted in Entrepreneurship, Interviews, TechnologyComments (0)

Things to Consider When Developing a Social Media Strategy

Tags: , , , ,

Things to Consider When Developing a Social Media Strategy


Developing a social media strategy is a tedious task. It doesn’t necessarily involve a few social networking sites and eventual posting of things on the web page thinking people are taking in everything. In today’s world, thinking unique always helps a company or a firm to go up the rungs of popularity. And to top it, the internet and technology have changed the way we look at things and the way we think and would want to execute things. Therefore, it’s always advised to first form a proper strategy for the social media marketing taking into consideration yours goals and needs that have to be achieved. Once a plan is laid, it’s always easier to start implementing it.

Determine your objectives

The first and the foremost issue would be to ask yourself as to what do you want to achieve? How many people do you want to reach out to? Who would do the financing? Should you do it in a phased manner or is it a one-time strategy? Are the goals short termed or long termed?
All these questions have to be answered first and only then you can proceed to the next step.

Research! (The only way to figure out a solution)

Find information about things and compile them in a proper way. Check the internet tools on the internet to see which one suits your needs completely. Ask people what they would want. Make a survey and see what you find in the results.

Plan out! (Think out of the box!)

The next step would be to plan your strategy and eventually implementing the same in whichever way needed. See what you can do with new technology. Smart phones are used by every other person nowadays. See if you can go mobile and spread your message in a more subtle way. There are other ways on the internet like the social networking sites and other relationship building sites.

You can also use video blogging sites or any video uploading website to post a video and urging people to watch it and then eventually share it. This is a form of marketing called viral marketing. This wouldn’t cost you a penny if you can do it right.

Connect! (With your audience)

It would all depend on how well you planned out everything. Now go public and see what they think on the larger platform. You’ll get positive and negative views, but it your choice if you want to change the negative mindset of the people by trying to understand what they want and trying to accommodate their issues, and eventually bring in a few amends. People watch and they judge you by what they see. Therefore, you should know how to talk with your audience.

Keep ONE Identity!

It’s easy nowadays to get confused with different names of the same company. And this is what leads to audience losing interest in what you have to offer. Always remember to have one identity on the social networking scenario to avoid such confusion.

After connecting, ReConnect!

Customers are your sole agenda. Therefore, you should always remember that you are the one who should be following up with them and communicate. Make yourself crystal clear. Make your customers feel they are heard. Make them feel important. That is how they’ll eventually respond back effectively.

Lastly, the most important thing about social media marketing is, understanding the people you want the market your product with. If you know the people, you would obviously get to know how such people respond. This would give you an insight into how your strategy should be and what tools should you use to achieve your goals.

About the author: Brianne is a blogger by profession. She loves writing on technology. Beside this she is fond of gadgets. Recently an article on esata vs usb attracted her attention. These days she is busy in writing an article on eboard for her blog.

Posted in Lifestyle, Social MediaComments (0)

Introducing SHOUT! – Interview with Stavros Alambritis – CEO/Founder of GZero

Tags: , , , , , ,

Introducing SHOUT! – Interview with Stavros Alambritis – CEO/Founder of GZero


I recently got the opportunity to interview Stavros Alambritis. Stavros is the CEO/Founder of GZero.

In our interview, we talked about what his company does, his journey so far, launching his latest creation SHOUT! and more…

This is the full interview.

Stavros Alambritis

Can you give us some background information about yourself?

Sure, I went to uni and dropped out within 3 months to start my first business at 18. I now head up various companies and GZero is the latest start up creation. The main difference between GZero and my other companies is that this embarks on something that is very personal to me and my lifetime hobby or addiction to computers and technology.

I have had a string of businesses and experience ranging from being a Microsoft Certified professional, deploying networks in schools to owning an Award winning Club Nokia Service Centre which i sold in 2006.

Tells us what your company does?

Our company set out to eliminate some of the things that i personally find frustrating in life. I figured that my tastes are pretty common so things that would benefit me should hopefully also benefit others. We have launched with two initial products. The first product was born out of my frustration with windows PC’s slowing over time and affecting my regular gaming. Did i mention i love computer games?

GBoost is a patented free system that enables gamers and other professionals to temporarily strip down their PC to a console like status. This enables them to get maximum performance out of their hardware. The software is still in beta stages and we are getting some very positive feedback from our initial early users.

The second product we make is VoCal – The Voice Calendar for iPhone. This was also born out of a frustration of typing reminders into my calendar. I found it far too slow and cumbersome for todays fast and busy lifestyle. When i looked for another solution, i found that nobody had thought of being able to record a quick voice memo and then have it alert you at a more appropriate time. I now think that this product is a luxury for the mind, a kind of personal assistant that never forgets.

Talking is so natural yet people still reach for a sticky note or pc/mac or phone calendar for making reminders to get jobs done. My favorite use for VoCal is when i am driving. You know the times when you can think about things, i usually remember a job that must be done when i am driving but may forget at the end of the journey. Have you ever tried typing into your phone when you are driving? It can be quite hazardous to your health. Now with VoCal i can tap the app and speak into the phone very quickly and easily and set a quick future date for the reminder to come in.

How did you get into iPhone app development?

I was watching the very first keynote by Steve Jobs when he announced the 1st generation iPhone, and having a good grounding in mobile phones, i thought, ‘this is gonna be big’. When Apple unleashed their groundbreaking new multi touch and gesture controlled interface it had to be big. As soon as the app store was announced we starting looking for a programmer to join our existing team who were already working away on GBoost at the time..

Do you also create apps for the iPads?

Not yet although we will be converting some of our apps to native iPad format to benefit from the increased screen size.

Tell us about SHOUT!,Where did the idea come from?

SHOUT! was initially developed as a new feature for VoCal as an attempt to make the app more social. Once the team saw how good and fun it was. We decided to release it as a stand alone app at the lowest price tier available in the app store. We felt that SHOUT! was too good to just be an extra feature of VoCal so we made a separate and more fun app.

SHOUT! is kind of an accident and we are excited to see where it may lead. We are also planning to include it as an extra feature for our new and existing users of VoCal and it is our first app that we are looking to release on the Android platform also.

What is it about SHOUT! , do you think, that appeals to so many people?

SHOUT! has only just launched and is already receiving rave reviews.

There are two main things when it comes to SHOUT! that we think are appealing.

Keeping with our Voice theme, the first great thing about SHOUT! is that it allows Facebook users to express their emotion in a way that could never be done by text alone. We have seen/heard peoples wall posts on Facebook. Some of them are quite hilarious. People have recording themselves making jokes, gathering round their iPhone to sing happy birthday to friends, or giving us a running commentary on their status and thoughts.

Each SHOUT! is limited to 2 minutes which keeps them from getting boring. We look at it as a bit like an audio tweet. One user is a stand up comic who is now announcing gigs and making people laugh on his Facebook account. He says that he can do it in a new more expressive way and we agree. Text alone can be too dull and videos are not always convenient to make. Why Facebook didn’t include an audio option as standard is still a mystery to us but i’m not complaining.

The second thing we are enjoying about SHOUT! is our groundbreaking new interface. It is minimalistic and almost looks alive. It is fully customizable with lots of new customization options planned. We are looking at cool ways for users to interact with the app to change the monotony of using the static apps that are currently out there.

Everything we have learned so far in our last two years has taught us to soft launch SHOUT! as a simple micro release concept v1.0 and just put it out there. Then we want to let our users direct the future of the app and of course bug fix along the way. We will make gradual and incremental free updates bringing more features yet keeping to our core philosophy of speed and simplicity.

The number one feature we have been asked for by almost everybody so far is the ability to post a SHOUT! direct onto somebody’s wall. So that will be coming in Version 1.1 with a new yet to be unveiled ability also coming soon.

How long did you spend on developing the app?

As our team of 7 is now getting to grips with the tools and each other, it took us just 7 weeks! Which is a lot faster than the 6 months it took us to do our initial release of VoCal.

What are the challenges of developing for the iPhones?

The main initial challenge for us was to find a programmer who understood Objective C. There was hardly anyone available here in the UK that could develop in objective C back then, so, in the end, we decided to hire a seasoned veteran in other languages and have him learn the new language. We challenged him to learn this new language and start developing. He was totally new to Apple Mac’s and the whole ecosystem at the time but has since become very proficient.

What are some of your favorite development tools?

XCode was the only tool out there when we started and is still the main tool we use today. We have recently looked at some of the other tools that are out there but feel that they compromise too much and cannot get the maximum benefit out of the Apple operating system (iOS)

What is your favorite iPhone app?

VoCal of course. I cannot leave home without my iPhone and VoCal :)

What advice do you have for someone wanting to start developing for the iPhones?

Start small and don’t take on large expenses unless you have major backing. The market has now matured so you are up against the best of the best including large companies such as EA in the games category. People must remember that even Angry birds flopped in the App Store for the first 3 months, meaning that developing a great app alone is not enough. You need to be good at marketing also.

We were actually late to the App Store but got lucky enough to earn our position in the top 100 of the Business Category and stay there for the last year and a half. Some guys get lucky when Apple pick their applications to be featured in the App Store. This gives them great exposure. We have yet to be featured but stay hopeful that one day we will.

What can people expect moving beyond 2011?

I expect interfaces to move more towards voice as keyboards and mice slowly give way to new ways of interacting with devices. Gestures are only the beginning and Google has been quick to adopt voice recognition on their Android platform. I expect Apple, this year and next, to make a major move into Voice recognition with perhaps a revamped version of the iPhone 4 being released with a faster processor and overhauled iOS platform to cater for the new voice features and also to give us a better notification system.

I would just also like to add that in the long term, i believe that Star Trek like devices that people talk to and perhaps have a conversation with, with become more the norm over the coming decades.

Thanks for your time.

Thanks for yours.

http://gzero.com/home.html

Posted in Entrepreneurship, Interviews, TechnologyComments (0)

LAUNCH 48 Presents… The Inspire Conference (7th & 8th June 2011)

Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

LAUNCH 48 Presents… The Inspire Conference (7th & 8th June 2011)


the inspire conference

Over two days in June 2011, The Inspire Conference will bring together some of the most brilliant thought-leaders in Technology, Creative, Entrepreneurship and Society from across the world to the heart of Europe’s exploding tech and creative scene in East London.

Topics ranging from social entrepreneurship to open data, from the future of Internet typography to the next big thing in User experience will invite the audience to think, reflect, learn and be inspired.

Speakers include:

• Alex Breuer / Design Editor – The Times
• Ann Cotton / Founder – Camfed
• Anthony Browne / Policy Director for London Mayor
• Aza Raskin / Ex Head of UX – Mozilla Labs
• Conrad Wolfram / CEO – Wolfram Research
• Erik Hersman / Co-Founder – Ushahidi
• Michael Birch / Founder – Bebo, Profounders
• Parag Khanna / Best Selling Author – Second World
• Rajesh Sawhney / President – Reliance BIG Entertainment
• Rory Sutherland / Vice Chairman – Ogilvy
• Roshaneh Zafar / Founder – Kashf Foundation
• Stephan Shakespeare / CEO & Founder, YouGov
• Tom Chatfield / Game Theorist

And more to be announced soon!

Inspire is the first and only accessible and affordable thought-leadership event of it’s kind to be held in Europe. During the two days, 25 passionate speakers will share the power of their ideas with you, creating an intellectual theatre that will stimulate your creativity and boost your inspiration.

Early bird tickets for The Inspire Conference expire in 5 days so make sure you get yours soon! To find out more about the conference or to buy tickets – Click here

I seriously can’t wait for this event! YHP will be doing a lot of filming + interviews, it should be a blast.

Posted in Be Inspired, Events/SeminarsComments (0)

Mark Bao’s ThreeWords.me Acquired by Czar

Tags: , , , , , , , ,

Mark Bao’s ThreeWords.me Acquired by Czar


mark bao threewords.me

We recently had a blog post about mark bao’s selling his web viral app, well according to a report on Mashable.

He has just sold his site and service to Kevin Ham. Ham is a dot-com mogul whose portfolio includes around $300 million worth of domain names.

Billed as “the man who owns the Internet,” Ham owns domains such as God.com and Satan.com and routinely pays six-figure prices for URLs he likes.

Bao launched the app not too long ago; its purpose was to solicit compliments from users’ online friends. The user would simply post or tweet a unique URL along with a phrase like, “Enter three words that describe me.” The app would then collect (often anonymous) three-word descriptions and track which words came up most often.

Read the rest of the story

Posted in Be Inspired, MediaComments (0)

Jude Gomila- Co-founder of heyzap

Tags: , , , , , ,

Jude Gomila- Co-founder of heyzap


By Honey Carew

Jude gomila

Jude Gomila is encumbered with bags full of determination, as he is currently an uprising resourceful entrepreneur for game players. Education is his foundation, due to his personal developments academically.

He has successfully obtained both a degree and masters in Manufacturing business and finance. He studied within United Kingdom’s top university – University of Cambridge. His entrepreneurial skills were sharpened during his time within the entrepreneur society within his university years.

Mr. Gomila started Sugar Global, which is a consumer electronics industry. This industry specializes in the sale of digital photo frames to UK stores. He also became a co-founder of helpthirst.com.

His role was creating an Internet advertisement website called helpthirst.com for the charity (word vision), along with gaining support from commercial participators. This website consists of a game in testing an individual’s memory, regarding the statistics that they are being asked. Once, one answer is the correct answer, a cup of water is donated to the charity.

Jude is also one of the co-founders for the website “heyzap.com”. Heyzap began in August 2008, and is known for satisfying the needs of game creators and players.

Heyzap is engraved with forum for discussion to be held regarding their favorite games, or ways of how one can improve. Tips on how to have social game on an individual’s website is also given. Jude Gormila has done so much within the space of two years, the next few years to come bigger and better things are promised.

Posted in Start-UpsComments (0)

Tom Latchford, Founder of Raising IT

Tags: , , , , ,

Tom Latchford, Founder of Raising IT


Tom(In the Middle)

Tom(In the Middle)

Tom Latchford is CEO of Raising IT, which is creating a technology platform to manage personalisation. Raising IT builds websites and online tools for charities to power marketing, fundraising and member management (service users, supporters and staff).

Raising IT is working with organisations such as UNICEF, Dyslexia Action and Children with Leukaemia to decrease costs, raise funds and increase efficiency.

Tom was an E-Media Consultant at charity consultancy Action Planning a position he took after graduatiing from oxford, and since starting Raising IT has won a number of awards for its success including WorldSkills Entrepreneur of the Year 2009.

Posted in Start-UpsComments (0)








  • Popular
  • Latest
  • Comments
  • Tags
  • Subscribe

Archives

Join the YHP community

Subscribe via RSS

Categories

YHP Calender

May 2012
M T W T F S S
« Apr    
 123456
78910111213
14151617181920
21222324252627
28293031