(Mike Williams, CEO of Springthrough)
Mike Williams the founder and CEO of Springthrough in Grand Rapids said the issue of talent is on the minds of everyone in the West Michigan technology industry.
When the tech bubble burst, he said, technology people started leaving Grand Rapids to find better opportunities on the west coast.
“But there is a resurgence these days, and a lot of it seems to be around the startup community,” he said.
(Chris Ake, co-founder of Grand Apps)
One of those startups is Grand Apps, a company formed by Chris Ake and a partner in late 2011. Ake said they saw a niche opening in mobile marketing for small businesses that could not afford top dollar developers. At the same time, the business owners didn’t want to settle for do-it-yourself app development.
Ake did not have a bit of app development experience. However, since he had worked as a server in the restaurant industry “for years” Ake and his partner started building mobile apps for the restaurant industry.
“We got a couple sales, did a real-life feasibility test and found out it worked.”
Grand Apps had no outside funding. The operation was “100 percent bootstrapped,” Ake said.“It was tough. I was flat broke.”
Money wasn’t all they were short of. Ake freely admits he had no sales experience, no management experience, and no startup experience.
“I had nothing. All I did was serve (in restaurants).”
The drive to survive fueled his passion. Ake was tending bar on the weekends to pay for his attention to Grand Apps Monday through Friday.
“Life is so short, why would you want to do what someone else thinks you should do?” he said.
Read more about Grand Apps.
Read more about Springthrough
This is only the first of several articles I will be writing on Indie Tech Talent I have found in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Have ideas about who or what I should be writing about. Please be the first to let me know via the Contact Me page, or rod@rodkackley.com.
(c) 2014 Lyons Circle Publishing Inc.
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