I like to write about true stories, so I always search for inspiring and lesser-known stories to bring to my readers. I am going to talk about Suresh Kumar G and George Christopher who started a million-dollar company in south India. Well, we always know about their success, but their struggle is often not seen. And I like to showcase success and also their struggle, which makes a complete inspirational story. MacApp Studio is not only breaking boundaries in the app world but also breaking all stereotypes of a million-dollar company.
Suresh Kumar G and George Christopher are childhood friends who come from humble family backgrounds. Like a normal Indian boy, they also followed the suit, complete their engineering study and work in a US company and live a comfortable life. With all these monotonous lives, both of them had a hobby of creating apps. Even though they worked in different companies at different locations they always had contact and develop applications as their hobby.
As life went by, one day both of them co-developed an app that was a technological solution and uploaded it to the app platform. It had one user who bought it for 5$. This was a turning point for both to realize that their hobby has some value. This provided the necessary push and made them join the intel app developing competition. Both working full times for companies like CISCO, worked part-time to develop the apps, and won the first prize at the competition. All this happened in the months of 2011, consecutively they participated in all upcoming app developing competitions and won prize money collectively to quarter-million dollars.
After winning all these competitions and attaining the highest black belt award from intel, both were invited to Intel to participate in a conference to facilitate their achievements. After interacting with scientists and other fellow developers they realized that they have something the world needs and that is where the idea of MacApp studio was seeded. When other developers took days to create an app, the duo took only 5 days to deliver a quality app. This became their USP, this framework became the very success of the company, delivering a quality app with a record time.
After coming back from the USA, both of them left their job and started to work for their company, it was not a cakewalk for them. There were no takers for their app, and their money was draining rapidly. Now the real struggle came up, the company is not making money nor do they have funds left. All their liabilities became a huge question mark, but they kept working towards their goal. Suresh’s wife Archana and George’s wife Saraha gave the moral and mental support which made them to achieve their goal.
One fine day one of their app which they uploaded on torrents site ranked as the most downloaded app on the network, this attracted an app distributor to approach them for licensing. This was the turning point for MacApp studio and then there was no turning back. Both Suresh and George together run the company taking individual responsibility. Suresh as the designer and George been the developer has made more than 1000 apps for global companies.
It took them 5 years to make the company a value-based app studio, they worked in a bootstrap model and saved each penny to sustain through all odds.
To keep the company from any controlled management they let go of many investment opportunities from angel investors.
They have created some of the best apps like Money Bag, Declutter, and TasksBox.
The duo broke the stereotype of hiring anyone with skills, foregoing all educational background, communication skills, and resume. They hire people based on their individual interests. MacApp studio hires people even if the candidate has not completed the degree. Suresh Kumar G and George have made unique work training modules to convert each individual employee into a productive resource to the company.
This methodology has made the company approachable to many people with skills. Most of the employees are from a humble background earning a corporate salary. This will not only improve the individual life but create a micro-economy in that region. Companies like Zoho and Corporate 360 have proved it already.
By following this hiring methodology, it has created a benchmark in tech-based hiring. MacApp studio offers gold coins and other valuable gifts as appreciation to their employees. As the company is witnessing a YOY growth of more than 140% this is a truly inspiring story of ordinary people with extraordinary missions.
With bigger dreams comes bigger achievement. Suresh and Christopher has launched Pepul, a social media networking site backed by the founders of freshworks and paytm. With this new venture they have proved to be the next big thing in the Indian IT industry creating original products from india.
I hope these stories inspires people to achieve their goal, with preserverance and commitment.
Hi
Very interesting & inspiration story written. I like.