Software development

[PhillipMarlow]

If you wanted to put together a software development company that you wanted to produce 500K in revenue a year, what would that entail?

What kind of guy would you have manage the operation?
What kind of software would you create? (you don't have to answer that if you don't want to.

I know some of you have been a part of this but I don't know too much about that industry...

Cheers : ) :costumed-smiley-087

 

[tainted]

Big money in security, and no one seems to know what they are doing. I've seen $800k / year software protectors used by the US military with fucking pitiful features and user manuals full of lies, and a $800 / year protector developed by a Spaniard and a Russian that's so fucking effective that not a single antivirus can detect malware wrapped in it. There's plenty of desperate labor out there. Hire some lads in Eastern Europe to put something together for you, resell it in the US as an "enterprise solution" snicker. Or resell pentesting services. Or higher the pen testers, and start an industrial espionage outfit. Some big companies out there spending millions to have someone acquire and reverse engineer their competitor's products. There are so many things you can do. Just remember, the business is shady as fuck. If you don't know what you are doing, you'll get ripped off an fucked by you Eastern European "friends", or sued by your US clients. I've had the FBI pay a visit to me. Now I make money online in a less shady business arena. But yeah, there's a lot of demand out there, coupled with a lot of clueless people. If you play your hand right, you should make a killing. I know some friends who have. Personally, I tried and failed. I find affiliate marketing easier. Good luck, no matter what you do.

 

[justo_tx]

Saying you want to put together a company that does 500K in revenue via software development is kind of like saying you want to put together a company that does 500K in sales a year, you can sell pretty much anything under the sun and you can build software to address pretty much any problem under the sun (thus getting you to your rev goal).

Your best bet (imho) is to identify some problem you've noticed around you and try and build a product or consultancy to address that. I know you've mentioned supply chain/logistics in the past but without being knee deep in that industry you aren't going to be able build a product to address that industry without understanding its problems, context is key. Are you going to trust a new PPC tracker designed by a company that has never run a campaign? So you can either build software addressing an industry you understand, I'm assuming IM, or you can launch a run of the mill consulting company that can query the customer for requirements and spit out a solution regardless of industry, or you can target a market so large you can build something on spec and sell it on its merits (for example a better turn key ecomm platform.)

Concerning picking a manager, that's a crap shoot man. Concerning size for 500K-ish rev, I'd guesstimate 2 devs and 1 designer with the dev manager splitting time between BA duties, coding, and managing.

 

[PhillipMarlow]

Nice! Thanks for the input justo. Yeah, I'm just thinking about things for down the road. We need to grab beers soon

Saying you want to put together a company that does 500K in revenue via software development is kind of like saying you want to put together a company that does 500K in sales a year, you can sell pretty much anything under the sun and you can build software to address pretty much any problem under the sun (thus getting you to your rev goal).

Your best bet (imho) is to identify some problem you've noticed around you and try and build a product or consultancy to address that. I know you've mentioned supply chain/logistics in the past but without being knee deep in that industry you aren't going to be able build a product to address that industry without understanding its problems, context is key. Are you going to trust a new PPC tracker designed by a company that has never run a campaign? So you can either build software addressing an industry you understand, I'm assuming IM, or you can launch a run of the mill consulting company that can query the customer for requirements and spit out a solution regardless of industry, or you can target a market so large you can build something on spec and sell it on its merits (for example a better turn key ecomm platform.)

Concerning picking a manager, that's a crap shoot man. Concerning size for 500K-ish rev, I'd guesstimate 2 devs and 1 designer with the dev manager splitting time between BA duties, coding, and managing.