Future of software is the future of the world
Sri Lanka has some ‘dope’ software developers with major common denominators, but all the stakeholders can and need to do more, says Sanjiva Weerawarana, Founder, Chairman and Chief Architect, WSO2 Lt. Col., IT Advisor, Sri Lanka Army.
Sanjiva Weerawarana, Founder/Chairman - WSO2 speaking at the memorial lecture. Pic by Indika Handuwala
Delivering the IESL Ray Wijeyawardena memorial lecture titled ‘Nobody to Leader: Achieving Global Leadership with Software’ in Colombo last week, he said that what is common about firms such as Creately, 4Axis Solutions, Paraqum Technologies, AdroitLogic and his own firm WSO2 is passion, passion and passion about the ‘problem’. “All these have a ‘zero’ concept of local or regional market, they have razor focus on quality, they want to win the market and not be a ‘player’, they have the energy to keep going despite challenges and the belief that we are not ‘second class’.
Software company Creately has two million users in 190 countries and its largest markets are the US, UK, Germany and India, he added. “It’s profitable and growing in the last five years and it’s 100 per cent made in Sri Lanka with a team of 20 people and zero direct sales. It’s registered in Australia and raised US$300,000.”
He added that 4Axis Solutions has 13 million downloads of Drawing Desk which is a casual drawing product, has a 10,000 downloads a day and is the top rated app for iPad in US/UK stores. “It started in 2012 as third year students at University of Moratuwa IT faculty and now has 14 people. It started without funding and is profitable,” he said noting that the company is registered in Singapore.
Paraqum Technologies has hardware programmed in software and started in 2013 to promote electronic product development, Mr. Weerawarana said adding that it has world class performance hardware for HEVC and DPI. “It has 30 engineers again no funding and is registered in Sri Lanka.”
AdroitLogic is an enterprise middleware firm, is profitable with no investment taken, has customers including Walmart, SGX and Kuoni and has 26 people.
Explaining his firm WSO2 Mr. Weerawarana said it has 400 enterprise customers in 31 countries, nine in Sri Lanka has 485 full time employees (448 in Sri Lanka), all product design, development and innovation is from Sri Lanka, it raised $40 million plus and is about to be profitable and is registered in the US.
Mr. Weerawarana stressed that software is global, not local. “Selling by information asymmetry is over, selling globally doesn’t require physical presence, ‘local’ cannot be protected with barriers (unless you manage access to the global Internet such as in China) and there’re no barriers to entry for anyone to any market,” he said noting that the regional concept is meaningless.
Software is eating the world, he said noting that it allows anyone anywhere to compete and that some such as firms mentioned before are doing it already. “Entrepreneurs refuse to let things be and making excuses is inexcusable,” he added.
99 problems
Life is full of problems, he said stressing that the question is, ‘what do you do with them?’ Either one can complain, ignore, do something about them, he added. “Learn to see problems. Note them when you experience them. Observe others experiencing them. Predict problems that will come in the future because of some other change.” In doing something about these issues, he said you need to have tools – knowledge and continuous education. “Not just about (or even) formal education,” he said noting that landing a rocket back vertically is hard, but not that hard if you know the science of it. He urged to focus on ‘entrepreneurship education’, ‘ideation’ etc.
“Trying to replicate Mark Zuckerberg is foolish because the next one will happen without your (or my) help.”
So, what does it take to solve hard problems? Its knowledge and experience along with being young and foolish, according to Mr. Weerawarana.
“Your entrepreneurial age is not how long you’ve lived.”
To consumers he advised that no one causes Creately or 4Axis because it’s made in Sri Lanka. So, demand the best, don’t accept second class because it’s local, he noted stressing to push local to be the best.
To enterprises he advised to give the new guy a chance. “Don’t require big revenues before you trust a local business – use your judgement. Buy based on current needs not RFPs.”
Using a quote from a local company to WSO2 some years ago, he said ‘your product was fine but the other one had more buttons,’ eliciting laughter.
“Don’t discriminate against local business. Leave your ego at the door,” he said. He called for policy consistency saying slapping the annual revision to national tax policy as an utter joke. He said that authorities need to make it easier to do business and took a dig at labour policies saying that intellectual creative workers need to be easily hired and fired. Now local rules don’t allow it. Establishing reasonable and ‘non-discriminatory corruption’ was something Mr. Weerawarana advocated.
To entrepreneurs, he advocated that they should stop making excuses, or stop calling themselves as entrepreneurs. Think big, and then think bigger. Think global domination, market leader. Share your opportunity with your team. He said that in this respect 30 per cent of WSO2 is owned by employees. To industry he said to stop focusing on $1 billion, $2 billion or $5 billion revenue. “It only applies to selling people, ‘services’. Stop focusing on ‘the number of people employed in IT’, he said noting that as a percentage Sri Lankans are in IT more than India even now. Software companies generate value massively disproportional to revenue, he said. He advocated celebrating failure.
“Learn from Israel, not India. Software opportunity is real and it’s massive. People numbers don’t matter; tiny Sri Lanka can take on the world and it’s already doing a tiny teeny bit.”
He said there is a need to have one intrinsic advantage. Young (20-something) people are willing to sacrifice weekends to learn, but need to learn to solve problems, not just be accountants, managers, marketers or lawyers.
The best piece of advice Mr. Weerawarana gave which most don’t propagate was the need to remember that Advanced Levels is not the make-or-break in life.