Sramana Mitra: How many people were on the team at this point when you were going through this? Jonny Nicol: Six months earlier, there were 16 people. I actually let people go before we ran out of money, which was painful. Then there were eight of us. It wasn’t actually the case that they could work
Sramana Mitra: I completely agree with you. Daniel Scandian: The priority is to be profitable and grow. If I don’t reach profitability, it can be very difficult. The company has to remain profitable. We are 230 people right now. We need to add another 200 people in the next two years. Sramana Mitra: What happened to
Sramana Mitra: Do you need to a raise more money or are you planning to now keep growing organically? Daniel Scandian: Now, we are breaking even. Last year, we achieved $65 million in revenue and we plan to reach around $150 million in 2017. We are cash flow positive now. Just now, we are building
Sramana Mitra: Is there a convenient way to get the database of all the private jets’ flights just like an online travel agency for commercial flights can access such a database? Is there an equivalent of that database available somewhere or did you have to create that? Jonny Nicol: I had to build it from
Daniel Scandian: We realized that that process was the same that should work in Brazil. Of course, the software was a little bit different, but the workflow was quite the same. We were lucky for them to open to us. We went to Brazil and started building a software. The Brazilian market is much more
Sramana Mitra: What happens next? Jonny Nicol: I got a one-year work clause where I was still on-call and working, but, in reality, I was not going to work. Instead, I used my pilot license which I got from the military to do some freelance piloting. I had three jobs. I was an air display pilot, air ferry
Sramana Mitra: You were almost like a solo entrepreneur with your brother helping you out. Daniel Scandian: Yes. My brother took care of the company while I looked for investors. Then I had to talk to some investors in Brazil. In 10 months, I had a very nice investor from Brazil and from Argentina. I
Sramana Mitra: I’m interested in success from a financial point of view. What kind of revenues were you able to generate with that company and what happened to it? Jonny Nicol: In the first month, revenues were $100. In month 11, it was $238,000. I actually disagree that you measure the success of a company