Bootstrapping from Australia: Emagine CEO Dave Peters (Part 6)

Sramana Mitra: How is the customer base distributed? Are we talking Asian customers? How have you built the sales channel?

Dave Peters: We’ve got 13 telco customers across Australia, Asia, Middle East, and Africa. All of them are paying for recurring software fees and also for our managed marketing operations team. We have teams on the ground plus some centralized remote teams to provide the software and the services for them to run all of their customer value management.

Sramana Mitra: Do you sell direct or through channel partners?

Dave Peters: We do both. We have a partnership, for example, with HP in the Middle East. That has been successful in terms of bringing us new clients. We have partnerships with some of the other marketing consulting firms who want to add a platform to their services as well. To date, three quarters of our sales are still direct and about a quarter through partners. We are in the process of ramping up the partner channels because that’s how the next level of scale can come on the back of where we are at the moment. That’s our focus at the moment—working with partners who have complementary services or complementary platforms to extend our reach.

Sramana Mitra: What else is interesting in your strategic maneuvering of growing this company from 1998 to 2015?

Dave Peters: In terms of lessons for entrepreneurs, I kept educating myself. I did a graduate management course here in Australia. I went to Harvard for the last three years and did a course at Harvard, which was all about entrepreneurs and growing the business. One thing I’ve learned is always keep learning. The other thing is the big change from the first five years to the last 10 years has been about surrounding yourself with people who’ve been there and done that. I sort of wish I had done that right at the start. I went out and did it myself and made a lot of mistakes early on.

I’ve got a Board now who give me advice and guidance. Even though I’ve been doing it now for 15 years, I still think that if you can find somebody who’s five times as big as you are and those guys are willing to give you the benefit of their advice, you’ll learn a lot. If you make one less mistake and it saves you six months, that’s really valuable time. That’s one of the biggest things I’ve learned.

Sramana Mitra: What is your current size? What scale are you operating at now?

Dave Peters: We’re in the $10 million to $20 million range. We’re profitable and growing. We grew 30% in revenue terms. We’re still growing good. One thing I’ve noticed about entrepreneurs in particular is that they think spectacular growth is the norm. What I’ve noticed is if companies grow anywhere from 15% to 20% per annum, after 10 or 15 years, you’ve got a big company. If you can keep that going for the long term, then that’s a very healthy business. The reason why these companies like Facebook and Google get written about is because they’re the exception. As you said before, the unicorns.

Sramana Mitra: No question about that. You’re absolutely right in pointing out that that’s absolutely not the norm.

Dave Peters: I always try to have a level head when I talk to younger guys. I think one thing that I would like to share with entrepreneurs is, if you’re doing a million dollars turnover today and you grow that by 20% per annum, in 15 years, you’ll have a pretty big company. Just be patient and concentrate on your customers. If you want to go for it, just recognize that you might get the reward, but you’re also increasing the risk substantially by funding yourself to go through the roof. It’s probably going to take you 10 years anyway. Be prepared for the long haul and you got to love what you’re doing. I think perseverance is the other key thing.

Sramana Mitra: Terrific. Thank you for your time.

This segment is part 6 in the series : Bootstrapping from Australia: Emagine CEO Dave Peters
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