If you want to know more about our company. I'm happy to share the details. It's not a secret. Here are the details even though it has nothing to do with this thread.
- Company was founded by my self, Hamed, and Behroz. Hamed is my Brother, Behroz is my cousin.
- Since starting we've raised about $300,000.
- There have been roughly 500,000 download of GamePress by 2014, and about 25,000 monthly active users (not insane numbers, but good enough for a niche product)
- In the summer of 2014, we were funded by YCombinator (one of Silicon valleys most competitive investment firms). During that time we started transitioning from GamePress to a more "prosumer" tool targeted towards interactive books. This was called Tappabl.
-We didn't like the direction of Tappabl. It wasn't what we wanted to do from the beginning. So we decided to go back to our roots. We rewrote GamePress from the ground up and relaunched as hyperPad in 2015.
- Biggest mistake: we didn't make hyperPad an update to GamePress and ultimately lost our user base in the transition
- Since 2015 the team has changed. During 2015 the team was 6 people. My self, Behroz, Hamed, and 3 other hired developers (2 Jr programmers, and one sr).
- In 2016 the Jr programmers returned to school, behroz decided to pursue other options (moved to the US, works full time at Amazon, but is still 100% of the hyperPad team, just no longer writes code due to Amazon non compete policies). End of 2016/early 2017 our senior programmer left to work at a start up in silicon valley.
- Also during 2016, we hired some artists to create some custom art work for potential hyperad use.
-2017 we hired 2 jr programmers (only temp). We also hired hired a small marketing firm, but they ended up not working out.
- Currently we have about 5,000 monthly active users. Not a huge number. But it's more more than this forum. The forum and Hub are areas we're trying to get more active. But as of now, not a clear representation of the size of the user base.
- Right now our focus isn't to have a million users. We would much rather have 1000 users who are using the app, providing feedback, collaborating and just building awesome stuff.
Currently the team is just Hamed and I full time, and behroz part time. We've actually just concluded interviews and have hired 2 additional programmers that will be joining us in January.
We never raised additional money because:
-
Raising money is time consuming and makes you lose a lot of focus. When you raise investor money your company and focus changes to build something investors want rather than what users want. We'd rather build something for users.
-
We don't need more money. hyperPad isn't our only source of income (we are working on it full time though!) We're fortunate enough to be able to bootstrap using other funds.
Finally, yes there are bugs and issues. But you need to remember this forum isn't the only way users communicate with us. We get hundreds of emails about questions, bugs, and other feedback. A lot of our time is trying to diagnose these issues and verify if it's a bug we caused, or something wrong with their logic.
When it comes to the forum, it's a bit different since our awesome community can also help out. Often times they try and suggest a solution that will work until the bug is verified and fixed.
If the bugs are getting in the way of your enjoyment of hyperPad. Then I'm truly sorry. We're working hard on fixing. Sometimes we get overwhelmed (especially when there is a really *helpful and vocal user), but we'll be updating our roadmap with the bugs we've verified and the ones we're working on.
Finally... If you're not enjoying hyperPad and it is crashing every time you start it up, or there are too many bugs to make it useful, then you can get a refund. Apple does offer refunds. Contact the Appstore team and they will get you sorted out.
That doesn't mean we want to see you go, but we understand if you need to part ways.
