WEBVTT
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This is the startup Still Say podcast. Thank you for
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tuning in and do us a favor like.
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This brime on YouTube, LinkedIn and be sure to give
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us your feedback.
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Hope you enjoyed this episode.
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Hello everyone, thanks for joining us today. I'm Anthony Prakash,
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your host has always on startups they'll say. I'm delighted
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to be joined today by Dennis Yakomenko, who's joining us
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from Toronto, Canada, and he is the CEO and the
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chief brains behind Faster than Light. Dennis and I had
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our initial conversation of all places on LinkedIn. You know,
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we had a couple of chats about what each other
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is doing. I've found what Dennis is doing with Faster
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than Light super interesting. You know how he started off
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his journey as a software engineer coming straight out of school,
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and today he's selping a number of startups and a
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number of enterprises launch their product through Faster than Light.
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And I hope you all get to learn what Dennis
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is doing and what his team is doing and get
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inspired what Dennis.
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Welcome to the show.
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Yep, thank you very much. Thank you for inviting. A
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bit nervous, but excited.
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I should be the one nervous Dennis. I mean, you've
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done a lot in your young career, so why didn't
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we start with that, you know, just tell us.
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About your journey. You went to school in Kiev.
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It looks like you went back to back with your
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bachelors and masters as well.
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Right, yeah, yeah, it's very common in Ukraine, place or
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grown that you're doing your bachelor degree and basically right
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away you're starting your master degree, which I found a
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bit confusing. I would rather do a pause. But when
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you're young and you basically do understand what you're going
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to do in this life, you have a straightforward for
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watch is that most of your students, your friends are following,
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so you're just following with them and you just getting
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your master's degree. Yeah, that's what happened to me as well.
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So was there a reason you chose software engineering or
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just computer science if you will, as your prefer choice
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to do masters as well?
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Actually, programming one was always one of my favorite subjects
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back at school. I remember like those early days when
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like just laptops came up and I was lucky enough
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to have one at home back then, you know, or
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like simple games, simple stuff, but still I always kind
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of was inspired that it's something that is always on
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the age of technologies. Everybody is talking about it, so
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it was something that was driving me all the time.
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I wasn't sure what I wanted to do in my life,
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as probably most of people back then when you were
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a team, I just wanted to learn more and get
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some experience and obviously earn some money because if you're
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a work afterward, you would expect this work to be
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well paid. So yeah, that's how I've got my first
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job as a developer right after I finished my university,
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and I've got some new skills. I've understood, okay, how
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startups are working a bit because we also work on
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a few startups backs then. And that job brought me
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some money and opportunity to create cool things that I've
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joined a lot. And then ago I've started learning how
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this business is built it in general, and I have
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got a lot of aha moments. And then I got
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a very nice moment in my life my son.
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When was that my son?
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A bird that was twenty sixteen. The birst of my
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son pushed me to basically grow and take more responsibility
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and create something that would allow me to earn more
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money and do something to make sure that he has
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also a happy life. And that's how basically started my
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own company. It was super risky, but yeah, worked out
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and I'm really happy about it. So now I have
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two babies I really like in my life. That's why
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my son was burned in April twenty sixteen and the
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company was started in May and sixteen.
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Wow, back to back.
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That must have been super super heavy to deal with.
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So let's I mean, this is the sort of a
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business podcast. I know, who's more precious for you there
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among the two babies, But let's talk about Faster than
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Light here. So you did mention it was a risky move, right,
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But I mean I'm sure you gave it a lot
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of thought prior to saying, okay, this is the way
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to go.
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This is the future I want for me and my family.
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And of course you had that background as the software developer, right,
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I mean, which is your passion as well that you said,
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So how did you kind of I went a niche
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to say, okay, this is what I want do through
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Faster than Light. Because truth to be told, I mean,
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there were so many people out there who could say,
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you know what, let's do software development. But what was
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your vision behind Faster than Light and what is that
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space that you saw to say, Okay, this is the
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space I'm going to go after and help these sort
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of people.
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That's a very good question. First of all, when I've
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started it, I wasn't sure about it, and obviously a
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social expected answers that I would say, yeah, I had
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the vision, you know, I wanted to I knew that
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I'm going to nail it, But in fact I was
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a super risky and I was like, Okay, let's give
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it to try and let's see if I'm going to
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open the champagne afterwards. So that was a mood. But
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the reason why I decided to risk and why I
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saw an opportunity is all about people. So I understood
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that in this business, it's still a lot of opportunities,
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even though there are a lot of people, like you mentioned,
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a lot of companies that are doing their job, and
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some of them are doing it better, some of them force.
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But I saw that actually when I work, especially with startups,
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they are really value people. They actually don't really care
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about a company names, they don't really care about you're
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going to work on mark or windows. They they don't
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care about all of this stuff that seems like a
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vailable They really care about people that they're working with.
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So those people who are willing to go extra mile,
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who are you know, like willing to raise the hand
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and say, hey, sorry, you're doing things wrong and I
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can help you to do things right that would save
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you time and money. You know, let me do my job,
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and not just quietly sitting somewhere on a zoom and saying, yeah,
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no problem, we're going to do that. Yeah, I understood
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that those people are really vailable, and they're rare. So
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basically it's also not about you know, like technical knowledge.
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It's more about this kind of step in people that
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are not afraid, that are trying to actually act like
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owners in a company, even those like we're obviously a
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service company. That's a sweet niche that always going to
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be needed. It doesn't matter how many companies you have.
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Those companies that can provide such a service is always
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going to be on top. It doesn't matter actually it
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or not. You can hire a plumber, but if that
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guy going to be you know, like a guy who
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really willing you to help, who is not looking why
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it can be done. But what can be done to
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make it happen. Those type of personalities. Basically, that's what
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we're trying to build in my company. That's why I decided, Okay,
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either I need to find one of those in the market,
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either I need to create one. So I decided to
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go with second approach.
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Yeah, creation is much more number one fancier. Obviously it's
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gonna bumpy, right than. I'm sure you've seen your ups
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and downs in your career.
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We'll get to that. But what sort of what of
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what sort of clients did you decide to go after? They?
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So you did say startups, and you know they don't
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there's just care about the quality of people and whom
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they work with. But when you took the risk, you
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should have also had sort of an idea to say,
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here are the type of companies and I'm going to
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knock knock on their doors and see how I can
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help them out.
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Okay, So as for me, I would say, I'm really
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good with working with the same the same type of people.
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Who is more looking for delivery, who is more looking
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for results, who is looking for for.
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A backup, not for a guy.
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Outcome, Yeah, yeah, exactly, outcome, Not for those who are
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trying to micromanagement, not for those who are just looking
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for another few guys in their multi building industries'y let's
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say yeah, okay, actually doesn't matter if it's like two
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more or twenty more. I don't care. I just need,
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you know, like some server to be up and running,
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and I have like a limited amount of money, so
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I actually don't care. So even though we had some
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experience with like really big companies that I cannot mention
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that they are super famous, you definitely know it or
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you have their equipment your home, we still prefer to
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work with startups. We call it a bit of coboy
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development because we know their mentality. I know their mentality,
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and they also looking for such a type of developers
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who can deliver stuff quickly with quality, can understand okay,
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what needs to be done that's not And those type
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of clients they're usually startup owners either startup owners either
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they already have a business, but they still have this
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kind of nice men say yeah, so they didn't forget
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yet how to to run a business with joy, not
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with you know, like multiple layers of managers. Those like
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middle management usually don't really care about the business. They
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care about the stocks, they care about their insurance, and yeah,
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they don't have this execution power. So usually you have
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this on top sea level founders, co founders and bottom level.
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Usually how it's like could be surprised, but usually that's
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how it works those and if you are able to
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shorten the distance, so if those who are actually execute,
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those who are actually influenced on what's going to be delivered,
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can talk directly to those who is also interesting in
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a successful business, then you've got the best possible without
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out from my experience, and usually such a short distance
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happened only in startups because if you're talking about bigger clients,
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they have, like I said, multiple layers of managers, which
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is fine, of course it cannot avoid it.
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But a lot of bureaucracy as well.
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You know, yes, a lot of a lot of stuff
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is struggling because you simply cannot understand what business actually
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needs and you can exactly less possible results unless like
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middle management is actually also really wants to move it forward. Usually, unfortunately,
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from my experience, again that's not a case.
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Yeah, yeah, So in other words, I mean, just to
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summarize what you said, I mean, you need the right
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DNA of people sitting across the table on the clients
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or the right mindset with whom you can operate I mean, otherwise,
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I mean it's not only going to hurt them, hurt
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you because I mean that's not the type of work
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you want. And the quality is compromised as well, you know,
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if they are micromanaging and you can't build great products.
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I mean, you know.
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So that's that's one thing I've seen as well, because
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you're so focused on sticking to what you think is right,
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whether than what the customer wants. So either the project
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is delayed big time, overspent all of that good stuff
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versus focusing on delivering a world class experience or putting
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together a world class product.
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If you exactly exactly, you've got it. So basically that's
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a loose loose for everyone. That's loose for us. Also clients,
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you know, they're unhappy with this, with what happening, so
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it's loose for them because they're not getting what they
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wanted to have. So yeah, it's always about finding right
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people from both proth sites, right mindset and client site,
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and right mindset on our side with people going to
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execute it, who actually going to work on the project.
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So with your journey so far, it's almost going to
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be ten years very so since you start the next year,
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would be a nice time to open another bottle of champagne. That's,
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like you said, probably many many bottles of champagne for
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you and your team. How I mean where are you
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right now? I mean compared to where you started off
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to where FDL is right now? Can you paint a
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picture of what are the things you.
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Guys do you know? Whereas your role, do you.
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Have teams located? And what sort of work are you
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guys executing.
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That's a tough question because there are a lot of
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sub questions inside.
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I mean to what would extent you want to share?
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Go ahead, yeah the word.
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So as for the faster than Light, I must say
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I'm happy with where we are. And when I started
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this company almost ten years ago, I didn't expect that
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we're going to have COVID that you know, like hits
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the whole industry and we bags and had a lot
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of projects in entertainment industry and that was a big hit.
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Then since I used to be based in Ukraine, we
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got a war which also affected us a lot. Nowadays,
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I would say I'm happy where we are. We are
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not that big company that I want it to be,
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but still we are focused on what we can do best,
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basically delivered to our clients. We are gaining more clients
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even those nowadays, all this startup industry kind of shrinking
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a bit, and a lot of a competition on the
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market more than ever. A lot of you know, like
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the eye tools that a lot of startup owners believe that,
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why do anyed developers come on? I can write everything
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with g I too, and at some point it is
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right if you need a lending good to go just
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within it tool and a lot of tools on the
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market that you can use. We're in small budgets probably
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cost of a lunch. You can build yourself a website,
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but if you're talking about real developments, you still need
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proper developers. I'm happy with the people that they're working
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with me since I'm working with developers. And again it's
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a very competitive market, not only for us as agencies,
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but also for developers because they can basically work for
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any company in the world. Yeah, you know, like you're
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gonna just change your browser. Here you go. Now you're
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working for Microsoft, you know, like aut it up and
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now you're working for I don't know any Nvidia, doesn't
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matter where it's headwater anymore. It's also important to have
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right people that kind of work with you and they're
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gonna believe in you and me a SESS owner really
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trust them and believe in them.
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So I'm really.
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Happy that we've builded the trust the people that are
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working with me. They're dedicated, they're willing to you know,
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deliver those results, they're willing to grow, and I'm happy
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where we are. So that's you know, like it's nice
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about the company. Yeah, as for the people itself, Like
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I said before, we had the headquarter in Kiev, and
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back then on those times where there were dinosaurs on
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the streets before COVID, people were visiting offices. Nowadays it's
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all like a gun and they all around the world.
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They could be in Poland, it could be in Estonia,
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as they could be you know, in Brazil. It doesn't
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matter anymore. And I see also in a company, since
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we were working worldwide with different time zones. That's one
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of the questions from customers from clients, they are always curious, Okay,
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how you're going to work with London Australia. I don't
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know New York, and it's actually it doesn't matter. It's
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also not a problem anymore because people spread all around
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the world, and yeah, that's also quite an interesting challenge
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nowadays to keep them happy, to keep them working as
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a team, and say all remote yeah don't work anymore.
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So you gathered them in one place and you've kind
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of created a life wife. So it's extra challenge, but
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it's nice to have it, honestly. So I'm happy where
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we are. But yeah, I hope I answered your question.
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You did. You did?
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Yeah, I mean, you know, being being a founder, being
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a CEO, especially where you've come from, taking a big risk,
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especially after your son was born. I mean, it's not
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many people can do it, so you know, kudos to
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you for doing that. I'm very happy that it's successful
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and you are happy where you are. So having said that,
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I want to switch gears a little bit. I mean,
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we spoke about faster than light so far, but I
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mean I would like to learn a little bit more
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Dennis as a person, right, I mean you obviously started
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off as a software guy who likes you a right code.
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I mean, I know you do a lot of pet
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projects on your own as well. Yeah, so, how has
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this journey changed you as a person, because I mean,
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right now you're not just thinking about yourself, You're not
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thinking about your family and thinking about many people in
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the company as well their lives too, Right, So, how
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would you say you've kind of grown as a person
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lessons that you've learned in your journey as a CEO?
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Nis, That's an interesting question. Well, I must say I've
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changed a lot. Some of main things are still there,
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others changed a lot. After so many books about management,
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after so many people that worked in a company. Remember
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first time I was needed to actually fire a person
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that was so stressful, I've called to my mentor, like
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my previous manager, and asked him, okay, any advices, what
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you would suggest me to do? He said like, yeah,
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don't try to humiliate, don't humiliate yourself, be yourself.
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It's okay.
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Yeah, And what happened, you know, like no emotions and
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all those advices, and I was like, okay, so so
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so much things I need to keep in mind. And nowadays,
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you know, as any person who are just working and
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working for my project, for my companies, there are no
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day offs, no sicklyfs. Even though you can put a
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day off in your calendar. Clients don't care. Actually people
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even though they respected, things are happening and you still
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need to be in touch. The change a lot the
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way of how you're thinking. That change a lot of
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how you basically live your life. All those books about
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work life balance also you know, like I've read so
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many of them, and it's still an interesting journey by yourself.
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I'm happy where I am again. I learned a lot.
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My technical background helps me to find the sweet niche
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of knowing. I would say developers language, because for me
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it's super easy. I understand, but they're talking about what
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they're facing is and even those I haven't wrote any
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line of code for a couple of years already, Unfortunately,
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because I like it a lot, I still can talk
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to them their language. But over the years I've also
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learned business language, what business actually needs because business don't
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care about I don't know where you're going to deploy it,
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what struggles you're having. Their business just need like we're
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a simple language. Usually answer how much a part? Yeah, yeah,
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when it's going to be done, when I can have
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it to my investors and it's exactly nice. That's changed
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me a lot because now I learn how to be
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you know, like structor to talk to business, how to
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be kind of in the sweet switch, sport out transitives
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and make those bose really great worlds work together and
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always does that affects my life because even when I'm
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talking to my parents, I kind of have this switch.
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But I'm trying to be very well organized. I'm trying
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to be you know, like very structured with I don't know,
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to do least and everything. It doesn't work in real
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life unfortunately, Yeah.
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Because I mean a lot of people say, oh, you've
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got to compartmentalize your life, you know, you don't, don't
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let work come into your personal life and yc versa.
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But I mean, you know, as humans, it is very
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natural for it to crisscross and both impact you know,
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both lives in a good way and a bad way. Right,
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But I mean it's it's but it's totally up to
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the individual to figure out what works best for them.
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What works for you may not work for me, and
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yc versa. Right, But back to your point on you know,
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you were saying you speak the business language as well
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from a developer language.
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I mean I look at it as you're wearing so
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many different hats right now.
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You know, when you're a CEE wearing a CEO hat,
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you also have to play a hr person's hat at times,
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like you said, you have to fire somebody from the company.
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You also have to be an investor sort of a
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hat if Andy b right. I mean, you know all
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of those plus when you go home, you got to
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play that, you got to play a partner whatever it is, right,
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So so many things that we got to look through.
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Yeah, that's true, that's absolutely true. But I would say
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that it happened to a lot of us each personality.
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Even though you're not a CEO or older or an investor,
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you might have less responsibility, that's true. But wearing those
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different hats, yeah, it's still still a thing for everyone.
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It just matter if you understand all those heads or not,
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or if it's like a surprise for you that you
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actually wearing different hats, and then you kind of should
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be a bit differently because I cannot behave the same
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as I'm doing as a CEO with my son. It
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just simply doesn't work like this because.
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Kids, actually the CEO of you, you're.
399
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Not exactly, exactly exactly, and a lot of people, you know,
400
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like they have this kind of assumption. I would say that, Okay,
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if you're a startup owner or a CEO, you finally
402
00:23:26.400 --> 00:23:30.920
reach this sweet spot where you boss for yourself. You're
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the only boss. Nobody can tell you what to do
404
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and how to behave and how to you know, like
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live your life. But that's not true because the truth is,
406
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if you would have, for example, your kids, they would
407
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really influence on your life a lot in multiple ways.
408
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Your wife, even your cats can influence in your life.
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Because that's the guy doesn't care if you're a CEO
410
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or not, if you have a very important meaning or that,
411
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He's still going to do his job. So it's the
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same with with clients. For them, I'm not a boss,
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I'm also listening to them. I'm also listening my employees
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what they're telling, what is important for them, and trying
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to listen to them and trying to I just my
416
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behavior not to be I don't know if it's possible
417
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to say bad words in this podcast, but I think
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you've got what I mean.
419
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Oh yeah, totally understand. So then if you didn't say
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you read quite a bit in this conversation, right, I
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mean you read a lot of books. You also mentioned
422
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that you have mentors whom you reach out to in
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case you run into a tough situation or whatnot, to
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get advice through this journey. I mean, who's been your inspiration?
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Do you have any people you look up to to say, oh,
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I want to be like that person. I mean, arala,
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I want to follow that person's footsteps. If you will
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away that it's in the business world.
429
00:24:57.759 --> 00:25:01.240
You're really good in asking questions, really good, that's a
430
00:25:01.279 --> 00:25:04.319
good question. At the beginning of my journey, I thought,
431
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and I had also this kind of assumption that over
432
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there some supermans. You know, you can take anyone like
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Mask or Jeff Bezards, whatever, like famous figures or not.
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They could be from any industries. That could be I
435
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don't know, some famous actor. You would say, yeah, Tom Cruise,
436
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is he a genius because he has so many licenses,
437
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he's doing everything by himself. But then slowly you're realizing,
438
00:25:28.279 --> 00:25:31.079
like at least in my case, I realized that there
439
00:25:31.079 --> 00:25:36.279
are no supermans in this life. Each person has actually
440
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real life, some struggles in their life. They could be divorced,
441
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they could have bad relationships with all the friends, and
442
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they could be really selfish even though they are genius.
443
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So what I found inspiring for me is that I
444
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can take some good parts of different people and follow
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only those particular parts. There are no one person that I
446
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would say, yeah, he's or she's.
447
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My old money, yeah, and.
448
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I would I would like to be like this person.
449
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So sometimes it could be even not a real person.
450
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It could be somebody from books, but I just see
451
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some you know, like characteristics. I see some yeah, exactly,
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I see interesting things of how they handle some problems.
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Even though you know it's not real real person, I
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still kind of try to get this feeling of how
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they provence situation, how they tried to find a solution
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and kind of accept to my life and trying to
457
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build myself because I like this approach, because I like
458
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how they spiritful conflict. Yeah. Yeah, it's kind of Frankenstein
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from from different.
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I love that.
461
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Yeah, I mean it's so genuine because I mean, you're
462
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absolutely right. I mean you can't model yourself. I mean
463
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it's it's not like you know, they're a saying or something, right,
464
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I mean they do everything well and they are great.
465
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That are a genius.
466
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I mean, you know, you can get inspiration, like you said,
467
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even from your cat, right, so making it your own
468
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and you know, just looking up to all those good
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habits of people is a good way to go and
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it's a it's a nice way to think about, you know,
471
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how you inspire yourself.
472
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So thanks for sharing that.
473
00:27:21.880 --> 00:27:24.599
So back to STL itself, Dennis, how did you guys
474
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come up with a name?
475
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Who came up with the name?
476
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I expected this question. Actually we started it with my
477
00:27:29.720 --> 00:27:33.720
good friend and he came up with the name because
478
00:27:33.759 --> 00:27:37.319
of a video game. Back then he played a video game,
479
00:27:37.640 --> 00:27:41.640
and even those I would wish to say that. Yeah,
480
00:27:41.759 --> 00:27:45.519
we had a long journey and we tried to figure
481
00:27:45.519 --> 00:27:47.440
out how it's going to be called. But at the
482
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end it doesn't really matter. It's more matter what you're
483
00:27:50.759 --> 00:27:53.200
going to put behind the name. What what are going
484
00:27:53.200 --> 00:27:54.000
to be the people no.
485
00:27:55.039 --> 00:27:55.559
To be told.
486
00:27:55.599 --> 00:27:57.200
I mean when I spoke to you a couple of
487
00:27:57.240 --> 00:28:00.759
times and I saw the name, it's number one catchy,
488
00:28:00.799 --> 00:28:04.279
which is important for any number two is at least
489
00:28:04.440 --> 00:28:06.759
from my perspective, I try to connect the dots to
490
00:28:07.200 --> 00:28:09.920
what FDL ment and what it means to your customers.
491
00:28:10.039 --> 00:28:12.039
I mean, the customers you're working with, at least a
492
00:28:12.119 --> 00:28:14.880
majority of them, that's how they want stuff down the
493
00:28:14.880 --> 00:28:15.799
board as well.
494
00:28:15.839 --> 00:28:19.440
Right, I mean, whether it's building a product that.
495
00:28:19.559 --> 00:28:23.119
Was not you know, like just a nice name, kind
496
00:28:23.160 --> 00:28:26.920
of tasted it, so you know, you kind of tasted. Okay,
497
00:28:27.119 --> 00:28:30.759
do I want to work in Faster than Light? If
498
00:28:30.839 --> 00:28:33.079
that's the name that I really want to work with,
499
00:28:33.200 --> 00:28:36.680
And you're like, yeah, that sounds great. And actually internally
500
00:28:38.119 --> 00:28:41.599
we often use you know, like a short name, which
501
00:28:41.640 --> 00:28:45.680
is FTL, and then we've came up with another another
502
00:28:45.839 --> 00:28:51.200
naming is the Limits because same letters. But again also
503
00:28:51.240 --> 00:28:54.119
really much our vipe of what we are doing. But
504
00:28:54.160 --> 00:28:59.119
obviously you cannot call your company exists the internal internal
505
00:28:59.200 --> 00:29:03.000
name for all the work that we are doing. I
506
00:29:03.079 --> 00:29:08.000
really hate all those limits and all those saying Okay,
507
00:29:08.079 --> 00:29:11.839
it's impossible to achieve, it's impossible to deliver. It's my way,
508
00:29:12.200 --> 00:29:14.759
you know, like two small deadlines, whatever it is. So
509
00:29:14.799 --> 00:29:18.599
that's why I'm trying to teach Mike folks. You know, like, guys,
510
00:29:18.759 --> 00:29:21.079
do you remember the company names? They're like, yeah, yeah,
511
00:29:21.200 --> 00:29:26.039
you know what you're gonna say, that's another internal name.
512
00:29:27.160 --> 00:29:28.279
Nice? I like it.
513
00:29:28.960 --> 00:29:31.799
Yeah, I mean what again, whatever inspires you. I mean,
514
00:29:31.839 --> 00:29:34.200
in this case FTL could stand for many things. Then
515
00:29:34.720 --> 00:29:37.920
it aligns with your story as well. So that's awesome.
516
00:29:37.960 --> 00:29:41.640
So I didn't ask you about if there are people
517
00:29:41.680 --> 00:29:45.680
listening and the other startups, are you know, any other
518
00:29:45.720 --> 00:29:49.400
business for that matter, What sort of technologies do you
519
00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:54.319
support or want to be supporting for the clients, A
520
00:29:54.400 --> 00:29:57.279
list of other like a catalog of things that you
521
00:29:57.319 --> 00:29:58.519
want want to tell people.
522
00:29:58.720 --> 00:30:02.759
That's a good question. We are working with UH with web,
523
00:30:03.079 --> 00:30:06.279
so we well, on our website it says we do
524
00:30:06.440 --> 00:30:10.799
web everything that's working, we basically we're working with that.
525
00:30:11.759 --> 00:30:15.559
Or we do have designers. We do have front end developers,
526
00:30:15.599 --> 00:30:20.039
back end developers, mobile developers, create like all those people
527
00:30:20.160 --> 00:30:23.359
that you might need when you were actually building something.
528
00:30:23.680 --> 00:30:28.279
We have and the technology itself. It's also not that
529
00:30:28.519 --> 00:30:33.240
important nowadays, especially I would say whenever we've started, we've
530
00:30:33.279 --> 00:30:37.759
started with surubun rails and that was top technology for
531
00:30:38.079 --> 00:30:45.079
startups back then, but nowadays everything is growing rapidly Nowadays.
532
00:30:45.119 --> 00:30:47.519
You know you have no JAS, but I don't know
533
00:30:47.680 --> 00:30:53.319
react goal. You have so many statter frameworks that helps you.
534
00:30:53.319 --> 00:30:56.799
You have flatter for example, that was just non existing
535
00:30:56.839 --> 00:31:02.400
back then. Nowadays, everything go so quickly. While we're talking,
536
00:31:02.559 --> 00:31:05.759
you know, a few few frameworks were born and a
537
00:31:05.759 --> 00:31:10.880
few more were dead already. So yeah, technology, I know what.
538
00:31:10.920 --> 00:31:13.599
You mean anymore. Yeah, awesome.
539
00:31:13.680 --> 00:31:15.759
So then there's anything else you would like to share
540
00:31:15.799 --> 00:31:19.799
about yourself or faster than light that I probably didn't
541
00:31:19.839 --> 00:31:22.279
touch on, that you would like to share with the world.
542
00:31:22.799 --> 00:31:28.000
Good question again for the end. It's always important to
543
00:31:28.079 --> 00:31:33.279
say something inspiring. But honestly, I would say we're doing
544
00:31:33.440 --> 00:31:36.680
just great job, proud of what we're doing, but to
545
00:31:36.759 --> 00:31:41.039
be you know, not to create it as a commercial episode.
546
00:31:41.359 --> 00:31:43.960
Just I'm proud of what we're doing, and I appreciated
547
00:31:44.039 --> 00:31:48.240
you for me talk about who we are and what
548
00:31:48.279 --> 00:31:53.359
we're doing. That's that's great. And yeah, no more things
549
00:31:53.400 --> 00:31:57.799
from my side, I would say that I'm really appreciated
550
00:31:57.920 --> 00:31:58.799
for this time.
551
00:31:59.240 --> 00:32:03.319
That's all anytime, Dennis, I mean, your story is very inspiring.
552
00:32:03.599 --> 00:32:05.960
I mean, trust me, not a lot of people will
553
00:32:06.000 --> 00:32:09.240
take the path that you've taken right and come to
554
00:32:09.279 --> 00:32:12.880
a point where you are employing so many people and
555
00:32:13.160 --> 00:32:18.559
pursuing your passion, which was in software, helping startups build products.
556
00:32:18.640 --> 00:32:21.240
And of course you can't mention everything that you've worked on,
557
00:32:21.640 --> 00:32:23.119
but I know for a fact that I mean, some
558
00:32:23.200 --> 00:32:25.480
of them are products that we touch on a daily basis.
559
00:32:25.559 --> 00:32:29.160
So kudos to you and the team and let's keep
560
00:32:29.160 --> 00:32:33.119
in touch. And I hope this episodes are learning for
561
00:32:33.480 --> 00:32:36.400
people who again want to be a founder, take the risk,
562
00:32:36.599 --> 00:32:40.279
jump in, and the results will come. So thanks again, Dennis.
563
00:32:40.480 --> 00:32:54.480
Good talking to you than you
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00:00:00.640 --> 00:00:03.560
This is the startup Still Say podcast. Thank you for
2
00:00:03.600 --> 00:00:05.919
tuning in and do us a favor like.
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00:00:05.919 --> 00:00:08.480
This brime on YouTube, LinkedIn and be sure to give
4
00:00:08.560 --> 00:00:09.240
us your feedback.
5
00:00:09.679 --> 00:00:11.080
Hope you enjoyed this episode.
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00:00:11.960 --> 00:00:15.720
Hello everyone, thanks for joining us today. I'm Anthony Prakash,
7
00:00:15.800 --> 00:00:18.800
your host has always on startups they'll say. I'm delighted
8
00:00:18.839 --> 00:00:22.079
to be joined today by Dennis Yakomenko, who's joining us
9
00:00:22.079 --> 00:00:28.039
from Toronto, Canada, and he is the CEO and the
10
00:00:28.120 --> 00:00:32.119
chief brains behind Faster than Light. Dennis and I had
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our initial conversation of all places on LinkedIn. You know,
12
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we had a couple of chats about what each other
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is doing. I've found what Dennis is doing with Faster
14
00:00:41.960 --> 00:00:45.159
than Light super interesting. You know how he started off
15
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his journey as a software engineer coming straight out of school,
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00:00:49.079 --> 00:00:51.880
and today he's selping a number of startups and a
17
00:00:51.960 --> 00:00:56.000
number of enterprises launch their product through Faster than Light.
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And I hope you all get to learn what Dennis
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00:00:59.759 --> 00:01:01.799
is doing and what his team is doing and get
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inspired what Dennis.
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00:01:03.159 --> 00:01:03.960
Welcome to the show.
22
00:01:04.079 --> 00:01:06.920
Yep, thank you very much. Thank you for inviting. A
23
00:01:06.920 --> 00:01:09.560
bit nervous, but excited.
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I should be the one nervous Dennis. I mean, you've
25
00:01:12.560 --> 00:01:15.280
done a lot in your young career, so why didn't
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we start with that, you know, just tell us.
27
00:01:17.120 --> 00:01:19.480
About your journey. You went to school in Kiev.
28
00:01:20.359 --> 00:01:22.159
It looks like you went back to back with your
29
00:01:22.200 --> 00:01:24.719
bachelors and masters as well.
30
00:01:24.359 --> 00:01:29.040
Right, yeah, yeah, it's very common in Ukraine, place or
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grown that you're doing your bachelor degree and basically right
32
00:01:33.719 --> 00:01:37.359
away you're starting your master degree, which I found a
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bit confusing. I would rather do a pause. But when
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00:01:40.760 --> 00:01:44.640
you're young and you basically do understand what you're going
35
00:01:44.680 --> 00:01:47.560
to do in this life, you have a straightforward for
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00:01:47.719 --> 00:01:51.840
watch is that most of your students, your friends are following,
37
00:01:51.920 --> 00:01:54.519
so you're just following with them and you just getting
38
00:01:54.519 --> 00:01:58.239
your master's degree. Yeah, that's what happened to me as well.
39
00:01:58.319 --> 00:02:02.760
So was there a reason you chose software engineering or
40
00:02:03.000 --> 00:02:05.680
just computer science if you will, as your prefer choice
41
00:02:05.760 --> 00:02:07.480
to do masters as well?
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Actually, programming one was always one of my favorite subjects
43
00:02:13.479 --> 00:02:17.039
back at school. I remember like those early days when
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like just laptops came up and I was lucky enough
45
00:02:20.599 --> 00:02:23.400
to have one at home back then, you know, or
46
00:02:23.599 --> 00:02:28.400
like simple games, simple stuff, but still I always kind
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of was inspired that it's something that is always on
48
00:02:32.759 --> 00:02:35.879
the age of technologies. Everybody is talking about it, so
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it was something that was driving me all the time.
50
00:02:39.840 --> 00:02:42.280
I wasn't sure what I wanted to do in my life,
51
00:02:42.360 --> 00:02:45.719
as probably most of people back then when you were
52
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a team, I just wanted to learn more and get
53
00:02:48.960 --> 00:02:52.479
some experience and obviously earn some money because if you're
54
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a work afterward, you would expect this work to be
55
00:02:56.800 --> 00:03:00.400
well paid. So yeah, that's how I've got my first
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job as a developer right after I finished my university,
57
00:03:04.000 --> 00:03:07.560
and I've got some new skills. I've understood, okay, how
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00:03:07.879 --> 00:03:11.240
startups are working a bit because we also work on
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a few startups backs then. And that job brought me
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some money and opportunity to create cool things that I've
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joined a lot. And then ago I've started learning how
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this business is built it in general, and I have
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got a lot of aha moments. And then I got
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a very nice moment in my life my son.
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When was that my son?
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A bird that was twenty sixteen. The birst of my
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son pushed me to basically grow and take more responsibility
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and create something that would allow me to earn more
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money and do something to make sure that he has
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also a happy life. And that's how basically started my
71
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own company. It was super risky, but yeah, worked out
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and I'm really happy about it. So now I have
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two babies I really like in my life. That's why
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my son was burned in April twenty sixteen and the
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company was started in May and sixteen.
76
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Wow, back to back.
77
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That must have been super super heavy to deal with.
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So let's I mean, this is the sort of a
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business podcast. I know, who's more precious for you there
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00:04:30.720 --> 00:04:34.800
among the two babies, But let's talk about Faster than
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Light here. So you did mention it was a risky move, right,
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00:04:39.000 --> 00:04:41.160
But I mean I'm sure you gave it a lot
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of thought prior to saying, okay, this is the way
84
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to go.
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This is the future I want for me and my family.
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And of course you had that background as the software developer, right,
87
00:04:53.079 --> 00:04:55.399
I mean, which is your passion as well that you said,
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So how did you kind of I went a niche
89
00:04:58.439 --> 00:05:00.600
to say, okay, this is what I want do through
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Faster than Light. Because truth to be told, I mean,
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there were so many people out there who could say,
92
00:05:06.000 --> 00:05:09.279
you know what, let's do software development. But what was
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your vision behind Faster than Light and what is that
94
00:05:13.000 --> 00:05:15.560
space that you saw to say, Okay, this is the
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space I'm going to go after and help these sort
96
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of people.
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00:05:18.480 --> 00:05:21.720
That's a very good question. First of all, when I've
98
00:05:21.759 --> 00:05:25.360
started it, I wasn't sure about it, and obviously a
99
00:05:25.519 --> 00:05:28.480
social expected answers that I would say, yeah, I had
100
00:05:28.560 --> 00:05:31.639
the vision, you know, I wanted to I knew that
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00:05:31.680 --> 00:05:34.360
I'm going to nail it, But in fact I was
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a super risky and I was like, Okay, let's give
103
00:05:37.480 --> 00:05:39.959
it to try and let's see if I'm going to
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open the champagne afterwards. So that was a mood. But
105
00:05:43.199 --> 00:05:46.240
the reason why I decided to risk and why I
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saw an opportunity is all about people. So I understood
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that in this business, it's still a lot of opportunities,
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even though there are a lot of people, like you mentioned,
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a lot of companies that are doing their job, and
110
00:06:01.800 --> 00:06:05.279
some of them are doing it better, some of them force.
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00:06:05.560 --> 00:06:09.879
But I saw that actually when I work, especially with startups,
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they are really value people. They actually don't really care
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about a company names, they don't really care about you're
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going to work on mark or windows. They they don't
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care about all of this stuff that seems like a
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00:06:24.160 --> 00:06:28.319
vailable They really care about people that they're working with.
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00:06:29.120 --> 00:06:33.639
So those people who are willing to go extra mile,
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00:06:33.920 --> 00:06:37.519
who are you know, like willing to raise the hand
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00:06:37.600 --> 00:06:41.120
and say, hey, sorry, you're doing things wrong and I
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00:06:41.199 --> 00:06:43.519
can help you to do things right that would save
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00:06:43.600 --> 00:06:47.000
you time and money. You know, let me do my job,
122
00:06:47.199 --> 00:06:51.120
and not just quietly sitting somewhere on a zoom and saying, yeah,
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00:06:51.199 --> 00:06:54.040
no problem, we're going to do that. Yeah, I understood
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that those people are really vailable, and they're rare. So
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00:06:57.439 --> 00:07:01.879
basically it's also not about you know, like technical knowledge.
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It's more about this kind of step in people that
127
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are not afraid, that are trying to actually act like
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owners in a company, even those like we're obviously a
129
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service company. That's a sweet niche that always going to
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00:07:18.319 --> 00:07:20.879
be needed. It doesn't matter how many companies you have.
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Those companies that can provide such a service is always
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going to be on top. It doesn't matter actually it
133
00:07:29.279 --> 00:07:32.000
or not. You can hire a plumber, but if that
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00:07:32.120 --> 00:07:34.399
guy going to be you know, like a guy who
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really willing you to help, who is not looking why
136
00:07:38.319 --> 00:07:41.680
it can be done. But what can be done to
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make it happen. Those type of personalities. Basically, that's what
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00:07:46.519 --> 00:07:49.639
we're trying to build in my company. That's why I decided, Okay,
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00:07:49.759 --> 00:07:52.519
either I need to find one of those in the market,
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either I need to create one. So I decided to
141
00:07:55.720 --> 00:07:56.879
go with second approach.
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00:07:57.079 --> 00:08:02.839
Yeah, creation is much more number one fancier. Obviously it's
143
00:08:02.839 --> 00:08:08.399
gonna bumpy, right than. I'm sure you've seen your ups
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00:08:08.399 --> 00:08:10.040
and downs in your career.
145
00:08:10.079 --> 00:08:13.800
We'll get to that. But what sort of what of
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00:08:13.920 --> 00:08:17.759
what sort of clients did you decide to go after? They?
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00:08:17.839 --> 00:08:21.079
So you did say startups, and you know they don't
148
00:08:21.160 --> 00:08:23.920
there's just care about the quality of people and whom
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00:08:23.920 --> 00:08:26.759
they work with. But when you took the risk, you
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00:08:26.759 --> 00:08:29.519
should have also had sort of an idea to say,
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00:08:29.720 --> 00:08:32.360
here are the type of companies and I'm going to
152
00:08:32.440 --> 00:08:35.039
knock knock on their doors and see how I can
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00:08:35.080 --> 00:08:35.679
help them out.
154
00:08:35.799 --> 00:08:41.080
Okay, So as for me, I would say, I'm really
155
00:08:41.120 --> 00:08:44.480
good with working with the same the same type of people.
156
00:08:44.639 --> 00:08:48.240
Who is more looking for delivery, who is more looking
157
00:08:48.279 --> 00:08:50.759
for results, who is looking for for.
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00:08:50.759 --> 00:08:52.159
A backup, not for a guy.
159
00:08:52.240 --> 00:08:57.039
Outcome, Yeah, yeah, exactly, outcome, Not for those who are
160
00:08:57.080 --> 00:09:01.879
trying to micromanagement, not for those who are just looking
161
00:09:01.960 --> 00:09:06.559
for another few guys in their multi building industries'y let's
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say yeah, okay, actually doesn't matter if it's like two
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more or twenty more. I don't care. I just need,
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you know, like some server to be up and running,
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and I have like a limited amount of money, so
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I actually don't care. So even though we had some
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experience with like really big companies that I cannot mention
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that they are super famous, you definitely know it or
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you have their equipment your home, we still prefer to
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work with startups. We call it a bit of coboy
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development because we know their mentality. I know their mentality,
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and they also looking for such a type of developers
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who can deliver stuff quickly with quality, can understand okay,
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what needs to be done that's not And those type
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of clients they're usually startup owners either startup owners either
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they already have a business, but they still have this
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kind of nice men say yeah, so they didn't forget
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yet how to to run a business with joy, not
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with you know, like multiple layers of managers. Those like
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middle management usually don't really care about the business. They
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care about the stocks, they care about their insurance, and yeah,
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they don't have this execution power. So usually you have
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this on top sea level founders, co founders and bottom level.
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Usually how it's like could be surprised, but usually that's
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how it works those and if you are able to
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shorten the distance, so if those who are actually execute,
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those who are actually influenced on what's going to be delivered,
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can talk directly to those who is also interesting in
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a successful business, then you've got the best possible without
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out from my experience, and usually such a short distance
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happened only in startups because if you're talking about bigger clients,
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they have, like I said, multiple layers of managers, which
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is fine, of course it cannot avoid it.
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But a lot of bureaucracy as well.
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You know, yes, a lot of a lot of stuff
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is struggling because you simply cannot understand what business actually
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needs and you can exactly less possible results unless like
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middle management is actually also really wants to move it forward. Usually, unfortunately,
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from my experience, again that's not a case.
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Yeah, yeah, So in other words, I mean, just to
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summarize what you said, I mean, you need the right
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DNA of people sitting across the table on the clients
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or the right mindset with whom you can operate I mean, otherwise,
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I mean it's not only going to hurt them, hurt
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you because I mean that's not the type of work
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you want. And the quality is compromised as well, you know,
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if they are micromanaging and you can't build great products.
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I mean, you know.
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So that's that's one thing I've seen as well, because
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you're so focused on sticking to what you think is right,
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whether than what the customer wants. So either the project
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is delayed big time, overspent all of that good stuff
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versus focusing on delivering a world class experience or putting
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together a world class product.
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If you exactly exactly, you've got it. So basically that's
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a loose loose for everyone. That's loose for us. Also clients,
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you know, they're unhappy with this, with what happening, so
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it's loose for them because they're not getting what they
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wanted to have. So yeah, it's always about finding right
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people from both proth sites, right mindset and client site,
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and right mindset on our side with people going to
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execute it, who actually going to work on the project.
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So with your journey so far, it's almost going to
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be ten years very so since you start the next year,
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would be a nice time to open another bottle of champagne. That's,
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like you said, probably many many bottles of champagne for
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you and your team. How I mean where are you
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right now? I mean compared to where you started off
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to where FDL is right now? Can you paint a
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picture of what are the things you.
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Guys do you know? Whereas your role, do you.
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Have teams located? And what sort of work are you
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guys executing.
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That's a tough question because there are a lot of
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sub questions inside.
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I mean to what would extent you want to share?
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Go ahead, yeah the word.
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So as for the faster than Light, I must say
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I'm happy with where we are. And when I started
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this company almost ten years ago, I didn't expect that
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we're going to have COVID that you know, like hits
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the whole industry and we bags and had a lot
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of projects in entertainment industry and that was a big hit.
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Then since I used to be based in Ukraine, we
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got a war which also affected us a lot. Nowadays,
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I would say I'm happy where we are. We are
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not that big company that I want it to be,
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but still we are focused on what we can do best,
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basically delivered to our clients. We are gaining more clients
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even those nowadays, all this startup industry kind of shrinking
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a bit, and a lot of a competition on the
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market more than ever. A lot of you know, like
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the eye tools that a lot of startup owners believe that,
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why do anyed developers come on? I can write everything
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with g I too, and at some point it is
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right if you need a lending good to go just
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within it tool and a lot of tools on the
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market that you can use. We're in small budgets probably
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cost of a lunch. You can build yourself a website,
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but if you're talking about real developments, you still need
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proper developers. I'm happy with the people that they're working
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with me since I'm working with developers. And again it's
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a very competitive market, not only for us as agencies,
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but also for developers because they can basically work for
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any company in the world. Yeah, you know, like you're
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gonna just change your browser. Here you go. Now you're
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working for Microsoft, you know, like aut it up and
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now you're working for I don't know any Nvidia, doesn't
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matter where it's headwater anymore. It's also important to have
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right people that kind of work with you and they're
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gonna believe in you and me a SESS owner really
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trust them and believe in them.
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So I'm really.
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Happy that we've builded the trust the people that are
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working with me. They're dedicated, they're willing to you know,
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deliver those results, they're willing to grow, and I'm happy
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where we are. So that's you know, like it's nice
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about the company. Yeah, as for the people itself, Like
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I said before, we had the headquarter in Kiev, and
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back then on those times where there were dinosaurs on
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the streets before COVID, people were visiting offices. Nowadays it's
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all like a gun and they all around the world.
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They could be in Poland, it could be in Estonia,
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as they could be you know, in Brazil. It doesn't
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matter anymore. And I see also in a company, since
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we were working worldwide with different time zones. That's one
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of the questions from customers from clients, they are always curious, Okay,
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how you're going to work with London Australia. I don't
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know New York, and it's actually it doesn't matter. It's
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also not a problem anymore because people spread all around
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the world, and yeah, that's also quite an interesting challenge
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nowadays to keep them happy, to keep them working as
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a team, and say all remote yeah don't work anymore.
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So you gathered them in one place and you've kind
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of created a life wife. So it's extra challenge, but
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it's nice to have it, honestly. So I'm happy where
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we are. But yeah, I hope I answered your question.
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You did. You did?
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Yeah, I mean, you know, being being a founder, being
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a CEO, especially where you've come from, taking a big risk,
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especially after your son was born. I mean, it's not
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many people can do it, so you know, kudos to
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you for doing that. I'm very happy that it's successful
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and you are happy where you are. So having said that,
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I want to switch gears a little bit. I mean,
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we spoke about faster than light so far, but I
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mean I would like to learn a little bit more
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Dennis as a person, right, I mean you obviously started
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off as a software guy who likes you a right code.
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I mean, I know you do a lot of pet
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projects on your own as well. Yeah, so, how has
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this journey changed you as a person, because I mean,
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right now you're not just thinking about yourself, You're not
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thinking about your family and thinking about many people in
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the company as well their lives too, Right, So, how
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would you say you've kind of grown as a person
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lessons that you've learned in your journey as a CEO?
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Nis, That's an interesting question. Well, I must say I've
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changed a lot. Some of main things are still there,
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others changed a lot. After so many books about management,
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after so many people that worked in a company. Remember
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first time I was needed to actually fire a person
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that was so stressful, I've called to my mentor, like
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my previous manager, and asked him, okay, any advices, what
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you would suggest me to do? He said like, yeah,
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don't try to humiliate, don't humiliate yourself, be yourself.
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It's okay.
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Yeah, And what happened, you know, like no emotions and
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all those advices, and I was like, okay, so so
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so much things I need to keep in mind. And nowadays,
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you know, as any person who are just working and
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working for my project, for my companies, there are no
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day offs, no sicklyfs. Even though you can put a
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day off in your calendar. Clients don't care. Actually people
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even though they respected, things are happening and you still
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need to be in touch. The change a lot the
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way of how you're thinking. That change a lot of
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how you basically live your life. All those books about
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work life balance also you know, like I've read so
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many of them, and it's still an interesting journey by yourself.
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I'm happy where I am again. I learned a lot.
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My technical background helps me to find the sweet niche
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of knowing. I would say developers language, because for me
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it's super easy. I understand, but they're talking about what
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they're facing is and even those I haven't wrote any
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line of code for a couple of years already, Unfortunately,
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because I like it a lot, I still can talk
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to them their language. But over the years I've also
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learned business language, what business actually needs because business don't
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care about I don't know where you're going to deploy it,
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what struggles you're having. Their business just need like we're
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a simple language. Usually answer how much a part? Yeah, yeah,
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when it's going to be done, when I can have
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it to my investors and it's exactly nice. That's changed
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me a lot because now I learn how to be
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you know, like structor to talk to business, how to
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be kind of in the sweet switch, sport out transitives
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and make those bose really great worlds work together and
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always does that affects my life because even when I'm
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talking to my parents, I kind of have this switch.
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But I'm trying to be very well organized. I'm trying
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to be you know, like very structured with I don't know,
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to do least and everything. It doesn't work in real
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life unfortunately, Yeah.
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Because I mean a lot of people say, oh, you've
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got to compartmentalize your life, you know, you don't, don't
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let work come into your personal life and yc versa.
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But I mean, you know, as humans, it is very
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natural for it to crisscross and both impact you know,
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both lives in a good way and a bad way. Right,
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But I mean it's it's but it's totally up to
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the individual to figure out what works best for them.
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What works for you may not work for me, and
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yc versa. Right, But back to your point on you know,
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you were saying you speak the business language as well
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from a developer language.
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I mean I look at it as you're wearing so
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many different hats right now.
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You know, when you're a CEE wearing a CEO hat,
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you also have to play a hr person's hat at times,
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like you said, you have to fire somebody from the company.
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You also have to be an investor sort of a
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hat if Andy b right. I mean, you know all
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of those plus when you go home, you got to
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play that, you got to play a partner whatever it is, right,
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So so many things that we got to look through.
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Yeah, that's true, that's absolutely true. But I would say
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that it happened to a lot of us each personality.
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Even though you're not a CEO or older or an investor,
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you might have less responsibility, that's true. But wearing those
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different hats, yeah, it's still still a thing for everyone.
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It just matter if you understand all those heads or not,
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or if it's like a surprise for you that you
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actually wearing different hats, and then you kind of should
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be a bit differently because I cannot behave the same
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as I'm doing as a CEO with my son. It
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just simply doesn't work like this because.
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Kids, actually the CEO of you, you're.
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Not exactly, exactly exactly, and a lot of people, you know,
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like they have this kind of assumption. I would say that, Okay,
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if you're a startup owner or a CEO, you finally
402
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reach this sweet spot where you boss for yourself. You're
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the only boss. Nobody can tell you what to do
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and how to behave and how to you know, like
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live your life. But that's not true because the truth is,
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if you would have, for example, your kids, they would
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really influence on your life a lot in multiple ways.
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Your wife, even your cats can influence in your life.
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Because that's the guy doesn't care if you're a CEO
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or not, if you have a very important meaning or that,
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He's still going to do his job. So it's the
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same with with clients. For them, I'm not a boss,
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I'm also listening to them. I'm also listening my employees
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what they're telling, what is important for them, and trying
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to listen to them and trying to I just my
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behavior not to be I don't know if it's possible
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to say bad words in this podcast, but I think
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you've got what I mean.
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Oh yeah, totally understand. So then if you didn't say
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you read quite a bit in this conversation, right, I
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mean you read a lot of books. You also mentioned
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that you have mentors whom you reach out to in
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case you run into a tough situation or whatnot, to
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get advice through this journey. I mean, who's been your inspiration?
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Do you have any people you look up to to say, oh,
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I want to be like that person. I mean, arala,
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I want to follow that person's footsteps. If you will
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away that it's in the business world.
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You're really good in asking questions, really good, that's a
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good question. At the beginning of my journey, I thought,
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and I had also this kind of assumption that over
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there some supermans. You know, you can take anyone like
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Mask or Jeff Bezards, whatever, like famous figures or not.
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They could be from any industries. That could be I
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don't know, some famous actor. You would say, yeah, Tom Cruise,
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is he a genius because he has so many licenses,
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he's doing everything by himself. But then slowly you're realizing,
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like at least in my case, I realized that there
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are no supermans in this life. Each person has actually
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real life, some struggles in their life. They could be divorced,
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they could have bad relationships with all the friends, and
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they could be really selfish even though they are genius.
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So what I found inspiring for me is that I
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can take some good parts of different people and follow
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only those particular parts. There are no one person that I
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would say, yeah, he's or she's.
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My old money, yeah, and.
448
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I would I would like to be like this person.
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So sometimes it could be even not a real person.
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It could be somebody from books, but I just see
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00:26:14.079 --> 00:26:17.759
some you know, like characteristics. I see some yeah, exactly,
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I see interesting things of how they handle some problems.
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Even though you know it's not real real person, I
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still kind of try to get this feeling of how
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they provence situation, how they tried to find a solution
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and kind of accept to my life and trying to
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build myself because I like this approach, because I like
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00:26:40.119 --> 00:26:44.759
how they spiritful conflict. Yeah. Yeah, it's kind of Frankenstein
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from from different.
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I love that.
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Yeah, I mean it's so genuine because I mean, you're
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absolutely right. I mean you can't model yourself. I mean
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it's it's not like you know, they're a saying or something, right,
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I mean they do everything well and they are great.
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That are a genius.
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I mean, you know, you can get inspiration, like you said,
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even from your cat, right, so making it your own
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and you know, just looking up to all those good
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00:27:13.200 --> 00:27:15.880
habits of people is a good way to go and
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it's a it's a nice way to think about, you know,
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how you inspire yourself.
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So thanks for sharing that.
473
00:27:21.880 --> 00:27:24.599
So back to STL itself, Dennis, how did you guys
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come up with a name?
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Who came up with the name?
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00:27:26.519 --> 00:27:29.480
I expected this question. Actually we started it with my
477
00:27:29.720 --> 00:27:33.720
good friend and he came up with the name because
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00:27:33.759 --> 00:27:37.319
of a video game. Back then he played a video game,
479
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and even those I would wish to say that. Yeah,
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00:27:41.759 --> 00:27:45.519
we had a long journey and we tried to figure
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out how it's going to be called. But at the
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end it doesn't really matter. It's more matter what you're
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going to put behind the name. What what are going
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00:27:53.200 --> 00:27:54.000
to be the people no.
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To be told.
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00:27:55.599 --> 00:27:57.200
I mean when I spoke to you a couple of
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00:27:57.240 --> 00:28:00.759
times and I saw the name, it's number one catchy,
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00:28:00.799 --> 00:28:04.279
which is important for any number two is at least
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from my perspective, I try to connect the dots to
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what FDL ment and what it means to your customers.
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00:28:10.039 --> 00:28:12.039
I mean, the customers you're working with, at least a
492
00:28:12.119 --> 00:28:14.880
majority of them, that's how they want stuff down the
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board as well.
494
00:28:15.839 --> 00:28:19.440
Right, I mean, whether it's building a product that.
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Was not you know, like just a nice name, kind
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00:28:23.160 --> 00:28:26.920
of tasted it, so you know, you kind of tasted. Okay,
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00:28:27.119 --> 00:28:30.759
do I want to work in Faster than Light? If
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00:28:30.839 --> 00:28:33.079
that's the name that I really want to work with,
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00:28:33.200 --> 00:28:36.680
And you're like, yeah, that sounds great. And actually internally
500
00:28:38.119 --> 00:28:41.599
we often use you know, like a short name, which
501
00:28:41.640 --> 00:28:45.680
is FTL, and then we've came up with another another
502
00:28:45.839 --> 00:28:51.200
naming is the Limits because same letters. But again also
503
00:28:51.240 --> 00:28:54.119
really much our vipe of what we are doing. But
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00:28:54.160 --> 00:28:59.119
obviously you cannot call your company exists the internal internal
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00:28:59.200 --> 00:29:03.000
name for all the work that we are doing. I
506
00:29:03.079 --> 00:29:08.000
really hate all those limits and all those saying Okay,
507
00:29:08.079 --> 00:29:11.839
it's impossible to achieve, it's impossible to deliver. It's my way,
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00:29:12.200 --> 00:29:14.759
you know, like two small deadlines, whatever it is. So
509
00:29:14.799 --> 00:29:18.599
that's why I'm trying to teach Mike folks. You know, like, guys,
510
00:29:18.759 --> 00:29:21.079
do you remember the company names? They're like, yeah, yeah,
511
00:29:21.200 --> 00:29:26.039
you know what you're gonna say, that's another internal name.
512
00:29:27.160 --> 00:29:28.279
Nice? I like it.
513
00:29:28.960 --> 00:29:31.799
Yeah, I mean what again, whatever inspires you. I mean,
514
00:29:31.839 --> 00:29:34.200
in this case FTL could stand for many things. Then
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00:29:34.720 --> 00:29:37.920
it aligns with your story as well. So that's awesome.
516
00:29:37.960 --> 00:29:41.640
So I didn't ask you about if there are people
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00:29:41.680 --> 00:29:45.680
listening and the other startups, are you know, any other
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00:29:45.720 --> 00:29:49.400
business for that matter, What sort of technologies do you
519
00:29:50.000 --> 00:29:54.319
support or want to be supporting for the clients, A
520
00:29:54.400 --> 00:29:57.279
list of other like a catalog of things that you
521
00:29:57.319 --> 00:29:58.519
want want to tell people.
522
00:29:58.720 --> 00:30:02.759
That's a good question. We are working with UH with web,
523
00:30:03.079 --> 00:30:06.279
so we well, on our website it says we do
524
00:30:06.440 --> 00:30:10.799
web everything that's working, we basically we're working with that.
525
00:30:11.759 --> 00:30:15.559
Or we do have designers. We do have front end developers,
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00:30:15.599 --> 00:30:20.039
back end developers, mobile developers, create like all those people
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00:30:20.160 --> 00:30:23.359
that you might need when you were actually building something.
528
00:30:23.680 --> 00:30:28.279
We have and the technology itself. It's also not that
529
00:30:28.519 --> 00:30:33.240
important nowadays, especially I would say whenever we've started, we've
530
00:30:33.279 --> 00:30:37.759
started with surubun rails and that was top technology for
531
00:30:38.079 --> 00:30:45.079
startups back then, but nowadays everything is growing rapidly Nowadays.
532
00:30:45.119 --> 00:30:47.519
You know you have no JAS, but I don't know
533
00:30:47.680 --> 00:30:53.319
react goal. You have so many statter frameworks that helps you.
534
00:30:53.319 --> 00:30:56.799
You have flatter for example, that was just non existing
535
00:30:56.839 --> 00:31:02.400
back then. Nowadays, everything go so quickly. While we're talking,
536
00:31:02.559 --> 00:31:05.759
you know, a few few frameworks were born and a
537
00:31:05.759 --> 00:31:10.880
few more were dead already. So yeah, technology, I know what.
538
00:31:10.920 --> 00:31:13.599
You mean anymore. Yeah, awesome.
539
00:31:13.680 --> 00:31:15.759
So then there's anything else you would like to share
540
00:31:15.799 --> 00:31:19.799
about yourself or faster than light that I probably didn't
541
00:31:19.839 --> 00:31:22.279
touch on, that you would like to share with the world.
542
00:31:22.799 --> 00:31:28.000
Good question again for the end. It's always important to
543
00:31:28.079 --> 00:31:33.279
say something inspiring. But honestly, I would say we're doing
544
00:31:33.440 --> 00:31:36.680
just great job, proud of what we're doing, but to
545
00:31:36.759 --> 00:31:41.039
be you know, not to create it as a commercial episode.
546
00:31:41.359 --> 00:31:43.960
Just I'm proud of what we're doing, and I appreciated
547
00:31:44.039 --> 00:31:48.240
you for me talk about who we are and what
548
00:31:48.279 --> 00:31:53.359
we're doing. That's that's great. And yeah, no more things
549
00:31:53.400 --> 00:31:57.799
from my side, I would say that I'm really appreciated
550
00:31:57.920 --> 00:31:58.799
for this time.
551
00:31:59.240 --> 00:32:03.319
That's all anytime, Dennis, I mean, your story is very inspiring.
552
00:32:03.599 --> 00:32:05.960
I mean, trust me, not a lot of people will
553
00:32:06.000 --> 00:32:09.240
take the path that you've taken right and come to
554
00:32:09.279 --> 00:32:12.880
a point where you are employing so many people and
555
00:32:13.160 --> 00:32:18.559
pursuing your passion, which was in software, helping startups build products.
556
00:32:18.640 --> 00:32:21.240
And of course you can't mention everything that you've worked on,
557
00:32:21.640 --> 00:32:23.119
but I know for a fact that I mean, some
558
00:32:23.200 --> 00:32:25.480
of them are products that we touch on a daily basis.
559
00:32:25.559 --> 00:32:29.160
So kudos to you and the team and let's keep
560
00:32:29.160 --> 00:32:33.119
in touch. And I hope this episodes are learning for
561
00:32:33.480 --> 00:32:36.400
people who again want to be a founder, take the risk,
562
00:32:36.599 --> 00:32:40.279
jump in, and the results will come. So thanks again, Dennis.
563
00:32:40.480 --> 00:32:54.480
Good talking to you than you
