From a product startup to a software business
Founder responsibility, up to 10 direct reports and a reusable platform serving paying clients.
The starting point
I founded Smotion in June 2020 and personally designed and developed shlang, a language-learning app based on books and films. I tried to turn it into a paid product, but monetization did not succeed.
The decision
I retained the team and shifted the business to outsourced software development. That meant finding clients, negotiating scope and pricing, and taking responsibility for delivery and commercial risk.
My responsibility
I own the company and conduct all client negotiations. I lead hiring, product direction, architecture and delivery, and have managed up to 10 direct reports. The business has approximately US$200,000 in annual revenue. Revenue describes company scale, not profit or an engineering spending budget.
Products and client delivery
Our work includes PECOM, Tvelly, WeCharge and Gynto Club. I personally contributed to PECOM’s native mobile applications and the Go backend for WeCharge.
Clubium provides branded community applications on a shared Flutter, Node.js, TypeScript and MongoDB platform. It has three paying clients. Client applications launch in 2-10 days on the existing platform.
Result and measurement
Across client applications, Clubium has reached more than 10,000 users cumulatively over three years. This is a lifetime figure, not monthly or daily active users. The revenue and product figures are founder-reported as of October 2026.
Leadership perspective
The change of business model preserved the team after the initial product failed to monetize. Running the company ties technical choices directly to client commitments, delivery capacity and commercial consequences.