How can we help you? Meet the Geovation Engineering Team

You are about to go on an adventure

Imagine you are on an outdoor adventure in a wild and rugged mountain range. You’re on the plain approaching the mountains through fog, wind and rain. In order to climb the peak you are heading for you have to cross a wide, deep and scary chasm.

There’s no way around this obstacle, the only way to get to your goal is to find a way across it. The chasm is so wide and the fog so thick that you can barely see the other side.

In front of you is a scary-looking bridge that apparently spans the chasm. Next to the bridge is seasoned traveller who greets you in a friendly manner. She asks you how she can help. You tell her that you want to get to the other side of this chasm in order to climb the mountain on the other side. The traveller tells you that the bridge is the only way across.

“Are you sure this is the only way?” you ask. “There may be others”, she says, “but this is the way most people take”. “That bridge looks a little dangerous to me” you tell her. “Well”, she says, “it is quite a tricky bridge to cross. In fact, 9 out of 10 people that try to cross it fall off before they reach the other side. I can give you some advice on how to cross it safely but you’ll have to take the journey by yourself”.

You’re an adventurer and you really want to climb the mountain you see in the distance. The only way to get to it is over this bridge. Do you cross it, knowing that only 1 in 10 people get across safely?

Welcome to the world of the innovation start-up.

We can help

While I may have made it sound a little melodramatic, the fact remains that 9 out of 10 start-ups fail. Actually, the real figure is more like 11 out of 12, but let’s not split hairs.

Working in an early-stage startup can be both lonely and frustrating. It can feel, at times, as though you are wobbling on that bridge above the chasm. You may, for example, need to persuade an investor to put their faith in you before you can actually build your product or service. In order to do that, you may need a proof of concept or a Minimum Viable Product. For that, you need a developer on your team or the cash to hire one. The trouble is that to get the cash you need the investment. It’s Catch 22.

Here at Geovation, we can help with that. We want to maximize your chances to succeed and help where we can. We have a small but talented Engineering Team who have a broad spectrum of knowledge. We can offer you help and advice on how to build your first experiment. We help all Geovation members, not just those on the Geovation Accelerator Programme. If you’re a hub member, we’re here for you too.

Do you want a second opinion about your architecture, tools, team building, product discovery, service design or lean business canvas? The Engineering Team can help with that too. You can reach us via the public Slack channel #ask_to_geovation_eng and book a surgery session.

In addition to advice and surgeries we can provide direct hands-on support such as UX design and review, experiment design and coding. We’re a friendly bunch and we’re here to help you. Don’t feel worried about interrupting. We may not answer immediately but we’ll get back to you just as soon as we can. I’ll say it again:

The Engineering Team is here to help you. Please just ask us.

You can meet the engineering team on demand: Just talk to us. We prefer it if you can coordinate with us on an individual basis as we all have different schedules, but the public Slack channel is a great place to start.

Who are we?

Here’s a little run-down of the team so you know who we are:

Sebastian Ovide (@Seb (Geovation) on Slack): Sebastian started coding when still a kid and has over 20 years of professional experience building software for corporations, SMEs and startups. Sebastian leads the Engineering Team, jumps into the trench to do hands on work when he can and provides coaching to members.

Paul Nebel (@paulnebel on Slack): Paul is a Virtual CTO. He is a specialist in the creation, design and build of innovative, technology-led businesses, products & services.

James Gardner (@jamesgardner on Slack): James is a Virtual CTO. He loves assembling or building the right components to help your business gain traction in the market and with investors.

Joy Shan-Chun Kuo (@joykuo on Slack): Joy is a software developer with curiosity for technologies and passion to build applications in an agile way. He is our mobile specialist.

Robert Brooks (@Robert Brooks on Slack): Robert is a designer with a background in mapping, having previously worked as a cartographer at a wayfinding consultancy. He focusses on usability and process design and delivers work in the fields of UX/UI and service design.

Abdul Omar Faruq (@Omar on Slack): Omar is our graduate engineer learning to be a software developer, supporting the team across a wide range of projects.