YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 24, ARMENPRESS. Founded in 2015,  Groksmith has become a Venture Builder from a consulting service.

In a conversation with "Armenpress" the company mentioned that 2-3 times a month they organize Groktalk networking events, within the framework of which they invite the leading specialists of the field to share their experience.

Formerly known as Hex Division, the company once started as a startup consulting firm. According to CEO Hovhannes Kuloghlyan, everything started with his friend Tigran. Having a few ideas, they decided to start a business and finally came to the conclusion that the most optimal is to start a consulting company.

"Working with startups, we have provided complex consulting services - product management, software development, marketing, etc. At some point, we started startups, because from the beginning our goal was to achieve business goals with client companies, which meant active involvement in building a business. We can say that we are a unique factory for startups” says Hovhannes Kuloghlyan.

According to Hovhannes, startups are aiming to have results in the short term within the framework of the received investments, as their future life depends on it. The company has the same goal - to help their customers be more successful, to be able to attract new investments, and to create long-term cooperations.

"A startup is like a man jumping off a cliff who has to build a plane for himself during the flight so that he does not crash. Since he has limited resources, we come to the aid of building an airplane. From the beginning we thought to approach the issue as complex as possible. In other words, we know that the goal of the startup is to build that plane, to ensure its flight capacity, otherwise destruction is inevitable. "We are already involved in providing appropriate assistance," he was quoted as saying.

According to him, the most important thing in consulting companies is trust and good reputation, because it is the work with clients that allows them to develop and gain new clients. Over time, the company's approaches have led it to become a co-founder, establishing startups on a partnership basis.

Kuloghlyan mentions that a new business model, Venture Builder, is rapidly developing in the world. According to him, this model has certain advantages compared to the classic approach to creating startups. If someone is constantly creating startups, he surely is creating a certain knowledge base, gaining experience. A company that creates many startups can share that experience with other startups. He notes that in order to create a company, one must have all the elements. That's the key to the company's success. They have collected elements, which they share with startups, and at the same time act as a co-founder.

“We invest in the newly-created companies those sections of business which can be automatized and standardized and due to automatization, we register higher efficiency in shorter period” Kuloghlyan emphasized.

Groksmith plan to become the first Armenian Venture Builder to enter the international market, working with leading startups within the framework of this business model.

"Groksmith is a business consulting firm focused on the IT sector," says Ben Frunjian, Chief Operating Officer.

To better present the concept of their company, he emphasizes that their function can be divided into two stages. At first the conduct market research and business modeling, then construct and operate.

"We help startups get their product from the idea stage to the market. Companies come up with ideas, those ideas are incubated here. We study the market, competitors, what products they give, how they provide those services, how they present themselves, what customer segment they have, what is the target age group of the product. After understanding everything, we move on to the design stage. Its visual appearance, structure, how people will use it, how it will become accessible: all these components are being designed. After that the product is ready to enter the market. Later we develop marketing steps. After that the company starts applying for investments. We try to help in that as well. And after receiving the investments, they can move forward to the next stage. To create new applications, expand the team, increase the company, etc." Frunjyan said.

Most of Groksmith's customers are from Silicon Valley. They also work with German, English and Canadian startups, and the geography of calls received during the day can almost cover the entire surface of the globe. There are both programmers and product managers in the team, and their total number reaches 40.

"We worked with Armenian companies when we just started. Working with Armenian startups has been within a partnership, that is, not just providing services, but we have been co-founders or it has been a scope of cooperation. One such example is the partnership with Wirestock, which is now growing and developing quite rapidly. Another successful example is the Cribby smart crib” says Hovhannes Kuloghlyan.

The rebranding of the company was related to the alignment of both the new business model and the ideological basis of the company.

"The name consists of two words. The word “Grok” is from the book Stranger in a Strange Land by science fiction writer Robert Heinlein. “To Grok anything” means to deeply understand, realize, merge with the latter. The second component – “Smith” means blacksmith, symbolizing work and craft. In other words, Groksmith means conscious work. This name describes the company very accurately, as we merge with the product and work to develop it” Kuloghlyan explained.

Groksmith addresses the issue of education within the field. That is why Groktalk networking events are organized 2-3 times a month in the company's office, in the framework of which the leading specialists in the field are invited to share their experience.

They have a strong goal to strengthen the networking within the Armenian IT community. People come, share their experience, then communicate with each other. He is sure that some interesting ideas are born from this communication.

If we look a little wider, the educational gap is a global problem. We live in the conditions of the fourth industrial revolution. The Internet, new technologies, in a short period of time have changed our lives very drastically. "People are simply not ready for many changes, especially the education system is not ready for that, because the system we have was created during the previous industrial revolution," he said.

Understanding the importance of the problem, they decided to organize a conference in spring, presumably in May, where people engaged in innovative education will come, conduct seminars, communicate and share their knowledge. 

Karine Terteryan