GoodWorksLabs was founded in 2013, when the IT industry saw a pertinent gap in terms of product building experience. Today, the company is changing the way people experience products online. It develops customizable high-end technology products, mobile apps and software to games, and also works with deep learning technologies for Fortune 500 companies and startups
GoodWorkLabs is emerging as one of the most sought after brands in the technology space in India today. The five-year old company has grown 500 per cent year-on-year and has marquee clients in its stable, such as Flipkart, Apple, Mercedes Benz and ST DuPont to name a few. In fact, recently, GoodWorkLabs was even ranked the fifth fastest growing technology company in India by Deloitte Fast 50 Awards.
That being said, in a global marketplace where product development is becoming a lot more accessible and with costs continuing to drop (because of stiff competition), how is a company like GoodWorkLabs planning to push for sustainable product development for its repertoire of brands? We speak to its CEO & co-founder, Vishwas Mudagal, to unravel the story behind the company’s growth, what helps them stay ahead and, how they are bracing for the next wave of technology innovation.
“One of the main reasons clients trust us is because we advise them on the best innovative practices to follow in order to convert their vision to reality. One such example is how we helped MetalMann, an international metal trading company, build a simple, yet reliable online marketplace solution”, explains Mudagal. GoodWorkLabs designed and developed an end-to-end mobile app and e-commerce platform for MetalMann, moving its entire business to the online space, and enabling people across the world to buy and sell metal online with ease.
The growth story
At the time of founding, co-founder Sonia Sharma and Mudagal wanted to bring in their experience in building high-end products, creating R&D teams, focusing on design and understanding the startup ecosystem to develop products and foster a culture of innovation for companies. “We identified a gap in the IT services industry – the lack of product building experience – and wanted to become the go-to product for folks in the ‘services’ industry”, adds Mudagal.
From a six-member team in 2014, today GoodWorkLabs has a 100+ strong team on board, with offices setup in Bengaluru, Kolkata, San Francisco and New York. Since inception, the company has grown 1112 per cent, and with the initial capital funding of Rs. 25 lakhs from Mudagal, GoodWorkLabs achieved a growth of 500 per cent in the first financial year itself. While the company initially saw rolling revenue of US $0.5 million in 2014-15, it grew five-fold to US $2.5 million in 2015-16. “With increase in the mindshare of high-end consulting in the technology space, we grew in terms of revenue. Right now, we’re focused on providing mobile technology solutions, designing games and providing cloud-based tech support,” indicates Mudagal, further stating that, “We are primarily a customer and execution focused company which means we don’t do transactions. Instead, we build relationships with our clients. We don’t run behind 100-200 customers. Instead, we choose a handful of premium clients and focus on growing those businesses.”
We identified a gap in the IT services industry – the lack of product building experience – and wanted to become the go-to product for folks in the ‘services’ industry
One of the major growth drivers for GoodWorkLabs has been its design thinking process for products, which has resulted in some of the best companies working with its team to design the UX and visual design for their products, apps and games. The challenge, however, lies in continuously building a solid business case (with a competitive advantage) and letting that take the lead when designing products for customers. “It also comes down to our ability to spot industry trends ahead of time and to exploit opportunities in the market, which helps us stay ahead of the curve”, says the CEO who also wrote the bestseller book, ‘Losing my Religion’, in 2014.
As a society, we now seem to be learning that design and solid product development is more about building value. With stiff competition online, and trends and forces forever re-shaping the structure of design and product development, we will have to wait and watch how companies like GoodWorkLabs evolve. The company’s focus for now, however, is on branching out to launch new business units.
Creating core business units
Apart from emerging as an outsourced product development company and UX design studio, GoodWorkLabs branched out in early 2017 to launch a new business unit called GoodWorksCoWork, a co-working studio to build a thriving startup community and provide an ecosystem for growth. “We plan to expand this to other cities as well,” Mudgal quickly adds. Additionally, GoodWorkLabs also launched an enterprise level software product called GoodWorksMarketPlace, a complete end-to-end e-commerce solution for any company that wants to trade online. Lastly, GoodWorkLabs also works as a fully functional consulting division where it provides technology consulting for startups and multinational companies. “After the launch of our enterprise level software product, we also launched accelerators for hospitality, workforce management, field force management and education. As part of the future roadmap for GoodWorkLabs 2.0, we are internally building a center for big data, machine learning and artificial intelligence to provide clients with the best-in-class technology services,” he reveals.
Bracing for the next wave of technology
Trends suggest that user experience will soon move to the next level such as augmented reality (AR) and voice-based experiences and GoodWorkLabs soon plans to move into these deep technology domains. “Mobility, IoT and the need for a connected environment is only bound to increase in the coming years and the time has come for robotics to take the lead in terms of technology,” explains the co-founder. With these technologies likely to converge in the next two to four years, GoodWorkLabs is poised to become an innovation partner for its customers and help them adopt these technologies in the future. In order to stand out, it’s important to go beyond understanding product and design requirements of customers and create an environment of innovation and most importantly, to choose technology with the end users in mind.
Finding the right balance
Currently, with the formation of core business units, the company is going through an organizational restructuring. “We have already begun to onboard senior leadership teams to drive these business units to its fullest potential. The emergence of a group of companies has already begun and its influence is going to be massive in terms of revenue and headcount. In terms of geographical growth, we plan to expand and build a strong presence in the US and European markets in the next two years”, Mudagal shares.
Currently bootstrapped and cash positive, the company has demonstrated fast growth in terms of revenue and business verticals. But will the company need to raise funding in the coming year? “We are not looking out for any funding. In fact, as part of our diversification drive, we will incubate a few startups and also fund them in the coming years”, opines Mudagal. “Most products that we build impact millions of lives and shape the future of technology and industry. As a team we’re changing the world through technology and design,” he says, on a parting note.
Snapshot information
GoodWorkLabs
Founders: Sonia Sharma and Vishwas Mudagal
Year of Incorporation: 2013
City: Bengaluru
Investors: (Bootstrapped) Initial capital funding of Rs. 25 lakhs from Vishwas Mudagal
Company Profile
GoodWorkLabs is a leading Outsourced Product Development firm and UX design studio. With a core focus on AI, Machine Learning & Big Data, it helps startups and Fortune 500 companies design and build robust products such as enterprise & consumer software, mobile apps & games.
With offices in Bengaluru, Kolkata, New York and San Francisco Bay Area, the company is growing at 500 per cent year-on-year and has established itself as a premium tech provider. GoodWorkLabs has also been awarded the 5th fastest growing technology company by Deloitte.
