"I believe that everybody has a £3 million idea inside them," said entrepreneur Seb Brock when he visited the College to conduct the final round of product trials on his Chattoo instant messaging app with Year 12 Business students.
"A good friend of mine, who now brings in £120,000 sales revenue per month, explained the business model to me. Once you have you paid for your server you have access to a global market of 6 billion people; the potential for economies of scale, through digital businesses, are immense," Seb told a fascinated audience.
"I was a Mergers and Acquisitions Lawyer for a London Law firm who prided themselves on having their staff available 24 hours a day and 7 days a week. I had the suit, I had the salary but I did not have a life. On holiday in Tenerife I had 200 emails a day to deal with. Following my friend’s advice I decided to take the plunge, hand in my resignation and become an entrepreneur. Starting with a blank ‘ideas book, I jotted down every idea I had. The aim was to find one that I believed could help people to solve a problem and develop a product."
Seb’s first business start-up, MonkeyFind app, flirted briefly with success before succumbing to the harsh realities of modern business. The initial £40,000 capital was soon eaten up with costs, and despite a promising start in linking cafés and restaurants with consumers in Reading, Seb quickly learnt that consumer’s plans were just not sufficiently flexible to take advantage of ‘flash’ discounts.
This is the second time that Seb has visited Shiplake to run a focus group to assist the development of his Chattoo app. In May 2014, our previous cohort of Year 12 students discovered software malfunctions and also suggested improvements before the initial trial launch. Chattoo were so impressed with their contribution that five pupils were given summer internships to continue with testing and also to promote the social networking app.
After another round of rigorous testing from Shiplake Sixth Formers, Chattoo now plan to refine the app ahead of the grand launch at the University of Birmingham towards the end of October. With a bit of luck, Chattoo could be the next digital ‘craze’ amongst its young target market.
