StorPool Storage - THE NEW WAY OF DATA STORAGE

Company: StorPool Storage

Representative: Boyan Ivanov

Position: CEO

How would you explain your business in one sentence to your grandmother?

StorPool accelerates the World by storing and processing data more productively.

Where did the idea come from and what problem does it solve?

Large organizations that manage their own datacenters use data storage architecture that is now over 50 years old. The users and applications today need a different paradigm to data storage and management. This is a shift from a physical storage appliances to data storage implemented as software.

How did you form a team? How do you know each other, why did you decide to work together?

One thing leads to another. We were sharing a garage to build 2 companies.

Was there a moment that almost turned you down?

 If you're looking for an excuse to quit - there will be hundreds of such events. If your mission is important enough - you'll find the strength to persevere

The biggest mistake so far?

Most things we did before learning about Dunning-Kruger effect. Still all founders need to work on things, that others deem impossible and sometimes lack of knowledge is a bliss... :))

The most valuable advice you would give to those after you?

Be laser sharp on customer problems. When you think you're laser sharp - likely you're still not focused enough. 

How do you resemble the Bulgarians and how do you differ from them?

Like: resourceful. Lean. 

Unlike: extremely professional. Attention to detail. Focus on global impact. Building things from scratch, vs. being an outsourcer for someone else.

Why is Bulgaria a good (or bad) place to start a business?

As anything in life there there are both good and bad things: The good: some people are "hungry" for success. Thinking out of the box. Good tech talent here. The bad: not enough knowledge & experience on building and scaling product companies. Young ecosystem, that needs years to catch-up. Not enough smart money and connections to developed markets. Early days for our entrepreneurship journey as a country. But hey - it's all good, we're making solid progress and we have to earn it! :)

If you have a magic wand, which partner or investor would you like to bring to the team?

No one person or investor will solve all issues. Superheroes exist only in movies. Even there they're teams lately. Also an investor will not do the hard work that founders and startup teams have to do - build something people want. To us it's about having impact and that means one thing only - delivering value, which customers use (and pay for). So: if we had a magic wand we'd use it to close deals on running the storage behind some keynote leading companies: like Apple, Amazon, Microsoft, Tesla, SpaceX, to name a few. 

What are your goals? Where do you want to go from here on out? 

Becoming "The Storage Company". Like Google but for storage. Oh, and storage on Mars should be powered by StorPool.

Why did you become part of the BESCO team?

Support the local ecosystem. Keep up the good work! :)