.mk Startup of the Month [June, 2024]:
From hobby to building a startup
For Pero Gjuzelov, video has always been a hobby of a sort, something to pass the time with. Working with various IT and telecommunications companies as a software engineer has allowed him to accumulate IT related experience and, in 2017, he finally decided to turn his hobby into something profitable, and to found Vidict Media Server.
The adventure began with a client convincing him to take the next step and to enter the entrepreneurial waters. So, Pero quit his job at a then–local IT company, and decided to devote himself fully to building the first product.
“Until that crucial moment, video was my hobby. The first project I worked on was for a Canadian client. The client wanted to send personalized video messages via email. I found the whole idea new and refreshing; that’s how video streaming was introduced to me. Shortly afterwards, I wanted to have this kind of software. I didn’t take much to realize how a software like this might be useful in the future ,” says Gjuzelov.
The beginnings were difficult, as he himself puts it. Part of the difficulties stemmed from his reluctance to open his own company. Regardless, these difficulties were also instrumental in opening his horizons for the future.
“At the time, clients were using another type of video streaming software and were paying through the nose for it – so I asked them if I did something similar, would they be willing to give it a try? I started on my own, changed servers since we didn’t have a main server that would do the main video conversion, and we started from there – in 2017 we opened the company. Over time, we have created other products that we are equally proud of, and, now, we are starting to invest in new products by using the artificial intelligence ,” adds Gjuzelov.
The first few years are spent building the Vidict Peer product. With it, they solve one of the biggest problems – how to save on video hosting by using video streaming.
“When an event is followed by many users on one stream, there is network congestion, since the network is overrun with more data packet traffic than it can cope with. At that time, my client had substantial data packet traffic, more than anyone in the Balkans. To overcome the problem with the network congestion, we used peer-to-peer streaming – it helped that we were experienced and quite knowledge in the technology that’s being used. In 2017, we started the development through internet search engines. In 2019 and with 12 customers, the product was being used commercially – that’s how the story of Vidict Peer began,” says Gjuzelov.
As he points out, it was necessary to constantly upgrade and learn new things that will take the company forward – without feeling of anxiety or fear, or as he says, “fear is something that comes later”.
“For me, fear comes later. At the beginning, I was brave and willing to face the challenges – fear, however, limits the mind and I always try to brush those thoughts aside ,” he adds.
The pandemic and the first challenges
While the first three years for the company were going much better than expected, serious challenges came with the COVID-19 pandemic.
“All the clients were connected to sports events. When the COVID pandemic struck in 2020, Vidict was left without any funding for six months. For people to avoid groupings of any sort, especially for sport events, the governments allowed sports events to go on national television,” he says.
The team itself went through rough restructuring. From five employees, the team got reduced to two, leaving Gjuzelov with only Anastasia Nikolovska – a student responsible for the machine learning part of the company’s technology. Today, Nikolovska is the co-owner of the company and plays a significant role in its development.
“The time of COVID was a time of survival. The hard days truly put us through the wringer. We were looking for clients, we focused regionally, we had projects in Kosovo, and several other different platforms. We also had a project with FITR, a telemonitoring project called “My Virtual Doctor”, but it was not greenlit by “Moj Termin” and we were unable to release it to the public. However, we managed to overcome that crisis. Even though we went from five employees to two, we are now expanding the team again. There will always be challenges, what’s important is how we deal with them,” recalls Gjuzelov.
The search for customers and sales mentality
Today, one of the biggest challenges facing Gjuzelov and Vidict is finding customers.
“This is the most difficult part – at first the clients came to me on their own, but then we had to move to methods such as cold calling, lead generation, etc. The quality of the products must always speak for the company. People are not drawn to the name of the company or the brand, but to the value that that the product brings. And we had a very good product; we offered cheap streaming, something that’s unlike other streaming solutions. To top it off, it was quite simple to use,” emphasizes Gjuzelov.
On a daily basis, the company faces technical challenges as well.
“We find ourselves greatly challenged in situations of network congestion. At times, we’ve had 30 thousand video requests per second. Even so, the software managed to handle the demands. Challenges also arise when the main servers go down for various reasons, resulting in a lot of lost time,” he says.
According to him, the development of each company depends on the quality of the product itself. “In the beginning, we had to turn away customers. This was done so that I could maintain the quality of what I was doing. Since I didn’t have time, I decided to resign my job and start working on the product with full commitment,” he says, adding that today he often gets involved when he is needed to close a deal and be part of the entire sales process.
One of the biggest problems facing the IT community in Macedonia comes from the predispositions tied to making sales.
“We have good staff in Macedonia and the region. I firmly believe that with solid management and good motivation, each employee will excel. But in some branches, such as sales, we simply don’t have enough people, due to the mentality. On the other hand, however, there is no shortage in terms of technical expertise. I’ve had an example where good motivation resulted in excellent professionalism,” adds Gjuzelov.
Technology that brings events to a billion viewers
Vidict’s software, on the other hand, brings events to billions of viewers. But for the company to be able to reach new heights of success, more support is needed, both in the form of new investments and in the form of ambitious and creative staff willing to contribute to new solutions.
“In 2023, during the Cricket World Cup, we had close to a billion viewers. They were watching video delivered using Vidict’s technology. However, we are a bootstrap company and that makes us vulnerable to various fluctuations, such as the pandemic, the number of customers, etc.,” explains Gjuzelov.
His desire is to direct the young staff in those technical areas where he himself excels.
“I want them to learn how to apply artificial intelligence and similar technologies. Our further development also depends a lot on whether we find a strategic partner, such as a telecom company etc., and we are actively looking for a suitable partner. The other idea is to come up with an investment that will support our vision and allow us get in the game with the big players – something that the whole country will be proud of,” he emphasized.
So far, the help they have received from domestic institutions such as FITR has proven to be quite useful.
“FITR helped a lot. We were grantees in 2016, and, at that time, I had a vision for the product, but I was unable to fully shape it. FITR was instrumental in helping me realize the potential for Vidict. FITR had lecturers from abroad and, thanks to those lectures, I was able to design and implement the strategy. Soon after that, the startup was born,” says Gjuzelov.
However, what is missing is a bigger initiative to encourage the development of the Macedonian startup ecosystem.
“In France or Western countries, there is huge support for startups – from logistics to events and everything else. When it comes to marketing, such events and conferences are of great importance. We saw this during our participation in the Web Summit where we made contacts with potential customers, such as Boeing. The state can also help a lot. One example is FITR, but, again, but when it comes to crucial events, events that allow to network and share ideas, we’re sorely behind,” emphasizes Gjuzelov.
Regarding their future plans, the company is constantly working on new products to overcome the challenges faced by their customers. They are also focusing on the usage of artificial intelligence.
“In 2022 and 2023, we made our grand comeback with new products related to the quality of the videos. With the help of AI algorithms and models, our new product Vision Boost increases the quality of the stream significantly. To make the necessary AI improvements, it takes somewhere from 30 minutes to an hour. We, on the other hand, do it on the fly, that is, while the event is live,” says Gjuzelov.
His advice for future Macedonian entrepreneurs? Do not be afraid and prepare well.
“The advice for young people is to simply not be afraid and to be well prepared. Instead of focusing on how much money they will earn, they should focus on having the desire to succeed. They should not think locally but globally, they should want to be the next Steve Jobs and Elon Musk,” says Gjuzelov.
