If We Can, You Can

Author:

Jeremiah Alexander

Business:

Ideonic Limited

Published:

12/11/2008 11:40:00

I remember coming towards the end of my degree in Computer Games Programming, looking at all my job options and thinking, I’m not ready to slow down yet. I felt that I had many skills which I would not get to use if I just went into employment, so I decided to set up in business and began looking for the support to do that.

My idea started when I was doing my placement year in Newcastle. I was sitting on the Metro looking over notes from my Japanese evening class and thinking there must be an easier way to learn than this.

A year later after completing my degree I realised that I had spent the last four years learning how to manipulate probably the most powerful and engaging medium available and I could turn this medium and these skills towards learning.

I started Babel Digital, now Ideonic Limited, in August 2006. We focus on using computer games as a medium for education, training and communication.

Initially the business was focused on one idea for a language training simulation, and so the aspirations were to get a large investment, get the product to the market and make a huge impact.

Over time, instead of focussing purely on the language training simulation, we ended up completing a lot of smaller scale projects, across a variety of learning needs. However, we are still designing and developing prototypes for our language training simulation and so we hope to develop that soon.

When looking for support, I pretty much went to everyone! That’s the great thing about the North East; I was almost spoilt for choice. Initially my four main ports of support were Teeside University, Business Link, the DigitalCity and Codeworks.

In business, I think people often expect you to fail and sometimes you believe them, so it’s a real boost of confidence when the business does well. 18 months after we began and we’re still in business, and we’re going from strength to strength.

Now I have the business, I can’t turn off anymore, even when I’m away on holiday, all I see is new opportunities or new ways of doing things. I believe it must irritate the people around me quite a lot!

I think the biggest challenge was trying to do everything myself. I once heard that to be a successful entrepreneur you need to be lazy, because then you’re forced to surround yourself with good people.

This is something which I’m still learning about; I’m building the right team and support network so that I can share my workload without sacrificing on quality.

I think I’ve made numerous mistakes such as underestimating the importance of cash flow, or not looking for future projects whilst absorbed in current ones. But I don’t think I would actually do anything differently; learning from my mistakes is too important to me.

If you’re thinking about biting the bullet and setting up your own business, to quote the great philosopher, Nike, “Just do it!” Business is difficult and there are endless skills to master but I think being proactive and just going for it is the most important thing: Courage + Adaptability + Persistence = Successful Entrepreneur