Armenia’s IT ecosystem is growing rapidly and the solutions it offers the world are both diverse and innovative, following the latest trends and developments. Data science and AI are leading Armenia’s IT sector, with its firms bidding to take on world markets.
Dowork.ai, a project management tool that helps marketers deliver projects on time and on budget, is one of those startups initiated and developed entirely in Armenia and swiftly growing thanks to an EU4Business grant.
Where there’s a problem, there’s an opportunity
A bachelor in Math with a master’s in Computer Science, Mushegh Gevorgyan, 35, is the CEO and founder of Dowork.ai. With 15 years’ experience in technology, he has always been responsible for project estimation and delivery as a lead software engineer.
“Throughout my career, no one has ever been able to give accurate estimates,” Mushegh admits, saying that the reason was that management did not learn from its experiences — and there was no technology to enable such a learning process. “This is how I decided to start Dowork.ai.”
Along with his team, Mushegh was so dedicated to finding a solution to this serious problem that he managed to raise enough funding and gain initial traction. An important milestone for a startup to show a product meant for a wide market was to come up with a valid business model that would foster sustainable growth.
It was then that they had applied to the Traction programme organised by Hero House. Hero House is a project initiated by the Catalyst Foundation and supported by the EU4Business “Technology Development for Armenia’’ programme, which is part of the Innovative Tourism and Technology Development for Armenia project.
“This is where we won a grant that allowed us to expand our team from 5 to 12 and accelerate product development,” says the Dowork.ai founder, noting that this grant helped them get to the market as soon as possible. “We got our grant in fall 2020. It was hard times for Armenia and local businesses, but we never stopped working on our platform. With this grant, we were able to exceed all our initial metrics: we successfully ran a Product Hunt campaign and became the #1 Product of the Day .”
Analysing the past, working for the future
Dowork.ai may sound like a miraculous “secret weapon” for companies to be able to come up with accurate project estimates: it helps to keep processes under control right from the start, to establish effective communication with the clients, and, most importantly, to maintain an involved, engaged and relaxed team. It enables project managers to do a better job with resource management and to estimate projects with little to no surprises. The key to Dowork.ai is analysing information about as many projects as necessary, be it those the company itself has completed or data available on the web, to come up with the best estimate.
The startup is currently running another campaign that helped them to earn their first beta-paying customers. “We are working on our major release, which will allow companies not only estimate a project but also track it and have a better picture of progress.”
The most important thing for startups is speed. “The EU-funded grant allowed us to expand our team very quickly,” Mushegh says proudly. “If we hadn’t done this, it would have slowed down the process and taken much more time from us to reach the point where we are now.”
The EU4Business Innovative Tourism and Technology Development for Armenia (ITTD) project is ongoing in Armenia. Its overall objective is to ensure shared, balanced and inclusive growth in tourism and innovative industries. The project is working with innovative tourism ventures in the northern regions of Armenia, providing support to hi-tech and innovative entrepreneurs, organizing international knowledge exchanges for hi-tech researchers, and establishing networks to foster a business culture among students and the general public.
Under the ITTD project, more than 100 ventures have already received support, the provided assistance has helped sustain or generate a total of 400 jobs, and more than 800 individuals have undergone various trainings.
