Apps and downs of disruptive tech
Waze developer Uri Levine is constantly abuzz with new ideas
● Waze has changed the driving habits of the more than 250-million drivers around the world who use it today. Use the traffic and navigation app once to find a place you’ve never been, and soon you’re hooked, using it to get to places you go to routinely via the most efficient route that bypasses heavy traffic, potholes and traffic officers.
Uri Levine, co-founder and former chairman of Waze and a serial entrepreneur, recently spoke about his experiences and business insights at a presentation at Tiso Blackstar in Johannesburg.
Disruptive technologies
Levine, who is based in Tel Aviv, Israel, has focused for 30 years on developing hi-tech projects, disruptive technologies, strategies and start-ups.
Waze, of which Levine owned 3%, was sold in 2013 to Google for $1.1bn, the highest price paid for an application at the time.
“We built Waze formally in 2008 and launched it formally in 2009. By that time I knew I was going to build FeeX for financial fees, but I only built that in 2013.”
Entrepreneurs are always planning what they’re going to build next, he said.
In 2012, Waze was growing faster than all other navigation devices (apps and devices) combined. There were many navigation devices on the market before Waze, which disappeared, apart from Google.
Dressed in faded jeans and a T-shirt emblazoned with “Easy Decisions are Easy. Hard Decisions are Hard”, Levine said tough decisions need to be taken in start-ups, the journey of these businesses was filled with failures, and the sooner you got going with them the better.
He compared building a start-up to falling in love.
“There are many ideas you think of and eventually you think: ‘This is the one I’m going to work on’. There are many dates that you go on and eventually there’s one date where you tell yourself ‘she’s the one’,” said Levine.
Then there’s obsession and eventually you tell your friends — ‘this is what I’m going to do’. And usually they will tell you this will never work.
“You take your date for the first time to meet your friends and they tell you she’s not for you.
“The good news is you’re in love and you don’t listen to anyone else. The bad news is you’re in love and you don’t listen to anyone else. But really, in order to go through this journey you need to be in love with the idea, with the concept, with the problem you’re trying to solve.”
It is only with that kind of commitment “will you have enough to go through the hardship of the journey”. And the hardest part of the journey is the traction, he said.
Levine said failure was a reality. Out of 1,000 people behind start-ups only 100 “will make the leap of faith and quit their day job”.
The reasons for failure is that start-ups misunderstand users and the problem they are trying to solve. They are not trying solve a challenge that many people face. They don’t have the right team and do not sufficiently disrupt the market.
Fast recovery is essential
A fast recovery after failure is essential and part of that recovery is trying again and trying different things, he said.
Levine’s businesses were founded on things he found needed to be dealt with or done better.
“It’s about doing good and doing well.” Levine is working on an array of other projects, each of which sounds as if it has the potential to disrupt its respective industries. There is FeeX, which targets the problem of hidden charges in financial services. He started Engie, to help consumers when they go to a mechanic, to enable them to be informed as the app connects directly to the car computer.
Fairfly monitors airfares after a reservation is made, so one can rebook the same flight — or take a better-priced flight — if the price drops more than the cancellation fee of the initial flight.
Moovit, which is similar to Waze but is used for public transportation, is growing faster than Waze, at a rate of a million new users every day. The company has more than 150-million users in more than 2,000 cities.
LiveCare is a wearable device for the elderly, which allows for a two-way communications portal for instant help. And there’s more. SeeTree is a system they’re building for farmers, to use sensors and drones to assess whether trees are healthy or not.
“You start to build the dream and the passion around that” and the rollercoaster journey will have ups and downs, but the frequency of these ups and downs when you’re building a start-up are dramatically more than in an ordinary business,” he said.
Out of 1,000 people behind start-ups only 100 will make the leap of faith and quit their day job
Uri Levine
Waze co-founder