Eric Shapiro has been working on software development for a long time and has built the company,
Relium, from that work. Now that the company is growing through its mobile app work Shapiro is trying to find the right balance between being an entrepreneur and a software author.
“Trying to find the balance of running the company and what I call doing actual work can be challenging,” Shapiro says. “I don’t want this to be a 500-person company.”
For the longest time the Ann Arbor-based firm was just Shapiro and one other independent contractor. It has grown to a staff of five employees and a few independent contractors in the last two years, including two new hires over the last year.
“I wouldn’t be shocked to have one or two more employees,” Shapiro says. “We have a lot of requests for Andriod software now.”
Relium does mobile work for some larger brands, including
Weather Underground and Philips Electronics. It also does smaller projects with local clients, such as the
Ann Arbor Hands-On Museum.
“About half of our companies are local and half are from around the world that came to us through word-of-mouth,” Shapiro says.
Source: Eric Shapiro, president of Relium
Writer: Jon Zemke
Read more about Metro Detroit's growing entrepreneurial ecosystem at SEMichiganStartup.com.
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