Doug Rawson started it all by playing around with a spreadsheet - just to help move things along on the project team.
Tracking things like timetables, and contact information.
Then he added a document-storing capability.
And along the way, searchable attached files.
It was an eight-year project, he says.
Something he did while also running his company, AENTEC, a Reno-based electrical engineering firm, co-owned with Marty Evans, vice president of engineering.
Rawson is president of the corporation.
He spent long hours in front of his computer, proving once again that all those computer geek hours can beget profitable results - such as a software called Praesto that now travels the world in a bundle with FileMaker Pro.
Rawson's software is a job-tracking and project management solution created specifically for architectural and engineering firms, as well as facilities management offices.
That alone would make it an attractive tool for firms trying to keep a finger on the pulse of corporate- wide operations that include among a myriad of data invoicing, project tracking, images, correspondence, timelines, and contacts.
But the genius of it as a saleable tool, says Rawson,was partly happenstance.He built it on the database platform of FileMaker Pro, a world-class software found in offices throughout the globe.
Praesto's primary customer base engineering, architecture, facilities management is narrow, says Rawson.
The plan is to keep it that way for now.
The tool allows his engineering firm to pull up fee-based feasibility studies.
It gives him profitability comparisons between categories of projects.He can costcompare working with various project managers and with other firms.
And then, his firm can take all of those (and more) factors into consideration when bidding a project."And we do," says Rawson."It's awesome." Beyond loving the software he created, though, Rawson is enthralled with the business possibilities.After building Praesto around his engineering company's needs, Rawson began marketing it in 2002, selling it to his first client, Reno-based Aspen Engineering, in 2003.
His marketing method? "Viral marketing," he says.Word-of-mouth.
It's not fancy, but it's affordable and it's working for Praesto.
Rawson now has 110 licenses on the market.
And that's another awesome aspect of the product he loves, he says.He's structured Praesto to require minimal business support.
He sells it (for about $795 per company plus $250 per workstation); he gives a short, often online, training, and he collects monthly license fees electronically (about $24.95 per workstation per month) as long as the customer uses the software.
But if it's such a great piece of software, why aren't the gorillas in the marketplace snapping it out from under him? The customer base is too small for the big guys, says Rawson.
His calculations of the number of architectural and engineering firms that might use Praesto is enough to bring in multi-millions enough to make him a rich world-traveler.
But that's a small market niche, he says, for the gorillas.
He's happily basking in the comparative security of knowing that his trademarked, copyrighted, though not patented, product is too small to be co-opted.
