How Quash Reached 20 Beta Companies and 250 Engineers on Its Bug Testing Platform in 2023 (Interview with Co-Founder Ameer Hamza)

Introduction and Overview of Quash

Nathan Latka

00:00Quashbugs.com currently helps 20 companies and two fifty engineers identify an average 50 bugs per week, which they can then go smash or quash as the URL says. The company today is seeking $500,000 in a pre seed round of 3,000,000 post money valuation. That means they want to sell 15% of the company. There's three co founders, two others building this so far. Again, the goal now is can they convert these free beta users into real paying customers?

00:24We'll see if they can do it over the course of the rest of the year. Hey folks, my guest today is Ameer Hamza graduating with an interaction design degree from India's top school. He first ventured into Honeywell as a product designer. After spending two years there, leading the design and user strategy for multiple products, he launched his own product design agency along to this current co founder Prakhar. They built multiple products zero to one for clients

00:45in the agency. And from there, they came together as three co founders to build quash, a platform to make mobile testing faster and easier. Hamza, are you ready to take us to the top?

Ameer Hamza's Background at Honeywell

Ameer Hamza

00:54>> Yes, that's good.

Nathan Latka

00:56Honeywell, you know, people think Honeywell, they think physical products. So just to be clear, what do you think mobile testing? Were you working on, like, the Honeywell mobile app and that's where you identified this problem?

Ameer Hamza

01:04>> No. So Honeywell recently, like, a couple years back, came up with their own software wing where they where they're offering is an enterprise performance solution. It's a SaaS offering. It's all software focused. So Honeywell is going into that that business, and that's where I was involved in. I was not specifically involved in any mobile applications, but I got to got the hang of SaaS and b to b products and how they built Scratch up because that

01:31>> was a very new vertical for Honeywell. So I got that experience there.

Nathan Latka

01:35Very cool. Okay. So what are I guess, give me a customer story today. Who can you name somebody that's using you?

First Customer Story: Riggy

Ameer Hamza

01:42>> So we have a customer, Riggy. Riggy is a it's a so they make tools for content creators to match them to, you know, prospective deals that they can get, that they can advertise using their content. So they have a platform for that, and they are one of our customers. So they so we deployed our POC there. That was one of the very initial versions that we had created of quash, which had very limited capabilities. But yeah.

02:19>> So after being deployed there, we had a very good response. There were some major feature requests that we were getting. So that version could the the only thing that that version could do was was let testers, you know, report bugs directly from the mobile device that they were testing on, and then it would just export all of the bugs into a Google Sheet. So then after testing that, we got some validation from there, and they started

02:45>> asking for Jira integrations and a dashboard, a place to manage all of the bugs that were being reported. So we have right now built all of that and we would be having a formal version one launch in the coming weeks sometime.

Nathan Latka

02:59So are you pre revenue today, or do you have a customer paying you?

Ameer Hamza

03:02>> We do not have a customer paying us at the moment. We will be releasing free trials of the v one of the product in the coming week. And we are in deals with some of these companies who are ready to pay us, but the first month would, of course, still be a trial.

Nathan Latka

03:18How do you know they're ready to pay you?

Ameer Hamza

03:20>> We have been talking to them. We have so they have already been using our product, whatever state it had been up until this point, and they are interested in it. And we How do you

Beta Feedback and Version One Roadmap

Nathan Latka

03:34know that though? Hamza? Mean, try and use numbers here, Hamza. So when they're using you, did they quash $6 on average bugs on average per month for the past six months and and that's why you know they're willing to pay?

Ameer Hamza

03:45>> No. The the numbers are way higher than that in terms of the bugs being reported.

Nathan Latka

03:49What's the number?

Ameer Hamza

03:51>> So an average company an average mobile company reports in in India reports 50 bugs in a week. Like, that's an average number that we have reached. And we

Nathan Latka

04:04that's for your that's for your beta users?

Ameer Hamza

04:07>> Yes. Yes.

Nathan Latka

04:08Okay. 50 bugs per week. And how many of those bugs do you help them? Like, many were fixed?

Ameer Hamza

04:14>> So all of them are in fact fixed. So we do not so where we come in is not the actual task of fixing bugs. Our product helps customers at two ends. One is to report the bugs easily. And then the second value proposition that we have is for the developers who need to fix the bugs. So we make sure that the tickets that they're getting from the bugs being reported are very comprehensive in terms of that

04:43>> the the session recordings of where the apps crash and the the logs the exact logs of the crash that the developer needs in order to

Nathan Latka

04:51Understood.

Ameer Hamza

04:52>> And how many of

Nathan Latka

04:53these how many of these I don't mean to cut you off, it's a quick show, so I apologize for that. How many beta users do you have on the platform today?

Pre-Revenue Status and Beta User Numbers

Ameer Hamza

04:59>> 20 customers.

Nathan Latka

05:00Okay.

05:01So there's 20 there's 20 users on average reported 50 bugs last week each.

Ameer Hamza

05:05>> Not 20 users, 20 companies using our product. The number of users would be somewhere around 250.

Nathan Latka

05:13Okay. So 20 companies with 250 users, they reported on average 50 bugs per company last week?

Ameer Hamza

05:19>> Yes.

Nathan Latka

05:20Okay. And when did you launch the beta program? What what month?

Ameer Hamza

05:24>> Two months back. So that would be July.

Nathan Latka

05:28And when did you guys write the first line of code for the platform?

First Line of Code and SDK Development

Ameer Hamza

05:32>> The first line of code was written back in March. So my other cofounder, Ayush, had been working on building this up individually in his own capacity for, like, some time now. Because our our application is also an SDK. It's not, like, something that is, like, very easy to build, and it it takes some some and some expertise in terms of knowing Android or iOS and, like, the the base codes of these platforms. So it has been

06:05>> in the works since March, but we launched the beta a couple of months back.

Nathan Latka

06:10Oh, what's going on there, YouTube? Good to see you guys. Now imagine this. You love watching these interviews with SaaS founders, but imagine if we took all of the valuation data out from over 2,807 interviews I've done manually. Saves you a lot of time. Well, we've done this. We've built it into the beautiful interface inside of Founderpath. Check this out. I'll show you how you can access this in a second, but you log in, you connect

06:33your Stripe account, you see your valuation real time. You can see what it changed over the past eighty eight days and even set goals for valuation this year. Now the secret evaluation is there's many different ways to value a SaaS business. So the reason you're gonna see three or four different valuations inside of your Founderpath dashboard, this is all free by the way, is because depending on who's doing the buying of your SaaS company, you're gonna

06:57get a different valuation. A VC is gonna pay a different valuation. Private equity firm is different. If you're gonna do a minority sale, that's different. And if you sell the whole business, that's a different valuation. You can see all those when I hover over here. Right? So the teal is what a VC would pay. Yellow is what private equity And red is if you sold the whole thing outright. Now what's cool about this is this is

07:19not built off random data. Again, you guys hear these interviews on YouTube. All these datas are built from real time valuation data points founder share with us on the show. So traction 1,200,000 seed round 3.7 raise. They sold 22% of their business. Go in here and filter by the event. Maybe you only wanna see companies that have sold the whole business. Well, here are a bunch that have been acquired the valuation and the multiple. Maybe you're

07:45going out right now and you're raising your seed round. We'll go in here and look at all this recent seed deals that went down, what they raised, what valuation they raised at and what percent that they sold. There's never been a larger dataset of SaaS valuations than what you can get now inside of Founderpath. And we're thrilled to bring it to you. All right, we're gonna go back to the YouTube video here in a second. But

08:07if you wanna check this tool out, if you wanna jump in and sign up, you can check it out for free to get your valuation at this link. This link, founderpath.com/products/valuations. Or if you go to founderpath.com and hover over products, click on get your valuation here, and go ahead and sign up to give it a whirl. Again, all that valuation data live right inside the platform. I hope to see you there. Alright. Let's jump back into

08:33the interview. So since he worked on it before you, is it is it fair to say he owns more equity than you do, or do you guys split it fifty fifty?

Ameer Hamza

08:41>> Could you repeat the question?

Nathan Latka

08:42Who owns more equity?

Ameer Hamza

08:45>> He does. He does.

Nathan Latka

08:46How did you guys have that conversation?

Equity Split Among Co-Founders

Ameer Hamza

08:49>> So he had been like, we we had known him for some time. Like, the the agency you mentioned about in the bio that I had written for you, Prakhar and I were primarily the the two main founders of the agency. But Ayush, the third cofounder, he is from a technical background. So we would often call him in for some of the development work that we required. And then he approached us with this idea that he was

09:14>> working on. And, yeah, given the gap in experience, like, he's been in the industry for, like, eight years now. Prakhar and I are fresh graduates of college from 2021 batch. So yeah, we we did not really have a problem with the splitting of equity bid.

Nathan Latka

09:32So Hamza, what's I'm just trying to get to the split. So the the the original guy owns how much and then how much do you and Prakhar own?

Ameer Hamza

09:40>> So I I would like prefer not to get into the exact numbers of it

Nathan Latka

09:46Why?

Ameer Hamza

09:47>> In this conversation. Because that's something

09:51>> that is

Nathan Latka

09:53This is the trade this is the this is the trade of the show. Right? We've got 20,000 listeners per episode. I'm giving you free exposure that sponsors pay for. The exchanges you give me information, people can't get anywhere else.

Ameer Hamza

10:04>> Yeah. So are you showing half the company? The other half is split between Prakrit and I.

Nathan Latka

10:08Okay. And you guys are bootstrapped? No outside capital?

Why Quash Needs Outside Capital

Ameer Hamza

10:11>> Up until now, yes. But we are in the process of raising capital at the moment.

Nathan Latka

10:15And and I guess why do you guys wanna raise capital? Obviously, that leads to dilution. Would you absolutely need the money?

Ameer Hamza

10:21>> Yes. We would. Because our product is development heavy. So we would need so right now, we have only our product is has only works for Android. But in order to cover more platforms like iOS, Flutter, React, we would need larger development team that we that would, you know, build it for us. And then there is a large part of growth and acquisition costs that would be involved in order to, you know, get to a certain goal

10:49>> of customers.

Nathan Latka

10:50How much are you looking to raise?

Funding Ask: $500K Pre-Seed at $3M Valuation

Ameer Hamza

10:53>> Right now, we are looking to raise 500 k dollars.

Nathan Latka

10:57And what percent of the company would you be willing to sell if you raise that money?

Ameer Hamza

11:02>> Around 15%.

Nathan Latka

11:04Okay. 15%. So you're you're looking for like a 2.5 or or 3,000,000 post money valuation on a pre revenue company? Yes. What gives you confidence that you'll be able to sort of sell that story to an investor?

Ameer Hamza

11:16>> We have been already in in talks with a lot of investors that we have personal connections with, and they have been, like, confident about it since the beginning. So right now, we are talking to a lot of them.

Nathan Latka

11:30And yeah. Hamza, has anyone given you a has anyone given you a term sheet as the lead investor, which means they're gonna put in more than 50% of the round size?

Ameer Hamza

11:39>> Not at the moment. We do have some contributions that we have gotten from founders of other companies, but they have like, they were just sufficient for us to, you know, go for, like, three or four months. But, yeah, we are still looking for a a lead investor.

Nathan Latka

11:55Sorry. You people have already given you money, but without signing paperwork? I guess I don't understand. How did you close on the smaller checks if you don't have a lead investor yet?

Ameer Hamza

12:04>> So the these people are are not investors per se by profession. So they they are founders of other companies who happen to have, like who are interested in investing very small amounts. And so how that works is they invest now, and we give them equity later on when we're closing the round based on how much they had invested.

Nathan Latka

12:26What if you don't what if you don't close the round?

Ameer Hamza

12:30>> We will close the round. Like, there there has been paperwork that has been done, which so it's it's in years time at max that we have before we can, you know until we can delay the conversion of the amount in into equity.

Convertible Notes from Founder-Angels

Nathan Latka

12:46So you sign convertible notes on these smaller checks and they'll convert Yes. A future equity round? Yes. Okay. Got it. Got it. When you mentioned again, you've got these customers currently using you on a beta motion, right? So I think you said there's 20 companies with two fifty developers using it. What do you plan to launch in terms of a pricing plan?

Ameer Hamza

13:08>> In terms of a pricing plan right now for the capability that we have developed, our pricing, we are thinking of it to be somewhere around 15 to $20 per user per month. But, of course, like, we still are pre revenue, so we are willing to experiment with that, and we aren't married to, like, a single number per se.

Nathan Latka

13:31How are you testing that price point and when does it go live on the website?

Ameer Hamza

13:36>> It won't go live on the website for quite a while, I'm sure. Because the first, I would say like five to 10 customers that we would get, we would not we would be negotiating with them in terms of how much value they think we provide them. And we we will let the market, you know, pick up a price point and see how much we can stretch it before we actually, like, put it out on the website.

Nathan Latka

14:01How many folks are full time at the team today?

Team Size and Full-Time Transition

Ameer Hamza

14:05>> We have five five people, excluding the three founders.

Nathan Latka

14:10Mhmm. And I guess you guys started working on this code back in March 2023. So how have you been paying for food and your rent and personal expenses?

Ameer Hamza

14:18>> So up until June this year, all of us did have, like, the the other primary jobs that we had. Only in June, we left the jobs and got into it full time. So it hasn't been pretty long.

Famous Five: Books, CEOs, and Tools

Nathan Latka

14:32Alright. We're rooting for you guys. We're out of time now. Let's wrap up here with the famous five. Number one, what's your favorite book, Hamza?

Ameer Hamza

14:38>> What's my favorite book? I'm currently reading Don Quixote and that's a brilliant book.

Nathan Latka

14:43Number two, is there a CEO you're following or studying?

Ameer Hamza

14:49>> Is there a CEO I'm following or studying? So I have been, like, looking closely at the CEOs of some of the the testing companies itself. So Asit Khan from LambdaTest is one person that I we also, I had the chance to get to chat with him as well. So that's interesting. Yeah.

Nathan Latka

15:09Number two, what's your fair three, what's your favorite online tool for building quashbugs?

Ameer Hamza

15:14>> What's my favorite tool for building on online, for building quashbugs? So a lot of the work here in building quashbugs has been, like, the tech part, and I haven't been directly very directly involved tonight. I have been handling the product side. So I would say I what I have been using most is Figma, a FigJam for brainstorming, and then of course, the good old Jira.

Nathan Latka

15:41Okay. Number four.

Ameer Hamza

15:42>> How many hours of sleep are you getting every night?

15:45>> Six.

Nathan Latka

15:46Okay. And what's your situation? Married, single, kids?

Ameer Hamza

15:49>> Single. Single.

Nathan Latka

15:51Okay. And how old are you?

Ameer Hamza

15:54>> 24.

Nathan Latka

15:55Last question. Something you wish knew when you were 20.

Life Advice and Closing Thoughts

Ameer Hamza

15:58>> Something I wish I knew when I was 20. Okay. I would say

16:04>> don't really stick to don't really be very strict about sticking to one plan in life. Try things out. And because you will probably end up where you never thought you would.

Nathan Latka

16:18Guys, quashbugs.com currently helps 20 companies and two fifty engineers identify an average 50 bugs per week, which they can then go smash or quash as the URL says. The company today is seeking $500,000 in a pre seed round of 3,000,000 post money valuation. That means they wanna sell 15% of the company. There's three co founders, two others building this so far. Again, the goal now is can they convert these free beta users into real paying customers?

16:43We'll see if they can do it over the course of the rest of the year. Hamza, thanks for taking us to the top.

Ameer Hamza

16:48>> Thank you. Thanks so much, Nathan.

Nathan Latka

16:50One more thing before you go. We have a brand new show every Thursday at 1PM central. It's called Shark Tank for SaaS. We call it deal or bust. One founder comes on, three hungry buyers, they try and do a deal live, and the founder shares back end dashboards, their expenses, their revenue, ARPU CAC, LTV, you name it, they share it and the buyers try and make a deal live. It is fun to watch every Thursday 1PM

17:15Central. Additionally, remember these recorded founder interviews go live. We release them here on YouTube every day at 2PM Central. To make sure you don't miss any of that, make sure you click the subscribe button below here on YouTube, the big red button and then click the little bell notification to make sure you get notifications when we do go live. I wouldn't want you to miss breaking news in the SaaS world, whether it's an acquisition, a big

17:38fundraise, a big sale, a big profitability statement or something else. I don't want you to miss it. Additionally, if you wanna take this conversation deeper and further, we have by far the largest private Slack community for B2B SaaS founders. You want to get in there. We've probably talked about your tool if you're running a company or your firm if you're investing. You can go in there and quickly search and see what people are saying. Sign up

17:59for that at nathanlatka.com/slack. In the meantime, I'm hanging out with you here on YouTube. I'll be in the comments for the next thirty minutes. Feel free to let me know what you thought about this episode and if you enjoyed it, click the thumbs up. We get a lot of haters that are mad at how aggressive I am on these shows, but I do it so that we can all learn. We have to counter those people. We

18:19got to push them away. Click the thumbs up below to counter them and know that I appreciate your guys'support. All right. I'll be in the comments. See you.