How a technical founder turned a problem from his day job into a lucrative SaaS product
TL:DR
Founder: Andrew Goldis
Business: Currents.dev
Business Stage: 6-Figure ARR
Industry: Developer Tools
Location: Vancouver, Canada
In 2019, Andrew Goldis ran into a problem scaling browser-based testing at his day job as the director of engineering for a startup. So, he built the sorry-cypress open source plugin to solve it.
He not only solved his problem, but it quickly became apparent that his little open source plugin was helping a lot of companies to scale up their Cypress testing infrastructure to millions of test records without breaking the bank.
He needed to justify all the time he was spending on this app, so he renamed the product to Currents and expanded the open source to a SaaS model in 2021.
“I never planned for sorry-cypress to become a business, but the reality was that for companies, it was much easier to buy a SaaS product rather than sponsor a small-scale open-source project,” says Andrew. “That’s how Currents started.”
Today, software teams around the globe use Currents as a plug-and-play replacement for Cypress Cloud.
Going all-in on Currents
As an accidental entrepreneur, Andrew struggled with confidence and not always knowing what next steps he should take. So, in 2020, he started to level up by reading and listening to relevant podcasts, and joining and participating in communities like Indie Hackers and MicroConf Connect.
In this time, the company was steadily growing, and Andrew started to entertain the idea of working on it full-time. He ultimately made that decision earlier this year.
“So there are a few factors: the revenue, the traction, the trajectory of the revenue, and also my confidence in my ability to manage and to grow this thing,” says Andrew. “I also became active in the Indie Hackers and MicroConf Connect communities. And Rob, with his podcasts and books, was very inspirational for me to discover other people’s stories and to find out when is the right time to leave the job.”
Another contributing factor was joining MicroConf Mastermind Matching earlier this year when his business was gaining traction, and he was seriously considering taking the leap to work on it full-time.
“One of the concerns was that by leaving my job and being by myself, it would be lonely,” says Andrew. “I would need some support from like-minded people, and that seemed like a nice option.”
He joined his mastermind with two clear goals in mind: 1. Hit specific financial milestones 2. Go from a product to a real business.
“I have two goals,” says Andrew. “One is growing revenue and improving other business metrics. And the second one is to grow the project into an independent business. Today it is still founder-focused, I need to hire people and delegate my activities.”
After a few calls with his mastermind, it became apparent that he found a group of like-minded peers that would be able to help him.
Seeing different perspectives
One of the biggest things that Andrew appreciates about his mastermind is being exposed to other founders’ experiences and struggles in a tight-knit environment. It makes him feel like he is not alone and can gain different viewpoints.
Looking to the future
In fact, a couple of months after joining a mastermind, he applied to TinySeed and was accepted.
Today, Andrew has a team of 4 people working on Currents. He is well on his way to turning the product into a sustainable, real business.
Want additional support and accountability as you are building your SaaS company? Join the MicroConf Mastermind Waitlist!
