These kinds of companies are the hot new thing in tech. Fast-growing businesses like Square and Belly are doing quite well, while even older operators like Facebook (NASDAQ:FB) and Zynga (NASDAQ:ZNGA) now claim they are mobile-first companies.
Another such name in the space is Taskbox. The company created an app based on the iPhone which essentially manages a person’s inbox. The software allows a user to turn an e-mail into a to-do list with a simple swipe. Plus, there are also options to indicate the priority and the drop-dead date. You can also assign the task to someone else, while the Taskbox dashboard tracks the progress of every task.
Andrew Eye is the CEO and co-founder of this hot company, and he has quite the interesting background. Andrew worked as a software architect for the Marines as well as NASA. Even then, though, he wanted to be more than just a tech guru. So, he went on to start several companies, one of which he sold in 2010.
In the case of Taskbox, Andrew started the app because he thought that mobile e-mail was broken, since it doesn’t take advantage of the form factor, including the use of swiping and social features. Plus, mobile in general is a huge opportunity. As he put it: “Mobile is a place where habits are the least engrained and the experience is the least rich.”
To get things off the ground, Andrew has snagged a round of angel funding. Some of his investors include McAfee’s CTO Michael Fey and serial entrepreneur James Foster. Plus, the timing for such a company has been spot-on. Keep in mind that recently Mailbox sold out to Dropbox for a reported $100 million.
I had the chance to chat with Andrew. Check out the below video to find out how he came up with the idea of the business, why mobile-first is a big deal and hear his thoughts on the Dropbox deal.
Tom Taulli runs the InvestorPlace blog IPO Playbook. He is also the author of “How to Create the Next Facebook” and “High-Profit IPO Strategies: Finding Breakout IPOs for Investors and Traders.”Follow him on Twitter at @ttaulli. As of this writing, he did not hold a position in any of the aforementioned securities.
