TheAppLabb, founded in Toronto in 2007, is a striking example of how digital services agencies need to stay on top of constantly accelerating technological innovation to not only remain relevant but grow.  In this session we sit down with its founder, Kundan Joshi.

*Learn more about Kundan's company here: https://theapplabb.com/

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Qasim Virjee 0:15

All right back once again, for this time 20th edition of The Star Wars Podcast. I'm Qasim Virjee. The CEO and founder of start well here on King Street in our lovely, infamous or famous depends on who you know, studio. And this time around, I am sitting with my friend kundun, who is the founder of the App Lab. You might know the App Lab for being one of Toronto's Premier, mobile app development firms, they do a lot more, I think we're gonna dig into that in a second. It's not just about mobile phones anymore. They do a lot more than just the apps that maybe when you founded the company, people were using. So welcome to the studio credit. It's a pleasure to have you here.

Kundan Joshi 0:59

Well, thanks for having me. It's very excited to be part of two part of your podcast.

Qasim Virjee 1:03

Yeah. So let's jump in. Tell us a little bit about the App Lab. Let our listeners know what you guys do. And maybe we could start from the beginning. The company was founded back in

Kundan Joshi 1:13

2007. So 11 years now. Okay. Yeah, almost 12 years, actually.

Qasim Virjee 1:19

And the early days, what was it founded to do?

Kundan Joshi 1:22

Early days, it was a digital agency. So as founded to do to build websites to build software, to do social media marketing, so a bunch of different things. And then the iPhone came up, and we realized, hey, we need to be in the app business. So our claim to fame is that we've in the last 12 years to build more than 500 apps. That's our bread and butter. That's a lot. That's a lot. Yeah, totally. For a wide range of clients. So you have the fortune 500. Like the Unilever's and the Samsung's and the Dells of the world, you have the mature like the Technion, and the park and flies and the depths of the world. And then we work with startups and scale up so you guys

Qasim Virjee 2:03

built this up? Read it. Yes, it's the Toronto Film Festival for our listeners, Toronto International Film

Kundan Joshi 2:08

International Film Festival. So So yeah, so the whole range, where yeah, we will build apps. And that's what we've been doing. But as you said, we've been, we've been evolving as the nature of the businesses. I mean, we didn't start our company as an app development company, we started our company as enablers of better human experiences, through technology through cutting edge technology in a way that we can obviously create great businesses or successful businesses. So app was the a great format to enable that apps, successful apps must have great experiences. And as a result, they do have an impact on creating better experiences. But there's a lot more than that. So. So today, we'll be creating great experiences through apps, we'll be creating great experiences through chatbots, we'll be creating great experiences through augmented reality and virtual reality and Internet of Things, and so on and so forth. But our primary models are building custom apps for our clients, and using our platforms or app accelerators to help them build apps faster. So those are primary models.

Qasim Virjee 3:19

I remember years ago, you're telling me about the concept of in the beginning, it felt like it was kind of like a white label. precursor to the end customer facing app, right thing that you're getting maybe as a development firm, you guys are getting a lot of leads for a particular type of app. So you built something that almost anyone could use to speed up your development time, right? And then from there, it's become something more