By Astoria Luzzi
In the second interview of Global EntrepreneurshipWeek, we spoke with Alexey Adamsky, the founder of Three Red Cubes, a software development company that also creates mobile applications. Adamsky is currently completing his master’s in computer science at Ryerson.
The Eyeopener: Do you want to tell us a little about what your business is about?
Alexey Adamsky: We’re a software development company. We work with the Microsoft technologists primarily, including Windows, Web, Ganet, Xbox, Kinect, etc.
Eye: What drove you to start Three Red Cubes?
A.A.: A few things. I never wanted to work, I wanted to work for myself. Second, I’ve always had lots of ideas, so I wanted to bring them to life and kind of engage people. I started dreaming. [Engaging] was my biggest dream.
Eye: What are some challenges you found along the way that you think other entrepreneurs would also face?
A.A.: Trying to stay focused. That’s the biggest one because there are lots of ideas and trying to choose the one… that’s always the challenge. We’ve been through many ideas…[We] try to prove the content and not be afraid to fail. This is normal in being an entrepreneur.
Eye: Is there any time you remember questioning what you were doing? Or is their a challenge that you faced that you would like to share?
A.A.: The tools that we used…people are always thinking that these are not the best tools. Everyone tries to use the cool technologies, so they think they’re cool. We constantly have the challenge to explain to people why we chose this, and we’ve been through many friends and co-workers that said “Oh, there’s no future in this” and a year later, they come to us saying “Do you know about this technology?”, and we say ‘Yeah, we’ve been using these for two years.’ We’ve seen that a lot lately because that was our investment.
Eye: What is it like balancing your student career with being an entrepreneur at the same time?
A.A.: Nearly impossible. You have to choose one or another, and I was very happy to gain knowledge from both my undergrad and master’s. I mean, the strange part is finishing your masters and writing your thesis. It’s challenging… For people who consider to take education and business, it’s very important to see how they could balance it.
Eye: What would be your advice to students who are considering becoming an entrepreneur but are hesitant?
A.A.: I think it’s very important if you’re an undergrad to start doing something else out of school, like most of the stuff that I know…they don’t teach you in school. You have to come after class and start doing something that’s going to bring you experience and knowledge… It really depends on your ability; it really depends on your passion. Everything I do, I do by myself and I can argue that I have as much experience as someone working for two to four years.
Eye: How do you divide your time between school and your business?
A.A.: I never spend a lot of time doing school. Even in undergrad, I only went to classes once in a while and did my assignments. The only reason I went to school, and I already had a vision, I wanted to get knowledge, not the marks, and that’s what I took away from my undergrad and graduate career.
Eye: On average, how many hours a week do you put towards your business?
A.A.: 50-60 hours at least. I spend, [at the DMZ], at least 12 hours everyday, seven days a week.
Eye: What is the best thing about being an entrepreneur? Clearly it’s challenging. Do you have any regrets?
A.A.: I certainly do not have any regrets. First of all, I get my own schedule. I think the [best thing] is that I can work on my own ideas, bring my dreams to life. That is priceless. I mean, it’s a lot of effort, it’s a lot of time…it’s a challenge, but it definitely works. It’s like sky diving; everybody thinks you’re stupid but you can’t describe how good it is.
Eye: What’s your hope for Three Red Cube’s future?
A.A: We definitely are not planning to sell our business. We want to build an enterprise that is going to be as big as Google and Microsoft. I know it sounds very ambitious, but I mean, you got to dream big and that’s our vision. We are already working with six companies, and working on our own ideas, so never stop. Continue innovating.
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