Scaling up FOO : transforming a Lebanese startup into a Mena mobile app developer -

Abstract

This case focuses on documenting the key issues faced by FOO—a key SME player in the ICT sector—and more specifically on how it tackled those issues during its growth process over the prior six years. Based in Beirut, Lebanon, FOO was founded by two AUB graduates in 2009, right at the beginning of the mobile apps boom. As a startup, FOO focused on mobile app development in order to generate revenue and profit by deploying mobile technologies to enhance mobile user experience. Since then, however, FOO has emerged as a leading ICT player providing content based apps, user driven apps, interactive marketing, video streaming, e-business solutions, and more, for various operating systems including Android, iOS, Windows, Blackberry OS, and Symbian OS. In addition, FOO founders are currently expanding their work to include virtual reality, smart homes and cities, wearable technologies, Bluetooth beacons and big data, among others. The evolution of the case highlights the subsequent points, focusing in particular on how FOO faced and tackled them. First, the case shows how the role of complementary skills and expertise in the founding team of FOO was key to its success. Second, it portrays how FOO dealt with the risks and challenges that a high-tech startup company faces when entering a new market space in the Middle East – e.g., mobile apps. Third, it highlights how a startup like FOO adapted and pivoted from its startup business model as an app developer to a digital innovation partner, while it grew and learnt the importance of differentiating its offerings. Fourth, it focuses on how human resources-related issues come up and are worked through as a firm like FOO grows beyond the founding team into a full-fledged functional organization. Finally, the case study documents how the financing decision faced by the founding team came about and was thought through via weighing the pros and cons of partnering with venture capital versus strategic investors. Overall, the case contributes to our practical kn