Pivoting In Circles - Chasing AI's Tail

Alexander Fahie

This year, the team at TAISK has made numerous pivots, so much so that we've done a complete 360 and returned to our original focus: AI for any task.

In this penultimate newsletter of the year, I will reflect on our journey so far, examining what we've accomplished, where we faltered, and what our plans are for the coming year.

But first, let's celebrate. We're still here and going strong. We haven't taken on any external investment and yet we're experiencing growth—hiring more engineers and forging partnerships with some of the most renowned brands in the world. More on that next month.

"Whoop."

For me, avoiding external investment is a crucial principle. It's not because I'm opposed to investment or venture capital—on the contrary, every company I've run has benefited from patient and supportive investors.

My reasoning is simpler: it's all about focus. In the past, when building companies, I juggled a multitude of responsibilities, from product development to customer relations to staff management, compounded by the demands of fundraising and reporting.

Like many young entrepreneurs—I was quite young when I started—I subscribed to the entrepreneurial culture of fast-paced growth, raising substantial capital, driven by Silicon Valley ideology. Or as a respected mentor once called it, "California Juice".

Access to venture capital was relatively easy once I began pitching; a connection here, a referral there, and soon enough, I could raise enough funds to chase dreams. However, therein lay the problem: I was chasing dreams rather than concentrating on fundamentals.

So, when my last company closed and I had the opportunity to establish TAISK, I resolved to learn from past mistakes and focus on building a robust business.

I prioritised developing a high-quality product that people would love, even if it meant slower growth compared to venture-backed startups. So, if that's my philosophy for building a company, what is my vision for TAISK?

From the outset, my goal was relatively straightforward.

Inspired by the potential of AI, I sought to create a support mechanism for entrepreneurs like myself—something to help carry out tasks typically requiring either substantial financial input or significant time investment.

These tasks could range from sales and marketing to drafting contracts or filing returns. My vision was to integrate AI into all these little tasks (hence naming it TAISK).

With AI taking care of these tasks small teams could do more. Compete with bigger organisations and deliver exceptional value to customers and other stakeholders.

I firmly believe that creating such a support mechanism for entrepreneurs would be incredibly valuable—I would certainly use it.

Enter problem number one: defining the tasks. At the beginning of 2024, we compiled a comprehensive list of tasks we aimed for AI to accomplish - it went from a few to hundreds and the list keeps getting bigger. It was our proverbial elephant...

One chunk at a time, our engineering team, from scratch, developed smart automations to fulfil some of them. But being a small team, it was a mammoth task (see what I did there?!). We needed more engineers, but that was contingent on revenue generated from our application to fund.

Whilst I realised that to make TAISK valuable, it needed to be a Swiss Army knife, capable of addressing various needs that entrepreneurs encounter at different times. I needed a bigger team to take on the challenge. Otherwise we would end up multi-tool where none of the functions really work optimally.

This led to our first pivot: building specialised tools instead of a Swiss Army knife. The team focused on a few popular use cases and developed independent apps to address specific problems. The hope, to make some quick money to fund team expansion.

The first tool was Rolochat, a conversational interface for accessing HubSpot data.

Unfortunately, just as we launched it, HubSpot also launched their version, which was 100% superior... buggers!

Nonetheless, we gleaned valuable insights from the experience, particularly in accurately reading and interacting with large databases through a chat interface—insights we could apply to our core application as well as future projects.

Our next tool was called EasyReport. Check out the promo video:

Over the last year, we've conducted extensive work with schools, where a common challenge for teachers is writing reports.

While there are existing AI tools for report writing, they generally produce generic reports and lack database integration. So, we decided to create a secure solution that safely integrates with any school's data, enabling teachers to generate targeted reports for students in a fraction of the usual time—accurate reports delivered in minutes.

EasyReport is set for launch in January.

We've also engaged in numerous custom development projects. These projects have been invaluable for our team to explore new methodologies and delve into frontier technologies - particuluarly agentic AI (autonomous systems that carry out tasks by choosing which applications to use and how).

Moreover, custom development funds our efforts. These individual projects sparked an idea: What if we could leverage our custom development to fund research and development for our core application? This approach would ensure that clients receiving custom work obtain exceptional value for money, while users of our core application gain access to technologies previously reserved for larger companies.

This brings us to our final pivot: re-focusing on our Swiss Army knife concept. Rather than independently funding and developing each tool, we're collaborating with corporate partners with specific challenges that necessitate AI-based solutions.

Heading into 2025, our strategy is clear. We will continue to evolve and deliver an application that addresses more tasks required by entrepreneurs and SME owners. Simultaneously, we will maintain our custom work for corporate partners, nurturing a symbiotic relationship that benefits all parties involved.

To everyone who has been involved, thank you and see you in the New Year.

Alex is CEO of TAISK and TAISK Labs . You can message him at alex@taisk.com