All of the techies haven't migrated to northern California, or at least that's what Mike Burba is trying to prove with his new company DevHive.
The seven-month-old Farmington Hills-based start-up wants do for the software industry what Henry Ford did for the cars. Put more simply, it's a Silicon Valley-style start-up swinging for the fences in the IT world.
"We saw the opportunity for this to be something that is pretty big, pretty significant," Burba says. "We see it playing a big role in the evolution of IT."
DevHive allows software engineers to create and store software code in its system. That allows companies creating their own computer systems to tap into the system and use what they need (think Legos) instead of building everything from scratch. No more endless hours writing and crunching complicated code.
And here's the kicker: the software engineers get paid when their products are used. It's very analogous to various pay-to-play websites on the Internet.
Taking our Wayback Machine to the early 20th Century, imagine a time when there were dozens of different automobiles manufactured by small, expensive companies. Ford made production easier and more efficient with its assembly line process. DevHive hopes to do something similar with software by making essential bits of code available on the Internet.
"It's never been done before but we think it has the potential to be huge," says Burba, also a West Point graduate.
If works out like he hopes, the five-man start-up will grow to $25 million in revenues and employ more than 100 people in five years. For now, Burba and his cohorts are talking to investors about venture capital and in talks about joining Ann Arbor Spark's incubator.
"Our plans are for aggressive growth right now," Burba says.
Source: Mike Burba, founder and CEO of DevHive
Writer: Jon Zemke
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