First Customers·George Richardson, AeroCloud

AeroCloud: A SaaS Journey of Pivot and Persistence

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George Richardson is the co-founder and CEO of AeroCloud, an airport management software that helps airports optimize operations and revenue.

In 2017, after retiring as a professional race car driver, George was looking for a new challenge. He randomly met Ian at a coffee shop in England and after they got to know each other, they decided to start a business together.

Ian had previously built and sold an on-prem software product for airports. So given his domain expertise, the duo decided to build an app to help airlines resell last-minute plane tickets, but they struggled for 2 years to gain traction.

Eventually, they had an aha moment. They asked themselves – why not take Ian's proven on-prem airport management software and reinvent it for the cloud?

It seemed like the winning idea they had been searching for.

So they pivoted and started building a new product. But even with Ian's strong track record, they still struggled to sign those critical first customers.

A breakthrough eventually came at a conference when a potential customer said he'd use AeroCloud if the founders could build custom features for his airport.

It wasn't trivial work and risky to use up much of their limited time and money.

But the gamble worked – after making the improvements to the product, their first airport signed up to pay for AeroCloud. This success convinced other airports to sign on too, giving George and Ian much-needed early momentum.

Fast forward to today – AeroCloud now serves 60 enterprise airport customers, has grown to a team of 60 across the US and UK, and hit multiple millions in ARR.

This episode is part of our First Customers series.

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