About the author
We covered AboutUs way back when the office was setup in Lahore  
http://greenwhite.org/2007/09/21/aboutusorg-dev-office-in-lahore-what-do-they-do/
AboutUs kept going ahead Ray King was a smart entrepreneur even at the height of economic crises AboutUs secured a 2.5 Million USD Funding, and recently went ahead and bought another startup Jyte in January.
How ever it seems all is not well, they recently closed their Lahore office, here is the post from Ray’s own blog to confirm it. What could have gone wrong?
Let me be very clear here I don’t believe that closing of Lahore office had any thing to do with revenues or cost cutting, because just a couple of months back they acquired a company if it was for getting money for that, the closure would have come before the acquisition, and nothing suggests that their revenues have dwindled, for me the problem lies some where else.
I have been aware of AboutUs Lahore setup from start till very recently, AboutUs started with a lot of passion in Lahore I remember their first employees were paid huge premiums about 20~30k above market price for fresh grads which created a lot stir in the local IT startups, It was a dream company with high wages beautiful office location and brand new power full PCs, it was a startup environment with lots of money. Engineers got to work on their own projects which were both complex and cutting edge, and content writers were paid heavily for doing what they loved to do.
How ever until recently all was well, then there was a change, the management which setup the office here went away, as far as I know AboutUS tried to remotely manage the Lahore office and the people in middle management tried to grab the vacant top position and unfortunately some times it happens to us as a nation to get to the top the easiest way we know is to trample some one else. I am not sure and can’t confirm that this is the only reason but I am sure that some one sitting miles away if feels rift with in the team it does not bode well. Also if it means that their concentration is divided into solving internal office issues instead of growing the business they might do what Ray has done, it is unfortunate for us though.
Disclaimer : The speculations in this posts are based on first person info got from several people attached with aboutus.
March 11th, 2010 at 1:39 pm
New blog post: AboutUs Closes it’s Lahore Office http://greenwhite.org/2010/03/11/aboutus-closes-its-lahore-office/
March 12th, 2010 at 3:40 am
“Disclaimer : The speculations in this posts are based on first person info got from several people attached with aboutus.”
I don’t know from where you got all this information, but I assure you it has no basis whatsoever. How can I be so sure of it is probably because I was a part of AboutUs Lahore from the very start.
March 12th, 2010 at 8:35 am
“as far as I know AboutUS tried to remotely manage the Lahore office and the people in middle management tried to grab the vacant top position and unfortunately some times it happens to us as a nation to get to the top the easiest way we know is to trample some one else.”
ha ha ha…. Hassan is right, this is as far from the actual facts as you can get
March 12th, 2010 at 8:52 am
@Hassan, and @Asad, well I have my own sources but maybe that’s not the real story (I also got this from some one who was at a very high level, and some others from some one who joined early on) but again there are many sides of the story, if you have another side and think the information fed was wrong please go ahead and let us know, I would be happy to include your views in the post, my intent is not to throw mud at any one, but to analyze what kind of issues do exist and get other people aware of these and work amongst our selves for the solution.
And by remotely managing i did not mean that they had no local management but limited control over here, and again by no means it is wrong but might have been an issue i do say “I am not sure and can’t confirm that this is the only reason” and i am sure this might not be a reason, but the fact is an offshore office was closed when the parent organization was not in trouble or doing cost cutting, so this seems strange.
March 12th, 2010 at 11:39 am
I have been affiliate with AboutUs for over a year. I was there before the management changed and after it as well. I can tell you for sure that things ran very smooth despite the change in ‘management’ as you call it. Even though the ‘management’ that you refer to only comprised of one person and he was retained on a contract and was still working with AboutUs. All I can say is, I know for sure that this is not what happened.
March 12th, 2010 at 3:10 pm
@Moeez, thanks again as i mentioned earlier as well, if you are willing to share (and are not under any contract to not do so) do let us know what happened,
I can re-iterate that there might be more reasons i did use the word speculate for the exact same reason that i am not driving any conclusive argument.
March 13th, 2010 at 2:13 pm
I think it happens for the better! Once i get the chance to see few engineers at aboutus, they treat you like shit and as if you dont know anything and they know something which you can just dream about and all that attitude was because they were getting paid to do nothing!
March 13th, 2010 at 3:22 pm
Adil you got the language skills of a 5 year old and yet you somehow managed to reach a bizarre conclusion. I have no idea which ‘engineers’ you are talking about, but aboutus lahore staff had the most friendly people. I believe that you’re hiding your own inadequacy by flaming others.
March 13th, 2010 at 4:17 pm
Mr. Adil, I also seriously dont know which engineers are you talking about. Can you please name those engineers. Cuz I have asked my teammates and they say they dont even know you. Can you please put up some proof that can prove your theory??
As far as I remember, you are 03-1833. You talked to me once regarding positions at Aboutus and I told you very politely that we are looking for people who have experience in RoR. I even gave you some links to free ruby/rails ebooks, which I think was not my duty. It was just out of my good nature to help people. At that time I do not think that you had RoR experience, I think you had actually no experience at that time. You were still in your last semester.
Also can you tell the people here how many years it took you to graduate from FAST? Your CGPA and your extra-ordinary GPAs in your CS courses? Which off course you got after trying 2-3 times for each course.
Next time you post a comment on blogs like this, and point your fingers on others, do think what you are capable of. And do post proofs to your bizarre theories.
March 13th, 2010 at 6:39 pm
@Hassan
Sorry if i dont have the language skill’s like yours’, can you tell me where i can take classes to improve my language skills? Sorry sir i admit that i may not as “intelligent” as you are, and i am a person with many inadequacies and i not perfect as you are!
@Laiq
I know my cgpa is not good as yours, and i am not even close to your’s. Yes i take many CS course 2-3 times, it took me 6 years to graduate, and got a gpa of 2.22, anything else you wanted me to tell the audience here? And I have no guilt over this and i am proud that i am not among clerks out there…! I know that i am not, so called “intelligent”, as you and many others were in the campus. And i also appreciate the help and guidance you gave me once, which of-course was not your duty at all…
@Hassan and @Liaq
As far as my comment is concerned, about the attitude of people at aboutus, you dont have to ask me, go to the campus or people in this industry and ask anyone! If my perception was wrong, why Mr Qazi and many others also hear/experience the same bad reputation as i have?
If i put myself in the shoe of those who work there, i will be asking people why people have perception like this and send them an apology if some incident has cause this perception to build, and not fighting with people over mistakes which we have made. It is not necessary that those actions/words/incidents were intentional, but as humans we all do mistakes without knowing…
I am really sorry for those who have lost jobs due to this closure, and its bad for this country and also for those families who will be effected by this and when i put my comment, if it send the message as if i am happy on this, i am really sorry.
Every perception has some kind of truth behind it, it may be based on person’s own approach towards the situation, his/her knowledge and experience. But if most of people have the same perception there is a big chance that perception is a fact, not inability of that person to analyze the situation. So its the job of those (about which people have perception) to correct it, not of those who have perception about them.
Again @Hassan and @Liaq
I have nothing to hide here, i can even put the names, but i think this is enough… and sorry again for the lose of your job.
March 13th, 2010 at 8:05 pm
yaar Adil. kal mujhe bhi 10-12 banday keh rahay tha ke Adil Muhammad eik chawal banda hai. I can even put the names but i think this is enough. And I am not worried about losing my job a bit. So you dont have to take any tension about it. Thnx
March 13th, 2010 at 8:50 pm
Thanks laiq for your reply, your reply has proved many things…
March 13th, 2010 at 9:11 pm
“But if most of people have the same perception there is a big chance that perception is a fact, not inability of that person to analyze the situation.”
Mr. Adil, can you invite “most of the people” here to comment. I guess not.
“I think it happens for the better! Once i get the chance to see few engineers at aboutus, they treat you like shit and as if you dont know anything and they know something which you can just dream about and all that attitude was because they were getting paid to do nothing!”
I think everyone can understand what you wrote. You should not feel sorry for what you said.
March 14th, 2010 at 10:10 pm
Friends, please keep emotions check, lets keep the focus on what happened and what technically other start-ups can do to avoid ending in the same scenario, I am sure the decision was 100% business one, but that leaves us with one less place to work in and raises questions about viability of country as a good outsourcing place.
With the current national security situation around us blaming each other will not do any good, we still have a lot of apprehensions to clear lets focus our energies on those.
March 16th, 2010 at 3:49 am
Flame flame flame it all..!:)
March 16th, 2010 at 4:50 pm
Hi,
I was part of AboutUs for last 1 year and 6 months and it was by far the best place to work here in Lahore.
I am even saying this now even after they have closed their Lahore office because there is NO place in Lahore who can offer benefits and facilities to employees which they offered.
I believe that it was purely a decision for the business which they had to take. There are some factors such as instability in the country and security situation which definitely are risks to businesses and especially startups have to avoid risks like that.
@Adil: I dont know the background which makes you say this about the engineers at AboutUs and when you say “I guess thats for the better” definitely shows a bit desperation. If you need any help to get a little bit professional the current atttiude that you are demonstrating in your comments then let us know. We will surely be able to help you out.
@Qazi: It would be great if you can moderate such non-professional comments that makes personal attacks on any companies and its employees. And especially in situations where the commentator doesnt have any such proof to prove their point.
Peace
May 9th, 2010 at 5:11 pm
well i think the situtation in Pakistan are backing of alot of things.