Juma Labs Founder Justin Martin, who recently graduated from Caddo Magnet High School, started his software development company over the summer to build technology with a mission to improve education.
“Education is something that is important to me because it can change lives in dramatic ways and it is the most important building block that we have in society, next to compassion,” said Martin. “Education is also one of the fields that can most benefit from technological innovations.“ One of the most memorable things Martin learned in elementary school was the definition of technology, which he said is “the application of science to everyday life.” “I’ve always been a thinker, a tinkerer and interested in technology. Applying technological know-how to everyday life crystallizes my goal perfectly: to build and apply new technology to improve education.”
Martin is now joined by high school friend and software engineer Ron De Benedetti.
Juma Labs founder Justin Martin and partner Ron De Benedetti.
Juma Labs is now housed in Cohab, a workspace in Shreveport, and will be leading the Young Entrepreneurial Programs in 2014.
The young entrepreneurs are already off to a strong start. After putting their first app FlipQuiz on hold, Juma Labs began working on Write Something, which allows anyone to publish a textual work on the site.
Write Something is focused on bloggers, writers, poets, and anyone else creating textual content. The site was designed to be a functional, beautiful outlet for content as well as a way for users to monetize content by accepting donations through a widget and increase likelihood of the work being discovered.
The company has a set of principles that drive all of the product development: simplicity, ease of use and effectiveness. Juma Labs believes that products should be as simple and lightweight as possible, if a six year old can’t pick up a use a product, it’s too complicated and if a product doesn’t do its job, there’s no point in building it.
The duo already has other projects in the works. Keep up with Juma labs on Facebook, Twitter and the blog here.
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