Former students on their way to appiness

Sheenu Chawla, managing director of Sush Mobile. Photo / Sarah Ivey

An Auckland-based app company has hit the $1 million turnover mark on the back of designing successful programs for businesses.

Sush Mobile was set up by Sheenu Chawla and Sulabh Sharma, who came to New Zealand to study. Staff numbers have increased from four to 15 over the past year.

The company developed Speak Like a Pro, an app for its client Spicers NZ, which gives business people tips to improve their public speaking.

The $1.29 app is at number three on the New Zealand Apple app charts business section, and went to number nine within 48 hours of its launch.

Sush has since developed enterprise apps for organisations such as Local Government NZ, Ritchies Coachlines, and entrepreneurs.

One of the apps Sush recently launched is the Precision Farming app, used to order, monitor, measure and record the activities of fertiliser spreaders on farms, meaning farmers do not have to buy GPS devices. Another is designed to allow people such as travelling sales staff to design and fill in custom-made forms on their phones.

Chawla said app design was no longer as simple as making a mobile-friendly website. "Mobile device applications are changing the way businesses engage with their customers as well as enhancing the capabilities of their operations."

Chawla said New Zealand companies were starting to realise the value good apps could add to their business, partly on the strength of the success of big corporations overseas.

"And it's not just consumer apps. There's also business-to-business and business-to-employee, to improve efficiency and productivity."

She said a lot of app developers did not focus strongly enough on design. "Design is a major component. There are half a million apps in the app store, why should someone choose yours? You have to make it distinctive."

Sush is set to open another branch in Wellington and has a third centre in India.

Chawla said they were investing heavily in new technology, to keep up with the dynamics of the mobile industry.

She said key for the future would be to design apps that added real value. "Everyone knows what an app is but not what it can do for their business."