From Oracle to Chartmetric: A Journey from Employee to Startup Founder and $7M ARR

From humble beginnings as an MBA student to dropping every idea and finding his passion in solving a problem, Sung M Cho, founder and CEO of Chartmetric, shares his journey of perseverance, innovation, and trust-building that led to a $7 million annual recurring revenue.

  • Person, Sung M Cho, is founder and CEO of Chartmetric, a data analytics tool for music industry professionals
  • Chartmetric has major labels and tech companies as customers and hit $7 million in annual recurring revenue
  • Before founding Chartmetric, Cho was a first engineer at mobile game company Gamevil, studied MBA at UCLA, joined Oracle as a product manager
  • Cho didn’t originally intend to join a startup, but enjoyed learning about computer science and took risks when joining Gamevil
  • At Oracle, Cho felt stifled as the company seemed like a “tax collection agency” and innovations were happening outside of it
  • Cho wanted to start his own company in Silicon Valley to have pride in his life
  • When starting a company, Cho believes three things must match: passion for solving a problem, skills to help solve it, and finding others who are good at it
  • After quitting Oracle and trying different ideas, Cho felt lost and depressed, but realized he needed to move forward one step at a time
  • Chartmetric now has customers such as Universal Music Group, Sony, Warner, Netflix, Facebook, Amazon, Apple Music, and Pandora Radio
  • After running out of money, Cho gained the trust of his first customer who paid for an annual subscription upfront
  • Cho believes it’s important to exceed the expectations of early customers and build reciprocity with them
  • When starting a SaaS company, gaining the trust of the first customers is incredibly difficult but important
  • Cho doesn’t focus on competitive advantage, but instead builds something similar or the same as competitors and differentiates over time
  • Chartmetric’s pricing formula is to charge one tenth of the cost that customers would have incurred if they did not use the product
  • Cho only charges $20 a month for independent artists and believes in putting many years of effort into building a SaaS tool or business
  • Cho’s long-term vision is for Chartmetric to become an indispensable tool for the music industry, similar to Bloomberg Terminal in finance.

Source: EO via YouTube

âť“ What do you think? What is one thing that you wish you had known before starting your entrepreneurial journey, and how has it impacted your experience as a founder? Feel free to share your thoughts in the comments!