Bedroom start-up now rivals Google

Sunday Business Post - New to the Market - September 23 2007

Aodhan Cullen started in business when he was 12 and now runs one of the most visited sites on the internet, writes Dermot Corrigan

The emergence of a viable online marketplace means that a growing number of new companies are successfully targeting the internet, according to Dublin based entrepreneur Aodhan Cullen.

Twenty-four year old Cullen, who was recently named BusinessWeek Young European Entrepreneur of the Year, said the availability of cheaper web technology meant good online business ideas no longer required substantial financial backing.

“Within the internet industry, this is an incredible time where so many new services are being launched onto the internet every day,” said Cullen. "The upfront capital investment for internet businesses is now very low. Traditionally, you might have needed a couple of million to launch a business, but at the moment you can have a great idea and get it up and running with a very low capital investment."

StatCounter is a web analytics service that provides free web site traffic statistics to 1.4 million members. It tracks over nine billion page-loads per month across over two million websites. Its business model is based on selling advertising in the members’ area where users view their traffic statistics. It also offers extra detailed statistics to members on a paid-for basis.

StatCounter is one of the most visited websites in the world, ahead of household names like Apple, Adobe and Dell. It has the same ranking in the Google PageRank system (9/10) as Google itself, Microsoft, Cisco, NASA and the White House.



Cullen, who set up a business typing CVs when he was 12, was designing websites for companies by the time he was 16. His customers wanted to know how popular the websites he was designing were, so he came up with the StatCounter idea.

StatCounter has never been advertised or aggressively promoted, according to Cullen. It does not try to compete with larger players in the market, such as Omniture or WebTrends, but is instead aimed at smaller and midsize customers, primarily websites with 250,000 pageloads per month or less, that want a free reliable service.

“It started off quite slowly,” said Cullen. “Then, word of mouth started spreading, and each year we would double or triple our membership base, and it just all grew organically. Once we had all the people coming to our website and visiting StatCounter, we were able to show ads to support that business model.”

Cullen, who has a degree in computer applications from Dublin City University, said that the organic growth meant he had no requirement for outside funding.

“Whatever revenue came in from the website was spent back on the website," he said. "The fact that we have not had to consider any outside funding means we have been able to direct the company the way we want to. Third party funding may be considered in the future if something arose, but in the meantime, there is no need for it."

According to Cullen his young age has not impacted on the growth and development of his business, apart from one memorable occasion.

"I was 16 when I started doing StatCounter, so I could not get a credit card,” said Cullen. “All the hosting had to go through my da's credit card. That was quite funny, but once I reached the legal age of 18 I could get my own credit card and that was a main obstacle out of the way."

By the time the BusinessWeek result was announced in July, StatCounter had just moved into a new office in the Guinness Enterprise Centre in Dublin 8, where it employs eight staff.

"Up until three months ago, Statcounter was run from a bedroom in our home,” said Cullen. “The Guinness Enterprise Centre is run by the Dublin Business Innovation Centre (DBIC), which offers assistance to start-ups. One of the attractions is that there are lots of young, growing IT businesses there, and there is a spirit of hard work, enthusiasm and entrepreneurship."

"My advice would be to believe in themselves, to believe in what they are doing, and not to give up,” he said. “There are going to be a lot of hurdles along the way but if you keep persisting with something you are a lot more likely to be successful."