A Spiritual Entrepreneur

Spiritual Entrepreneur, Is he a priest or a pundit?

No.  He is neither a priest nor a pundit…!

He is the Co-founder of Standardtouch, Director of qsaudi.com, CEO of MyWebExperience and also CTO of funnyfunnyjokes.org.

Here is a story of an entrepreneur who began his career at the age of around 17 years. To introduce his personality, no other line will be more beautiful than this, as he says, “All the wealth you painstakingly amass will remain here. You won’t be able to take one single thing with you. Always remember this. What are you gaining really, and at what price? Are you sacrificing your Hereafter for some glitz & glamour of this world that many call luxury?”

Mr. Hamza Mauzam Ali (B.E, M.Tech Medical Electronics) started his business journey in 2003 when he first developed a website for a Dubai based company iconcomputersllc for 600 USD when he was in 12th standard. It was his first earning. While he was pursuing engineering he started Standardtouch and business ideas were exploding.

After finishing engineering, Hamzah was in a big dilemma like most of the youngsters weather to join a handsome paid job in Oil & Gas Company in Saudi Arabia where his families were located or peruse his long term dream of business.

He syas, “The greatest gift in this life is Faith. If Almighty blessed us with that gift, everything else is secondary, money, health and anything”. Then he moved ahead with his father’s support and encouragement that he will join Masters with intention of starting business in near future.

With strong faith and commitment he was moving ahead to chase his dreams. It was final year of his Masters that Hamzah started a full-fledged company, but it was a tough game. Failure after failure.

With a heavy heart, he continued to work, but didn’t look back. Every project was a big setback, hours of investment but no return, zero income. The first sold project was ebamooz, a classifieds portal for Saudi Arabia. He worked for more than nine months on the project, but it failed to takeoff.

He was expecting that, this site may run successfully, classified ads will be copied from competitor’s websites. However, soon a legal notice was issued from competitors called DMCA. The project crashed.

Finished…!

“Let’s go to Saudi Arabia, and work in Oil and Gas Company…

What will family say…?

How to face friends…?

Am I failed..?”

NO… I think, these lines which he often says in his motivational speeches made him stronger to work with the same passion with which he had started. Hamza says, you’ve got to be patient in this journey called LIFE. It will make you, it will break you. You’ll meet people along the way who will render help & those who will leave you by the wayside. But if you keep asking the One who made you, He will never disappoint. So never stop asking..!

Mr. Hamza continued his struggle.

After receiving the legal notice, the project was crashed. Then came sheikhjobs, a jobs search engine for gulf, which aggregated jobs from different websites in gulf countries. It was a great idea first of its kind but after the complete design the project failed because there was no marketing strategy, no customer acquisition plan. It went down the drain.

Mr. Hamza is a man of self motivation and strong spiritual beliefs. He says, “Accept and be happy for what Allah has blessed you with, it may be a small thing for you but to others that could be their biggest dream.”

He didn’t stop with consecutive failures, he moved on…

Next came in 2009 July, JATINDIA – JOB aptitude test India, this was again a brilliant idea. It had a test for recruitment of final year students. Hamzah was damn sure that this will work. It was also the time Standardtouch had its first employee. He was excited even more. Business plan was to get students signed up on websites.

This time as a marketing strategy and promotion of website, faxes were sent to all college principals with website and its importance. Thousands of students signed up for the tests. Tests were online, but here there was no planned strategy or even resource for connecting with companies. Idea failed.

He says that these series of failures have made him learn business skills, and given him much more insight. Technical skills too were improving day by day.  With all the previous experiences, he continued to work on the same project and started various options for more promotions.

And the success story begins.

He started Studyx – a project where students can earn while they learn, can upload old question papers, answers of questions, notes, etc.

He also began Resultsx – a results aggregator website where one can directly see results online for different exams. It used to get huge hits during result times.

Also, he launched Vtu results, which was an alternate result website for Vtu University, income was generated from ads. He then worked on NjoyLife which was a huge success and later rebranded it as funnyfunnyjokes.org. This contains moral stories and jokes. It was lifeline for me in continuing into business, said Mr. Hamza.

After the success in previous works, then Mr. Hamza came up with qsaudi.com, which has products, blogs articles, and various services. He didn’t stop his journey of success there, because Hamza believes that “Ask, ask and ask from none but Allah with full conviction! You’ll start to see miracles come your way.”

Many times, adverse situations break us and we sit with all desperation and despondency. However Hamza seeks motivation from even adverse situations. He says that “sometimes, we are too concerned with our problems that we fail to see a thousand other things that are going perfectly alright”. He combines motivation with faith in Allah, and keeps moving ahead.

Really a great thought to get motivated in all odd situations.

Then moving ahead, Standardtouch started web development divisions and went on to build more that 400+ websites followed by e-marketing division. Further on  Standardtouch started selling courses, online consultation, servers, etc. Currently it has a complete team and offices in India and Saudi Arabia and clients from all over the globe.

Currently, Mr. Hamza is facing medical problems. During such tough times he never stops smiling and motivating. After the treatment in 2018-19, he wrote a Facebook post, it made many of his friends so emotional and we all pray for his good health. He wrote:

“Just got discharged from hospital, after 10 days of stay, plasma exchange. All praise to Almighty. Pray this treatment cures me completely from this stiff person syndrome. Special thanks to my brother Abdul Mannan Ali for his unparallel support, time and love throughout the stay and tough times here. May Almighty bless him.

PS: keep calling and be in touch, Alhamdulillah I can talk and work, the less calls I get the more sick if feel.”

When asked about problem he is facing, he replied, “April 2019, it is almost two years that I have been diagnosed with ‘stiff person syndrome’, a very rare neurological auto immune disease, currently affecting only 5000 people in the whole world. It rendered me almost bedridden for more than 7-8 months, and is still with me. For months it is weakening my ability to write or stand or even hold mobile for prolong durations. My whole spine and back is locked and doesn’t bend since past two year. It taught me how weak we are, how dependent we are on the most merciful. Today I take about 14 tablets a day which allows me to walk short distance. Alhamdulillah my office is the adjacent building where I sometimes spend a few hours, and I am blessed that much of my work is done by employees (thanks to team). And whosoever puts his trust in Allah, then He will suffice him. I am in need of prayers, which can do miracles.”

I asked him a line for me. He replied, “Physically, socially, digitally and mentally, a person needs to protect their space from undue influence if they want to reduce their sins.”

For readers, he says, “Standardtouch is open to any mentoring and guidance to youth and wannabe entrepreneurs”.