Featured Startup on Azure - Modulus

Charlie Key is the founder of Modulus. He dislikes it when things are not efficient. He dislikes even more that others run into inefficiencies when they develop software and try to get their businesses off the ground. So, he wants to help. Modulus is his way of helping. In his words, "We want to make sure that developers spend the least amount of their time on non-value added tasks." 

No time wasted. Building products. Shipping. You can download a movie about Modulus here.

BizSpark: Tell us who you are and your role in the company

Charlie Key: I’m Charlie Key and I am the CEO and cofounder of Modulus. My role is hard to describe, it often changes on a daily basis. It’s important that I touch all the components of our business as CEO. I drive a lot of our business development and marketing initiatives. In addition, I’m intimately involved with our product innovation strategy. Modulus is focused on engaging the community so I’m often at meetups and talking about Node.JS in public forums for the development community.

BizSpark : What is your company’s mission?

Charlie Key: Modulus was built to help businesses and developers save time and be more efficient. We want to make sure developers spend the least amount of their time on non-value added tasks. Our mission is to help developers do the things they love to do; build products and solve problems, not waste time.

BizSpark: In 140 characters or less, tell us what your company does:

Charlie Key: Modulus is a holistic solution. We provide a scalable Node.js hosting solution, integrated MongoDB, and unparalleled application metrics.

Charlie Key, CEO and Co-Founder

BizSpark: Tell us about your Azure based solution.

Charlie Key: Our core product is a scalable infrastructure that allows us to offer customers the best way to host their Node.js applications. This includes an easy to use web interface and command line tool. This helps effectively deploy and scale applications. Along with hosting we have integrated MongoDB, which allows users to create and use MongoDB databases right through our platform. What’s the benefit of this integration you ask? Users have their hosting and database in one single location. What truly helps us stand out is that we provide a persistent storage mechanism. The persistent storage mechanism allows customers to save and access data from any of their application instances. The pièce de résistance are the metrics we save and display. These analytics give our users information about their application in real-time. This includes how well the application is responding, how many requests it is receiving, and more. Real-time metrics are a powerful and indispensable tool.

BizSpark: How is Azure implemented in your solution?

Charlie Key: We take advantage of the virtual machines that Azure provides. The entirety of our metrics engine and storage runs on Azure. This includes the machines to store the data and to retrieve it. Every request that goes through our system is saved for evaluation.

BizSpark: How did you get excited about Azure?

Charlie Key: The support is amazing and we’re thoroughly impressed by the rapid pace by which new features are coming online.

BizSpark: What were the Azure features that prompted you to decide to build on Azure?

Charlie Key: The availability of Linux Virtual Machines. It’s important to us to be able to work seamlessly on-premises and on the cloud. Azure gives us that flexibility. It’s efficient, stable, and easy. We are big fans of easy!

BizSpark: What specific value are you getting from BizSpark beyond the technology?

Charlie Key: The network. We love the ability to talk to engineers about the product we’re building and the solution it provides.

BizSpark: What has been your biggest “aha” moment since founding your company?

Charlie Key: The moment we realized what we were building could be used by a much larger audience than we first expected.

BizSpark : What advice do you have for companies that are thinking about building in the cloud?

Charlie Key: Take your time and determine the architecture for your product. Spend time with outside engineers and get their opinion on the overall design. Keep each component as general as possible. As technology improves, you want to be able to swap it out for something more efficient.

BizSpark: What is the one thing that you would like readers to take away about your Azure app?

Charlie Key: Our company…our product, exist to help developers spend their time doing what they love, building. The solutions we offer are not just for developers but the businesses that employ them. We’ve created solutions with clear ROI. Developers stay happy and businesses get real value.