Harvard Innovation Labs Companies – i-lab – Quikforce – 29/43

Quikforce

QuikForce is working hard to simplify the process of moving.  The founders of the company have over 20 years of experience in moving, and are committed to providing convenient, affordable and simple moving services to their customers.

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How it Works

QuikForce provides on-demand professional moving services. We have built a network of over 50 moving companies whom we can match you with to provide you a hassle-free moving experience. No more awkward phone calls, inaccurateQuikForce is working hard to simplify the process of moving. The founders of the company have over 20 years of experience in moving, and are committed to providing convenient, affordable and simple moving services to their customers. price quotes, or long emails.

Once you place a order through QuikForce, you are guaranteed a professional moving company that will satisfy all of your moving needs.

Website

http://www.quikforce.com/

Team News

• This Singaporean entrepreneur funded his way into Harvard and a new startup in the US

There’s no doubt in anyone’s mind about Singapore being an excellent place to start a business. Stable politically as well as financially, rich in investment and support, and an easy place to set up an enterprise, it sounds like an entrepreneur’s paradise. But for some Singaporeans, it’s not the promised land of entrepreneurship. The original land of promise, the United States, still beckons with its siren’s call.

The call was irresistible for Desmond Lim. The Singaporean entrepreneur moved to the US to complete a master’s degree in public policy, business, and government at Harvard University. He also worked at the MIT Media Lab for a while until earlier this year. “I really wanted to come to the US for school because I felt there was so much more to learn,” he tellsTech in Asia. “I think Singapore is great, I learned so much there, but I feel it’s small – there’s so much more to learn in the world.”

Unlike a lot of his peers, Desmond didn’t choose Silicon Valley for his next step. While living in Boston, he founded a new startup called Quikforce. It connects users to moving companies, allowing them to get the entire process of a move done through the site. It also implemented a software-as-a-service solution for movers that was warmly received by them. The startup is working with more than 50 movers in Boston and recently expanded to Miami. Desmond says it has so far generated more than US$50,000 in revenue and has facilitated over 100 moves.

Quikforce was named after his father’s one-van operation back in Singapore. “My father has been a mover for the past 35 years,” he says. “Both my parents barely finished school, and they don’t know how to use technology to do their job well. That’s why I wanted Quikforce to help people like my dad to do their job better.” In August, Desmond pitched Quikforce at TechCrunch’s NYC Meetup + Pitch-Off in New York, the only startup by an Asian founder there.

• Harvard-born on-demand moving services startup expanding along the East Coast

QuikForce, an on-demand moving services startup that’s currently headquartered at the Harvard Innovation Lab in Allston, is expanding from Boston to Miami next week.

The company offers a website where users can book professional moving services from a network of about 50 movers in Massachusetts.

Its sights are now set on Miami, where QuikForce is currently signing up moving companies to service customers in the area.

“(Miami) is a big moving market in the East Coast,” said QuikForce founder and CEO Desmond Lim, who founded the company with $20,000 in savings.

Since the company launched at the end of July, it has completed more than 100 moves and generated about $50,000 in revenue from connecting movers to customers.

QuikForce is named after a small moving business that was founded by Lim’s father in Singapore. “My father has been a mover for the past 35 years and I grew up helping him,” he said.

Lim’s parents began working full time after finishing fourth grade and Lim became the first in his family to go to college.

Lim launched his first startup in Singapore at age 17, which was a platform that connected students to tutors. His second business was a Thai food restaurant that he launched his freshman year of college at Singapore Management University, and then sold for an undisclosed sum his senior year.

Lim graduated with a master’s degree in public policy, business and government from Harvard University this year and was a teaching fellow at the MIT Media Lab from 2013 to 2015.

QuikForce is run by a team of eight.

• 17 Entrepreneurs Celebrate Summer Business Accomplishments

Summer is over. While many were going on vacations and traveling, business was still being completed for many entrepreneurs and business owners. The time flew by and as school starts, the weather changes and the temperature drops, we decided to connect with entrepreneurs and business owners to see how their summers went and what were some of their accomplishments. We decided to ask them what their best business accomplishments as we head into the fall.

• Meetup + Pitch-Off: New York 2015

• Harvard i-lab Startup Uses Big Data to Match Customers With Movers

Moving season is upon us, Boston, and if you’re relocating your place of residence but haven’t booked a mover or a truck… well, normally I’d impart upon you a Taken-like “good luck.” But there’s another solution available that could quell your moving woes.

QuikForce  was born out of the Harvard Innovation Lab in 2014 – where it’s currently operating out of – but really it predates that year by about three decades. Founder Desmond Lim, who boasts a master’s degree in public policy from Harvard, conceived of a platform to connect customers with well-curated movers in such a way that he likens it to “Kayak but for moving firms.”

Lim’s father, who was a mover for the past 35 years, was the inspiration for this budding company. Having been around the moving business for much of his childhood, Lim was poised for years to help innovate the industry.