Tope Awotona the creator of Calendly hits $30 Million and proves his naysayers wrong. Tobe is the brainchild behind one of the most popular scheduling software to date.
Nigerian raised Tope Awontona is the creator of Calendly founded in 2013. Calendly is a scheduling app that is so simple anyone can use it. Calendly prevents the constant headaches of emailing back and forth to set appointments. The user simply offers a list of times and days and the person invited chooses what works best for them.
In 1996 Awotona’s family moved from Lagos, Nigeria to Atlanta, Georgia. Born into a family of entrepreneurs and professionals Tope’s upbringing played a big role in his becoming the man that he is today. His mother and aunt owned a pharmacy. His late father was a microbiologist, and his grandmother owned an import-export textile business.
As with most black startups Awotona’s biggest challenge was locating money to fund his business venture. Tope was determined not to hassle his family for financial assistance to start Calendly. Instead, he used every cent of his own money, credit cards, 401k, and loans going towards his dream.
Tope Awotona the creator of Calendly hits $30 million and is headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia. As told to Inc.com Awontona was not fond when it came to raising money. But it forced him to become resourceful, scrappy, and laser-focused.
One might wonder how he did it. Word of mouth and sheer determination played a heavy role in the success of Calendly. Awontona’s background in IT doesn’t hurt either. He has spent time at IBM, and in sales at Vertafore and Dell EMC. He has also created other startups before Calendly, such as ProjectorSpot and a dating website.
Awontona dealt with numerous challenges while getting his company off the ground. Even when his company had a proven product with actual customers, potential investors still told him no. Despite being met with rejection after rejection simply because of his skin color he kept at it and did not give up.
For your scheduling needs visit Calendly.com to learn more.