Blip: “We were pioneers in a different way of working”
Winner of many awards as “the best company to work for in Portugal”, Blip is writing code from Porto to over five million people across the world. Sara Sousa, the Senior HR Professional from Blip talked to us on the second SLP interview.
How did you start and how many Blippers are you now?
Blip was founded in 2009 as a software engineering startup with only 3 people. Betfair was one of its initial clients and three years later they bought this company and Blip was integrated on their group. After that, I’ve already moved twice for different offices and in February 2016 Betfair joined with Paddy Power, to become the Paddy Power Betfair Group. Nowadays we are already 300 Blippers and you are still growing.
Did you have a connection to Porto since the beginning?
The Blip founders are no longer with us and I didn’t meet them. But I think they have a connection with Porto because they were born here.
Even after the acquisition of Blip from Betfair, the group decided to stay in Porto. What can be so attractive to make a world-known company bet on this city?
The main reasons for staying here are the major skills that we can find in Porto in the software engineering area, with a great know-how that can produce great software here, reason enough to be a differentiating factor. In addition, Porto (and Portugal, of course) has the same time zone than UK and Ireland, and that’s a plus because almost every Blip European stakeholders are from there. The cost of human labor is obviously another reason (although it’s not the main one) but the key reason is the human skills that we can’t obtain in another location at this moment.
As one of the fathers of Porto tech ecosystem, how can you be different from the other tech companies of the city?
It’s a fact we’ve been here from the beginning of this tech wave of growth in Porto and north of Portugal. And at least in the beginning, we were pioneers in a different way of working and a different workplace in Portugal. We were one of the first companies that adopted a more relaxing and flexible way of working. We’re still the best company to work in Portugal, we won the price last year too, we won the best workplace too, and we’re also making an extra effort to be on the top of the companies that offer best tech conditions to their employees. So, yes, we were in the origin of some of the best working conditions that some companies are putting in place nowadays.
What can Porto’s tech community expect from you in the coming years?
We are working on some projects, some of them in the HR area and some of them can also be pioneers. I think there are two points of view: what we can offer to people that work with us — and the feedback is still very good — and what is the work conditions on the global market and about that I can assure we’re on the top. The future will show us the way but we’re working on new projects every year.
Do you think we are reaching a breaking point on engineering labor supply in Porto?
I think every year we have new people coming to the market but we also have an exponential increase in the demand and so we have less talent available now in Porto. We would be naive if we couldn’t see that could be a problem in a future. Blip is one of the three founders of Porto Tech Hub and we’ve even created a program called SWitCH to convert some talents from universities and bring them to our area. We give them a paid internship. We cannot wait only for the universities to form people. We have to convert other people from the market.
Based on your experience so far, what would you recommend for companies/startups that are looking at the Porto region as a location for their next office?
We are actually at this point that, in one hand, we want more companies to come to Porto because it is good for the market but, on the other hand, if those companies want only to recruit labor from Porto there’s a real risk we could have a rupture on this level. We have to think in a sustainable way. The labor cost is one of the key-factors and if we have a rupture on labor the location Porto could be less attractive, and we don’t want that.
One last — and personal — question. Porto was the issue of this interview and it’s also your city. What’s your favorite restaurant in Porto?
I really think one of the most attractive things in Porto is the food. We can have a great meal here. So, it’s very difficult for me to select just one restaurant, but in terms of the quality of food, the place, and staff, I choose Flow. I think it is a very nice and pretty place, with an interesting menu that really worth knowing.
By FES Agency
