Estify, an Agoura Hills software provider to the auto collision repair industry

Employees: 60

Financials: Not profitable, raised $2.3 million to date

What led you to start your own business?

Furniss: While in college at Brigham Young University, I was put into a tech entrepreneurship class because the regular entrepreneurship class was already full. I thought I was going to listen to pocket protector-wearing programmers talk about things I knew nothing about. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

Where did you get the startup money?

Moss: Since we were still in college, we entered a few business-plan competitions, which landed us around $100,000. We joined the Amplify.LA accelerator and moved from Utah to California. Since then we have raised two more rounds of funding.

What’s been the biggest challenge so far?

Moss: Keeping the gritty, lean methodology present in everything we do: testing assumptions, sticking with the good ones and moving away from the bad ones quickly.

What’s the most important lesson you’ve learned?

Furniss: Have the right people around you. Working with quality individuals with similar visions, values and goals can make a world of difference when important decisions or challenges face the company, which they inevitably will.

How many hours a day do you put in?

Furniss: Often I stay up late into the night finishing a task or pondering about challenges the company is facing and how to overcome them. We have tried to keep a culture that we don’t need to kill ourselves with long days and miss out on the truly important things.

Has your youth led to any awkward situations, such as when you supervise employees who are older than you?

Furniss: It probably doesn’t help that I look even younger than I really am. People are often taken aback by our youth when we first meet them, but that quickly fades.

Would you start another company?

Moss: Definitely. I love the creative process and building something of value from nothing. You get to go through different stages and you get to see so many interesting and challenging things.

What do you do to unwind?

Furniss: My wife and I will go on late walks after a busy day to get away from the daily stress. I love snowboarding, which has gotten a little harder since moving to California; wakeboarding, when we aren’t in a major drought; and hiking.

– Omar Shamout