Ryan Johns
Ryan Johns (Co-founder & CTO at KeepTruckin)
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Today's interview is with Ryan Johns - Co-founder & CTO of KeepTruckin
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Name: Ryan Johns
Current role: Co-founder and CTO at KeepTruckin
Previous Roles: VP Technology at Tapjoy, Software Engineer at Card Player Media
Education: Washington University in St. Louis (BS and MS)
Major: Computer Science
How did you decide on being a Computer Science major?
I originally had plans to be a doctor. I actually started out at WashU as a pre-med student but then switched into the Engineering school, still thinking I would be a doctor, and was on track to major in Biomedical Engineering. It was less memorization and more application than what I previously had as a pre-med student, which I really liked. But, I had a bunch of friends from my freshman floor who were big on computer science.
Computer Science was something I was already interested in, and I had a realization sometime during my sophomore year that it was really something I should be doing as my career. As a result, I switched to a computer science major in the beginning of my junior year, which was the best decision I ever made. I finished up my undergrad studies and stayed the extra year to do my masters as well.
What exactly is KeepTruckin? What is your role there?
I am the co-founder and CTO of KeepTruckin. Part of my job is overseeing all things tech related at the company. All of our software and hardware developer teams, among others, report to me. To touch on what we [KeepTruckin] do, in a nutshell, is that we offer fleet management services to various commercial vehicle fleets across North America. Today, our primary audience is the United States and Canada, but we might expand that in the future. KeepTruckin offers a range of services that include compliance services through logistics and tracking of the assets that fleets own and operate (drivers and vehicles). We provide operational insights and regulatory compliance to those fleets.
There are a lot of federal rules that require certain kinds of tracking for drivers, really aimed at safety so that drivers don’t overdrive and get into accidents when they are too tired. KeepTruckin provides a hardware solution that plugs into the truck itself, a device of our own design, that records everything about what that specific vehicle is doing from the internal computers. The device also has a number of external sensors that we have onboard our device itself – GPS, accelerometers, temperature, humidity, etc. The device is paired with a smart phone application to create a compliant electronic logging device solution, which the government requires for these fleets.
That is our core service but then on top of that we also offer a whole bunch of additional services that fleet owners and operators care about. We offer all kinds of things such as location tracking to utilization tracking, where we give the drivers a good operational insight into how they are using their fuel, whether or not they are being efficient drivers, if there are any problems with their truck, and if they are driving safely.
How large is KeepTruckin’s team?
We have almost 1,100 people on our team. We have offices all over the world. In the United States, we are just over 200 employees split across San Francisco, Nashville, and Buffalo. We also have about 600 people in Pakistan, predominantly in engineering, sales, and customer support. Then, we also have a smaller team (about 100 people) in the Philippines that are exclusively sales. Finally, we have a very small team of hardware engineers based out of Taiwan.
When was KeepTruckin started and what has you’re growth looked like?
We started in 2013 and growth has been pretty crazy! We had around 40 people at the end of 2015 and then we really blew up in 2016 on the back of new regulations. The ELD (Electronic Logging Devices) mandate went into effect in 2017, so we grew in a very significant way, ramping up our sales and operational capacity throughout 2017 in preparation for that mandate. Since then, we’ve continued to grow in a lot of different ways, and we are looking for a lot of different ways to expand the business right now. The growth is definitely not stopping.
Did you have any prior work experience before starting KeepTruckin?
Yes; I started immediately after college in Los Vegas as a software developer working for a poker gaming software. The company was called Card Player Media and we did a couple of different things. One half of the business was basically just a website offering a range of things poker related such as strategy, news, and a way to track your own poker ROIs. We also had a sister site that was the actual online gambling portal. Here, we offered a subscription based poker gaming ecosystem. Card Player Media was a very small company with not much structure, something I really enjoyed. I like working with small teams and figuring things out on my own, so I really enjoyed the small team size at Card Player Media.
After Card Player Media, I teamed up with one of my college roommates who had been an engineer at Google, Stephen McCarthy. Stephen left Google to start a company, Tapjoy, with his Product Manager from Google. Stephen was the first engineer there and he immediately recruited me to join the team.
Stephen and I spent a weekend together bootstrapping together what ultimately became the Tapjoy mobile ads network. I then moved out to the Bay Area full time and the two of us built the engineering team at Tapjoy to about 50 people by the time I left in 2012. At that time, TapJoy was doing a little over $100M in annual revenue.
Personal hobbies and passions?
Skiing is definitely one of my hobbies. I love winter sports. As a kid, I grew up in the mountains with my grandparents, so skiing is huge for me. More recently, I have become very interested in travel and food. I married a lovely lady who is quite the foodie, and she has really taken me on board with that. My favorite restaurant is probably Atelier Crenn – a French restaurant in the Bay Area.
If you had to offer a piece of advice for college students today, what would you say?
Number one for me would be: Be more aware of what is happening in the world outside of your studies. In college, it is super easy to be super hyper focused on what you are trying to accomplish in class. It becomes very easy to lose track of what is happening in the world and what trends are emerging in terms of industry development and stuff like that. College is supposed to be about finding your passion, but it can become really hard to do that without paying attention to what is happening around you.
Kind of similar to that, another piece of advice I would offer is try to take classes outside of your focus area. I would definitely emphasize taking classes in an area that you think might be relevant for your long term career. For example, I would highly recommend that business students take a programming class, maybe an intro to computer science course or something like that. Being able to just speak that language and understand what goes into it will really help with negotiations, hiring, fund raising, etc. On the flip side, engineering students should definitely take a business class or two. It is unrealistic to think that you can become a founder or executive of a big company and not understand what is happening on the business side. It’s really important to be well rounded!
Do you think there are any industries or majors that are really important for college students to try and get into today?
As far as industries, transportation logistics is close to my heart given the KeepTruckin experience. I think it is an industry that is very underserved, technologically speaking, and that is ripe for disruption. Outside of that, healthcare and Blockchain are two other areas that really interest me. All kinds of technology solutions are coming into the healthcare space and Blockchain is obviously super hot right now, too. I think it’s to be determined what will actually emerge from Blockchain. I think there are some applications that will win and become big businesses and others that won’t. But, it’s not perfectly clear what will actually come of it right now.
Do you have any recommendations for students trying to decide on their career path?
I think the most important thing is to establish a plan and stick to it. You really have to understand: This is what I am trying to accomplish and these are some steps I need to take to get there. Constantly networking with your fellow students, advisors, and mentors will be incredibly helpful.
For me, for example, I knew that when I left college that I wanted to start a company one day. So, I sought out roles that would give me the experience needed to get me there. It was pretty clear when I left college that I needed to be a programmer first, understanding what it takes to deliver software and what it takes to be a manager before going out and starting a company. I also wanted to know how to fundraise and come up with my own ideas. All of these things were clear to me from the beginning – it was just about finding a job that moved me one step closer to the goal each time.
When you think you’ve learned all you can, it’s time to get a new job and move on. (Never sit ideal is the moral here)
Does KeepTruckin offer any internship opportunities?
Yes, we do offer internships. Last summer, we had two interns from WashU with us for the entire summer on the operations side. They were doing Business Operations work to help us know where to grow next. I am planning to also start an engineering internship program this summer.
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