It’s no secret that the booming new media and tech industry isn’t exactly booming with Latino entrepreneurs, programmers or start-ups. From the valley to the alley the Latino footprint is small. But a few good men are looking to change that. Enter the men behind Cardboard App — a virtual business card creation application. It’s no easy feat without having a huge investor backing, but the Puerto Rico natives not only built the app, but also launched it within a year. On the heels of its recent launch, ‘LLERO caught up with one of its co-founders Enrique Völckers Nin to get the inside scoop on what Cardboard App does and how the team was able to launch the app in record time.
‘LL: What exactly is Cardboard App?
EVN: Cardboard is a business card creation application. Through your mobile phone you can create your own business card. So instead of having to contract someone to design a logo and then go and pay to print them you can create your business card with your phone, with the touch of your finger moving things around and then sharing it with the contacts that you have. So what we’ve done basically is take advantage of the touch technology of the iPhone and integrated that so that you could do design your own business cards.
‘LL: How does designing the card work within Cardboard App?
EVN: There are about 1000 pre-designed templates available for the background for your business card depending on your industry. So you can pick one and then enter all your information: name, title, company, email and Twitter handle etc. and all the information appears on your business card. Then you drag the information around with your finger and change fonts, change colors, change text size; you have complete control on the design and positioning of the information of your business card. Then you can take that business card and share it on email, via text and even on Facebook and Twitter.
‘LL: What is the difference between say sharing a digital signature and using Cardboard App?
EVN: The difference is you have your own business card and people can then in turn share their card with you. Then you will have a digital Rolodex stored in the app where you can see all the cards of your contacts. Also, the cards are interactive so if you tap on the phone number of the card it will call it right from there. If I press on the email, it’s going to pop a window to write an email, if I press on the Facebook link it will take me to the profile of the person. So it’s an interactive business card.