Miguel Tomás is CTO and co-founder of Bica Studios, a Portuguese startup that develops games and entertainment services that are ready to explore the potential of the mobile platforms. He is also former student of Computer Science and Engineering at Técnico. “The link to universities is always the best way of bring together students and companies”, he explains.
“I have always wanted to create games”, he said. “I started to be interested in game design, then Art and 3D, and I also tried sound…” In 2013, after working in another gaming company, he decided to found Bica with Nuno Folhadela (current CEO).
It was a challenge. “We knew that we wanted to create games, we knew how to make them, but the whole process of setting up a company and its internationalisation was new to us. It was a very interesting challenge, and it still is”, he says. They started with a team of 4 people. Today the team is composed of 13 people from Portugal, Mexico and Russia, and three of them are Técnico alumni. Besides Miguel Tomás, also Nuno Monteiro (Lead Engineer) and João Catarino (Game programmer) studied at IST.
According to the CTO, the daily life at Bica Studios (currently based at Vodafone Labs) is “quite relaxed”. “The company has already released two games: Smash Time and Slice In, which are radically different. “Smash Time is a smasher. A group of heroes must save the planet and we help them, by smashing the «blobs» before they attack our heroes. (…) Slice In is a more casual game, which aims to fit the slices on the empty slots of a rotating “pizza” while it moves faster and faster.”
The reaction has been very positive until now. Our purpose is “to make our business grow, not only in Portugal, but also abroad”, and the fact that the company is based in Portugal is not a problem. “America, Japan and the UK have a solid gaming industry for many years. All we need is a more accurate knowledge of the industry itself.”
The alumnus left an advice to all interested in entering this business: “Today we have platforms that allow anyone to begin. Start creating games. Talk to people, talk with us and with everyone involved in the gaming community. And remember: success requires hard work”.
