Motivation and time are very important in students’ life, as well as the place to study. Some students prefer to study while listening to music in public places, while others prefer silent spaces, but all of them prefer night spots with plentiful power outlets. Having this in mind and after looking for a place to study in Lisbon, during Summer, in a Sunday afternoon, Ricardo Santos, student of Mechanical Engineering at Técnico, came up with the idea on which the concept of UniPhi is based.
“I had the idea in my mind for 6 to 8 months, and I was thinking how would I solve the problem and who would I invite to join me in this project” says Ricardo Santos, flanked by João Araújo, also a Mechanical Engineering student at Técnico and one of his partners. Guilherme Oliveira e Costa, a law student at Universidade Nova de Lisboa, joined the team.
“Above all, we wanted to solve a problem, which was and still is our motivation”, says Ricardo Santos. After visiting many places to study and a lot of work, UniPhi Beta was launched in July 2018. “The app was designed so that users can find a place to study or work according to their needs and interests”, stresses João Araújo. “The app is lightweight, easy-to-use and fast”, adds Ricardo Santos.
UniPhi is available for Android and iOS, and it has already more than 1300 users. More than 8000 places were visited and 4500 searches were done through the app, which collects over 220 places including coffee shops, libraries and study rooms at universities.
“We are relatively satisfied with the result since we didn’t spend much time promoting the project”, says João Araújo. The positive feedback has been very important to keep the project going. “We allow users to suggest changes so that we have updated information based on our community”, highlights Ricardo Santos. “We want the app to grow so it’s important to have the users’ feedback”, adds the Técnico student.
According to Ricardo Santos “we want to focus also on freelancers or anyone looking for a place to work. There are a lot of people who need a place to write, to work, to use personal computers or simply to use Skype”. “We realised that we have better opportunities to grow if we looked into the labour market”, adds João Araújo.
UniPhi website will be launched in September, new partnerships will be established and a partners group platform will be created very soon, which will “allow to create a proximity relationship between users and partners. And if everything goes well, we aim to do the same abroad”, shares Ricardo Santos. “The app is quite simple at this moment but it tends to grow. We want to develop a sustainable project”, stresses Guilherme Oliveira e Costa.
The two Técnico students recognised the importance of their training in this whole process: “Técnico helped us developing our problem-solving skills”, stresses Ricardo Santos. “Técnico graduates are well prepared and ready to face any kind of challenge”, he adds.
