Possessing a doctorate in electrical engineering, it is perhaps not surprising our Co-Founder Erhan Ermis was determined to build something of high quality with a bright future.

He and our other two Co-Founders, Michael Savolainen and Avinash Nandakumar, started Hyphen in 2018 with a vision to create a new type of business solutions company, tackling some of the world’s biggest projects. Less than six years in, they already achieving that goal and helping clients realise their ambitions.

The extent of the progress has surprised even Erhan but the success of the venture has not. As he explains in this interview, he is already excited for the future – and sees greater opportunities still to come.

Hyphen: What was it that inspired you to partner with Michael and Avi and start Hyphen?

Erhan Ermis: In 2015, I took a seven-month leave of absence from BCG to contemplate how best to shape my career and life as a whole, which was quite an explorative and introspective process. I went back to BCG possessing a clear desire to build something outside the established corporate world but I had not figured out yet what that would be.

I continued brewing ideas until I left BCG in 2018, the year after my first son was born. Around that time, I was helping an ultra-high net-worth individual build a new beauty brand and I learned Avi was in Dubai meeting a very close friend of mine, so we met up and discussed a few ideas.

Michael, Avi and I already had a good relationship by then – we worked together on joint projects for BCG between 2014 and 2016 and knew each other socially – so when Avi and I met up in 2018, the timing just seemed to align for all three of us to try building something together.

We deliberated extensively on what we could bring to the market because we all agreed we wanted to do something distinctive and elite in terms of the value proposition. Those discussions evolved into the initial premise of Hyphen and it has just kept evolving since then.

 

Hyphen: You mentioned you wanted to create something distinctive and elite – how would you define what is unique about this company?

Erhan Ermis: Hyphen is, in my view, a problem-solving entity and a future-of-work enabler.

Many professional services companies solve problems but they’re rather focused on certain approaches, mandates and outputs.

We have gone the other way and have a very broad horizon by comparison – it’s the union of problem sets in the professional services space. We’re much more open in how we define and solve problems as there’s no core mandate and we aren’t fixed to the idea of doing things a particular way.

We also know that curating cross-functional teams with relevant experience can be the most impactful course of action a lot of the time, which helps us to be more flexible. Another difference is that we don’t produce just one type of solution; we can generate conceptual solutions and we can produce – and help to implement – tangible, practical ones.

We can bring more to the table and I would say that we are a hybrid version of various types of professional services firms. That’s why I call Hyphen the Swiss Army knife of business problems – no pun intended given that my fellow Co-Founders are Swiss!

 

Hyphen: You, Michael and Avi each oversee particular business functions now – how have your individual responsibilities and areas of control changed over time and how did that transition occur?

Erhan Ermis: As with most things at Hyphen, the way we took charge of particular aspects evolved naturally. Initially, all three of us were doing everything.

As we got more support and breathing space, we started focusing on what we enjoy and where we can leverage our particular strengths more effectively. We each bring distinctive qualities that complement one another very well, as do the rest of the leadership team.

Occasionally, intellectual differences of opinion appear but I think that’s healthy – having a variety of perspectives means we don’t end up operating in an echo chamber. There is a spirit of trust that enriches our thinking so we get more robust discussions, which ultimately are in the best interest of Hyphen and the clients.

 

Hyphen: Thinking about evolution from a different perspective, are you surprised at all with the company’s progress since those initial discussions between the three of you?

Erhan Ermis: We knew early on that we were on to something good. As those initial discussions continued and we fleshed out Hyphen’s ethos and approach, it was very instinctive and clear to me we had a strong value proposition, even when we still needed to work out some of the practicalities.

One thing that has slightly surprised me is how quickly we have matured. Clients recognise the strength of our value proposition, are attracted by our breadth and flexibility, and know they can rely on our robust infrastructure and operating model. Hyphen is recognised as an extremely high-quality organisation; we have established our credibility with our clients, and they engage with us for one simple reason: because we bring them success.

Thinking about the scale of projects we are doing and the impact we are generating, it might seem like a big jump if our position now was compared to where we were five years ago. However, if you look at it incrementally, it is easier to understand because we have made such great year-on-year progress during that time.

 

Hyphen: Given all of that, what would you say represents realistic progress in the longer term?

Erhan Ermis: Cementing ourselves as a core member of the professional services landscape with our distinctive qualities and approach is realistic. The Hyphen name already carries its own flag in the industry, and we want to take it further.

We are very active across the Middle East and to some degree in Europe, and there is more ground to cover both to expand within these geographies and to expand the spectrum of our offerings. Those two things will be our external-facing focus while we continue to invest and build on our corporate infrastructure, which is important in ensuring we are the most effective and competitive organisation we can be.

Hyphen: Another aspect of the company’s evolution is the development of technology products and services – how fundamentally do you see that changing the nature of the business?

Erhan Ermis: Building tech products is our Hyphen 2.0 vision because we’re not just solving the current problems that clients have but we are thinking about the future as well.

This is what I mean when I call us a future-of-work enabler because a huge part of that is being able to offer tech services and platforms that facilitate the effective and reliable management of external workforces as easily as possible.

We evaluate tools on the market to see whether currently available solutions are suitable for our use. In some instances, we have concluded it makes more sense to roll up our sleeves and build it ourselves because we have the capabilities within our team to do that.

Those individual solutions will then form part of a broader ecosystem in time and, in fact, our first tech product is being rolled out as we speak, but none of this distracts us from our current operations.

Our investment in tech is about finding new, additional ways to generate value for clients in the longer term. It’s like the old analogy about giving a man a fish: Hyphen 1.0 is kind of like helping a client catch a fish, whereas Hyphen 2.0 is about giving them the fishing rod and the line so they can do it themselves.

 

Hyphen: To extend that analogy, the business has so far tended to fish in a few particular ponds – that is, establish a strong presence in select key geographical regions. Is that something you see continuing or do you think that Hyphen will look to new markets?

Erhan Ermis: There’s an element of opportunity cost to everything we do right now. The issue is not one of ability as we can solve problems and find solutions for anyone, anywhere; it’s a matter of capacity and continuing to maintain quality as we scale up. Right now, we have to think about how best to deploy ourselves most effectively and weigh up expansion accordingly.

Right now, it makes more sense to continue cementing our presence in the Middle East because we have a lot of knowledge of that region and believe we have plenty to contribute.

We have worked on quite a few projects in Europe too, and it is a place where we can be a bit more active. Discussions are ongoing for some great projects and we continue to explore opportunities for some large-scale collaborations; it’s an exciting time.

In terms of North America, for example, we have worked on a few US engagements where clients approached us, and we made it happen. We have not pushed proactively to enter that market yet, but it is somewhere we want to be – and will have to be if we are to realise our global potential.

 

Hyphen: You talk about capacity there – the team has expanded very quickly in the last 18 months in particular. How has it been integrating everyone and how would you describe the culture here?

Erhan Ermis: We collectively work very well as a group – we split things up, divide and conquer, and coordinate well. Having the group we have across different departments makes a massive difference and we truly are blessed with an incredibly high-quality team.

Technical skills are essential table stakes; we look for people who supplement those with the right mindset, entrepreneurial mentality, drive, attitude, humility and other intangibles because our culture is so important and I am proud of what we have accomplished in building this group.

It’s also really exciting when we’re all together – in retro sessions or on co-working retreats, for example – and you can see how the collective is growing. I didn’t expect to have such a large team by this stage but this is the cream of the crop coming together.

I am convinced that everyone at Hyphen would succeed in anything they do, both individually and collectively; but it’s more than just success, it’s about succeeding in style. This team is going to do that, which is inspiring to me and I look forward to seeing where it all leads next.