When teenagers get to have their own computers, the odds are that they will use them for surfing the web for school works, posting on social networking sites, and using social media platforms for entertainment. But that was not the case when Abhik Saha kept a personal computer at 11 years old, as he did way beyond the usual activities of teenagers on computers. Considered as an average student at Don Bosco English Medium School, Abhik was able to develop apps and create his own search engine eventually with his first computer. This happened in a small town called Chalsa, in the Jalpaiguri district of West Bengal in India. His interest in programming was sparked when he started his class on the principles of web design at age 11. Equipped with his computer, the tech wizard worked on that subject even outside of the class. Despite this, Abhik failed his computer science test that year, the only one in the entire class. While it seems like a sign for him to give up on it, he took the opportunity to improve and studied hard on the subject. “I did excellently well in the next computer science exams, this was a major boost,” he said in an interview with Your Story. Abhik revealed that he became interested in web designing more than programming. But with the vast applications of the latter, his computer science teacher tried to convince him to make the switch. “My teacher appreciated the effort I put into designing web pages but insisted I work on learning programming as well,” he said. “To me, C++ and other programming languages were plain boring. But what followed is still a surprise to me.”
He met with a software developer who introduced to him how great the world of programming is. Abhik was made to try Visual Studio, a programming integrated development environment for building software. “I began studying programming seriously and improved my coding skills, and solved logical problems. I then knew this was the direction I wanted to take in my life,” he said.
Abhik explored more to the point that he built his own company called Arnabhik Corp. Founded in April of 2014, it is a firm that builds websites which later on bagged projects from international clients. As of writing, Abhik’s company has made over 30 websites. “With the company turning out to be a success, I decided to move forward,” he shared. By moving forward, he meant buying two more computers for coding, his first server, and a broadband connection. With an extended access, Abhik went on to learn more computer-related skills. He built basic software utilities, a security system, and an antivirus. Upon getting a smartphone for his birthday in 2015, Abhik got to understand the crucial role of apps. For this he began learning app development for Android. Eventually in 2015, he made a 2D game app called Birdingo, which was his first one. He also created two education apps, a learning app on computer programming language, a 3D gaming app, and an app platform which provides a free hosting for websites. His success as a tech entrepreneur carried over in 2016 when he made more apps like GreenCulture and Reming God, which are agriculture and remind apps, respectively. Moreover, he created his own programming language called Lino in April of the same year. “I did not see the need to rely on multiple languages to create technology, so I took up a project to invent a unified language,” he said. “As I worked on understanding the frameworks that hold up the Internet, time and again my research hit a number of roadblocks.”
But he overcame this and developed his own social search engine, the first in the world. Called Origgon, it shows users the top searches chosen by people all over the world instead of based on keyword searches showing irrelevant content like spam, fake sites, and advertisements.
“The idea of launching a search engine came to my mind after I successfully created Lino. I began working on the assignment but was in need of funds. Around mid-February 2017, I met an angel investor via Facebook who invested Rs 21 lakh and helped me turn this project into an actual business,” says Abhik. “My objective was to build an index and database of websites one by one. I wanted to make a search engine that extracts results from other search engines and algorithmically sorts the best, deletes the spam and malicious sites. Our main feature is, we do not track you or your IP, and you are completely anonymous while using our servers,” he adds. Upon finishing his board exam, Abhik moved to Mumbai and launched his search engine in August 2017. Now with only three members in the team, Origgon is set to become the best search engine in the world, as how Abhik would put it. But before that happens, the young entrepreneur’s wishes for a funding of about 7 million USD to upgrade Origgon in terms of server capacity, marketing, and research and development.
