The Making of Salman Lakhani, and Cubix.

Salman Lakhani is the founder and CEO of Cubix, a successful digital product solutions company that builds mobile apps and games for the web, iOS and Android, including technologies such as augmented reality, virtual reality and much more.

The company has its focus on artificial intelligence, deep learning, machine learning, big data, blockchain technology and a lot more. To put it simply, Cubix is a true technology company, and Salman Lakhani is a leader who has successfully brought together the best people to produce a world class winning team. This is the story of Salman Lakhani and Cubix to date:

Salman’s Persona and Cubix

When you observe Cubix today, what you see is a brilliant family of thinkers and doers who love to work and play hard. The company is a stylish and dynamic entity, envied by many for its awe-inspiring achievements for which it has received significant business and technology awards. And seen at the forefront of presentations and mentorship sessions is a confident and handsome Salman Lakhani himself, who doesn’t shirk to thank and name each of his main people who bring creations to fruition. His smile shows how pleased he is, but never let that fool you; he is a serious-minded individual, diligent with everything, leading and working alongside his best people.

He is humble and straightforward, polite and brutally truthful. This is a man who has seen a lot over the years, and the success we see today is a result of indeed many years of laborious effort, heartbreaks, thrills and joys. Yes, there were ups and downs through Cubix’s existence too since its inception in 2008, but that is just a part of Salman’s story, as he faced hard times during his younger days; and, it is those bleak times that taught him a great many lessons and prepared him for life ahead. Indeed, that thing we call life was already upon Salman at an early age.

Salman’s Origins

Born on September 14, 1980, Salman didn’t come from an affluent background, and although he did belong to a community known for having business suave by nature, not everyone is born with a silver spoon in their mouth.

Salman’s family has its roots in a Kathiyawar/Gujrati tribe with its centuries’ old belonging in Sindh. Some members of this tribe or community moved around in what was pre-partition India, with many retaining Karachi as their habitat. His father belonged to Ahmedabad, and his mother is from Karachi. Salman had a brother, three years younger than him. The family lived near Aisha Manzil in Azizabad, an area that’s considered a bit below middleclass economic standards, and they managed their lives in a small apartment.

Mammoth Personal Struggles and Heartbreak

From his younger days, his father suffered with psychological challenges that seemed to worsen as time passed. His temperament varied, and undue anger was usually part of it, often resulting in incidents of manhandling and domestic violence. Due to this, being at home often got scary, and having guests and friends over was out of the question.

Salman’s mother bore the brunt of this, but she was patient, while handling her own struggles. She began to lose part of her memory, possibly due to chronic stress. But for a long time, it was this brave lady who was the sole breadwinner for the family, cooking and supplying meals to sustain a dignified living. She kept the family together and made sure the boys went through school. However, their struggle also comprised housing, and landlords weren’t always understanding. The family had to move frequently, another painful process amid traumatic conditions.

The hardest lessons in leadership are sometimes learned in dire circumstances; Salman, being the elder of the two brothers, began to shoulder some of his mother’s burden by doing odd jobs while he studied. The boys studied at a community school belonging to their community, the Agha Khan community, and sometimes even paying fees on concession was a difficult.

As with most traditional school administrations in the country, punishment for late fee payments often meat making students stand out in the sun. This was a cruel ordeal and embarrassment amid personal struggles, something that people go through patiently when they don’t have a choice. This went on for a long time, as the brothers made it through school and college.

Life was still somehow livable for that time. Then, things took a turn for the worse. While Salman landed his first white collar job, his brother fell ill and was diagnosed with cancer. The family was distraught while they tried every remedy and prayer possible. Nothing worked. Eventually, Salman lost his brother at a tender age. It was an agonizing time for them all, but challenges persisted.

Glimmers of Hope

Financial burdens plaguing the family, depression, and now the loss of a young sibling, would be sufficient to bind a person for good. However, Salman somehow realized he had to cope. He still had his mother by his side, and he kept working hard, beyond college, and then at university.

Salman won a scholarship and graduated from Staffordshire University where he completed his Bachelors in Computing. Besides his formal education, in a recent interview, Salman said,

I educated myself by observing people and learned from my professional and personal environment. I think life is the best teacher and the experience we go through is the best learning curve for every one of us.

Risks, Trials and Rewarding Experiences

Managing his studies amid familial and economic chaos, Salman probably hadn’t braced himself for challenges of another kind. This chapter began with an internship at a small software house, and then a role as a junior developer. He was a quick learner, and there were eyes on him. Initially, he had an offer to partner with a senior investor who had influential contacts.

After discussing the opportunity for business with a few of his peers, he fancied his chances against their intuition. Everything looked good at the start, but before long, he had few uneasy questions about what was going on in the company. He opted out, but was not compensated for his finances stuck that were with the company. He had to be brave about it because there was no way he was going to force powerful people to be fair. So, Salman moved on.

His next venture was a significant position with a pioneering software house. Salman had his real start in the IT industry here, as a software engineer, and later, he earned senior-level positions in the same company. The higher management recognized his leadership qualities and promoted him to Project Manager.

In a span of just three years, he landed a position working right next to his boss. Once again, things looked really bright, but it was not too long before he discovered proceedings that made him uncomfortable i.e., the way certain employees were victimized. It’s experiences like these that drove Salman to envision a company that would have opportunity, fairness and competence as some of its core values. He says,

I believe I was a born entrepreneur and at the age of 28 I founded Cubix with an investment of just $500. It is now a multi-million-dollar company with a global clientele.

Core Values and Cornerstones

Success is possible with intense focus on decisions and immediate execution. Of course, the process would span more than a day, a week or a month, but the results would eventually speak for themselves. The key here was to trust the opportunity at hand and execute, and this is one of the reasons why Salman holds trust very high despite being proverbially stabbed a few times.

You will be wronged in life, many times over, but you never lose heart, because a few faithful souls together can change the world,

Besides this major rise and fall, and rise again, there have been a couple of instances when the company took significant hits. These were of course due to factors out of the company’s control; however, the company and its processes are secure enough to sustain new challenges to keep working unhindered. This is when a company is no longer a company, but an institution.

The most recent example of robustness and stability Salman and Cubix demonstrated was in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic. While many companies downsized and even shut down, Cubix successfully managed their work and sustained operations through the first wave, without letting go of a single employee. There was zero panic because they followed their process and remained disciplined while working remotely with safety.

Salman’s words are usually spoken with his familiar direct and pleasing tone. Not too long ago, when asked about the reason for the company’s resilience and why Cubix has bounced back after major slumps, Salman said:

I never give up, and this is the killer-instinct that keeps driving Cubix and me forward… Giving up is not an option, but a choice, and you build your destiny by making right choices.