Win32 Virus Removal

The founder of Russian software house Kaspersky Lab shares his most important rule in business: To set targets, reach them and leave the sceptics gaping.

EUGENE Kaspersky was never a KGB man or a lieutenant in the KGB. Instead the 44-year-old Russian is a colourful figure in the world of computer security who has an insatiable appetite to do everything. Thats just the way he was built. I want to be everywhere, he tells StarBizWeek.

Kaspersky says that if he were not at the helm of a very successful international organisation today, he would be Columbus opening new frontiers.

I am not the kind of guy who stays in the corner and watches TV and waits to get entertained. I am the entertainer and I like to open new lands, he says.

And that, he has. He is the founder of the Russian software house Kaspersky Lab which works relentlessly to provide computer virus removal tools to users and is famous for its antivirus database called Kaspersky Anti-Virus.

Indeed, being of Russian origin, the firm is a rarity in the technology industry which is dominated by American and Japanese brand names.

He says it is his low threshold for boredom that keeps him moving and in continuous search for new terrain.

I cant stay in the same place for long. I want to make as much and do as much. My most important rule in business is to set targets, reach them and leave the sceptics gaping, he says.

Kaspersky says it has been a challenge to build an international IT company based in Russia but he survived on ambitious targets.

I started with no resources. There was just no money. And it was unusual for an IT company to come from Russia. Most of the IT companies are from US, UK or Japan, he says.

Luck is a word that does not apply to successful men. The highest monuments are built piece by piece.

The blonde, blue-eyed and bearded Russian studied cryptography at a high school, which was then co-sponsored by the Russian department of defence and the KGB, and went on to work for the department of defence.

I was always curious about viruses, he says. It was this apparent love for mathematics that determined his technical future and it wasnt long before an empire was born.

Kaspersky got into the business by accident he started collecting viruses as a hobby, in 1989, after his PC at the Ministry of Defence became infected with the virus Cascade.

I was a military officer and worked for a military research institute in the Soviet Union. At night, I worked on computer viruses and found that it took up a lot of my time, he said. Soon, I started to publish articles and conducted lectures on Internet security.

By 1991, he had written an antivirus programme to detect and disinfect them, and he co-founded Kaspersky Lab in 1997. The company was named and ran for a decade by his ex-wife Natalya.

Eugene says the early days with zero income and zero capital were knotty times, but he soldiered on and became self-dependent for ideas.

During the Soviet time, there were no businesses. There were no academicians. I just read a lot of books to get ideas, he says. His favourite book is Good to Great by Jim Collins.

Today, Kaspersky Lab is an international group that employs over 1,500 highly-qualified specialists, with central offices in Moscow, as well as regional headquarters overseeing the activities of local representatives and partners in five global regions.

The company works in over 100 countries and its products provide protection for over 250 million users. Eugene speaks regularly at security seminars and conferences held world over.

We did not know we were going to be such a success. We had no idea how to develop our business. Year after year we made more mistakes and then got more experience on how to do it and how not to do it, he says.

Far from being the quintessential bullying boss, Kaspersky says his management style is simple and open.

I lead by focusing on results not procedures. I hire the right people so I can delegate 100%. I do not like to look over the shoulders of my employees. I just check their milestones, he says.

He says flexing of corporate muscle is shunned in his organisation.

People who demonstrate their power disappear quickly. Leaders are okay but not those who demonstrate their power, he laughs. There is also no dress code and flexible office hours are the order of the day.

I just check the results of my employees. I share my view on how to do things. But most of the time I give them the freedom to manage their projects, he says.

Kaspersky says it is this management style that makes him comfortable leaving his company for a couple of months, which he does so every year. This time, he is in Malaysia to expand his empire.

We dont limit our territories. We have partners around the globe.

There are many who are interested in switching to our programme. Thats why we are paying a lot of attention to regional development, he says.

His biggest challenge, he says, is dealing with the amount of hours in a day, which never seems to be enough.

My work takes too much time. Half of my time is spent travelling, he adds. But theres no escaping from it and especially so given his motto: To do my best to change the world in a good way.