GILLAND
AVRIL
Gilland Avril’s
Peekaboo App
Wins Get In The
Ring Title
Photo and Story by Stan Bishop
Last year, Gilland Avril pitched his
innovative app idea in the finals
of the Get In The Ring (GITR)
competition hosted by the Saint
Lucia Chamber of Commerce,
Industry and Agriculture. But the
technology didn’t capture the
judges, plus you needed a certain
high-end smartphone to actually
access it. He lost the competition.
This year, however, Avril, of the
company, Ngage, redeemed
himself by winning.
There are various components
of the Peekaboo app and, based
on market research, Avril intends
to target different areas with
versions of the app. He initially
looked at putting the near-field
communication (NFC) chips into
the coasters, buttons and fridge
magnets his girlfriend, Kassia,
created for her business.
NFC allows cellphones, tablets,
laptops and other devices to
easily share data with other NFC-
equipped devices. The technology
evolved from radio-frequency
identification (RFDI) tech, which is
behind those security scan cards
that get you into the office every
day or bypass that tollbooth on
your morning commute.
“I started playing around with
the idea for the app around
December 2018. Kassia wanted
to do something unconventional
with her items. For example, you
can download an app which could,
when you hold your cellphone
over the image of, let’s say, the
Pitons, the app selects a video of
the Pitons. That’s the power of
augmented reality. There are some
aspects of virtual reality (VR) to be
included in that, but that’s the next
phase,” Avril explained.
GITR is a worldwide podium for
startups to connect with investors
and fans who can contribute in
knowledge, network, funding
and time. The GITR Foundation
connects startups to innovators
to scale up their businesses,
working closely with leaders of
entrepreneurship ecosystems in
more than 100 countries. GITR
is known for its format where
startups face off in a boxing ring.
Avril, a former St. Mary’s College
alumnus, studied Computer and
Electronics at Sir Arthur Lewis
Community College (SALCC),
but never liked the software
component, finding it tedious
spending hours programming and
coding. But Kassia’s project made
him do a 180-degree.
“We actually tried to reach out
to companies overseas that were
asking between US$6,000 and
US$10,000 to create an app
like this for us,” he said. “For
that amount of money, we were
not sure how the market would
respond to our investment,
especially since it was a not-so-
popular technology.”
had no idea how he was going to
do it. He forced myself to learn
how to do it by figuring out the
programming and coding. Today
the app has limitless possibilities.
“We’ve done a rough demo for
Invest Saint Lucia and they’re
interested in it. We also showed
a traffic officer how using the
technology can allow them to
simply open the app over a driver’s
number plate or insurance sticker
which would result in an image of
the driver’s license or insurance
popping up on screen,” he told me.
Avril was among 12 competitors
in this year’s preliminary round
for GITR and one of three tech-
based companies in the finals
held in March. He now wears the
title belt and has earned bragging
rights. Moreover, he also won a
trip to Berlin, Germany in mid-
June, where he was grouped
against other random winners
of the global competition where
an overall winner was chosen.
He also interfaced with venture
capitalists who have the financing
to potentially broaden the scope
for his app.
“Get In The Ring is not so much
about getting financial rewards,
but really about opening up
opportunities for entrepreneurs. I
also want to use the app to market
Saint Lucia as a whole rather than
just individual businesses,” Avril
said.
For this year’s GITR, he proposed
doing augmented reality, but
58 SL-YOU | It’s All About Business
www.slyoumag.com | September-October 2019