After his family’s home was destroyed in the Kosovo War, Edi Demaj moved to metro Detroit in 1999. Once here, he immediately found employment. “I was 14 years old, and I worked as a dishwasher, a cook, a busboy, and a waiter,” Demaj says. “I couldn’t believe there was a country like the United States. If you work hard, you succeed.”
Demaj hasn’t stopped since then, and he still holds down four jobs.
After learning the ropes in management, acquisitions, and development from Grand Sakwa Management, a large commercial real estate and development firm in Farmington Hills, Demaj was hired in 2011 at Bedrock Real Estate Services, an affiliate company of Quicken Loans Inc. in downtown Detroit. At Bedrock, he serves as a project coordinator in office and retail leasing. While Bedrock is his first priority, he also works as director of business development and marketing at Solaborate, a new tech ecosystem that combines multiple social tools into one platform. With an office in downtown Detroit, the company has roots in Los Angeles, Silicon Valley, Kosovo, and Macedonia.
Unlike some other social and collaboration platforms, Solaborate allows video-calling straight from a browser, as well as the simultaneous use of screen-sharing and video-calling without downloads or plug-ins, says Labinot Bytyqi, co-founder and CEO of Solaborate. Users can send instant messages and share photos and media files straight from a browser.
Bytyqi says the company’s mission is to “provide a dedicated place for you, your company, and your products and services by providing all of the tools and services to allow you to be more productive.” Companies can use Solaborate to support and demonstrate products or services while offering a more personalized customer experience, he adds.
Solaborate allows audio-calling, video-conferencing, file-sharing, and screen-sharing as well as single-screen access with Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, and Google+.
As part of the beta launch, Solaborate developed a mobile app that enables users to access personal, company, and product and service profiles while sending and receiving messages, posting on walls, asking questions, providing commentary, and discovering other users and businesses along with potential recruits.
For his third job, Demaj serves as COO of iziSurvey in Rochester Hills, which helps businesses, organizations, and individuals to conduct surveys, including online. “The primary markets are universities, retail, research centers, hospitals, and title companies,” Demaj says. “If it’s a classroom, you can pass around two tablets so that every student participates.”
Lastly, Demaj is CEO and co-founder with his brother, Etrit, of Empyerwebs, a software development firm in Rochester Hills that works with Phronesis Technologies in Kosovo. The company’s first offering was iziSurvey.
“How do I do it? I just love to work,” Demaj says. “Although it wasn’t easy for my parents, they got my brother and I through school. I am very fortunate to have had the ability to get a world-class education in the best country in the world, and build a career that is evolving every day.” db
