Martin and Henrik made millions from helping Apple users

To meet this demand, he started Eplehjelp (Apple Assistance) with fellow student Martin Fossedal. It was an immediate success, and company is still growing.

Henrik had been interested in tech for a long time, and after high school he started working at Humac, a chain of Apple stores. He quickly realised that people did not fully understand the products well enough.

He started holding courses for Humac’s customers, but found that the group format wasn’t working. Everyone had different needs, and needed to learn their own way.

That’s how Henrik came up with the idea of Eplehjelp. Instead of giving courses for large group, he could film the courses and put them online. That way, users could follow along at their own pace.

Cross-discipline understanding

Henrik brought in fellow student Martin, who was already working as head of marketing for Næringslivsutvalget, one of BI’s student organisations.

Using what they had learned in class, they started Eplehjelp. The service has gone from simple video streamed from their website, to online courses, one-on-one teaching sessions, books about Apple products, and customised courses for businesses.

Their revenue is now in the millions, and the business has ten employees.

“Having a cross-discipline understanding between, for instance, business, marketing, leadership and project management – in other words, everything you learn at BI,” Henrik said, “does something to you, your business understanding, and the way you run a company.”

A business that started with the simple idea of helping people with their Apple products has evolved into a full-time job for both Henrik and Martin.

“[Eplehjelp] is actually somewhat larger than we had imagined initially,” Martin says.

“A lot larger, I think. And a lot more advanced,” Henrik adds.

In the future, the company aims to expand to both the Nordics, and the US – and to always stay focused on the users’ needs, Martin says.