Introduction
Roshandass Rao, Chief Executive Officer at SimplifyQA Sdn Bhd, is a robust professional recognised for his experience in driving business agility, operational excellence, and employee-centric leadership style. He has a proven success record in diverse portfolios and industries. A graduate from Western Michigan University, Rao holds over 27 years of experience, 15 in the IT segment of Software Development and Hardware Delivery, and 8 in Software Testing and Development.
SimplifyQA is a forward-thinking technology company redefining software testing and quality assurance. They affirm AI is central to our product development and innovation, faster time to market, and provision of the best customer experiences. Their services aim at faster product development through AI and testing and improved business efficiency. SimplifyQA stands by its name: Agile, accelerate and automate.
Founding of SimplifyQA
Primarily working in the IT industry in Quality Assurance, the team noticed a significant gap as the testing tools were disintegrated. During the tenure, every organisation used multiple tools to manage a single product, which meant several different teams were involved, such as functional teams with functional knowledge and non-functional teams with automation knowledge. Due to this specialisation, each team worked only within its own expertise.
SimplifyQA was created to bridge this gap. The team wanted to build a platform that anyone could use without requiring programming expertise. That’s why they launch SimplifyQA, a low-code, no-code, or rather, scriptless solution, where even a functional user can create automation scripts independently, without relying on coding knowledge.
The second problem was that tools were disintegrated, i.e., they had to perform part of the process in Tool 1, another part in Tool 2, then manually consolidate reports from different tools into a single report.
This required multiple licenses and was time-consuming. To combat this, they decided to build everything into a single platform, inclusive of test management, agile management, defect management, and executive-level dashboards for comprehensive insights.
The vision behind building this product and, ultimately, this company was to fill these gaps and make testing more efficient and beneficial for both companies and end users. That is the foundation and core vision of SimplifyQA.
Scalable Solutions
With respect to innovation, though SimplifyQA was a low-code/ no-code in nature, though the product wasn’t something new in the market. There were already other companies offering similar features. However, these tools couldn’t perform efficiently. Despite having no code/low code, even if they recorded test steps, users still had to edit them heavily. Therefore, several users preferred writing tests manually instead of relying on the recording approach.
Before SimplifyQA, many tools attempted to refine this error, but the team’s vision was to build an automation tool with a recording feature that worked perfectly, i.e. once the user records, it should be accurate by default. It is allowing users to record test steps accurately without extensive edits. That’s the innovation the team focused on and even achieved it gradually.
They also aimed to disrupt the industry with other features like impact analysis. They identified gaps and innovated modules such as the Test Execution Plan, because teams often struggled with knowing what to execute, who would execute it, and how to track it. The Test Execution Plan module helps teams assign test cases, track progress, and address risks proactively.
Similarly, they witnessed a major gap in cloud execution as running large test suites used to consume 10 to 15 hours. The team addressed this by creating App Cloud Execution, utilizing multiple cloud machines to distribute test cases and ensure efficient execution.
This is how they continuously look at real problems, innovate solutions, and deliver solutions that accelerate the workflow. SimplifyQA looks at specific challenges in the software testing industry and stays ahead of the curve by transitioning the program to produce tangible results.
Innovating with Adaptable AI Led Solutions
As a company, SimplifyQA works with a lot of young talent, and their focus is always on discovering what’s new in the industry and identifying what value addition they could serve.
They have a dedicated team that conducts extensive R&D, with at least 30% of their revenue reinvested into these efforts. Through this department, they continuously innovate new methods of conducting several procedures. They don’t wish to stick to the traditional QA approach that has been followed for years. Instead, they want to disrupt the market with fresh methods and a modern perspective.
For them, innovation comes from empowering and encouraging their team to upskill and contribute towards the company and personal goals. They are free to experiment and present their ideas at any time, and they work with employees to refine these innovations. If an idea proves valuable, they integrate it directly into their current product.
Invaluable Customer Centricity
When they started SimplifyQA, their approach was clear, i.e., to build an initial version with only the features they saw missing in the market, rather than creating something no one would use. Their mantra is and will remain to focus on what the market truly needs and develop precisely that.
They began working closely with their customers, gathering constant feedback to understand their day-to-day challenges and incorporating those insights into SimplifyQA. This has shaped the product into something that feels tailored to them. Whether their customers are large enterprises or small businesses, they actively listen to their feedback on new features, understand their problems, and solve them directly.
This customer-driven development approach has led to exceptionally high retention rates. Instead of shipping hundreds of features that end up being only 5 to 10 percent used, they are ensuring practical, high-value features tailored to user needs. Whether their clients are in the US, Malaysia, or India, they ensure they understand their pain points and try to solve them as soon as possible.
Adapting to the Evolving Tech Landscape
The first iteration of SimplifyQA came in 2017. During that period, they didn’t have access to advanced tech within the company. They just wanted to develop something that was good for that period and matched their capabilities. They thought that as the market would evolve, they would function accordingly. The product was functioning well until 2020, until COVID-19 struck. The team survived through that period as well. Due to the emergence of AI, the need of the hour is to renovate the product to fit market standards. Because AI requires a lot of incoming data and heavy data processing. They knew their platform wasn’t built for that kind of technology.
That’s when the team rebuilt SimplifyQA completely. They studied the market extensively, went to certified bodies, and understood what might come in the next ten years. As the technology evolves, so does the company as the team evolves and strives to make a difference. The company’s team ensures one thing: whatever features they develop must enable seamless feature additions and continuous adaptation to market demands.
One thing the product team ensures is that the product evolves based on the market demands. Today, SimplifyQA is re-built with capabilities that are completely microservice-driven in architecture. This implies that if tomorrow they need a new feature, all they need to do is just write a new microservice and get it started. As per the market trends, they have ensured their product is very scalable and highly adaptable.
This is possibly the most important thing in today’s market because every week, there’s some new addition, and every other week, clients are asking for it.
Expansion of Services
At present, SimplifyQA hasn’t partnered with any external organisations. However, they strongly believe in partnering with their customers by understanding their needs, keeping track of market trends, analysing what other tools are providing versus what their tool is serving, and growing from the analysis.
COVID-19 was a defining period for them, as back then, SimplifyQA had only one product, and they were fully product-driven, without much focus on services. The pandemic created an era of “survival of the fittest,” where the future was uncertain. At the same time, IT experienced a massive boom, presenting many opportunities. They had to decide whether to remain a pure product company or explore additional avenues. This was a significant milestone in the company’s growth as they decided to expand into services.
This decision worked out well as they began offering highly technical development and testing services (not support services), which allowed them to build strong in-house expertise. This expertise, in turn, directly enhanced their product because their team had exposure to industry best practices and cutting-edge technologies.
Expanding into services helped them broaden their horizons beyond product development and positioned them for stronger growth.
Integration with AI
SimplifyQA, as a product or as a company, integrates flawlessly with AI. Today, with the product SimplifyQA, they are trying to bring AI integration into every module to support agile processes, create and execute test cases, verify reports, and detect errors.
They are also building AI to aid in their agile process, to create the test cases, execute the test cases, verify the report, and check whether whatever is being generated is generated correctly or has room for error. Therefore, they are trying to build AI in every aspect where the product meets.
Future of Work
As a visionary leader, Roshandass believes it is very important to foresee what’s coming in terms of opportunities and challenges. The company should know the direction they are heading for and what challenges they might surmount.
To stay relevant and competitive, they need to be aligned with a futuristic perspective. As per him, being a leader doesn’t imply sitting in the office and generating perspective on the future possibilities. Rather, leaders need to actually step into the market, survey and analyse the possibilities or challenges that might affect their growth. As a leader, one of the main principles he follows is to lead from the front and be prepared for the future.
This way, when the business reaches that stage, there is no hurdle and even if they face a challenge, they already have strategies prepared to overcome it. In simple words, the primary principle is to keep looking ahead while working in the present. This is a continuous cycle and aids businesses in growth and development, limiting last-minute crises.
Values & Vision
As long-term vision applies to both the company and the product, Rao wishes for continuous innovation and evolution. SimplifyQA is already doing great in the market as it has established a name for itself. As a leader, Rao believes that growth happens when something new or different is created, and it adapts to the ever-evolving world.
The company’s long-term vision is to keep innovating and to change the way the world uses ALM tools or approaches test automation. They don’t want to stick to the same standard methods everyone follows, as they dare to be different and ahead of others. They want to be a little unorthodox, so people can witness that what they are doing is not only different but better, and that there’s value in changing how things are done rather than just following tradition.
The first part of this vision is to keep improving their current products. The second part is to develop even more products as a company to aid the consumers. Now that they have the technology, the people, the ideas, and the capability to innovate, they wish to build something new, whether it’s within IT or even outside IT. The core principle is to keep innovating and keep creating.
Redefining Leadership
At SimplifyQA, Roshandass’s leadership is grounded in clarity, trust, and adaptability. His priority isn’t to build tools with flashy features; rather, it’s to create solutions that genuinely make testing easier. He believes in empowering people to challenge themselves, learn quickly, and stay ahead of change. Every decision is guided by a single principle: making life simpler for their customers. That’s the standard they have established for themselves.
Early in his career, he saw how testing often became a roadblock as talented engineers were burning late nights fixing issues that should have been automated. That experience shaped him, and that became his simple mission, i.e., to eradicate the unnecessary pain.
It was his mission to give teams their time back so they can focus on innovation instead of firefighting. Every challenge along the way has reinforced one thing for him, i.e., the real impact comes from solving meaningful problems, not from building shiny tools. That’s the philosophy that drives the team to launch products that benefit society and produce tangible results.
