Before telling you our story, I have to tell you that in 2024 our co-founder and my partner of 44 years was killed in a road incident while we were cycle touring together. Ann leaves a massive void in our family, amongst her friends, and at Crick Software. We miss her terribly, but her values live on in everything we do. Read more about Ann.
Here’s the Crick Software story so far:
First, a question: if you were just getting by, had three young children and a mortgage, and your partner came home one day and proposed they give up work to write a piece of software, what would you say?
Well, in 1993 I asked that question, and Ann said yes. She became the wage earner, teaching in a special school, where she worked her socks off and soon became the lead teacher for literacy and English, using early versions of the then-unknown software “Clicker” to help her pupils. In the evenings she was making Clicker curriculum resources, based on what she needed for her pupils the next day.
Meanwhile, between walking the children to and from school and cooking the dinner, I was developing Clicker in our back bedroom. After a year we were able to start copying the floppy disks (!) for Clicker’s first release (sometimes with the help of our three children), and then we could start getting Clicker into schools.
Before long, Ann’s resources became a vital part of the fledgling company, and gradually this became her main role as she transitioned from teaching to working for Crick Software.
By now we needed more people to answer the phones, build our first website, do the invoicing, and package up the software. The company had to move out of our house, along with the boxes of floppy disks, fax machines, etc.
In 2001 we established our first US office and began to offer Clicker in many countries. We also developed DocsPlus, our literacy software for secondary schools. Today we have a team of 50 brilliant people, all of whom perform their specialism much better than I ever could - I’m so privileged to work with them that I can’t imagine ever wanting to retire!
Thank you for reading our story – do take a moment to read more about Ann.
John Crick