www.newrivervalley.com

Matt Gentry | The Roanoke Times

Fahad Hassan at the keyboard.

BLACKSBURG -- Virginia Tech senior Fahad Hassan started doing internships when he was 15.

He's already started his own company and weathered its failure and is in the middle of launching another project, meeting with lawyers and investors and consulting with teams of programmers.

If anyone needs a tool to help organize his life, it's Hassan.

But he is banking on the fact that he's not the only college student with a hectic schedule with his latest venture, Daylert.com.

That's the name Hassan has given a Web site that is going into its testing stage today at seven universities, including Virginia Tech.

While offering some of the same options as the popular Facebook.com Web site, Daylert also has various calendar options and the ability for users to view daily, weekly and monthly calendars of friends to help schedule get-togethers, meetings and parties. Users will also be able to send themselves text messages to alert them of things they have to do each day, hence the name.

And while the site allows students to create profiles, post messages to one another and create groups, Hassan doesn't want it to be seen as the next Facebook. He would, however, love to mimic its success.

That site, created by a Harvard University student in 2004, has close to 10 million users and earns most of its revenue through online advertising. Hassan also hopes to make money through online advertising.

"Facebook is huge. We're not going to take them over," he said.

But no matter how often students log on to Facebook or myspace.com, they don't need them, he said. Hassan hopes his site will become so integral to students' lives that they will absolutely depend on it.

"There are all these social networks out there but they don't bring a lot of value to the table."

Instead of just providing a way for groups to say they belong, it will actually make it easier for the groups to plan events and gauge attendance beforehand, he said.

"What's the point of saying, 'I belong to this sorority'?" Hassan asked. "That's great. I already knew that; you're wearing the T-shirt."

The site will act like a good organizer with its ability to condense all of the various commitments a person has and combine that with the interconnectivity of sites such as Facebook, he said.

"There's nothing new about this stuff," he said. "I'm just putting it all together."

Hassan, an interdisciplinary studies major at Tech, has discussed the idea with various business leaders he's met during the course of many internships in software programming that started when he was a high school student in Montgomery County, Md.

A Johns Hopkins University program for high school students helped open the door to some of the internships and Hassan has been obsessed with making his mark since then, even contemplating dropping out of college because he was so anxious to get out into the world.

Instead, he's tried to begin his journey into the business world while at school. When he was 17 he started Fhast Computer Solutions, a computer consulting company he ran out of his parents' basement.

Despite a $250,000 contract that got him started, the company failed because of inconsistent use.

The idea for the Daylert Web site came to Hassan at 3 a.m. July 17. He'd just finished watching the movie "Pay It Forward" about a young boy's plan to change the world. He began scribbling a crude design of Daylert in his notebook.

A few days later he began discussing the idea with friends he has in the business world, and he said he's gotten a favorable response.

"I've had two people tell me this is a bad idea," he said. "Both of them are my cousins."

While Hassan is excited about the new site, he ultimately has bigger plans. The Bangladesh native sees this as a means to greater achievement. If he's successful he hopes to make enough money to help change the world.

"That sounds crazy," he said. "But if you know me, that's the way I am."

Liz Hart, a Tech senior who is one of the testers, vouches for Hassan's big ambition and endless energy.

"I don't think he sleeps," she said.

The site will launch Oct. 20 after a testing period that will involve about 40 of Hassan's friends at Tech, Elon, George Washington and Clemson universities as well as Morehouse College, the University of Maryland and West Virginia University. Those schools will be part of the initial launch and Hassan hopes to expand the site to schools across the country.

Hassan has promised stock in his company to his team of designers and is meeting with various groups of investors to help with the funding. The rest has come out of his own pocket.

Hassan learned from his past failure that you need to be well funded to start a successful business. While he's still searching for investors, he seems confident that no matter what happens with Daylert, it will be a positive experience.

"You learn something new every time," he said. "That's the bottom line."