According to Wired, last year Facebook bought the popular texting and talking platform, WhatsApp, for a whopping $19 billion. WhatsApp offers an attractive alternative to traditional (and often pricey) mobile plans, and allows users to send text, voice, photo, and video messages without paying standard SMS rates.

At the time of the Facebook takeover, WhatsApp employed a scant 35 engineers to serve over 450 million users. Clearly, you don’t need a massive number of employees to reach a massive audience.

Good Things Come in Small Packages

Although the number of WhatsApp users has doubled to upwards of 900 million, the company still employs just 50 engineers. This begs the question: with only one engineer per every 40 million customers, how does this skeleton crew keep the app up and running, not to mention administer updates while managing to address customer concerns?

Coding is the key. WhatsApp uses a rare programming code called Erlang, originally designed to support high speed phone networks. Because WhatsApp’s functions are similar to major phone systems, Erlang makes it possible for coders to tackle every issue at once — aka., quickly and reliably make large-scale, instantaneous changes.

Putting Apps into Action

When you’re a small operation providing service on a global scale, every single employee counts. You need to make sure to find the right people for the job and foster an environment that rewards fast-paced, innovative work.

In an interview with the New York Times, WhatsApp Founder Jan Koum says, “We are providing a richness of experience and an intimacy of communication that email and phone calls simply can’t compare with.” The key is incorporating that same mission of engaged, intimate communication into the atmosphere at the office.

The Rise of the Small Business

Instagram is another an app that enjoyed its rapid rise to success under the guidance of a small but effective team. In October 2010, a core crew of Stanford grads created the photo sharing app, which quickly became a staple in the life of social media aficionados everywhere. In 2012, when Facebook purchased the app for $1 billion, the profits of the sale was shared by the company’s 13 core employees.

Snapchat, the ephemeral photo and video sharing app, maintains a similarly small team of workers. Business Insider reports that the company currently has less than 30 full-time employees. This small group effectively manages the more than 400 million snaps that are sent every single day. In the world of mobile apps, scalability can often equal success.

Is Bigger Always Better?

This may be because small, effective work communities have a few significant advantages. Forbes stresses that in small businesses, employees become familiar with almost every aspect of the company, and will get to know every person in every department.

This fosters both a collaborative atmosphere and a clear and unified company vision — something that can often get lost in the inherently disjointed inner-workings of larger companies. Perhaps the biggest upside is that employees will be more invested in their work on a personal level. This is because they actually are having a hand in building the company that they want to work for from the ground up.

It can be intimidating to start a small business in a sector dominated by a select few mega corporations. But stories like WhatsApp and Instagram serve as a constant reminder that there’s still room for the little guys to succeed.