Career story: Aki Korhonen

Growing with Simucube since the beginning

Aki Korhonen, Simucube’s Senior Hardware Engineer, has been part of the company’s journey for over ten years. What started as small freelance projects alongside his day job eventually turned into a full-time role as the company’s third employee. Nearly a decade later, Aki has had his hands in some of Simucube’s most significant product developments, always with a focus on durability, long lifecycle, and engineering excellence.

From university research to industrial electronics

Aki studied electronics and signal processing at Tampere University of Technology (now Tampere University). Before joining Simucube full-time, he worked at the university’s electronics department as a research assistant and later as an electronics designer in a company manufacturing , where he worked on testing and lifetime testers.

His background in industrial-grade electronics would later prove to be highly valuable.

Discovering Simucube in its early days

Aki first became familiar with the company — then known as Granite Devices — through its founder, Tero, whom he met at his previous workplace. During this time, the company was focusing on industrial motor controllers. While still working full-time elsewhere, Aki began contributing to small freelance projects related to electronics, product images, and graphics.

One of those projects would become something much bigger which would lead to Granite Devices’ first step to sim racing.

“One of the early projects was the original SimuCUBE 1 product. It was essentially the first step toward our own simulator products and the beginning of the external brand,” Aki remembers.

As projects increased, the decision became clear. In 2017, after freelancing since around 2015, Aki joined the company full-time as its third employee.

What Aki sees as the reason for him to leave his day job and join this small company relates to the interest he had towards new challenges and opportunities. He explains: “The challenges were completely different. There was no repetition. We designed electronics for industrial-level devices, but in an entirely new context. It was interesting and full of possibilities.”

When everyone did everything

During Aki’s first years at the company, with only three employees, roles were anything but rigid.

“Everyone did what they could. Sometimes even things they didn’t yet know how to do — and then we learned,” Aki laughs.

Because the company was building something entirely new, requirements were not always precisely defined at the beginning. Often, the real needs became clearer during the process itself. That made outsourcing difficult, so much of the work had to be done in-house.

Today, when working as a Senior Hardware Engineer, Aki sees both continuity and change.

“The focus on employee satisfaction has always been there. Since the beginning, we’ve experimented with different ways to support well-being. Being employee-owned means there’s no external pressure and we have the freedom to try things.”

As the company has grown, roles have naturally become more specialized.

“When there were only a few of us, you had to know a bit of everything. Now the job descriptions are narrower. You don’t have to know everything anymore.”

Designing the core of Simucube products as Senior Hardware Engineer

Over the years, Aki’s responsibilities have included electronics, mechanics, and even graphic design. As the company has grown, his focus has increasingly centered on electronics design.

Among the major projects he has contributed to are:

All three Simucube wheelbase versions
ActivePedal Ultimate which was the first active sim racing pedal on the market
Simucube LightBridge wireless data transmission
Simucube Link Wheel Module

These projects form the backbone of Simucube’s Link Platform.

“Having fairly free hands to design my areas of responsibility the way I see best. We don’t stretch pennies unnecessarily — we invest in durability and longevity,” Aki explains.

Freedom and responsibility in practice

At Simucube, self-direction is not just a phrase, it is part of everyday life.

Aki explains that in product development projects, he has largely been able to make key technical decisions based on his own expertise in hardware engineering.

“Most of what we do is new. There isn’t a predefined way things must be done. The products are fully our own, and people’s professional skills are trusted.”

The goal is always to find the right balance between reasonable cost and reliability.

Building products that last

If there is one theme that consistently emerges in Aki’s story, it is longevity.

Simucube products are designed with the same philosophy as industrial equipment: they must function reliably for years.

In sim racing, that long lifecycle stands out and at Simucube that’s expanded to the whole experience.

“It’s not just about the physical product anymore. It’s about the whole experience. When a customer invests in a premium product, they’re also buying peace of mind. We don’t leave them alone if something doesn’t work.”

Customer-centric thinking has always been a core principle, designing durable devices and ensuring customers feel supported.

One particularly memorable moment for Aki was the release of the original Simucube 1.

“It went from the first drawings on paper to almost production-ready in about three months, which is very short in product development.”

Now, nearly ten years later, some of those first units are still in use around the world.

“That’s something you can be proud of,” Aki says.

A culture of trust and experimentation

The culture, as he describes it, aims to be open and inclusive. And being fully employee-owned makes a difference.

“There are no external owners at Simucube. The owners are close to everyday work, not distant figures somewhere else.”

As a shareholder himself, Aki feels it affects his perspective.

“You think about things differently. It gives additional motivation. When you’re an owner, you see decisions from a broader angle.”

Keeping both employees and customers first

When asked what values are visible in Simucube’s daily life, Senior Hardware Engineer Aki summarizes them simply:

“We aim to keep both employees and customers satisfied and put them first.”

From three people doing everything themselves to a globally recognized sim racing brand, Aki Korhonen has witnessed, and helped build, the entire journey. And at the heart of it all remains the same principle that guided the industrial motor controller design to company’s very first sim racing product Simucube 1: build it to last.