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“I’LL NEVER FORGET ME AND MY BROTHER LAYING ON THE FLOOR BECAUSE WE DIDN’T KNOW WHETHER THE BULLETS WERE GOING TO COME THROUGH OUR WINDOW OR NOT." 08:51, 31 May 2025 One of the most

memorable moments of growing up in Moss Side for Kyle McKitty was avoiding stray bullets while a firefight took place outside his home. Manchester born and bred, Kyle was the middle child of

a family of five who lived on Alexandra Road. Of Caribbean descent, Kyle says he was a teenager trying to find his way during the time when the neighbourhood had built its dangerous

reputation which saw South Manchester nicknamed, ‘Gunchester’. “I remember my mum running upstairs and saying, ‘get down’ because they were shooting right outside the house.” He told the

M.E.N. “I’ll never forget me and my brother laying on the floor because we didn’t know whether the bullets were going to come through our window or not. I’m not going to say it was very

tough or that we lived in the slums. "Moss Side 25 years ago was a great place to be, but it was a dangerous area, there was a lot of gang culture.” Article continues below However,

Kyle says that he was able to avoid the gang culture through his love for dance and performing arts that saw him spend most of his time at nearby Zion Arts Centre, in Hulme. “It was very

different for me because I was into dance and performing arts, but I was centred around people who are around gangs whether through school or just living in Moss Side. “People started to

know me for the guy being on stage and dancing and having fun. There were times where I was riding my bike from my house in Moss Side to the Zion Centre and a gang member stopped me. “In

that moment, I didn’t know what could have happened. I remember thinking, ‘oh this is it, they’re either going to rob me, I’m going to get shot or something.’ “And the first thing they said

is, ‘is that you Kyle?’. I didn’t really know them, but they knew me, just because of performing and hearing about me in different ways. They kind of spudded me and I went on my way. “It

made me realise that, although there is that gang culture, I kind of made it out of that to make something of myself rather than falling into that. I could easily have fallen into that gang

culture and fallen into that path.” At 16-years-old, Kyle left Moss Side after receiving a scholarship to study at a private dance school in London called Millennium Performing Arts College,

however, he dropped out after only two years because of feelings of isolation. “I felt that because I was the only black boy and didn’t grow up in the same environment as everyone else, I

felt like an outsider.” He told the M.E.N. It was at this juncture in life where his entrepreneurial journey really began, the seeds had already been sewed back in Moss Side from a small

project which saw him start a small t-shirt business, but after leaving Millennium he decided to travel to New York for three months to network. While there, Kyle mainly took dance classes

and worked to ingratiate himself into the vibrant dance scene in the city, becoming friends with dancers who would go on to work for the likes of Katy Perry, Rihanna and Beyoncé. When he

returned to the UK, he says he was armed with an impressive contact list that helped him excel in the world of PR in London. After becoming a guide of sorts for professionals who wanted to

explore the London nightlife, Kyle was encouraged to create an app for dancers also looking to find classes online. After a bit of research, he managed to create the code for Dance Global,

which he went on to sell for a small sum. Suddenly finding himself in the world of app development, he went on to launch the ‘App Kit’, an agency that creates apps for business, and he

currently boasts clients such as events company Everyday People and Sweat Box, a male only gym based in London. “When I first did this six years ago it was for small individual

entrepreneurs.” He said. “We’ve grown and now we’re targeting the medium to large businesses who want to move more into the tech and software space. “I look at my business like an Uber

model, Uber doesn’t own any cars or drivers. All my contractors are all freelancers and they come in and they do a job for me and I find the clients for them. “I’m the middleman for them

both and I’ve managed to build a really great company from that. When I look at the journey now, I think that I’ve been doing it for a while and it’s now at a different level. Article

continues below “It’s a great moment for me and I want more because I’ve got that spirit in me.”