Podcasts about founders factory

It might not be what the UK is best known for, but is our burgeoning tech sector the answer to buoying up the British economy? And if so, what's standing in our way? This week, Jeremy Hunt is putting his case for the UK becoming home to the next Silicon Valley to Clare Barclay, President of Enterprise and Industry EMEA at Microsoft and Chair of the new Industrial Strategy Advisory Council, and Rohan Silva, Chair of Founders Factory in Western Australia - and former advisor to David Cameron.In this special Daily T series inspired by his new book, Jeremy Hunt pitches his optimism and ideas to leading experts on how the UK can change the world for the better. From mass migration to leading the AI revolution, we ask, can we be great again?Producer: Rosie StopherExecutive Producer: Louisa WellsVideo Editors: Andy Mackenzie and Will WaltersStudio Operator: Meghan SearleOriginal music by Goss Studio Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Send us a textIn Conversation With is a travel podcast where we speak with travel industry movers and shakers that are transforming business travel.  Get insights into the company they represent and learn about  how they are capitalizing on the future of travel.In this episode we speak with Alice Ferrari, CEO at KyteAlice is the CEO & Co-Founder of Kyte, a modern API platform streamlining how travel companies collaborate with LCC and NDC carriers. She is passionate about building solutions that help airlines develop their operational and customer propositions.Alice spent her entire professional life working in the airline industry, having started her career at easyJet in operations strategy and subsequently developing travel tech startups for Founders Factory, easyJet's partner venture studio. Your host: Riaan van SchoorYou can subscribe to this podcast by searching 'BusinessTravel360' on Google Podcast, Apple Podcast, iHeart, Pandora, Spotify, Alexa or your favorite podcast player.This podcast was created, edited and distributed by BusinessTravel360.  Be sure to sign up for regular updates at BusinessTravel360.com - Enjoy!Support the show

Show SummaryOn today's episode, we welcome back a previous guest, Marine Corps veteran Waco Hoover, an entrepreneur and investor with over 20 years of experience in venture capital, M&A, entertainment, media and live events. We talk about MCON, an annual event that celebrates military culture and includes MCON Health conducted in partnership with PsychArmor.  Provide FeedbackAs a dedicated member of the audience, we would like to hear from you about the show. Please take a few minutes to share your thoughts about the show in this short feedback survey. By doing so, you will be entered to receive a signed copy of one of our host's three books on military and veteran mental health. About Today's GuestWaco Hoover is an entrepreneur and investor with over 20 years of experience in venture capital, M&A, entertainment, media and live events.He served in the U.S. Marine Corps from 1997-2001 as an infantry Marine, combat water survival instructor and infantry scout. He served several deployments across Southeast Asia.After separation from the military, Hoover graduated from New York University, cum laude and completed Harvard Business School executive education programs. He then became an entrepreneur and investor who now has over 18 years of experience in venture capital, M&A, entertainment, media and live events.He is currently Chair of the Be The One initiative for the American Legion. He is also a co-owner of Veteran Entertainment Television, advisor to Founders Factory, a London based venture capital firm, Managing Partner at Xperiential Group, and serves on the board of Irreverent Warriors, a non-profit preventing veteran suicide. He has advised global brands including MGM Resorts, Informa, Vivendi, and Las Vegas Sands Corp. He was a co-founder and investor in businesses sold to Informa, Emerald, Endeavor Business Media and Onstream Media.Hoover speaks at industry events including VenuesNow, PTTOW!, CEMA, The American Legion, Military Influencer Conference, SXSW, Pollstar, TSE 100, Society for Independent Show Organizers, National Sports Forum and XLIVE.He lives in Southern California with his wife, son and two yellow labs, Tucker and Winnie. In his spare time, he enjoys surfing, diving, and mountaineering as often as possible. He is a member of The American Legion and recently hosted the Be the One Symposium at the 104th American Legion National Convention in Charlotte.Links Mentioned During the EpisodeMCON Web SiteMCON HealthPsychArmor Resource of the WeekThis week's resource of the week is the previous podcast episode featuring Waco, episode 156 where we talk about the American Legion's Be The One Campaign an initiative whose goal it is to eliminate the stigma related to mental health treatment, and in turn, lower the number of veterans who die by suicide every day.   You can find the resource here:  https://psycharmor.org/podcast/waco-hoover Episode Partner: Are you an organization that engages with or supports the military affiliated community? Would you like to partner with an engaged and dynamic audience of like-minded professionals? Reach out to Inquire about Partnership Opportunities Contact Us and Join Us on Social Media Email PsychArmorPsychArmor on TwitterPsychArmor on FacebookPsychArmor on YouTubePsychArmor on LinkedInPsychArmor on InstagramTheme MusicOur theme music Don't Kill the Messenger was written and performed by Navy Veteran Jerry Maniscalco, in cooperation with Operation Encore, a non profit committed to supporting singer/songwriter and musicians across the military and Veteran communities.Producer and Host Duane France is a retired Army Noncommissioned Officer, combat veteran, and clinical mental health counselor for service members, veterans, and their families.  You can find more about the work that he is doing at www.veteranmentalhealth.com  

Drop 1: MasterCard Stablecoinhttps://www.mastercard.com/news/press/2025/april/mastercard-unveils-end-to-end-capabilities-to-power-stablecoin-transactions-from-wallets-to-checkouts/Drop 2: Kiln Stablecoin Yields https://www.kiln.fi/post/trust-wallet-kiln-defi-simplifying-access-to-stablecoin-yield-for-200m-usershttps://www.theblock.co/post/352160/ledger-live-usdc-usdt-usds-dai-stablecoin-yield-self-custody-kilnDrop 3: UK Crypto Regulation Draft legislation https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/680f6387faff81833fcae94b/0302425_draft_RAO_SI.pdfhttps://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/680f6397b0d43971b07f5bfd/20250428_RAO_SI_draft_policy_note.pdfFCA discussion paper https://www.fca.org.uk/publication/discussion/dp25-1.pdfMais:Fabric Ventures, Animoca Brands, Coinbase and Founders Factory announce UK Web3 acceleratorhttps://www.animocabrands.com/fabric-ventures-animoca-brands-coinbase-and-founders-factory-announce-uk-web3-acceleratorBridge launches in Mexicohttps://www.bridge.xyz/news/mxn-fxBridge partners with Visa to launch stablecoin card issuing producthttps://stripe.com/gb/newsroom/news/bridge-partners-with-visaReown report: state of on-chain UXhttps://reown.com/onchainux-reportWorldcoin launches Visa rewards for verfied humanshttps://world.org/blog/announcements/world-card-your-digital-assets-accepted-anywherePlaytron will launch Game Dollar on the Sui blockchain, a gaming focused stablecoin issued by the M0 protocolhttps://x.com/PLAYTR0N/status/1918218276284379385Sui announces Fireblocks support for institutional usershttps://blog.sui.io/fireblocks-digital-asset-infrastructure/. Redes sociais / comms.. https://blockdropspodcast.xyz/.. Instagram.com/blockdropspodcast.. Twitter.com/blockdropspod.. Blockdrops.lens .. https://warpcast.com/mauriciomagaldi.. youtube.com/@BlockDropsPodcast.. Meu conteúdo em inglês twitter.com/0xmauricio.. Newsletter do linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=7056680685142454272.. blockdropspodcast@gmail.com

Drop 1: MasterCard Stablecoinhttps://www.mastercard.com/news/press/2025/april/mastercard-unveils-end-to-end-capabilities-to-power-stablecoin-transactions-from-wallets-to-checkouts/Drop 2: Kiln Stablecoin Yields https://www.kiln.fi/post/trust-wallet-kiln-defi-simplifying-access-to-stablecoin-yield-for-200m-usershttps://www.theblock.co/post/352160/ledger-live-usdc-usdt-usds-dai-stablecoin-yield-self-custody-kilnDrop 3: UK Crypto Regulation Draft legislation https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/680f6387faff81833fcae94b/0302425_draft_RAO_SI.pdfhttps://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/680f6397b0d43971b07f5bfd/20250428_RAO_SI_draft_policy_note.pdfFCA discussion paper https://www.fca.org.uk/publication/discussion/dp25-1.pdfMore:Fabric Ventures, Animoca Brands, Coinbase and Founders Factory announce UK Web3 acceleratorhttps://www.animocabrands.com/fabric-ventures-animoca-brands-coinbase-and-founders-factory-announce-uk-web3-acceleratorBridge launches in Mexicohttps://www.bridge.xyz/news/mxn-fxBridge partners with Visa to launch stablecoin card issuing producthttps://stripe.com/gb/newsroom/news/bridge-partners-with-visaReown report: state of on-chain UXhttps://reown.com/onchainux-reportWorldcoin launches Visa rewards for verfied humanshttps://world.org/blog/announcements/world-card-your-digital-assets-accepted-anywherePlaytron will launch Game Dollar on the Sui blockchain, a gaming focused stablecoin issued by the M0 protocolhttps://x.com/PLAYTR0N/status/1918218276284379385Sui announces Fireblocks support for institutional usershttps://blog.sui.io/fireblocks-digital-asset-infrastructure/. Redes sociais / comms.. https://blockdropspodcast.xyz/.. Instagram.com/blockdropspodcast.. Twitter.com/blockdropspod.. Blockdrops.lens .. https://warpcast.com/mauriciomagaldi.. youtube.com/@BlockDropsPodcast.. Meu conteúdo em inglês twitter.com/0xmauricio.. Newsletter do linkedin https://www.linkedin.com/build-relation/newsletter-follow?entityUrn=7056680685142454272.. blockdropspodcast@gmail.com

 This week, we dive into the latest EY Digital Assets Survey and what it reveals about institutional sentiment: 85% of respondents increased their crypto allocations in 2024—and nearly the same expect to do so again in 2025. We unpack which assets are in focus, the critical role of regulation, and how institutions are beginning to engage with DeFi.On the market side, ETF inflows remain strong, especially into IBIT, with ETH reversing its outflows from the previous week. We analyze current holder trends and potential upside scenarios. We also look at Bitcoin's increasing correlation with gold and how it's behaving around key geopolitical headlines.In macro, we touch on updates from the White House and key economic prints—JOLTs, ADP, GDP, and the BoJ rate decision—all leading up to Friday's NFPs.In the news section, we discuss BTC treasury trends at 21 Capital and explore Solana-based DeFi treasury entities like Upexi and DeFi Development Corp.Onchain, we review the implications of EIP-9698, early signs of renewed strength in ETH signals, and the Loopscale exploit. We also note Monero-BTC swap developments and DeFi TVL climbing back above $100B.We close with key upcoming catalysts to watch: Friday's Non-Farm Payrolls, the May 7th FOMC decision, and Ethereum's long-awaited Pectra upgrade.Topics Covered:Institutional Trends: EY Survey highlights, asset preferences, regulatory priorities, and DeFi participationMarket Update: IBIT-led ETF inflows, ETH reversal, BTC holders & gold correlationMacro Overview: White House, JOLTs, ADP, GDP, BoJ, and NFPs outlookNews & Earnings: BTC treasury strategy at 21 Capital, Solana-based DeFi treasuriesOnchain Insights: EIP-9698, ETH revival signals, Loopscale exploit, and TVL growthCatalysts Ahead: Non-Farm Payrolls (May 3), FOMC & Ethereum Pectra Upgrade (May 7)Host: Ben Floyd, Head of Execution ServicesSpeakers: David Duong, Head of Institutional Research Brock Miller, Senior Staff Software EngineerJoshua Pak, Senior CES Sales TraderCoinbase NewsCBAM BTC Yield Fund: A conservative Bitcoin strategy targeting 4–8% net annual returns over a market cycle, with subscriptions and redemptions in BTC.UK Web3 Accelerator Launch: Coinbase joins Fabric Ventures, Animoca Brands, and Founders Factory to launch a new UK-focused Web3 accelerator.Coinbase x PayPal Partnership: Coinbase expands its PayPal partnership to support seamless 1:1 PYUSD-USD conversions and explore new onchain use cases.Coinbase International Exchange Q1 Recap: Highlights from Q1 performance and key growth initiatives planned for Q2 2025.LinksEY-Parthenon Digital Assets Strategy Report

Global technology leaders Coinbase, Fabric Ventures, Animoca Brands and Founders Factory have announced the launch of a multi-million pound accelerator in the UK, set to transform the UK's blockchain and AI ecosystem. This partnership aims to unlock product market fit and growth for the next generation of disruptors and to drive investment in technology startups as a key engine of the UK economy. As institutions and jurisdictions around the world accelerate their adoption of AI, blockchain technology and digital assets, the UK stands uniquely positioned to compete in the global race for innovation. As Keith Grose, UK CEO, Coinbase asserts: "With deep reservoirs of talent, capital, sophisticated regulators and leading academic institutions, the UK is well positioned to benefit from these opportunities. However, ensuring that these products and services are born out of the UK is vital. For too long, access to capital, mentorship and resources has held back this ambition. This significant investment changes that." Business and Trade Secretary Jonathan Reynolds said: "This announcement is a strong vote of confidence in the UK's tech sector - underlining our position as a global leader in innovation. Not only will it ensure that the UK remains a key leader in blockchain technology but will also unlock growth as we deliver on the Plan for Change. Our modern Industrial Strategy has highlighted financial and professional services as key growth sectors for the UK to thrive in, showing that we are listening and responding to the needs of Fintech businesses - whether that's on access to talent, finance, or the wider regulatory environment." Founders Factory, one of the leading start-up accelerators globally, will deliver world class business and growth training, with hands-on support across business strategy, go to market, product development and fundraising. Alongside them, Fabric Ventures, Animoca Brands and Coinbase will deliver support on tokenomics, community go-to-market strategies, and best practices for scaling businesses in the blockchain & AI space. Robby Yung, the CEO of Investments at Animoca Brands stated: "It is critical that the UK takes advantage of the opportunity of the fast-growing Web3 industry, not just as a hub for investment but as a place where innovation is built, owned, and scaled. The UK must be a creator, not just a consumer, of this innovation. The real opportunity lies in developing it here, building intellectual property that leverages the world-class talent base and ecosystem in the UK." The Labour Government's vision for growth is deeply tied to the success of one of the UK's fastest-growing sectors: technology. This initiative is a step change in making that vision a reality - supporting a diverse group of founders across blockchain-based payments, entertainment, AI, and other cutting-edge industries. Commenting on this, Co-founder and Managing Partner of Fabric Ventures, Richard Muirhead said: "This Government's AI Action Plan has been met with widespread optimism. However, this is only one piece of the puzzle. The convergence of AI, blockchain and Web3 plays to the UKs strengths in these disciplines - and fostering collaboration amongst our strong industries like financial services, advertising and pharmaceuticals is essential for the UK to maintain its leadership in the global digital race. This accelerator will play a key role in driving that progress." Damian Routley, COO at Founders Factory, said: "This is about leveling up the UK's ability to build and scale frontier technology. Founders in blockchain and AI need more than capital - they need hands-on, specialised support to unlock product-market fit and go global. That's what this accelerator delivers. By combining deeptech expertise with the power of a world-class network, we're creating a launchpad for the next generation of breakthrough UK startups." See more stories here. More about Irish Tech News Irish Tech News are Ireland's No. 1 Onlin...

In this episode of the Market Mentors podcast, Matt Dodgson is joined by Kartik Krishnan, a demand-generation expert with experience at Google, Onfido, CapDesk, Beamery, and Founders Factory. Kartik shares his insights on how early-stage B2B tech startups can effectively balance demand creation and demand capture, overcome marketing challenges with limited resources, and build scalable go-to-market strategies. He also dives into product-market-price fit, the role of AI in modern marketing, and how founders can structure their teams for long-term success.They discuss:Let's Get Some Demand-Gen Terms Out of the WayWhy Do Early-Stage B2B Tech Startups Struggle With Demand Generation?Focus on Finding the Right Audience or Inbound as Well?What Channels Would You Recommend?What About Qualifying Leads?Product-Market-Price-Fit – Why Is This Important?Budgeting for ExperimentationWhat Type of Marketer Should a Startup Hire First?What Will Change for B2B Marketers in the Next 12–18 Months?And so much more..Market Mentors is brought to you by Matt Dodgson, Co-Founder of Market Recruitment. Market Recruitment is a recruitment agency that connects B2B Tech & SaaS businesses with world class marketers to help them grow.If you'd like to be a future guest on the Market Mentors podcast, you can apply here.

Eliza is a start-up owned by Daily Mail and General Trust (DMGT). The website uses an affiliates-based publishing model and has, since October 2023, increased its Instagram followers by 173% and more than trebled its followers on TikTok. One of its content formats, developed on TikTok, has had more than 100 million views. When she took on the role as MD, Hannah's brief from one of the biggest publishing conglomerates was, “reposition what a magazine looks like for fashion and beauty in today's social world”. Prior to that, she tried her hand at the law, was a self confessed terrible PA, worked with the best entrepreneurs in the business, joined Founders Factory, and successfully exited a Podcasting company. Her story is super inspiring and she's proof that you can try your hand at many different industries and develop your ow working style. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

A push to expand s is the focus of this edition of Business Day Spotlight. Host Mudiwa Gavaza is joined by Bongani Sithole, CEO of 54 Collective. Topics of discussion include: 54 Collective's rebranding; strategy for investing in African startups; the state of venture capital investment on the continent; and the influence of high interest rates on startup funding. Business Day Spotlight is a MultimediaLIVE Production. Producer is Demi Buzo.

In this episode of The CFO Playbook, David McClelland explores how financial management should be embedded into company culture with Richard Dana, co-founder and CEO at Tembo Money. With a background in corporate finance, Richard shares how he leveraged his interest in travel to co-found the budget-boutique hotel booking platform Doris and Dickie, and the lessons learned from being thrifty in balancing the books from day one with a small team, managing by cost. Reflecting on his role as CFO at Founders Factory, a unique platform matching leading corporate brands with industry expertise with innovative start-ups to solve specific pain points within their sector. Richard affirms his mantra that founders should focus on being thrifty and making every pound work hard, whilst having a path to profitability and a clear understanding of the financials. Now on a mission to address the housing affordability crisis, Richard co-founded family lending platform Tembo Money, with the aim of closing the generational wealth gap by broadening access to homeownership. With no CFO currently in place, the focus since its launch in 2020 has been on becoming profitable with a lean team and outsourced accountancy. Richard highlights that despite the crossovers between the CFO and CEO roles, there is a much greater focus on "selling the business" as a CEO, whilst keeping an eye on the money during the early days of growing a new business. Finally, against the backdrop of the current economic landscape, Richard gives his view on starting a business in a recession; although it's challenging, partnering with established companies and focusing on a product with a real customer need can help mitigate risks. Extending cash runway is crucial for startups, and involves monitoring cash flow, cutting costs, and exploring non-investment funding options. Chapters - (0:00:01) - Inside the World of Finance Leaders (0:13:29) - Building a Finance Startup (0:22:45) - Funding and Recruitment for Startups (0:33:57) - Startup Strategies and Acquisition Considerations (0:43:39) - Liberating Finance for Families About Soldo: Soldo provides company cards connected to a powerful management platform. Employees use Soldo cards to buy what they need for work without being out of pocket or going over budget. Finance teams use Soldo to distribute money instantly, while staying in control of who spends, how much, where, and on what. Thousands of businesses, from small to large corporations including Mercedes-Benz, Sony, and Get Your Guide use Soldo to make their business spending simple and efficient. To find out more or to book a demo, visit Soldo. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

How much should you be charging? Are you leaving money on the table, or are you scaring away potential customers? Pricing strategy can be one of the biggest challenges for product people, so we asked Founders Factory coach Fanni Fejes to share some of the lessons she teaches founders.(Since we originally ran this episode, Fanni has moved on to take the Head of Product role at Bequest.)In this episode, listen to learn about:Having a good pricing strategyApplying anchor pricingUsing metrics wellQuote of the EpisodeIf the pilot is free, make sure that it's for a certain amount of time – and then you have the chance to renegotiate from there… In my personal experience, it's easier to ask for more money than to ask for money at all.Featured Links: Follow Fanni on LinkedIn | Bequest | Founders Factory | Fanni's 'How to Price Your Product in a Startup' articleOur HostsLily Smith enjoys working as a consultant product manager with early-stage and growing startups and as a mentor to other product managers. She's currently Chief Product Officer at BBC Maestro, and has spent 13 years in the tech industry working with startups in the SaaS and mobile space. She's worked on a diverse range of products – leading the product teams through discovery, prototyping, testing and delivery. Lily also founded ProductTank Bristol and runs ProductCamp in Bristol and Bath. Randy Silver is a Leadership & Product Coach and Consultant. He gets teams unstuck, helping you to supercharge your results. Randy's held interim CPO and Leadership roles at scale-ups and SMEs, advised start-ups, and been Head of Product at HSBC and Sainsbury's. He participated in Silicon Valley Product Group's Coaching the Coaches forum, and speaks frequently at conferences and events. You can join one of communities he runs for CPOs (CPO Circles), Product Managers (Product In the {A}ether) and Product Coaches. He's the author of What Do We Do Now? A Product Manager's Guide to Strategy in the Time of COVID-19. A recovering music journalist and editor, Randy also launched Amazon's music stores in the US & UK.

Welcome to a new episode of our special series At The Cap Table. Today Savitri Tan from Isomer Capital is joined by Naza Metghalchi, Principal at EQT Ventures to talk a lot about her career so far, transitioning from a platform role into investment, why surrounding yourselves with the best is integral and how to build relationships of trust with founders.Naza Metghalchi was born in Iran, raised in Paris, and has lived in London for the past 15 years. She started her career as an intern at Seedcamp in 2012, whilst all her friends were joining consulting firms or investment banks. Later, she joined onefinestay, where she fell in love with the raw energy and enthusiasm of startups.She joined the team at Series A, led commercial positions in the sales and product marketing teams, witnessing periods focusing on profitability and others on growth (at all cost!), until the company got acquired after having raised $80m. She then became an early employee at a startup studio, Founders Factory, where she set up their accelerator program.An avid supporter of the European ecosystem, she published Rewarding Talent, a guide to democratising employee equity, and is an active angel investor, in consumer social, and the future of work space.At EQT, she loves partnering with founders that are execution-driven whilst being self-reflective, and working alongside them as a problem-solver and people-person at her core.Outside of work, you can usually find Naza organising a dinner party, listening to podcasts outdoors, reading Japanese literature and travelling to South America. Naza holds a BA in European Politics, and a MS in Management from the London School of Economics.Watch the full episode as well as our upcoming events on eu.vc

In this special episode of the Productized podcast, recorded at Productized Conference 2023. Join Product leader Inês Liberato in this roundtable discussion on the hot topic: "The Responsibility of AI: Who's Accountable for Predictive Model Results?" Inês hosts an eye-opening chat with product experts Chiedza Muguti, João Freitas, & Elizabeth Immer, unpacking AI's responsibilities. They tackle vital questions about generative AI's rise, steps for companies to embrace AI responsibly, and the importance of hitting pause for deeper reflection. Inês Liberato is a Product leader, Founding member at Women in Product UK, former Product and venture Coach and CPO at Founders Factory. Elizabeth Immer is a Head of Product Acceleration & Strategy at Frontiers with a background in behavioural science. Chiedza Muguti is a CPO at Alteos, Co-Founder of BlackInTech Berlin and a speaker, experienced in financial products and services. João Freitas is an Executive Board Member at Cofidis Portugal, in charge of digital products and value creation at Cofidis. Resources: Find Inês on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/inesliberato/ Find Chiedza on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chiedzamuguti/ Find João on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joao-colaco-de-freitas-jcf/ Find Elizabeth on Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lizimmer/ Stay Updated: Twitter: https://twitter.com/productizedconf Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/productized.co/ LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/school/productized/

In this episode of the Productized podcast, Margarida speaks with Inês Liberato, Product & CPO Coach at Founders Factory. Inês explores her curious career path and shares how the role of women in tech is changing. She talks about the importance of building what matters and the need for accountability in AI. We hope you enjoy this conversation.

Twitter rebrands to X, Meta launches creator subscriptions, Apple faces 1 billion dollars lawsuit, Apple releases security updates, N-gen turns Spotify data into art, Spotify increases Premium price, Bing Chat available on Chrome and Safari, MIT develops PhotoGuard to protect images, Mediobanca partners with Founders Factory, Netflix introduces 'My Netflix' tab, Samsung to unveil Z Fold 5 and Z Flip 5 at Unpacked.

Timur Csillik (Co-Founder & CEO @ Nabu) and Diederik Kruijssen (Chief Data Officer @ Nabu) join us on today's episode.Backed by Founders Factory, Nabu (nabu.xyz) is building the most trusted NFT valuation engine, to increase transparency in Web3 and enable the universal adoption of NFTs as an asset class. In this episode we discuss Nabu's approach of leveraging machine learning and AI to ascertain NFT prices, perspectives on upcoming growth drivers within web3, the frontier space of NFTs in particular and web3 in general, and much, much more.Recorded Thursday June 22nd, 2023.

Svilen Rangelov and his brother have already raised tens of millions of dollars for their tech startup that has reinvented the supply chain. Their venture, Dronamics, has attracted funding from top-tier investors like Speedinvest, European Union, Strategic Development Fund (SDF), and Founders Factory.

The BAE HQ welcomes Peony Li, the founder and CEO of Jude, which is a platform helping people to live longer, happier and healthier starting with bladder care.Peony was born in China and her parents were actually in a similar industry to what she does now but she never thought she'd follow in their footsteps.She initially went into banking but after working weeks where she only slept 8 hours in an entire week, she knew she had to leave.Peony's journey from there was winding and she picked up a variety of different experiences which make her a well-rounded entrepreneur today.This includes being a startup advisor for The Baobab Network, the Head of Investments at the Founders Factory and the Head of Operations for Daye.Jude are tackling taboo problems head-on because Peony knows too many people are suffering in silence.They've grown significantly in a short space of time and have already raised £2m to further their mission.So listen in to hear the story of what she's doing about it.If you're listening to this and want to see the video, go to YouTube:https://youtu.be/U9e4_h9Ac2kVisit our website: http://thebaehq.com

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Aaron Jones, an award-winning entrepreneur working in Artificial Intelligence. Aaron co-founded Yepic AI, a company in the generative AI space whose flagship product “vidvoice.ai” is a state-of-the-art video translation technology that dubs your lips in real-time. Think about your Star Trek moments when Kirk says, "Scotty, Beam us up!" in any language. KEY TAKEAWAYS Before I was an entrepreneur, I was a cameraman at K Productions, producing a TV show for Sky. I was also an assistant vision mixer adjusting the lighting on the cameras. I thought a career in acting was for me when I was younger, but then I realized that I wanted to make a difference in the world. Everything I've done since then has been around the idea of whatever I spend my time on. I want it to make an impact and change people's lives. At university, I started an ethical fashion brand which got me into eCommerce. I don't care much about fashion, but I do care about people. There was a great story about people producing a product locally that was sustainable and recycled, and I started a foundation in Cambodia to fund education. The idea was that every time you bought a product, you'd be funding a child's education to get parents to earn more and children to learn to break the cycle of poverty. I did that for several years and received an honor from the Queen for my work and numerous awards. Like all great ideas, they evolve, and we realized that if we wanted to make an even bigger impact, we needed to make a place for other designers to grow their brands and sell more products so we could build more schools. That's how the business evolved into a company called See Fashion – which was a terrible idea. Never work with fashion designers if you want to make money.  We pivoted away from fashion to technology, enabling eCommerce brands with a product and a business to sell more. We did this by connecting all the stores as an intelligence web, using visual search as a hook to encourage users to show us what they were interested in buying by uploading photos to the app/store. It soon became an API business, and we sold APIs to companies like Yves Saint Laurent and huge corporations. The most valuable part of the business was the visual search. We did not own the IP, and because GDPR came in, our sharing network had to shut down as I had not sold the company when I had the opportunity to be acquired. That journey led me to meet with the Founders Factory team more than three years ago. It started consulting on an eCommerce enablement project using Generative AI to enhance and generate imagery. It blew my mind that researchers generated images from nothing, and I became obsessed. We've since probably created the first ‘stable diffusion' before research papers made the subject popular. Still, ours wasn't very stable and needed an extensive data set to generate the images. This means that, for an eCommerce brand, it wasn't that feasible. After this, we got into video and formed Yepic AI. BEST MOMENTS ‘Entrepreneurs are a bit of everything. Starting a business in a new and exciting space Is exciting, but it also requires you to wear many hats at the beginning.' ‘Don't work with designers, exit and take acquisition offers, do something meaningful.' ‘A problem that a lot of Generative AI companies are facing is when the hype burns away, to sell it to businesses as a click-through enhancement/ increase to drive more sales, you need to prove that your image drove the sale. So you certainly more than imagery!' ‘There's been loads going on in the background for a long time, but the public has suddenly become aware of it, and they've realized that Generative AI isn't just deep fakes, among others. You can create stuff. You can generate images in Canva now. You can edit people out of your photos using AI. The creative possibilities in the eyes of the public have opened up massively.' ABOUT THE GUEST Aaron Jones is an award-winning entrepreneur working in Artificial Intelligence. Aaron co-founded Yepic AI, a company in the generative AI space whose flagship product “vidvoice.ai” is a state-of-the-art video translation technology that dubs your lips in real-time. Vid Voice is being used in business meetings, telehealth, live events, and film dubbing. It's the first and only service of its kind, which will be made available via Zoom. Aaron was recognized in the Queen's Birthday Honours list, making him the youngest person to receive a British Empire Medal for services to Industry. He was also awarded Alumni of the Year 2018 by Essex University and shortlisted for Forbes 30 under 30. Check out the Yepic platform here Learn about Aaron here ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew, a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, and commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers and accelerating over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner.  Twitter: SabineVdL LinkedIn: Sabine VanderLinden Instagram: sabinevdLofficial Facebook: SabineVdLOfficial TikTok: sabinevdlofficial Email: podcast@sabinevdl.com Website: www.sabinevdl.comThis show was brought to you by Progressive Media

Aarish Shah is the Founder of EmergeOne and Projected.ai and host of Off Balance and Nothing Ventured Podcast. Will talks to Aarish about having the venture capitalist money idea and having that "aha!" moment that it could work, what drives him and having a purpose of helping others, and using his podcast to teach lessons that he's learned along the way. EmergeOne (http://emergeone.co.uk/) Projected.ai (https://projected.ai/) Off Balance and Nothing Ventured Podcast (https://nothingventured.tech/off-balance) Follow EmergeOne on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/emergeone/), Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/EmergeOneUK/), YouTube (https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCfrtssmo3LELM6QDFOkU1Ug/featured), or Twitter (https://twitter.com/emergeone_uk). Follow Aarish Shah on LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/in/adsinuk/) or Twitter (https://twitter.com/adsinuk). Follow thoughtbot on Twitter (https://twitter.com/thoughtbot) or LinkedIn (https://www.linkedin.com/company/150727/). Become a Sponsor (https://thoughtbot.com/sponsorship) of Giant Robots! Transcript: WILL: This is The Giant Robots Smashing Into Other Giant Robots podcast, where we explore the design, development, and business of great products. I'm your host, Will Larry. And with me today is Aarish Shah, Founder of EmergeOne and Projected.ai and host of Off Balance and Nothing Ventured Podcast. Aarish, thank you for joining me. AARISH: It's great to be here, Will. Really happy to be talking to you today. WILL: Yeah, I'm excited. I can't wait to dive in and learn more about you. Tell me about your journey, how it all started. AARISH: Wow, it's a bit of a long run. I'll try and condense it. But I am 44 years old at the moment. About 20 years ago, I came out of uni with a degree in languages which I found was sort of useful but not essential. So I ended up for a few years doing kind of the normal corporate thing. I worked with PriceWaterhouseCoopers, Nortel Networks, and then Deutsche Bank. And I qualified as an accountant along the way, so I'm effectively what you guys would consider a CPA over in the U.S. I then kind of up sticks, and I spent the next ten years of my life running a group of manufacturing and trading businesses alongside a property portfolio out in Papua New Guinea, which is a very, very interesting place to be, definitely one of the hardest environments to be building and running businesses for many reasons. I've had everything from people coming into one of my offices with guns. I had one of my factories burned to the ground and everything in between. So really, really great learning experience and certainly amazing to learn about physical products, you know, the manufacturing and distribution and sales and so on of actual physical products. And then, in 2015, I came back to the UK. I didn't really know what I wanted to do. And so I had a bunch of coffees with people and ended up as founding CFO in an EdTech venture, which was a joint venture between Eton College, which is one of the premier schools here in the UK where famously all of our Prime Ministers seem to come from, and Founders Factory which is an accelerator that was founded by Brent Hoberman of lastminute.com fame. So that was really exciting. I was straight off the boat from Papua New Guinea, sitting 10 feet away from Brent Hoberman, learning everything that there was to learn about the tech sector here in the UK and beyond. And had a really great couple of years working in that business and learning really everything there was to know about the VCA ecosystem, the early stage ecosystem, how to build products, how to finance them, how to sell into new territories (We were operating in China at the time.) and all sorts of other things. And then, in 2017, I decided it was time to move on. And I became what you guys would probably call a fractional CFO. So I worked across C through Series C businesses, everything from EdTech to FinTech, D2C, B2B marketplaces, beauty tech, you name it, kind of been there, seen it, and done it. And in 2019 and 2020, started getting approached by FDs and CFOs that wanted to work with me. And I really doubled down at that stage and decided to build EmergeOne into what it is today, which is a consultancy providing CFO services to venture-backed tech startups and scaleups. So we work with a huge bunch of businesses here in the UK that are backed by VCs, some of the big names here like Hoxton Ventures, Stride, Octopus, Outlier, Founders Factory, and others. And I'm really, really passionate about helping founders build their businesses in a scalable and sensible way, I guess, especially in the current environment. And so we're really lucky that we're trusted by these VCs and the founders that we work with to deliver really great services to them. And then, a couple of years ago, because I've been working kind of in the tech sector for so long, I started noodling around with a couple of ideas of projects that I wanted to move forward with. I raised a really small kind of pre-seed back in 2021 and started building a product, which is today Projected.ai, which we have just launched. We're in the process of launching at the moment. And what that is is effectively an email newsletter, if you can believe it, providing internal and external data to our client businesses. So effectively, it's like a flash report of your financials alongside some really sort of personalized news about what's going on in your industry, alongside some other sort of bits and bobs that we're currently building in. On top of that, a couple of years ago, again, I realized that I had a really good network of people that I had relationships with, and I decided to launch the Nothing Ventured Podcast to start speaking with people that operated in the VC ecosystem here in the UK and beyond. So I've been really fortunate to have guests like Hussein Kanji from Hoxton Ventures, Mac Conwell from RareBreed ventures in the U.S., and various others. And I really got to talk to them about why they got into venture, what they see is happening in the market, what are they excited about. And all those sorts of things. Because, to be honest, I'm really passionate about learning and understanding about where people are coming from, why they do what they do, what drives them, what they're passionate about, but equally, the sort of challenges they've also faced. And that's been going now for 60-odd episodes. We're launching Season 4 shortly. And I'm really lucky and fortunate to have been able to do that. And then finally, at the back end of 2022, so in December, actually, just as I was jumping on a plane, I sort of released something on LinkedIn, which was like 100 lessons that I've learned as a CEO and CFO over the last 20 years of operating. And unexpectedly, the thing went viral. I've had close to a million views on it, thousands of likes, hundreds of comments, and reshares. And I decided to turn what was effectively just a list into a short-form podcast, which has turned into Off Balance. So we're releasing that daily and kind of expanding on each and every one of those topics that I went through in that list. So, yeah, look, I mean, I'm someone with a finger in a lot of pies. I'm a massive generalist, so I love getting involved in different projects at different times. But I'm really fortunate to be able to do what I love doing. It's just been a wild journey for the last seven years, certainly, but the whole 20 years of my life. WILL: I love it. I love it. I love every idea that you had weaves into that venture capitalist money idea. So let's start at EmergeOne. When did you have that aha moment that this could work? AARISH: So I work a lot in strategy, so there are two forms of strategies, emergent and there's defined. So most people know about a strategy that is written down; it's a playbook. They go out, and they pursue it. For me, it was really emergent. Firstly, I realized that there were not that many great CFOs operating in tech, certainly here in the UK, because it's, to an extent, a nascent industry. And whilst there are great accountants, and there are great finance leaders in larger businesses, actually doing that in a startup or a scaleup is very, very different. Now, don't get me wrong, there are some great CFOs out there. It's just that I think there are far fewer than many people [laughs] assume there to be. So that was kind of the first thing that twigged with me. And I was seeing a lot of businesses picking up people and calling them a CFO when I knew for a fact there was no way that they really had the experience to be able to call themselves a CFO or to operate as one. So I guess that was the first aha moment. And the second aha moment was as I started talking to more and more VCs via the podcast, and just generally because I was out in the ecosystem talking to them, I realized that actually, the work that I was doing was not being driven necessarily by the client companies but actually by the VCs themselves because they wanted to make sure that having invested 1,2,5, 10 million pounds or dollars that those companies were in good hands and safe hands and that capital was being managed effectively and efficiently. And obviously, we're sitting in January of 2023 now. Never has that been more appropriate. More and more businesses are struggling. They're struggling to raise. They're having to extend their runways and figure out how to manage their cash in a much, much more significant way than maybe they had to two or three years ago. And so, for us, that's like a massively important thing. And having a great CFO in your business is going to help you do that. And therefore, we are getting approached more and more both by VCs as well as by companies that are just on the lookout for someone to help them. It was sort of a series of aha moments. But as I said earlier, it was an emergent strategy. It was something that kind of developed over time. But also, I'm someone that learned quite early on in my life to back myself. I think I took the punt on building this agency, if you like because it felt right. And it felt like something that I would enjoy doing, and it felt like something that I could actually make a difference in. And I think all of those things kind of culminated in really making EmergeOne what it is today, and I'm really proud of what we've been able to achieve. WILL: Yeah, I love that idea because I feel like, especially in startups, like you said, that excellent CFO is really hard to find. It's really hard to find. But if you don't have the numbers, you don't have a business. Let's be honest, the numbers you just don't have it. AARISH: Yeah, it's crazy to me that over the last decade or so, we've had, obviously, this period of super cheap money, super cheap capital. People have been raising at very inflated valuations. But we're seeing all of that come home to roost. We're seeing that in the public markets. A lot of these companies that IPOed over the last several years, obviously, have had their valuations drop significantly, you know, companies like Peloton, I guess, and others. People are starting to realize that actually cash is king. They need to understand how the cash is flowing through their business and to know that they need to have an intimate knowledge of their numbers. And, in fact, a lot of our role as a CFO in a business is to kind of coach the founder to make sure that they do understand those numbers and how they need to present them to internal stakeholders, external stakeholders, whether that's your board, whether that's investors, or whether that's your employees to make sure that people have a good idea of not only how they're tracking but where they're heading and where the end goal is. And I think it's massively important. I've always been a massive advocate for people getting to grips with their numbers, even if you're not a numbers person. Because especially if you're a founder or you're the leader in the business, the CEO, ultimately, the buck stops with you. You've got to know those numbers. It's not good enough to say, "Well, my CFO, my accountant has a handle on them." Like, if you're sitting in an investor meeting trying to pitch them to raise 5 to 10 million bucks, you're going to need to know those numbers inside out. And it's astonishing how many people actually ignore those. And what I would say is, you know, ignore them at your peril. WILL: Yeah, that just blows my mind because if I put myself in an investor seat if I'm giving you money, I want the head person, the CEO, to know exactly how to handle that money. So yeah, I love that idea, and I love what you're doing. Let's go on Projected.ai. And if I understand this correctly, this is more of a kind of [inaudible 10:51] the words. AARISH: So it's like a newsletter on steroids. WILL: Yeah, but it's to be honest about your numbers to board members and investors, correct? AARISH: Yeah. So Projected.ai was born out of this understanding that I guess I have, which is that CFOs and finance professionals working in startups and scaleups and SMEs they have dashboard fatigue. We interviewed CFOs, and they're operating off like 20 different dashboards, each of them giving them different numbers, each of them telling them something different. And they don't even have time to look at those dashboards, let alone make decisions based on the numbers that are coming out of them. So what we wanted to do with Projected was provide a touch point for that CFO where they could check in with their numbers in a really easy way on a consistent, regular basis. When I thought about this really clearly, I don't live in dashboards; where I live is in the tools I communicate in, so that's my emails, that may be my Slack channel, that may be WhatsApp or iMessage, or whatever it is that you use. But certainly, for business, it's going to be email and Slack for the most part. So I thought, what is the easiest way to communicate with someone in their business? It is via one of those channels. And what are the things that they want to know? Well, they want to know what's happening in their business, what's changed in their numbers over the last week, or two weeks, or month, but also what's happening outside their business. Because often, in startups, we get so kind of tunnel-visioned into what's happening inside the business. We don't take the time to look outside and figure out what others are doing or what may be happening in the macro environment that may have an impact on our business. And an obvious case of that at the moment is interest rates having moved up quite significantly over the last several months and still going to, as well as sort of inflation numbers also on their way up, and central banks everywhere trying to rein those in. All of that is going to have an impact on your business, especially if you're a consumer business, for example. And if you don't factor in all of those things or if you don't look at all of the things that could impact your business, you're going to make decisions with imperfect information, and, therefore, you'll make imperfect decisions. Now, you're never going to have perfect information. But the more information, the more pertinent information you have, the more transparent you can be, exactly as you said, to your board, to your shareholders. Tell them exactly what's happening, and get their advice to help you through those rough patches. Ultimately, we've got some tricks up our sleeves in terms of what we're going to be doing with those numbers, and how we're going to be presenting them, and how we're going to be manipulating them when we do show them to our users. But I kind of felt like we've moved past that time where CFOs were only about the numbers looking backwards. A really great CFO today is all about communication, information. It's about turning data into information, turning numbers into a narrative. Yeah, that's what we wanted to build, a tool that could support them and help them really be the best CFO they can be. WILL: Yeah, that's amazing. Transparency is the word I was looking for. So you nailed it, yeah. So I love that idea, the transparency of the numbers of the business just using AI. So that's amazing. It makes it a lot easier to send it out and to make it happen. So I love that idea. AARISH: Yeah. I mean, the interesting thing is; obviously, we've all been hearing a lot about generative AI and large language models at the moment. And we've definitely got plans to incorporate that into what we're doing. But the other side of that is you got to be really, really careful, obviously, because, as we all know, there are biases that can creep into any of those sort of AI-driven models. But equally, there are inaccuracies. And, in fact, a lot of those models tend to be great with words, not great with numbers. So one has to be really, really careful about bringing those tools into play. And because we know what we're doing, we can assess for that and make sure that the information that we're putting out there is the right sort of information, but actually, what we can do in terms of modeling our cash flows and revenue and effectively forecasting out a business. Because bearing in mind a lot of startups, most startups, most scaleups, most SMEs don't have the balance sheet. They don't have the money to go out there and build an AI tool themselves. They just simply don't. And they may not have the wherewithal in-house, but they almost certainly don't have the cash. So what we're doing is hopefully providing a bridge for them to get better information in terms of what's happening today but also maybe an inkling of what might happen tomorrow, which helps them, again, to plan better. And, again, it comes back to this whole thing around decision making, transparency, and making sure that they're able to look at their numbers with confidence and communicate those to others with confidence, and really understand what's driving those numbers as they keep building their businesses. But everything we do at Projected, everything I do definitely as a founder and as someone that operates in this ecosystem, is all driven by how do we make the ecosystem better? How do we help founders? How do we help their companies? How do we make sure we can drive that number down from 90% of startups failing within the first three or five years? How do we turn that number into 70%, 60%, or less? So that's all about information. It's all about giving those hard-won lessons, hard-learned lessons back to founders and guiding them, I guess, in the best way we can. WILL: Yeah, I love that. I love that. MID-ROLL AD: thoughtbot is thrilled to announce our own incubator launching this year. If you are a non-technical founding team with a business idea that involves a web or mobile app, we encourage you to apply for our eight-week program. We'll help you move forward with confidence in your team, your product vision, and a roadmap for getting you there. Learn more and apply at tbot.io/incubator. WILL: Let's transition to talking a little bit about you. I love to just ask questions to the founders because, honestly, what founders go through just amazes me that you continue to go. You wake up, and you do it over and over again. So it's amazing, so kudos to you. So let's talk about that; why? Why do you wake up every morning and do EmergeOne, do Projected.ai, do the podcasts? What's your why? AARISH: I'm in therapy trying to figure that answer out myself. WILL: [laughs] AARISH: No, look, I mean, I think what drives me, again, it's that sense of purpose of helping others. It's also scratching the itch. I think a lot of founders, it's about scratching that itch. There is something that you can see that is wrong in the universe, and you want to fix it. And if I think about those various sorts of businesses or podcasts, each of them attracts me in different ways. So EmergeOne, we get to help lots of businesses, providing them really, really significant support. And we're working with great VCs, with great clients, great startups, and scaleups. At Projected, we get to expand that range because you're no longer reliant on one person providing a CFO service or a bench of 20 people or whatever. We can now do that across hundreds, thousands of startups if need be. With the podcasts, it's a combination of learning and hopefully also providing some learning to others, helping them understand a bit more. So the Off Balance podcast these are like two-minute short episodes, which go into the detail of those 100 lessons that I've learned. And some of them are very, very personal to me, but they're probably applicable across most businesses. And all I'm doing is exploring those in a bit more detail and hopefully passing that on so that some other founder somewhere doesn't have to go through the same pain of learning that lesson. They can look out for the signals and figure out how to deal with it in advance. And Nothing Ventured scratches my itch to learn more about the VC ecosystem. If you imagine I'd spent ten years out in New Guinea, I had no idea what venture capital was out there. I really didn't understand what the tech ecosystem was. When I arrived there, we were still on dial-up. There were no mobile telephones. It wasn't until 2008, 2009, that mobile telephony really kind of picked up over there. So when I came back to the UK, I was just surrounded by all of this stuff which I was massively curious about. And so everything I've done since then is about scratching that curiosity and learning. And I think that that drives pretty much everything that I do in life in general, which is this huge passion to learn and understand the world a bit better and to hopefully pass on whatever I can to others because I think life's too short to hold it all for yourself. The more you can give, the better the world is. WILL: Yeah, definitely, definitely. Let's give a sneak peek into Off Balance. You said that you use that to teach lessons that you've learned along the way. What have been some of the big obstacles that you've come across? AARISH: Oh wow. I mean, there are 100 lessons in there, [laughs] so I'm going to have to pick a couple of my favorites. Okay, so one which actually I posted about today on LinkedIn it was like the episode we dropped today, which is "Hire Slow, Fire Fast." And I got a lot of flak about this actually talking about it on LinkedIn when I first posted it. And the reason I think that I got a lot of flak was all people read were those four words: hire slow, fire fast. And they just assumed what I was saying was you should fire in the vein of a lot of the larger tech businesses over the last couple of years where maybe they've sent a mass text message or email and just sacked a bunch of people. And that's absolutely not what I'm advocating for. I think you should always be human when you are dealing with people all the time. But the things that I've really learned is if you don't have a process to hire people well, you end up hiring the wrong people. And you end up hiring people that either don't have a fit in the business or are just not the right people in terms of their ability to do what you need them to do. And we're all probably aware of this fact by now, but it bears repeating, right? All of us when we are talking to other people, we look for reflections of ourselves. So when we are hiring people, we look for people that emulate how we see ourselves, whether that's in the way they talk, in the way they dress, whether they look like us, or whether they come from a similar background. And I think those are all obviously negative biases that we all need to remove. And the way you can remove those is in a couple of ways, so, one, use data wherever possible and use data points. Secondly, have a process that makes sure that you have a really strong top-of-the-funnel, bringing in candidates from across all sectors, all experiences. I make sure that there are several people involved in that process so that you're all giving your feedback on an individual so that you can make sure that, actually, I thought this person was going to be great in this role, but maybe my CTO thinks they're not; they're going to be mediocre. We can have that conversation and understand where those challenges have come up, and hopefully get to a place where we either decide actually, yeah, you know what? We shouldn't hire this person. Or, actually, yeah, you know what? I think you're right. I'm convinced that this is the right person. We should go for them. But I think the point is companies can lose hundreds of thousands of dollars hiring the wrong person, that's in recruitment fees, in training fees, and lost time, et cetera, et cetera. So it makes sense to do it right, right from the beginning. And the flip side of that is if you have hired someone and they turn out to be a toxic person or not fit for purpose in terms of the role that they're doing; the point is not to then just send them an SMS and say, you know, "You're fired." The point is, you know, Donald Trump style, no. WILL: [laughs] AARISH: The point is actually to take the decision really quickly. So if you realize that that person is not working out, then make the decision and execute on that decision as quickly as possible because I've seen it too often and have done it myself to the business' detriment. I've seen too often people sitting on a decision to move someone on. And that's ended up leading to problems in the business because other employees, other members of the team will recognize that toxicity or that person isn't pulling their weight, or they aren't able to do the job even. And that will just lead to negative impact on the rest of the business as well. So that's definitely one I would always come back to is, like, hire slow, fire fast. I think I'm happy to take more flak on it because I strongly believe it is something that more founders and more businesses should take heed of. And the other one, I think it was number one on my list for a reason, and that's cash trumps everything and today, even more so than anything else. I think businesses over the last, certainly in the venture ecosystem, over the last sort of five years, growth at all costs has been the mantra, and that's throwing dollars at marketing and just building new customers, or buying new customers, I should say, to supercharge growth when actually that isn't sustainable. And it doesn't necessarily lead to good outcomes in the future. My preference is twofold, one, spend as much time and money as you can in cultivating your existing customers, make sure you're really giving them delight in whatever product or service you're providing them because that means that they're going to stay with you longer. They're going to pay themselves back in terms of how much it costs to acquire, and hopefully, they're going to be advocates for your business. And all of that basically leads to a better cash bottom line. And today, always, but today over and above any other period, I think over the last 5, 10 years cash trumps everything because you are only as good as your runway. And when you run out of money in this market, it is very hard to go out and try and raise additional capital, and raising capital at the sort of valuations that people have also been used to over the last several years is getting harder and harder, if not impossible. So those are probably the two that I would always come back to; it's the hire slow, fire fast, cash trumps everything. And it's better to spend money retaining and loving your customers than trying to constantly acquire new ones. WILL: Yeah, I love that. I love that. Let's flip it to the other side, what have been some of your biggest wins in life? AARISH: I mean, I'm going to say the obvious one. My biggest wins are my family, you know, my wife, my kids. I've got two beautiful daughters, one's 21, one's 15. I hope we've raised them to be well-adjusted children. We've given them, I think, the ability to go out and do what they want in life. And that's really important to me. My wife, her, and I have been together for 20 years. We've had our ups and downs, but today I think we make an amazing team. And I'm really fortunate to have her in my life. If I think about wins and success in business, it's really hard for me and, again, because I think success is a state of mind. It's not something that you can chase. And I think too many people get caught up in this sort of idea of I'll be successful when. And what I mean is I'll be successful when I've raised that big series A, or I'll be successful when I've exited my business, or I'll be successful when I've made that huge sale, or when I've hired that rockstar employee or made it to founder, or whatever it is. If you approach success with the attitude of you are already a success, whatever you're doing, you are alive today, living in one of the most exciting times on the planet. You are a successful human being; whatever anyone else says, that's a major win in itself. And understanding that state of mind that you have to be in is something that it takes a really long time to understand and really internalize. And I think the way that I've managed to get to that place is I've realized that in the past, either I was chasing success or I was waiting for someone else to tell me that I've been successful. When in reality, if I judge success based on my own benchmarks, then it's impossible for me to look at what I've done and say I haven't been successful. I've got two businesses, two podcasts. Who knows? One of those businesses may fall over, one of those podcasts may not get a single listener or whatever. But the mere fact that I've shown up and broken ground on all of that stuff for me is, I think, an indication of success. It's something I'm really proud of. And as I move forward in life, I'm always going to try to do better. But I already know that whatever successes or failures I may have in the future, I've already been successful. And I think that's the thing that all of us should hold on to in life. WILL: Yeah, I totally agree with that, and I really, really like that. So I'm going to close it out with this: what advice would you go back and give yourself when you first started at the very beginning knowing what you know now? AARISH: I would say from the age of like 15 to the age of getting on 37, 38, I was a product of what other people wanted, what I did at school, what I studied...well, what I studied at university was what I wanted to do, but it was almost in retaliation for what others wanted me to do. Where I worked, the sort of path that I trode was very much based on culturally, familiarly what was expected of me kind of growing up in a very middle-class and privileged background. It wasn't until I came back to the UK from Papua New Guinea, where I basically came back with nothing to my name and no idea what I was going to do, and I started doing things that I wanted to do and started backing myself in spite of what other people were saying. So even when I left that first job working at the EdTech business, one of my cousins turned around and said, "Why are you leaving that job? It is paying you a really good salary. Like, why would you leave that to do this thing?" And I had someone else, an angel investor who's one of my closest friends; she turned around and said, "Well, if one of my portfolio companies came and said, oh, they're looking to bring in a CFO, I'd tell them they're stupid and spend their money elsewhere." And I was like, "No, I can see that there is something to be done in this space. I'm going to go and do it." And, lo and behold, again, it's paid off. And so I think the one piece of advice I would have given to myself, and I would give to everyone, is back yourself early on. You may not have the experience to do everything. You may not have the network. You may not have the cash. You may not have the friends and family that can invest in you or whatever it might be. But take that first step, back yourself because ultimately, if you can't back yourself, no one else is going to. WILL: Wow, that's really good, really good. Wow, I really like that. Yeah. Yeah, I really liked that because it's kind of the initial stage of that self-care, especially as a founder. Like, if you don't believe in yourself, how can you even ask someone else for it? Because they can see, like, well, is this a good investment? Are you going to see it through, or are you going to quit? AARISH: Yeah, and in fact, I'd add to that one of the other things I've said is, but I came to this late in life, is if my mind and my body aren't healthy, then my business can't be either. I realized quite late in life, as I say, probably mid-30s, again, that I'd probably done more damage to my body than I needed to through my diet, through whatever proclivities I may have had. The most amazing I've ever felt is today, where I'm exercising daily, where I'm taking care of myself mentally, taking the time to think about what is important to me, and to show gratitude for a lot of stuff as well. And exactly as you say, if you're not looking after yourself, it's really, really hard to look after a business, to look after team members. And certainly, when other people are looking at you, they're going to kind of sit there and say, "Well, how safe is my money in this guy's hands? Or do I think that this person is going to be able to see it through?" So 100% the two things are back yourself and look after yourself. I think those are two really important things. WILL: All right, to close out the podcast, is there anything that you would like to share with the audience? AARISH: I mean, I think it's been awesome speaking to you. I would love for everyone to come and check out Nothing Ventured and the Off Balance Podcast. And please connect with me on LinkedIn, follow me, follow me on Twitter. My handle is @adsinuk, so that's @A-D-S-I-N-U-K, both on LinkedIn and on Twitter. You can find me at Aarish Shah on LinkedIn, obviously, as well. I'm always keen to hear from people, learn from people, talk to them. All I would ask is be gentle with each other. Come find me. Come have a chat. And, yeah, it's been awesome speaking to you today. WILL: Yeah, it's been great talking to you too. And I'm going to lead by leadership. And I'm going to look you up on LinkedIn, Twitter; check out the podcast. I'm excited about that. So I'm looking forward to it. AARISH: Amazing. Thanks, man. WILL: Yeah, thank you. You can subscribe to the show and find notes along with a complete transcript for this episode at giantrobots.fm. If you have any questions or comments, email us at hosts@giantrobots.fm. You can find me on Twitter @will23larry. This podcast is brought to you by thoughtbot and produced and edited by Mandy Moore. Thanks for listening. See you next time. ANNOUNCER: This podcast is brought to you by thoughtbot, your expert strategy, design, development, and product management partner. We bring digital products from idea to success and teach you how because we care. Learn more at thoughtbot.com. Special Guest: Aarish Shah.

Ashley is a Principal at VamosVentures. She started her career at Morgan Stanley in Capital Markets and moved into strategic roles at Shoptiques.com, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Estee Lauder, focused on the intersection of consumers and technology. She was previously an investor at Brand Foundry Ventures, Founders Factory, and Dorm Room Fund. Ashley holds a BA from Brown University and an MBA from MIT Sloan.VamosVentures invests in diverse founding teams and mission-oriented companies across FinTech, Sustainability, Future of Work, Commerce, and Health and Wellness. 100% of their portfolio is diverse led and over 87% of their portfolio companies are Latinx led. 100% of their investment team is also diverse.Connect with Behind Company Lines and HireOtter Website Facebook Twitter LinkedIn:Behind Company LinesHireOtter Instagram Buzzsprout

Ashley is a Principal at VamosVentures. She started her career at Morgan Stanley in Capital Markets and moved into strategic roles at Shoptiques.com, Saks Fifth Avenue and Estee Lauder. She was previously an investor at Brand Foundry Ventures, Founders Factory and Dorm Room Fund. Ashley holds a BA from Brown University and an MBA from MIT Sloan.

Ashley is a Principal at VamosVentures. She started her career at Morgan Stanley in Capital Markets and moved into strategic roles at Shoptiques.com, Saks Fifth Avenue and Estee Lauder. She was previously an investor at Brand Foundry Ventures, Founders Factory and Dorm Room Fund. Ashley holds a BA from Brown University and an MBA from MIT Sloan.

Jeannette is a high-performing corporate CEO turned Entrepreneur with a multi-million business portfolio across multiple sectors. Jeannette now helps business owners and senior executives take their businesses and their careers to the next level! She now has a portfolio of businesses, covering property investing, board advisory, and business mentoring. The breadth of her experience in business, mergers & acquisitions, and investing, along with her ‘ down-to-earth approach, makes for a unique combination. Alongside her direct engagements, Jeannette is also an active Mentor for the UK Hospitality mentoring program, a judge for Everywoman in Travel, and a member of the Travel Advisory Board of the Founders Factory. Jeannette's broader contribution has been formally recognized. Inducted into the Travel industry ‘Hall of Fame' as ‘Businesswoman Of The Year' she was subsequently acknowledged as ‘One Of The Most Influential Women in Travel' by the Association of Women Travel Executives. Jeannette has helped hundreds of people unlock their true potential in their businesses and careers and her podcast Brave, Bold, Brilliant is in the top 1.5% of all podcasts in the world.

Der tägliche Nachrichten-Podcast der deutschen Startup-Szene Heute u.A. mit diesen Themen: Nuri vor dem Aus „Black Friday“-Marke verfallen Neuer 50-Millionen-Fonds Trade Republic expandiert weiter Joint Venture von Founders Factory und Hubraum Paycell auf Europakurs EU beschließt Frauenquote für Aufsichtsräte YouTube präsentiert neues Label für Gesundheitsinformationen BYD mit starkem Wachstum Infos der Werbepartner: ROQ: Gehe jetzt auf roq.tech/daily und erhalte die komplette Plattform 3 Monate lang for free.

This week's episode features a conversation with Sam Sturm, Chief Venture Architect at Founders Factory Africa (FFA). FFA is the go-to innovation partner for startups, investors, governments, and corporates — throughout Africa and beyond. Sam shares insights on the value of relationships, his journey into the venture space, his thoughts on the Venture ecosystem, the myth of talent scarcity and his favourite productivity hacks. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/the-grinders-table/message

Bongani Sithole is the Managing Director and Chief Scale Officer of Founders Factory Africa, a venture builder, accelerator, and investor focused on backing early-stage founders of Fintech, Healthtech, Agritech & Logistics startups. Bongani talks about his journey into startups, Founders Factory Africa's programs, and some of the opportunities in the startup ecosystem in Africa.   Reach out to Bongani: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bongani-sithole-7112527/   For more information on Founders Factory Africa, head to: https://www.foundersfactory.africa

Ashley started her career at Morgan Stanley in Capital Markets and moved into strategic roles at Shoptiques.com, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Estee Lauder focused on the intersection of the consumer and technology. She was previously an investor at Brand Foundry Ventures, Founders Factory, and Dorm Room Fund across commerce, health and wellness, and financial technology. Ashley holds a BA from Brown University and an MBA from MIT Sloan. https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleyaydin/  **** FREE RESOURCES

Speaking to Alina Truhina, Chief Strategy Officer and Philani Mzila, Investment Manager at Founders Factory Africa (FFA). We explore the journeys that early-stage businesses face within the agri-tech sector, how entrepreneurs can connect with investors and how organisations such as the FFA support entrepreneurs to build and scale agri-tech startups across the continent.  Please visit their website: https://www.foundersfactory.africa/Rate and review this episode and subscribe to the podcast. Directly contact me on info@mbalinwoko.com

In the second episode of Deciphered, Adam Davis, Associate Partner at Bain & Company and Mike Cashman, Partner, Bain & Company  are joined by Sarah Kocianski, Strategic Insights Lead for Fintech at Founders Factory, and Tim Levene, Partner and CEO, Augmentum to discuss the future of Fintech valuations. Where do the market correction and current volatility leave Fintechs?Timestamps:- Volatility & market correction, where are fintech valuations heading? (3:08) - Fintech funding (5:37) - Macroeconomic pressures vs dry powder in the current market (6:36) - Are lower risk assets back in favour? (8:01) - What investors and founders are looking for (10:40) - Fintech valuations  (11:53) - Are Fintechs overvalued on hype and hope vs fundamentals? (13:21) - Will companies stay private for longer? (18:10) - Superior geographies, in terms of investment and valuation perspectives? (19:39) - What type of fintech do you want to be in this market? (24:52) - BNPL (25:03) - Advantages of rising rate environments vs consumer/business defaults (26:41) - Investing in sectors and trends, from services or product perspectives (27:40) - PE, VC, and growth equity splits (29:35) - Sentiments around raising investment (34:30)Sources & Resources cited:-CB Insights: State of Fintech Q1'22 Report-BBC UK: What is the UK's inflation rate and why is the cost of living going up?-Axios: Fintech Deals Newsletter, Fintech SPACs go splat-Dealroom: Fintech 2021 Report-SoFi: Q1 2022 Results Report-Bain & Company: Macro Trends

AN ENTREPRENEUR WITH IMPACT. Brent Hoberman is Co-Founder and Chairman of Founders Factory, Founders Forum and firstminute Capital. He co-founded lastminute.com in 1998, was CEO from its inception, and sold it in 2005 to Sabre for $1.1bn. He also co-founded Made.com which went public in 2021 for $1.1bn.

An exciting episode with Louis Warner Chief Operating Officer and Accelerator Programme Director for Founders Factory. Louis has held a series of operational and leadership roles in privately backed, early stage, internet and technology-led businesses including being a member of the early team at lastminute.com Listen to Louis Warner and Sina Sadrzadeh while they dive into the topic 'Great founders get these 6 things right '.  Interested in attending Elevating Founders @ London Tech Week? Go to: www.londontechweek.com  For more information about Elevating Founders go to: www.elevatingfounders.tech 

Claire Morris is Chief Studio Officer at Founders Factory, the world's leading venture studio and accelerator, where she helps build and scale tech startups - powering founders to go further faster where she has turned more than 50 early-stage ideas into the next generation of tech companies.Creativity Without Frontiers available at all relevant book retailersStay in touch with Unknown OriginsMusic by Iain MutchSupport the show

Peony Li is Founder and CEO at Jude — a company bringing bladder care into the mainstream. She studied Economics at Cambridge, and has worked in Investment Banking, she worked as Head of Investments at Founders Factory, at Daye as Head of Operations before finally founding Jude and raising $2.5M. We talk about the rosy picture of entrepreneurship versus the harsh reality, what it's like to be a founder in a taboo industry and how optimism is a habit rather than something you're born with. I hope you enjoy. You can find me on Twitter @MustafaSultan and subscribe to my newsletter on www.musty.io

In this episode, Dan chats with Olly Betts from Founders Factory.  Here, they discuss entrepreneurship in financial planning, how you take your idea and turn it into a business, and Olly's number one tip for launching your own business. Join us: https://www.nextgenplanners.co.uk/join-our-community 

Taha Dar is the founder and CEO of SearchSmartly, an award-winning prop-tech startup backed by Founders Factory. SearchSmartly transforms the property search experience by helping renters, and buyers save hours searching for their ideal home while providing estate agents with high-quality, pre-qualified leads. Taha has a diverse background in technology, strategy, and finance and previously worked in the world of Formula 1 at the Red Bull Racing F1 Team. Taha holds an MEng in Aeronautical Engineering from Imperial College and an MBA from the London Business School. Feel free to connect with him on LinkedIn here: ◘ https://linkedin.com/in/tahadar Learn more about his business here: ◘ https://www.searchsmartly.co/ Links that the guest wants to share: ◘ https://www.instagram.com/searchsmartly/

On this episode of the Agency Builders Podcast, Andre and Christian sit down with Jordan Ross, the founder and CEO of The Founders Factory. In this episode, Jordan dropped value on: - The skills he learned managing a team at Amazon - How he started his own agency and 10x'd his Amazon income in a year - Figuring out when to outsource/hire based on bandwidth - Focusing inputs on driving a process that will take you from A (where you are now) to B (where you want to go) --- If you're looking to build your own agency, you'll need a lead generation system in place to generate a consistent stream of sales calls. The team at KnowledgeX is here to help! You can learn more about our Pay-Per-Call lead generation system by visiting our website here: https://www.knowledgex.us/ --- Contact Jordan: Email: jordan@jordanrosscoaching.com Website: https://www.jordanrosscoaching.com/ --- Contact The Hosts: Andre: andre@knowledgex.us Christian: christian@knowledgex.us Twitter: @andrehaykaljr Website: www.knowledgex.us --- P.S. Be sure to subscribe on your favorite podcast listening platforms so you don't miss new episodes dropping every Thursday!

Join me in a discussion with Ashley Aydin and her path from Staten Island to the incoming Principal at Vamos Ventures. We'll talk about her Puerto Rican and Turkish roots, starting off her career at Morgan Stanley and Estee Lauder, and her passion to be at the intersection of consumer and impact investing - interning for Dorm Room Fund, Brand Foundry Ventures, Founders Factory, and Vamos Ventures all while at MIT Sloan's MBA program. #WeBreakBread

Lynn Anderson Clark, strategic partnerships lead at Founders Factory, speaks to Eric Schmidt, former CEO and chairman of Google and co-founder of Schmidt futures about why future founders should solve the world's biggest problems. Their conversation explores how the startup ecosystem can increase impact investing, finessing the balancing act of profit and purpose, what entrepreneurial culture is like in the UK, and Eric's top tips for success, *spoiler alert* it's about shots on goal!

As a co-founding board member at 1871 in Chicago and creator of the Dancing with Startups program, I am always on the lookout for potential global expansion partners, like Founders Factory. They are a very dynamic startup accelerator and venture studio, launched five years ago in London by Brent Hoberman and Henry Lane Fox, on the principles of aiding founders with hands-on resources. On this episode of the Reboot Chronicles we dig into how entrepreneurs and startups should evaluate incubators, accelerators or venture studios with Founders Factory Managing Director, Isabella Chick. With a growing list of corporate partners, 100 people (wow) and 4 global locations, they have funding from numerous organizations, allowing them to invest in and rapidly scale and transform global sector challenges—opportunistically. How it Works Standing out from the rest, Founders Factory provides a different perspective, separating their accelerator and venture studio, enabling a more direct operating approach. Moving beyond the typical "cohort" model, over 200 startups have been in their six-month accelerator factory—68 in 2020 alone. Most of these ventures have received bespoke tailored services and advice focused on growth—with a keen understanding about the (land mine) spaces between retail and brands. Another secret sauce they provide founders is coveted all-access passes to world-renowned companies like J&J, M&S and L'Oréal who has a strong CVC group. The venture studio program allows entrepreneurs to start with funding and some de-risking. Isabella shares the two ways the venture operation works: either Founders Factory develops an insight or target area with a corporate partner and brings talent into the mix, or founders bring their concepts to the group and pitch for inclusion in the program. Corporate Partners Isabella points out, the importance of relationships with their corporate partners across multiple sectors, including education, media, beauty, travel, finance, AI & big data, retail, and home. This is not the typical demo-day/corporate entertainment format, but a more serious corporate commitment program. Within these sectors, the industry relationships they have, plus the corporate partners clout, have been crucial market accelerators for the entrepreneurs and startup teams. These corporate partners often de-risk too, as they can engage with the startups ahead of investment. Once a vote through the investment committee has been determined, based on the relationship momentum, concept feasibility and other insights, they can commit. With L'Oréal alone they have run over 200 pilots with entrepreneurs and startups! --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/rebootchronicles/message

This week on the Bet On Yourself Podcast I am talking with Brent Hoberman. Brent is Co-Founder and Executive Chairman of Founders Factory (a corporate-backed venture studio and accelerator), as well as The Founders Forum (a global community of founders and tech leaders), and firstminute capital (a $210m seed fund with global remit, backed by Atomico, Tencent and over 70 unicorn founders). Previously, Brent co-founded lastminute.com in 1998, where he was CEO from its inception to sale in 2005 to Sabre for $1.1bn. He is truly one of the internet's original unicorns. Technology businesses Brent has co-founded have raised over $800 million. The list is extensive and includes companies which support global entrepreneurs such as PROfounders Capital, Founders Intelligence (an entrepreneur-powered consultancy), accelerateHER (a network taking action to change the underrepresentation of women in technology), Founders Keepers (a technology executive search firm), Founders of the Future (a network that identifies and supports aspiring entrepreneurs), Founders Pledge (a community for entrepreneurs committed to finding and funding solutions to global challenges), Grip (AI powered event networking solution) and most recently Founders Academy (a new type of business school for a changing world). Brent is Chairman of the Karakuri board and sits on the advisory boards of The Royal Academy, the UK Government Digital Service, the WEF Digital Europe Group and the Imperial College Innovation Fund. He is also a Male Champion of Change for The Global Tech Group, and in 2015 was awarded a CBE for services to entrepreneurship. Brent is truly a remarkable entrepreneur and this episode is full of wisdom for anyone looking to make an informed bet on themselves. I have a feeling you're going to want to listen to this one twice! Buckle up! Minute by minute summary 03:00: Brent's foundation 14:00: How did you get lastminute.com off the ground? Brent talks us through the stages and recognizing the need for a co-founder 16:40: The importance of identifying your strengths when hiring 18:40: have you dissected a formula for scaling? 21:05: How did you survive the dot com bust and end up as one of Europes most successful internet companies? 26:25: Building consumer trust 28:30: Much of your focus is on supporting entrepreneurs through Founders Forum, what was your original vision? 32:30: How to pivot? Where to double down? 35:15: Optimistic entrepreneurs 36:20: In 2019 Brent became a male champion of change, he walks us through what this means. 39:40: What is giving you hope for the future? --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/ann-hiatt/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/ann-hiatt/support

[0:58] - Intro and journey to starting Sustainbly.   [6:15] - What does Sustainbly do? [8:34] - What changes have you seen in the donation patterns since the pandemic hit? [10:11] - How are charities leveraging digital to fundraise? Is your platform really making an impact to their bottom line? [12:19] - Why have you build Sustainbly as a for-profit rather than a non-profit company? [14:37] - What are some concerns consumers have in using such apps and how are you addressing that? [16:21] - How did you get help and resources from Virgin Startup, We Work, Founders Factory etc?   [19:36] - What advice would you give to entrepreneurs on how to stretch their money in the early months? [22:31] - How do you work with a family member and what advice would you give others who are in the same situation? [25:56] - What did you do when funding was tight?   [27:58] - What were some of the successful strategies you used to get funding? Book recommendation:Summer - Alley SmithTraction - Gabriel Weinberg and Justin MaresHooked - Nir Eyal

In this episode, we explore high-touch venture investing models - in particular, venture development and talent investing, as well as peer-selected investment. 2:16 - an introduction to accelerator programs and their objectives, with Catalyst Fund's Aaron Fu.3:47 - a discussion with Adedana Ashebir on Village Capital's peer-selected investment model.6:16 - Founders Factory Africa's Lwazi Wali and Sam Sturm on venture building and the merits of a human capital intensive investment model.10:20 - GreenTec Capital Partners takes their venture building model one step further. We hear from Erick Yong on GreenTec's Results for Equity model.16:07 - Then, Catalyst Fund takes their venture building model yet another step further. As Maelis Carraro explains, their program offers venture building as a grant and does not take any equity in the startups in their portfolio. 22:55 - While the aforementioned programs support existing startups, Antler's startup generator investment model brings individuals into a cohort to co-found startups with other participants in the program. We hear from Selam Kebede on the merits of this model for African markets.27:59 - The Flip's founder, Justin Norman and executive producer, Sayo Folawiyo, discuss their takeaways episode, and Sayo shares his experience, from a founder's perspective, as a participant in startup programs.

Product is everything, and whether your ‘tech-savvy' or not, we all need to adopt the product thinking mindset as leaders. As Head of Product at Founders Factory, Seb Sabouné joins the show to share his latest insight into how we can best adopt this mindset. In this current climate with the coronavirus, it's important more than ever to grow as leaders through empathy and resilience. Hear what Seb teaches through his product coaching framework to help with just that. Links mentioned in this show: Founders Factory: https://foundersfactory.com/ ‘Play Bigger' by Al Ramadan, Dave Peterson, Christopher Lochhead, Kevin Maney Hosted by Gillian Davis, co-author 'First Time Leader; Foundational Tools to Inspire and Enable Your New Team' this podcast is to inspire managers to step up and lead their teams. We talk to those on the front line and get managers to share what has worked, what hasn't and what resources they have tried and tested. This podcast is powered by OverTime, an agency that helps new leaders build great teams, products and, companies. For more information, visit www.OverTimeLeader.com.

Lwazi is currently the head of venture at Founders Factory Africa. She is a 2019 Obama Africa Leader and two-time early-stage tech founder, who is passionate about building products that sit at the intersection of economic science, impact and technology. In this episode, we dive deep into the trends, challenges and strengths of venture capital in the African continent. Check out https://medium.com/@scalescape/trends-challenges-and-strengths-of-vc-in-the-african-continent-6b92ce2198dd for shownotes & resources!

To solve problems on the continent, entrepreneurs are building sustainable, impact-driven, infrastructure-building, tech-enabled, for-profit companies - how should these companies be funded?In this episode - our third and final episode of our three-part series on venture investing in Africa, and the final episode of Season One, as well, we take a first principles approach to fundraising in Africa, and dive deeper into the opportunities for entrepreneurs to leverage different types of capital and funders to achieve their business' objectives.1:45- We define Venture Capital in the Silicon Valley sense, from Stratechery's What Is a Tech Company?2:48 - A discussion with LifeBank's Temie Giwa-Tubosun, on building a solution in the healthcare space - as a proxy for our exploration into impact-driven, for-profit startups in Africa6:24 - A discussion with MDaaS Global's Genevieve Barnard Oni and Oluwasoga Oni on building tech-enabled, brick and mortar diagnostic centers in Nigeria, and being told by one investor that they weren't "tech enough"10:31 - If the businesses being build to solve problems across Africa are not "tech enough", and if venture capitalists fund tech companies, then what fundraising models should we use? We hear from LaunchLab's Josh Romisher on the variety of investment vehicles used to fund off-grid solar home system ventures. 14:01 - Exploring innovative finance models with the Bertha Centre for Social Innovation and Entrepreneurship's Tine Fisker Henriksen.18:41 - If we're re-thinking investment models, should we also be re-thinking the very nature of finance for emerging markets? With Founders Factory's Lwazi Wali.22:12 - How might we imagine new, yet-to-be -determined models for Africa? Perhaps with the help of a history lesson from Alex Lazarow, global venture capitalist and author of Out-Innovate: How Global Entrepreneurs - from Delhi to Detroit - Are Rewriting the Rules of Silicon Valley.25:17 - As always, Sayo and I share our thoughts.

Venture Capitalists, generally speaking, are looking to fund high-growth ventures that have the potential to scale and achieve virtually infinite returns. But achieving that scale is hard, even more so in Africa, where there are market size questions, fragmented markets, and regulatory considerations. As a result, venture investors are looking for a specific type of founder and entrepreneur - one who has demonstrated the potential to pull it off and achieve the growth and scale investors are seeking.In the African early-stage ecosystem, with its funding scarcity, limited track record, talent shortage, and expansion challenges, how do venture investors reconcile their quest for funding high-growth ventures in this environment?2:24 - defining venture capital, courtesy of Stratechery's Ben Thompson and his blog post What is a Tech Company: https://stratechery.com/2019/what-is-a-tech-company/3:59 - VCs are looking for scale, and talent capable of achieving the desired scale, with Microtraction's Chidinma Iwueke & Dayo Koleowo + TLCom Capital's Ido Sum8:14 - a discussion on scarce deal flow and a lack of investable startups, with Dayo & Digest Africa's Peter Kisadha 10:46 - 4Di Capital's Justin Stanford + Ido talk about the need to balance their portfolios to account for the realities of the African market...11:46 - ...but a balanced portfolio doesn't mean lesser return expectations13:35 - how venture builders like Founders Factory Africa & Lwazi Wali are supporting entrepreneurs through their journey to scale16:14 - GreenTec Capital Partner & Maxime Bayen on their results for equity initiative17:58 - Lwazi + Startupbootcamp Africa's Zachariah George & global venture capitalist Alex Lazarow on achieving incentive alignment through initiatives like corporate VC and evergreen funds23:32 - a discussion with Justin & Sayo on venture investing in Africa

Shelley Laslett is the CEO and Co-Founder of Vitae.Coach (Vitae) - a startup that takes neuroscience out of the lab and into life to help people grow themselves and their businesses. Using the latest neuroscience, Vitae helps businesses improve performance by empowering people, teams and leaders with practical neurological knowledge, tailored learning programs, brain based coaching and advisory services. Shelley is a Social Scientist and Neuroscience Coach. She is currently completing her Masters in Applied Neuroscience at King's College in London. As well, as being the CEO of Vitae, Shelley is also a startup advisor, startup mentor startup board member and international speaker. Previously, Shelley was the General Manager of YBF Ventures - a startup incubator and VC fund. Prior to entering the startup world, Shelley was an international strategy and innovation consultant with Accenture UK. She has helped a number of companies evolve, change and bring their new ideas to life. Some of the companies Shelley has worked with include; The Walt Disney, Company, LinkedIn, Salesforce, NASDAQ, Techstars, Deloitte, Westpac, Diageo, AgriDigital, WeWork Labs, Founders Factory, marie claire, Qantas, Cover Genius, SKY Plc, Optus, Lloyds Banking Group, OMD, Commonwealth Bank, Tank Stream Labs, Body Image Movement, the projects*, Verizon, Springboard Enterprises, ANZ Bank, Sunculture, Bupa, VMware, Qantas, Dentsu Aegis Network, Innovation Bay, Fonterra, IBM, Royal Dutch Shell, Tech Ready Women and EY. Poppy Renegade describes Shelley as; "...unlike anyone you've ever met before. She has an infectious, yet calming energy, a brilliant mind and a powerful presence. Shelley is blazing her own trail and lifting others to new heights along the way." We discuss a wide variety of topics from Meta cognition Social Pain and how it actually does affect us Male and Female differences or indifferences Shelley references a number of scientists Naomi Eisenberger The Flynn Effect Shelley can be reached at any of the links below: Company Website: https://www.vitae.coach/ Instagram: @shelley.vitae LinkedIn: Shelley Laslett & Vitae.Coach Facebook: Shelley Charnley-Laslett & Vitae.Coach If you're interested in coming on a Flow States Retreats offering head to the link for more info on our Byron Bay 2020 offerings. Instagram: @flowstatesretreats Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/flowstatesretreats/ --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/tyson-venables/message

After London and Johannesburg, startup accelerator and incubator Founders Factory is launching a third city — Paris. Once again, the company is partnering with a corporate backer. And this time, insurance company Aviva France is backing Founders Factory Paris. Albin Serviant is heading the team in Paris and the plan is to hire 50 people. There will be more corporate backers coming soon, which should give enough runway for the next five years.