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out of 100 million uh fund we're going to make potentially 14 to 17 investments >> because I love music uh and I wanted to allow anybody to I thought anybody should be able to experience music >> the the companies that need a certification is when they're selling especially to larger uh enterprise customers this is for sure an entry ticket >> everybody's trying to find a way to cover when things are going wrong instead of thinking how we can make is the same >> and how can we trust that you have security in place and you say oh we don't have that then they're going to say please come back next year when you have it >> it's beautiful and you can see the song unfold in a visual way >> hello >> hello >> what's your name and what do you do >> my name is Paul Buring and I'm the founder and CEO of Cyber Juice >> what does Cyber Juice do >> Cyberjuice is a platform a software platform where we help startups and smaller companies when they are met with the security requirements from their customers. Customers are asking are you certified with ISO 27,0001 or sock 2 or something else then they come to us and we help them get certified without getting a headache. >> Which organizations management manages the issuance of these certifications? that is certified like authorized certified bodies that will give you the actual stamp. I used to explain this like if you're going to get a driver's license, you go to the school to learn how to drive and then you go to the authorities to get your actual to go to the exam and get the actual driver's license. So, we're the driving school and then someone else can give you the actual stamp. >> Are these certifications uh needed to be renewed each year? >> Yes, that's an excellent question. So uh you you have every year you have a reertification so someone comes and check are you still doing things right and is everything in place >> which is the origin of these certifications are the governments pushing for a kind of security framework or or which is the >> so there's a lot of regulations um these uh these days from the EU especially so that is not specifically for certifications but certifications also help to show that you're compliant towards the law and regulations. >> Which kind of h technical aspects are usually covered in this certification? Is it data data let's say storage EU versus US? Is about security against hacker attacks like which are the kind of >> it covers pretty much everything. It's like a broad um information security management system is what it's called. one the main certification that we help with. Um so it covers everything from technical aspects like have you uh do you have good passwords and encrypted hardest and is everything is access control in place. So all the technical aspects then it covers the organization. Do you have good governance structure in place? Is management actually backing up on this? Uh and then you have the uh the people aspect. Do your employees actually know how to have good security habits? Do they know to um not click links in emails, to not let people in the office who not supposed to be there, um to use good passwords and two factor authentication? So, it's it's everything. >> Do companies need to be certified at certain points? because I can imagine a lot of startups will uh start and really don't take a look at the certifications which is the point the time point where they need to be certified >> that's an excellent question um so I would start with saying not everybody needs to be certified so if you are a startup uh building a a product for consumers um your your customers probably don't know anything about these certifications. They still want to know that their data is secure, but then you just have good security practices. You don't necessarily need a certification for that. The the customers that the companies that need a certification is when they're selling especially to larger uh enterprise customers. This is for sure an entry ticket. It's like a license to operate as we say. So you are not going to get through procurement in a to a sales cycle without a certificate for the enterprise customers. So when you ask when do you need it? I would say you need it before you start serious uh sales cycles with enterprise customers. That's a good point. So don't start before you have built anything. You can do some pilots be before you get certified but when you start serious uh sales cycles that's um that's a point where you want to have the certification. >> Okay. and have new certifications been issued since this new AI wave of LLMs than akai I guess now there are new risks and new potential hacker attacks with these kind of technologies right >> yeah so um there is an ISO certification that is focused on AI companies as well so it covers like what you would expect from the more traditional certifications plus some AI um controls as as they're called and this one is called 4201. So there's an isolation for that as well and we have the EU AI act which is uh some of it is already u in place and some of it will come in the next year or so. So that's a law and you can say if you if you uh want to be on top of that well you need to of course understand what's what's in the what are the rules in the law but you can also get the ISO certification to help you have good governance and control around all your AI. >> So so far we we know that for getting enterprise clients you need a certification. What happens if you don't have the certification but you start working with any kind of enterprise? Are there any legal matters in that case or any outcomes that are negative for the >> So it's it's not a legal uh de like it's not a legal requirement that you need a certification. It's more of a market requirement. So what will happen if you go to an enterprise customer and say we have this amazing software product now give us all your data and we're going to help you. They're going to say where is your ISO certification and how can we trust that you have security in place and you say oh we don't have that then they're going to say please come back next year when you have it so that's what will happen you will meet the market demand >> okay and regarding your business what challenges does your business has right now >> so our biggest challenge right now is to get more leads >> okay yes more leads >> so can you send us some leads then that would be helpful >> okay perfect and any lesson that you will tell to the viewers based on your entrepreneurial journey. >> Yes, I have one that I actually learned from another uh founder that I really took to heart and that I think is very good to always remember and that is to stay as stupid and naive as when you started. >> It's uh yeah it's just a really good thing to always remember because it's the energy that keeps you going and keeps you resilient. >> Amazing. And any connection that you would like to have? Well, I want to say Barack Obama, but um I would like some >> we we don't have it yet in the network. >> Well, you don't know that. You don't know that. You might be a second order connection of someone. >> Very soon. Very soon. >> Um I would just like to be connected to uh founders that have this problem and want help because we are really focused on being the best solution for startups. like it it really isn't should be a no-brainer to come to Cyberduce if you have any kind of compliance problem whether you're an AI startup or a SAS startup we have we can help you with your compliance work so I hope you can spread this out to a lot of uh founders and early stage companies that um that want our solution >> perfect we will thank you so much >> thank you and thanks for asking for the interview >> hello hi what's your name and what do you do >> I'm Nicolola I work for Criselix uh as an analyst, investment analyst. I Criselix is an early stage venture capital firm that is based in Vancouver and uh the Netherlands. So we have our main office in Vancouver and then we open an office back in 2018 in the Netherlands because the Tudel University was one of the partner of our four fund and our main focus is mostly engineering firm and deep tech startups. So we invest in this deep tech startups from different sector. So yeah >> which is the ticket size or >> so we have a pretty specific investment model. So our limited partners so the investor in our fund are big corporations. So that can span from different sectors but yeah we can share there some name about we have Mitsubishi Tachi Kur Lion Delbel Ibonic as a chemical companies SCG which is another cement company and basically we understand with them like a problem in the industry in their industry problem that uh we think are relevant to solve a bottleneck in their value chain and then from that side we go back to the startup world and innovation and try to find a solution uh for for that specific problem. A problem that is mo mostly for uh the whole the whole industry not specifically for that partner uh and that's what makes uh the impact for us. So we usually try to be the first investor in a company uh investing 1 to 2.5 million as a first ticket uh taking ownership between uh 20 to 30% and uh leading investing almost every time and uh and then we have the capability to follow up rounds uh with uh later on investment >> which is the main challenge that corporates have when acquiring a VC backed uh firm >> when in acquiring. >> Yeah. So when when the BC wants an exit which is the main struggle there >> well you have to arrive to an exit. So first of all uh it's a whole path through through the exit. So I would say everything that is before the exit it's uh it's already quite challenging. So first of all uh it's everything in the problem you're trying to solve because uh most of the startups especially founders especially technical founders uh they usually look for technology they work on a technology and they find application for that technology uh while I would like to challenge the founders to really uh find a problem that is worth to solve uh not only in terms of size but also in terms of uh why why people cares about that and uh it's important that the founder has the vision of about his company and what he wants to achieve but it's also really important that uh the problem that the technical founder is trying to solve actually work and uh in terms of exit it's uh it's really it's in the deep tech it's a it's it's it's a different thing so it's very rarely that you're going to have an IPO so it's most likely that you have a strategic acquisition from big partner so that's why it's also really important that you try to understand as soon as possible how the industry play who can be interested in this technology and how and why and who can be the potential acquirer. So when we look at a company even very early stage uh we try to understand who's going to be interested in this technology or for example even in which scale because uh maybe for you don't need to scale to use size or in terms of plans and capabilities maybe have to demonstrate the technology and then you have an industrial partner that is already uh once the technology is the risk is is already interested in uh in uh in buying acquiring the company. So you can actually build a thesis around doing an early exit from the company uh if if the industry allow you to. So yeah it really depends on the industry and depends a strategic partner but yeah it's actually changing the industry is a way but changing the industry from the inside is also really really I think something really important that's what we're trying to do because the the thesis of our fund is the decarbonization uh of the industrial asset but the carbonization of industrial assets through uh industrial efficiency. So we targeting every solution that potentially can have an impact in creating value, reducing cost, reducing CO2 impact, reducing uh energy intensive stuff because that's where the value is locked and that's where also the emissions uh are most of the time. >> How many companies does the fund source and how which is the percentage of companies that pass through and are available to pitch to the fund? >> Oh, okay. We have a a database uh where every founder can apply and uh which have that all of our LPS have access also to so it can also give them visibility to the LPS they can have visibility to these investors that might have some power to invest on their own and uh that's potentially like around 2,000 per year something like that in terms of numbers and uh we made out of 100 million uh fund we're going to make potentially 14 to 17 investments usually. So yeah and you're going to see 2k startups per year. Uh then you try to see which one of them match. Then we have 1 hour call with the founder try to understand a little bit more and uh and then but the due diligence process is really long for us. So usually can take even a year even for an early stage company on a small tickets like this and uh so because we also we are a small team so and we go a lot deeper into the technical uh details the IP details and uh so the due diligence gets along so I would say not so many will pass the bar and the bar is pretty high and it's important for us to keep the bar high because uh that's when you show consistency see in through doubts all the funds that uh my company and our VC firm is one of the longlasting in uh in deep tech was founded in 2000 so it's we raising our fit fund so it's really important to show consistency to the investor and that's why the bar is super high so what's a red flag that you can find when a company shows up to you >> well I would say again it's sometimes startups they think about what the investor would like to see. Um but sometimes they they have no clue in the sense that uh sometimes they show you uh technical details. I can do this faster. I can do this cheaper. I can do this better. But it's not important if no one cares about that advantage. So for example, I was talking with a company that it was making a new cement materials and they were saying I can my cement materials can dry faster two times faster and then I actually call a customer a potential user of that of that material and it was like yes but I build a wall then I leave it dry and in the meantime I'm building other walls so I don't care if it takes one day or three days to do it. So that's a technical advantage but no one that doesn't unlock anything. So the real important when I'm saying solving a problem that matters is really about solving um a problem that can unlock value. So uh something a piece of data that is missing in in some sort of processes that when you unlock that you can attach that to some big decision making um process that can unlock some value increase the throughput increase the plant capacity reduce the energy cost and it's also so important it's so very important for uh specifically also for the industry and for potential acquirers and corporations that it's not only about reducing the cost but it's creating the strategic value. Uh so there is so many example and so many nuances but it's really try to find a niche problem that have an impact a big impact. So that's no one focus around there is less competition and it's really about that understand a problem really deeping with a technical analytical eye scientific eye to go deep you know into a problem and and and understand it and then try to use the engineering world to solve that problem instead of like use the engineering world create a problem and uh and then solve the problem with your technology. So I would say more program driven less technology push uh especially for some of the VC then if that's our investment model of course there are some type of innovation where of course a technology push uh can work and there's plenty of cases but yeah depends for for a VC for a VC like us it's really important that because it's actually show that you can grow you can have return on >> what's the difference of investors in Vancouver in Canada and in Europe >> wow that's uh that's something that we see every day. Um I would say Vancouver in general, Canada is uh has a bit of North American mindset. So uh they're less risk adver like less risk adverse than than us. And also culturally they're more close to North America also about this and people is actually thinking entrepreneurally like I I would like to build the company and they they they know what's the entrepreneurship story should be here in Europe especially in innovation but in every in every any piece of the of the ecosystem there is a lot of risk adversion and you can see that in in deal terms it's not friending and neither for the investor nor for the for the founders uh everybody's trying to find a way to cover when things are going wrong instead of thinking how we can make this succeed. So and then then it's a reflection that that is reflected then in the in the term sheet and uh in the regulation in the all the bureaucracy that you have around uh permitting for first of a kind plans it's it's really important it's really slow it can take some time while in the US maybe you can you have different regulation or you don't have regulations I would say it's better to it's good to have regulation but there should be different regulation between the fast pace of a startup and the fast pace of early stage companies compared to the pace of uh the rest of innovation or corporates innovation or in general. Uh so that's that's really really something that I miss and then the other big difference of course is the market and um in Europe you have different markets in US and Canada you have one big market and one language while here you have a lot of nuances a lot of different regulations so open a market in the Netherlands and then move to Germany is a completely different game then you have to move to the N the Nordics add some other risk and can slow down the pace so uh of course like Europe is moving towards like having like a more share regulation and stuff but it's really also about the different stage that should be like adoc uh regulation for different stages of the company I would say >> any lesson for the viewers that you would like to mention >> well in founders or whoever >> whoever >> fuel curiosity still have a lot of curiosity about stuff because uh it's it's what fueled the work. So it's really about keeping up the open the the eyes open and have curiosity every day to whatever it can be the policy can be a new founder can be a new love or a new company or whatever just have the curiosity to go and explore everything deeply because otherwise there's nowhere living and doing what we do. >> Nice. And any connection any for connection that you would like to get? Well, if you willing to approach the VC word, feel free to contact me on LinkedIn. And um a lot of stuff is it's difficult because a lot of stuff I realize in the VC work happen behind the scenes. So feel free to to to reach out potentially and the same for founders like we have uh our website where you can uh leave our pitch deck and uh your pitch deck sorry and uh yeah >> perfect. Thank you so much for the interview. No worry. Hello. >> Hi. >> What's your name and what do you do? >> Uh, I'm Jonah. I'm a tech entrepreneur. >> Which is your startup? >> Uh, it's called Dub Live. It's a music app. I'm aiming to make people be able to make music. Make it as easy as listening to it. >> How does it look like? >> Um, it's a sound canvas. So, if you think of something like Mirro, uh, where you have all these different shapes, um, double Live is a sound canvas. So you have lots of different shapes and each of the shapes makes different sound or has a different musical effect. You can touch and change and play and create music as you go along. >> What's the origin of this uh canvas idea? In which did you base your your idea and where do you think this is the approach that you want to take for your company? Well, it's a long question because uh I started making music apps a long time ago and it's just sort of been an iterative process to get to where it is now. Uh I suppose I've always had an interesting idea of uh if you're a guitarist, you have or or a musician, you have like muscle memory. You know how your fingers you play guitar and you your fingers know where they're going to go. I don't think very hard how to do it. If I could encode that knowledge into a into a visual interface, then anyone could take the same thing and and make it their own, >> if that makes sense. >> Okay. And when that pop, why why did you decide to facilitate this? Why did I decide to name? Because >> because I love music. Uh and I wanted to allow anybody to I thought anybody should be able to experience music. Um and I always wanted to make it social. I always wanted it to be um not just a thousand elite artists with a million fans, but a million people with, you know, a thousand fans or just their friends. It doesn't have to be a a perfect song to enjoy it. Um especially if you're making it in live in front. >> And what's the stage of the company right now? Which uh challenges do you have right now? >> The challenge is is kind of done. The challenge is gaining over the release anxiety being out there. This is this is actually uh the week I plan to launch, but I probably said that last week and the week before. >> Okay. So now it's time to launch. >> Yes. >> Which uh actions are you going to take to to launch? >> Well, obviously I have to like do all the QA, make sure it works, that kind of stuff. The steps beyond that, I have a a kind of a list of friends, a list of uh people that I know that would enjoy it, that I can that I know well and I can get intimate feedback from. So I would give it to them. um probably have some calls and work through things with them. Um that's and and and see how that goes. I'll probably change some things, loop that a bit and just grow slowly. It's better to have good feedback um quality feedback than just, you know, a thousand people used it, some people say some stuff. >> Are there any competitors that are doing something similar in the space? Do not mention them. I mean the road the road to social music technology making is littered with dead projects along the way. So it's a it's a kind of a difficult path. Um many people have tried to monocatize music um and it's it's it's uh failed many times. So in a way it's a risk. Um but I think I have some interesting ideas. Uh so one of them is making it visual. Like typically when you make a song, you make a song uh you share it and and you have a song file. What do you do with that? You can't load it onto you know Tik Tok or you know it's people we're in a visual society now. Everyone wants a video. So I've I've turned it by making it into sound canvas. It's beautiful and you can see the song unfold in a visual way. So instead of sharing a song, you show a video of that. Uh that's that's one way that I hope will enable people to kind of engage with it in a in a different way. >> So what do you think about AI in music? >> Well, I think it can be part of an interesting process, the way you use AI to explore things, but I think you the human has to be in the loop. Somebody sent me an Somebody sent me a list of AI songs. It was an app that you could make AI songs in and you could go to their gallery and people had made, you know, a thousand AI songs and I was like this the mo I could I couldn't even listen to one cuz I don't care like the value of it is close to zero when it's so easy. The the resistance to there's nothing to be impressed by. You know, you see someone climb a mountain or play some incredible piano, it's like really hard. that's impressive like to to to prompt something is not really impressive. >> Which is one lesson that you would like to give to the viewers. I think it's important to stay with your vision um and stick with that and not get distracted by other ideas or um I've studied a number of things that I think if I'd seen them through and kept going and given them the daylight that they deserved and got through the kind of some of the pain along the way um that belief would have seen it through and they would have been valuable. Um, and I think I think it's too easy too easy to get distracted by the next interesting idea. >> Okay. So, be true to yourself. >> Yeah. And and stay stick with stick with it. >> Stick with it. Okay. And any connection that you would like to get from the the the audience? >> Uh, I'd like to meet uh some amazing new musicians um the next generation that are going to make next next 10 years of incredible music. Perfect. Thank you so much for an

When you're building a startup, [music] I say this to people that interview, you know, it's not sexy. This is crawling over glass for [music] 5 years. This is late nights. This is jumping in when you're on call or when you're pushing to close [music] a customer's books. Like this is not a 9 to5. We started with doing just pitches with people. Uh and [music] uh we grow this for over 5 years and then we we started to do hackathons and then we had [music] summits, you know, we we started to do more things. One in six founders identifies as LGBT. One in six. That's the same as [music] the whole fintech industry. >> Well, do you have the ambition that you want to go world domination, but that's going to take [music] seven rounds of investment where, you know, net net you're going to be a 15% shareholder, but at a business that's going to be worth more than, you know, 1 to 5 billion. >> It's about people really. It's just finding the right people. uh and if you just have A+ players in your team. >> We believe that [music] LGBTQ founders uh are used to deal with [music] adversity. >> Hello, what's your name and what do you do? >> I'm Nick Kappa, the founder of Nano. We're an AI native financial services startup. >> Okay. Which kind of clients do you help? >> So, it's a good question. I think uh every business needs accounting, payroll, and tax. Um but we're super focused on SAS e-commerce and restaurants for now. I think these are businesses that get neglected the most from traditional accountants. So that's where we see we unlock the most uh value for. >> Why do this business get neglected from traditional accountants? >> So one I think it's not necessarily a segment problem. I think uh accounting is an industry that hasn't really evolved in the last 50 years. But I think if you're looking at specific use cases around e-commerce or or software companies or or restaurants, if you zoom in on restaurants, notoriously they have very messy books, meaning that the and they're also very margin constrained. So if you think about closing month end for restaurants, there's a lot of miscellaneous expenses and receipts uh particularly around petty cash which accountants can't necessarily always get the full context for meaning that uh either that it's too much of their time being spent for the billable hours that they can charge uh so they look at an industry where it's not necessarily profitable for them. >> Okay, we are here in the startup world cup event where a lot of startups pitch. Uh what do you think about the event and tech makers also organize it? So, I'm a big fan of TechMakers. Um, I love what they do. I think a lot of what we do at Nano stems around focusing on community. Um, so I think they've done an excellent job. I think the Startup World Cup is is allowing a lot of communities to find a platform and a vehicle to reach a status where they've seen on a global level. So, I think that's something that we're very passionate about at Nano. Uh, I think the the 10 finalists, uh, one of them being our customers, Gos, sorry that you didn't win. uh great business but uh I think that we we need more uh competitions like this I think we need more platforms where startups can showcase I mean if you think of 10 finalists you know there's probably about 50 startup founders actually in the audience and I think that everyone should get a a fair chance I think that everyone's taking the risk of building a company and that's why we love working with founders and supporting them but uh overall it was an exceptional event and I wish to see more of it >> nice and which challenges does Neno or which vision which challenges which is the path of an right now. >> Um I think challenges when when you're building at such a high velocity I think what's unique is that you know we're building a financial services company which involves accountants, payroll specialists, tax fiscalists but we're also building engineering technology. Uh both are equally notorious hard to acquire the top 1% talent. So I think uh we're growing faster than we can keep up with. At the same time you also need to find the best possible engineers and the same time the best possible accountants. And I think one thing is hiring someone that's a brilliant profession or has a great CV. Another thing is making sure that they're a culture fit. And I think when you're building a startup, I say this to people that interview, you know, it's not sexy. This is crawling over glass for 5 years. This is late nights. This is jumping in when you're on call or when you're pushing to close a customer's books. Like this is not a 9 to5. And I think that it's very hard making sure that we're attracting the right talent that understand the mission and and are equally bought into the mission. And I think that's what keeps me up at night. Is AI going to replace all of these professionals? >> So, no. I think that, you know, we look at the way that we build um agentic workflows around our accountants, it amplifies their work. It actually makes them more proactive. And I think that's the gap that we try and close where legacy accountants, you know, they take too long to respond. They don't really offer you factual advice. Whereas the way that we think about the value model is actually helping our accountants understand more context around the business but also to be able to be more proactive meaning that they can work on real-time intelligence but also build a system where if a customer comes you know via the platform for a question we can actually help them very quickly in understanding the context of their business and I think that's a big part of our operating model that we see nano being different in compared to traditional accounting firms. Are these erh accounting services worldwide standard or are depends >> accounting is highly regulated. Uh so in every specific region you need to be for example GAP in the Netherlands or GAP in the UK. So all of our accountants are professionally certified. I think that's very important particularly around the nuance on local tax. You know, EU is a very tribal uh state of or or group of states and I think that with every other market that we move into, you need the first two people that we hire as a certified tax fiscalist and accountant. >> Okay. So, it depends a lot. How did you started Neno? Like what's the origin point where you saw this pain? >> Uh I [ __ ] hate financial admin. I think it's the most mindless use of an entrepreneur's time. And I think that uh the underwhelming service providers that do the bare minimum just to keep you compliant is fundamentally broken. Um I think that uh business owners deserve better and they deserve more. Uh I've been through this journey myself. I've had to fire accountants. It's incredibly frustrating given like the hard-earned fees that you have to pay them. Um, and as someone that actually failed accounting going through Varsity, uh, it's a passion point where you turn something into something that you hate into liberating the professionals that actually do it in order to do an exceptional job. Um so for me it was less about actually building an accounting AI native accounting firm and more about actually solving real problems that I had to face myself and you know our fastest growing uh growth channel is referrals because more and more founders that we speak to that we see the same recurring themes and I think that this is not just a problem in the Netherlands like we know that this is a global problem not just stem from uh lack of accounting profession professionals but at the same time you know the tools that both accountants and founders are working with today they're just not equipped to serve them in a way that AI should and I think that's what we're changing. >> What makes Nano different? >> Um I think there's always a core saying that we think about at Nano which is be different and be excellent and I think that when you look at the gap between legacy tools both software and services and and and you think about the way that we think about building and what the future will look like I think the differences around how we think as a team collectively. I think it's very unique that you have accountants sitting directly to next to to engineers and that feedback loop is just accelerating every single day. But at the same time like we're super focused on the customers and I think there's this there's a saying too big to fail and I look at big firms or big accounting software companies like they're just too slow and they're not modernizing fast enough and I think our biggest differentiator is the speed and velocity at which we move at. >> Any lesson for the viewers that that are watching this >> um >> life lesson or entrepreneurial lesson? Any lesson? Oh jeez, I've got a lot. Um, I think if someone tells you to not start a company, don't listen to them. I think that everyone should go and believe that they have an entrepreneur in them. I think it just be patient uh in the way that you find your purpose. You know, I only figured out Nano where I was at a crossroads of either having to move countries or going back out into the job market or realizing that actually the silver lining is it's my time to build. So I think be patient around looking for those signals that that that are your kind of calling and and really invest in yourself with trying to figure out what your passion is because if you build something around your passion, you don't work every day. You know, you're doing something that you have a purpose for. And I think a lot of people struggle with finding what that purpose is because they're very impatient or they're simply not investing enough in themselves to actually realize what that true calling is. Okay. And any advice on how to raise funds for your startup? Yeah, got a lot of advice there. Um, I I think I'll speak from my own experience. I think that uh we're we're dealing in a in a two-sided market where everyone can become a builder. So, they're equipped with tools that were not available 5 years ago in order to go and build something that's presentable. I mean, I presented my uh preede round with a Figma demo and a slide deck. You know, I wasn't even equipped at then to go and build something that would have been like a working prototype. That being said, I think that um find the investors that align to your thesis. So don't waste time with investors in deep tech if you're launching a B2C app. You know, like look for people that are writing a lot about what you're building and have a genuine interest. Um you don't need an engineer today. You should invest in understanding how to build at least a working prototype and and find your first 20 customers. like prove that you're solving a problem that people are willing to pay for and prove that uh investors look at you know they will make randomized they will make 20 investments a year and they know that more than 80% are probably going to fail. So every single bet that they make they're thinking about will this generate outsized returns and if you're not pitching a product that investors can believe that this is the ability to deliver you know 20 30x investment that they're going to bet over the next 5 years that's not that's not VC backable. So I think that the question that you want to ask yourself is like what what type of master of your destiny do you want to be? Do you want to go the um bootstrap route and build a business that's profitable and sustainable but it doesn't need to hit a 10 15 20 100 million valuation or do you have the ambition that you want to go world domination but that's going to take seven rounds of investment where you know net net you're going to be a 15% shareholder but at a business that's going to be worth more than you know 1 to 5 billion. So I think it's picking the type of route that you want to go on and then uh being at peace with the fact that you know if you strip down a founders's role and this is just the reality like your job is to acquire resources delegate resources and generate outsized returns simple as that. It's very transactional and I think you just you know if you pick that route you need to be okay with the fact that that's what you're going to be doing for the next you know 10 20 years if you want to continue building something that's generational. Um, I think a lot of people don't actually understand what it means to have the accountability and responsibility as a founder to report to a board to understand that, you know, there's going to be multiple opinions that you may not feel are always on your side, but actually everyone in the room has genuine intent to make you succeed. Um, and also the fact that a company evolves. I know that I might not be the perfect CEO for this company in six years. You know, there might be someone better than me. And you also need to understand that your team will evolve too. someone that is brilliant right now might not be brilliant for the company in three years time. So your world and decisions is constantly changing and if you're someone that takes a lot of pride in making decisions and sticking with them and you're not open to change however hard that change might be whether it's for you or one of your employees or your team it's very tough to to find like consistency in that. >> Understood. And last to last question how do you incentivize employees? So I think your your so firstly your founding team should all have fair equity. Um they don't join you to earn a salary that would pay at Uber or Booking.com. And I think that if you're working in a startup and people are expecting high salaries like they need to understand or believe and and and commit to the fact that their long-term value is going to be in a potential exit one day. And we also know that like you need to be realistic. You know most startups don't make it past you too. So, uh, I think you need to be paid fairly with where the market is, but it also needs to be aligned to where you are as a as a startup. Like, you can't be paying high salaries if you're not even past the 1 million AR mark. So, you need to be very fair on equity um and generous and to make sure that people as you grow continue to unlock equity from your employee option pool. Um, I think that's very important. And you also need to make sure that as you grow, you're rewarding people that are high performers so they see their value and and you know, are in it as long-term investors as possible. And unfortunately the people that are not performers, you need to get rid of them as soon as possible. >> Understood. So last question. Any ask to the audience for a specific connection that you would like to have? >> Um, look, I love working with founders. So anytime that you believe your accountant is underwhelming or uh you should deserve more value from it, you have my LinkedIn, reach out to me. I'm pretty sure I'm know that we can help you. Um, and at the same time, like we love working with builders, you know, we want to make sure that we're supporting the people that are going out and and like racing to achieve their dream without taking on all the financial admin that no one ever wants in the first place. So, I think for me, it's about working with customers that we truly support and want to build with, but at the same time, like we want to build a sustainable business, too. >> Okay. Well, thank you so much for appreciate it. >> So, hello. What's your name and what do you do? >> I'm Fabian. I'm the founder and the chairman of TechMakers. So what's stick makers? >> It's a community of entrepreneurs. I think curious minds uh in Amsterdam for about 7,000 people now. Uh we started about five years ago and uh we had a beer tap machine and created a meetup and just invited people to come and share their story with us. >> And um how's the the event? How are you looking at the event? We are right now on this techmakers event also a startup world cup has collaborated. H what are your thoughts about all the startups? It's amazing because you know we've we started with doing just pitches with people uh and uh we grow this for over five years and then we we started to do hackathons and then we had summits you know we we started to do more things uh but you know it's just we found the right people who wanted to build this community with us like Cher who basically was doing this incredible event tonight >> which uh factor do you think has been the most determinant factor to grow techmakers that has able tech makers to grow. I think for me what's funny is that you have if you take the monthly pitches it's like 50% is the core people and 50 people 50% is just other people curious to come and check it out and I love that you know like uh just other people they're like hey what's going on you know and I'll go have a have a look I I just really love that and that curiosity I think it's uh I think the common denominator of that I think >> what kind of people come to tech makers >> um I think mostly builders, people who want to build stuff. Uh but I think people build in different ways. Uh but you know, I think like people would build for their own startup, but then you'll have also uh like maybe some investors who are also building or looking at builders. Uh you have incubators who are also like having a lot of people building over stuff there. uh and uh yeah it's quite a broad spectrum of people uh that just want to be like in the early stage uh phase of people figuring things out basically. >> Okay. And you also have a startup yourself right? You're a founder too aside from tech makers. >> Yeah indeed I build in more medical devices in in the AI around that industry. >> What's the startup name? >> It's called Fox Insights. >> Fox Insights. And what's a what's the product that you're building? >> Uh well technically it's a knowledge graph that orchestrates agents uh that helps you take your uh patent to patients basically because medical devices you know when they go to market the failure rate is uh is is is incredibly high because it takes a lot of time to figure out uh where you which path you need to take to to get to your patient. So FDA approval or uh you know uh European certification and stuff like it's very codified and very uh a lot of data out there. There's very siloed. Uh so we're trying to solve that problem. >> Okay. I see. And uh so far uh you're focusing in the European market I guess for the pay or >> no no actually our first uh clients are in the US. US >> actually we're trying to come to Europe and then it's like super messy you know you get your >> certification and you need to go to 27 markets it's like >> are you going to replace the patent lawyers >> not necessarily actually we're just giving them the tools to be more efficient as well uh so we just not have that tool we also have a marketplace where other experts can because science you know medical devices they go online but they go offline they go in in in clinical trials and then they come back online All that data is very much everywhere. So we build like a a brain around it that tells you you need to go there. >> And which challenges do you have right now either with tech makers or with your company the >> I think for me now like uh with time uh I'm my 40s now. Uh but I feel like uh it's about people really. It's just finding the right people. Uh and if you just have A+ players in your team all time, you know, it's uh it's uh you increases your chances of success. >> How do you identify A+ players? >> I don't know. I think there is, you know, like um the the most common denominator for me is like the the resilience. You need to be very resilient there. Um but depending on what you build, it needs to be like experts in those fields, right? Especially in medical devices. So to find like a blend of uh of entrepreneurs who've successfully been there before and people who have been good at actually scaling businesses as well and then the the the domain expertise in regulatory medical devices and stuff like that to build the brain basically. >> Understood. And any lesson you would like to give the viewers that are watching this? >> Um don't give up. Uh actually just talk to people also. It's surprisingly easy now to actually just talk to people, you know, just not online but also just go uh knock on people's door. I think that's the people love to talk about solving their problem and then you know they just find ways to just uh meet people face to face and a lot of people are building communities as well. So let's just find the communities of also people who are building in that space that can share experiences together. I think that's quite important. >> Amazing. And last but not least any ask for the viewers for the audience any connection that will you would like to get? >> I think if uh just come and pitch with us we know we we we like to meet any kind of curious minds that are building some cool stuff. >> Any founder >> yeah any founders who is building cool [ __ ] you know Amsterdam is a fantastic place for this. There's a lot of amazing people. I think even the Netherlands there's people coming from all sorts of places here you know from you know limber from Hingan you know that just you know just come and travel to meet our builders I think we should nurture that and Amsterdam is a crazy place for that so let's just do more cool stuff together >> amazing cool >> thank you so much for >> thanks man >> so hello what's your name and what do you do >> yeah my name is Sabinaso >> I'm a venture partner at Identity VC >> what does identity DBC do >> identity VC is a European preede seedstage venture capital fund >> and we invest in LGBTQ founders or LGBTQ uh in leadership in pre CH startups because we believe that LGBTQ founders are exceptional founders. >> How how did this uh fund originated? What was the when was the turning point? Well, the idea came from a very good example in the US. Um, and our founding partners still Klein and Johan Bhan. They saw this incredible success in the US and they say, "Well, there's not such a fund in Europe. So, let's create this community, this LGBTQ community of queer funders, queer founders, LGBTQ funders and founders in Europe because um we believe in the power of the LGBTQ community. It's very strong, very powerful. Um yeah, and that's what we do and we built according to the angels. Gangels is the US example that we have and it's very good uh successful fund. >> Is it difficult to manage or be part of a European VC because national okay but European how is the complexity in this type of VC? >> Um I'm not sure if it's if you can call it complex. We we have uh offices in London. We work from the Netherlands and we have a headquarters in Berlin and we have a lot of vent venture scouts working across whole Europe. So we are have boots on the ground. We have communities everywhere. We connect them and yeah the most difficult part is actually being LGBTQ is not something that you put in your deck, right? >> So um we have to reach out. We have to be visible. People can find us. Uh we have a large community online community of LGBTQ queer funders, queer funders and founders. People can take part in that. Uh 80% of our deal flow comes via the community. So that's uh that's very good. Um yeah, so we are connected and visible and active in different parts of Europe. Which sector is are there any sectors that the the BC prefers? >> No, it's sector agnostic. >> So the stage is important. So we invest in team, we invest in the people uh preede and seed stage. >> Is there something uh different about LGBTQ founders that do you think there is something different? >> Great question. This question I get asked every day. Yes. Uh we believe that LGBTQ [clears throat] founders uh are used to deal with adversity. They are used to uh develop senses antennas to scan the room. Is it safe? Is everybody feeling safe? Um that's very handy when you build a company, when you build teams, when you inract attract uh new customers to figure out okay this is um these people are really feeling safe. You have to build psychological safety to build high performing teams to build innovative teams right and that's what we believe that uh LGBTQ founders do best. which challenges uh does your VC have right now? >> So um attracting deal flow. We can always attract more deal flow. We have a lot of deal flow from the community. Um weekly we see a lot of deals but yeah we would love to see more from different countries. So uh when people can reach us, find our our website or via the venture scouts that would be um very helpful. Um and we are still fundraising until I think September this year. So almost closing the fund. Um yeah, so when there are LGBTQ uh investors or maybe straight investors understanding exactly what we are um investing in and understand the huge opportunity that we have um that's also interesting. >> Okay. Any lesson for the viewers or for entrepreneurs yes watching this? So a question I get asked very often is okay but LGBTQ is a small niche right but one in six founders identifies as LGBTQ one in six that's the same as the whole fintech industry so it's it's a fast growing market it's a very wealthy market also to uh sell your products to. So that's something that is very often misunderstood. It's a huge opportunity. It's not a social innovation thing. It's pure business performance that we invest in. >> And last question, any ask to the audience for a connection that you would like to have? >> Yes. Every LGBTQ founder who feels like, okay, I want to be part of this European community of uh fast growing startups, uh super nice investors. Yes. Come to us. >> Perfect. Thank you so much for the interview. >> Thank you.

Hello guys. In this video, you're going to watch four different interviews of some of the attendees at the Everybody Networks Here event this Monday. Everybody networks here. It's an organization that realizes different events across Europe where they focus on just one thing, networking and really deep connections. They also facilitate workshops in each of their events where in which the speaker is passionate about the topic. It can range from public communication to coaching to other different type of topics. In this video, I'm going to interview Oberg, also called the second level qu, a menopause advocate and coach for life after menopause for woman. Then I will interview Samantha Not. She uses her art to make people reconnect with their true essence with a eeky guy focused paintings. Afterwards, I will interview Loreno Hume, an image consultant which makes his clients to reflect in their image, their true identity and true self. And then I will interview Martine, the founder of Everybody Networks Here, so he can explain a bit about what the network is about and how he grew it to me such amount of countries by being just a solo founder. I hope you enjoy it. >> Hello. What's your name and what do you do? >> So, my name is Obj and I am in the empowering women in menopause. >> Okay. >> Yes. >> So, uh do you do workshops, coaching? Uh what's your business about? >> So, it's a workshop coaching of course a retreat where a lot of women come together and they can feel the energy. So you create kind of uh you know um a safe space so that they can open themsel and uh this is the best way actually to work with them so that they feel understood they feel seen and then they can open up to yeah optimize their situation where they are and create uh more wisdom more power within theirel and more freedom at the end. >> How did you started this? Which was the breaking point that you said okay I want to really do this? So the breaking point is actually really funny. It was uh this year in February and um this was the really breaking point. I was at an event uh woman health and uh there was uh you know the the room was filled with women you know all age you know and uh some mavericks some men who was there also and there was a panel discussion with three women and one man and there was some information cames out about women in uh in generally and also women in menopause and um yeah the only the the clinical side of women in menopause and not the other side you know the clinical side is you know the weight gain hormonal cows and also brain fog and um the other side is that women are powerful there there are a lot of wisdom in that age they know their boundaries and they are beautiful so I decided in that moment to um my mission and my vision to speak more about what women bring in the society women that age and uh less about um you know the the the other side what the society knows which is only clinical but we are human beings so and I'm myself in menopause so I can speak about it >> and um yeah that was the mission it started there actually like really started there yeah >> which is the main lesson that a woman when she has the menopause will you give to her >> uh menopause is not the end of a woman's power. It is the beginning actually because she don't have, you know, she don't get menstruation anymore. She raised children. She's now in the power in the in the in the heat of her of her being, you know, she she she knows what she know what she wants. So, she just have to remember it because it's there in her. So this is what I want women to feel when uh when yeah when they work with me or when they come out of a talk or a session with me that they feel like okay everything is possible. Age age is just a number and uh I don't listen to what the society tells me. I listen to myself because the power is in myself. The beauty is in myself. The wisdom is there. The leadership is there. So, and I am beautiful the way I am because I've been through all this. I've been young and now I can feel the new me. And just to be curious about it and not just listen only to this one side of society says, but the other side and to rediscover you as a woman as a queen. >> Do you think there is some misconception about in the society how it's perceived menopause? Yes, because the society uh has a picture of how women should be you know women should be young and thin and beautiful etc. you see also in in a fashion and um the perception of a woman in menopause is that okay she's been there done that you know she's she's obsolete no she's still there and she's uh like I said before a beautiful being a beautiful powerful woman because uh we talk about mother earth we talk about women and without us without women there's no life and a woman in her 50s or in menopause she come in this all in in this uh second level you know and the second level uh is the wisdom and the the leadership like I said so and I call this woman the second level queen the one who remember who she is she's been through adversities and she raised children she raised the society and now it's her turn to give this everything she've been through to give this wisdom to the generation who comes behind her generation of girls of women young women who when they see that those women are queens, you know, that that they use their power. So those women can give the light, can shine the light for the generations to come and to see, okay, when I'm going to be this age, I'm going to be a powerful woman because I know who I am and this is what I want to give the ladies. >> Amazing. >> Yes. >> What challenges do you have right now as an entrepreneur? Uh as an entrepreneur, the challenge is uh more visibility and uh to um yeah to to to reach out to more women and who um who see the the benefits in in uh in working with me and the benefit in um finding their freedom and um so I'm a lot in LinkedIn and I go a lot in in network uh events. And um well I just won myself the visibility award woman visibility award and yeah to to be more um to reach more people. So >> it takes time of course >> takes time but I'm sure you will >> yes because this is really important. This really important I mean I came to to Holland um in co uh I was almost 50 and um I left my boyfriend I left the country. I left my job because I bet on myself, you know, and I came here, I had no job, no signed contract, nothing but I knew I have my mindset and I can make it everywhere. And I wanted to show myself that this um yeah, the the menopause is is not uh is not the end, you know, you can still do something and you can do more because you have more. Just have to remember that you can do more. And after that I found a job and I won this award. And if I hadn't done that, if I didn't hadn't bet on myself, I wouldn't have be where I am today talking to you. >> Amazing. >> Yes. >> And which lesson would you like to give the to the audience any lesson for life? >> Look at yourself in the mirror and see the beauty, the power and talk to yourself. Say how amazing you are, how far you you became, how far you came um and who you became. And um tell yourself that you're amazing. And tell yourself that you're magnificent and smile at yourself because you're the only one who can make you happy. Nobody else. >> Okay. And any ask to the audience? Any ass to the network? Any connection that you would like to to reach? Yeah, people in uh in health, people who want to empower women. They have some uh someone who has a mother, someone who has uh I don't know uh to empower women in in in this phase of their lives and uh yeah just to reach out to me if they if they want and um if they feel the need and the necessity >> to the health sector any specific profile psychology, therapist or researcher? Yeah, psychology um um yeah HR you know so women who are in the in the phase of their lives where they are like okay I have the knowledge I have this but I'm functioning and I want to know who I am so it can be like I said HR it can be in the healthcare it can be uh a mother who raised the children and they're all out now and she doesn't know what what to do with herself and Um, yeah, women in in their 4Gs, women in power, and women who want to know more about themselves. >> Perfect. Thank you for the interview. That's nice to meet you. >> Of course. Thank you so much. >> Hello. >> Hello. >> What's your name and what do you do? >> My name is Sment and I'm an artist and I use uh my art to for transformation to make clear what is beneath the noise. Which kind of people come to you? >> Uh people who are on a crossroad who know that there is a shift but they are not doing something with the shift. There's a lot of noise around them that they cannot come to their own answers within them. So uh those people I come to meet it's like leaders, people executives, people who are very trying finding alignment in their life and are looking for their essence. >> How does your art transmit their the answers to their to their crossroads that yours mentioned? I use my 14 40 symbols and the moment I talk with people then I draw and I used the also eeky guy the reason of being the reason of why you living that's what I use to help people getting back to who they are >> how is ikiguai so explain us a bit more in detail about how ikiguai is related to to your art how do you use it >> well I use the four questions of uh what do you love and can you be paid for it? But it's more because I is more than all only the four questions. It's about your life. It's the way you live, the way uh you do things in life and take them. For instance, I was walking around and at the pavement then I saw only those tiles and then I see one seat came through with a little bit of grass and everything like you know and I I saw that I was looking at and I stopped with it. Also when the birds are flying or they're sitting and they're also talking about talking to you like you know it's the things in life that you stand still if you slow down and if you are you know using what's around you that can elevate you that can calm you that you see life because we are in a rush I don't know what kind of rush but we are in a rush going to there or we are busy with finance or of course with children of parents but this is about you recognizing who you are in the world and who you can be and if you are living your purpose so that's what I do that I can show you a step inside to who you are and then when I create an artwork the artwork you can put it somewhere in your house or in your office and on sudden days you'll see it will follow you or it will talk to you because I explain the artwork and if you are thinking about things or you have decisions to make or not even then you can see and look at your artwork and you see like hey why is it showing me this what did Sam explain to me or you got a symbol card and you can oh that's what it's meaning so it's talking to you it's a process about you who you are in your essence >> your red thread >> and I I also assume that during your sessions the your clients are also in the same uh place right and they see yourself like painting and >> well I'm drawing I I do have a video session that you can sit uh we have a teams >> and then I'm going to draw make you pick cards or no cards and then you talk sometimes people talk and then they stop because they getting their rest they are slowing down and I'm drawing because sometimes it's mesmerizing people see that I draw something and then I'm going to explain to you what I draw >> to let you get it. >> Wow. >> Yes. >> Amazing. >> And which um which are the most impressive transformations you've seen through your art? uh people crying, people recognizing uh also the people who are in awe. You know the moment you are drawing for somebody, it's very personal. It's also unique. I got a lot of paintings and I have a lot of drawings and a lot of eeky guy artworks I made for people and sometimes they reflected to me again like Sam what you made here this was about my grandma this was about this piece so I get the stories back and this is the thing what's doing the most for me is when people bring the stories back to me about their artwork >> the end you you get also something from them right with all your art >> I get I I give them energy but I get energy a lot of energy beautiful energy >> nice which challenges do you think you have right now if there are some >> uh challenging well a lot of people want to know like but okay Sam how does it work um so I I have my cycle it's like first you have to pause then I listen but you're also going to listen and I discover and you also going to discover. So it's a two-way and after the discover we align. you align with who you are and not what I'm telling but it's like you are going to recognize things and then I create and in the creation you see things from yourselves and it's an impact because at the end I believe that all the people who are aligned will make a better place in the world because when you have a lot of noise you struggle you fight but if you are aligned you know what to do. You don't struggle that much. You will find ways. >> Any lesson that you would like to give to the audience? >> A lesson. >> A lesson in your entrepreneurial journey for example or a life lesson. >> Be you. Be authentic. Live your life and be uh be enough. You are enough. >> Okay. Any ask for a contact that you would like to have from the all the network and viewers that are watching this contact. Um I love to collaborate with more people to elevate themselves their projects uh combining with who I am with my art. So with the eeky guy art make some collaborations work like wow. >> Perfect. Sounds good. Well, thank you so much for the interview. Really enjoy. >> Thank you for your time. >> Thank you so much. >> Okay. >> All right. You can move it. >> Okay. So, I'm going to pick one card and and this uh will tell me what it right. >> I'm going to tell you what it wants to show you at the moment. >> Okay. This this one. >> All right. Okay. Yeah. >> Yeah. Show it. You can turn it around. >> Oh, I love those cards. I'm going to tell you what's on the back of the card. Is >> a bird. You know what the bird says? It says freedom. >> Okay. >> So, if I'm looking at the card, you can hold the card. So, what you see is this is freedom. You have your inner circle. This is you in the middle and your friends and family are there at the background. You do your do you and then you see here is a stairs and also a gate. So for you the next level because you are in the growth. You're beautiful from the inside and the outside and you are growing. Sometimes it's hard on the way that's why you have that black uh petal but when you are growing you keep on shining who you are. You are beautiful from the inside and the outside. And if you start growing, even if it gets hard, just keep being you. And then the freedom is all around you if you are following your authentic path. >> Okay. Yeah, that's something that I'm starting to know. So that's good. It makes sense. >> Amazing. >> All right. >> Great. That's Hello. Hello. What's your name? What do you do? >> My name is Lorenzo Hommet and my company called Image by Colors and Image by Colors is a company for coaching for also for trainings about image, color, styling and performance. >> Okay. >> Yeah. And what I'm doing I helping CEOs, I helping entrepreneurs with their first impression because uh the first impression is most of the time a stable impression. So I help them to to to be that that is for you very important that it is a good good impression. >> Which kind of clients do you get? Do you receive? um a lot of CEOs but also leaders leaders um that they know okay what is my ambition what is my vision and all the things and how to um perform myself that's kind of clients I have women female everything which are the most impressive transformations you had I can imagine a lot of leaders didn't look thought about their appearance when they were grinding uh right and Then suddenly they have to pitch. >> Yeah. Yes. But but also you you know when you are in in a company and you have um um 30 years or most of the time a lot of years you do the same thing every day every night and you don't have people around you that you can mirror you know in in a company and then they um after that they look after viewers okay is this is this what I have to do till my dad you know and uh then it is so important that you have people around you have intervision or other things because if you in your own bubble, then is that your truth? And if you people have your people surround you and to uh hold yourself accountable for things and all the and all the things what you're doing then uh you can grow and that is also my um opinion because um uh five years ago I started also with my personal development and I see a lot of things you know most of the time men that they don't want to talk about their feelings and um I was there also this I know and And if you can go there with start with your feelings. Um sometimes I was crying also you know because and you know a man cannot also you have also a lot of things where you have to uh go through and uh that helped me to to be the man who I am now and that I also use in my coaching. which are the main things that entrepreneurs do not take into account when they dresses themsel themselves. Yes, most of the time if they um um you know it starts from the inside that that's that's the first it start from the inside and um uh it's so important that you aware when when you stay on stage or if you uh talk to to people that you know okay what kind of clothes you wear but also um I say also um uh walk you talk you know there also your clothes is important but also who's your your tone of voice is important all these thing that I'm learn people that you be aware about it >> so you also help with communication also their personal development it's like a for complete >> your non your unfortable communication is not only your clothes but is also how you walk how you how you talk how you treat people how you give people a hand that is image you know is not only in the clothes but image is also that people found themselves uh comfortable you know and what what are you doing that people came to you go to a coach and and um then you have a lot of coaches you know and uh then uh for me important what are you doing that's um I make a decision to say okay I want to that you coach me then maybe you do a lot of things that uh you be authentic that I go by Do >> you a little bit know what I mean? >> So you you want them to show their image to show their true true themselves, their authenticity. Yes. >> And that's what they will make them. >> Yeah. They have to cut it. >> I will cut it. No worries. >> No, but it is very important that you you still stay authentic. In my profession there are a lot of female but are maybe I one of uh I'm the only one uh men in this uh at that use image color style image performance and that is one of my unique selling points and I'm also a musician so also I know also on stage how you perform yourself and that is an totally different uh with clothes and everything um than when you are on stage. age or when you uh leading a board or anything, >> how did you start it? >> Um well, I was modeling in my 20ies. That was what you asked. I was modeling in my 20ies and um I um go to Italy, in Spain, in in London and everything. And then one of my friends who I was modeling in those days, he told me, "You have to do something about image consulting." So, okay, what is that image consulting? Because in the Netherlands um if you you dress all the things that why you you know but when you go to Spain or in Italy you know the man female they dress nice every day is a party you know and he's a image consultant said okay maybe is is it something for me so uh there was um um men and women they were they had all the banking in in uh the Netherlands they were honorable was the first suppliers uh from that uh that company. And so um on the job they learn me this uh this job two years every day. I see a lot of banking people came and then um then I was in those days I was a junior um image consultant and they help me say okay what you see see the eyes and you you learn also to be to um uh to also look further than also the clothes and everything you know also okay what is the profession what are what are they doing um what kind of car they do so concept conceptual um also thinking you know and then uh also to write down a a clothing protocol that uh when something in your company when people coming in your company that you can give them a book this is this is our protocol and so you have to use this and so that's then take it or leave it you know so um and I was also project manager in those days so they um give me also the opportunity to also to make some um um protocols with the boards of the companies and so I start from 2009 and um so till now. >> Nice. Amazing. >> Yeah. >> And what challenges do you have right now? >> Um you know uh we had a very hard times a few years ago the co time. So you see a lot of entrepreneurs they stopped but also a lot of entrepreneurs they nowadays they also uh their self-esteemed and and a lot of things they struggle with that so uh in my coaching for me is also um u I help them with with uh I have some some new things some some test personal power test what I'm doing with a client and um then we going to look what's are the the things where we can start and from that from then we build it up further to help them with their performance their clothes their style and that they can can uh yeah do their work further >> and uh that is one of the things what what I'm uh I'm still looking for uh but I'm looking also for um to go to um uh international uh to will develop my brand. That's one of the things entrepreneurs that are starting to to care about their image right now. That's what I understood. No, but also my my own company, my company is image by color and I'm I'm living in Amsterdam, but I'm based in Hilverson, but uh I do master classes and everything through the the whole Netherlands and all the things and also online and but I want to to go uh international and I I like uh to to travel. So I like to travel to to Madrid >> to Yes. It's your country. >> My city. >> Yeah. Yeah. your city Madrid um but also Italy, Rome, um Milan also and London and um this is what I'm doing this for everyone you know because uh if you have if you talk about image image is what uh uh you and and I everyone needed okay and so also image is um you have image and identity identity is um um how do they call it in English? Um your your self uh your self-image is identity and image is how people see you >> how people see you and for me it's important that identity and image that it's is a synergy. >> Okay. Any lesson for the viewers that are watching this? Um be authentic and um um self-development is very important. If you want to to stay, you have to develop yourself uh every day. >> Every day. >> Every day. >> Okay. And any ask to the audience any connection that you would like to have from the network that is watching this? Um yes, if you want to follow me, I have my my my website is image by colors and uh monthly I have also um a masterclass >> and then also it is a little bit also with network marketing because you you see also a lot of other entrepreneurs or sometimes people who struggling also with uh things and and you have to know that you are not the only one because there are a lot of other people they struggle also with a lot of things. So, um, follow me and and, uh, um, >> to connect with more people that you can help. >> Yes. >> Sure. >> Well, thank you so much for the interview. >> Thank you. >> Thank you. >> Hello. Hello. Oh, hello. Oh, >> Martine. >> What's What's your name? >> My name is Mortang. >> And what do you do? >> I'm the founder of Everybody Networks Here. >> Explain me what what does Everybody Next Force do? >> What Everybody Networks here does. uh we create um workshops and uh international networking events for um experts and like-minded professionals. >> Okay. How did the the project started? The company started >> how it started? Um it started yeah pretty yeah I would say almost naturally but it's um I was actually looking for my own uh job. I lost my job and um to be really honest I couldn't be bothered to sending out um called applications and CVs and uh my idea was to fight my job through a networking event and then a networking event that I would organize myself because then I can set the the team I can set and I can learn something new also while doing it. Never organized an event and um yeah, so that's how it started. Um and um and I keep continue doing it and I got more opportunities u coming my way along the way in different cities, different countries and um so this is now um yeah I'm not sure I would say uh what uh what I'm doing uh everybody networks here. Yeah. Which is the the biggest factor you you think that has brought you to make these events for hundreds if not thousands of people along the way? What made me do it? >> Cons no the biggest driver consistency virality which is the the thing that you think it's >> yeah it's about uh keep on showing up >> me showing up all the time doing it again and again and again continuation repeat learning from um previous events try to improve them um yeah this bit I'm trying to Yeah. >> And has social which which social media are you? Instagram, LinkedIn or >> Yeah. So mainly LinkedIn um and uh also Instagram but to be really honest um I actually copy my LinkedIn post directly to my Instagram post to Instagram. So it's the exact same content. And I know marketing gurus out there maybe think this is not the way to do it but um I just don't have the time to u to do it otherwise. >> Which kind of workshops uh and guests we can expect in one of your business? all kinds of uh for me it's very important that the that the host uh the workshop host is very passionate about the subject that this person is talking about that's really important for me because that will uh that enthusiasm people will see this and feel this and then you normally or what I experience is then you will get like a nice workshop and Um uh it doesn't matter what the subject is, what it is about. >> How did you get this? We are in Zoku Amsterdam. How did you get this spaces? How did you approach to such a company and ask them about doing an event? >> Yeah. So Zoku is not only in Amsterdam, they're also in Paris, in Vienna and Copenhagen. So I started doing these events with Zoku in Copenhagen. And it was uh me approaching them and asking them, hey, you have this space here. can I can I do this event here? So, it's very much about me approaching them. Uh this is now one and a half year ago. Uh more to two years ago, I think. Yeah. >> And what's next for everybody next year? More cities, different formats. What do you expect in the coming months or years? >> Yeah. So, um the last one and a half years. So one and a half year ago I made the decision to go all in with everybody network that works here and my plan was to create as many events as possible in different cities, different countries. I've done this now and I have a lot of learnings from this uh and I've the community becomes bigger also. Um, and now after the summer, um, I'm going to think about the next step. And the next step, not know, I'm not exactly quite sure how this could be, but it has to do a lot with it has to do because at the moment I'm doing everything by myself. Um, I do have support from some people who are helping me in the different cities, but uh, also not every city, but um, I have support from people, but I have to ask maybe for more support. So for example uh I've now recently only recently starting with uh uh I have an accountant or somebody is looking into the financial part of this uh what I'm doing and uh I've only recently started this so I'm going to um yeah outsource more things so I can create more events and I can make this uh community even bigger. >> I see. What challenges do you have right now? Yeah, that I'm a one one man show and uh I'm my own bottleneck. Uh this is how you say it. I'm um um because I want to make this bigger. I think that um uh networking and inerson networking becomes or is already so important and will become more important uh in the future coming years. Um and um yeah, I just want to make this bigger and see how far how far I can go with this. >> Is there any region or city that you think they are more social and they network more? Do you have more attendees? >> Um yeah. Yes. Uh so uh in um so when I do the events in Switzerland I have uh the intendency is quite high uh but if I do it in smaller cities maybe in the Netherlands then it's not so high but it doesn't matter so much the energy most times the same or I try to make it the same at least and um it doesn't matter if I'm with five people or if I'm with 50 people it's all about the opportunities that comes out of these events and it doesn't matter so much like with how many people you are. Um so that um >> any lesson that you would like to give to the viewers or the from your entrepreneurial journey >> listen to your gut feeling >> and uh we also just had a workshop today but but it is very true and trust trust trust the process these kind of things I keep telling myself I'm also not sure all the time with the things that I'm doing I'm also learning by doing, right? I haven't studied for this. I have Okay, I've studied marketing and law, but I've never studied event marketing. Um, I just started somewhere and I showed up. And when you show up and follow your uh your gut, amazing thing can happen. >> Wow, that's really nice for myself. >> Amazing. >> But but I think it's really true. I think it's really really true. >> Amazing. any contact that you would like to get from uh the post from the network. >> Sorry. >> Any contacts that you would like to get from the post or from the network? From the video, from the audience >> from the audience. Um >> um any specific one that you will say, okay, this person would be really interesting to be in my event. Everybody is welcome first of all at my event. So there doesn't I don't have one particular person. Uh everybody should feel welcome at my events. Um, but I'm always looking for awesome workshop hosts. I'm also uh looking for partners who would like to partner with me on doing events together with me. Sponsors back to partners is like a partner can already be if you have like a um a space uh an event space or maybe somewhere in your office you have space where I can host my events, right? So that I can actually increase my cost and put the ticket price also down so that more people can actually network. Uh I'm also very uh we're also looking uh to to speak with these uh people these partners. >> Perfect. Well, thank you so much for the interview. >> Yeah, thank you so much for having me and uh yeah, thank you. >> Have a seat. Thank you. Thank you.

Hello guys, in this video we come with the presence of Nina from Monokco Media. She's an entrepreneur and a marketing expert that she's going to help us in three cases, three practical cases. One, an academy of Vacata where they are starting and they want to find how to compete. Then a CRM for mering acquisitions that are building which is a really close sector. So let's see what she tells us. And then my own project connector, my influencer role in it, how the content funnels the the network and see how she can support in this journey. So uh Nina, can you tell us more about yourself and what do you do? >> Thanks. Yeah, thanks for inviting me. I'm glad to be here. uh in my role as a founder and marketing expert. Um I've started Monokcomdia because um yeah so I'm from uh the marketing field but I also have a research backbone which is my positioning. It's evidence-based. Um and that's also what I do in my work. Um I always let it be uh fully guided by research and by evidence. >> Okay. And what kind of services do you offer as well? So usually what I do with my clients is we take a step back uh and we look at the whole system. So marketing in itself is a system and if you want to reach your business goals with marketing you need to design it for success that requires you to zoom out and to look at the bigger picture. And what I mean by that is if you already have clients for example, you are looking at your um most successful projects, the ones that brought in the biggest revenue, the ones that you um really loved doing and you look what they have in common. So you will see uh commonalities for example um around a certain buyer persona. Um you will see commonalities around maybe business size that you were um helping uh to solve their problem. And then what you really want to focus on in that step is you want to look at the certain uh words wording that your clients are using. Um by that you can carve out the buyer persona and you use your buyer persona to restructure upstream your positioning, your value proposition and your messaging systems. >> Okay. So would you say that it's a bad idea to start thinking about paying ads because you have an vague hypothesis about your ICP for example okay my CP is here in LinkedIn or in Google you should always find a a better strategy and then pay us right >> yeah I really recommend that highly because if you just go in uh with a vague assumption that is your best way to burn a budget Um, if you want to do paid ads well, then the strategy needs to be there because you want to have um a very clear value proposition that uses your client's wording that you can use for structuring your cold traffic offer. And once you have that as clear as daylight, then you can send paid traffic onto your onto your offering. Paid traffic in itself is just the fuel. It can uh it can really uh let the fire shine brighter but for it to burn properly you have to put the system in place. >> Okay, sounds good. So with this introduction let's dive deep into the cases. So first we have a Latin flow academy. This is a vaca academy that started recently some months ago. The founders have extensive expertise and they already have a network and they see that the they are competing with whales that are already been in place for a lot of years. So they are wondering what to do differently uh to to get more clients. According to the the founders the the business is actually on the beginners. So on getting newcomers that will advance some classes going to intermediate advance and at some point uh this kind of uh users or clients they leave the the school because they feel that they already good enough to dance. Uh one of the things that they are doing is they are implementing some other styles or similar styles to veta to differentiate themselves. But how would you think that they can be can be helped in this case? >> So what you really want to do in this case is you need to zoom out again and look at the bigger picture and look at the whole environment to see how can you reach your goal of having a community of having people having beginners that want to do um their whole curriculum with your school. So um what you really want to look at is uh your market, your target audience and the people that are already coming to your school. >> Um what do they for example say about your school? So if you're looking at the market, there's a few um factors that come into play. Um because the market is already kind of saturated, right? There's a lot of dance schools that have um a similar offering and if you want to compete uh with paid ads in that environment, you will always compete on price. So that's an issue that you want to try and avoid. Um if you're looking at the audience, um they're they are hanging out in certain channels, right? In certain communities, you'll probably want to be on the socials, uh Instagram, Tik Tok, um and meet them there. And then if you look at the people that are already coming to your dance school, what are they coming to your dance school for? So you've already mentioned that they have specific dance styles and that is a big advantage because potentially there are dance styles that other dance schools in Amsterdam are not offering yet and that students will come to your school for specifically. So that is something that you want to communicate with the right group. But that said, since this is a new um dance school entering a market that's already quite saturated, the dance school will have to be more creative because potentially it's a smaller budget that can be used potentially um it's not that easy to compete with a budget on paid channels uh on prices. So what you really want to focus on is what other added value can we give to our students and to our community. So potentially look at events. Can we have a recurring um social dance event that people will want to attend that people will may maybe even make their own uh UGC about? Post some videos on Instagram, on Tik Tok and by that make use of um of other channels other than paid uh advertising as well. >> Okay, perfect. Thank you for the for the help for the explanation. Then let's move on to the CRM that I built. The context of this essentially it's a CRM that I started building as a pilot for a mer acquisition advisory firm in Spain and it has let's say AI tooling. It can centralize all their operations. So they really like it. The problem that I found here is that I try to reach through LinkedIn in the Netherlands and Spain and I don't get enough feedback either of people that would like just to give me feedback on the software or even buy the product, right? So, it's really a close market because they build relationships locally, relations locally and they connect buyers and sellers. Therefore, as a in the Netherlands, for example, approaching as an international is is tricky as well in this context. And I think I'm now a bit demotivated in that aspect with this CRM. Although with my pilot clients and a new potential customer might be really relevant. Therefore, what I did on the landing page was make it more generic since I can use the tooling currently for also other types of clients like solopreneurs. And how would you say that I can approach this case from a marketing perspective in this kind of close market? Mhm. Um, so there's a bigger issue that I see at the moment because from the M&A that seem to be quite of a closed community, you sort of went more broad into more uh different um use cases, more different industries. That isn't a problem per se, but the more you can niche down, the better your target audience will be able to find you. So that's one. Um, if you want to break into a very tight network, um, you will need people to open doors for you. So, um, one thing I can really recommend to you is, uh, to look at the, um, people that you already have on your platform, see if they can potentially, um, open doors for you in the M&A network. Um if you don't have that possibility then you will have to go and network potentially at events potentially wherever you find uh people in M&A just to see um and get feedback also about your product and about um if it is really solving the problem that you set out to solve for them. So you will need a lot of feedback from your desired market. Um, so another thing that you see a lot in uh SAS is a partnership program because um you will want to have people that can introduce your CRM to their network. So you want to find people that are either working in M&A or that are servicing the M&A um market community. So, if you have people that work in or adjacent to that market, find find the ones that will become a partner for you. Find uh the ones that will potentially get to use your CRM either for free or for a certain percentage of the of the um clients that they bring in for your platform. This is a very common uh approach in the SAS world and uh that is something that has been working very successfully for a really long time. Even Monoku media is in partnership programs. >> Okay, perfect. Well, sounds amazing. I think I will apply it. And last but not least, my personal project, the connector, which my current project, which basically consists on creating a network through content like this and through interviews in events, organization, tagging and posting the people in the linkering post that funnels the YouTube channel, which is where their content is originally located, and also a form where people can put their desires of connection. For example, I offer my marketing services and I want to connect with partners or with clients or with X company, right? The idea with this then is to match the people myself. Uh I match them through in this database and then I post the results of the matching in in my socials again. And in this way there is a circle of traffic and I can create a network that is useful since uh I starting building dust since I when I went to events or communities I saw that the matchmaking procedure wasn't done really properly. So the whole objective of this concept is to match people effectively and with purpose which is a thing that I haven't seen yet. So the what do you think >> and what type of matchmaking are you doing with the platform like who are you matching to whom? So I'm matching everybody that has wants to connect with other person of their interest or that has a specific need or even matches that are not seen but because I know that person that person could have some synergies with other other person then I can also match them together. The idea is first uh we have a simple form where you put your socials, your details, what you offer and what you're looking for and then you can enrich it with also data from your social lifestyle data if you are an investor of what you're looking for for a buyer of companies if you are a company also your details what you're looking for partners clients and and yeah that's and also even if you are a job seeker talent or recruiter in this way. That's that's what I'm doing. >> And we spoke about niching down before, right? >> Yeah. Yeah. It's true. It's true. >> Again, it's um it is a beautiful pro project because it's always nice to get people in touch and to help them actually drive moments of um of meeting each other in real life. I believe marketing is going to move much more towards that over the next couple of years, but it's still important to find your niche within that. Right? So, currently you're working with a lot of founders. That's already pretty much a niche and that's nice and it's um a good way to bring them all together. So, right now you have um a lot of different people that you're speaking to, but if you focus on one group, it will be easier to reach them through your LinkedIn. it will be easier to reach them through your YouTube and they will know how to find you as well. So that is one thing that I can uh give you um as an advice and then also look at how do you pull the bigger um picture together like now you have the LinkedIn, you have the YouTube, you have the database and the form um but what is the value delivered? So what do people get out of it? I I can see value in matchmaking for sure, but what happens after I fill in the form? What is my expectation? Am I waiting for a week? Am I getting a match next month? Am I getting a match next year? I don't know that. And I don't have insight in that. So, um it would be really nice to do something with the audience that you're creating. Even if just a way to be in touch with them monthly through for example a network event or maybe you have um a monthly update of what businesses are in the community, what interesting um opportunities came out of that. Were there people that met each other? Um how did the meeting go? So keep people updated about that and also try to find what value can you create from them, right? because you are you have access to all of these people. You can speak to them and get um information from them. What helps them? What kind of value do they want to get from the community? What is their expectation? And from that you get an idea of where you're building towards. You get an idea of the direction that you're going to go in. >> Okay. Well, thanks. I will apply the the for sure. Definitely. Uh thank you so much for coming here. What some last questions more general I think uh do you think is there a point uh where you have to pay ads and when or is that feasible to know? >> Yes, I think there's definitely a point um and it's also in my opinion very easy to spot but I'm a practitioner of course. Um you need your strategy to be to be super tight. You want your positioning to be um very clear, as clear as day. And you want your cult traffic offer to be extremely specific and in your desired customer's language. Once you have that, that's the perfect moment to go and test out which channel is the one that's working best for you. Um because even if you know your target audience very well, it is still important to within that audience, wherever they hang out, test which channel works the best to get your customers to convert. And then one other factor that is really important is is it already working organically? Do you already have people finding you organically through your website, through your socials, through LinkedIn? Do they approach you organically? Then that is the moment where you know ads will work. >> Okay. And any conversion metric that is uh is there a best conversion metric or does it vary depending on the business? >> Leads. Leads if you ask me, but that's because uh I'm very much uh from a lead genen background. It depends on the business that you're in. So I will focus on leads many times because that's what the businesses want. But for example, if you want to drive awareness, if you're running a branded campaign, then the um the ideal goal for your campaigns can be either awareness or engagement. But usually um businesses focus very much on leads and they want to um track the revenue that they get per lead. So uh that is that is the conversion we most apply and then you have a lot of different conversions if you're looking at the e-commerce space. So then you might have an add to cardart abandoned cart purchase. So uh it really depends on the field that you're in. >> Well but that was it. Thank you so much for the the whole master class and I hope everybody has enjoyed the this video and see you next time. Thank you so much. >> Thank you so much. Follow us on LinkedIn.

Hello guys. In this video, you're going to see how I interviewed three founders that attended the TechMakers event. Techmakers is a community of more than 7,000 builders, founders, and investors that are focused on the tech scene in Amsterdam. It enables people to come together, network, and growth. They have startup pitches, hackathons, conferences, and also deep dives, really technical. And this 10th of June they will be doing the startup world cup 26 2026 Benelux region. It's a pitch competition where the winner can compete for a 1 million investment prize in San Francisco against other startups. So the winner of Venus to San Francisco. So I think I will also be recording that. Enjoy the video. >> Hello Julio. What's your name? What do you do? I'm Nico, co-founder of Perfectus. And um we're developing a no code drag and drop builder so people can create their trading strategies visually and reliably. It's like uh WordPress but not for websites but to create your trading strategies. >> Okay. Why did you started this uh this company? >> I started this around 10 years ago when I was uh trading with real money. Um got beat hard by the market after a week of trading, chasing losses, revenge trading, losing money. Um and then when I realized that this was like the marking point for me uh my obsession with like stripping away the noise in trading because there's a lot of distraction and I got distracted a lot particularly when I was like 19 and yeah lost a lot of money first week of trading >> and well I'm a ex econometrician so um I was wondering are you also going to implement the statistical models or risk assessment models in your platform or is mostly done for building a strate strategies. How does your platform help to assess risk? >> We do this to an extent because it's it's very important. We will probably not do it as fancy as in your studies, but we try to follow best practices because in the end you are wearing different kind of hats. You're tra you're wearing the head of a trader of an analyst and of a market observer. Um so the bit of like trading is taken care by perfect because you can create your algorithmic trading system and now you need to know is it good or not and there comes the analysis uh into place which you can also do in profctor. So you create a strategy and then you can run it in platform with our in-house back testing engine and you get a back test report and then also your statistical metrics like is it profitable, how profitable is it, how big is the draw down, um is the strategy good enough for certain prop firms. So you get quite a good feeling already. Um and we simply follow yeah best practices. So we don't go as deep as like a like a quantitative report but good enough for amateur and newbie traders which are our focus groups to get a feel is it worthwhile now to forward test on demo money and then let's say after three or six weeks now you get a feeling cool it's still profitable on on this live account but demo money now it's worthwhile to actually try it on real money. Okay. What's the vision for Perfectos? >> Becoming a piece of infrastructure. This is the this is the goal. Being uh a piece of ethical infrastructure in trading because there are yeah many players with kind of like mismatching incentives such as brokers that A and B which is not per se bad but it's definitely a conflict of interest. The same with prop firms. As soon as you are profitable as a trader, they there's a tendency that they terminate the the accounts of those traders. So being a player, a stakeholder in this environment with like a strong purpose of really adding value for traders, this is our our purpose, our vision. >> And what's the current progress so far? Do you have users? Have you tested uh how your platform helps them regarding other alternatives? So we launched last year pretty much exactly one year ago 2025 in June. We have developed the core product the drag and drop builder for 18 months because in our industry there is no wiggle room for any mistakes which actually proved us right because we had early traction with a B2B player a Dutch investment fund using our software up to today. And um yeah this is pretty much where where we are at. Um we will launch very soon our back testing engine next week actually. We will add also a a speech to bot feature very soon. So making it even catering better to newbies and amateur traders so they don't need to um care too much for the details in the beginning and just get started as well. >> Uh what which is one of the challenges you are currently having >> since we are hyper niche not only that we in the trading industry but also algorithmic trading. So in a room you might find one person who is an algorithmic trader if even finding those people is quite a challenge. So this is also what we would uh get the capital for to find those people um increase our reach getting the market share in our niche to be the player for algorithmic trading. >> So one ask will be to find capital and investor. >> Exactly. Yeah. >> And any lesson from your entrepreneurship that you would like to share with other fellow entrepreneurs? If you can start with a co-founder, it's much easier than you alone. Uh I wouldn't be here without my two other co-founders, Yosa Max. Um they have completely different angles and it's a much richer discussion and as a entrepreneur I think it's very often of like what you don't do and what you do. >> Um so this really helps. Find a co-founder I think is a is a very good first start. >> It was nice to meet you. Thank you. Likewise. >> That's it. All righty. Hello. >> Hello. What's your name and what do you do? >> I am Carla Canino and I'm the founder of Kylie. We are the only dual platform for AI fairness, compliance, and revenue recovery through no PII and no integration. >> How how does that work? >> That's a great question. Think about us as first um sitting on top of the tech stack. We are an independent evaluator. Um we essentially white hat uh customer service interactions to see how systems how customer service systems in the financial sector behave towards vulnerable populations. So based on the anomalies or based on the friction points, we extrapolate that information and create uh say a cost um a cost um profile uh in order to provide a financial incentive for companies to improve their models and we also improve the data directly. So you disentangle discrimination from these statistical models that at the endang like create some discrimination in these financial models when assessing loans for immigrants or disabled. >> Right. >> That's that's what we're aiming to do but we're not quite there yet because we're not yet working with credit decisioning. But that's a very good point. I do love the disentangling uh point. I would say that we identify friction points. I wouldn't say discrimination itself because a lot of the gaps that we notice are more a sin of under representation than a sin of uh purposeful discrimination right a lot of the anomalies that we identify are actually accessibility related and there is unfortunately a wide uh unpreparedness or lack of preparedness towards uh you know things like um uh yeah visual accessibility for example and there's also a lot of looping or refusals or um simply the lack of context that uh results in things like hallucinations or again like the promise of escalation to someone that is able to respond to an accessibility query but then it doesn't. So all of those are friction points and simply I mean the majority of the times is a memory retrieval issue basically the rag is undertrained right uh the knowledge base is lacking this context and that's why we are now uh basically our slogan is context is everything >> okay why did you started this company >> um Kylie started as an idea in early 2024 and um it started here in the Netherlands We did our first pitch at Holland Fintech, which is where I met Fabian and the guys from Techmakers. We uh again just as an idea, we won that first pitch and a couple of months later we were also pitching for um for TechMakers. Uh that same fall we got selected for Tech Stars Miami and we went through the program. We graduated in December and since then we have actually both um yeah proven the the the thesis which is essentially that by identifying biases we were able to also quantify operational friction and operational costs to as an incentive right for for organizations to become fairer. Um and we created the methodology and the first study like last summer. We deployed it in uh deployed it we launched it in November. That was the first publication that we had actually quantifying and having empirical evidence of unfairness in platforms. And this February we just launched our like the first version of our platform. So it's been a year and a half or almost two years of yeah of development. >> The how and the why. Why are you doing this? Why are you building this company. I think oh this sounds really emotional but I think in in many ways this is what I'm meant to do but um personally like I have a disability as you've seen um I'm a woman I'm an immigrant and I've been in the room when we make decisions around you know like yeah like who do we flag in you know in credit or fraud decisioning um I'm in one of the decision makers to uh to you know develop um finan financial products and I can tell you that we make the wrong assumptions about people. we uh unfortunately inject so many biases unknowingly so and we have such complex tech stacks that in the in an era where there's an 80% AI adoption by financial institutions it would be it's I can see the danger right like I can see the danger of not quantifying this the danger of not tracking not only how it affects uh people but how these models are actually drifting and kind of you know um reinforcing this bias us more and more the you know throughout the years. So I just think it's something that needs to exist and their legislation is also helping me out with that or helping us out with that right. It's quite literally kind of uh gearing more towards the the methodology that we're using. Um but yeah, like you know, a myriad of experiences that I've had have told me that um we we have an opportunity right now with the adoption of AI to change things. And I've found a way to both incentivize financially and create full visibility into doing exactly that, right? to be able to um do well and do good financially speaking and I mean make make fairness profitable for people quite literally or for corporations. >> Do you think the financial sector is adopting AI at the same rate or speed than other sectors? >> Quite frankly, I haven't done a comparison. And I know the financial sector has um yeah is adopting it at an 80% rate uh depending on the use cases or some internally some uh customerf facing twothirds of financial institutions already have implemented AI for customerf facing interactions and it's only going to expand right like into like we're seeing agentic AI and that's going to you know slowly creep into a lot of the um yeah uh experiences we know that KYC is partly fueled already with AI Biometric authentication is partly fueled with AI nowadays. So in 3 years time a lot of these things are going to be the norm and so you know I think that obviously access to to financial services is a human right. Everybody needs to to participate in the economy, right? And if this is affecting such a broad segment of the population or many segments of the population which in aggregate are you know you saw the presentation over 60% of current and future customers then who are we building you know like what what are these models going to how are these models going to affect the the financial access for everyone in two three years time >> AI is not explanatory. >> Pardon? is AI is not self-explanatory, right? It's like a black box. >> Exactly. Exactly. And >> so we need systems. >> Yeah. It's a it's a it's a black box. And it's a black box that already um carries its own biases, its own uh you know um uh data weights, but it also it's complex because of the tech stacks of the companies deploying it, right? Because we're not talking about just analyzing, I don't know, Chachi PT or analyzing Gemini. Every single one of those corporations or the, you know, major corporations out there have a very complex tech stack and they, a lot of them even have AI governance platforms already embedded, but they can only control what they see and what they have, right? Uh there it's it's virtually impossible for them to truly be able to see how their models are performing towards these specific groups in production. And so that's why we're coming. In fact, they have zero visibility right now. >> Okay. Which uh is one of the challenges the most important challenge that you're facing right now with your company? >> That's a tricky question. >> So, let me think about this one. I think a couple of years ago, people kind of ran away from the concept of biases. They either swore that there were no biases and you know like their their model didn't carry any bias uh or they said they they they would do eventually something and I think the biggest challenge that we had recently was around regulation like there was there was a lot of things up in the air in regards to the AI act and in regards to enforcability and also the complexity around regulation in the US. Um, but we found a way to operationalize ISO 24027, which essentially gives us not only the highest standard, but by virtue of something like I don't know if you're familiar with the Brussels effect, but by virtue of um the Brussels effect is essentially European influencing policy policy elsewhere because Europeans are much faster uh you know and thorough at establishing yeah regulatory benchmarks um and and frameworks, I'm sorry. uh and so that gets adopted elsewhere and so for for us the clarity that just happened around the AI act the the fact that they expanded some of the responsibilities around bias analysis and transparency um they also validated that you know the the use of synthetic data was you know preferable and in some cases there's exceptions so it actually gives us um yeah a lot of validation in terms of our methodology but it I think the the biggest challenge that a company that kindly has is perception, right? Like people like and it's changing a lot, but people like running away from the conversation around biases and now they really like now they're embracing it. So it's it's turning the wave. >> It's a hard question. >> I know. >> And what else? Uh one lesson that you would like to to give to other entrepreneurs or founders that are listening to this. Oo, so many. Um, I'm a solo founder for a reason. It's really hard to have a company and it's really hard to have a company in something like this where you're trying to both make an impact and and you know have a have a fully like full-fledged um uh scale. I would say one of the toughest pieces of advice I was given was it's going to be much harder than you think and it's going to take way longer than you think. And that was true. But the other one, the other most valuable piece of advice that I was given was you only fail if you quit. And sometimes some people should quit. But if you're good at product, if you're a good technologist, if you're a good entrepreneur, you receive feedback, you update your vision, your product, your deck, your business model, whatever it is, you adjust, you test, and you keep on going. >> So the only way that you fail is if you quit. Okay. >> I don't know. I mean, honestly, uh that is what's what's pushed me forward for years on this. >> Perfect. And one last thing, this should have been the last question. My bad. Uh but this is the last question. >> Any ask that you have for uh the community, my community, my network and tech makers or >> the viewers that are going to see this? Any ask? >> Um well, >> what are you looking for? We're always looking for we're always looking for pilots to validate the efficacy of our remediation models or remediation data that is so we've already proven our methodology right like we've already created the platform itself and now what we need to demonstrate or quantify is how effective and what is the delta between say you know one type of institution and another so that those are the pilots that we're seeking to do >> um financial institutions overall so uh insurance so the the the test uh set that we that we launched with was with insurance companies, with fintex and with banks. So So yeah um and we are opening our next trench uh next week actually right around money 2020. So um we are looking for investors that have a specific thesis around responsible AI or AI infrastructure. We consider ourselves an AI infrastructure company, not an AI governance uh company. And we need people or we need investors that can essentially open the path for us to become the global standard in AI fairness. That's what we're aiming for. >> Perfect. >> Thank you. >> Thank you so much for the interview. Thank you. >> Thank you so so much. I super appreciate you. Thank you. >> That's it. >> Okay. >> Hello. Ano? What's your name? What do you do? >> Hi, my name is Nitin. >> Nin >> and I work uh as a data analytics uh engineer uh in Ministry of Defense. Uh I work for Dutch Navy at the moment. Okay. >> So, I give my services uh to uh to the Dutch Navy. >> Uh are you entrepreneur as well or? >> Yes, I'm an entrepreneur. I have a partner and uh we have also a service model in India to do a support model. Uh so that's what we do at the moment. So my clients are like uh were actually Hineken uh BAM uh Grand Vision. So now uh also I work for a semiconductor company in Munich uh infinion and uh now uh we are quite occupied with uh ministry of defense because uh they want uh to cope up with uh all these years which they have neglected on investments on data tech uh so we are helping them to uh to get their governance model of the data and uh putting solutions uh for them. Which kind of solutions does your company offer? Only data science software. >> We have like solution like artificial intelligence, uh data science, uh data uh data engineering, u uh data governance, master data, uh and also developers who are developing pipelines uh from finance uh from supply chain uh to uh to make a central data warehouse uh where the data is managed and stored in a nice way. It's very challenging because the uh defense is such a complex organization and everything has a procedure. So it's not easy. So it's my first time working with a uh defense company like a Dutch defense and uh it's very challenging to be honest. It's not as fast as uh like a private company but uh it's a very good experience on how to do stakeholder management. >> You mentioned you have outsourced labor in India. Yeah. what which are the benefits of uh outsourcing in India compared to doing it >> so basically for Dutch defense it's not possible because you need a lot of clearances and you know rules and regulations and you need Dutch speaking people so that's why most of the uh support is in Netherlands but for other clients we have a a framework where we support uh clients who need 24/7 services on like on a sport model to support an application and we are like cheap for example we are cheap because uh in India we have cheap labor, good intelligent guys. Uh sometimes they need some guidance but uh technically they are very sound and we have already the solutions built up. Uh and it helps clients to not go from the scratch and rather than just use those solutions or use the framework. Uh for example, if a company has lot of backend systems and they have already implemented it and they need u support to just maintain it, you know. So then we have uh people who can do it on a very cheap uh models. >> When did you started or did you join this company? How did it start? >> Yeah, actually 8 years ago. So uh actually I always wanted to be an entrepreneur. Uh only thing is when I moved to Netherlands, I started working with Accenture. So and you know you always not sure if you want to live in this country and you need to learn Dutch and are you capable enough to to deliver to the clients because you need to set up some standards uh and uh and then like suddenly an offer came which I thought uh would be very nice to just leave uh my uh you know and as far as I say like when you're young I'm not young but like I say to young people when they're young they should make mistakes they should uh lose also Because then you know the difficult times and you can grow up. But if you are late you get used to the security and comfortable life you know having a job the salaries coming in uh you stop taking risk in life. So taking risk is very important even you don't have to you know you have security but you also know to how to lose little bit and take some risk. So that's my uh tip to the young people. >> Amazing. So you started with a a co-founder this company. Uh yeah, I'm the co-founder because basically my most of my experience uh was earlier in media and then I switched to SAP with SAP solutions with SAP I worked with on uh implementations in with Shell for example and with Shell I learned a lot on uh how to make how to deal with ERP data, how to make a business warehouse, how to store the data, uh how to make it secure and how to make the statistics working for the company not only for the history but also for the forecasting like predictive analysis and predictive forecasting and budgeting for example >> what do you think about the AI wave and the sub ERP CRM that we these big companies that we're accustomed to what is is AI going to affect to these big companies are new players going to enter or anybody is going to have a personalized approach to to their CRM or ERPs or >> yeah the EA will Of course it's not going anywhere and the companies like ERP systems uh will be you know using more AI layer for example to get some information for example if you're using ERP system there are specific reports which you can you know get out like how much sales you have done in a month and what are the profits for example and then maybe the the the AI layer will help like for example to get like some out ofthe-box uh questions uh uh like what was the customer segment or other stuff. >> Do you think from a business standpoint new players are going to appear against SAP classic SAP or something? I think Zap is a very big company and they have al they're also trying to change it more on cloud solution and I think they basically there will be players coming in and out but uh uh this has always been like industry is never for like one person like one company stays for like thousand years they keep on coming and changing but SAP and like Microsoft they are big companies uh and they are like doing all the revolutions in the technology field uh but I think the most important thing is to how to keep the data uh for a long time like data governance when you have data for 20 years it it needs storage for example and the data has to be good and AI will only work if the data is correct because many companies don't know how to keep the data uh first of all safe and then second thing is uh correct because lot of misinformation like on the data is happening uh in big companies >> okay which is one of the challenges or the most important challenge your company faces Right now >> I think it's not about technology because now their life has changed you know like 10 years ago for one solution I have to look on like their groups like I say like this is my problem what should I do for example in technical way like if I have to make like some code you know I what is the code for this like complicated stuff so I have to take help from the forums you know like I have to go online and check with some people technically now things are very easier but the processes are very complex like if you go to like big companies they have bureaucracy you know like especially in government you see like from one department to another department the the communication is not so easy and to get approvals even even more difficult. Uh so I think in current scenario I would say like this uh the to to to to just get like fast uh you know approvals and and and uh coordination is difficult especially in big companies uh government companies for smaller small scale companies startups is more easier because you know you sit in one room with everybody and everything is so easy but like big organizations like government defense uh space uh the data is also you know you need to keep it secure so it's not easy to use open source for example you need to use only like in-house stuff uh so yeah these are very complicated which only delays stuff but hopefully now their focus is more on uh on you know on self um dependency for for example >> using open source models instead for APIs right >> like NATO for example is now working with America but if America is not there then we need to have our own capabilities. So building our own capabilities is very important uh which uh the government has started to focus on right now and they give they're giving more budgets to spend on it for example because previously it was not a big deal and you know your own making own capabilities was not much a problem but now because the defense is now very uh uh sensitive uh you know topic uh it's very important to have your own integrity and own stuff in your hands. So Europe is now working on it. So I think that's like how it's going to work in future. >> How do you see the industry the your industry the IT industry in the next 10 to 20 years with this AI advancement? See the the a advance will make people more smarter because in the phone right now like if you compare 20 years ago uh as a small child you don't know you have to ask your parents your teacher uh about something you know and now like the generation is so smart like if you have something in your mind you can check with the AI and you can do something by yourself because there are so many things online and I think in coming time people will become more smarter but the only thing is like uh where there are there is no requirement of human interface that will be eradicated and the same tasks which are performed every day uh doesn't need humans anymore. So on that uh if you are productive for example as a human even you are a plumber or you are uh you know you can do something with hands you are a farmer that I would say like will be more productive but if you are sitting in an office and you think like you are a consultant and you get like paid in like checks I think those jobs will be will be gone because uh repetitive task and task which doesn't need uh human interference will will go but uh other other stuff like industry as like IT industry is one thing where all the money flows in but maybe the money flows from IT industry to other like agriculture space uh other stuff like you know where you you really need humans you know >> yeah okay uh what's one ask that you would like to have for the viewers the community and the network something that a contact some funding anything >> I would just say like uh I can just say on a human perspective that uh technology will come and Oh, but your vision uh your ethics uh your uh energy should stay the same. Uh when you see something, you should be interested in it. You should be curious about it and you should be able to approach people because many people do not approach people. >> Would you like to to look for a contact in the network? Like that's what I mean. >> Which kind of contact would you like? I would like to know like if somebody's interested to have offshore support model >> in Asia and cheaper model uh we can provide like uh uh talent uh from developers to project managers >> any specific uh company size that you're looking for or company sector >> we we have like companies from like 10 million to 100 million and we can also um uh organize more um support bigger sport models because we started just like few three few years ago and we have lot of u u library for uh good talent uh so if >> especially big enterprises >> yes like we have good AI developers ERP developers uh those kind of uh human talent we have a lot and we have a setup where we can provide uh good expertise in a cheaper uh version >> and good >> perfect one lesson that you would like to give to the entrepreneurs or founders watching in this interview, one lesson from your entrepreneurship or advice. >> Uh, one lesson I would say like of course um just I think when you wake up you should be energetic. It's not only about your work but also other things in life. When I wake up I also look at in my garden I look at the leaves and plants. So it also gives me like you know a good energy. So I think not only work but also other aspects of lives are very important. That's what I do. I don't know if it works for other people. Uh but yeah, that's >> rich life. Perfect. Amazing. Thank you for the interview. >> Thank you so much. >> Nice to meet you. >> Thank you.