0:00

So giveaways are like, that's, that's like

0:02

huge. That's been doing good for us. And we've been trying

0:04

like some, some minor partnership giveaways,

0:06

and, and just experimenting with those and how we do

0:09

them and how often we do them. That's already been

0:11

incredible. Like, we can track that for sure. Right? How many people enter,

0:13

how many people join our, our community, but like, we've

0:15

been. More true fans

0:18

because of those, because they're joining our, they're joining

0:20

our discourse, they're getting involved. They're, they're

0:22

using the, they want those giveaways

0:24

to give them something, but then they also fall in love

0:26

with the team, right. They fall in love with the concept. They fall in love

0:28

with the vision. What's

0:39

up. What's up. Welcome to another week of

0:41

the age of information, where

0:44

we interview guests and then our guests

0:46

give us answers. I'm excited

0:48

to talk with our guests to kill the

0:50

mall. Nickeel thanks. Absolutely

0:53

happy weekend, everybody. I think a great

0:55

place to start. This would be if you could

0:57

speak about team meteorite. So

0:59

I came across you, you're a co-owner of team meteorite,

1:01

an e-sports team, so we, you know, how you came into

1:04

it, what it's all about. Yeah, sure.

1:06

Happy to start there. You know, it's not even an accident.

1:08

I won't even call it my like full-time job.

1:10

Right. This is very much sort of a advisory

1:12

like board seat type type situation,

1:14

but yeah, basically you know, so team

1:16

meteor, I think like, I it's, it

1:19

sounds like a team, but it really is like, I think franchise

1:21

is the right way to put it right. Because you have multiple teams for different

1:23

games and we have content creators. Like we have it's,

1:25

it's a run of the mill, like e-sports or, but

1:28

you know, the name of it is. Team meteor to represent

1:30

that across the board. And so to clarify there,

1:32

like that's, it's, it's quite a critical

1:35

thing. Like we're, we're trying to build an empire as,

1:37

as a hundred thieves, as, you know, TSM

1:39

and all the other, other big folks out there. We're definitely

1:41

still in sort of the mid, I call it like the mid

1:43

tiers. Like we've had some really awesome teams

1:46

and athletes play for us before that. 12

1:48

in the world type thing, like, you know, playing in really

1:51

big leaks, but we're still working on it. We're still working

1:53

on trying to get more into more games and finding

1:55

our ways into more tournaments, especially with COVID ending

1:57

right now, too. Like there's a lot of new opportunities

1:59

coming up and innovative players. So yeah, but, but

2:01

it gives some context there. I've actually known

2:04

the CEO, like. For quite some time I'd say

2:06

like, we actually, he comes from tech,

2:08

he comes from a tech background, but he started

2:10

seeing meteor out as a community. He actually just started

2:12

as like a, it was at, at one point or another.

2:14

It was one of the most like coveted rocket

2:16

league communities. I think it's still, I think

2:18

it's still kind of run it like that, but I don't think it's as big

2:20

as it is. It used to be since other things that

2:22

came out, but it was, it was pioneering in that

2:24

time. And what happened was they sort

2:27

of him and a couple other folks leverage that opportunity

2:29

to say, Hey, there's this opera. There's

2:31

this world of e-sports, right. There's ways to

2:34

take a preexisting audience habit,

2:36

you know, shield the hell out of it, steal the

2:38

hell out of some teams and some athletes that you hire

2:40

and bring on, right. And then you have this opportunity

2:43

to and that it just one thing led to another

2:45

and it became like a franchise cause other other games were

2:47

explored and you know, one thing led to another and it

2:49

became this. I don't, I don't know what to call it. Right. But it's, it's the

2:51

leggings. It's the, it's the legs to an

2:53

empire potentially. And it's something that we're really

2:56

excited to keep working on. And, and yeah, just because

2:58

of my connection to it you know, it started out with

3:00

like basic advisement. I was there when the community

3:02

started and I was helping them just look whatever.

3:04

And I was like, Hey, like you could, you could find sponsors

3:07

for this community. You could find other. And then

3:09

you know, it's really sort of a grassroots story. Like then it just,

3:11

one day they approached me and said, Hey, like we

3:13

actually think we have so much, we're so

3:15

respectable in the space that we have talent now

3:18

that we can like turn into athletes that could play

3:20

on our teams and they could be some of the top players in

3:22

the world. And one thing led to another and I, you

3:24

know, bought in a little bit and yeah, now I get to

3:26

be a co-owner. Incredible people and you know, we're still

3:28

expanding, still growing. It's still, you know,

3:30

it's still the wild west for e-sports everyone, everyone

3:33

runs different organization structures right there. Isn't

3:35

like, there's an agile methodology

3:37

to running a new sports team or behind the scenes.

3:40

But, but it's exciting to keep

3:42

learning it. It's exciting to talk. We talk to our competitors

3:44

all the time, right? Like we played against cloud nine one

3:47

time. I think that was a big moment for us, but I

3:49

mean, it was, it was all in good spirit. Right? It's all, you know,

3:51

like we learned from them, they learn from us in this situation

3:53

you know, this very large team playing and

3:55

I, and we won a couple of rounds against them. So it was

3:57

just, it was, it's a humbling moment,

3:59

but it also makes you realize a lot about how close

4:02

you can actually be and how much you can learn from each. And

4:04

yeah, I won't rant about it too long, but it

4:07

was an incredible opportunity. I invest a lot of time into

4:09

advising the executives. That's like my main thing.

4:11

There is executive, you know, involvement

4:13

or very much at the executive level, but

4:15

I've also started helping out with like partnerships

4:17

a lot more too lately. You know, just bringing in some of my network

4:19

of people who are interested in jumping into the space and

4:22

you know, hopefully not, hopefully

4:24

we do have some announcements coming up. It's going to be a

4:26

busy summer. Let me put it that way. And

4:28

yeah, it's a fun experience, actually,

4:30

quite a surprising origin story

4:33

that you guys just started out as this grassroots

4:35

community, but honestly, you guys coming

4:37

from a tech background, that makes a lot of sense, you know,

4:39

because a thousand truth, that's like a very old

4:41

startup outage, a thousand true fans, right.

4:44

You know, 10 million. No,

4:46

you're not telling him about a thousand true fans are worth much more

4:48

than, than, than fake. So

4:51

how did you guys build that community? Did you, did you kind of employ

4:53

some of the startup tactics? Oh,

4:57

no. I wouldn't say that. Like, I'd say

4:59

when I, when I was there at the start of the community,

5:01

I would say the main priority

5:04

was just. You know, like Reddit involvement,

5:06

involvement in all the like online forums

5:08

that were around rocket league. And just because of

5:10

the relationship that it's still

5:12

there, like, I mean, there's still a couple of people from that boundary came

5:14

in the community, going out executives, the team meteor, and

5:17

grew with the community and, and use their corporate

5:19

backgrounds that their startup and tech backgrounds to, you

5:21

know, make it work. But you know, at that time it was. They

5:24

were just, you know, big enough hobby gamers

5:26

that they knew exactly where to go to find

5:28

people, right. And to enter, build clans and to build tribes.

5:31

And so it's, it's interesting because probably

5:33

maybe like, there's some, you know, if

5:35

we're looking at people are starting communities today and all

5:37

the, all the talk of greater economy and community

5:40

economy, things like whatever those buzz words

5:42

are right now, I'm sure there's a lot of that that was

5:44

employed, but I actually like I'm impressed.

5:46

I would even say that at the time I remember

5:49

looking at it and there wasn't like really a

5:51

structure yet. It was almost like a subconscious

5:53

commute. Like it was so appealing

5:56

and it was so needed in the space to have the central

5:58

like hub for rocket league that

6:00

they just like, it was, I mean, I guess

6:03

we could compare it to first mover advantage in some

6:05

way. That's not always the most successful way, but it worked

6:07

for them. Like they were one of the biggest, you know, the

6:09

scores and they just had the most like. Like

6:12

professional players who were just involved

6:14

because they happen to stumble upon

6:16

this community. And that notoriety led to a

6:18

network effect of like quality

6:21

community members. Even if it wasn't the biggest later,

6:23

it's not some of, you know, some people who are dedicated

6:26

rocket league people that became like they were,

6:28

they may have been playing for a professional team at the time, but

6:30

they were coaching on the side in this committee. Which

6:32

is insane to think about. Right. You

6:34

know, take that how you will. I don't, I don't know if I can

6:37

start, maybe there's ways to piece that together, but I'll

6:39

say from what I was exposed to at the beginning

6:41

of that, like there wasn't a lot of that

6:43

employed and yeah, I didn't, I wasn't

6:45

day-to-day at all or anything, but I was just sort of like

6:47

giving them advice on how to turn that into more of a business.

6:50

And the fact that turned into e-sports is I guess

6:52

that's the coolest part. I agree that it is

6:54

really cool. How has this experience given you any

6:56

kind of knowledge or skills that you apply to start. Ooh.

7:00

Yeah. It's taught me to be scrappy with partnerships

7:02

because the way that, I mean, like, I I've

7:05

been doing partnerships with startups for a while

7:07

and I've always thought about you know, what it would mean

7:09

to you know, talk to big players, right.

7:11

And be a small player, talking to someone big

7:13

and convincing them to work on projects and, and,

7:15

and smaller opportunities first. But and I, and

7:17

with startups and with tech, I feel like there's more

7:20

formal, like formal structure with that. Like, I

7:22

think they know what they're getting into, but with, with

7:24

eSports, I'm

7:26

learning about. The wild

7:28

west of it through being a part of it. And

7:31

that's also, you know, that like, then I compare

7:33

that to what's going on in crypto, right. And NFTs

7:36

and all those like very, very cutting edge. But I don't look

7:38

at VR AR and I look at the way that people are doing

7:40

partnerships there. Like what does the future

7:42

of food, like all these, all these school companies

7:44

that are doing you know, like lab grown

7:46

meat and all that. Like they even, they like have

7:48

a hard time securing partnerships without being scrappy.

7:50

I can tell like, They have to find

7:53

ways to be creative with that, that find ways to be,

7:55

you know, to sell the cutting edge. Right.

7:57

And you know, to, to share some context, like

8:00

my day job is I run this,

8:02

you know, boutique consultancy. I haven't bespoke

8:04

consultancy, maybe the better word that, that focus on

8:06

AI and automation, particularly

8:09

in the Microsoft. And with

8:11

that project too, like we we've been,

8:13

you know, we're taking a different approach to being a

8:15

Microsoft partner company. And it's funny because

8:17

Steve mirrors inspired me to think about, you

8:19

know, how do we, how do we sell the bleeding

8:21

edge and how do we make it consistently exciting?

8:23

Because, you know, I, not that, you

8:26

know, Microsoft technology is boring per

8:28

se, but the way that people think about dynamic

8:30

music, Microsoft dynamics, or office 365

8:32

and getting consulting for that is, is that going to

8:34

be the same as, you know, using. Automation

8:37

and RPA to you know, to. Workplace

8:40

tasks and deliver experiences

8:43

to customers. Right? So, and it was just like,

8:45

it literally goes hand in hand in my exposure

8:47

to even, and then started stewards. I do a lot

8:50

of advisory and stuff. I'm just learning about,

8:52

you know, like there, there should be structure,

8:54

there should be formality, but also when you need to be

8:56

scrappy, like team meter, it keeps me on my

8:58

feet. It keeps me like constantly hustling,

9:00

constantly thinking about ways. Yeah. It's a reset

9:03

from that, like classic, like, okay, we need to have all

9:05

these documents drafted up. We need to have all these proposals,

9:07

whatever. It's almost like, let's like, let's

9:09

move fast. Otherwise, you know, there's another

9:11

e-sports team waiting for our attention fast and

9:13

break things. Yeah, it is. It is.

9:15

And it's, but it's like it's not just like a different

9:18

scale for sure. So yeah, I

9:20

wanted to tie it into other things that I'm doing though, because it is,

9:22

it does come around. It does like work. Right.

9:25

I really want to know how you got Microsoft in the same room

9:27

as you guys, like how, you know, you're saying you're scrappy

9:30

with the partnerships. What does that mean? How do you create

9:32

good partnerships with these big companies or

9:34

big entities in the industry? Yeah.

9:36

Yeah. So, so Microsoft partnership that's where, like my that's

9:38

for the consulting side of things that I do that's

9:40

a, that's like a different thing, like to become a partner

9:42

in the Microsoft ecosystem is it's like, there's

9:45

not a Facey barrier to entry. You just sort of sign

9:47

up for their network. You know, pay a fee and things

9:49

like that, but particularly back with the meter. So we

9:51

don't, we don't have a partnership with Microsoft yet eventually.

9:53

Well, but the other partnerships that we have right

9:55

now with brands that are or that we're talking to, and I,

9:58

I can't even like share everyone yet. Cause it does have

10:00

to be formally announced, but we're talking to, you know, energy

10:02

drink companies, we're talking to hardware

10:05

providers, things like that. It's it's still,

10:07

it's still hard. And the thing. One thing that I've learned

10:09

is hype gets you like 60%

10:11

of the way there, which isn't bad. Like just being an

10:13

e-sports team was already exciting enough. Like

10:18

just the fact that e-sports is so, like,

10:20

it seems so lucrative and it seems so new

10:22

and fresh and people are just excited by that alone. Like,

10:24

I'll admit that does work in our favor, but

10:26

it's also, it's also competency, right?

10:28

Like we're coming into these meetings and I have

10:31

to, like, I do have to pull out the tech card

10:33

a lot and be like, Hey, like this isn't our first

10:35

and everyone does all the executives say like this

10:37

isn't our first rodeo. You know, doing

10:39

partnership, maybe it is for e-sports, but you

10:41

know, we know you, we know what it takes

10:44

to, you know, move fast, break

10:46

things to, you know, apply. And if

10:48

there's methodology needed, we know it to apply.

10:50

It does, it does all come around a little bit. It

10:52

does all work together. And that, that earns

10:54

the respect of these people. Right? Because then they realize

10:56

like, oh shit, we're not just talking to some like newcomers

10:59

who are, are figuring it out as they go along. We

11:02

still are, I'll admit that much. And everyone

11:04

kind of knows like, no one really knows. Well, they're doing,

11:06

but, but we still have, like, we

11:08

have a craft to it. Right. We, we know what we're

11:10

doing. And when I work with the executives

11:12

of team media directly, and when I help

11:15

make decisions as a cone or like that,

11:17

that is all employed right. That we know that they're. Do

11:20

we know that there stakes and we know that we have to show

11:22

that we know that like, otherwise, otherwise

11:24

they're not getting these partnerships. Right. Brand

11:26

skin trustee as a gamer

11:29

owning an e-sports team sounds incredibly

11:31

appealing to me. Is it as

11:33

sexy as it seems or is it just a lot of

11:35

like dirty work that doesn't really get talked about?

11:38

No, I mean, it's, it's both right? Like I'm,

11:40

I'm consistently excited by the work that I

11:42

do, but there is, there's always the money. I

11:44

mean, there's hard decisions, right? I mean e-sports teams

11:47

have to operate under a different level

11:49

of, I don't, I don't even know

11:51

what to call it, but it's like there,

11:54

like I said, there is no, there's no rule.

11:56

There's no book like there, there's no

11:58

guy that you can use to, you know, spin

12:00

up any sports team and have very

12:02

direct methodologies. You can look at all what the popular teams

12:04

are doing, but they all are structured so differently.

12:06

So that's, that's the part that's like, not

12:09

as attractive for most part, because of the startups and with tech

12:11

and a lot of these. There's so many, there's

12:13

so many rules already written, right? You can get all these certifications,

12:16

you can get all these different ways. There's different ways

12:18

to be empowered, to learn things. E-sports,

12:20

you've got them. You got to make up a little bit of it, right. Or you gotta

12:22

find ways to take, you

12:24

know, traditional business concepts and turned it into something

12:26

special and sort of something that's that's appealing.

12:29

So it is sexy. It is fun,

12:31

but you know, like I said, it's for me as

12:33

a coder for me, like that's

12:36

right. As of right now, for me, that's. You

12:39

know part of my, maybe not even like

12:41

every single day, but it's, it's enough a part

12:43

of my life. It's, you know, it's something that

12:45

I'm, you know, consistently helping with and, you know, as,

12:48

as it grows, maybe I'll get more involved and maybe

12:50

it'll just vary based on the other projects that I'm working

12:52

on it at any given moment. But it's,

12:54

it's worth it. It's incredible. And yeah,

12:56

I mean, I say it's not for everyone. Like anything. It is, it

12:58

is a risk. You know, I'm happy to be like like I made

13:00

an investment to, to get that co-owner ship steak,

13:02

which isn't even bigger. Like this wasn't

13:04

just like, whatever, an easy handover.

13:07

It was years in the making. So,

13:09

right. This reminds me of this reminds me of like chocolate

13:11

with the warriors. And if you guys know the story behind

13:13

you, so tell me. And like the, I think it was

13:15

like the early 2010s or something he'd just gotten bought

13:18

out by Facebook. So he'd made like $2 billion

13:20

and he'd put his money to a whole bunch of risky

13:22

stuff. And he's like, how do I hedge my investments?

13:25

And so he got the investment with the warriors

13:27

and he saw that actually as a hedge against his financial

13:29

investments and those super interesting. And it sounds like

13:31

you were like a up and coming child within the e-sports e-sports

13:34

league. I, I did want to get back

13:36

to one thing. You said you, you self described

13:39

the your team as being mid tier.

13:41

So as you guys sort of scale up and

13:43

level up and get bigger partnerships and just

13:45

getting better in general, what

13:47

is sort of your biggest constraint factor? Is

13:49

it getting better athletes? Is it getting into better?

13:52

Tournament's what is stopping you guys from,

13:54

or what, what is like the biggest challenge you see, getting

13:56

to that? I like that. I like

13:58

that question a lot. Talent churn is crazy

14:01

in some, in some like sport or e-sports

14:04

people, people are young right.

14:06

In this, in this space, we, we got 18

14:08

year olds making a hundred thousand dollars a year

14:10

with just playing games all the time. I was

14:12

like, what? It does

14:14

sound like Jack. Right? It does. Yeah. And

14:16

I mean, but they, they get burned out, right?

14:18

Like, I mean, you can young talent. They're

14:21

still figuring things out. You know, they there's a

14:23

lot of experience that they can gain in the field.

14:25

But if they're not finding that passion right away,

14:27

if they're jumping around a bunch of teams or they can't like some

14:29

people just retire from e-sports completely right. At

14:32

very young, like 18 to 20, they

14:34

have like a, a couple of golden years, right. Where they, they

14:36

get, they make some money, they get a lot of cool offers

14:38

and opportunities and they're like, shit, I wanna go

14:40

get a PhD at MIT or something. Right. Like they, they

14:43

we've seen things like that happen. So it's interesting.

14:45

Churn is, is very real. I mean, th the

14:47

hardest part is scaling talent. I think.

14:50

Having, you know, scaling that executive team.

14:52

It's not rocket science, like we've, we've been doing

14:54

a pretty good job of setting up people to manage

14:57

partnerships, social media, you know, community

14:59

management, audience, man, all the, all that kind

15:01

of stuff has been pretty straightforward. And you don't need to have

15:03

like a a hundred person team working on this

15:06

by any means graphic designers. Like that's been,

15:08

that's pretty straightforward. The harder part is the

15:10

athletes. The tournament's,

15:12

you know, they're not like they're actually pretty

15:14

accessible. I mean, you have to be like, okay,

15:17

I'm lying a little bit, like the big, the big, like

15:20

global ones. Those have like insane.

15:22

There's an insane gap to get into those,

15:24

but the ones that are like, just. The

15:27

ones that are leading up to it. Like those, those

15:29

are actually pretty accessible. If you have the right talent and

15:32

then your team has to grow with

15:34

that talent and with that notoriety, with that

15:36

cloud. And then that's how you get invited

15:39

to like the big stuff. And then obviously how much you win.

15:41

How much you're going through different leaks and

15:43

stuff, but yeah, there's a lot of like, there's

15:45

a lot of clout at play. I would say there's a lot.

15:47

You have to, like, not only can you have the best athletes

15:50

in top, but you have to be able to show that you're moving pretty fast.

15:52

You have to be on the cutting edge, your investors,

15:54

your partnerships have to be desirable.

15:56

And then that's, that's how you become like, you know, the, the

15:59

pro the pro e-sports stuff. But, but

16:01

to be honest, that we have had. You

16:03

know, we've been invited to some leaks just because

16:05

of where we are right now and how quickly we've been moving. And,

16:08

you know, even, even with some athletes during

16:10

that, we've had, we still have teams that are good enough to

16:13

sustain the team meteor brand

16:15

as something that's like an up and comer and we

16:17

have to constantly work for it. We have to constantly buy

16:20

for it, but it's, it's not it's not too bad.

16:22

And I think it's just, it does come down to

16:24

the type of the, you know, the type of players you have

16:26

and the way that they're producing content,

16:28

building momentum. There's a lot of that, a lot of different

16:31

things. And then, yeah, there's then once

16:33

you get all those things in a row, then that's where you can

16:35

start to like really, really clap. The

16:37

climb to get to the very top is the,

16:40

that's the hardest part. And that should, that's going to be a work

16:42

in progress for a while. Yeah. Yeah.

16:44

You know, on the topic of talent, I think when

16:46

you look at like professional sports leagues, one of

16:48

the really fascinating things is they

16:50

get these great athletes, you know, the NBA

16:52

or NFL, but then they make characters out

16:54

of them. They make brands out of them. And that's

16:57

in part because, you know, OBJ is just like

16:59

a charismatic person or LeBron is a funny

17:01

actor and whatnot. When you guys are

17:03

sourcing talent for e-sports. Important

17:06

of a factor is that person's personality

17:09

or their character or their career. You

17:11

know, e-sports, isn't, in

17:13

my opinion, isn't even like mature enough

17:15

to understand that that's actually vital, at

17:17

least some level of personality or some

17:19

level, like right now, it's not to say it like some

17:21

of the best players in the world. Like they're the quietest

17:23

people. Right. Which is fine. But I think that

17:25

for the more mid tier and grassroots

17:28

e-sports teams that are going to come up, or the ones that

17:30

are just kind of coming from nothing, right. They,

17:32

they have to value that they have to find the value

17:34

of that. And I think there are, there are athletes

17:36

that can bring best of both worlds. There also are. There's also

17:38

like dedicated content creators, which we have

17:40

to which are, which are, you know, carrying

17:42

that load for us a little bit as well. But

17:45

I think athletes that can represent that that's

17:47

it's insanely powerful base plan is

17:49

a great example. They, they have like

17:51

professional players that are just really damn

17:54

like they're really, really good. At

17:56

like, you know, I would say I don't even put

17:58

it as like three phrases giving a damn about

18:01

how they're seen and it's, it's a

18:03

benefit like that. That's building brand value.

18:05

That's building reasons to do partnerships.

18:07

If it's just a bunch of really quiet people

18:09

and they're not, they're good players,

18:11

but they're not really no. That's going to be a disadvantage

18:14

in the long run and that but also I feel

18:16

like for the athletes that becomes kind of un-fun

18:18

after some point, right? Like it just, if, if

18:20

you're not building that audience, then you're not getting those

18:22

brand partnerships, but like we could, we

18:24

could try to, but brands can pick and choose

18:27

who they work with when they worked at like, you

18:29

know, e-sports teams we've discovered that already. So

18:31

it would just really suck to be like, everyone, all

18:34

your peers on your team are getting like the

18:36

school brand deals because they're actually making content and you

18:38

just stuck in the dark because you don't even have a Twitch account.

18:41

So, like, I think that it's, it's

18:43

vital and we're working on and we're trialing different

18:45

ways to do this and incentivize for it. But

18:47

it's, it's going to be essential. It's not, it's not

18:49

yet, but I think it will be because the

18:51

space is going to get more saturated and you

18:53

know, there's going to be, it's, it's decentralized

18:55

sports, right? Like it's very different. And with

18:57

that, there's more, you know, like

18:59

things have to be done differently, but they can take

19:01

a lot of inspiration from traditional sports as well.

19:04

For sure. And e-sports is ever going to

19:06

have like a crossover star, like Connor McGregor.

19:09

Ooh, hard to say

19:12

maybe where it's actually don't get that. You're saying you're

19:14

asking about Connor McGregor would ever play,

19:17

no, I'm saying if you

19:19

have someone who brings so much personality

19:21

and so much hype, that the people who

19:23

are in who are the audience love it.

19:25

And then that evangelizers to other

19:27

people. And then this person becomes bigger than the sport. Oh,

19:31

yeah. I

19:34

would say, I would say I could see

19:36

a professional athlete retiring and

19:38

becoming an e-sports player. I can see that too.

19:42

Maybe not McGregor McGregor was bald man,

19:44

but I could see, like, I know that like there's

19:46

a lot of them. There's obviously basketball

19:48

players who love playing NBA two K. And

19:50

there's also a lot of like NFL players that love play

19:52

Madden. Like they, they like they've streamed

19:54

it before. I feel like I've seen, you know, things like that,

19:56

a lot of the rookies and stuff. So I know, I feel

19:58

like I've heard inkling Stu like they've,

20:01

they've been approached to be content creators

20:03

or ambassadors for any sports. But

20:05

they're like, they're playing for the Seahawks or

20:07

something like that. So, but

20:09

I'm saying like, like building up

20:11

a star and then yeah. Yeah.

20:14

That's different though. Yeah, for that one. Damn,

20:16

that's really hard to say. It's

20:18

it's I

20:21

don't know. I don't know that. I feel like

20:23

there's like

20:25

the content creators could be bigger than

20:27

the team. I don't know about the athletes. That's a tough one. But

20:30

I think they're like, I think a hundred thieves

20:32

that, that e-sports team is showing very

20:34

much so like their, their

20:36

conduct creators are larger than life. Like those

20:38

people are like, people forget that a hundred thieves is

20:40

even an e-sports team, like a franchise

20:43

sometimes because some of the people that they've

20:45

pumped out from their condemnation side are like

20:47

the biggest, you know, YouTube is right

20:49

now. Right. And, and are doing like the craziest

20:52

shit. So in that regard,

20:54

it's kind of, it. But it's not the

20:56

athletes yet. I haven't really seen it from an athletes

20:58

like ninja ninjas, not like an

21:00

athlete. Right. I mean, he's really good at what he does.

21:02

And you know, he's tried a little bit, but it's

21:05

like at the end of the day that it's

21:07

the content creation thing that makes them larger than

21:09

Fortnite himself, not the actual like, skill

21:11

that he has. So we'll we'll I guess

21:13

Nate Schott who runs a hundred. Like

21:16

he wasn't bigger than the game, but he was like

21:18

the, he was like the spokesperson, I guess,

21:20

for call of duty for some time. So

21:23

it depends on like what you've see as crossover

21:26

or as like bigger than the sport itself.

21:28

But like, I think a lot of them get on the level,

21:30

but they never really get like bigger,

21:32

if that makes sense. Unless they, unless

21:34

like, I think maybe Nate shock could do it now.

21:36

He's kind of doing it though, because he retired from call

21:38

of duty and he's, he's running this empire, but

21:41

I don't know it's there. And I guess he was like, It's

21:45

a long game, right? Like it's not all of these things

21:47

are like 10, 12, 15

21:49

years in the making. So it's not like

21:51

it's not one of those crossover things where we can make a star

21:53

overnight. Like it's, it's all of these different things have to

21:55

play and they have to build their own empires.

21:57

And I'm sure it could happen, but we need more time.

21:59

Let me put it that way. So w what

22:01

do you think is the biggest lever

22:04

that's yet to be unlocked in the e-sports space

22:06

technology? Definitely. There's,

22:09

there's a certain degree of their startups

22:11

that are building. Very cool infrastructure

22:14

products for making e-sports better for

22:16

making you know, the possibilities of

22:19

more people getting involved with these sports, like easier

22:21

and, and, you know, kicking down barriers to entry.

22:23

There's play BS. I don't know if you've ever heard of

22:25

it, but it's like a high school. So they

22:27

literally run like the high school. I think,

22:29

and then I think they're doing like high school to college bridge

22:32

of e-sports. And they like, they, they

22:34

self-fund all the high school leagues,

22:36

so they have investments to do things like that. Or they collaborate

22:38

with schools and, and find money to literally

22:41

have, you know, professional teams in,

22:43

at a bar, whatever varsity, right.

22:45

Like e-sports and things like that. So but they they're

22:47

using technology. Right. They're using cool

22:50

techniques of decentralization and, and

22:52

coaching platforms and things like that to make it easy.

22:55

Those, you know, those high schoolers don't

22:57

feel like they're on their own, right. They have access to a big

22:59

network and technology is just, it's going to bring things

23:01

together, crypto, I'm sure it will play a

23:03

role in this, the way that people I've heard collectibles

23:06

from e-sports teams, right? That's, that's a way to see

23:08

funding, I suppose, NFD or something

23:11

like that. Like, there's, there's a ton of ways

23:13

that it's going to change the business model and there's

23:15

a ton of ways that's going to change like the structure or

23:17

the potential of you know, critical mass.

23:20

Just the size of what, like e-sports already huge,

23:22

but the ways that players can engage the where's, that

23:25

the ways that a new athletes can engage

23:27

things like that. I think technology will be at the forefront

23:30

or even for the creators, like more distribution

23:32

streams so that they can become bigger than tech talkers.

23:34

Right? Like there's, there's all these, like all these

23:37

options. I think technology will be behind it and

23:39

it's not we're scratching the surface,

23:41

but barely I will. I do like

23:43

solid. Like I do believe that. I

23:46

actually really vibe with that.

23:48

I read a an interview with a,

23:50

this professor at Harvard. He wrote a book about experimentation

23:53

and he acts as a consultant for many companies. But what

23:55

he said is that Booking.com has

23:57

a culture of experimentation where

24:00

they, they have this issue of called hippo

24:02

highest paid, highest paid

24:04

person's opinion, and that's not

24:06

a way to make sensations. So instead they said,

24:08

we are going to constantly constantly

24:11

run tests, booking.com on tons of

24:13

hundreds of tests per day. On their users

24:15

through AB testing and not just

24:17

informs like before they can even release a product.

24:20

Part of the proposal is you have to find

24:22

how are we going to run experiment on this? And I believe in Netflix

24:24

also has a similar culture. So what

24:26

are you, what are your feelings towards experimentation? Oh,

24:29

I love him, man. I, I actually, I'm doing,

24:31

I'm like I've done

24:33

workshops and I will be doing more workshops

24:35

on that. Coming up in the near future. Dedicated

24:38

and passionate. Cause my background is like

24:40

I started as a developer. I moved into product

24:42

over the years and more operational and

24:45

more like the fridge of business and engineer.

24:48

And in that, like in that happy place of

24:50

being, you know, in product and operations,

24:52

I found a lot of ways to, you know,

24:54

use like experiments we do

24:56

in engineering to dictate how we can do sales

24:58

right. Or vice versa. And it's, it's

25:00

incredible, right? The way that you're designing the products way

25:02

that you're selling them the way that you're building them, like experimentation

25:05

is it's vital. And yes,

25:07

I guess that is like something that I could bring from

25:09

tech and startups into the sports world.

25:11

And I mean, they definitely. I haven't

25:13

seen as much of it happening, but

25:16

it totally tat, and I can, I can totally work to the benefit.

25:18

I think you're just early, right? Like there's just not enough

25:20

people who are, are thinking that way, but in general,

25:23

experimentation is vital. I think the future,

25:25

I think startups, I mean, it has to be coordinated

25:27

and asked to be smart. Like I, you know, I understand

25:30

there's a lot of risk and you're playing with investors' money,

25:32

but there's ways to there's

25:35

even ways to make that like a central, like,

25:37

like you were saying, right. With the, with the problem that

25:39

booking.com was having, like, I feel like. I

25:41

feel like when startups run into that problem, they can also,

25:44

like there could be employee churn.

25:46

There could be a lack of momentum

25:48

within the company. There could be, you know, founders

25:51

even can get, you know, lose motivation themselves

25:53

cause they they're starting to run out of steam on ideas

25:55

or just kind of, you know, running the same company

25:58

every day and not really finding new things. So the

26:00

mindset of experimentation, at least

26:02

having that mindset, that to me.

26:05

I do a little bit of angel investing. And I, I

26:07

want to hear you say that. I want to hear somebody

26:10

telling me that, Hey, you know, we know what's at

26:12

stake. We know we're using other people's money, but

26:15

we can use experimentation because X, Y,

26:17

Z, and they give me a methodology. They give me reasoning.

26:19

They give me, they give me a way to scope

26:22

it. Right. That's essential to me that

26:24

I think that is like, you know, the

26:26

way that startups should think. And like I said, and maybe,

26:28

maybe I'll even advise against it. I'll say, Hey, you guys

26:30

might not be ready for the experimentation phase.

26:33

But be in the mindset of it. Right. Think about, you

26:35

know, think about the pro, make the pros and cons

26:37

list, keep it. And once you're ready,

26:40

pass product market fit, like, you

26:42

know, put these things into action strategically

26:44

and you will you'll see results. Like I,

26:46

I really believe that. So all with good time,

26:49

all with conscious, you know, debate and, and

26:51

deliberation, but it's vital.

26:53

And I think, you know being involved in startup

26:55

worlds and just even for bigger tech companies, Like

26:58

booking.com and all those companies at

27:00

that level. It's it's key and yeah,

27:02

I could talk about it all day. That could be a separate

27:04

episode. I'm sure. But, but it's yeah,

27:07

it's, it's super important. And I I encourage

27:09

everybody to think about the, at least the mindset.

27:12

Cause I know that, you know, we have to be realistic sometimes,

27:14

but the mindset, you know, helps it

27:16

just drive motivation helps drive founders.

27:18

It keeps, it keeps it exciting. Right? You want

27:20

to do what you're passionate about? Can

27:22

we maybe, maybe like to illustrate this point,

27:24

we could go through it a little thought experiment.

27:27

So if there was something that you guys were thinking of going

27:29

through, I don't know, like what's, what's some like potential

27:32

feature that you guys might employ in your team or, oh,

27:35

good question. I think the experimentation

27:37

would come down to ways that we could.

27:41

The mindset that we live when we do so it's

27:43

with a brand partnerships in particular, I will say that's

27:45

probably where the experimentation comes in because we

27:47

get approached by brands say, Hey, you're not

27:49

top tier though. We want to work with you,

27:51

but we can't, we can't value

27:53

you yet just yet in the way that

27:55

you might want to be valued, because you

27:58

mean to see you grow. We need to see bigger

28:00

opportunities, bigger contemplators whatever. So

28:03

what we've been doing and you know, where we'll

28:05

see the success of it as a, as the rolls out

28:07

is we've been trying to find ways to do, like,

28:10

we've been trying to innovate on how we can distribute

28:12

and how we can utilize our community

28:15

and bridge that with our content creators and bridges

28:17

out with our athletes and find ways to create, you

28:19

know, like, I dunno if it's like viral

28:21

loops, but just ways to. Build,

28:24

you know, build loyalty to a brand

28:26

based on like the different touch points that you can hit

28:28

in a community in, in team meteor as

28:31

like a franchise. Right? How

28:34

are you tracking metrics? Yeah.

28:36

So we're, I would say a lot of that. So

28:38

giveaways are like, that's, that's like huge.

28:41

That's been doing good for us. And we we've been trying

28:43

like some, some minor partnership giveaways,

28:45

and, and just experimenting with those and how we do

28:47

them and how often we do them. That's already been

28:50

incredible. Like, we can track that for sure. Right? How many people enter,

28:52

how many people join our, our community, but like, we've

28:54

been. More true fans

28:57

because of those, because they're joining our, they're joining

28:59

our discourse, they're getting involved. They're, they're

29:01

using the, they want those giveaways

29:03

to give them something, but then they also fall in love

29:05

with the team, right. They fall in love with the concept. They fall in love

29:07

with the vision. That's an experiment I would say. And

29:09

that's like, that's it's happening right

29:11

now. I can't say if it's going well or not yet. Okay.

29:14

It, it is because our, our like true

29:16

fan list is growing, but it's not, you know, it's

29:18

not directly revenue. But now

29:20

we have people who are saying, you know, how do I become like

29:22

a premium member of this community? Right. How do

29:24

I become a patron

29:26

of like, or how do I enter more? Right. How can

29:29

I, how can I sponsor. Something

29:31

like we have, you know, like we have

29:33

our main e-sports stuff. Right. But we also like sponsor

29:36

micro competitions where people can do like prize

29:38

pools and that's just community engagement. Right. That's

29:40

like, we're just trying to build that up. And people actually

29:42

want to put money behind that because they want to have a

29:44

higher chance of, you know, winning and playing.

29:47

Like, not that to say we encourage

29:49

gambling per se, but we, we, you know, we're

29:51

doing these like cool community events and these

29:53

giveaways are driving that and that

29:55

makes people more dedicated. To

29:58

me as a concept. And then, you know, people are

30:00

playing it and that leads to more audience leads

30:02

for eyes wakes are Twitch more popular, so we can track

30:04

subscribers. We can track views

30:06

per stream. And then, you know, we can. How

30:09

our social media is going. And then we can go

30:11

back to mark brand partners and say, Hey, we

30:13

built loops, right? We built ways that, you

30:15

know, all of our, everyone who's involved

30:17

in our network can know about your brand. And

30:19

not only that, but they can evangelize it. And

30:21

also they fall more in love with the team, which means

30:24

they will see more of your product because

30:26

they're more involved with the community and we'll

30:28

put it out there if, you know, if we find a mutually beneficial

30:30

partnership. So it's sort of. Yeah,

30:33

it's a, there's, there's a lot of different ways to think about it,

30:35

but we've been doing that a little bit and, and that all

30:37

that comes from, like, let's just experiment with doing

30:39

giveaways more often or with,

30:41

with more strategic partners, not

30:43

just in random, you know, organization that we find,

30:46

like really make it, you know, picking and choosing, and

30:48

then seeing them. How can we, how can we

30:50

make it as enticing as possible to make people

30:52

feel like they're a part of something and not just

30:54

like, you know, not just entering another random giveaway.

30:56

Right. So yeah. That's yeah.

30:59

You know, I love, I actually really loved that idea of

31:01

giveaways. I mean, Like,

31:04

I think it was like 20 times or something. I used to listen to

31:06

a lot of the radios. It relates to like the top 25

31:08

radio hits or whatever. And so whenever we drive,

31:10

I would want to listen to like 90 and 94.9.

31:12

If you're in the bay, you know, you know, what's up. But

31:15

I was always curious, like, how does 94.9

31:17

know how much engagement they have? Or how did their advertisers

31:20

know how many people are listening at any given time?

31:23

Whatever this random radio channel. And I realized

31:26

it's because of the giveaways and the, you know, they're giving away tickets

31:28

to concerts. They're giving away tickets

31:30

to like backstage meetups with Katy Perry,

31:33

you know, shout out California girls.

31:35

But I was like, this is, this is such an interesting

31:37

way to figure out how engaged your users

31:39

are. If they're willing to pick up the phone and

31:41

call in and dial in and wait on some wait

31:44

list to be the 94th person on

31:46

on some lists and then eventually get to meet like

31:48

soup dogs. That's pretty impressive. That's like

31:50

pretty, pretty impressive. So I really like that idea. The

31:52

other thing that I really wanted to touch on is like, you know, me

31:54

and for us, we're sort of building our own startups he's

31:56

a little further ahead than I am, but as

31:58

I I'm really like sort of the design group,

32:00

thinking out the idea, flushing it out. And

32:03

the problem that I'm facing right now is

32:05

one of experimentation it's to figure out

32:07

what sort of landing page will convert

32:09

the most number of users to subscribe

32:12

to whatever it is that I'm selling. So

32:14

if you had any advice, you know, somebody that's like,

32:16

God, the idea done some sort of customer discovery,

32:19

how do they implement extra mentation

32:21

to get really, really narrowed down and convert

32:23

users? Yeah. Great question.

32:26

And I think that it's. There's

32:28

a lot of methodologies you can follow. There's a lot of, you

32:30

know, there's AB testing. There's like all

32:32

these different principle, like there's too many to name. Right.

32:34

So I'm just going to I'll, I'll jump to how

32:36

they're utilized though. So once you find a

32:39

way, so once you find the way that you want

32:41

to track, that's like the most important thing. Once you find

32:43

that, I think it becomes understanding,

32:46

you know what? You look at the timeline,

32:48

you look at your roadmap, right? You look at

32:50

your engineering powers, look at the resources

32:52

that you have as a company and you figure out, you

32:54

know, how can you. How can we add

32:56

something to like, you

32:59

know, let's say there's, there's a feature that hasn't

33:01

been as flushed out as you would. But

33:04

there's other features that are being worked on, right? Like

33:06

where, where could we shift priorities

33:08

without like shifting the whole company or having

33:10

to steer the whole ship around. Right. And experimentation

33:13

comes from like picking those battles, I think, and understanding,

33:16

you know, like obviously the metrics, obviously the way to track

33:18

it, but also understanding like the people behind

33:20

her. Right? Like how can we, how can we incentivize

33:22

our engineers to feel like they're building something that

33:24

could really like, that that's one thing, right. Or

33:26

how can we empower them? All

33:29

our sales, marketing, and engineering team to understand

33:31

that, Hey, we got this feature. It

33:33

can be better, but we're kind of stuck right now,

33:35

right on it because we haven't got enough

33:37

customer discovery. We've done all these interviews,

33:39

but we're still not sure how it's converting. We need landing

33:41

pages. Other things that could help us out. And

33:44

you craft that vision based on, you know, what

33:46

what's available for startups realistic. You

33:48

have to be realistic about how you do it. Bigger companies

33:50

can kind of do it whenever you want, but if you don't have to look

33:52

at the, you have to look at the grand vision and you have

33:54

to find the gaps wherever you can, and you don't have

33:56

to see, you don't have to, you have to make that decision, like, all right, we have some

33:59

space in the sprint. We have some space

34:01

in there. In this quarter, right.

34:03

Just straight up, like how can we do it in, how can we

34:06

get our team prepared? And then, you know, how

34:08

can we also go to our team, right? How can we, you

34:10

know, maybe it starts with the founding team and

34:12

then you can even go to the actual, like people

34:14

who are, you know, more on the ground and doing field work.

34:16

And, you know, you have, you have these discussions internally,

34:18

right? And you take, you say that, Hey, these customer interviews

34:21

are not going like, or we want to do more

34:23

than just that. And we think it's worth this

34:25

and, and, you know, As a founder,

34:27

it's a few to make that business case, it's up for you to

34:29

inspire because I've also seen experimentation

34:32

go terribly wrong, where that's, where everything

34:34

becomes an experiment. And suddenly everyone

34:36

is burnt out, man, everybody's going to get burned.

34:38

I've I've seen it so many times

34:41

and it's. I've even seen it.

34:43

I don't even know if there's a name for it, but it's like the desperate

34:45

pivot. When you, when you really

34:47

overanalyze your product market fit or

34:49

your failure to hit it, that you'd literally just

34:51

want to try every idea in the book. That's how you lose

34:54

a whole team then unfortunately like it, it has

34:56

to be picking battles. It has to be strategic

34:58

and you have to inspire it. Right. You have to be able

35:00

to, at least in startups, you have to be able to say, You

35:03

know, as a leader, I know this experiment is right.

35:06

I know when it's going to happen, I know how we can prepare

35:08

for it. And I know that it's, I

35:10

know that everyone's going to be taking a risk by putting time

35:12

into it. And, and you know, it, it might not

35:14

turn up to be exactly what we want, but this

35:17

is how we can take it. And then that's another thing, right. It's just

35:19

understanding like, all right. Even if it doesn't get us the exact

35:21

results that we want, even if it's not showing exactly

35:23

what we. How can this experiment

35:25

give us a takeaway that we can still leverage, right? How

35:28

can we have a plan B like it's

35:30

giving, it's giving it a lot, especially to

35:32

get out. That's what it is. It's giving it, meaning it's

35:34

flushing it out. And it's being able to inspire

35:37

like core parts of your team, which is a startup

35:39

that's everybody. Right. You know, it's inspiring them to,

35:41

to go along for the ride and understand where it

35:43

fits in your roadmap and why. Why it's

35:46

happening when it is. And that's even, that could be even

35:48

selling your co-founders right. That can be just selling your,

35:50

your first employees, that people at the top equity.

35:52

Right. You know, investors that these experiments are,

35:54

are necessary to success. So they have to have methodology

35:57

that have to be well thought out. And that has to,

35:59

you know, that's a fall, the tracking, right? Like first

36:01

you just have to understand, you know, how you're going to convert

36:03

it and how you're going to know what's going to happen, but

36:06

you also got to know why it's going to happen. And,

36:08

and, you know, to what extent in, in, you

36:10

know, the growth stage. The pivot

36:12

stage wherever you are. So, yeah, that's

36:14

that I'd say around like long,

36:16

long advice for, it's almost, that's like a cycle. What

36:18

I'm drawing for you is basically right? No,

36:21

I think that's a, that's incredibly helpful. I also

36:23

froze if you didn't have anything else on this, I wanted to touch on

36:26

chat bot this, this company that you, I guess you

36:28

were once an operations person on and now

36:30

you're advising. And why are you guys? So

36:32

how would you describe that? Like what stage are you guys at right now

36:34

with that? Yeah. It's

36:36

my nine to five. I don't know if I want to call it, like,

36:39

like I just do a lot of things. So that, that is like, that

36:41

is what gets the majority of my time. And I'm still

36:43

doing operations and sort of retro involves. So T

36:45

meters like that, it's more of a, that's more of

36:47

a part-time thing. Cause that's where I'm a board member.

36:49

That's where I'm more of like a, I come in for the big

36:52

decisions, but I'm not on the day to day. But you

36:54

know what I'm doing? Yeah, that,

36:56

that whole sphere. So I've been doing startups

36:58

for a little bit as fun as it is, you know, you find

37:01

a point where you just kind of want

37:03

to do bigger things or you want to, you want to take, take

37:05

a step back and find I've had, you know, a failed

37:07

startup before. I did startup consulting for

37:09

awhile, which is it's really fun, but it is a lot

37:11

of risk and it's a lot of, you know, other things. So I

37:13

wanted to give enterprise a shot. I wanted to give enterprise,

37:16

I'd call it enterprise grade innovation,

37:18

right? Great. R and B, I

37:20

like, I like getting paid for that. Right. I got this. I think it's

37:22

super cool. You know, to help people,

37:24

you know, help older companies take

37:26

legacy technology and make it new, right. Using

37:29

modern methodology, using agile principles

37:31

using, you know, what, what all these companies in

37:33

this case, Microsoft is giving in terms of

37:35

open source and, and ways that you can really access

37:37

information. And here's there, you

37:40

bleed literally bleeding edge technology, but you know,

37:42

you know that it's safe because it's Microsoft, it's not a startup,

37:44

that's go under tomorrow. So

37:46

yeah, th that came from an itch that you know, I've

37:48

known my co-founder for a little bit. Now,

37:51

Chad ODA he's I've known him in the space because

37:53

of my, like, when I was doing more of the

37:55

product stuff. Like I, I did,

37:57

I did run a head of product at a startup, a couple of startups.

37:59

I was also interim had a product go to some startups

38:01

doing like more of the advising side. And

38:03

a lot of it ended up in the chat bot

38:05

and conversational AI space because my first

38:07

startup was in that space. I've also done stuff in consumer

38:10

and more like general B2B. But yeah,

38:12

to like put it simply like we are where we're

38:15

an AI strategic consulting firm.

38:17

We do like delivery implementations as well,

38:19

but we're really focused on bringing new perspectives

38:22

to the space. Right. And new ways to empower,

38:24

you know, AI driven leaders with, with

38:27

modern methodologies, right? Like things that

38:29

we talk about in tech and startups that, you know, companies

38:31

that are unfortunate 500. They

38:33

don't know how to do that. That's it right there. They need people

38:36

who can help them understand this is how we can push

38:38

this technology faster. This is how we can make our returns.

38:40

You know, I'm, I'm one of those people who helps

38:42

to help craft that vision. And that's what I do

38:44

a chat mode and it's incredible. And it's also

38:46

given me a lot of opportunities to even advise

38:49

like, you know, people who are, are more

38:51

senior, who might be. You know,

38:53

they, they might even want to be starting their own

38:55

startup or they even want to be starting their own. Like they

38:57

want to start angel investing and I've been able

38:59

to actually help people, like, make those, some

39:01

of those decisions, right? Like, oh shit. Like I have all this money

39:03

to play with. And I, I only invest in stocks, but I

39:06

could also invest in startups. And, and this is

39:08

how I can make that decision to invest in AI

39:10

or, or, you know, cutting edge of automation

39:12

and the future of workplace, future work

39:14

type stuff. Yeah, so that that's, you know,

39:16

hopefully that clarifies a little bit more on what. So

39:19

tell me if I'm if I'm wrong here, but it seems like

39:22

a theme for you has been taking

39:24

these lessons that you've learned from

39:26

being a guy in tech and being in startups and

39:29

applying them to areas where they haven't thought like this

39:31

before, you know, move fast and break things on these

39:33

boards experimentation, and then go to

39:35

big companies and take this take

39:37

this kind of startup, lean, iterate,

39:39

quickly methodology to them as well.

39:41

So if first of all, do you agree with that?

39:44

And second of all, how do you convince them to buy it? That's

39:46

crazy. I mean, you like, I've never even, like,

39:48

I didn't think of that until just now, like this whole

39:50

conversation has been able to paint that picture.

39:52

And yeah, I think it's totally right. Like, that is what it

39:54

is. And I love I'm that passionate about doing

39:57

it and I'm not gonna lie. I think, I think passion

39:59

is a little bit of a selling point. Like they want it's

40:01

back to hype, right? Like hype does help sell a

40:03

little bit. Like everyone wants, you know, their, their

40:06

workplace to be better. Everyone wants to customers

40:08

to buy into more, you

40:10

know, longer term opportunities, feta

40:12

them more like everyone wants that. And I think

40:14

there's. To an extent,

40:16

you have to be able to show like, Hey, you know, we

40:18

got Delta over here, which

40:20

has automated their entire check-in process.

40:23

Right? If other airlines are not jumping

40:25

on this and they're not using scalable technology,

40:27

they're going to fail. They're going to go under right. Or they're going to get bought

40:29

out in a, in a bad deal. Like that's fortune

40:32

500 things, more like that, right. Like startups.

40:34

And that world is one thing. But the other world is

40:36

like, you know, their, their competition. Like

40:39

the espionage has got to be crazy. Like, I can't

40:41

say I'm privy to any of it, but like the

40:44

amount of, you know, some companies

40:46

are so far behind, but, and

40:48

all they're trying to do is compensate with marketing,

40:50

which is not even like, that's not a great strategy

40:53

anymore. And they're starting to realize that because they're bleeding like

40:55

that and COVID exposed a lot of that,

40:57

unfortunately for the better or for the worst.

40:59

Like it's sad to see, but some companies just,

41:01

you know, over indexed on the wrong

41:03

things. And so when, when price is actually happens, when

41:05

economies flux, like. They're

41:08

not ready. And that's, that's like a new motivator

41:10

now. Right? It's like, if they, if they can't turn the ship

41:12

fast, everyone doesn't like the executives

41:14

who are, you know, kinda did a sitting pretty

41:17

comfortably, like they're going to lose what they got. Right.

41:19

And the people, the shareholders, like the value

41:21

of the stock goes down, but these are it's

41:23

it's real shit. Right. And when they look at companies

41:26

like. And then they look at companies

41:28

like Airbnb and all these other like really cool Bumble.

41:30

I feeling that that's got

41:32

them stared, right? Like something, something is

41:34

like really raw. Like these tech companies are doing

41:36

this, you know, are maturing

41:39

in such a, like such a fast amount of time and

41:41

they can just move so fast. They can, they can

41:43

be. A lot of different stocks and they can, their

41:45

value just is so different Tesla, right? That's

41:47

like, got everybody in, in automated,

41:49

like automotive scare these days, or at least, or

41:51

it's pushing them to do Eby, which is like, that's

41:54

good. Right? Like, that's really awesome. But it

41:56

had to take somebody, right. And now all these other companies want

41:58

to start employing that innovation first methodology.

42:00

They want to make sure that R and D can

42:03

be bounced. So it's helping them find balance.

42:05

I will say it's not as easy as just, you know, saying

42:07

like, Hey, Tesla's doing this, let's do this too.

42:09

It's more of like, At

42:11

some point, you got to realize that there are hospitality

42:14

hates Airbnb, right? Like they, or

42:16

VRVO like there that's pretty scary

42:18

to them. So they got to find ways to make their experiences more

42:21

streamlined, more comfortable, more, you

42:24

know, it's not just the stay it's like, it

42:26

sucks to pay for hotels. Sometimes there's all these weird

42:28

deals and prepays and whatever. Like,

42:31

I wouldn't jump into it too long, but I've had enough experience

42:34

and exposure to these industries now

42:36

and how they think. And they like,

42:38

they won't show. But they have something

42:40

to be concerned about. And if they're not at least finding

42:42

ways to balance those investments using

42:45

current, like also it's about using current

42:47

technology. I'll mention that too, because we like it. That's why we

42:49

do the Microsoft stuff is because so many of

42:51

them use Azure. So many of them use the

42:53

Microsoft suite, right. There's also a Google and AWS

42:55

and stuff. Right. But it's using their existing investments

42:58

to, to be able to find this balance and

43:00

not having. You know, completely

43:02

refactored their whole company. Cause that's also, that's

43:04

not a selling point, right? That's very difficult. And that

43:06

requires, you know, people getting fired and stuff like no

43:08

one wants to do that either. So it's balanced,

43:10

it's helping them find that balance, but also realizing that,

43:12

Hey, if you don't find that balance soon, you're

43:14

not going to get ahead at many anytime soon, like

43:17

you're going to be stuck and it's not favorable

43:19

to anybody so long answer, but I

43:21

wanted to share as much as I could because I think it's a

43:23

topic I'm really passionate about. No

43:27

dude. I think you're, I think you're spot on because

43:29

so my background, I'm like a CPA and I love

43:31

looking at financials and things like that. And I think in, in,

43:33

in that example, you just gave for hospitality.

43:36

Airbnb comes into the space. If you look at

43:38

the predominant amount of money that they spend on their income

43:40

statement, it goes towards a software engineers

43:42

or R and D and an R and D is just another

43:44

word for software engineers. So whatever software

43:47

engineers are getting paid, we all know that designers and

43:50

designers. So really hospitality.

43:53

Imagine if a hotel was spending that much money, not

43:55

in real estate, but on soft direction. There's no way

43:57

that's, that's, that's what Nikki was saying. He's saying that

43:59

the proportion of R and D spent

44:02

at like the Marriott in relation to their total spend

44:04

is going to increase year over year in order to compete

44:06

with Airbnb, because they're going to go innovation first. Versus

44:09

maintaining market share or whatever else they were

44:11

doing before. And I think generally

44:13

that is great for the world as like a net positive

44:16

because every, everybody wins maybe not Marriott,

44:18

but whatever everybody else wants. So maybe to wrap

44:20

things up, Nikela, it's been fantastic. The thing that I

44:22

wanted to wrap up with is you've mentioned angel

44:25

investing sort of here and there. I

44:27

want to get your favorite startup that

44:29

you have invested in, but that you have not

44:31

worked for man, I can't share

44:34

one yet. That's the bummer? There is

44:36

one side, my age, the dressing is very selected.

44:38

Like I, because I'm just starting, like I haven't been really

44:40

doing it for too long. Technically my favorite angel

44:42

investment is team meteor. That was, that

44:44

was like really not. That was, that was pretty independent.

44:46

I have a couple of other minor ones that are

44:49

sort of bubbling up too. Like these are, it's

44:51

too new to say. Like

44:54

I'll, I'll imagine you're investing

44:56

before. You're, you're sort of on the side of

44:58

like pre-seed I guess. Yeah. Very,

45:00

very much. Pre-seed very much like,

45:03

definitely like stealth mode with type coming out of

45:05

stuff. No type. So there, there is one there's

45:07

one coming. But I can't share yet because I'm under,

45:10

I'm under NDA for it. So, but yes,

45:12

there, there is like, I will say that.

45:15

Like there's three of them that I have that

45:17

are not team meteor and all, all of

45:19

them get me excited. I mean, they're just, how

45:21

about you tell us the space they're in the space. One

45:26

is in carbon reduction, carbon emission

45:28

reduction, which I, I love that shit. I love,

45:30

I love social responsibility and

45:32

the two other are in consumer and one

45:35

is. Sort of like, I think they're

45:37

about to pivot into crypto, which is like,

45:39

they, they started as more of like a collectibles company

45:41

type thing. Digital collectables metaverse,

45:43

but I think they're going to, I think they're going to over-index on Bitcoin

45:46

and the other one is Well, the other

45:48

one is like, I definitely can't share what it is, but

45:50

it's, it's very much like local consumer.

45:53

I'll put it that way. So definitely more focused on like IRS.

45:55

It's in the money-making space. Yeah, yeah,

45:58

yeah, yeah. But the other two, like I can, at least,

46:00

I think I can surely see their industries and it's, it's

46:02

exciting, but there that's the thing you're still trying to even figure

46:04

it out, you know, what, what technologies to really double down

46:06

on and things like that. So I'm helping them out

46:08

with that right now. And that's whenever they're ready to go. You'll hear about it

46:10

and okay. Yes. Wait, wait. I do have any

46:13

sports one too. I forgot. I almost forgot it's tech. It's

46:15

kind of for that ones anymore, that wasn't

46:17

in a very early phase of like the, of

46:19

my investment, but like that one is, I'm also

46:21

not going to be working for it, but that one

46:23

is like, yeah, that one will get my investment

46:25

coming up soon. There'll be something to share

46:27

with that one too. That probably it's going to be weird. That one might

46:29

actually come first. I think that the farthest heading product

46:32

is just about to go live and I'm going to join

46:34

them, you know, with that process. So,

46:36

yeah, a couple of that's

46:39

fantastic. So I have one final

46:41

question for you to wrap things up. What

46:44

is something that you wish more people

46:46

knew about that you want to highlight? Like one,

46:48

one thing that I'm really passionate about that

46:50

I think, like, I think a lot of people are getting really into

46:52

it. I love the idea

46:54

of going to, like, I'm not about

46:57

city elitism too much. Like I understand

46:59

there's value in Miami. I understand there's value in Austin,

47:02

New York, Chicago, even Minneapolis

47:04

is a startup scene now. But my favorite thing is I

47:06

love jumping around those communities

47:08

and just immersing myself for like the time

47:10

that I'm there. I'm going to Seattle next week.

47:12

And I was there a couple of weeks ago. I just the opportunity

47:15

to speak to someone like some people

47:17

out there that I know that are like doing cool

47:19

shit in tech and seeing how different the vibe

47:21

is. I I'm going to start like, like

47:23

I'm not even kidding. Like I want to start hosting like dinners

47:26

in these cities. I just want to learn and immerse

47:28

myself and that it's a passion for it, because

47:30

that inspires me to think about. You

47:32

know, my, my thesis is an angel

47:34

investor, my thesis as an operator

47:37

for, for this, you know, consultancy

47:39

my inspiration for how I do partnerships.

47:41

Like all this stuff works together and

47:43

it inspires me a lot. So I'm not driven

47:45

by having to move to any of these cities.

47:47

Right. Maybe that's a hot take, but

47:50

I love SF too much. I'm not going anywhere,

47:52

but I love to travel and

47:54

I love to immerse myself like that. And, and, you know, with

47:56

conferences coming back to, I think there'll be a lot, but I

47:58

will say that I've done like a lot of speaking engagements in

48:00

my time and I love it. And like, I don't even talk about

48:03

it a lot anymore, cause I've been out of the game for a bit, but

48:05

I just love the idea of like, you know, talking

48:07

about something I'm really passionate about and finding people in

48:09

different places around the country, around the world

48:12

that I can share that passion with and, and find

48:14

ways to double down, not and, and build new connections out of that.

48:17

Even if I don't live there, you know, there's the, world's

48:19

becoming more online. Like it's, it's been

48:21

like that for a while. And so what's wrong

48:23

with that. Right. So yeah, that's something I want to share

48:25

that I think that, like, you know, I hope a lot of people

48:27

are going to be finding value of that to us as COVID

48:30

sort of backs up. And as people start moving around

48:32

again, as you know, don't like, you don't have to be hung

48:34

up on a place, just enjoy the people that you're meeting there

48:36

and find different ways to, to share your

48:38

passion and, and learn from people. So,

48:40

yeah. Perfect. Thank

48:42

you so much for joining us. Nickeel honestly, it's been a

48:44

wonderful man. I learned a lot learned a ton from

48:46

this episode. Yeah. Thanks so much. Y'all

48:48

it's been incredible. I'm honored to be a guest.

48:51

That's our episode for this week. Thank you so much for listening.

48:54

Make sure to subscribe to us and rate us on Apple

48:56

podcasts. We would really appreciate

48:58

the support. You can also follow me on

49:00

Twitter at F Z from Cupertino

49:03

and Busan. The ad next facade.

49:05

See you guys next week.