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professional financial advice. Any views expressed may no
longer be current and may have already been acted upon. Welcome
to this deep discovery podcast. My name is Andrew Aldridge. The
purpose of these podcasts is to bring to life the people and the
companies behind what demons do. To that end today. I'm delighted
to be joined by Oliver Wheatley and David Blake, who associate
investment directors within the tech growth team here at DBS
capital. So Ali de thanks so much for joining us. Great to
see you. Thanks for having me. So you've both recently joined
the reg depends on people are listening to this, of course.
But can you just please tell us a bit about your background and
your experience? Ali if I can start with you perhaps?
Yeah, absolutely. Andrew. So Ali Wheatley from Yorkshire
originally so went to group in Leeds went to you and hold that
against you. Yeah, one of the odd ones in the office, from the
other side of the Pennine. So big Leeds fun, went to York
University studied management in it and then moved across to
Manchester to train as a chartered accountant with RSM
was quickly attracted by the shiny lights of corporate
finance, and so moved into into work in advising on mergers and
acquisitions. In the mid market, so typically 10 to 100 million
enterprise values, predominantly private equity backed
businesses, and mainly across the tech world wanted to make
that shift from his value realization into value creation,
and so moved into direct investment role in the
technology venture capital team at Development Bank of Wales.
We're first joined up with David. And so So yeah, spent
couple of years they're invested in, in early stage businesses,
anywhere from 100k seed capital, up to two 3 million
participation in series A rounds and kind of almost
feeding them kind of what you're doing previously, once you get
to that kind of 10 to 100 million kind of m&a activity.
Absolutely. Yeah. So I mean, the businesses that work so what,
when I was in the m&a world, it was time at KPMG Clearwater,
corporate finance, a sort of boutique, European Investment
Bank, and Grant Thornton and very much more mature
businesses, sort of 2 million plus EBIT, da, already have
fully well established processes, management teams,
well beyond kind of proving the MVPs and
a million miles from kind of seis companies and much more
established.
Totally, yeah, but I mean, I guess, and part of the the role
that I was doing was was very much a it's a project management
role, where there's little onset little value, you can add, but
the businesses are kind of there in terms of the shapes and
they've they've been around funding rounds for several
years, if not longer. So the value you bring in is really
being able to execute that that final realization. But yeah,
these probably can't do it in a bit. But the the opportunity to
work with some of these early stage businesses who don't
necessarily know what that future roadmap looks like, and
haven't been there and seen what what good looks like, yes, you
can pass on some of those lessons and can
get good value creation stage. So Dave, what about yourself,
kind of, where do you come from?
So like, like Ali, I'm coming from a background in it, I
guess, originally in accountancy, qualified
accountant that kind of came through the kind of industrial
side rather than kind of KPMG public accountancy route, via a
number of blue chip companies, my backgrounds, kind of
originally in defense, kind of move it over to medical devices,
eventually ending up in kind of power generation, where I'd kind
of made a bit of an unusual decision as a kind of qualified
accountant, to kind of leave accountancy actually, and pursue
something that was a little bit more interesting. Yeah. So I
actually went back to university to study software engineering,
okay, I kind of picked up a bit of a bug through using kind of
Excel and Visual Basic and then started using Python and PHP,
kind of programming languages. And I could kind of see this
technology called Clinical blockchain that is a bit of a
thing at the moment. Kind of coming along, and I thought, you
know, this is a really good opportunity to go away and
understand how this technology could be used for supply chains
and the kinds of organizations that are working with actually
So I made that decision, went back to university study their
masters in software engineering kind of built out a kind of
focus on blockchain technologies, kind of finished
and, and see the kind of networks I'd made there, I'd
started working with a number of startups, technology businesses,
I was trying to pitch my own FinTech at the time as well. And
I ended up taking a call from Simon, who is obviously our
Simon, fellow Jones, yes.
Jones, who's obviously often director here. And even he said,
look, we've got this opportunity, it, we think you'll
be a really good fit for it given you a financial and
technology kind of background, when you come and join us. The
then it was the development bank of Wales, where I'd started
working with Olli. And from that point, I mean, I joined the seed
team. Yep. So I was working with the kind of earlier stage
companies, which was, you know, really quite exciting. And
again, kind of technology agnostic, but, you know, a
number of interesting companies that I've got involved with,
including kind of space tech, through to AI, machine learning
title companies through to agri tech systems. And, and he was,
and that was really quite interesting, you know, and then
getting involved with them as they were scaling up and doing
the kind of follow on and building those really strong
relationships with these fast growing companies, you know, of
which, you know, several of them were growing very, very rapidly
as well. And that really is actually one of the motivators
for wanting to work in this industry. Because you do get
that kind of exposure to working with these types of companies, I
guess, you see that kind of immediacy, don't you make an
impact, you see something happen, and it's not like, oh,
it's not like a behemoth of a company where decisions get
made, and it takes months or years to see the interaction,
it's this is this is real time,
and I try quite hard to kind of delve into the company as well,
and kind of feel like part of the team or, you know, in a way
where we have, you know, a kind of constructive relationship
where we can challenge each other, you know, as you would
expect from that kind of investor investor, you kind of
relationship, but also, you know, kind of feeling that
you're kind of on that journey with them as well. And kind of,
you know, batting for them when they when they go into, you
know, certain interesting periods as well. So,
yeah, I think that kind of fits in with kind of the DPS ethos
that we always talk about how we try to work proactively with our
investi companies. And it is that that working hand in glove
with them as kind of exactly, as you said, I guess so. So
hopefully, that was a an appealing factor about going too
deep, which again, kind of following on that kind of that
relationship? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. But so you kind of alluded
to there, Dave, but I'll start with you on this one is kind of
just talking about venture capital, and kind of what is so
interesting about this sector and kind of why did you kind of
go from your blue chips in your, in your, in your studies to kind
of look at the world of venture capital?
Well, I guess when you get to the stage, we've got monthly
management accounts in your rolling can have closures and
all the systems and stuff in place. And those kinds of
organizations work for a lot, you know, a lot of people, but
I've always found myself quite entrepreneurial, entrepreneurial
in spirit anyway, you know, and, and certainly kind of
aspirationally wanting to have my own tech company as well.
And, you know, having the opportunity to work with
individuals who probably are the best at what they do in the
world. And being on that really fast growth journey with them,
you know, is, is that it's that kind of perfect balance. And as
I mentioned earlier, that that mix of those previous skills,
actually, when I look back now, and this actually feels like
where you're supposed to
be you say, yeah, all those elements together into one
place. Yeah. Which is, it's fascinating. It's, it's always
amazing again, when you kind of not just like yourselves, but
when you hear from entrepreneurs, about their kind
of backgrounds, and kind of how they ended up kind of doing a
startup etc. And it's fascinating to see the
backgrounds where people come from, because they come from all
walks of life, but only kind of so VC, you know, kind of you
made that kind of step down the food chain, if you like into
into the kind of that value creation world and yeah, yeah, I
can get what was the motivation for that kind of? You touched on
that before, but what was the motivation?
Yeah, well, the I guess the the excitement that comes with
dealing with the earliest stage businesses that you don't get
when you are at that one predictable, developed, well
advanced stage. But I mean, that the job is well, it's the job it
doesn't feel like a job sometimes the opportunity to
meet like, you've mentioned that some of just the most creative,
entrepreneurial, inspirational minds in in the tech universe,
both across the UK and globally. Absolutely. Is it's a pleasure
to do that and, and just everyday been been a school day
really, it's a new technology comes along or something
completely left field but actually If it's you then ask
yourself why is this? Why is no one else done this before? And
I think that exposure is different sectors and different
worlds, isn't it? Yeah. Whether it's you kind of whether it's
med tech to AG protective to fintech? Yeah, it's entirely
different kinds of fields that you're looking at, I guess.
Totally. Yeah. And, and I guess alongside that is the value
creation piece in itself, both for the management teams, and
for the deep region, investors, which being part of something
where you've backed yourself, and through the process that we
go through in assessing opportunities, we've picked
something and we supported it and been there through the
various challenges that we make of them. And through the
strategic journey to ultimately creating something which is a
value to everyone around the table. It's exciting to be part
of
it, just be careful don't become like me before before locked
down. It was, you know, when when going to the pub was, was
more of a regular thing. You know, it's, I was known as a bit
of a curveball, because any subject come up, oh, we've got a
company that does something in that sector, or, you know, it'd
be it'd be sports injuries. Oh, yeah, I know something a bit
about that. Or yeah, it'd be about agriculture. Oh, I know
something about that. So just be careful, don't tune into it.
You'll just have to end up coming to the pub, where there's
instead,
we can be put balls together. That's good. That's good. So
kind of you talks about kind of finding the right companies. And
again, we touched on there across different sectors, but
what do you look for in companies? What What kind of in
that kind of early stage company that we're looking at, whether
it be seed, or all the funding, kind of what do you look for
what are the key qualities only.
So again, people would be be the starting point. So guys,
shouldn't girls who can demonstrate they've got there's
a reason why they should win in the sector, that they're,
they're choosing to operate in either from previous experience
combined with the advisory board, they might have
established, and generally, the direct experience in in the same
field, either in a bigger company and stepping down
decided to do something similar or directly from the academic
world as well. But also people who we believe we'll be able to
work with, and have a collaborative relationship for,
for the good times, and potentially bad times, and to be
able to work our way through that. Second piece would would
be having a very robust and clear understanding of what the
problems are that you're trying to solve. And ultimately, a
value proposition which, which is compelling, and clearly
addresses that that need. So it'd be management value
proposition, I guess there's
two main key things. And David Yeah, other than just saying, I
agree, kind of what's what, what are the things you look for?
Well, I do agree. I mean, absolutely. Management,
fundamentally, you know, one of the biggest drivers in the in
the early stage VC decision making process. And I just
extend from what Ali was saying, but, you know, having a balanced
team have the right skills, to be able to be able to kind of
execute on what a business plan says, or what the technology
developments going to be is really, really quite important.
And, you know, I guess the additional piece that I think
wasn't mentioned, I tend to look for is, you know, that there is
significant technology, you know, really tangible
technology, they're, you know, defensible, defendable, and also
something that really makes them stand out from everybody else,
which can be sometimes quite hard in the kind of software
space. Yeah, with the demonstration. slightly easier
in the hardware space. I think
there's a multitude multitude of different areas we will look at.
But yeah, I think that's there are probably three, the three
main ones will be management value proposition and tech and
the 4/5. If we're wanting to add one into the mix would be the
the business plan corresponds to a market opportunity. Yeah,
it's got that scalability, I guess, and that that
opportunity,
yeah, efficient scalability as well.
And I guess you probably am in the I guess you probably some
see pitches or kind of things come to where you probably look
at it and go Do you know what those numbers just a way off? Or
they're being overly ambitious? I guess there's that can be a
red flag, I guess, do occasionally. Is that Is that
fair? Or is that kind of sometimes is that just an
entrepreneur enthusiasm that you've kind of got to just work
with and dampen down a bit?
I mean, so I think that's a really interesting point.
Because I guess sometimes you can be presented with something
that is almost too realistic. Yep. And I guess that can some
that can sometimes Yep. You know, demonstrate almost a lack
of ambition. Yeah. Almost. Balancing. Yes. So, you know, I
think the important thing is, how many how many decks do we
see a year could be several 100 could be several 100. Right. So
you get quite you get quite good at being able to understand the
ones that are just saying what they were I think what they
think that you should that they should be saying yeah, I and
those that are being genuine, genuine about what the
opportunity isn't, and, you know, looking at how that kind
of business plan feeds into it. Yep, that tends to give it away
quite quickly, I
guess, the competitive landscape and we'll have you know, for, if
they say gonna take 10% market share of apple in the first
year, you probably know that's gonna be slightly ambitious. But
you know, if it's more a more kind of discreet, it's kind of
market and potentially you they can do that.
Yeah. And often, that's the most frustrating thing. It could be
an incredible business and the most amazing tech that someone's
come up with, but it's the actual market opportunity, isn't
there to to create a basketball opportunity for us, but could
still be a good potentially lifestyle business.
Absolutely. Yeah. Which, which, unfortunately, isn't right for
us and the investors. But yeah, it could be could could work.
So one of the things we've worked quite hard to do, you
know, between Simon nollie and myself, you know, we've worked
quite hard to kind of build they're almost an investment
thesis, if what, you know, the overall what it is that we're
looking for the opportunities that we're going to invest in
and work with. And, you know, we work quite hard to, to stick
towards that. I think that's pretty fair to say, yeah,
so you can kind of quantify it as well, I guess on the people
funds as well. Yeah, I guess it's when you when you got to be
quite in the sector, etc. But I guess they've also got to be
open to critical thinking, because, you know, if you're on
the board with them, they've got to be able to take challenge.
They can't be
radical candor. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah.
Cool. So we're talking about kind of their kind of what we
look for etc. And we do a debrief here we work
internationally we are, we've been across the world, etc. and
feedback we always get is that the UK is one of the best places
in the world to start an early stage tech company. Where if you
starting of course, it's early stage, you know what I mean? But
obviously, working in Wales, specifically, but also across
the UK, and what kind of ecosystems and support networks
and things we've seen built up. I mean, Dave, kind of what
support is out there for entrepreneurs and startups and
in scaled?
I mean, funnily enough, we were talking about this earlier, and
I think now is probably the best time ever to have been starting
a tech company from, you know, what support is available kind
of aspects. I mean, some people might look at the kind of
economic situation and question that But certainly, from what's
available, yep, to support you this no time like the present,
there is more support now than they probably ever has been, if
we look across the entire ecosystem, these incubators
available universities spin out support for the spin outs for
the universities, there's probably more funding available
than more sources of funding available than there have been
very good kind of Innovate UK, smart kemri in Wales type
support as well.
I guess you've got also Yeah, you've got that regional funding
and structures as well. I mean, whether it be Development Bank
in Wales, or smartcompany, or Scottish investment bank or
enterprise enterprises, like catalyst and Northern Ireland,
things, you've got those regional kind of support, as
well as kind of national initiatives like British
business bank and Innovate UK and things. Yeah,
absolutely. Yeah. I was gonna say British business bank is
probably a big driver in this as well. So
are they kind of any, any kind of other kind of things that
they're that's out there that which is
no, I mean, I think just to echo what David said, and now being
such a great opportunity for investors to launch, I mean, if
anything is, the problem facing them is which ones to back, and
which ones to go into. So there's incubators in Manchester
alone, there's three or four different ones that you could
choose. But I think maybe the last couple of years, seen a bit
of a shift from it being public sector driven initiatives
through the private sectors actually taking ownership and
seeing that, especially across angel groups, both regional, you
know, within cities and, and just general sector specific
ones, which not only bring the seed funding, which everyone
needs, but it's also the expertise that they can bring
from the
Yeah, and also kind of very specific ones. So you know, kind
of female led angels, groups, etc, support female
entrepreneurs, you know, like things like font north in
Manchester and things. And yeah, it said, there seems to be more
more and more thing going on. Yeah, I couldn't, I couldn't
agree more here that there's probably never been a better
time, except for the current economic climate. But, you know,
that's, I think the ecosystem, the structure is there. It's
about it's about the timing.
And I think, you know, less, I'd say, tangibly, but but there's
just so much information available now, as well. If you
if you can, you can probably go away and find any other VCs
opinion on, you know, what it is that needs to be included in a
deck, for example, whereas I think, you know, several years
ago, this might have been a bit more of a mystery for people you
can just
guess, kind of almost subliminally but things like
Dragon's Den and things like that have bought kind of
entrepreneurship to a mainstream audience, and maybe maybe of
last 1020 years made it more more kind of acceptable or kind
of more kind of goal driven for people more of a kind of an
objective for Yeah, I
think Dragon's Den probably scares founders more than
Yeah, yeah, we're not all like that. We're not all tracking
this. Mostly. It's not mostly like that. Yeah, absolutely. And
honestly, yeah, kind of starting a business is, it's, it's tough.
It's, you know, it's a tough world out there. It's an honest
world out there. It's, you know, things buy in things. But what
are the kind of common challenges that you're seeing
within these kind of companies either you work with and more
generically, so only?
Sure. I think recruitment would probably be the number one issue
the facing. For us, obviously, key tech hires, which is is
challenging, although might be more opportunities for that for
that market pool increasing as that continues to be layoffs
from some of the bigger participants. And sales
personnel as well, who are able to make that shift from the big
company to the small company world and be aligned in terms of
being in the trenches with the startup and and what being part
of a startup truly entails. So taking salespeople by giving
them
I mean, just adding to the kind of resource piece as well, I
think, certainly in the early stage, like adding staff to the
company, yep. is a is a probably an area of great anxiety for
founders as well, because finding the right people and
giving up control to make and give and giving up control.
Yeah, yeah. I mean, both there, and is this person the right
person? Yeah. And then managing it, if it's not like, the
resource, and that can be very difficult.
And again, you know, it's up to know or as you might think,
you've got the right person in etc. Yeah, they might dimple it
later, blue chip, etc. But the mindset is very different. When
you're a startup, you know, you are the one that you might be
the CEO of a startup, but you're the one put the teabags in the
in the in the tea cutter, you know, you're the one making sure
that the office is clean. You're the one you know, all those
kinds of very basic things that when you're in a blue chip, you
don't worry about but you had to roll up your sleeves.
I mean, this is, obviously this has been an area of debate quite
recently with, I guess, Elon Musk taking over Twitter, and
him calling everybody in and saying, Are you prepared to work
hardcore, you're going to, you're going to put in the hours
that it takes in order to, you know, build a, you know,
essentially reverting Twitter back to that kind of startup
mentality? And, you know, I think it can be quite difficult
for people to adjust to that. And, and one of the advantages
Started tab is their ability to move quickly and dynamically
pivot. But that probably does involve working more than 3540
hours a week. And yeah, you know, I think one of the things
we're keen on as a team is to be able to work in the same kind of
manner as the companies that that we're invested in the
expectations that the, you know, we're expecting them to, to work
quite hard. And vice versa, I think they should expect us to
work equally as hard and as fast for them as we do expect them to
run the business.
It was interesting. Last year, we 2022, we had a deep Jack's
conference in London, and we had a number of our investi
companies on a panel. And one of the questions the audience to
one that the CEOs was, you've got three investors on your cap
table. You talked about debriefing? The first one he was
go to for advice, and why is that? He said, we said, I know
that I'll get a response. He said, You know, I know that if I
texts I've asked or Ben at 11 o'clock at night, I'll get
responsive might not be straightaway but probably by
eight o'clock next morning, they'll come back to me, etc.
Who said it's that interaction and that kind of that they're on
my side and working as hard as me kind of gives me that
reassurance. Which I guess is critical, because it can be
quite lonely when you're an entrepreneur, I guess, you know,
if you're if you've got that pressure on your shoulder and
your comfort, yeah, communication everywhere is key.
To us. I mean, it not just with investi companies, but with with
prospects, when we do receive decks, you know, that we turn
them around ASAP, don't we, as soon as we can be a positive or
negative? Just
a quick note for some company can be as good as a quick yes. I
mean, it's, it means that they can they can focus on winning to
me,
I think we work quite hard on kind of building those
relationships with the companies as well. I mean, we're not
really the kind of team that wants to just put money in and
just sit off. Yep. And, and just leave them, you know, it's,
there is an element of just wanting to, you know, be able to
understand what's going on in the company, and, you know,
provide help where we can and
meaningful help as well. So, obviously, you know, that kind
of generic kind of challenges, but I guess it'd be remiss was
not to kind of talk about the cones, economic climates, you
know, we're, for people listening to this later, you
know, with this as early 2023. We're talking, you know, that
there's, there are challenges macro level there and across the
border in the UK and global moments and, you know, kind of
what pressures is that putting on early stage companies,
they've kind of start with you.
I think, I think it is putting a lot of pressure from kind of a
number of aspects really. So. At this current stage, I would say,
staff might be or potential recruits might be less likely to
leave their current Multiple corporate jobs to want to join
startups where I think it's perceived that the landscape is
a lot riskier at the moment, Chuck, no, a lot of the
narrative is that kind of venture capital markets are kind
of cooled down in the last year or two or the dice 12 months or
something, really. And that's putting a lot of pressure also
on funding rounds as well, which is probably making it harder,
although I kind of think that there is a lot of dry powder out
there, and there's just been a bit of a, it's a bit of a reset
really, as far as valuations are concerned. So I think there's
deals to be made, as long as the the valuations are corrected to
support those, probably down from the lofty highs of 40 60x
revenue as would have been kind of 12 months ago to something
more reasonable. And I
guess that depends on the sector, as well, you know, a med
tech, different to a SaaS product or things like that. And
it also depends on how quickly the company is growing as well,
if you're growing at a T two d three kind of range, it's going
to be a lot easier for you to to raise funds at a valuation that
you want, as opposed to one that is late. I mean, the entire
market is its supply and demand. So you know, and it's
interesting, because I think like a lot of the time we can
have kind of conversations with founders around kind of
valuation and kind of setting expectations around that. And I
think sometimes it can feel, from their perspective, quite
personal. But really, like I said, it's a market demand
thing. If there's lots of investors trying to get into
your company, you're probably more likely to be able to
support a higher valuation than if the if there's fewer, so it's
Yeah, I guess from our perspective, what you don't want
to do is effectively swamp the company and lose their
motivation. You know, you want to make sure they're suitably
Yeah, you're kind of in it as well. So as a founder,
yeah. Well, I mean, absolutely. You know, one of the things I
think that companies don't really do so well is think
about, think about it as an entire journey. And I wouldn't
get described as a it's like getting on a bus. Yeah. And kind
of understanding where everyone's kind of going on that
bus together. And understanding how many different rounds of
funding you're expecting, I think it can be quite easy to
kind of get into the routine of raise, raising cash, running out
of cash raising cash, again, when our cash, whereas, you
know, kind of building in that, well, you know, we're going to
try to raise it this amount, be kind of generous, understand
that there's going to be 20 to 30% dilution on a round,
probably, yep. But making sure that the company's got enough
funding to keep it going, rather than being in a position where,
you know, you want to set a valuation and only take 5%
dilution. And, you know, well, I have a really high valuation
now, but they make it really difficult to, for anyone to
anyone to invest in the future. Absolutely.
I saw one LT recently, it was great pitch great company. They
knew they need to raise about 7 million pounds over probably
five tranches during the course. But when you looked at it, it
was actually the valuation at this point was unrealistic,
because it was great that they'd thought it through. But
ultimately, by the time they got to that that's that kind of last
tranche, it will make perfect sense. But it's just too early
in terms of going too high to me. But that's, that's what the
education process, I guess. And
I certainly believe that, that founders should be retaining a
kind of meaningful chunk of their company is absolutely
going to be because we want them to be incentivized
to their babies as well. Exactly. Ollie anything's gonna
have to add to that. Challenges.
Yeah, I guess just the general uncertainty, and that creates
delayed decision making across the piece. So especially when
you think about the, if you're, we've got an investor that's
looking to win a new customer, and it's new technology, and
they've not experienced it before. Yep, that decision
making processes just getting delayed and delayed, and there's
a lot more, I guess, upfront trial work in which there always
is, but everything just gets just takes longer. So that would
be one of the key ones. And then just the continued increase in
across the whole overhead base and the challenges that presents
our founders with 10s of both stuff, staff retention, and you
know, the attraction of like they were So conversely to was
the amount to be able to attract some of the talent into the
startup culture. Similarly, the the the attraction of that more
stability and potentially the pay rises that we've seen in a
larger operation, and then customer retention as well. When
the markets as it is
uncertainty and yeah, and I guess, from your perspective, I
guess kind of understanding where that that kind of cash
burn of companies is, you know, it's if it's a software
developer, you probably got a laptop and that's probably about
it, that is electricity costs but you know, if you've got a
company that is using a load of electricity, then that's gonna
have a recent kind of events we'll have much more of a direct
impacts and I guess just kind of understanding that and yeah. So
you've been with deep edge a little while now which is which
is great. I know you're still getting to know the companies
etc, but kind of Yeah, I guess first impressions, you know, and
try not to swear shots. What what your first impressions are
the portfolio that you've kind of inherited? Ollie, I'll start
with you on that. And I guess you know.
And I guess the people, first of all, again, like a bit of a
repeating record here, but people, people, people, but
we've had some incredible minds that we've gotten and real
thought leaders in their chosen fields, combined with the
breadth of technology that we are open minded to consider in
here, deep bridge from some of the vanilla b2b SaaS companies
to Metaverse and contact lenses and hard tech, just the whole
array if if it's the right investment thesis that the
business has the right opportunities and everything
else stacks up, then we're open to it,
which I guess kind of again, yeah, we're talking about
economic challenges and things I guess, you know, that's gives
investors some diversification, you know, if you're not all in
one area, which could be adversely affected, or whatever
you bought, you bought the distributed?
Absolutely. And I think the the other thing for would be you
look at obviously, we've got very early stage investments,
and somewhere we've been in for a number of years, and the,
there is a real tangible opportunity for good two or
three of them to be 100 million pound plus businesses within the
next couple of years. And so yeah, it's an exciting time to
join for sure.
And Dave, kind of first impressions.
I mean, just wow. I mean, I mean, the the breadth and depth
of the technologies that that the companies that are, you
know, certainly, certainly the ones that I'm looking after,
anyway, is just, it's just amazing. And, you know, from
that kind of diversity perspective, you know, on one
hand, we've got propulsions, and rocket propulsion and AI kind of
companies going all the way through to kind of quantum
computing. This is broaden. Like Ali said, the opportunity there
is absolutely huge. Yep. And it's really quite exciting. And
again, a number of these companies are very much the
thought leaders in the space. And that really is quite
motivating today to be
today. This is great. As exciting as that it's great to
meet those guys. And yeah, absolutely. So I guess kind of
what your what your ambitions for 2023 kind of here, we're in
January now kind of what's what's the future like Dave?
Well, I mean, personally, I've got a one year old in the house.
So quite like a full night's sleep. Yeah, that's fair enough.
That'd be my personal goal. I mean, good luck with that. But
it's nice to have aspirational goals. I think more, I think
more kind of work related, very much around growing and maturing
the portfolio really kind of getting into into the companies
and really kind of building those relationships with them,
and hopefully been able to rely realize that a number of returns
for some of them, but this year,
yeah, I think, you know, we're, I know, you guys are working
hard with a number of companies on exit opportunities. Which,
which, which would be great. And is exactly what our listeners
want to hear. Which is great. Olli, what about yourself at
2023?
So yeah, I think it's developing the relationships with with a
couple of things that we've we've inherited, being able to
hopefully continue that reputation, that deep reach of
actually being the ones to go to if you've got the questions and
but but more than that, actually, you'd be proactive
with that. And so it really fostering deep relationships
with with the existing portfolio, at least a couple of
partial exits, certainly, if not full, would be fantastic. And
then hopefully bringing in another couple of exciting new
businesses to the fold as well. We
were looking forward to to new companies coming in niche that
you guys are now kind of identifying, selecting that
serve, that's gonna be exciting as well. So
and there are some really exciting ones coming through as
well.
So yeah, is that kind of core sectors? Is that kind of across
the board is is that
yeah, I think I think that's fair to say no,
but good. Okay, one of the purposes of these podcasts is is
for our for our contacts, our clients, etc. Just to get to
know the people behind the bridge and kind of what we do
etc. So Dave, so we're here to kind of what what do you get up
to away from work what your personal interests
so I might not look like it but I'm actually a big heavy metal
fan.
And for those listening, not watching he hasn't got a mullet.
So
I did have just before the the haircut ready for the podcast
is fade is getting higher and higher. There'll be a mohawk
mentioned I've got a one year old in the house. But you know,
one of the things I quite like to do, it's kind of that
engineering problem solving type piece. So I spend quite actually
a lot of my free time kind of writing in Python, which is
pretty my favorite coding language. So when I do get a bit
of time, and I tend to be trying to do something with that really
cool,
good. And Ollie, what about yourself?
I'm a massive f1 fan, mainly from the sofa, but try and get
to the odd race nearby bit Silverstone or near European
shores? And other than that, so recently married so yeah, it's
your how
are we going great soon as well. That's,
that's what I guess. As a ginger guy, and I'm actually looking
forward to the ribbon away. And then yeah, to work a little
working cocker spaniel. So outdoors, enjoying join nature
keeping fit, or all the usual stuff, I guess when you got time
to fit it in around the page? Oh,
absolutely. Yeah. So okay, brilliant. So the question we
ask all of our guests on the podcast, is it I'll be honest,
my favorite, the podcast. It's most insightful. But if you're
when I was stressing the most Absolutely, everyone does. And
everyone, everyone comes out. And usually when they dial in
via zoom, or they come in, they always go, Ah, this would be the
hardest bit everything else I can answer. But this is so so
here we go. So if you could invite three guests dead or
alive, but not friends or family who don't upset anybody. So the
debrief dinner party, who would they be? And why? Ali? I'll
start with you. Okay. We'll make Dave sweat a little bit longer.
Yeah, I'll just with Dave actually told me this before. So
I might just. So I'll start with Steve Jobs, I think is a bit of
an obvious one. But I think just that the journey you went on
Apple for for one would be just to hear it firsthand would be
amazing. And I think one of his strongest skills was being able
to prioritize, especially around the plethora of different
innovation routes he could have gone down and how he did that is
similar to how we make investment decisions, you know,
how did he back so many winners? And
it's also how we face challenges, which particularly,
I think people I think get lost with that sometimes they just
think Apple was a success story. And it was just a straight line.
And
I presumed it was on the basis that you can't cook and only if
the serving was fruit
second, second on the list, so ties into the f1 piece. But I
guess a little bit of lessons could be learned as well. So
toto Wolff Mercedes Benz and just that being able to deliver
a constructor championships in a row that consistency or
consistency continuously you how is it to be said about
motivating his team to come in year after year to win once a
win wants to improve and see
is interesting recently, actually, because obviously,
they had their least successful year for a long time. 20 282.
And I can't remember there's toto or somebody else on the
team actually said that at the last race of the season. They
said there's more motivation now than ever before. So when when
you're not doing well, I guess it's quite easy to motivate
yourself. So it's just kind of maintaining that performances.
Yeah, it's interesting.
Yeah, no, absolutely. I'm sure it'd be some interesting side
stories of absolutely the true relationships and what was
really said, between between him. And then last, just to
lighten the mood will be Will Ferrell. Okay, yeah, he's, he
plays the exact same role pretty much doesn't mean in every
movie, but yeah, it's one of the few actors who can just crop me
up every time. I'm
sure he'd have a good few stories as well. So very
interesting, interesting mix. Dave, what about yourself?
Well, so I guess, following along from the Steve Jobs, I was
actually gonna say Steve Wozniak, you know, for inability
to productize you know, some of the the pretty largest products
ever created. would be absolutely fascinating to hear
how we kind of went about that and kind of managing it.
Secondly, I
actually went to a speech by Steve Wozniak Did you was
fascinating. Yeah, it was really interesting. And it was
interesting. She was talking about working in a commercial
entity. Yeah. How to drive that science. Yeah, in a commercial
entity we do. And that's quite quite a natural kind of an
unusual skill to actually be able to do that.
I mean, it can be quite hard. It can be quite hard for companies
to to maintain that focus on innovation and that r&d piece,
especially when there's kind of financial targets that need to
be made. And yet you're constantly under pressure to
commercialize rather than innovate up so. So that's quite
interesting. Secondly, would be David Attenborough, okay. I
mean, the guy's a national treasure isn't the you know,
what, Sunday Sunday evenings when we're putting on an
Attenborough show? I'm watching it with the boys and
aged children, not the Yeah, not the
football to my children. And we're kind of settling in and
we're watching it. And you know, a lot of the environmental stuff
that he's doing just kind of remind you of some of the really
big problems that are kind of going on in the world that needs
solving. And it always makes me feel quite proud to work in an
industry where, you know, we have the ability to support
companies who will be able to solve some of these problems as
well, which is just, I find that just truly amazing. And
I suppose somebody recently who actually said, one of the
amazing things, actually, when you think about when you watch
these shows is yes, you look at the problems, etc. But actually,
if you think about how we've, in the last 50 years, discovered
some of these problems. Yeah, makes sense. So actually, the
science is led to the, to these discoveries of what's going
wrong, is fascinating in itself. And now we've got to find the
science to actually rectify it. So yeah, it's,
you know, a lot of these kinds of probe programs as well kind
of lead consumer behavior, if you think about kind of micro
plastics and plastics, and then all the kind of spin off
businesses that the set up, you know, to solve these problems on
the back of the movements, you know, it really does have a big
impact on commerce. So, yeah, so you probably be quite
interesting. Yeah, absolutely. And then thirdly, I'd say to
lighten the mood, but I guess gives you a bit of a focus on
what I like to watch, but it's a guy called John, John Oliver.
Okay. Yeah, but he presented TV show last week tonight. Yep. by
John Oliver. He also does the voice of his rz.
garbage goes.
It's the cabbage guy. Yeah, John Oliver, married gay, married a
cabbage did a really interesting piece on AI. And how it
interprets certain things. It was genuinely of AI talking
about John Oliver doing different things. And one of
them was Malik Harrison. You can watch that if you've
seen that. That's that sounds good. Yeah, that'd be good. I
think that'd be a very interesting dinner party. I
think we will, we'll fail probably style show. I think
he'd just be clowning around. But anyway, let's get into this
just flew, obviously. Yeah. Excellent jokes. Well, thanks
very much your time really appreciate that. And yet, we'll
hopefully catch up with you again later in the year and do
the cutover other things. So yeah, it's great to catch up.
Thank you for joining us if you have any topics you'd like
covered in future podcast and please email us at Discovery at
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