The Funding Valley: How Deep Tech Gets Funded | Alex Piskunov, Deep Tech Investor

Oh, today on the show we have Alex Piskanov. Alex is a deep tech investor. He has made his way through a number of different jobs and a number of different types of investment firms, mainly private equity. And we talk a lot about how to use different types of financial instruments to get through those time

periods, those famous time periods of piloting, de-risking your technology until you're able to actually go to market, sustain yourself with revenue, uh things like this. So, very interesting episode. I learned a lot. But a special piece of this episode was that it was during climate week in New York and I had nowhere to do the episode

until after a bunch of outreach. The only people to get back to me was the Waterfront Alliance. And so I wanted to shout them out. Uh I have a specific I made sure to look this up so I had a a specific description. of the Waterfront Alliance, US-based nonprofit with a network of more than 1100 partners

committed to advancing the environmental resilience, economic opportunity, and equitable access of waterfronts in the New York and New Jersey region. They drive real change by bringing together communities, policy makers, and industry leaders to shape a more sustainable future. So, obviously, I can get behind that. It's very similar to my mission.

But I wanted to say thank you very much because uh it was a pretty insane ask [laughter] of me to just show up and do a a random person to do a podcast with another random person and they were very supportive. So very excited to collaborate with them in the future. I would uh look them up. They're doing

very important work uh in New York and the New Jersey areas. Um shout out to our other sponsors of this episode, Clean Techch Growth Lab. If you're looking to grow in clean tech, there are the people to do it with. And as always, the producers of this podcast, Craz Friends. And with that, I give you Alex.

Oh, welcome to another episode of The Grove. Shout out to our sponsors mentioned just before this, but without them, it would not be possible to interview awesome people doing awesome things like Alex. Welcome. >> Thank you for inviting me. Happy to be here. I am excited because you know so much more than I do about financing deep

tech which is one of the most important parts of scaling company. So before we get into it you give a brief introduction of yourself and what you're building. >> Sure. Well, uh, over the past 10 years, I've run two investment funds. Both were focused on deep tech as you've mentioned. Uh, one of which was more

earlier stage oriented and focused on the emerging markets as well as the US >> and the second one was more growth stage focused and uh, we also did a bunch of deals in Western Europe and uh, the the more developed parts of Southeast Asia.

>> Nice. Uh right now beyond my investing work I also do uh quite a lot of different uh government advisory projects mainly in the emerging markets like Kazakhstan, Pakistan, South Korea and South Africa and uh a lot of them uh are to do with sustainability and impact investments and you know new technologies. So happy to talk about it

today as well. >> Yes. so much there's there's so there's so much that you're speaking to that I just don't know about yet. >> So excited. Um for you personally uh you know before we get into the the details of finance how did you get into this space?

>> Well you know if you asked me 10 or 15 years ago would I imagine myself in the space? I would definitely say no. Are you crazy? Uh when I was a student you know I wanted to go and uh make something out of myself and work in finance. I worked in investment banking

did a couple of years of tech M&A then moved on to private equity because you know at the time you know in IB of course you get paid a lot are high profile but uh you know at the junior levels of course you don't get much responsibility and a lot of the work

that you do it goes just into the table so it's not as fulfilling as they say yeah >> so in uh private equity what interested me was uh you know of course the team was smaller so I had an opportunity to get involved in more things and also you know actually see the results uh of the

labor which is of course meaningful and um at a certain point uh you know I realized uh that I've been speaking so much to the uh CEOs and founders of the portfolio companies that we invested in that for me it became very interesting to see you know how green is the grass on the other side

>> so what's it like to be an entrepreneur >> and uh I left PE and you know I guess I took the first leap of faith which was to go and start up my own company. It was uh not in tech at all. It dealt with imports of exotic wines into the UK.

>> That's crazy. >> From places like uh Georgia, Indocuses, uh South Africa, Chile, Brazil, and Peru. >> So, you know a lot about wine. >> Uh I mean I definitely did back then. [laughter] You know, I don't I don't think this knowledge the case, right?

But you know, I I can definitely say, you know, it was an education by itself. you know from logistics to contract negotiation and uh like in my uh current and previous work as investor definitely helped uh to you know understand better you know how entrepreneurs think what kind of point they prioritize when

fundraising and doing business and whatever so it was very helpful >> and uh after a few years you know scaled into business and uh had a good opportunity to sell the company uh to European family office so took that opportunity see it >> and uh since then being more active in the investments field right

>> uh running those two funds. >> Awesome. So well a lot of questions about uh wine I guess but then we can say that [laughter] different episode. Um so when you talk about uh private equity I think a reason why uh I think this conversation is important is because a lot of times when I'm speaking

to earlier stage founders which VC is a good uh vehicle for um but a lot of times founders as they're scaling their companies I I don't think are aware of other uh financial vehicles that they can take uh advantage of to especially in in in hardware >> um and deep tech in general. So could

you just explain some of the alternative things that exist that you could bring into a financial stack like what is private equity and how does it apply and then anything else that you think >> well uh if you compare VC to private equity I would say you know they're just two sides of the same coin right so you

know if you are outside of the financial field a lot of people think that VC is private equity and to a certain extent you can argue it is because you know they are both investing their own capital in ter in return for equity the main distinction is you know they're just investing it in different stages.

So of course you know VC is early and private equity is later and uh the way that they interact with the portfolio is different. But uh if you are asking specifically about earlier stage companies especially in deep tech >> well I guess just like as as as a company scales like what types of

>> financial opportunities are available? >> Okay. Well I mean uh I guess you know there's a standard ladder right? So in the beginning you invest your own money and then it's a triple F round which is you know friends, family and uh fools uh right and then uh depending on you know how uh accomplished you are as an

entrepreneur if you've done it before you know if you haven't you can probably go the accelerator route and you know get support with you know fundraising business development hiring like a CTO and whatever so the things that you cannot really focus on uh if you don't know how right problem is with accelerators normally the check sizes

that they give are relatively minor in return in return for the equity um and also uh from my experience and I've mentioned at quite a few acceleration program they do tend to move at the pace of the slowest cohort member so if you know some things probably it's not for you right uh that's one way right uh if

you are a more hardware oriented startup up uh or you know more traditional business. Uh another alternative to accelerators you can take is probably uh the venture studios right venture studios they act more like a partner rather than uh you know as an external advisor uh to the startup and they provide you know a lot of things to do

with R&D with testing with you know go to market or whatever it's a good way and also uh I would say you know especially since co you had a bunch of more opportunities that emerged for uh the founders to fund raise like for example venture deps or you know a lot of the corporate um investors started to

build up their own uh venture studios or accelerators or VC funds even if they haven't been doing so before. So now there are a lot more opportunities >> and uh of course you know down the road you can move the private equity route and whatever. So I think right now is really a good time uh to be an

entrepreneur. So, so what is the difference then between uh doing something like private equity and doing something like just taking a loan out if say you're a hardware company you scaled let's say you raise a series A round and you have uh a ton of um physical assets that you could take loans out on top of.

>> I see. >> So yeah, how does something like that differ from private equity versus something else? >> Okay. Well, I mean, uh, I think the difference is first of all, if you are an earlier stage company, it's unlikely that if you go to the bank, uh, they would really be as willing to give you a

loan. Uh, especially, you know, if it's a hardware product or it's something to do with innovation or deep tech rather than, let's say, you know, a uh, brick and mortar store or micro financing or whatever because for them, they're not experts in this field. Of course, it's no longer as understandable, >> right? uh also you know even if you do

manage to get that loan likelihood is you know the term they're just not going to be so attractive right and uh you know another thing is uh I've already mentioned you know you can be a great entrepreneur but there are only 24 hours in a day so you cannot do everything and uh you know private equity firms or VC

funds for that matter they do uh you know at least on paper claim to be really helpful in terms of how they scale your business right and uh part of your job uh as an entrepreneur know when fundraising is to really you know separate uh the claims from the reality >> uh from the potential investors. So when

so uh something that we spoke about before during this episode was uh financing through a valley of death and so there and uh I was at uh an event two nights ago and I saw somebody speak I don't remember the name of the company or the person's name [laughter] but they were talking about how commonly there's uh

this idea that there's a valley of death before the first pilot and then once you successfully navigate that. You get a first uh pilots and now you're ready to commercialize. Then there's a second valley that happens before you're able to stabilize commercialization and that's another valley where a lot of companies uh fail

or go out of business. And so uh you know whichever one we want to talk about, >> I'm curious your uh your opinion about how to finance uh a company through both of those valleys when you're not necessarily making stable. Well, I mean, look, I think uh you know, a lot of the

people these days, especially if you read the media, they do love to invent uh additional values of days uh death or terminology and whatever. Like, for example, if you look at the fundraising round, there is no longer, you know, just seed, series A, series B, whatever that is, you know, A+ bridge round, you

know, preede and whatever. So like ultimately it really depends on a case by case basis about you know your capabilities as a startup and you know what kind of product exactly are you building right I would say that you know especially if we look at deep tech and uh in particular the hardware aspect uh

a lot of them are really feeling the pinch when it comes to fundraising because you know they have >> uh significant cost associated you know with R&D with commercialization with building the product that you as a software as a service startup or whatever you just would not face right so uh for those entrepreneurs I would

definitely say it's very important to uh properly budget uh their expenses and you know uh allocate a significant amount of money as sort of a contingency budget right because otherwise you know uh no matter how good we plan the likelihood is you know situation is going to be worse especially if you are

an early stage company where everything is just not so predictable. Um from the investor side, I would also say that you know of course uh uh doing such a thing as a bridge round perhaps you know it's not ideal. So bridge round is if you don't know where a company has not really achieved its uh fundraising and

uh growth expectations but it still needs more money. So you know for the investors is a a bad choice right either you give some money uh without really a gross evaluation which is you know maybe in the short term it's not good but it could still you know lead to the company potentially pulling out of this value of

death >> or the second choice is you know not giving any more money and you know the market is also not believing in the company so it goes bust and you lose all your money right so it's sort of this uh fostian uh bargain. Ultimately, you know, a lot of uh deep tech funds, they

uh do try and participate in the bridge rounds and they do provide quite a lot of value which helps uh entrepreneurs to at at least you know survive that value of deaths. From the entrepreneurial side, I would also say that you know it's quite important to uh really narrow down uh the commercialization aspect because if you

compare entrepreneurs from the emerging markets to the entrepreneurs in the US and the UK, you would often find that in the emerging market they do try and you know build as technologically s product as possible. you know get as many patents as necessary you know do very uh significant and drawn out R&D

and on the other side you have guys you know in Silicon Valley or in London who are uh building an MVP out of sticks and stones and then you know trying to commercialize it as soon as possible and of course you know if you look at the VC market then for the VCs

>> early signs of commercialization means that you know the market uh at least you know shows interest in this company if not believe it outright. So it's a more valuable sign than you know just having another uh data room full of patterns which you know at the early stage especially they're quite circumventable.

So I would say for an entrepreneur it's quite important you know to try and uh establish traction or whether whether you know it's a commercial contract if you can do it or even a pilot right of course you know paid pilots are better.

>> Yeah. So I think I I think that's uh first of all you read my mind because uh right after this question I do want to ask about uh the differences between uh your your work in emerging markets and then uh also places like here >> and uh but right before then what is the

right time if I'm a founder and I'm saying okay VC is great I need to fund raise but I'm I'm looking at alternative uh methods or more complex capital stack when is something like private equity right? And uh I don't know how related it is, but if you're talking about establishing traction, it's not always

possible depending on the type of hardware or deep tech company, it's not always possible to deploy a pilot or get paid for it or something. And so letters of intent or things like this or or other tools for that. So uh in both those ways, when is uh private equity the um uh right and how does a founder

prepare for it and then you know other methods of proving traction. Okay. So let's uh start from uh the end right when is private equity right? I would say you know a lot of the uh firms that fund raise from private equity a lot of the startups they do it at a point where

you know they validated the product they established you know a coherent team. they manage to achieve notoriety on the local market and then they want to go international right or you know in the US for example expand you know from east coast to the midwest or you know to the west coast or whatever right because of

course you know the market there it's relatively different and uh the tools that the private equity provide is first of all it's a big chunk of money secondly a lot of the private equity firms they specialize in a given field like for example you know once again you know software as a service or medical AI

or whatever. And of course you have uh an opportunity to draw from synergy within the portfolio companies uh which would not have been possible had you been outside of their portfolio >> and [clears throat] u also uh private equity firms you know of course uh if you look at them with a cynical eye you

can say you know the robber barons and you know bot feeders and whatever but they still they still uh provide uh quite a lot of value uh when it comes to setting up the proper governance standards. or for example preparing the company for a later IPO if it comes to that. So a lot of entrepreneurs uh at a

certain stage they just don't think about that yet. So it's a change in mindset which can sometimes be helpful. >> Cool. And then as far as traction goes if you're you know take put on your private equity hat.

>> Uh you're looking for traction you know letters of intent like pilots like what like what kinds of things? Well, uh, you know, once again, uh, if if I was to put on my private equity hat and a company came to me and say, hey, you know, we have a bunch of letters of the pilots, I

probably would not take them seriously, okay? >> Because once again, it's a more VC kind of approach, right? An earlier stage and private equity, you do tend to deal more with companies which have, you know, substantial budgets that you can analyze. And actually you know when it comes to the valuation of those

companies in private equity it's quite similar to the investment banking approach rather than you know more of a gut feeling and uh you know the qualitative approach favored by VCs. So as a private equity person you know I would look at uh you know how substantial their uh book of uh contracts is you know what are the

strategic plans for growth uh you know uh are there any issues they're facing for example with distribution or with further product development and whatever to be able to better understand you know first of all where can I deliver the most value right as a firm and secondly where do I feel that's the weakest so

that you know I can establish negotiation in a certain way to really you know benefit the firm as well. >> Cool. So now emerging markets uh where let's just set the foundation for it. So when we say emerging markets to you where are we talking about? What does that mean? Well, uh I would say you know

anything outside of US uh western Europe and uh you know places like uh China really right because uh if you look at countries like Japan or South Korea yes you know they are first tier countries and yes you know they are not emerging markets by definition but still in terms of technology for example a lot of the

problems that they face are quite similar to you know places like Malaysia or Indonesia or you know Colombia right so in a lot of the cases their reputation for you know high-tech is mainly historical and uh I just don't think you know they always find the right way to deal with that on a

national level to support the national champions. So then uh where uh just to to ground the conversation somewhere uh you just want to which which market I guess is your favorite or do you have the most experience in or something?

>> Well look I mean uh beyond the US and Western Europe uh I've invested quite heavily around Southeast Asia. I've invested in Eastern Europe in some parts of LATAM. I would say you know the only market I haven't really touched was Africa.

>> Okay. And uh I guess you know the reason why uh first of all is because uh as you know I focus mainly on deep tech Africa right now at least it's not about deep tech it's more about you know impact investments as well as you know maybe things like uh infrastructure or

sustainability and whatever. So of course you know it's a good investment opportunity for some but uh in my uh field of work I've mainly dealt with Africa on the government advisory level. >> Okay cool. So then, so then let's uh when you say Eastern Europe, you talk about the Balkans.

>> Uh when I say Eastern Europe, uh I was uh talking about uh places like uh Ukraine, Russia, and Poland, for example. >> Okay, cool. >> Uh but if you asked me about uh my favorite market in terms of the emerging ones, I would definitely say Southeast Asia just because how diverse it is in

terms of, you know, what kind of technologies are trending. >> Okay, cool. >> And things like that. So, well, I just say I have a personal relationship with the Valkcans. So, if if you have activity there, we talk about it. But, so let's take Southeast Asia. So, what kinds of things are I I don't even know

if it's a if we're able to um take it as a geography itself, I'm sure that this type of conversation around what technologies are coming out and how entrepreneurs are developing them. I'm sure it it changes from country to country but um >> you know I'll just ask you you can take it wherever you want but what

technologies in Southeast Asia are uh considered deep tech and are being developed and then second you uh uh mentioned it earlier but how do entrepreneurs or entrepreneurial ecosystems or financial structures support the development of these technologies? Well uh first of all I would say you know deep tech in Southeast Asia is just the same as you

know deep tech is here in the US right as a broad term right so you do have you know innovations coming from the side of robotics or AI or space technologies autonomous kazm whatever problem is in a lot of those countries once again you know there is no infrastructure to properly support the growth of such

companies from let's say you know ideas away idea stage all the way to IPO for uh and you have you know gaps in especially the earlier stage financing as well as you know a lot of the companies that grow up in those region they still choose to do the IPO on the London stock exchange or New York stock

exchange for some reason. Uh anyway so uh another problem I think is that you know in a lot of those cases in Southeast Asia uh innovation is driven by the government. >> Okay. And at least from my own experience, I wouldn't say those governments have really, you know, arrived at the right right way to

support it. A lot of it it's very uh top down. So, you know, we give a directive and you do it. Yes. >> Right. And uh a lot of it you know the decision makers allocating uh significant budgets to initiatives which they themselves would not really be able to benefit from because innovation takes

a long time to really develop and they in the office you know for the next three or four or five years right so ultimately they are more short-term oriented which is a big problem >> and you know there are a lot of other issues I would say like for example in places like Japan or South Korea of

course you know once again you have a historical reputation for innovation at the same time a lot of the founders there sometimes you know they don't really speak good English they don't really understand foreign markets and for them a dream is to go and sell their product you know to escape telecom or

Samsung and whatever right so they don't even you know care about the traditional fundraising roots and if you look at you know for example the VCs or private equity funds here they don't really consider traction in uh Malaysia or Vietnam or South Korea uh on the same level as they consider traction in Ohio

or you know Massachusetts. >> So uh you know often case those two perspectives are different. Why why is what >> why why is that uh traction in Ohio is more meaningful than the >> well because they are a US fund right they uh fund raise from uh western investors >> okay >> uh and of course you know for them

something that is closer to home is not only easier to understand but also easier to control right so uh you know everything can be happening at a foreign market sometimes you know they don't even have an opportunity to properly due diligence it.

>> Yeah. Okay. So then uh as an investor with these things considered uh staying in in Southeast Asia let's say how do you go about uh deploying capital? >> Well uh I would say you know it's uh it's the same everywhere right? I mean what's quite important I would say you know for for example for the US funds

who do want to allocate to Southeast Asia is not uh you know to do it out of New York but to open up an office over there. Uh like historically uh geography wise you know Singapore it was always you know good jurisdiction uh at least you know to set up the funding and then you know invest uh uh all

across the region. Previously it also used to be Hong Kong but you know ever since co I would say Singapore has really stolen uh the first place uh in terms of Asia's financial center and uh another benefit of locating in Singapore would be that you know you have a lot of other funds government organizations you

know earlier startups you know accelerators and whatever in the same very very tight spot so it's very good for networking as well. So, so when you mentioned in these emerging markets a lot of times uh deep tech or innovation is supported by government initiatives >> and is that how you transition to doing

work in uh government consulting as far as investing go? Uh well look I mean um as I mentioned you know the first fund I've run it was uh more earlier stage oriented back then you know some of the investments we've done for example back in Southeast Asia through Singapore we had an agreement with the Singaporean

government that let's say for example we invest $1, they invest two without taking any equity in the startup. So for them it was an opportunity to land uh very very good foreign companies in Singapore and support them >> and uh we did a bunch of you know similar initiatives around the world.

>> Uh when I was doing a more growth stage oriented fund uh of course you know the checks that we gave they were higher and the level that we engaged with you know >> uh our co-investors or different other organizations it was much more meaningful. So uh I guess uh the way that I got involved with various you

know government bodies around the world was more you know them uh hearing about my expertise in certain matters especially once again you know in the major markets and coming to me for advice. So when so when you're going to a government and uh you know talking to them about well is when you go to talk

to a government like the the countries that you mentioned at the beginning of the episode >> are the conversations around hey we want innovation here we want to invest in it correctly how do we do that or are the conversations different >> well I mean uh I would really say you know it depends on a case by case basis

like for example let me uh tell you >> say Southeast Asia >> yeah let me tell you about you know some of the initiative that I've uh been working on right like for example back in Pakistan uh I was in the national council for development of AI which involved you know setting up the right

uh uh strategies for the digital education of the population which involved uh you know things like setting up R&D centers on the basis of technical universities also you know attracting foreign direct investment and you know partners from corporate investment side to come in and you know consider Pakistani startups uh more seriously uh and you know a bunch of other

initiatives like for example in Kazakhstan I was involved in helping them to plan for and build uh their smart city called Alatau which is basically their homegrown version of Saudi Arabia's neom if you've heard of it >> and you know similar things across South Korea and uh South Africa as well so really you know my level of involvement

as well as you know how they came to me as well as you know how I interacted really depended Okay. Okay. So, um I have I I have two more questions for you, but I just want to um just want to open it up and say >> as far as this conversation goes with uh

investing in deep tech, what deep tech means, how emerging markets are different than uh western, you know, more western markets in China. Is there anything else that you feel um is interesting or important or you know something a DT tech founder should know or something that's just going on in the world that uh that is important to you?

Well, I mean there are always things that are important, right? I would say for example like you've mentioned China from my experience you know China for western investors it's always been you know a dream to invest in uh because if you read the media of course you know you hear about you know Chinese

advancements in AI and building you know the like every day >> yeah every day like they are super special autonomous cars they are drones and whatever uh but you know for a bunch of reasons uh western investors are either not welcome uh in China or you know not uh allowed by the legislation

to seriously consider it as a market. Um but you know from my own experience I would say uh the most exciting deals for me were those that I didn't do right uh because in a lot of the cases I didn't really you know properly do due diligence to them. I did not really spot

the red flags and so what I hear is you know just the media picture or you know somebody came to me and say oh you know this company is great and whatever and I feel that you know when it comes to the Chinese uh market it's quite similar right so a lot of the investors they are

not really uh understanding the risks over there and uh not understanding that in many cases the Chinese VC or you know private equity market for that matter they are very similar to the US in terms of you know how many booms and busts there are how difficult you know it is to pick the right company from a field

of thousands to invest in and whatever um >> and of course you know without having proper presence in the country uh it's very difficult to achieve so uh I would definitely say that you know uh right now in the US there are still many great opportunities to consider like for example uh I'm sure you've heard right

now there is you know push towards America first and you know return to manufacturing as well as you know defense tech and you know dualp purpose technology and this is where you know places like Arizona or Ohio they're having you know almost a second resurgence right uh which is a good opportunity whether you are an investor

or a startup founder >> cool so then uh with the work that you're doing which I guess is uh you know involved with these investment opportunities like following uh the the work that's happening uh getting I mean it sounds like you speak to a lot of people in the space in the investing

space and get their sentiments and you know you can connect like what's happening on a policy level you know government level market level and and uh you know sift through all of this noise to create uh an opinion so with all the work that you're doing what is uh the biggest hurdle for you know whatever

your your goals are with uh with your business or maybe you have a a certain initiative that you're working on and those hurdles Um and how is it also an opportunity? Well, uh I would say from an investment side uh of course you know uh yes you might be you know excited once again you

know about about any given opportunity. Yes you know you might uh be able to win allocation deal or you know help them to grow but of course you know you are not a philanthropist. You also want to make money which only comes when you're able to achieve a meaningful exit. Right?

often case you know especially in deep tech uh a lot of those exits are quite difficult to predict uh which is a problem because you know once again even if you sit uh into the in the company's equity for another year or two sometimes you know your investors into the fund itself they could start pressuring you

hey you know we want our returns >> uh so you know in a lot of the cases especially in private equity uh a good situation to be in is when you are making an investment into a company to already know how exactly are you going to exit from it right whether you know

you have a contact let's say you know at a big corporation that is seriously considering future investments in this field if you know this company it passes a certain commercialization checkpoint or you know you predict you know a future IPO wave coming in the sector right and you feel that this company has

a meaningful chance of you know being one of the leaders is uh but you know once again often cases just looking at a crystal ball right so >> so is that the hurdle then just the >> it's definitely a hurdle because you know a lot of the funds especially if they're a VC fund uh because in the VC

world it does take much longer from investment to exit a lot of them you know they fund raise that money from the LPS they allocate it to companies yeah maybe they do something with the companies maybe not but you the company that they've invested in, they just don't grow as quickly as predicted. So

they cannot go out and do something else, let's say, you know, raise another fund because they have not demonstrated the results yet. >> Uh and you know, they cannot exit from those companies. So they end up sitting on the portfolio which is called you know zombie fund which is definitely not a good place to be in I would say.

>> So how is that an opportunity? So like where's the opportunity in that? Well, uh I would say you know uh right now in terms of for example let's say you know the exits uh once again it's definitely an opportunity if you can uh have a good conviction uh in the industries or

markets which are right now maybe not so favorably viewed by the rest of the market but you know you have the right resources or the right understanding or the right context really you know let's spin those portfolio companies to really generate uh the returns that are necessary, right? In a lot of such

cases, you have uh you know uh a good opportunity to acquire those companies, you know, or you know even stakes in those funds for maybe you know not pennies on the dollar but you know something kind of similar.

>> Okay. >> And uh you know down the road make a killing, right? Like for example, if you uh looked at the public market side, you might have heard, you know, about uh situational awareness fund, right? And it's uh allocations towards AI uh and [snorts] you know, they were acquired quite cheaply, right?

>> Right. While uh you know, of course, down the road uh a lot of the people still do believe that you know, AI in the future. >> So if you have enough capital to weather through the storm, then definitely you know, you're in the right place. Well, with all this work to be done and

everything that you're doing in the investment space and uh what inspires you? [laughter] [gasps] uh well these days I would definitely say you know it's an opportunity to make an impact to an audience you know or a market which is uh underappreciated because um myself uh originally I'm from Russia and I do understand that you know

yes there are many different problems in the Russia market as well as in a bunch of other emerging ones but like for example once again if we move to the investment or entrop entrepreneurial field. There are still many great technical entrepreneurs with very smart and innovative ideas which are ultimately scalable provided that they

get the right support right and uh I do feel that a lot of uh people in the west they are uh sometimes you know underappreciating sometimes not really understanding you know what's it like to do business in uh you know India, Vietnam, Bogotaa or wherever. uh and if you don't have a truly global

perspective then you know over the long run I don't think you'll be in a good place. >> So then so then the inspiration comes from being uh making an impact like you're >> exactly >> and and bring that perspective because you've been in a lot of places.

>> Sure. >> So I'm I'm I'm glad this is one of the places that you chose to be out of >> and also uh we mentioned it before recording but I did want to shout out the the shirt. Where did you say it was from? from Indonesia, from the island of Bali.

>> Yeah, that that thing is awesome. Well, thank you. I appreciate Yeah, I appreciate you uh coming and uh I'm looking forward to the next one. >> Very good.