Mastering Tech Growth

Mastering Tech Growth

by Mike Sirius
Technology

You Can Be Aligned At the Head or the Heart, but the Best Alignment is at the Wallet

If you are juggling too many ideas and do not know which one to focus on or are stuck because you are overthinking everything, this episode of the Managing Tech Growth podcast is for you. To discuss how to navigate your way out of that situation and avoid it in the future, Mike is joined by David Boice. David is a serial entrepreneur who, at just 22, founded his first business. Today, it is worth hundreds of millions. His current companies employ 500+ associates who are mainly engaged in developing and providing technology for several transport industries. KEY TAKEAWAYS Achieving growth takes time, but once you have it, maintaining momentum for a few years is relatively easy. Once you demonstrate growth, attracting capital becomes much easier. Focus on solving a problem that exists. If you solve a problem only you and a few others believe is an issue, you will go nowhere. Constantly striving to improve your understanding of your customers and their problems is a growth essential. Set up a customer advisory board of 12 to 15 engaged clients, a mix of big and small. Identifying your exit strategy before establishing your business is counterproductive. Be careful with automation. Often, to ensure that the customer gets the best service possible, you will need to insert humans into your systems Be positive publicly. Regularly congratulate people for their achievements. Discuss problems, but primarily in the context of solving them. You will meet resistance to change regardless of whether it is good or bad. Put in place systems that enable you to step back. If you don´t you will burn out. Not every founder should automatically become the CEO. BEST MOMENTS 5.46 “There's a whole category of private equity firms called growth investors.” 8.36 “Just make sure you're solving a problem before you start looking at anything else.” 22.18 “We kept thinking, and kept staying curious about, what could we do next? What do our clients need? What problems are we solving?” 25.08 “We weren't as prepared for how profitability was really going to drive the ultimate value of the company.” 26.59 “I am very much against pre-planned exit strategies.” 36.19 “The customer advisory board is a great way to have a constant focus on where you want to go.” 44.36 “Because clients don't always know what's possible… our job is to come up with the really big, visionary ideas.” 47.51 “Bring in people that have the skill sets that you don't have.” 1.00.36 “If you manage your downside, the only outcome that is left is positive.” 1.14.22 “Change, whether good or bad, is going to be resisted with equal intensity.” 1.22.49 “You can be aligned at the head, and you can be aligned at the heart, but the best alignment is at the wallet.” EPISODE RESOURCES https://teamvelocitymarketing.com ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E49
Jan 15, 2025
1:23:29

Sustainable Speed is Essential to Avoiding Tech Project Failure with Ivan Gekht

Today, Mike is joined by Ivan Gekht a Siberian Aerospace Engineer and CEO of Gehtsoft, a custom software development powerhouse. For the past 20 years, he has delivered complex solutions for numerous industries. Ivan has led transformative projects at both startups and billion-dollar enterprises. He explains why, regardless of the industry you are in, developing and delivering products at speed is essential. Ivan explains how the need to move at speed impacts the way you structure your business, go through development, deploy it, market it and more. Ivan covers using Agile, value stream mapping, decision making, creating a robust and sustainable team and much more. KEY TAKEAWAYS Prioritize speed and the ability to solve problems quickly. If you can´t move fast, you will fail. If it takes just a few days to create the product, then it takes 6 months to bring it to market, you lose. Not using Agile well will slow you down. Using examples, Ivan explains how to fix that issue. Use value stream mapping. Take a holistic, value stream-based approach to identify and address bottlenecks. This approach improves efficiency by 30%. Don´t end up with just a few go to people. If they leave, the project can fail. Empower cross-functional teams and the product owner to make decisions. You can´t 100% solve every problem, you just need to solve it enough to get to the next level and bring your product to market. Be truly customer-centric Often, asking 8 potential customers the question is enough to validate an idea. Achieve sustainable performance by providing a safe, learning-oriented environment. You need to learn to fail and do it safely. BEST MOMENTS 00:38 "Slow teams don't just lose, they get wiped out." 10:17 "If you know exactly what needs to be done and the outcomes are predictable, you don't need Agile." 17:52 "The majority of the time is wasted not on doing the work the wrong way, but rather on doing the wrong work." 21:35 “They (the product owner) should be trusted … to make these decisions." 31:20 “Harvard Business Review reports that organizations using value stream mapping can identify bottlenecks that lead to 30% improvements in operational efficiency." 51:04 “It's not about perfection… it´s about making it good enough to hit the market … that's where you get the speed." 57.12 “For the user stories … your personal opinion doesn't matter. It's not about you, it's about the end user.” 1.05.30 “That emergent knowledge and emergent decisions come up through the teamwork process to be able to deal with the complexity.” 1.27.24 “Make sure that everything you work on brings value to the people who are paying for it and make sure to shorten time to market.” ABOUT THE GUEST https://www.linkedin.com/in/ivan-gekht https://www.gehtsoftusa.com ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E48
Jan 8, 2025
1:29:03

Hire Proactive Global Talent For Your Team To Go From Zero To 10 Million with Ian Myers

Today, Mike is joined by Ian Myers, founder and CEO of Oceans. He is an expert in building high-growth companies by hiring the right global talent, delegating effectively and creating a company culture which enables everyone, including remote workers, to thrive. Ian and Mike discuss the best way to source talent from across the globe while avoiding common issues. Including, fraud, inadvertently breaking labour laws, and people working full-time for multiple companies and not delivering. They also discuss how to improve communication and inspire people to successfully work proactively. KEY TAKEAWAYS When you hire the right person, you will see an uptick in growth. Hire talent from sources that are usually overlooked by your peers. Look for people with overlapping skill sets. Soft skills matter. If you realise after week 3 you´ve hired the wrong person, go back to the drawing board. High-growth companies need thinkers who can pivot. Global teams are the future. They are productive, resilient and work 24/7. Forbes reports that those hiring global talent grow fastest. Employing globally keeps costs low, which is especially important for startups. Using an agency that specialises in providing companies in your country with global workers helps you avoid many of the most common pitfalls. How is explained in the podcast. Successful companies deliver the culture the people they hire are attracted to. Hire using referrals from your employees. Being good at delegating is a superpower; you are 33% more effective. Tell your people they are expected to be proactive. Make it a foundation of your culture. Pick someone people trust and respect and get them to introduce and lead changes. You have to manage remote workers differently e.g. your communication has to be more precise. BEST MOMENTS 1:03 "If you still think productivity can only happen in an office; you're clinging to an outdated model." 25.24 "Make good on the promises of the culture you're promoting." 34.39 "Referrals, when hiring, are overlooked by many firms." 37.49 "Innate intelligence, adaptability and understanding of how to pick up new things… that's what's going to matter the most." 48.32 "We give our people permission to be proactive by telling them they need to be. ." 59.20 "You no longer need to hire all-arounders … AI can handle most all-around tasks." 1.06.28 “Using channels to communicate instead of DMS is a huge unlock for visibility alignment across remote teams.” THE GUEST https://www.linkedin.com/in/ian-myers-oceans https://www.oceanstalent.com HBS delegation - https://online.hbs.edu/blog/post/how-to-delegate-effectively AI global economy - https://www.pwc.com/gx/en/issues/artificial-intelligence/publications/artificial-intelligence-study.html ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E47
Dec 18, 2024
1:13:47

Master Digital Accessibility to Make Sure Your Tech Venture Grows with Inclusivity with Michael Nicastro

Today, Mike speaks to Michael Nicastro who is the VP group, director of technology and head of accessibility at Digitas. They discuss a very overlooked aspect of scaling tech ventures - digital accessibility which is not just a compliance checkbox. It is actually a growth strategy that unlocks new markets, drives revenue and helps your product reach its full potential. Michael is passionate about ensuring that digital products are accessible to everyone and uses quality assurance and automation to drive growth without sacrificing inclusivity. KEY TAKEAWAYS 1.3 billion people worldwide face barriers when using digital products. Some have permanent disabilities, and others have temporary disabilities. Companies that are ignoring accessibility are losing out on an estimated $1.2 trillion annually. Lawyers are literally hunting for companies that are not complying with accessibility laws. The fines are high. In 2025, the EU is introducing new accessibility legislation. All areas of the business are involved in delivering true digital accessibility. There are 40 to 50 keystrokes that a page reader may use to read a URL. Each page needs to be tested to ensure each keystroke works, which is time-consuming. Outsourcing checking accessibility is far more cost-effective than doing it yourself. AI may change that. If your cart process is not fully accessible you lose sales. DAIs force you to focus on the experience you offer for all customers. Standardisation and automation are essential. BEST MOMENTS 00.32 "If your company isn't making accessibility a priority, you missing out on revenue and losing customers.” 12:12 “Screen reading one URL can take up to eight hours. You have to do it for desktop, PC and Mac, Android and IOS." 20.03 “If there's an image there needs to be an alt text behind it that tells you what the image is.” 30.46 “When you fix issues for those who have a disability, you're fixing issues for all.” 38.11 “There are trillions of dollars in the hands of those with disability and their families across the planet.” 42.24 “Passion is vital for mastering tech growth.” 57.40 “Ask - How can I build automation one time?” ABOUT THE GUEST https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-nicastro-2862061 EPISODE RESOURCES WCAG Guidelines - https://www.w3.org/WAI/standards-guidelines/#guidelines European Accessibility Act 2025 - https://www.deque.com/blog/european-accessibility-act-eaa-intro Tools Screen readers Mobile (Native) IOS Voiceover Android Talkback Desktop JAWS https://support.freedomscientific.com/Downloads/JAWS NVDA https://www.nvaccess.org/download Colour Contrast Analyzer https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker Digital Accessibility checker https://chromewebstore.google.com/detail/axe-devtools-web-accessib/lhdoppojpmngadmnindnejefpokejbdd?pli=1 ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E46
Dec 11, 2024
1:11:04

How To Build Your Brand and Take Command of Your Online Reputation with Jason Barnard

In this episode, Mike speaks to Jason Barnard, CEO of Kalicube. Using cutting-edge Brand SEO, he shapes brands on Google to reflect a growth-driven vision. Jason unpacks strategies for controlling your brand story in Google and all of the AI engines so you can take full control of your online reputation, be easily found by potential customers and convert them into clients. KEY TAKEAWAYS When it comes to tech growth your brand is the most influential factor. Your personal brand is just as important as your business brand. The way both Google and AI platforms represent you is critical. Your content needs to be packaged in a way that the machines can understand, so they can find you and showcase what you offer. Your website is the touchpoint AI and Google trusts and uses to verify who you are and what you offer. In their eyes, that website is the foundation stone. What you publish on 3rd party websites and how you reference and connect that content on your personal website makes a huge difference in getting found in the SERPS and AI searches. If you do not take control of your brand, it will be incredibly easy for a malicious actor to take control. How you structure your About page and align 3rd party sources with it is important. Focus on the sites and URLs the machines think are important. The Knowledge Graph will help you to do that. How you manage any career pivots matters. Publish in the places your potential customers are looking. Being found online is just the first step. People will research you, so everything said about you or by you, matters. Reputation issues can be fixed, but it takes time. Track what is said about your brand online and quickly deal with problems, including errors in video transcripts. Focus on your website. Get the structure right so the bots can understand it. BEST MOMENTS 2.07 "The brand is going to drive your business growth." 12.32 “The secret to (brand) control is making sure that you have one source of truth about you that you control.” 22.56 “Take control today, by cleaning up and optimising your digital footprint.” 33.01 “Our data from the Kalicube Pro database with 2 billion data points tells you the walk that you need to walk to be the most effective representative within your industry.” 43.48 “Be visible across the entire research environment for the topics we specialize in.” 48.42 “Anybody and any company can and should have a knowledge panel.” 50.31 “Generative AI, ChatGPT, Gemini, Bing and Copilot have created new demand.” 1.00.59 “If the algorithm decides that something is true, it will be true, and if it decides that it's true, you have to figure out why it thinks that's true and correct the source of information.” 1.08.26 “Video is increasingly important.” GUEST RESOURCES https://kalicube.com/solutions/free-downloadable-guides ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E45
Dec 4, 2024
1:13:58

Customer Journey Optimization Through Understanding Customer Intent With Alex Levin

Mike speaks to Alex Levin co-founder and CEO of regal.io a leader in customer journey optimization through understanding customer intent, Alex has guided companies to go beyond reactive strategies and meet customers exactly when they are ready to engage. He shares how anticipating and responding to customer intent can unlock untapped growth. They cover capturing and analysing customer data, including doing it in real time and incorporating contact centre interactions. As well as the current role AI agents are playing and how they are likely to develop. KEY TAKEAWAYS The rate at which one customer turns into more customers or $1 can turn into more $s is the factor that leads growth. Your customer needs and motivators change. You have to constantly analyse and update the way you approach them. Obtaining customer data is vital. Without it, you can´t keep your understanding of them up to date. Go beyond gathering customer data online. What they click on only tells you so much. Contact centre interactions are where you find the gold nuggets of customer understanding. Brands that invest in contact centres and reach out to customers at the right times with suggestions or help in a similar way they do with sales and marketing are seeing huge ROIs. Customers like you getting to know them and the fact you offer them truly personalised sales and support. Certain data patterns are strong indicators of intent. Figure out what they are for your business. Customers want contact, but only if it is relevant to them. Tailor your emails, calls etc. Analysing customer data is initially costly, so wait until your turnover is big enough or the spend per customer is high enough. Invest in building a real-time data pipeline to gain fresh insights fast. Now is the time to shift to using AI agents in your contact centres. They can absorb a lot more information than a human and hone in better on what the customer needs. BEST MOMENTS 04:31 "Whatever works today is probably not going to work tomorrow, so constant reinvention is necessary." 09:35 "That old low-touch model in customer service does not work." 16:04 "I'm not in favour of buying customer data .. but there are cases where there are reasons to do it." 21:35 "As a business understand what behaviour patterns you consider high intent with your customers." 35:10 "No matter who you are, we can ingest the data." 42:41 "The big thing now is, the shift to AI agents in the contact centre." 46:38 "Soon they're going to say, I'm so pissed off that x airline sent me to a human instead of an AI agent, because the agent would have gotten to my issue faster. It's gonna flip." ABOUT THE GUEST https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexlevin1 https://www.regal.ai Email: hello@regal.ai EPISODE RESOURCES https://www.snowflake.com https://www.usehatchapp.com ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E44
Nov 27, 2024
53:18

Why 1000s of Startups Fail and How to Make Sure Yours Doesn´t with Nick McEvily

For this episode, Mike´s guest is Nick McEvily a product leader and a startup advisor who has raised over $40 million for tech ventures. They discuss why so many startups fail and how to stop that from happening. Including why so many startups inadvertently end up building a product that their customers don´t want. Nick shares the validation methods, human-centred design, rapid product testing, de-risking and pre-sale strategies the startups he works with use to ensure that they build exactly what people need and sell it in huge numbers. KEY TAKEAWAYS Even good products fail if they are not a good market fit and are not tested early enough. There is no replacement for knowing your customer. That means truly listening and never assuming you know what they want. Invest in your research, interview your target customers and be prepared to reward them for their time. Nick explains how to find them and capture what you need to know. Pay close attention to the language potential customers use to describe your product and mirror it. If you can´t find people to interview about the product you are planning, you have to ask if there is really a market for your idea. Initially, use LinkedIn for outreach and to start to get your outbound marketing language right. You need to use pre-sales, but the people who buy then may not be fully representative of your main customer type. The validation process should be kept going indefinitely so you continue to gain insights into what your customers truly want. Understand your risk profile. If it is too high your product may not be viable. Nick explains how to check for this. Mastering tech is a lifetime task. BEST MOMENTS 00:20 "The brutal reality is that most products aren't failing because they are bad. They are failing because they weren't tested early enough" 8:38 “As a designer and a founder myself, I'll never outsource talking to my customers." 13:08 “The first litmus test for a founder is finding their product market fit." 15.35 “How will you sell it if you cannot find people to talk about what you're planning to sell?” 19:00 "Ultimately, to move this thing forward, you need compartmentalised skill sets …. departments that all have their own specialities." 33:53 "You need Google Search Console and Google Analytics plugged into your site map, your landing page." 41.51 "The market product fit analysis is never finished." 47:20 "The risk profile is too high if it takes a long time to find the talent you need." 57:35 "You got like, 10s of millions impressions on the game when it went live with your go-to-market campaign, and then you got hundreds of 1000s in the first week or so." ABOUT THE GUEST https://www.nickmcevily.com https://www.linkedin.com/in/nickmcevily ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E43
Nov 20, 2024
59:51

Scaling Tech Operations Without Compromising Growth with Andrew Parsons

In this episode of Mastering Tech Growth, Mike looks at the challenge of scaling tech operations without compromising growth. To do this he is joined by Andrew Parsons, an industry veteran who, for decades, has been transforming operations for Vive Bank, HSBC, MasterCard, Admiral Group and more. Andrew shares his insights on achieving operational excellence without slowing the pace at which a startup grows and evolves. A critical but often overlooked factor of tech scaling. Whether you're in a fast-growing startup or managing an established venture, this episode offers actionable strategies to help your operations grow. KEY TAKEAWAYS Be aware of the risks, but still be bold enough to innovate and break the mould. Use Jeff Besos´s decision-making process to make sure you don´t become so risk-averse that progress freezes. Set clear goals, clearly define your roles and set clear accountabilities. Fail fast, move forward, and spend your money wisely. Leverage frameworks, to improve operational consistency. This is especially important when you grow through mergers. Effective change management is the key when scaling. Set clear goals, take a structured approach to communicating them effectively and monitor the impact of the change. Communicate clearly in a calm, measured and consistent way, especially during mergers. Be an active listener – read between the lines. When things go wrong, calmly evaluate why and logically assess the problem layer by layer. Put automation at the core. Everyone should be driving it. Think carefully before automating decision-making. At the growth stage you will need to quickly hire the talent you need. Prepare for this, in advance. From an early stage encourage testing failure modes, to build resilience. Turn each crisis into a learning opportunity. BEST MOMENTS 04:04 "Risk management is the daily day buzzword. You're always trying to do something to make sure, it is the right thing for now." 16:03 “Clear goals, clear roles, clear accountabilities. If those are all correct, the people with those accountabilities will be the first to say, I need another person." 21:52 "You can never really communicate enough." 32:32 "Find a way of asking your questions that's not going to negatively charge the conversation and take things in the wrong direction." 47:05 "Gen AI will, and should, be used to augment and make life better for everyone." 01:11.14 “Make sure you've got a risk management framework that you can log these things into." EPISODE RESOURCES https://www.linkedin.com/in/andrew-parsons-49b6135 Jeff Besos decision making - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxsdOQa_QkM ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E42
Nov 13, 2024
1:15:54

Sourcing the Right Partners to Scale Your Tech Business with Jinesh Patel

Mike speaks to Jinesh Patel, co-founder and CEO of Uptime Health, to discuss the importance of strategic partnerships in scaling a tech business. Jinesh used 15+ strategic partners to grow from £1 million turnover in 2023 to £10 million in 2024. He explains how they found the right partners and built effective relationships with them to sell an innovative product that those involved in the dental industry had never heard of or thought about using before. He explains how to put together deals that are so good for the partners that they will not be able to resist working alongside you. KEY TAKEAWAYS ● With so many ways to promote your business, it is easy to choose the wrong ones and waste money. Jinesh talks about how to avoid this pitfall. ● Use partners who have a rolodex of the type of people who need your product so you are targeting a pre-filtered list of prospects. ● Take a highly structured approach to partnerships. Include regular milestones and incentives. ● Create a clear go to market strategy. ● Look for partners who are likely to sell your products alongside theirs e.g. anyone who sells medical equipment is also likely to sell medical software. ● Take the time to educate your partners. ● Vet your partners as you would investors. ● Reaching out to partners automatically improves brand awareness. ● Attend conferences as attendees and approach people in the booths who could be good partners for you. ● Tailor the incentives to appeal to each partner. Look for synergies and ways to help them to grow their business too. Examples are shared in the podcast. ● As you grow, partnerships need to evolve. ● You need different types of partners. Often, once a few have jumped aboard others will follow. ● If you are just getting started, target smaller partners. Jinesh explains why. ● Craft the contract to ensure that you have a way to contact the end customer. BEST MOMENTS 00:13:08 - "We educate the partners. They educate the clients, and they’re only bringing us opportunities that make sense.” 00:33:13 - “Qualifying your partners is just like when you want to raise capital from an investment group. You want to make sure you’re taking in good money, and it has good reputation.” 00:47:50 - "We still do direct [sales], because at the end of the day, not everyone wants to buy from a partner.” 01:06:39 - “The best way to hedge is to have more than one partnership of that size, so you’re not putting all your eggs in one basket.” 01:18:18 - "Closing a partnership has this huge element of pitching the product, talking about it, and...getting feedback." 01:19:07- “We’re always pushing out articles, podcasts just to educate and inform the community. That's been our go-to-market strategy.” ABOUT THE GUEST https://www.linkedin.com/in/jineshjpatel https://www.uptimehealth.com ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E41
Nov 6, 2024
1:19:17

Digital Identity and Fraud Prevention with Gautam Hazari

For this episode, Mike speaks to Gautam Hazari an influential TED speaker and the visionary CTO of sekura.id. He is at the forefront of developing innovative security solutions that tackle the complex challenges of identity management and fraud prevention. They start by looking at the impact fraud is having on businesses and why the situation is about to get a lot worse. Before discussing what you and the tech industry can do to mitigate fraud. Including being ready for when the fraudsters start using AI bots to work on an even larger scale than they are doing now. KEY TAKEAWAYS Deepfakes are already being used in real-time using voice and video. Fraudsters are now training AI bots to carry out their fraud for them so they are not reliant on how fast their staff can work. When a business is a victim of fraud, the trust clients and investors have in them is undermined which can trigger them to look to your competitors. Fraudsters use our chemistry against us. They turn on and appeal to the emotional side of our brains. They try to scare you or appeal to greed. Time is your friend. Pausing and counting backwards from 30 before taking action engages your logical brain and helps you to spot fraud more often. Passwords no longer work. It is too easy for fraudsters to steal those details from companies. Even password credential managers. Between 80 to 86% of data breaches are related to credential (identity) failure. That is why sekura id is focused on providing better ways to confirm someone´s ID. Cryptographic authentication tied to their SIM gives everyone, including those in poorer countries, a far higher level of security. There does not need to be a privacy issue, mobile providers are already heavily regulated. BEST MOMENTS 02:59 “ 6% of global GDP is impacted due to fraud." 08:41 "When they (fraudster employees) are replaced by these AI chatbots, there is no scaling problem… and that's scary." 33:56 "The internet doesn't have an identity layer." 50:36 "These startups are getting targeted more now because they are easy targets if they want to do everything themselves." 53:22 "Passwords are a problem." 57:11 "The SIM is nothing more than a cryptographic engine…It's a hardware-based cryptographic engine." 1.03.05 “Every single phone on earth has a SIM providing or doing that cryptographic protection right now. Why don't we use that?” 1.1.52 “It's not going to be a man-in-the-middle attack, it will be AI-in-the-middle attacks.” EPISODE RESOURCES https://sekura.id https://www.linkedin.com/company/sekura-id https://www.ted.com/talks/gautam_hazari_digital_me_why_we_need_a_world_without_passwords https://www.forbes.com/councils/forbestechcouncil/people/gautamhazari https://www.verizon.com/business/resources/reports/dbir https://www.netflix.com/es-en/title/81183491 ABOUT THE HOST Meet Mike, a seasoned tech entrepreneur and visionary with over two and a half decades of invaluable experience in founding and scaling successful tech start-ups. Mike brings a wealth of firsthand knowledge, and a deep understanding of the challenges faced by entrepreneurs and tech professionals. As a host, Mike is dedicated to sharing actionable insights, strategies, and stories gathered from conversations with industry leaders, innovators, and experts. With a remarkable ability to distil practical wisdom from guests, Mike curates engaging discussions that resonate with both aspiring entrepreneurs and seasoned professionals.
E40
Oct 30, 2024
1:20:06
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