Can you tell us a little bit about your life and the key moments that brought you to where you are today? I was born in Kenya and grew up in England where my school years, at an English public school noted for grooming top rugby players, cricketers and rowers were particularly formative for the person I have become today. Learning to play rugby in mid-winter showed me that my lighter frame gave me speed on the pitch that was complementary to the strength of the giants around me; those brutal afternoons on the battlepitch nurtured a brave, fighting spirit together with total respect for the power of teamwork. In the classroom, I loved both the sciences and the arts but chose to pursue a degree in Engineering; this gave me a discipline that has become part of my personal DNA as I firmly believe that the finest products combine beautiful design with precision engineering at their core. Following graduation, I worked as an embedded systems engineer on radar systems for fighter aircraft and realised within a few years that my calling was not to be in corporate life as I found the bureaucratic environment to be stifling. Still, in my twenties, I decided to embark on an entrepreneurial journey as a founder of a startup that was focused on providing technology products, management consultancy and executive search into the London and New York financial markets. My first business venture was the equivalent of a practical MBA (disclaimer: although I was a part of the London Business School Enterprise 100, I do not have an MBA) and I adored every single minute of the experience. Having spent three decades building brave ventures, my greatest learning is that creating early-stage companies is like a team sport, requiring a fundamental understanding of people and their behaviours; my recipe for success is based upon building highperformance, high-stamina teams that can lead, inspire and forge longstanding relationships. My greatest inspirer was my beloved late father who instilled in me a passion for cars, music, tailored clothes, collecting memorabilia and of course, business. The mantra that best defines my life is ‘Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication’. What have you learned from the Cryptocurrency and Blockchain industries? I first realised that blockchain technology would become relevant for the future of the internet in 2014. In 2015 I started a venture builder which launched several deep tech ventures. This included Zilliqa, the high throughput, low-cost layer 1 blockchain. I have learned that the blockchain-based world, and my vision for it, is still in the nascent stage akin to the internet in 1993. In these early stages, it has felt like a solution seeking a problem with too many pilot projects now lying in the graveyard. Projects have raised capital through token launches but have delivered little product and have survived through speculation on their tokens and hype-driven marketing. On the positive side of this innovation, I believe that token launches offer metaverse special 14
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