Secret Leaders

Most investors didn’t understand the concept. Most non-technical entrepreneurs at the time didn’t get it either. But Howie Liu, Co-Founder and CEO of multi-billion dollar tech juggernaut Airtable, had the conviction to bet the next 10 years of his life on it. “I didn't come up with Airtable as an idea, on a lark, it was informed by a lot of the research I did, a lot of the observations I had of the enterprise software landscape, of looking back at other companies that did similar things. I then came to this gut decision that this was a big opportunity.” Airtable is a low-code relational database, a highly versatile platform that’s grown massively since its founding almost 10 years ago. In the interim, Howie has learnt how to articulate a unique product to a huge customer base, and grow it from the ground up to become a category defining piece of software.  But how did a home-brew startup become a Silicon Valley darling? Howie shares his story from lifeguarding, ghosting Accenture on the first day of his new j

What would you do if you sold your business and effectively retired at the ripe, old age of 28? Phenomenally successful serial entrepreneur Norman Crowley took just three weeks before jumping back into business.  “A business isn't just a vehicle to make money. A vehicle is an expression of your creativity, it's working with friends. And then the thing nobody warns you about is that when it's sold, you just end up with a bank balance, and the friends are gone, the mission has gone.” Norman has founded multiple businesses in welding, gaming and eco-friendly energy. Each time he’s turned them into multi-million pound ventures, before selling them and moving on to the next big thing.  Norman has had his fair share of bruises - including having a dream billion dollar deal slip right through his fingers at the last minute.  “An Icelandic hedge fund, who already owned 25% of the business, offered to buy the whole thing for $1 billion. And when somebody offers to buy your business for $1 billion, it's impolite to say

Mathilde Collin is the co-founder and CEO of Front, a communications platform that has developed a cult following - despite having to stop working at one point because her anxiety had become so debilitating. Find out how Mathilde learned to overcome burnout, an incapacitated co-founder, and a serious case of competitiveness that almost let work take over her whole life.  Front has grown quickly since its founding in 2013, amassing a cult following, and recently announced a huge series C round with some investors including Eric Yuan - the founder of Zoom.  In this candid conversation, Mathilde shares why she was so unhappy as an intern before starting Front, meeting her co-founder, her Y Combinator experience, meeting Patrick Collison - CEO of Stripe, why dealing with anxiety has been so challenging, and why she considers discipline and transparency to be important skills for happiness and success.  “For me, what matters is when I'm not working, I want to make sure that I'm not working. I think the biggest thi

Tarilian Laser Technologies (TLT) was a medtech company founded by husband and wife team, Dr Sandeep and Nita Shah, who bamboozled everyone from the UK government to PWC. They claimed to have a revolutionary wearable blood pressure monitor, powered by a secret, proprietary algorithm. They raised millions, before everything came crashing down.  This is an audio exclusive with the journalist who just broke the story in The Sunday Times, Sara McCorquodale, founder and CEO of CORQ. When Sara, a former journalist, first heard what TLT had done, she knew it was a story she had to report on and has spent the last year investigating. “It was just six lines of JavaScript”, said Sara, of the secret algorithm. “It was a GCSE level sum, it wasn't an algorithm, it was barely an equation. And that sum had a £52 million valuation.” “Sandeep and Nita Shah, they were very credible characters… Usually you don't Google the person who owns the [scam] company and find search results which include them winning awards, and being en

“Impact X exists because I'm tired. And there are a lot of people who are tired of asking the question - what to do to improve the lives of black Britain? We've been having this conversation for a long, long time.” Meet Eric Collins. He’s done some work for President Obama, built some of the world’s biggest tech companies, is the host of a new TV show on Channel 4 called ‘The Money Maker’, and is the CEO of Impact X, a venture capital fund in the UK for underrepresented founders.  How did Eric find himself here? “I got a network of extraordinary people. When I say these people are extraordinary people I'm talking about when I was an undergraduate, there was a woman named Michelle Robinson, who was a student in my brother's class, you will know her as Michelle Obama.” Eric shares his incredible story from building a network at university with the selective eating club, Cottage Club, to the global tech behemoths he helped build, to the mistakes and reflections he gained from his time at SwiftKey, to hosting ‘Th

Today’s guest is at the helm of probably the biggest company we’ve ever had on Secret Leaders. Jeff Lawson is the Co-Founder and CEO of Twilio, a cloud communication platform that helps businesses use everything from text to video calls in their sites and apps. Since its founding in 2008, Twilio has grown to 4,500 employees, annual revenue of $1.74 billion, and is valued at $65 billion. Yup, $65 billion. Woof. All this despite investors not being interested at the beginning which forced Jeff and his team to make a decision. “When choosing between listening to investors and customers, we're gonna choose customers. And we're gonna let customers guide our actions. And if that works, then investors will follow suit. And sure enough, they did.” But how did Jeff actually do it? How do you build a company like Twilio?  We chat about: Learning how to start companies  How big companies work How to reinvent yourself if you want to stay CEO  How to have difficult conversations IPOing on the day of the Brexit vote

Before he was the manager for Nas and Gwen Stefani, before he was the producer for the film 8 Mile, before he was getting into fights with P Diddy and 50 Cent, Steve Stoute was an entrepreneur. He’s always been an entrepreneur - starting out shovelling snow and selling mortgages. And boy has he got some stories to tell, like what Roger Moore said to him when 007 met Steve and Bono in a bar in Monaco. Find out how Steve is turning the music industry on its head as the founder of United Masters, having recently raised $50 million from an all star trio: Apple, Google and Andreessen Horowitz.  “As an entrepreneur, your job is to have an idea, build out the vision so that it's clear, and that people can buy into it. Employees, outside partners, strategic partners, bankers, whatever it may be, you have to get people aligned around your vision.” Steve shares his journey, from growing up in Queens, New York, around the birth of hip hop, to investing in music producers, and creating and producing albums for Gwen Stefa

“I came across a job advert for a psychologist to join a matchmaking agency. I wouldn't describe myself as a spiritual person, but it just felt like my dad had sent [me] this opportunity. I had butterflies in my stomach. That was the moment that changed my life.” Are you unlucky in love? Or perhaps you’re exploring a very niche entrepreneurial path, then don’t miss Rachel Vida MacLynn, the founder of The Vida Consultancy, widely considered the best elite matchmaking agency in the world, on this week’s Secret Leaders.  “One of our biggest challenges is we don't get to keep our clients for a lifetime. We have to keep finding new clients because most of our clients only stay with us for 12 months, and they're expensive to acquire.” It's a fascinating niche - they're a matchmaking service for high net worth individuals, entrepreneurs and business people looking for long term relationships.  “I've pulled more and more psychology into the service, because it's become more apparent to me that a lot of clients think

Want to know what it’s like to negotiate for a person’s life? Want to learn the secrets of great negotiation? Want to find out why a deal can break down with no warning? “The deal-killers are as important as the decision maker”, explains Chris Voss. “We've changed our hostage negotiation strategies to take the people not at the table into account. And we found the exact same dynamic in business.” If you feel like your negotiation skills need sharpening, you’ll like this episode with Chris Voss, former chief international hostage and kidnapping negotiator for the FBI and author of the best-seller, Never Split the Difference. He’s got some pretty crazy stories too. Now the Founder and CEO of The Black Swan Group, Chris has carved out a career as the world’s number one negotiation coach, taking what he learned during his years at the FBI and applying those techniques to the business world.  “Listening is not waiting for your turn to talk. It's an evolved skill. There isn't any negotiation book out there that doe

“We were 100% sure about one thing: if you go to the fucking moon, you shouldn't go to the supermarket. We have the technology to go to space and we’re still going to the supermarket? This is counter intuitive.” Kağan Sümer is the founder and CEO of Gorillas, a grocery delivery service which promises to have your order delivered to your door in under 10 minutes, at retail prices. They’ve been blowing up. Recently launched in the UK, they’re the quickest ever European startup to be valued at over $1 billion and they’re only just getting started.  “Gorillas is about four things: being authentic, taking bold decisions, keeping riding, and constantly changing things and owning the change.” Kağan (pronounced Kaan, not Kağan) is celebrating Gorillas becoming the fastest ever European startup to reach a billion dollar valuation, and is now fighting hard to introduce the venture to the UK and US. If you haven’t heard of Gorillas, you can bet your bottom dollar they’re about to be everywhere.  “You can outsmart me. Yo

Most of the founders we speak to have already achieved much of their startup’s mission, but today’s Secret Leader is in the midst of a much longer journey with his company. Meet Matteo Berlucchi, a serial entrepreneur and the founder of Healthily which has spent several years building their product to a point where they can play for the ‘big prize’.  “Healthily is a moonshot, it’s the textbook definition of a moonshot. The idea behind Healthily is to use technology to enable people to manage their health in a better way... To become the Spotify or Netflix of healthcare.” Launched in 2015, the app formerly known as Your.MD, now Healthily, is the first medically approved self-care app in the world, and is aiming for a user base of over a billion people.  “To me, success is not making money, it has never been my definition of success. To me, success is building something that has impact.”  From his first days founding startups, to helping create Healthily and turn it into a profitable startup; investment, failur

“I was a keen gym goer and I used to buy protein powder from what was the leading sports nutrition company in the UK at the time. And about six months in I looked at the back and thought, ‘what actually is this?’” Oliver Cookson founded the sports nutrition business Myprotein in 2004 with just a £500 overdraft, selling it to The Hut Group seven years later having kept 100% equity. The deal ended up being worth north of £350m for him. So how did he pull it off? “I don't live with regrets because some people said to me, ‘should you have held onto Myprotein longer?’ If I did, I’d be a billionaire now. There's no doubt about it. It is always growing. However, you can only make a decision at that moment, where you are now.” Oliver has written a book about his experience - Bootstrap Your Life - and hosts a podcast of the same name (links below).  “If you want to create a leading brand, a national leading brand, or an international brand, there's no work life balance, especially if you’re bootstrapping. It’s impossi

How did two Americans called Jeff come to lead Seedrs, one of the UK’s leading crowdfunding platforms? And why did their planned merger with bitter rivals Crowdcube get blocked?  In today’s ‘Double Jeffardy’ episode, Seedrs Co-Founder Jeff Lynn and CEO Jeff Kelisky share their experiences and learnings - from the biggest missed opportunities when scaling, to what the CMA got wrong with the merger. “The CMA has chosen to take an exceedingly aggressive stance on anything that looks like a tech merger. I think they feel very burned by having approved Facebook and Instagram, where they didn't understand or see the platform power that would emerge.” In this episode you’ll learn about: The biggest mistakes Seedrs made in the early days Seedrs vs Crowdcube When Jeff realised he needed to hire a CEO How to integrate a new CEO into a founder-led company The failed merger How to get motivated to compete again after a merger like that collapses -- Sponsors Vorboss - get better internet: https://vorboss.com/secret

Founders dream of being early to market, garnering flattering press, watching their product fly off the shelves and IPOing in record time. For Kuba Wieczorek, Co-Founder and former Chief Marketing Officer of Eve Sleep, the dream became a reality. And then the wheels came off. Kuba founded DTC mattress company Eve Sleep in 2015 with his cousin Jas, and they quickly started experiencing explosive growth. Within just two years they’d raised £35 million and were valued at £140 million. To top it off, they IPOd in record breaking time. It was the stuff of fairytales. But the fairytale wasn’t to last.  “About six months after Jas left I hit rock bottom as well. You know, really rock bottom, I realised that it was either my health and my family, or staying at Eve, so I made the right choice. I resigned.” In today’s episode, Kuba shares his journey with Eve, the effect it had on him and his mental health, and what he will do differently in the future.  “I’ll be stronger with myself and not be seduced by crazy growth

Markus Villig was 19 when he decided to spend the $5,000 his parents had saved up for university on starting a business instead. His initial goal for Bolt, then called Taxify, was to solve Tallinn’s (Estonia) taxi problem. By 25 he was the youngest unicorn founder in Europe and had shown that Uber wasn’t going to win everywhere. “Today, Bolt is the fastest growing mobility company in the world. We have more than 50 million customers on the platform. We operate in more than 40 countries. And we’ve raised more than $600 million of funding with a team of about 2000 people.” Markus knew from an early age he wanted to start a company and build a product.  “The only things that were really, really clear for me were that it needed to be in technology, I really wanted it to be a consumer product. And it needed in some ways to make the world a better place. But other than that, I was pretty agnostic of which space to get into.” He chose transportation, not only because he can’t drive, but because hundreds of billions

You might not have heard of today’s guest or his company, but if you’ve had a Covid jab in the UK (or are going to) there’s a good chance you’ve used their tech.  Laurence Bargery is co-founder of accuRx, a healthtech supplier trusted by 99% of GPs, and with ⅓ of all vaccine bookings in the UK now taking place through their systems. “Within about four or six weeks of us releasing this suite of Covid tools we'd gone up from that 50% point to about 99% of GPs using us.” Laurence and co-founder Jacob Haddad built a tool to allow GPs and other healthcare providers to communicate more effectively with their patients. To date, their software is used by 7,000+ GP surgeries and has messaged 30m+ patients.  But they didn’t start out down this avenue. In fact, they started off looking at antibiotic resistance, but the market wasn't there, so they pivoted.  They knew they wanted to create something that added value to healthcare, but not knowing enough about the industry and its sticking points, they immersed themselves

We’ve been making the UK’s startup podcast since 2017 and this is our 100th episode. To celebrate, we’re doing something a little different and bringing you a bunch of the most powerful stories and insights from some of the amazing guests we’ve had the honour of talking to over the years.  In celebration of this milestone, we’re also giving away a pair of Apple Airpod Pros to a lucky Secret Leaders subscriber/follower. Entering is super simple and takes just a few seconds - go to www.secretleaders.com/competition to win. We’ve divided this episode into three sections. In the first, you’ll hear war stories from the founders of some of the world’s biggest unicorns; in the second we share tales of mental health and adversity; and in the third we bring you big ideas.  “What I want them to learn from me is to find that thing that really makes you happy, and where you're really creative, because that's what will bring you fulfilment in your life.”  From Daniel Schreiber, co-founder of insurance disruptor Lemonade,

As the captain of the Harvard squash team, Will Ahmed trained and prepared as best he could. But, whatever he tried, his body kept breaking down. He didn't know why so he started researching the human body, devouring medical papers. Now, several years later, those personal frustrations have grown into Whoop, a wearable tech startup you can see on the wrists of NFL players, pro golfers and Navy Seals - despite being consistently told his strategy was wrong. “The vision for Whoop has always been the same, which is that we're going to build this wearable platform that's going to help you improve your health. And it's going to start with the best athletes in the world. And then it's going to be on everyone.” So he was proved right. Whoop counted professional athletes LeBron James and Michael Phelps among their first 100 users, and just got valued at $1.2 billion.  “I object to the quote, ‘it's a marathon, not a sprint’, because it's actually both. If you truly are trying to create a company from scratch, and have

Most people recognise Trinny Woodall for being one half of Trinny and Susannah from their breakout TV show: What Not To Wear, but not many people know this side of her story. Trinny is a serial entrepreneur. She was a founder in the dotcom bubble back in the day, and is the founder of soaring makeup startup, Trinny London, which booked £42m of revenue in the last year. What happened? How did she get here? In today’s episode of Secret Leaders, Trinny shares her really surprising entrepreneurial journey that doesn’t get told. “Susannah and I started the idea [their first entrepreneurial venture], it was a very lucky break. And I did that for eight years. And then from that television came and then I started writing books and that whole part of my career, when I look back now, brought me to being the CEO of Trinny London.” It doesn’t matter if you’re a budding founder or a seasoned entrepreneur, this episode with Trinny is not to be missed. From hiring interns with a twinkle in their eye, to having to sell her c

How big can a flower company really be? Well, the industry processes over a billion transactions every year and Bloom & Wild is leading the charge to become the dominant player. In today’s show we talk to Co-Founder and CEO Aron Gelbard about how it all nearly failed before it had even begun, and how much of that market they can really take. “We're doing a few million of those. So we've made meaningful headway. But there's a huge way to go around the world.” That’s not bad for a company that set up shop in 2013 and quickly became best known for making it possible to send flowers in under a minute on a smartphone, and for those flowers to be delivered through your letterbox.  “We got 1,000 orders in the week of [our first] Mother's Day. And I remember this because I had to process them all individually in the spreadsheet, and it took me all day to do whereas normally the order processing took an hour.” From their first piece of accidental marketing by the Daily Mail (after being told to move on by Wholefoods o