Follow The Leader

It’s now late 2019, over one year since Taymur made his final decision. Follow The Leader host Jeremy Greenberg catches up with Taymur to find out what he has learned from his journey and how things are going at ActNano. If you enjoyed Follow The Leader, please leave us a review, tell your friends, and support our sponsors – Catalant and Entrepreneur magazine. Follow The Leader is produced by Avenue Group. Learn more at AveGroup.com.

With under a week to go, Taymur must stop the bleeding from a lost customer while finalizing his decision of what country to enter next. He feels his plan is falling apart and is uncertain about the expansion. Out of nowhere, a knight in shining armor emerges and offers to help ActNano. With only days left to make the big decision, Taymur and Jim make a surprise trip to a new country, which had not been on their radar earlier. Taymur captures his innermost thoughts in real-time by recording them in an audio diary. Hear his raw and unfiltered thoughts about what is happening – as it happens – for a real-time experience of what it is like to run a company. If you enjoy Follow The Leader, please subscribe and leave us a review. We would greatly appreciate it.

Taymur lands a major customer for ActNano, giving him more confidence about his prospects in Asia. However, he now has just two weeks left to meet his deadline for selecting a new country for ActNano to enter. He visits the last country on his shortlist: Korea. Taymur is excited since Korea is home to large consumer electronics companies, such as Samsung and LG, as well as auto companies, such as Hyundai and Kia. Taymur meets with a potential local wholesaling partner with many solid connections, yet he must overcome language barriers to determine if the company will be a good fit. He receives distressing news concerning his new customer, casting doubt on the entire expansion plan. Taymur captures his innermost thoughts in real-time by recording them in an audio diary. Hear his raw and unfiltered thoughts about what is happening – as it happens – for a real-time experience of what it is like to run a company. If you enjoy Follow The Leader, please subscribe and leave us a review. We would greatly appreciate it.

With four weeks left to meet his deadline, Taymur continues his trip around the globe in search of the next country that would be hospitable for ActNano. He’s now heading to Japan, home of potential blockbuster customers, including Panasonic, Sony, and Toyota. Taymur brings ActNano’s COO Jim Sheridan with him on his trip to Japan. Taymur and Jim have a week packed with meetings, but they must manage the challenging cultural formalities of doing business in Japan. Taymur captures his innermost thoughts in real-time by recording them in an audio diary. Hear his raw and unfiltered thoughts about what is happening – as it happens – for a real-time experience of what it is like to run a company. If you enjoy Follow The Leader, please subscribe and leave us a review. We would greatly appreciate it.

In 2012, Taymur Ahmad, founder, and CEO of ActNano invented a waterproofing technology that, in all likelihood, you have in the smartphone in your hand, the laptop on your desk, and the car in your driveway. Things were going well for years, as Taymur built a who’s who list of U.S.-based customers for his innovative waterproofing technology used by Tesla, Google, and Ford among others. However, now it's 2018, and ActNano is not growing fast enough to satisfy Taymur’s Silicon Valley investors. The only way to ensure significant growth is for Taymur to expand the company into new markets outside the U.S. Taymur has committed to an aggressive timeline of six weeks to select the next country for ActNano to enter. If Taymur misses the deadline or makes a poor decision, ActNano could lose funding and collapse. He embarks on his trip around the globe in search of a country that, with large potential customers, would immediately yield significant revenues. The first country on his list is Germany, home to some of the biggest automakers in the world, such as BMW, Mercedes, and Volkswagen. Taymur develops new tactics to attract potential customers and try to lock in German auto customers. Taymur captures his innermost thoughts in real-time by recording them in an audio diary. Hear his raw and unfiltered thoughts about what is happening – as it happens – for a real-time experience of what it is like to run a company. If you enjoy Follow The Leader, please subscribe and leave us a review. We would greatly appreciate it.

Tons of business podcasts interview CEOs who share the ups and downs of their company’s history. This is your chance to hear these stories, not with years of hindsight, but in the moment. Follow The Leader is a new podcast series that puts you inside the mind of CEOs as they guide their businesses through pivotal moments. Hear business leaders’ raw and unfiltered thoughts about what is happening – as it happens. Join host Jeremy Greenberg, CEO of two companies and Entrepreneur in Residence at the Wharton School, for a real-time experience of what it’s really like to run a company.