Scouting for Growth

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Dawn Herndon, a visionary leader at the forefront of artificial intelligence innovation. With a profound passion for technology and its transformative impact on society, Dawn is spearheading IBM's efforts in embeddable AI and the groundbreaking watsonx platform.  Her work is revolutionizing how organizations across industries integrate AI into their products and services, enabling real-time data processing, decision-making, and automation directly within applications and devices. Dawn will share her insights on the challenges and opportunities organizations face when integrating AI, the importance of trustworthy and responsible AI, and her vision for the future trends in our rapidly evolving landscape. KEY TAKEAWAYS I have the best job in the company, every day I get to talk about emerging technologies and right now it’s all about AI. Pert of what makes this an exciting topic is that it’s a bit unknown to people, and organisations and companies are trying to figure out what to do with AI.  What excites me most about AI technology is the innovations that comes from companies take advantage of these technologies and the ability they have to leverage it to drive real and tangible outcomes for their business. These can be enhanced productivity, attracting new clients, getting to new markets, driving their products, services, and solutions into new market categories. My passion lies in helping drive that innovation with the companies that we work with by providing thought leadership or co-creating with them. Embeddable AI has evolved not only so a company can leverage NLP/speak-to-text/text-to-speech technologies in the AI space but has expanded into the production of the “what’s next platform.” IBM’s platform provides not only machine learning technology and advanced analytics but also an overall studio for organisations to incorporate large language models, train them, fine tune them, provide governance around the models, and ways for organisations to take advantage of IBM’s AI technologies to drive productivity, efficiency, and optimisation. You can’t have AI if you don’t have data. If you have large sources of data and you don’t know where it came from then you have risk and exposure. IBM believes that data should be trusted, that you should know the data and, if you’re working with our AI technology, that you own the data, we don’t use your data, you use it to accomplish the outcome you’re driving in your business. More than that, we have a keen focus on governance, risk management and compliance – AI ethics. BEST MOMENTS ‘What is your company trying to solve and how can we work together to leverage technology that helps you solve that initiative and helps you drive that outcome you’re trying to achieve?’ ‘We want to make sure it’s tangible for an organisation and we do that by using an AI assistant, which doesn’t just provide a conversational AI-based interface but integrations to back-end systems.’ ‘Once a person joins an organisation and becomes an employee, watsonx orchestrate provides that ability for a manager to take action on anything to do with employee relations, like processing a salary increase.’ ‘Productivity is an ambiguous word that can be applied to so many different situations within companies, AI can improve that productivity across your enterprise.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Dawn Herndon is an experienced global business leader with over 25 years at IBM, showcasing expertise across various functional areas, general management, and building strategic partnerships. Currently serving as the IBM Vice President of EMEA Build Ecosystem and AI Partnerships, Dawn is at the forefront of the evolution of AI, focusing on embedding AI and watsonx. She spearheads the development of strategic partnerships that drive innovation and deliver value for organizations across industries and market segments. LinkedIn IBM PartnerPlus IBM Watsonx IBM Embeddable AI IBM Podcast ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Ola Jacob, Business Development Director for the UK & Ireland at Descartes Underwriting, a specialist Parametric Insurance MGA and Insurer. On today's episode, Ola will provide an educational deep dive into the world of parametric insurance. He'll explain what parametric insurance is, how it differs from traditional insurance, and why it is gaining traction as a data-driven solution to cover risks like natural catastrophes.  Ola will share real-world examples of how parametric insurance has provided significant value to corporate clients and industries adopting this innovative approach as part of their risk management strategies. KEY TAKEAWAYS When I started in insurance I didn’t know much about it, but when you strip it down to its bare bones it’s the idea of making good on your promise. That was a big draw for me because it felt altruistic. When it’s done right, and someone receives their cheque for the claim after it’s all gone smoothly is the best feeling in the world. The stigma we get from the bad experiences is what damages the image of insurance. The best solutions are ones that people don’t know about, and ones that don’t get in the way and make things better. If you’re going to create a solution that helps it should have another login or portal, something clunky that gets in people’s way, it should be cool and slick like a Rolex. Innovation can’t be done on your own, when I won the Insurance Times Technology Champion of the Year Award, it was a reflection of the whole industry and all the people I’ve met on my journey that have been open to change. I don’t think we’ve done it yet, I think there’s so much more change to be had and I’m excited to see how we can push further. The biggest problem in parametric insurance is the name, because it sounds so complicated. But it’s actually the simplest form of insurance there is. The Mantra behind all parametric policies is: When a pre-agreed parameter is met then a pre-agreed pay out is made. This forms the backbone of all parametric contracts. That differs from indemnity because indemnity is a promise to put you back in the same condition you were in before the loss, parametric is pretty much black and white. BEST MOMENTS ‘If you add parametric to indemnity it could really be a game changer that could change the face of how we do insurance forever.’ ‘I’ve always wanted to come in and do something to help change insurance for the better with technology.’ ‘In parametric products, the parameters must be measurable and independent, something that’s not controllable by somebody else, like weather.’ ‘Clients recover, using parametric insurance, with 10X less limit than they’d previously because of the speed of payout. And they’d planned how they would use that payout because they already knew what they were going to get if this event happened.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Ola Jacob is the Business Development Director for the UK & Ireland at Descartes Underwriting, a specialist Parametric Insurance MGA and Insurer covering Natural Catastrophe exposure globally.  With over 12 years of experience in the London Market Insurance Sector, Ola has worked on UK Retail, Product Recall, Terrorism, Onshore Energy and Parametric insurance. Ola's background in Human-Computer Interaction and Psychology has fueled his passion for developing new approaches to risk transfer and managing risk for clients. As one of the pioneers of parametric insurance, Ola helped build a distribution strategy for one of the first successful parametric solutions in the London Market. In 2024, he was named Insurance Times Technology Champion of the Year for his innovative work. LinkedIn ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Barbara Maheshwari, CEO and co-founder of Remote Bob, a game-changing virtual assistance hub that's redefining how entrepreneurs and businesses operate in our increasingly fast-moving digital world. Barbara is not just a successful founder; she's a go-to-market consultant, a sought-after speaker, and a startup scout for ABC Accelerator. With her finger on the pulse of the future of work, Barbara has helped countless businesses navigate the complexities of remote staff augmentation and achieve remarkable growth. Today, we'll be diving deep into Barbara's expertise, exploring the trends shaping the future of work, and uncovering valuable insights for scaleup ventures.   KEY TAKEAWAYS                                                                                                                                         The gig economy is characterised by an increasing preference for flexible, project-based work arrangements. This trend is driven by both workers seeking more autonomy and employers looking for cost-effective, on-demand talent. The gig economy allows individuals to work on multiple projects for different clients, often remotely, which can lead to a more diversified skill set and work experience AI and automation are reshaping job roles by taking over repetitive tasks and enabling new forms of human-AI collaboration. This integration is creating opportunities for workers to engage in more complex and creative tasks, while also necessitating the development of new skills to work alongside AI technologies. The shift is expected to lead to the creation of new job categories and the transformation of existing ones The future of work is being shaped by a variety of trends that emphasise flexibility, technological integration, global collaboration, and well-being. These trends are transforming traditional work models and creating new opportunities and challenges for both employers and employees. Both the gig economy and digital nomadism are experiencing significant growth globally. The gig economy encompasses a vast and diverse workforce, while the digital nomad community is characterised by its flexibility and global mobility. These trends are reshaping the future of work, offering new opportunities and challenges for workers and employers alike.   BEST MOMENTS ‘The global gig economy has seen substantial growth, with the World Bank estimating that there are approximately 435 million gig workers worldwide.’ ‘The number of gig workers has increased dramatically, with a 170% rise between 2019 and 2021. This growth is driven by various factors, including economic pressures such as inflation, which has led 63% of workers to turn to gig work.’ ‘The digital nomad community is also expanding rapidly. Estimates for 2023 indicate that there are around 40 million digital nomads globally.’ ‘Digital nomads are a diverse group, with no single generation, profession, or socio-economic class dominating. While they tend to skew young and male, one-third are female, and 54% are over the age of 38.’   ABOUT THE GUEST Barbara Maheshwari is the CEO and co-founder of Remote Bob, a virtual assistance hub that connects entrepreneurs with skilled virtual assistants. With an MBA from COTRUGLI Business School, Barbara brings a wealth of experience as a business consultant and go-to-market strategist. Her expertise lies in helping business owners solve their most pressing challenges and scale their operations efficiently. As a speaker and startup scout for ABC Accelerator, Barbara is deeply embedded in the entrepreneurial ecosystem, constantly seeking innovative solutions to the evolving landscape of work. LinkedIn ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook TikTok Email Website  

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Sri Ramaswamy, the founder and CEO of Charlee.ai, with a career spanning over 22 years in advanced analytics and artificial intelligence, Sri has emerged as a formidable leader in the insurance technology landscape. But Sri's story goes beyond her professional accomplishments. As a thought leader and mentor in the InsurTech community, she is breaking barriers in our traditionally male-dominated industry, championing diversity, and inspiring the next generation of female entrepreneurs.  Join us as we delve into Sri's remarkable journey, exploring the challenges she faced, the triumphs she achieved, and her unwavering vision for the future of Charlee.ai, and the broader tech landscape. KEY TAKEAWAYS One of the constant things I heard from claims managers was their inability to access a lot of data points within the claim files because a lot of it was in unstructured formats, so making a financial decision wasn’t easy for them. I wanted to create a platform to not only collect exposures easily but also be able to convert them into a common denominator that could be measured, predicted and queried – long before ChatGPT. Claims processes start with a very human experience because somebody has had a loss, and you’re dealing with them in the most sensitive and vulnerable position. When you think about how the process is carried out from receiving the claim until it’s resolved, there are a lot of nuances, such as being empathetic and empirical. That is key to understanding all the problems that can arise, data allows you to ask the right questions so you can get the details. The vision of Charlee is also behind how to get to these exposures and the risk intelligence, and how this leads to avoiding attorneys getting and litigations so a better settlement can be agreed with the claimant. But, it doesn’t stop there, the real vision of Charlee is to be able to connect those data points with actuary, with underwriting, with product marketing, even with your agent. All these people are stakeholders in how exposures are calculated, priced and offered in your product. One of the biggest things we’re seeing is a lack of proper documentation. How you arrive at a financial settlement is based on the facts of laws. If you don’t document your facts of laws or ask the right questions, you’re not going to get those facts of laws based on which you need to make objective decision points – which are very important for you to present in a court during litigation. BEST MOMENTS ‘I owe my career in the technology space to data.’ ‘Claims are the promise of the insurance contract. It’s here you get to know how the exposures you priced at the beginning are performing at the end.’ ‘Some exposures that are beyond your control, like the weather and climate, but the exposures and severity behind that are huge.’ ‘Attorneys being brought into the process are third parties that nobody benefits from.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Sri Ramaswamy: Over 22+ years of experience in advanced analytics and artificial intelligence. Founder and CEO of Charlee.ai, the insurance industry's first NLP-based predictive analytics solution. What makes Charlee unique is our patented, proprietary and pre-trained claim language model. It adds the context to the predictions, provides deep insights-based alerts, reserving patterns, prior trends based prioritised claim lists for enhanced claim workflows.  As a certified associate in risk management, I have a deep understanding of the challenges and opportunities in the P&C insurance sector, and I am passionate about leveraging unstructured data to drive financial outcomes and innovation. I have architected and launched data analytic solutions for underwriting and claims, and patented Charlee.ai's AI, NLP, and ML-based technology that can extract and analyse all sources of data, including documents, files, third-party, and social. Charlee.ai helps insurers lower claim costs, manage reserves efficiently, and improve risk selection, through individual claim insights and aggregate claims analytics dashboard. I am a thought leader and speaker on operational use of unstructured data, and a mentor for the InsurTech community. I also enjoy learning about astronomy, hiking, and yoga. ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Venture Partner of Alchemy Crew, a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world, working with over 30 corporate insurers and accelerating over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Amrit Santhirasenan, Co-founder and CEO of hyperexponential (hx). With a unique blend of actuarial expertise and software engineering, Amrit has spent over a decade in the Lloyd’s of London market, shaping the future of insurance analytics. We'll delve into the world of insurance pricing for complex risk decisions and explore the transformative potential of decision intelligence.  Amrit will share insights on how hx Renew is revolutionising how pricing models are built and deployed, offering an unparalleled user experience. KEY TAKEAWAYS I was one of the few idiots who graduated at the time of the dot com bubble bursting in software engineering and thought it would be a bad time to be a software engineer. I found myself in insurance and I’m a huge maths nerd as well as a technology nerd, so people said I should become an actuary, and I found that I loved it. I love insurance, I’m an insurance nerd, I think insurance is a huge societal pillar; There are no rockets launched, large buildings built, planes taking off without insurance. Without the mechanisms by which we can absorb risk, we can’t take it. When we take risks we reap the rewards of those risks and society moves on. Insurance is a fascinating sector that intersects technology, mathematics and human judgement in a way that’s very unusual. You have people that are tasked with working out how risky something is. By definition, if it’s perfectly predictable, it’s not risky. You analyse risk in lots of different way with tools and techniques and it’s a wonderful place for people who love solving hard problems in a variety of different ways. The essence of ‘decision intelligence’ has been around for a really long time. It’s important to distinguish between decision intelligence as a mindset and a way of solving a problem, and the technology side. The area in which hx has been novel is in crafting a technology solution around obtaining or applying decision intelligence to the problems that you’re solving. BEST MOMENTS ‘I tell everyone who comes to work at hx that they have to love insurance: Come for the fun opportunities, stay for the insurance.’ ‘We’ve crafted the technology to take away the boring database manipulation or building algorithm container and webforms to let our clients focus on the problem they actually care about.’ ‘The past isn’t meaningfully a guide to the future for emerging risks in the same way that it has been for more established risks, like fire.’ ‘In a competitive landscape, the best thing you can do is increase the amount of information to make the decision, that’ how markets become fairer, more effective, and more efficient.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Amrit Santhirasenan is the Co-founder and CEO of hyperexponential (hx), a pioneering analytical technology firm revolutionizing decision-making within the financial sector, particularly in specialty insurance pricing.  With a background as a qualified actuary and computer science graduate, Amrit brings extensive expertise in reserving and capital modelling, specialising in pricing and the integration of modern techniques and technology to create practical, impactful pricing systems.  Amrit remains deeply engaged with the insurance community, addressing the broader challenges of developing superior pricing solutions in an increasingly data-centric and technological landscape. ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Eveline Ruehlin, a true visionary in the realm of fashion technology and emerging trends. As a champion of advancements in digital health, artificial intelligence, and fashion technology, she brings a unique perspective on how Gen Z is revolutionizing the fashion industry. In today's episode, Eveline will take us on a journey through the eyes of Gen Z, exploring how this tech-savvy generation is reshaping fashion trends with their sustainability-driven preferences and digital-first mindset. We'll delve into the exciting world where AI becomes a fashion statement and discuss how emerging technologies are transforming not just what we wear, but how we interact with fashion itself. KEY TAKEAWAYS AI is immolating the brain. I decided I need to be influencing in neuroscience as well as fashion. I’ve always been interested in smart textiles, functional textiles was always a big thing in Switzerland.  When designing my own clothes with a designer from Project Runway, I saw the beautiful craft of pattern making – it’s an art that should never be lost. But with ecommerce, I saw the integration of technology and my university was right at the forefront of teaching this. Especially with AI or quantum computing on the horizon, we are going to find so many cures. AI has influenced, sped up, replaced and helped so many doctors, especially during the pandemic. Surgeries can be doing online with a doctor in another country, the digitisation of the industry is phenomenal. I was trained as a ‘nose’ when studying in Geneva, olfaction is a very big issue for me and I love how it influences your wellbeing. Digital health is picking up on that, perfumeries are working together with health experts for mental health purposes. The senses can change a person’s wellbeing and attitude. BEST MOMENTS ‘In-bound social media traffic can improve how quickly you can sell and get recognition.’ ‘Brain-computer interfaces, near-eye computer interfaces, moving into spatial computing, all this is coming.’ ‘The best quality is still handmade in my opinion.’ ‘AI is trying to emulate the brain, but I don’t think it ever will because there are new studies coming out every day about consciousness, where memories are stored, etc.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Eveline Ruehlin is a dynamic and multilingual innovator at the forefront of global emerging technology. With a remarkable career as a top influencer and brand ambassador, Eveline champions advancements in digital health, artificial intelligence, fashion technology, and sustainability. Her extensive experience with international organizations equips her to bring unparalleled value to enterprises seeking to navigate the complexities of global trade and diplomacy. Passionate about fostering a sustainable and circular economy, Eveline is a staunch advocate for smart city design and digital twin architecture. As a continuous learner, she delves into cutting-edge fields, including machine learning, blockchain, quantum computing, and cybersecurity, always with an eye on the digital transformation heralded by the 4th and 5th industrial revolutions. A fervent supporter of mentoring the next generation, Eveline is committed to sharing her knowledge, positive mindset, and leadership skills with young professionals entering the tech industry. Her personal interests in skiing, hiking, and outdoor activities mirror her professional ethos of resilience and exploration. Eveline's thought leadership extends to the realm of fashion tech, where she explores how AI and emerging technologies are reshaping the industry. She is particularly interested in how Gen Z and Gen Alpha influence fashion trends through their tech-savvy perspectives and sustainability-driven preferences. Eveline’s insights into the integration of AI as fashion statements continue to drive conversations about the intersection of technology and lifestyle. ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Emanuel Rose, CEO of Strategic eMarketing, who has led numerous successful marketing campaigns for companies through authentic storytelling and direct-response advertising. On today’s episode, Emanuel will share insights on differentiation and humanisation strategies for startups. Scaleups and captive insurance companies. We’ll explore best practices around targeting, testing messaging, and scaling for growth. We also talk about why startups founders must focus on becoming social CEOs. Emanuel will also discuss key lessons from his book on how solitude in nature can benefit mental health, leadership, and creativity. KEY TAKEAWAYS                                                                                                            AI is a tool of marketing and, like all tools, it has to be deployed correctly and with the intent of the campaign and the focus of the brand. It’s complicated to use, but I think it’s amazing, I love it, it’s forever changed my marketing. At this point in time, it still takes a human to drive it, though that might be different in time. As marketers, we’re taking and identifying a problem and from that we come up with a solution, which is what we’re selling, and maybe agitating it a little bit, triggering people and offering a call to action. I like to make it as frictionless as possible which I think has become lost in digital marketing, since the internet we’re back to pop-ups and interruption trying to get email addresses and phone numbers. I think that’s a huge mistake that doesn’t build long-term brand value and makes everything transactional rather than client based. The negative side of AI is there’s a lot of “spray and pray” happening instead of starting with your ideal client profile, finding some people who fit it, understanding what their needs are, and developing a conversation and qualifying that person to your service/product and yourself to that person. The relationship is what people are missing with this inauthentic rubbish. I want to encourage people to use tools that are organised around getting a lot of information from the prospects that they’re talking to so that there is publicly known personal information from social profiles/blogs/other content they’re written or participated in. This should be part of every AI tool you use, but then you need to do your own research, so when people are interested take a few minutes to see how that individual aligns with your ideal client profile.   BEST MOMENTS ‘The difference between a client and a customer is that you care about the client and their concerns, whereas you’re just doing business with a customer, it’s just a transaction.’‘Interruption marketing has got to go away again because it’s counterproductive.’‘We’ve forgotten that our job, as a service provider, is to serve our clients.’‘Make sure that you talk to people. If you’re in a marketing department, get on sales calls and hear the answers for yourself, understand what the pain points are, and how you can feed better information into the model you’re using.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Emanuel Rose is an accomplished marketing expert and author based in Reno, Nevada. With over 30 years of experience in the industry, Emanuel specializes in direct-response advertising, content marketing, and branding strategies. As the CEO of his digital marketing agency Strategic eMarketing, Emanuel has worked with numerous clients and helped them achieve business success through authentic storytelling. His unique approach to marketing has resulted in outstanding outcomes for many companies. Beyond his profession, Emanuel is an avid outdoorsman with a deep passion for nature. His latest book "The 7 Principles of The Magic Rock" explores the profound connection between spending time outdoors and mental health. Website ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner.   Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook TikTok Email Website  

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Magda Ramada, Senior Director and InsurTech Innovation Leader at WTW's Insurance Consulting and Technology, where she spearheads the company's engagement with InsurTech startups and blockchain initiatives worldwide. With over two decades of experience, she has become a prominent voice in digital transformation, advanced analytics, and emerging risks within the insurance industry. Today, we'll be exploring Magdalena's journey in InsurTech, her views on the challenges and opportunities in the industry, and her vision for the future of insurance technology. KEY TAKEAWAYS I got into insurance and technology by chance. 10 years ago I took on a project for a large insurance company whose CEO wanted to look at lobbying risks and macro-economic risks, which I was an expert on. I felt self-conscious talking about risk to the CEO, so I studied like I’d never studied before, and it was a great experience. After that, everything I did was around insurance which led me to blockchain technology, and I realised this was going to change the way we can neutralise risks. I don’t think I’ll ever leave. Technology is an enabler. It doesn’t need to be AI-based or shiny or a startup, as long as it’s the right kind of solution to transform the industry. In insurance, the applications of technology and the needs and functionality are very different from personal lines to motor, home or pet insurance. It’s a world with a lot of complexity.  What are the tools that enable me to use and analyse more data, leverage the data we already have, and how that data can travel from very different functions and allow a very different target operating model where the technical functions converge to work as one. There are a number of specialisms around that that go deep, like generative AI, natural language processing, OCR, where you become an expert in a niche and you don’t need to know insurance. The first thing you need to understand is how a technology is going to affect what you are doing. Then there’s the augmentation with everyone in the value chain (the claims handler, underwriter, customer, online customer, agent), these all need different interfaces and types of insight for the different personas to enable timely, better decision making. Not every technology will enable you to do that. BEST MOMENTS ‘Every time I had the choice of choosing insurance economics as an elective, I chose something else!’ ‘I like being on stage, it’s the closest I can get to teaching.’ ‘One of the things that makes us different from other species is our ability to imagine how things can change and be radically different. Technology can help us with that.’ ‘What is my insurer client going to need in 5 years? What is going to be critical? What is going to allow them to compete with others, to outperform and become front runners?’ ABOUT THE GUEST Magdalena Ramada Sarasola, PhD, is a trailblazer in the global InsurTech landscape. As Senior Director and InsurTech Innovation Leader at WTW's Insurance Consulting and Technology, she drives the company's engagement with InsurTech startups and blockchain initiatives worldwide. Dr Ramada Sarasola's expertise spans from microinsurance and financial inclusion to emerging markets and multinational enterprise strategies. LinkedIn ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Nicole Peck, president of ITC Vegas to dive deep into the highly anticipated ITC Vegas 2024 conference, taking place from October 15-17. In this episode, we'll explore the groundbreaking themes of ITC Vegas 2024, including tackling climate change or the ethical use of GenAI and data. We will also talk about the new ITC Vegas format which includes the neighbourhood to create smaller communities within a larger conference setting. Nicole also shares her insights and strategies for navigating these changes and preparing for a future reshaped by innovation. KEY TAKEAWAYS                                                                                                            I joined ITC last September, just before ITC 2023, to help guide the team to the next evolution of growth and opportunity. This event has been a rocket ship since it started and now we’ve moved into our ‘teenage’ growth years and we need to focus to ensure we’re delivering the best possible event for the community that we serve. This will be the 3rd year we’ve tackled the topic of climate tech. 3 years ago we were probably too early to the party and people weren’t ready to talk about it or use the terminology. Last year it really picked up steam and we’re starting to see traction on both what our audience has identified as topics that they’re interested in as well as our sponsors being interested in learning more about it. We have set out to create an event this year that has evolved and is different from years passed, because we recognise we’re in a ‘growing-up’ phase where we can do more for our community. We took a hard look at the feedback from the event last year and found that the event had become too big and difficult to find the right people or topics that people were looking for. To address this we’ve created more neighbourhoods on the show floor and made it easier to navigate. We also changed how our content and agenda was displayed on the website with clear tagging. I’ve been on events for the majority of my career and most have a very clear buyer/seller relationship. It’s not clear at ITC, ITC is a “supermatrix” event. We distil the people that attend our event into 3 cohorts: Industry incumbents (carriers/reinsurers), Investor community, and innovators (startups/entrepreneurs). Those 3 are constantly in flux from year to year, industry incumbents is strongest right now, but there a nuances at the event that speak to each one of them.   BEST MOMENTS ‘I was brought onto ITC to bring some of my New York City energy into the event and the team.’‘It’s important for me, as a parent, to leave the planet in a better place than when I lived in it.’‘The Founder’s House is invite only and where VCs can meet with the startup community.’‘Our objective is to facilitate as many meetings and connections we can for the carriers.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Nicole Peck is an innovative business leader with more than 27 years of experience driving commercial success through strategic B2B marketing and sales initiatives. She is a results-oriented executive who combines process efficiency with a relentless focus on customer outcomes. A master of forging powerful partnerships, Nicole excels at uniting diverse stakeholders to achieve shared goals. Her leadership style is both decisive and inclusive, knowing when to lead from the front and when to immerse herself in the details. Her calm demeanour under pressure and talent for fostering collaboration make her a sought-after partner, both within her organization and externally. Her unique strength lies in her ability to activate and inspire those around her, empowering teams to excel and achieve their highest potential. Nicole serves as an advisor to event technology startups and is a respected speaker on leadership, team building, and digital innovation. Her insights into emerging event trends are widely recognized and valued. She resides in New York City with her son. EmailLinkedIn ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner.   Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook TikTok Email Website  

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Jeff Abbott, CEO of Ivanti who, alongside his global team, brings insights shape the future of work. As the leader of a company dedicated to providing innovative IT and security solutions, Jeff brings a wealth of experience and insight to the discussion of the evolving workplace landscape.  Today, Jeff will be sharing key findings from Ivanti's 2024 Everywhere Work Report – a comprehensive study that explores the latest trends, challenges, and opportunities in the distributed work environment. KEY TAKEAWAYS If you think about where some of the most successful platforms are, Salesforce.com has brought an amazing platform to sales and marketing, Workday is an amazing platform for HR. CIO's and CISOs have not had that. Our quest at Avanti is to bring that platform, and in this transition we're in right now, the global business community at large, I believe it's the most important evolution in contemporary business we've seen in the last 25 years. It's going to be the basis for our economic wellbeing for the next 50 years, if we get this right. It makes sense for leadership teams to take active steps to dig a little deeper into this divide. With remote work becoming more prevalent, surveying your employees, I believe, is more and more important, this idea of remote leadership and keeping up with the ‘vibe’ of the company in this remote world to understand the experiences and challenges of employees and the executive suite with different mode of work. Over 90% of leaders we surveyed say that employees have the tools to be productive in a remote or hybrid work environment. But, of those employees, just 57% say they need better tools and better access and don't have the smoothest experience from a digital culture perspective.  What we're observing is that IT teams aren't fully bought into the value of DEX (digital experience platform). IT teams are less likely than leadership to say improving the digital employee experience positively affects productivity, retention and satisfaction. Additionally, those IT professionals don't always get to experience the benefits of the digital employee experience that they actually help power. As a result, they don't buy into it simply because they haven't had a positive experience themselves. Applying the promise of DEX should really start with IT, because they're the ones enabling it. BEST MOMENTS ‘The biggest challenge is engaging in the Everwork policy and technical adjustments in the safest and most secure way. You can't rush this. You got to get it right. Just can't wing it.’ ‘Threats from bad actors or cyber terrorists is as bad as it's ever been. It's getting worse. These days, it's a persistent threat, they don't just come and knock on the door with phishing, it's a campaign, it’s nonstop. Vigilance is so important.’ ‘Both the CIO and the CISO have to lock arms and enable IT to understand how they can truly impact productivity with the DEX platform by having transparency and visibility across the landscape of the company.’ ‘Ultimately, where we’re headed is no longer operating IT over here, security over here, we see these organisations starting to converge. That's why this platform is so important for the future.’ ABOUT THE GUEST As CEO of Ivanti, Jeff oversees all aspects of the company’s growth strategy and direction. Before becoming CEO of Ivanti in October 2021, Jeff was Ivanti’s President since January 2020. Jeff has over 25 years of experience working for enterprise software and services companies, including Accenture, Oracle, and Infor. Jeff holds degrees from the University of Tennessee and Georgia State University. He sits on the National Alumni Board at the University of Tennessee and has previously held board positions with the Georgia Leukemia and Lymphoma Society and the Posse’ Foundation. Website ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter | LinkedIn | Instagram | Email | Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Nick Telson-Sillett, a renowned entrepreneur, angel investor, and public speaker based in London. He has an impressive track record in the startup ecosystem and has made significant contributions to the industry. Today, we will dive deep into Nick's journey as a startup founder, his role as an angel investor, and explore his latest project, trumpet. We'll discuss his strategies for evaluating investment opportunities, his advice for aspiring entrepreneurs, and gain his insights on the current startup landscape. KEY TAKEAWAYS If you just look at the reservation market you’d think you find an open table at a restaurant, reserve the table, etc. We drilled in a bit further and found the niche of bars which you couldn’t book into in 2012. We went to the industry and pitched the idea of an app like Open Table that worked for bars, they and the customer base were positive about it and we went and built the software and signed up all of the best bars in the UK because there was no other app out there that was catering to them at the time. Because we’d built such a flexible booking system for bars, there was a boom in casual dining which didn’t exist back in the day for experiential, different types of restaurants which needed the flexibility. We then made a play for that niche. Early start-ups: Don’t get distracted. Focus is so important, everyone promises you the world, partnerships, sponsorships, all these things only add noise. Surround yourself with the work, 3 hours in front of my laptop is more worthwhile than going to a founders event. Becoming a founder has become a fashionable sport, people forget the being a founder is really hard work building your business and putting your head down. I love the start up world, I was mentoring founders so Angel Investing was an obvious route to go down because I can help financially as well as mentoring or helping the companies that I’m financially invested in. A lot of founders I’ve met aren’t investor-ready, and the first thing I say to founders is have you thought what you want out of your business? If it’s just you and you don’t need to raise money, and if £3m is lifechanging to you, you can build a business worth £3m and you hold 100% of the equity and then you can sell it. BEST MOMENTS ‘You can’t please everyone: If you build a product and you’re at the whim of your customers you’ll never have clarity or be able to build strategically, you’ll aways be chasing your tail.’ ‘We were the first app to introduce putting your card down or pay a deposit because we found no-shows was a big problem.’ ‘Sales is going to be the new engineering, finding great sales people that know what they’re doing is tough, determine your ICP (ideal customer profile) and go after them specifically.’ ‘Learning to say no to people doesn’t have to be rude, it’s about preserving your time to drive your business forward.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Sillett is a London-based entrepreneur, investor, and public speaker. He is known for co-founding DesignMyNight, a B2C platform that attracted over 8 million views per month and a B2B platform with over 5,000 clients. DesignMyNight was acquired by The Access Group in November 2017 for $30 million.  After DesignMyNight's successful exit, Nick Telson-Sillett continued his entrepreneurial journey and co-founded Trumpet, a buyer enablement software solution. He is also the founder of Horseplay Ventures, a venture arm that invests in startups, and has invested in over 55 startups as an angel investor. Nick Telson-Sillett is actively involved in the startup community and has hosted his own podcast called Pitch Deck, where startup founders pitch their businesses to him and guest angel investors/mentors. They discuss the pitch, the business itself, and the investment opportunity. LinkedIn YouTube ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Richard Gunn, Chief Revenue Officer at hyperexponential, who is at the forefront of revolutionising the insurance industry through advanced pricing decision intelligence and driving the adoption of hx Renew, a cutting-edge Pricing Decision Intelligence platform designed specifically for commercial insurers in Europe and beyond. On this episode we'll explore how hyperexponential is changing the pricing paradigm for insurers, the importance of advanced pricing decision intelligence in today's rapidly evolving market, and Richard's vision for the future of the insurance industry. KEY TAKEAWAYS Advanced pricing decision intelligence refers to the use of advanced algorithms, data analysis, and technology to gather, analyse, and interpret pricing data for the purpose of making informed spricing decisions. It involves monitoring and tracking the prices of products or services, analysing market trends, and understanding competitor pricing strategies Advanced pricing decision intelligence is important for businesses because it allows them to make data-driven pricing decisions, remain competitive, optimise profitability, and react In real-time. Advanced pricing decision intelligence involves the use of advanced algorithms, machine learning models, and software tools to gather, analyse, and interpret pricing data. These tools leverage technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) and data analytics to provide deeper insights into pricing strategies and market dynamics. Some common techniques used in advanced pricing decision intelligence include: data gathering, data analysis, machine learning models, and automation. Advanced pricing decision intelligence involves the use of advanced algorithms, data analysis, and technology to gather, analyse, and interpret pricing data for the purpose of making informed pricing decisions. It is important for businesses to remain competitive, optimize profitability, and react in real-time to market dynamics and competitor actions. BEST MOMENTS ‘The benefits of advanced pricing decision intelligence include: improved decision-making, increased competitiveness, optimised profitability, and real-time insights.’ ‘hx Renew offers a value proposition to insurers by providing insurance pricing software and a pricing decision intelligence platform.’ ‘By leveraging hx Renew, insurers can eliminate the manual data collection process, saving substantial time and resources. This can result in annual savings of up to and beyond $100,000.’ ‘hx Renew provides insurance professionals with a dynamic environment for real-time rate change monitoring and decision-making. This allows insurers to transition from relying on outdated information to making informed decisions based on up-to-date data.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Richard Gunn is the Chief Revenue Officer at hyperexponential, a company known for creating hx Renew, a Pricing Decision Intelligence platform specifically designed for the insurance industry. In his role, he is responsible for driving revenue growth and ensuring the company's financial success. With a deep understanding of the insurance market and a passion for leveraging technology to solve complex problems, Richard is instrumental in helping insurance companies make informed pricing decisions through the use of hx Renew. His leadership and strategic vision continue to propel hyperexponential forward in the competitive insurtech landscape. Website ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter  LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

In this episode, Sabine talks to Karrie Sullivan, a change management expert with a keen interest in psychology and the development and leveraging of AI. Karrie talks in depth about why AI is disrupting the world of change management and the innovation it is creating, including her work with AI personality assessment. They also talk about the general adoption of new technology and how to recognise resilience and innovation within leaders and individuals. KEY TAKEAWAYS Self-knowledge and introspection are both key components to personal development, which is essential when trying to promote change within and outside of ourselves. Whilst parts of our core personalities may be ‘fixed’ our ability as individuals to develop and evolve is dynamic, this is where we can create the change we want to see. Karrie frequently works within the intersection between small start-ups and larger enterprises to find the right people and innovation to create the best practice framework for all. Find the 7% of people who can turn chaos into opportunity and remain resilient under pressure. There is value in trying various new technologies and then adapting them to what suits your business, not all technology will be the right fit. BEST MOMENTS ‘We’re finding pockets of results and resilience so we and our customers, our clients can do a really good job of adoption and transformation” “How do we help ourselves become better humans?” “We work with those result drivers who can solve problems very fast, to adopt something new, so what they’re doing is creating best practices” “It’s actually a very small amount of people able to manage the change” “They want to see a culture, they believe in culture and they’re looking for other resilient mindsets to surround themselves with” ABOUT THE GUEST Karrie Sullivan is a seasoned expert in change management and organization design, with a keen focus on leveraging AI personality assessments to drive successful transformations.  With a background in large-scale transformations, Karrie has honed her skills to address change management and organization design challenges specifically.  She is adept at helping organizations adopt new technologies, such as Microsoft Copilot, by hyper-targeting adoption efforts based on employees' mindsets and resilience levels.    Karrie's innovative approach to hacking the change curve has significantly reduced the time it takes for organizations to become high-performing after undergoing transformation.    You can discover more about Karrie using the links below.   https://www.linkedin.com/in/karriesullivan/ https://culminatestrategy.com/   ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Sean Languedoc, a seasoned tech entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience building & scaling companies across borders. Sean shares the lessons he learned from scaling five companies, how Outforce.ai is transforming outsourcing, when startups should consider leveraging external teams, and his thoughts on how emerging technologies like generative AI or quantum computing are accelerating development cycles. He also offers advice for non-technical founders looking to build MVPs in a capital-efficient way. KEY TAKEAWAYS Each business started not because of a technology that I wanted to build, it started because of a problem I saw in an industry that I needed to solve, & I was enabled by technology to solve it. You can’t just walk into an industry like InsurTech & disrupt it with technology, technology changes a lot faster than behaviour & infrastructure. The lesson there was if things go wrong, the agency is blamed & I’d be fired. It’s nothing to do with technology, it’s all about people. Across all businesses you have to look at who are you disrupting & how influential are they in the decision-making process? Who wins & who loses & who can you embrace for your winning approach & get momentum behind those.  BEST MOMENTS ‘Everyone will tell you you have a great idea until you ask them to pay for it, or until you understand the culture of the industry itself.’ ‘For good operators who were really interested in optimising we got a lot of momentum, but for the companies that were horse-trading favours, not so much.’ ‘The industry standard is 39% of projects that go to outsourcing don’t work out. I’d say another 20% on top of those end up working out only because of brute force, relentless effort by the client to teach the outsourcing agency how to do it.’ ‘You can’t afford to take the risk of getting it wrong, you need to go in with data & research & get it right.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Sean Languedoc is a seasoned tech entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience building & scaling companies. He has founded five tech ventures across various domains, successfully taking two of them "south" from Canada to the US. Currently, Sean is the CEO of Outforce.ai, a company that transforms outsourcing from a daunting task into a strategic asset for venture-backed startups. Outforce.ai aims to be the catalyst that propels tech ventures to their next phase of growth by connecting them with the right engineering teams globally. Beyond his role at Outforce.ai, Sean is deeply involved in the startup ecosystem as a mentor, guiding entrepreneurs through the complex landscape. He serves as a board member at A100 & a Charter Member at C100, underscoring his commitment to fostering tech innovation and entrepreneurship in Canada & beyond. With his extensive expertise in international collaboration, recruiting, & navigating cultural nuances, Sean brings valuable insights on scaling teams, leveraging outsourcing effectively, and adapting to the rapidly evolving tech landscape.  His unique perspective, shaped by building companies across borders, makes him an insightful guest to discuss growth strategies for startups and & future of work in an AI-driven world. LinkedIn Website ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, & commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Edward Brawer, co-founder and CEO of PodcastAI, a groundbreaking SaaS platform that's revolutionising the podcasting industry. In this episode, we'll explore: Edward's entrepreneurial journey and the origin of PodcastAI, how AI is transforming the podcasting landscape, the future of content creation and distribution in the digital age, strategies for entrepreneurs looking to leverage podcasting for growth, & the challenges and opportunities in the rapidly evolving podcasting market. KEY TAKEAWAYS Our previous startup was with a video platform, we looked at what we could do with AI & the models were pretty expensive. It could take the titles of YouTube videos & it would give you new titles which isn’t super useful. The real Aha moment for everybody was ChatGPT because it wasn’t a technological development, it was realising how to use the technology. It was at that time I realised that there was no limit to what you could build with this which led me to start PodcastAI. In February I started playing around with AI voice models & I realised that I could create a parody of an episode of the All In Podcast. I posted it on Twitter & it was reposted by them & went viral, hitting 600,000 views. We did 6 in total & people wanted to know if it was real, if AI had produced the podcast, they asked for the code and GitHub repository. That’s when we knew we could do it & we now have a product called ‘The Magic Pod’ which creates a podcast for people who aren’t comfortable with being in front of a microphone, it creates a completely automatically generated podcast based on a blog, news sites in your voice. Podcasting can be as simple or complicated as you want it to be. At its simplest, you can have a Zoom recording a put that out, PodcastAI can level up your production quality by automating all the post-production, distribution & promotion. At the higher end it’s more like a scripted TV show. Everybody is able to do this. A100 years ago, the percentage of the population engaged in farming was easily double digit, now maybe 1% has to be engaged in farming because there are tractors etc. Not everybody became unemployed, they went on to do even greater stuff & increased the standard of living for everybody and earned higher wages. BEST MOMENTS ‘For most podcasters the interview is the fun part and the rest is less fun (pre- & post-production, editing, promotion & distribution, website CMS), Podcast AI makes podcasting effortless.’ ‘Magic Pod is a whole new game. You don’t even have to do the recording part, just give it a 3 minute sample of your voice, upload it into our system & it automatically goes out on the day & time you want.’ ‘Today, podcasting is a $28billion market. In 5 years it’s going to be $100billion.’ ‘You’ll have more throughput, higher quality overall outcomes of the work produced & agencies are going to be able to scale in a way they haven’t been able to, it’s going to become an enabling technology.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Edward Brawer is the co-founder and CEO of PodcastAI, a cutting-edge SaaS platform revolutionising the podcasting industry through AI-powered automation. Launched in 2023, PodcastAI offers a comprehensive suite of tools for podcast creation, post-production, & distribution. Under Edward's leadership, PodcastAI has secured venture backing, with Jason Calacanis' Launch fund as the lead investor. The platform offers innovative features such as AI-generated ad reads, fully automated podcast episodes, & comprehensive post-production services, positioning itself at the forefront of the rapidly growing podcasting market. Website ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, and commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor &  multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Jeannette Linfoot, a distinguished corporate CEO turned entrepreneur, board advisor, mentor, & investor, renowned for her ability to guide business leaders, C-suite executives, & entrepreneurs through complex business challenges & towards scalable growth, whose career is marked by her 'Brave, Bold, Brilliant' ethos, which she has successfully translated into a top-tier podcast that reaches audiences in over 120 countries. On this episode she shares insights from her extensive career, her transition to a portfolio career, & her passion for personal development & growth. KEY TAKEAWAYS In my mid- to late-40s, I took stock of where I was, I loved my corporate career, but I wanted to have more freedom, choice & flexibility in my life. Now, having a portfolio career gives me more choice around being able to travel more & ultimately, I call the shots. When scaling up, what got you to where you’re at now won’t necessarily get you where you want to get to in the next phase. Having a clear, differentiated position in the market is really important when you scaling, otherwise you’re just competing on price against your competitors. Be clear on your proposition to the customer & know where you want to take the business. There are only 24 hours in a day & you’re only one person, your success in whatever field you’re in will often be dictated by the talent around you. As you scale you may find there are certain functions that you didn’t need before that you do now, or a combined role may now be at a scale where it needs to be separated & more resources need to be brought into the business. In any business it’s great to have a mix of talent, experience, some of which is age related: the older you are the more experience you’re going to have. But, the younger generation will have fresh thoughts & more energy. Everyone contributes to a team. With Gen Z, it’s important to understand their motivations in terms of flexibility, they tend to be more values- and purpose-led & they’re choosing who they want to work with on how they align with their morals & values BEST MOMENTS ‘There’s never an easy time to scale a business, there will always be something that will challenge you, so really get clear on why you’re scaling up, start with the end in mind & work backwards.’ ‘If your systems, processes, the boring stuff is not solid you won’t be able to scale, it will fall over at some point. Map them out now & understand which areas you need to strengthen.’ ‘Don’t feel you have to scale up, it might not be right for you, you’ve got to want to do it yourself because it’s a hard thing to do. Prepare before you start on the journey of growth.’ ‘The formula for success is: belief + purpose + action = results.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Jeannette Linfoot is a distinguished corporate CEO turned entrepreneur, board advisor, mentor, & investor, renowned for her ability to guide business leaders, C-suite executives, & entrepreneurs through complex business challenges & towards scalable growth. Transitioning from a full-time corporate CEO to a portfolio entrepreneur, Jeannette now manages three businesses: a property investment business, an advisory business for corporate clients & business owners, & a one-to-one mentoring business. Jeannette's podcast, "Brave, Bold, Brilliant," has evolved into a comprehensive brand & framework for executive leadership development & strategy, focusing on leading oneself, leading the business, & leading teams. WebsiteLinkedInFacebookInstagramTikTokPodcast: YouTube, Spotify, Apple ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, and commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor & multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Bessem Ayari, Head of Innovation Strategy & Scouting at ERGO Group AG, where he leads transformative initiatives that shape the future of the insurance industry. With a dynamic career dedicated to fostering innovation and collaboration, Bessem is a pivotal force in the InsurTech landscape. Bessem shares insights on how the Ergo ScaleHub is redefining the innovation ecosystem & helping bold entrepreneurs scale new heights in the insurance sector. KEY TAKEAWAYS                                                                                                            In these times of rapid change & digital transformation, the insurance industry is compared to any other industry, everyone expects the same service & speed as Amazon, Netflix, etc. That’s what drives me. Innovation strategy is about a culture that we need to shape & create to be on a good path but also to provide the means & tools to do so. We have a very broad & on point innovation portfolio where we are very near to the core, really trying to solve today’s challenges. Innovation is about delivering valuable impact & we can only do so by tackling the challenges we have today. In our portfolio we also have the ability to look into the future at the trends in the business & technology side so we can see very early where the market is evolving & where we should dig deeper. We’re pretty good when it comes to tech incubation, we have scaled RA process mining, AI and GPT initiatives as well as metaverse, VR, etc. We’ve created competency centres internally for these. I truly believe in physical collaboration, having physical touchpoints really helps to get a better understanding, to understand Ergo, the processes, the people behind it. At the end of the day it’s a people’s business & you need to build trust. Trust is built by having a proper conversation face-to-face or having dinner together, getting into a boardroom & cluttering the whole space with ideas and concepts to be worked out.   BEST MOMENTS ‘I’m passionate about innovation, driving meaningful impact at work & giving something back to our customers & employees.’‘Innovation is about delivering valuable impact.’‘You don’t learn a technology from Power Point, you need to get your hands dirty, try it out, make it tangible, test it & derive a decision out of it quickly.’‘Getting direct connections to corporates is super valuable,  as a startup you need to understand how the corporate functions.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Bessem Ayari is a dynamic leader specializing in innovation strategy & scouting. As the Head of Innovation Strategy & Scouting at ERGO Group AG, he leverages his extensive experience to drive forward-thinking initiatives & foster collaboration between startups & the corporate sector. His passion for mentorship & a keen eye for identifying emerging trends in InsurTech position him as a pivotal force in shaping the industry's future. Known for his strategic vision, exceptional leadership, & commitment to nurturing innovative ideas, Bessem has consistently brought tangible value to his organization. His expertise spans innovation management, strategic leadership, & startup mentorship, making him an accomplished innovation strategist with a proven track record in fostering innovation & collaboration. At ERGO Group AG, he leads the innovation strategy & scouting efforts, identifying & integrating cutting-edge solutions to maintain the company’s competitive edge. LinkedInWebsite Make sure to check the ScaleHub site for more details ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, and commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor &  multi-award winner.   Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook TikTok Email Website  

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Andrei Mincov, founder and CEO of Trademark Factory, a company that specialises in trademark registration & protection. On this episode Mincov shares his insights & experiences on the importance of trademarks for entrepreneurs and businesses, and the common mistakes and misconceptions that people have about the trademarking process. He will also explores the role of IP in business growth & success, & the strategies &best practices for protecting & leveraging your ideas & brands. KEY TAKEAWAYS My dad was a famous composer in Russia. A radio station that stole a song he wrote & turned it into an ad for Samsung without his permission, at the time I was attending law school & he asked me for help. I didn’t know anything about IP but in 1996 nobody in Russia had any idea about IP because Russia had just changed from Soviet law into free market law, so I gave it a shot & as part of that journey I became passionate about helping people who created something to protect it from others who want to steal it from them. Trademarking is mostly the same around the world, there are small differences here & there & you need to understand them to be successful in those countries. But, this isn’t something I think entrepreneurs should care about, that’s why providers exists who can navigate them through this. What you should know are the basics, it’s not as complex as you might think: What is trademarking? What are you protecting? What do you need to show to the government to prove it's a brand & not a cute name or image? The biggest misconceptions I see with trademarks is that you don’t own the word or the image you own the mental association between that work, phrase or image & specific products & services that you sell. Why trademark? If you plan to be in business for several/many years, the brand will become the most valuable asset of your business. It makes it easier t=for you to attract better talent, attract better leads at a lower cost to advertise at lesser cost. Even if you file your trademark a day before someone else does, you’re good. The problem is you don’t know when someone else will file for a trademark, so you should do it early or else someone else will do it and you won’t be protected, even if you came up with the name first.  BEST MOMENTS ‘The trademarking process takes a long time & I’ve seen a lot of entrepreneurs being taken advantage of by unscrupulous firms that claim to be able to trademark their brand for $49.’ ‘The success rate of your trademark application is directly related to your willingness to understand the basics.’ ‘On a general level, what trademarks protect is the brand, whether it’s the name, tagline, logo, or some combination.’ ‘Trademarks is the only type of IP that you can own, in theory, forever. Copyrights, patents, industrial right expire, if you renew your trademark every 10 years you can own it forever.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Andrei Mincov, the founder and CEO of Trademark Factory, is a renowned expert in intellectual property law. With a career that began with a fight to protect his father's music, Mincov has since written multiple books on the subject, including an international bestseller, & has helped thousands of entrepreneurs and companies protect their IP. His passion for ensuring that hardworking entrepreneurs are not taken advantage of led him to found Trademark Factory, the only firm in the world that offers trademark registration services with a guaranteed result for a guaranteed budget. When he's not helping secure trademarks, Mincov enjoys living in Dubai with his wife & 3 kids & playing his one-of-a-kind DrumDesk. Website LinkedInYouTubeEmail: andrei@mincov.com  ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, and commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor &  multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Nick Pester, founder of Beyond Legal, who is on a mission to revolutionise the way startups access legal support. But Nick's impact goes far beyond just providing legal advice. Throughout his career, Nick has been a trusted mentor and advisor to countless early-stage businesses. From navigating the challenges of international expansion to securing major funding rounds, he has been in the trenches with founders, helping them scale their ventures to new heights. KEY TAKEAWAYS You have to balance the need of competitive advantage, moving quickly, & first mover advantage, which is super important and which I always try to support with the businesses I work with, against the harsh reality of doing something wrong or making sure you’re not being unnecessarily exposed and that you’re keeping yourself in a structure that’s attractive to investors. If you compare 2021 where capital was much more freely available and people could be more fast & lose with how they did things, to where we are now where capital has dried up and VCs are focused on existing portfolios, you need to be tighter and more organised in terms of your structure & corporate admin has become much more important. The best lawyers I’ve ever worked with are the ones who, alongside their technical legal knowledge being very good, have an ability to see what the business is trying to achieve & marry the legal requirement with the businesses objectives. Getting those types of people involved at the outset, even if it’s just a sense check, is so valuable.  Collaboration is key, we need to get away from the mindset that 2 opposing parties are adversaries. It’s a partnership  & the best lawyers are the ones who recognise that the horse trade isn’t just “you give us A and we’ll give you B”, it’s figuring out where the value lies for each individual party & marrying them together in a way that’s fair & respectful of each party’s interests. BEST MOMENTS ‘There’s a tendency for startups to chase the shiny ball, it’s easy to get distracted by spin-offs of what you could do, businesses that succeed in the long term are those that have patience, dedication & control.’ ‘Founders & business have a tendency to view lawyers as naysayers or box-tickers, people underestimate the value of a good commercial lawyer.’ ‘If you’ve got a good commercial lawyer in your team, empower them, give them the chance to lead on things & you’ll see the value they can bring beyond the legal side of things.’ ‘When selecting a lawyer to work with find an individual that works for you, don’t just go on simple recommendations by name.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Nick Pester is a seasoned legal professional with over 20 years of experience, specialising in FinTech & high-growth technology companies.  His passion for supporting the growth of innovative companies led him to found Beyond Legal, a venture that leverages his extensive experience to provide high-growth technology businesses with an alternative to traditional legal services. Beyond Legal's primary offering is fully flexible, on-demand, fractional 'GC Services', which allows companies to access top-tier legal support without the commitment of a full-time hire or the high costs associated with external law firms.  Website ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, and commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor &  multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website

Do you want exclusive bonus content for free? Please fill out this survey to get just that as well as getting your say about the future of this podcast including content ideas and future guests. On this episode of the Scouting For Growth podcast, Sabine VdL talks to Colin Sanburg, a seasoned entrepreneur & the Founder of FinElevate, an innovative strategic finance firm that is changing the game for small businesses. On this episode, we dive into Colin's entrepreneurial journey, explore the challenges faced by small business owners, & learn how FinElevate is revolutionising small business finance. KEY TAKEAWAYS If there were 10 things that could kill a company, the very first business I got involved with was doing 9 of them! It was in really rough shape. But, from the hardships of figuring out how to stop it being so bad & eventually getting better, I became obsessed with finance & how to build a better business. Now there are a lot more entrepreneurial groups & masterminds, but earlier in my career I went years without knowing other entrepreneurs. They were the hardest years where I was trying to figure things out. Luckily, I got turned on to a couple of books. After I got through that & connected to other entrepreneurs, the second stage of my career began. When people hear “fractional CFO” they think of a really experienced person who is C-Suite level who’s going to give them a complicated 12-page plan of all the things they should be doing that they don’t have the time to do. That doesn’t work for entrepreneurs, entrepreneurs want freedom, their business to do better than ever & live a better lifestyle. It’s hard to do that, but we get in your business to help improve it The reality is, most businesses need to do some of the same things. We can train your team & get in your business &, instead of giving you a 12-page plan, we can say for the next quarter we’re going to focus on these areas based on your goals, thus making progress.  BEST MOMENTS ‘You can get trapped in a bubble of small business & limited mindset, but once you break out of that & work with other entrepreneurs it’s so exciting.’ ‘We’re training your leadership team. The fear when you ask them to make more profit is that the team hears: “Make me more money”, when we come in we teach them how to grow their career as well as the company.’ ‘The goal is not to do 450 things at once, it’s to have 450 things mapped out so that we know the next thing to focus on.’ ‘You need to understand how your business makes money & you can describe that on a napkin.’ ABOUT THE GUEST Colin Sanburg is the Founder & CEO of FinElevate, an innovative strategic finance firm that helps small business owners leverage their financial data to drive profitability & growth. With an MBA & extensive experience as an owner & CEO of manufacturing, distribution, & service businesses, Colin has developed a passion for demystifying small business finance & empowering entrepreneurs to achieve their dreams. Colin's passion for connecting with & supporting fellow entrepreneurs led him to start several mastermind groups, where he became the go-to person for financial strategy & advice. He pursued an executive MBA to further enhance his skills & knowledge. Through his experiences, Colin has gained invaluable insights into the financial challenges faced by small business owners & is dedicated to helping them navigate the complexities of business finance to achieve long-term success. Website LinkedIn email ABOUT THE HOST Sabine is a corporate strategist turned entrepreneur. She is the CEO and Managing Partner of Alchemy Crew a venture lab that accelerates the curation, validation, and commercialization of new tech business models. Sabine is renowned within the insurance sector for building some of the most renowned tech startup accelerators around the world working with over 30 corporate insurers, accelerated over 100 startup ventures. Sabine is the co-editor of the bestseller The INSURTECH Book, a top 50 Women in Tech, a FinTech and InsurTech Influencer, an investor &  multi-award winner. Twitter LinkedIn Instagram Facebook  TikTok Email Website