"I fervently believe in the potential of startup founders to have an outsize impact in the world, shaping and building our future. However, for that to be positive for everyone, everyone must be positively engaged. Shockingly, in the UK and around the world, less than 3% of venture capital investment goes to female led startups, and in the UK less than 2% goes to those led by people from ethnic minorities. While venture funding is not the only route to building a high impact company, it is the dominant path for tech startups, so the lack of diversity in the funding landscape is awful for these huge and under represented groups, but it is also bad for everyone: we all miss out through the rich diversity of human creativity being squandered by a lack of inclusion, and the picture is not limited to just tech startups.

If we want a better world then all of us, especially those of us, like me, from over represented groups who benefit from great privilege, need to step forward to make a difference. Perhaps, like me, you want to see things change, but you struggle to know what you can do. I've always been disappointed by a lack of diversity and representation, but it has felt like a big issue that is beyond my ability to do much about. However, Grace Burton on the Future Worlds team recently introduced me to Better Allies, Karen Catlin's approach to creating more inclusive workplaces, which brilliantly tackles the deadlock by providing simple, everyday steps we can all take to turn intent in to action to make a difference.

Therefore, I was very excited when Karen joined me to share her experience of 25 years building software products, serving as a vice president of engineering at Macromedia and Adobe, and pioneering the Better Allies movement. I’m a complete beginner, at the start of that journey, but I'm encouraged that making a difference is possible and, at the same time, I now feel accountable, because by making it so simple Karen leaves us no room for excuses for not doing what we can. Simple actions, simple challenge." 

Ben Clark: Director, Future Worlds

Learn how Alena went from being a fan of hip hop and rap in Belarus, working with O2, and then to creating a worldwide entertainment and music platform with 800K monthly active users.

Hear how Sarah went from selling her house and investing her life savings to building an influential worldwide community in science, technology, government and business using the power of AI and emerging technologies.

This is a fantastic opportunity to learn and be inspired by Rob’s journey, going from a first-class honours degree in Electronic Engineering here at the University of Southampton to taking multiple companies to successful multi-million pound exits.

It's the last episode in our CES 2021 podcast series. In this final episode we are joined by Emitwise founder Mauro Cozzi. Emitwise is focused on helping large corporates to measure, track and profitably reduce their carbon footprint.  

Today it's great to welcome back Aura Vision Co-Founder Dr. Daniel Martinho-Corbishley. Aura Vision is one of the great successes to come through Future Worlds in the last few years and has done some incredible things on the world stage since working with us. Aura Vision works with retailers and shopping malls to combine cutting edge AI with existing camera infrastructure to accurately count customers, demographics and engagement in real time. 

It's a real privilege to welcome Absolar founder Dr Phil Wu for episode six of our CES podcast series. Absolar is delivering software that optimises the location of solar energy systems for buildings at scale. Listen to how they are planning to spark the next energy revolution. 

Episode 5 gives you the opportunity to meet long term Future Worlds friend and BOON founder, Dylan Grey. BOON is an award winning startup that creates personalised shopping experiences for online users while preserving their data privacy. 

Welcome to Episode four of our CES 2021 podcast series. In this episode we welcome Inpulse founder Devon Lewis. Inpulse are making smart clothing that monitors and enhances muscle activity. 

This podcast series shares with you the opportunity to meet the people behind the amazing technologies. We will take you behind the scenes so you can understand what it takes to go on your own startup journey. In episode three we are joined by Aquark Technologies founder Dr. Andrei Dragomir. Physicist Dr. Andrei Dragomir, part of the Quantum, Light and Matter (QLM) Group at the University of Southampton, is pioneering research in the heart of this burgeoning industry and has founded startup company Aquark Technologies to open up new possibilities in the field.