Leap Takers

Stefano Bernardi (@stefanobernardi) is an active italian angel investor on AngelList and at “Mission and Market”, a silicon valley startup founder of a Y Combinator alumni (Kickpay), and employee nr. 1 of Betable (backed by Greylock, Founders Fund). More recently he is also a part of Atomico's angel programme, where he focuses exclusively on investing in "planet+" companies, with teams that are trying to save the planet from the imminent climate crisis.

Furthermore, he is strongly involved in the crypto community as the executive director of AragonProject, as well as an author for the popular token economy newsletter.

Show notes: 02:52 -- Who is Stefano 03:55 -- Moving from Italy to San Francisco and entering the silicon valley startup ecosystem 07:16 -- Advice on how to get a job in a silicon valley startup 09:16 -- How Stefano met the Collison brothers - founders of $22.5bn fintech startup Stripe 11:10 -- What it’s like to work in a tech startup in San Francisco 13:50 -- Stefano’s move to start his own company 14:55 -- Tips for fundraising from VCs and angels & entering Y Combinator 17:00 -- Advice for applying to Y Combinator’s accelerator program 20:03 -- Why Stefano left San Francisco and returned to Europe 21:28 -- Aragon - description of the project and how it can help other startups 26:46 -- Favorite knowledge resources of Stefano 29:55 -- Most worthwhile investments 30:40 -- Advice to younger self 31:35 -- Unusual hobbies 32:45 -- What does courage mean to Stefano

Resources mentioned:

• Sam Altman
• Y Combinator
• Aragon
• Collison brothers (Patrick & John)
• Stripe
• Kickpay
• Mission and Market
• Atomico
• Token Economy
• Elixir

Nilson Kufus (@NilsonKufus) is one of the co-founders of Nomoko, a technology company that is building photorealistic 3D models of entire cities. Their technology enables applications for various industries like self-driving cars, gaming, or urban planning. Nilson obtained a degree in Liberal Arts & Sciences from the University College Maastricht and is also a former Swiss figure skating champion.

Please follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and my Website, where I post new episodes, share cool stuff & interesting articles I found, blog occasionally, and provide glimpses into my life!

Show notes: 02:24 -- Who is Nilson Kufus 05:23 -- How Nilson got into starting his own venture 09:49 -- How moving out and living abroad helps you develop critical skills for entrepreneurship 11:22 -- What is Nomoko and how they want to enable the 4th industrial revolution 14:33 -- Idea finding and first steps as a company 18:40 -- Financing of Nomoko 19:44 -- How Nilson dealt with manufacturing hardware needed to enable their core data product 25:17 -- Manufacturing in-house vs. outsourcing 26:42 -- Most exciting use cases of the Nomoko mirror world 28:37 -- Current status of development - which cities already have a digital twin 33:00 -- Key takeaways from 4 years of entrepreneurship 38:48 -- Nilson’s favorite knowledge resources 41:25 -- Nilson’s advice to his younger-self 41:00 -- What does courage mean to Nilson

Resources mentioned:

• University of Maastricht
• Nomoko
• A16z podcast
• Nomoko podcast
• LinkedIn

If you're enjoying the podcast, the best way to support the show is by leaving a review on iTunes or your favorite podcast app.

David Lu (@davidjlu) is an up & coming venture capitalist based in Sydney and Singapore, who is constantly traveling the world on the hunt for great investments. He is a Partner @256 Ventures, a global cryptocurrency VC fund, investing in a portfolio of diversified digital assets.

Previously, David founded Australia’s first student VC called, Textbook ventures. He also regularly writes academic papers around the topics of entrepreneurial ecosystems, startup roadmaps and early-stage fundraising. Forbes wrote an article about David with the title “Why Being A Young Investment Partner Isn't Always A Good Thing”.

Show notes: 02:50 -- How David got into Venture Capital 07:32 -- Resources for getting started with learning about Venture Capital & deciding what knowledge is relevant for your portfolio companies 11:45 -- David’s story of how he got started with Australia’s first student VC fund - Textbook Ventures. + How one of his successful investments led him to crypto. 16:20 -- David’s learnings from starting a Venture business (“Think in default scenarios”) 19:25 -- How do you react to things not going well when you grow your business + How creativity and thinking about the purpose of their fund helped Textbook Ventures to pivot 25:40 -- Riskiness of startup investing and how seed & pre-seed investing is the best way to build a relationship with promising founders 28:40 -- How VC is all about the people and how you make them feel 30:10 -- David’s investment criteria 33:14 -- David’s best investment to date 35:02 -- Unusual hobbies of David 36:43 -- Favorite books 38:05 -- Personal advisory board 40:18 -- Advice to younger self & anyone

Resources mentioned:

• Venture Deals - Brad Feld
• Harry Stebbings - The Twenty Minute VC
• Fred Wilson Blog - USV
• Elad Gil Blog
• The Lean Startup - Eric Ries
• Finite and Infinite Games - James Carse
• 256 Ventures
• Textbook Ventures
• Virgil Capital

If you're enjoying the podcast, the best way to support the show is by leaving a review on iTunes or your favorite podcast app.

Estefanía Tapias (@este_tapias) is a researcher on the topic of the future of cities and entrepreneur that was listed on Forbes reputable 30 under 30 list. She is from Colombia but has been living in Switzerland for the past few years, where she co-founded WeSpace. WeSpace is a community, co-workspace and digital platform inspired by women in Zurich, where she invited me to to record this interview. She obtained her Ph.D. at ETH Zurich and worked as a researcher and lecturer on the topic of smart Cities in Zurich and Singapore (Future Cities Laboratory).

We’ll talk about how Estefania took the leap from her academic career to found a co-working space, the mindset to to start your own venture, how she got featured in the Forbes 30 under 30, tools for website design, and much more.

Show notes: 03:21 -- How Estefania became fascinated with the topic of smart cities 04:32 -- Cooling Singapore project 05:22 -- The state of research in the field of climate change & cities 08:10 -- Advice on picking the right area of business or research to pursue 09:33 -- How Estefania decided what opportunity to pursue after finishing her PhD 11:50 -- How WeSpace got started and the purpose behind it. The future of targeted co-working spaces (like WeSpace which is a community and workspace inspired by women) 16:14 -- How to launch a capital-intensive business like a co-working space 17:53 -- Promoting your business initially 19:38 -- Initiatives that foster entrepreneurship among women & advantages of mixed founding teams 21:20 -- The mindset to make the jump to starting your own venture 23:40 -- The target group of WeSpace 24:25 -- Estefania’s favorite knowledge resources 26:13 -- Favorite books 27:56 -- How Estefania got featured on the Forbes 30 under 30 32:30 -- Estefania’s hobbies 33:40 -- Tools for Website design 35:15 -- Advice to your younger self - “Don’t take yourself too serious” 36:20 -- Estefania’s personal advisory board 37:40 -- Unjustified fears 38:30 -- What does courage mean to Estefania

Resources mentioned:

• “The three most harmful addictions are heroin, carbohydrates, and a monthly salary.” - Nassim Nicholas Taleb
• Nuzzel: Twitter news summary
• Zero to one - Peter Thiel * Traction - Gabriel Weinberg
• Wix.com
• WeSpace
• Helen Clark

If you're enjoying the podcast, the best way to support the show is by leaving a review on iTunes or your favorite podcast app.

Pascal Kaufmann (@PascalKaufmann) is a neuroscientist-turned-entrepreneur, who founded Starmind - one of Europe’s leading artificial intelligence technology companies - and Mindfire - a foundation created to incentivize collaboration in AI research. Inc magazine mentioned Pascal in the same sentence with no other than Elon Musk and Stephen Hawking. In this episode we’ll talk about how Pascal became fascinated with artificial intelligence research, some of the experiments he worked on, what advice he has for aspiring entrepreneurs, and unique insights into Starmind.

Please follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and my Website, where I post new episodes, share cool stuff & interesting articles I found, blog occasionally, and provide glimpses into my life!

Show notes: 02:38 -- How Pascal got interested in the topic of artificial intelligence 05:00 -- Scientific experiments connecting brains to machines 06:30 -- Why Pascal decided to found an AI company - Starmind 08:20 -- The general state of AI & where we are at 10:15 -- Resources to get started with a career in AI 12:30 -- Tips for aspiring entrepreneurs / mistakes to avoid 14:20 -- Insights into Starmind 15:40 -- Favorite books & movies 17:30 -- Pascal’s personal advisory board / mentors 19:10 -- Hobbies & habits to take your mind-off your startup 20:00 -- Advice to fellow entrepreneurs & future leaptakers 22:50 -- Closing thoughts - Switzerland as a hotspot for AI companies

Resources mentioned:

• The story of Prometheus
• Archimedean spiral
• Starmind
• Mindfire
• Captain future
• Friedrich Nietzsche

If you're enjoying the podcast, the best way to support the show is by leaving a review on iTunes or your favorite podcast app.

Daniel Naeff is the founder of Oakura, a platform where curated startups and vetted experts engage to create next generation businesses. We’ll get into what this actually means in the episode. He also served as the COO of Teralytics, one of Switzerland’s leading data analytics startups. He is also on the board of directors of the ETH Alumni - one of the world’s top 10 universities. We’ll take about bootstrapping vs. funding your company via venture capital, how to make smarter decisions as a founder, hiring the best team, favorite books, and much more.

Please follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and my Website, where I post new episodes, share cool stuff & interesting articles I found, blog occasionally, and provide glimpses into my life!

Show notes: 01:52 -- How and why Daniel got into entrepreneurship 07:50 -- Daniel’s time at MIT and how he got there 09:22 -- Recommendations and reasons for studying abroad 11:02 -- Diamond Heels - Daniel’s first startup 15:30 -- Teralytics and Daniel’s role 17:45 -- What is the right type of funding for your startup & how Venture Capital (VC) is broken 22:30 -- Why Daniel left Teralytics & next steps 24:20 -- Using insights to help out the next generation of startups 26:40 -- How Oakura started - Using blockchain technology to disrupt the traditional VC model 29:19 -- How to decide if you should continue or stop your current project - “Think in different scenarios” 30:20 -- Leveraging Essentialist thinking and the concept of “sunk costs” to help making important life decisions 33:20 -- Tips on hiring and assembling the best team 36:34 - Should you start a company with your friends or not? 40:00 -- What does Oakura mean 41:50 -- What’s the purpose of Oakura and how it could revolutionize the venture industry 49:20 -- How Oakura is tokenizing startup equity 51:18 -- Daniel’s favorite books 53:30 -- Unique hobbies and how to distract your mind from the daily entrepreneurial work 55:48 -- Thought experiments 58:25 -- Advice to your younger self / university students 1:00:00 -- Closing thoughts

Resources mentioned:

• ETH Juniors
• “We don’t make movies to make money, we make money to make more movies.” - Walt Disney
• The Power of Habit - Charles Duhigg
• The 48 laws of power - Robert Greene * Sapiens - Yuval Noah Harari

If you're enjoying the podcast, the best way to support the show is by leaving a review on iTunes or your favorite podcast app.

Short introductory episode where Remo (@TheRemoKyburz) is introducing the podcast and what led him to start the LeapTakers podcast. In short: In each episode I’m interviewing unique founders, shapers, and makers that work on building the future, as well as other fascinating personalities that push boundaries in various areas, such as investing, traveling, gaming, exploring new foods, and much more. In addition to being a source of knowledge & entertainment, I want to inspire people like you with this podcast to start your own endeavour and essentially become a Leap Taker.

You’ll learn:

• What this podcast is about and who is it for
• Remo’s background & why he started the podcast
• My hobbies

Please follow me on Instagram, Twitter, and my Website, where I post new episodes, share cool stuff & interesting articles I found, blog occasionally, and provide glimpses into my life!