PAC Talks

In this 3rd episode, Jeri shares the story of her startup CastAR, lessons learned, challenges with having too much money from investors, pressure from investors to roll out products, finally how it was curtains for CastAR. She talks about the early days of Tilt Five. The initial days of putting together the team, technology , why the name ‘Tilt Five’ and the call she received from Atari founder Nolan Bushnell which actually pushed her to start Tilt Five.

An amazing talk which also captures the problems with too much investment money.

Jeri ‘Too much money is also a problem”…!!!

You can listen to this episode in Apple, Spotify.

Episode 1: Click here

Episode 2: Click here

In this 2nd episode, Jeri shares the story of her transition from an early venture of ‘Computers Made Easy’ to the tough journey of breaking into the Silicon Valley arena.

(Link to Episode 1: The Life Journey: Episode 1)

She was surviving on the meagre savings doing part time work but her passion to make many innovative circuit boards, FPGA chips that could act as video screens, sound generators, etc. helped her to focus on her strengths & finally got the first ‘engineering’ job.

Jeri talks about the stint where she compressed Commodore 64 into a joy stick gaming device which went on to become a collectible item for the gaming industry.

She also talks about her days at Valve Corporation, discussions with Gabe Newell, from how she got the job and ended up buying AR gaming technology that was developed by her for Valve.

(This interview was done in Nov, 2020)

You can listen to the podcast: Apple, Spotify

“We help children become more confident in football and in life.” That is how simply Mark Connaughton, the founder of Klaas Kickz shared the basic concept of his Startup. “We do this through our colour coded football boots.” added Mark.

In this edition of PAC Talks with VJCV, Mark Connaughton, founder of Klaas Kickz shared his story. The journey of a 4 years old kid kicking football to being the founder of a startup simplifying football coaching for kids, Mark has always been close to this sport. You can also listen to the detailed interview on any of the podcast channels – Apple, Spotify, Audible, Google (PAC Talks with VJCV).

“So how the idea came about was in 2019, I was coaching in America. And I was directing a camp in California. I was coaching the 12 year olds that week, and I was trying to explain a skill, which involved using the top of the inside of your foot, it is called the Cryuff turn. The kid was 12 and was really struggling to identify the different parts of the feet, to use in football. So I, as a coach, I do silent demonstration, followed by a verbal demonstration and then I let the kid do the skill himself. But he just couldn’t grasp the concept. So I was thinking, There’s got to be something here that can make it easier for the child to learn the different parts of the feet. So there was 100 kids in that camp. I brought them over one by one and asked them, can they name the inside, the outside, the sole and the laces, and only nine out of 100 could do so. So I was thinking, I’m onto something here, there’s got to be an easier way. So I was staying on a farm in California that week, I went home and started drawing pictures of football boots, trying to get the different sections correct. There’s two different parts of the inside of the foot that nobody really talks about. One is to pass and then one is to shoot. If you are trying to shoot for accuracy, you would use the blue for anyone who’s not familiar with football. So I started drawing boots colouring in the different sections, putting red on the toes, because you’re not supposed to kick with the toes in football. I came back to Ireland and I got accepted into the new frontiers programme, which helped me develop my business model and my target market. Luckily enough, I got into phase two of new frontiers. So I think 12 got selected out of maybe 70 or 80 applicants. So I was delighted there because we got funding for the project as well and it helped me kick off but so our main objective was to find a colour coded football boot which after drawing many pictures badly, I decided to hire a designer. Her name is Lauren Burke and she’s based in County Roscommon. So she designed eight different pairs of football boots for us. Instead of me choosing my favourite, I decided to show the children at a summer camp we were doing in Westmeath, the different designs and let them choose their favourite. So there was about 100 kids on that camp. My favourite actually came for two out of the eight. The winner was the design we have now with the dots. So we tested it out and that was something that I learned on the new frontiers programme, test and test and test and are they comfortable? Do the kids like them? We continued the venture from there. But it took us eight different manufacturers or suppliers. I got it wrong seven times before I finally got it right. The 8th time, so as they say 8 time lucky. Eventually, in May 2022, we finally launched the Klaas Kickz, football boots. So again, it’s all about trying to make the kids more confident having that positive start to football. I just think if you have a positive start, and you can learn and perceive yourself to be really good at something, you’re more likely to stick at it, be more healthy, have more fun, make more friends. That’s so important as well, the friends part. I’m 30 years old now. I think most of my friends would be into football. So you just make lifelong friends from when you’re younger. I think that’s so important, just having a good experience, I suppose not being negative. But if you had a bad experience with sport at the start, it could turn you off sport altogether and you could end up living in a more sedentary lifestyle and not wanting to play sports. So I just think that the early ages between four and 10, when you’re starting off football, that’s what we’re trying to achieve.” added Mark.

The journey started long back for Mark. The kick off happened for him at the age of 4. It is very interesting to see how things shape up in the long run. Mark spoke about why it is called Klaas Kickz and his association with football for all these years.

“Yeah, I suppose it all started for me when I was about four or five. I used to meet up my dad every Sunday, and we bring our football with us everywhere we went. My dad’s name is Klaas. That’s where the Klaas Kickz comes from. I created a bond with my dad through football. I’m hoping that this can do the same with parent and child all around Ireland and even the world. My dad wasn’t big into football until I was big into football. But he knew the importance of playing, activities and being outside in fresh air. So then after that I moved on and I joined my first football team. I think I was about six or seven. I was living in Dublin at the time and I joined because my best friend at the time joined football as well. So we both had absolutely great time. We were just hooked on to football for the rest of our lives. We used to do the mini leagues every summer and because we started so young, we kind of had an advantage on the other kids. We just kind of picked up football really easy. We used to be coming home with a medal and trophy every summer at the mini leagues. Once you get that first medal or trophy, you just feel amazing inside. ” Mark spoke about his early encounter with this beautiful game.

Mark also emphasised on the fact that it is not about winning or losing, however it’s about being more confident.

Mark joined Shelbourne FC, when he was 16. He spoke about the influence of his mother as well. “My mom was actually a big part in this as well because she always used to bring me up to Dublin when we were living in Westmeath. She bring me up three times a week. I always say that the parents are so important, if the parent wants the kids to do well. They’ve shown that support and bringing them up to the football is so important. I played with Shelbourne FC for a while and was trying to break into the first team. A few years later, I joined Longford Town FC U19s. I made one first team appearance for Longford Town. I got a chance to represent Ireland for the college’s squad in 2015 and 2016. We played against France, Scotland and Wales and then just having that professional setup was absolutely amazing. I was the captain of my college team at Sligo as well, where I studied business and sport. That kind of gave me a hunger for business as well. But again, anytime I’d meet someone in the town that always kind of talked to me about football, and that made me feel confident. So again, I’m just trying to kind of give back to the kids, how I felt through football. Hopefully, they can have that, that experience as well. But again, it’s not about being a footballer or going on and live in that football life, the confidence that you can take from sports, and then bring it into whatever you want to be in when you want to be a doctor or whatever you want to be in your life. Use the confidence that you learn from sport. I’ve been coaching for the last 10-12 years in America, I was in California, the East Coast of America, and New York, just great experience as well. I always tell people to travel because it opens your mind to so many things. You learn so many things about different cultures. Even football is different over there as well, they call it soccer. Pinnies is a word for bibs. Cleats is the word for football boots. So originally Klaas Kickz was gonna be called ‘My first cleat’. That’s, that’s how it’s come since then, basically just live in the football life.”

Klaas Kickz use colour coded football boots to help kids understand the which part of the foot should be used for each move or skill.

“So one of the big problems that we’re trying to tackle is misunderstanding of instruction. So as a coach, we’d say use the inside, use the outside, use the sole, use the laces. Imagine if your kids don’t know football, and you’ve never heard of inside, outside, it can be quite confusing. But one of the things that kids learn from a very young age is colours, even in play schools, red, blue, green.”

“So now we have different panels on the boots. So for example, we pass with the inside, which is green, we shoot with blue, which is the top of the inside, which is also very hard to explain to a young child can use the top of the inside. You have to go down and touch the different parts of your foot that you want them to use. But now they just have to look down and it makes it so much simpler. And then one thing that people may not know if they’re not into football, is that you’re not supposed to kick with the toe, because it’s a bad habit. And it can cause injury if you kick with the toe too hard. So that’s now red. So we have kind of like traffic light system. red means stop. Green means go. And then there’s other colours in different areas. ” added Mark.

Klaas Kickz is also doing primary school programmes. Mark mentioned that they do six week programmes in primary skills for classes between junior infants and second class. Then we also do third to sixth without the boots as well. I’m a very high energy coach, I like to make as fun as possible, celebrating everyone’s little wins. Mark is hoping to spread their brand around Ireland and the world. Talking about the cost of the programme, he explained “the cost is kind of dependent on how many kids there are. So sometimes we have a small school with 40 kids and then we had a quote yesterday for 196 kids. At the moment, we are trying to spread the message.”

The word has started spreading for Mark and Klaas Kickz. Mark was delighted to talk about the next big thing for them. “We also have some very exciting news to share with a League of Ireland team soon. I won’t tell you exactly right now until it’s confirmed. But we hope to see the League of Ireland teams and the club’s using them for their underage academies as well.”

The boots are designed in County Roscommon and manufactured in Asia. They are currently sold at 39.99 Euros at the shops and online as well.

They are looking at conducting programmes in at least 50 schools this year and also selling around 5000 boots in 2023. The target looks to be an achievable one. Also keeping in mind that League of Ireland will be kicking off this season on a new high and the FIFA Women’s World Cup, with the Ireland team participating in it, is scheduled to start mid year. Already there is a lot of interest for the World Cup game as the inaugural game between Australia and Ireland is now moved to one of the biggest stadiums in Australia.

Mark won award at the recent National Startup Awards as well. He spoke about the support received from the Startup ecosystem in Ireland which has played a crucial role in the growth of Klaas Kickz.

“So for the National startup awards, we got shortlisted in the regional startup Awards, which was the rest of Leinster I think Dublin’s in a separate category and then the rest of Leinster. So we’ve seen our name there in the top eight of that category. I was absolutely delighted to be in the top eight there and the regional and then I got an email the next day. It said, Congratulations, you’ve been selected in the national startup awards. So I was over the moon I remember I was in the car, delivering boots at the time. I like to celebrate all my wins. So did a little first pump, as you will when you score a goal. So then we went up and obviously that’s where I met yourself as well as the startup awards. I was feeling quite nervous sitting there, but I wasn’t expecting anything. Just absolutely, absolutely over the moon just to get that recognition in especially in the first year and meeting all different business owners at it. It was absolutely fantastic. I suppose back to the sports from the layout, Local Enterprise Office, Enterprise Ireland just really supported us the whole way New Frontiers with our funding. You get 15,000 there and six instalments and I just trying to think of what or how I would have made this a reality without the support of the local enterprise. We also received a prime and grants that, again helped us further get our website and the branding done. That’s something that we really took like three or four months with a guy called Fanon. He’s absolutely amazed and understands football understands the kids, and he was able to send out a message that’s getting through to to the kids, which is, which is fantastic. I’m in a group as well called the BNI, which we we work together as a team 40 of us try and help each other out. The support that I’m getting there is absolutely amazing. We have an investor also on board now. We have the brains behind the operation, and I do the coaching. Yeah, just great that I’m not on my own anymore and as like teamwork makes the dream work, I heard a kid say yesterday. So again, we’re slowly building our team. And it’s exciting times ahead for Klaas Kickz.”

It is great to see how a simple concept is developed into a startup. The next couple of years will be crucial for Klaas Kickz and will be interesting to see how things go for Mark and team. I hope Klaas Kickz gets spread across the other teams in League of Ireland and in academies of Premier League, La Liga, Bundesliga. Football actually has got a lot of potential and t’s just a matter of being at the right place at the right time.

“teamwork makes the dream work”

You can read more about Klaas Kickz here:-

Klass Kickz

(Interview taken during 1st week of Nov, 2020) Candid conversation with Jeri Ellsworth, a high school drop out, American Entrepreneur, Inventor and currently the Co Founder & CEO of Tilt Five, Augmented Reality Gaming Startup. She has worked on computer chips which has supported gaming devices, set top boxes and even rocket launches.

This is the 1st of the 5 episodes.

In this episode, Jeri shares the story of her adventures with dirt car racing, learning the basic of building and racing cars from Duke Southard, selling computers through her initial entrepreneurial journey , “Computers Made Easy”, the humbling moments, life lessons and much more.

To read more about Jeri Ellsworth:

Wikipedia

https://www.jeriellsworth.com/

PAC Talks with Jeri Ellsworth 2019

To read more about the gaming startup Tilt Five: https://www.tiltfive.com/

Listen to the podcast on Apple / Spotify. You can watch this interview on YouTube as well.

0:00 Introduction 1:40 Looking back at the Journey so far 5:37 Self reliant, being terrified while getting into new ventures 7:40 Dirt Car Racing 16:30 Barber shop converted to Computers Made Easy 20:15 Help from across the road, Computers Made Easy 28:50 “I have arrived” , humbling experiences, you never arrive

In this latest edition of PAC Talks, it was a pleasure to interview one of the top 20 Artificial Intelligence startups in India.

Data Science Wizards (DSW) is a very young company, started in 2019, which is growing at a steady pace in the right direction. I met with the team, Pritesh Tiwari , Founder & Chief Data Scientist, Sandeep Khuperkar, Co founder & CEO and Sandhya Oza, Chief Project Officer at their European office that is based out of the startup incubation centre, National College of Ireland, Dublin .

You can listen to the detailed interview where we spoke a lot about data science, Unify AI, current tech space, digital transformation journey and lot more on the PAC Talks podcast available on Apple, Spotify.

The key message through out the interview shared by DSW core team-

“The vision of our company is make Artificial Intelligence and Data Science available for everyone. It should not be a luxury. ”

Sandhya, the Chief Project Officer of DSW shared her thoughts about her journey with data and women in data science:

So being a tech graduate back in 2015, I have always been interested about technology. I have always been fascinated about data science, artificial intelligence and data science Technologies are since 2016. So since then I started learning Python. I’ve always been into technology role and I was fortunate to work with the data science teams for almost like four years, managing multiple projects through, you know, different levels. Sandhya also spoke about the changing landscape for women in technology. “There is a shortage of women in data science specifically. But I think now, with much of awareness, lot of courses and all those things, women are leading at a major forefront.” she added.

Taking about the Vision of Data Science Wizards, Pritesh shared the thought of their startup in detail. “See the vision of our company is first of all to make AI and data science available for everybody. It shouldn’t be a luxury anymore. If we see in today’s time people who has lots of data like the big enterprises, they are leveraging artificial intelligence, data science and the smaller companies who are also generating data at a faster pace, they are not able to make use of here. Our vision is that AI should be available for everybody. Different different companies have different kind of a use cases like when we see if you are a very small organization or very bigger organization, you might be leveraging AI by building machine learning models or AI Architectures or probably you might be also leveraging your data through some dashboarding. So whatever you want to do with the data that you have in place, we can help you with through our unifyAI. So that is a reason in today’s time, if you see on our website, you might be seeing different kind of products that we have and different services that was at the very beginning when we started. But since 2021, we started working on our platform called asUnifyAI that summarizes, that brings all of this journey that we are talking about,like extracting the data, bringing data together into one place, building machine learning models, deploying models, monitoring everything through one single platform… We want to take this platform to all companies regardless if they are small or big , if they are in data science or AI journey then they can utilise our platform.“

We did have a discussion about how social media platforms use the usage data pattern to push content. “Initially it is you who is deciding what type of videos you want to watch , later on it is the platform which tell you what kind of videos and content you should watch. It is entirely driven by the platform” said Pritesh on this topic.

Sandeep highlighted the importance of AAA model for the growth and development of AI usage. ” This model is like, first a is awareness, second is acceptance and then finally adoption” he added. What we are doing is we are creating this entire recipe in a such an integrated fashion, that there is a modularity. There is a flexibility, there is a choice but enterprise customer gets a platform to launch their AI enabled used cases because there is too many technology moving parts, too many skill sets which needs to build this entire Journey. So our broader vision is that we are saying that you have a used case, you have data we have a platform for you to go. That’s the core of AI and it’s not that we are just integrating technology. What we are doing is we are helping them to integrate their landscape supported by the technologies and that’s unify all put together. “

One key point highlighted by the DSW team is about democratising the use of AI. The skills, technology and platforms required to leverage comes at a cost. DSW with the Unify AI platform says will become a cost effective yet proven ready to use platform for all data related solutions.

With lot happening around the tech space in the recent months and years, it will be interesting to follow the journey of Data Science Wizards and the magic they manage to do with data.

You can visit Data Science Wizards website to know more about the team and their offerings.

Smoothies, protein shakes, home made juices are all now a big part of the healthy diet regime. In the last 4-5 years , there has been a steady growth in awareness and adaptability of healthy lifestyle. This accelerated in the last 2 years when everyone was in the run to improve their immunity levels.

Work from home has helped in inculcating this to a certain extent as well. But now with most of the offices slowly getting back to a hybrid model, you are required to be in the office for a day or two in a week or a month. Corporate offices and co working spaces do have canteens to help you get that quick meal or even a healthy salad. Even with all the spread available in canteen , you would prefer to have the protein shake or specially blended smoothie.

There is definitely a small concern with the blenders. Let it be for office use or at home, the moment a blender is switched on the whole house comes to know about it. Now with WFH, if you forget to mute the meeting call then your clients or colleagues also know it is time for you to shake it up :). This can be well avoided if it is only one person WFH but with households who have 2 or 3 people logged in, it definitely is an irritant factor.

So here comes a brand who is asking you to not get mad about this , and says that the solution to this is to use MAD (Magnetic Air Drive) technology to operate their ‘noiseless’ blender.

Millo, started in 2016, is an award winning brand based out of Vilnius, Lithuania. One of the many promising startups based in the Baltic states.

In the last four years, the team at Millo have worked on tweaking the product and finally launched the latest edition this week. They are calling it Millo Air, the next-gen smart wireless blender.

In this edition of PAC Talks, Adam Trakšelis , the founder and CEO of Millo Appliances spoke about his entrepreneurial journey, how it all started and the future plans of designing a complete smart kitchen.

Listen to the podcast where Adam has shared in detail about this whole interesting tech product and his upcoming plans. Spotify, Apple

“We are pushing the barriers of new generation kitchen appliances, eventually want to implement the base part to the kitchen table.”

“I was into more traditional kind of entrepreneurship doing interior design and that kind of business. At some point, I started looking for ideas that can scale globally. Something that can be created in this small country and scaled for the whole world. One of the ideas that came to my mind is to create the best blender. To solve the problem of having a noisy blender at home and doing sports and drinking sports shakes. That became a hobby and eventually a day and night activity for me. “

This food tech startup has already won awards which include the Amazon Innovation Award.

Adam calls the Millo Air, the 2.0 version as the ‘Silent Blender’. He demonstrated this during the interview and even at 12000 rpm, there was hardly any sound. The final version product is at 15000 rpm. The initial blender from Millo was developed with a focus on user experience, design and convenience. The team behind this wanted to improve this offering and has now launched the new version where they are using the help of a magnetic drive to rotate the blades. There is no motor involved in this now. So the noise levels have reduced drastically in the latest version. The core of the product is a magnetic air drive with a stator.

“We generate magnetic field that spins the permanent magnets inside of the blending lid. There is only a tiny bit of noise coming from the device.” added Adam while demonstrating Millo Air.

Safety was another factor emphasised by Adam. He mentioned that the device can be disconnected from the base at any point and the blade will stop automatically.

The idea of having user specific lids and setting the blending options according to that is an interesting feature. It looks like the mobile app can track this and set the device accordingly.

“The level of consistency of smoothie can be set. The blender will stop at the right time and you will get the smoothie as per your requirement. It is kind of learning for both the user and the technology to get it right. Once you get it as per your preference then this can be set as the user specific choice.” said Adam about the way in which user specific preset modes can be set in the blender. He went on to explain that the energy used by the device to blend is the factor used to determine the texture of the smoothie.

The charging point of Millo comes as a magnetic hook that can be used to hang the base. So it acts up as a charger and a hook. When fully charged, the blender can churn out around 10 smoothies. This will help the user to carry it to his office or while going on a hike or camp.

Talking about the price point, he mentioned that the blender is priced at 299 EUR and is positioned as a premium product in the upper market segment. “It is not that we are greedy. But the technology, battery, magnet, etc. itself is costly. ” concluded Adam.

The blender is dishwasher safe. The first version of the blender has sold around 1000 units and he mentioned that the numbers were low as the production was not scaled during the pandemic. The latest version of the product is now available on the kickstarter platform and distribution available globally.

The team at Millo is working on a coffee grinder as well. He mentioned that it will be a good one for speciality coffee aficionados. The same base of blender can be used for coffee grinder.

Adam shared his vision of Millo. The plan is to build smart tech kitchen which will be sustainable , use recycled products and that reduces requirement of number of utensils and devices inside the kitchen.

The way new homes and offices have charging point for electric vehicles, future kitchens might come with pre fixed charging points for devices like Millo.

Smart kitchen is the future. Robot chefs, smart appliances, automated recipes, cook top island tables and lot more is happening. Just hoping that we do not miss the fun of human cooking, the hacks done to escape smoke alarms, the occasional burning of the food ,etc. Lets see how things shape up with this Smart kitchen world. A future with weekday tech cooking and weekend clever cooking may be the way going forward :).

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You can read more about Millo here.

The startups based out of Baltic states have started making their presence felt in the global market and will be interesting to keep a watch on the upcoming ones from here.

As per the publications by FIFA, there are 5 billion football fans around the world. The sport with the biggest fan following.

Digital penetration has been on an upward trajectory for the last 6-8 years in general and FIFA came out with the numbers which show it is the case with football fans as well. 83% of football fans use smartphone while watching television.

Companies have been tapping into this huge sports entertainment market. Sports betting companies and sports fantasy apps have made lot of in roads to reach out to the avid fans. The fantasy app market stands at approximate 20-23 Bn USD. The yearly growth as per various reports show it to be around 6-10% CAGR, which is phenomenal.

One thing the Sports betting companies have been trying to do is bring out the social cause and make it normal to bet / look less ‘taboo’.

In this edition of PAC Talks, I spoke to Alan Loughrey, Founder of Futnut App. Alan founded this football fantasy app start-up four years ago with a key thought in his mind.

“Futnut’s mission is to enable football fans to prove their knowledge in a fun, challenging and safe way. ”

You can listen to this podcast (PAC Talks with VJCV) on Apple, Spotify or watch the interview on YouTube.

Talking about the idea behind the concept of Futnut, Alan mentioned that there is a huge audience out in the market & football is life for them. He added that the fans in UK&I alone are around 22 million , which comprises of 11 million avid fans.

“They are all consuming content, following the teams, going to games, it is a social avenue for people – going to pub watch the game, etc. While doing that they are constantly trading opinions and knowledge, up until now lot of that has been in ether. Who actually knows his football, is it the one who is always yapping or the quiet guy, whereas now you can come in to Futnut , make your predictions and see how you rank against everybody else. So now the talking is over and let us see who actually knows their football. ” – Alan Loughrey.

“Who says that in order to play the odds or probability , you have to risk money. We are just used to that and that can be changed.”

Alan thinks there is a market for a safe & socially inclusive way to prove your football knowledge and the current per user engagement session of Futnut is pointing towards this direction.

One of the things that got my attention is the way in which Futnut is trying to provide a platform which can give the football fan the thrill of showcasing his knowledge , winning against other users and still do not have an impact on the pocket. Yes, there are apps like Fantasy Premier League, ESPN sports fantasy, etc. which are also in similar space but at times the user feels that too much time and energy is required to keep up with the team changes, use of chips, etc. in these apps.

Alan shared the thought on Why Futnut ? :-

The features currently available on the Futnut app includes NAP, Banker predictions, etc. Their website shares a detailed explanation of how it works.

In addition to this, Futnut also allow users to set up private leagues where friends can come together and play. They can also look at putting 5 Euros or 10 Euros and set up a prize for the winners. This can be also used for charity , fund raisers, etc. The money remains among the friends. Alan added that Futnut does not take any money from this and they just take a set up fee for private leagues.

Futnut had touched 1000 users during the Euro Cup and has an average of around 300-500 users now. The per user engaged sessions stood at 26 for the month of April 2022 and Alan is all smiles while saying that this is a real positive sign of things to come in the future.

Futnut was also part of the Enterprise Ireland’s New Frontier Program. Alan mentioned that this helped him to focus more on the app, research, build business plans, get help from experts for marketing , messaging, etc., got introduction to people who can help.

The biggest football extravaganza is around the corner and talking about his plans for the big event , Alan added:- “World Cup is a great example of an event that people can use in the private league side of things. It is already time boxed for 6 weeks. For private leagues, the engagement is more when it is a short time boxed events. It is a big opportunity for clubs to target World Cup to raise funds. Clubs can look at buying lands for pitches, updating gyms, etc. It will be a great opportunity for them to leverage the competition and use Futnut platform to do it successfully.”

The US market is now of the biggest when it comes to fantasy sports app. Alan is keeping an eye at the developments in US and is hopeful that soccer will scale up in the coming years there. He added that MLS has started growing and with the World Cup scheduled to take place in US in 2026, it will be a good market for Futnut in the long run.

Futnut , based of Galway, Ireland, is bootstrapped for now and Alan has started to look for raising seed fund of around 500k Euros now and overall around 1.1 Million Euros in the next couple of years . Alan wants to get investors with similar thought process to come on board and join his journey. His focus is to get a tech lead, marketing head, BDMs, etc. The plan to have a team of around 7 and scale it to 25 in the next three years.

“There are no straps left on my boots now. My boots are falling off. I am looking for investors.”

It is very well aware to Alan there are many other apps in the market in this segment and he says that it is a testament that they are in the right space.

Premier League will be coming to close this month along with other leagues and championships as well. The next 2 months will be the time for Futnut to make the required tweaks, look at scaling , make more users aware of the app, get associations with football clubs, brands, etc. and create the launch pad to get going from the upcoming season.

Alan and Futnut is a great example of someone following the curiosity path and coming out with solutions. It is very interesting to see how Alan has managed to run the show single handedly till now and will be great to follow the journey of Futnut in the coming years.

You can read more about the App: https://futnut.app/

Smart phones, Smart TVs and lot of Smart devices around us like wearables, kitchen appliances, etc. Brands are steadily building a Smart ecosystem around us.

Why not use a similar product for learning and improving table tennis ? Yes, there are already startups helping in various sports working on real time analytics, feedback, etc. But only handful of brands have ventured into technology based table tennis training.

I first spoke to Amir in 2019 and learned about him, his thoughts and reasons behind starting FastPong.

Amir Kamandi, the founder and CEO of FastPong will be unveiling his product to the global audience on 6th April, 2022. A former junior national player of Iran, Amir went on to study sports science at Seoul National University in Korea. He began to work on a project with researchers on how to train table tennis more effectively than the existing methods.

In this edition of PAC Talks, Amir Kamandi spoke about the global launch, readiness of the product, collaboration with Samsung Table Tennis team, how gamification and digitisation can urge younger generation to take up table tennis, etc. You can listen to talk here : Apple, Spotify or watch here: YouTube

Amir added that the research showed visual target stimulus training was an effective method for improving accuracy, decision making and speed for table tennis players. From this idea, combined with his experience of the table tennis industry, he went on to begin a start-up company FastPong in South Korea, a country renowned for its support of new technology and startups.

FastPong is a patented high tech table tennis training system that combines custom hardware and software. It is designed to provide more effective training for players of all levels. Multiple bright dynamic targets (effective in improving speed, accuracy and decision making in sports training) give visual feedback showing where the ball hits and data is collected via Bluetooth on the mobile app, for real-time metrics and historical analysis. Users can record and analyse their training history, progress and performance.

As per Amir, the assembling of the panels on top of the table tennis board takes 45 seconds to 1 minute. The mobile application gets connected with the help of bluetooth and the user can get real time feedback which can even be shared with coaches.

The product will be launched this week at a price point of around 2200 EUR. It is great to see the persistence showed by Amir and his team in bringing out this product. The journey of 6-7 years was not at all easy but with the passion to Win, the hurdles were surpassed and now all set to see orders coming in from across the globe.

A startup which combines hardware and software. Data analytics supported by Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning. Fast Pong has definitely got a good product. It was a pleasure talking to Amir Kamandi and hope to see this startup going places in the coming years. For someone who has lifted trophies and collected certificates in his young age for winning table tennis matches , it is a great feeling for Amir to get accolades and appreciations from the table tennis and startup fraternity.

You can read more about FastPong here: https://fastpong.com

29th June, 1993 – The day that changed the world for Tony.

Tony Kitous, the food entrepreneur leased his first restaurant on this day. From Tony , the teenager who visited UK to Tony Kitous, the person who built a food empire – the story spread across last four decades is an inspirational one.

The story of Tony is well known to the people who have been following the presence of Lebanese food in UK. He was 18 years old while visiting the United Kingdom in 1988. It was a short vacation trip from his home in Algeria with just 70 Pounds in his pocket. Tony who had travelled with his friend , slept at the Victoria train station to ensure that they save enough money. During this trip, Tony realised and understood that the UK is the place for him.

In this edition of PAC Talks, Tony shared his story and the amazing journey spread across four decades. You can listen to the podcast where Tony spoke about his life, experiences, food, cuisines, how I came to know about this brand, Tony’s response, etc. A fun conversation with Tony Kitous. You can find it in all podcast channels: PAC Talks with VJCV. Click here for Apple Podcast, Spotify. Watch the interview on YouTube.

The highlights of the talk is captured in this article:

The eldest in the family of seven siblings, Tony stayed in a 3 bedroom apartment in Algeria during his childhood days along with his parents and grand mother. Tony still remembers the way in which the big family was staying in the house and as the eldest brother everyone was looking up to him. During late 1970s , his local club was one of the best clubs in Algeria and all the matches were sold out. The stadium was across the road from his house and Tony, after his school, used to sell food, beverages and tickets during the match day.

“I grew up in the small streets of Algeria, selling sandwiches, tickets, lemonades and it was an amazing experience. The best and biggest experience is what we learn on the streets.”

For someone who had ‘tasted’ entrepreneurship at a very early age of 8 in the streets of Algeria, the urge to work hard and make profit was not new.

Once he decided that UK is going to be part of his long term goal plans, he needed the blessings of his parents. So while Tony was busy picking up almost all possible work in UK , he had the tough task of convincing his parents to let him stay in UK and try to make a living.

Tony spend four years before starting his own restaurant. He said that at that time all his friends were attending college to become doctors, engineers, etc. There was pressure on him to make sure by the time they pass out from colleges, he had a good job.

To the question: what were you doing for four years before opening the first restaurant ? , Tony replied that I was always planning and working hard.

Mr. Kitous worked for almost 90 hours every week for 4-4.5 years.

“Looking back, working 90 hours every week, was it difficult ? No. I enjoyed it”

June, 1993 : The last week of the month. The restaurant Tony was working did not open for 3-4 days. By now, Tony’s parents had agreed to him staying back in UK. Tony went and met the landlord, requested to give him an opportunity to run that restaurant in Wigmore Street, London. The landlord believed in caliber of that 22 year old boy, Tony and rest is history.

This was the first restaurant by Tony and is called Levant. It took 15 years for him to open the flagship restaurant , Comptoir Libanais. The name meant Canteen of Lebanon and was opened in 2008. The restaurant is now spread across the UK and also has a presence in Netherlands. Comptoir Libanais is a colourful restaurant with beautiful ambience and great spread of mediterranean cuisine. Tony shared the thought behind opening this brand. He wanted people from all parts of society to walk into the restaurant and experience the Middle East culture and cuisine.

The amazing taste of all these recipes comes from someone who has not gone through any formal education in cooking. A self taught chef Tony likes to play around and experiment with the flavours of food

“For me the dish is the table. I love to mix food, mix flavours from fresh salads, small pastries to dips like aubergine dips, chick pea dips. It is not one or two dish,I fill the table. “

Tony went ahead and opened three more separate brands. One of them is Kenza, a fine dine restaurant.

Yalla Yalla (Lebanese Kitchen) is another one which is inspired by the generosity of grandmothers.

“In our culture, we dress the table with food. That is how we show generosity. ” added Tony about the way in which he wanted people to understand the Middle East food culture.

Another brand was opened to give the experience of Lebanese Village Food called Shawa.

“I wanted to do to Shawarma what Americans did to burgers. “

He wants people to realise that Shawarma is one of the very few healthy fast food options available. Tony himself goes on a strict diet when he prepares for his marathons / ultra marathons and gets his share of protein from Shawarma.

Comptoir Libanais is now a listed brand in the Alternative Investment Market of the London Stock Exchange. The restaurant has fans from across the walks of life. Tony credited his current and past team members for all the achievements of his restaurants.

The plethora of dishes churned out by Tony did finally push himself to write. He took help from his friend, Dan Lepard, who is in himself a celebrity chef to publish his first book. So far, Tony has published three cook books. I managed to glance through few recipes while having my food at the Canteen of Lebanon at their Dubai airport franchise. Some interesting set of recipes for all types of cooks.

“This is my goal. I want to enter people’s home with our cook book. I am promoting our food and culture.

Covid hit his business as well. But they did everything that was possible in his hands to stay afloat. Personally he ensured to stay fit and keep him mind fresh to focus on the task in his hands. With the help and much compulsion from his team, they decided to launch a mobile app. This helped to get good business during these tough times. Tony acknowledges that Covid is still not over and the next couple of years needs cautious planning. The restaurant that was opened in Dubai airport terminal 3 in the A wing just before Covid was closed due to Covid . It finally reopened couple of months ago to the customers.

The future plans are already in place. The flagship restaurant will be soon seen in Abu Dhabi and Doha airport by the mid of 2022. Football World Cup travellers to Doha can definitely have their share of experience with this brand. Talking about the influence of technology, Tony added “Technology comes with a price and it is difficult for small restaurants to embrace technology. But going forward, restaurants might witness more of robots, augmented reality, etc.”

This story of the boy moving from Algeria to UK made me to compare Tony’s journey with the famous footballer Riyad Mahrez. “Riyad Mahrez is a very humble and great person” added Tony. But he mentioned that the comparison does not stand good. It was well explained by Tony as to the shelf life of a football player is small while someone in a business especially into restaurants do not have an expiry date. But is it that easy to establish a restaurant brand as well ?

“It is about Passion. Whatever you do in life there are two ways of looking at it – Very Hard and Very Easy, with a fine balance. If we choose the easy path it is not because its easy but you are determined and obsessed to achieve. It is very hard because you think it is hard.”

“I am dreaming much more than when I was a kid and don’t want to stop dreaming. I do not feel like I have achieved.” Tony gave a great message to all the readers and listeners while adding that it took ‘60 years of work’ for him to reach to this point:

“Keep Dreaming, Be Obsessed”

The Story of Tony Kitous is a prime example of following the Passion and making it count despite all odds. From working 90 hours a week, leasing a restaurant to now owning around 30 restaurants spread across the UK, UAE and Netherlands – the journey is full of flavours.

You can read more about Tony Kitous here: http://tonykitous.com/

Alcohol free / low alcohol (any beer with less than 0.5% ABV) beers, the NO-LO category is a new niche segment which has seen consistent growth in the last couple of years. The current approximate size of the no-lo beer category is 15 Bn USD and estimated to reach up to 25 Bn USD by 2025.

In this edition of PAC Talks, Zoey Henderson the founder of Fungtn spoke about her journey : from managing cafes, owning cafes, being a consultant to how she experimented and started the functional beer brand to keep herself busy during the lockdown.

You can listen to this interesting conversation with Zoey where she spoke about the changing drinking habits of people across different global markets, Positive Wellness, Mindful Drinking, No-Lo Alcohol category, how big brands will help the overall growth of this segment, functional benefits of mushroom beer, the current and future plans of Fungtn and a lot more in my podcast (PAC Talks with VJCV) on Apple, Spotify , YouTube.

I was drinking lot of alcohol free beers as my husband and myself had decided to take a break from alcohol. I was sitting in my garden, during March 2020, drinking alcohol free beers in the afternoon. I had mushroom coffee in the morning. I wanted more mushroom in food and was thinking about what can I put it in ? I just took the mushroom powder and stirred into the beer. Once it settled down, the taste was good.”

Zoey Henderson has created a niche within this niche and is giving people one more option, a chance to pick up an adaptogenic functional low alcohol beer.

Sitting in her house in North Wales, United Kingdom, Zoey is single handedly managing Fungtn, a craft beer brand. A myco adaptogenic low alcohol beer brand born in North Wales, courtesy an experiment with mushroom and beer.

It is always interesting to observe how people sometimes look back to the start of their career and have a big smile. Straight out of the university, Zoey got a chance to work with an advertising agency for a short period. She started her first business when she was 26. Zoey opened a smoothie / fruit bar called Moosh and later owned a coffee shop called Slate Coffee, in the east of London. Later on she picked up the mantle of consulting to help brands understand the nuances of marketing, simultaneously promoting and talking about positive wellness and mindful drinking. In the midst of all these, Zoey also managed events and festivals and restaurant groups. This give her an all around experience of the hospitality industry.

This experience helped Zoey to understand the consumers, track the change in the habits of people, and also her initial stint with advertising made sure that the focus on brand elements and brand building of Fungtn was given equal importance as the taste and quality of the product.

I came across these functional mushrooms eight years ago. They are called the adaptogens. I was quite stressed and was looking for herbal remedies. I researched them and sparked interest. These mushrooms are used in super foods for thousands of years.

As of now, Fungtn has the unique proposition of being the only functional beer in the market made from mushrooms. The name Fungtn comes from a combination of ‘Functional and Fungi’.

Zoey added that this is an unusual concept for some people. People have their thoughts about the beer – will it taste like mushroom ? will it get me high ? and she said the answer for both questions are No.

Functional mushrooms known as Adaptogens are simply herbs and fungi that contain additional compounds. They give nutrition that help the body adapt to stress and keep mind & body on good form.

The market for No-Lo alcohol beer has slowly and steadily seen an adaptation from consumers. The big brands like Heineken, Carlsberg have spent loads of money in bringing out their own version of 0.0 beers and an equal amount in marketing them. It was just few months ago when the famous Guinness Beer also joined this party.

The common norm that parties, functions, celebrations, etc always needs alcohol and the way big brands market around this concept has been there for ages. Now people have started to look for options. Whether the celebration can be more inclusive or have more options ?

No-lo alcohol beers have started making their presence felt in this. There are a handful of brands who have brought out 0.0 Wine and Gin as well. So this space is growing.

As per the reports, Millennials are the major target segment of this beer category. This might be because of their move towards a more responsible and healthy lifestyle.

Zoey is very happy to see the big brands spending money on marketing this category. As per her, the market will start moving when it becomes normal to drink an alcohol free drink. The big brands will have a huge role to play in making this happen.

It is a great indication that the Big Boys are joining in and kind of thinking we need to step up. Brilliant, come in , spend your millions in marketing to help and make alcohol free drinking main stream.

This in turn will increase the shelf space in the supermarkets for this category. There are already two alcohol free licenses which has opened up in London.

People who wanted to positively, actively do something to help. What is the easiest way to do that, by focusing on what you eat and drink. The food and drinks they consume have a direct effect in their health. So if we can start integrating healthier, botanicals, herbs, adaptogens into those foods and drinks then it is a feature and people are moving towards it.

Another important point mentioned by Zoey was about the way in which market should move ahead in the coming years. She said that it is about giving a choice to consumer and be flexible. Mindful drinking has been in the mind of many consumers. So it is all about the balancing act. Overall this helps to move towards a positive wellness.

In addition to this , she also emphasised on the importance of educating the Waiters. If a customer asks for a soft drink then try to give them an option of non alcoholic beers which might in turn help in getting them spend more time and money on food and beverage compared to just drinking one or two glasses of juice or soda which might kill the appetite as well.

Currently three variants of Fungtn made out of three types of mushrooms, Reishi, Lions Mane and Chaga, are available in the market. These beers have less than 0.5% ABV (Alcohol By Volume).

It is a matter of science. Molecules and elements come together to make flavour profiles. We just need to find the science to work out what it is.

Talking about sales, Zoey mentioned that over the summer , the sales of Reishi went up as it is lighter, during winter & Christmas, the sales of Chaga went up and Lions Mane has been our classic IPA which goes well across seasons.

Zoey is also excited about her NPD. The focus is to bring out a completely alcohol free beer. One of the main reasons for this is to tap into the Middle East market. She spoke about the way in which the Middle East market has started adopting the social aspects of celebration minus the alcohol. The younger generation in this market wants to enjoy but staying true to their traditional and cultural values. Alcohol free beers will be a great offering to this market who have not tasted beers but now has an opportunity to experience a zero alcohol beer.

She is also going to embark on a research project with a university in North Wales and another Welsh business that cultivates mushrooms to look at how more tailored extracts of mushrooms can be derived which enables to talk about the benefits of Vitamins and functions about them.

With the Lions Mane IPA already winning awards, the future plan is to expand to new markets. Fungtn is now available in Europe and Singapore. Plans are already in place to start the sales in the USA and Canada followed by Australia and other markets.

Fungtn started as a bootstrapped startup and got some support from the government. Currently has 2 angel investors. This week is going to be an important one for Zoey and Fungtn. The fund raising is happening and she is looking to raise a little more than 200k Pounds.

Zoey is looking to expand her business, recruit people, move from a brand completely managed by one woman to having people employed to support the growth of the brand.

The future will be all about integration, as always, bringing together the two worlds. When I go into a bar , I want to see half the menu with alcohol free and half the menu with alcohol. It is about giving the flexibility. There are still people who have a healthier relationship with alcohol.

I am sure , Zoey and Fungtn are going to have a roller coaster ride for the next couple of years in taking this Mushroom revolution to the next level. One thing for sure , the celebration of each milestone will see lot of alcohol free beers getting opened up. It is definitely a great time to get into this category and hope to see them growing steadily & going places.

You can read more about Fungtn here.

Thank you to Nicola and The Virgin Mary Bar for making me aware about brand Fungtn.