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One of the coolest new companies in the space of design, Figma has quickly become the dominant player in its space, with its highly collaborative, cloud-based design & prototyping functionalities.

We talk about Noah’s early passion for design, his varied design experiences, joining Figma and building the highly talented teams making design accessible to everyone!

This should be a fun one for anyone who loves design across the physical & digital world!

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The Auto Industry is in a position that it’s never been with global shutdowns, development of new technology, and changing consumer preferences.

Global competition is expected to keep rising as Chinese auto manufacturers aim to expand beyond its vast domestic market.

Recently, SUV's outsold sedans two to one and this shift shows little sign of stopping. Customers have largely flocked to the bigger cars due to cheaper gas prices, practicality & safety that a big car provides, style and greater fuel efficiencies. So much so that Ford has completely killed off Sedans from their future pipeline!

The cars we drive tomorrow will look and be used differently. Technological advances—including interactive safety systems, vehicle connectivity, and, ultimately, self-driving cars—are trends that would widely shift the dominance of the existing legacy players to newer more agile brands.

While electric vehicles only make up 2% of the total market today, by 2030 that number will be closer to 10%!

Today on Things Have Changed we are going to unpack the future of the automotive Industry and what we can expect to see in the coming years.

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Cannabis is a $52 Billion industry in the United States and Americans LOVE cannabis (They consume 29.9 million pounts of cannabis). This is a massive industry and growing! Like any other fast-growing industry, there are significant headwinds. After all the Cannabis entrepreneurs we’ve had on the show, one overwhelming and consistent problem is REGULATION. The amount of regulation is increasing and getting more complex.

To be a business operating in an environment that is extremely dependent on your understanding of what the government dictates, is REALLLLY hard. Like we’ve mentioned in our episode with Stacey Hronowski, founder of Canix, we learned that operators are spending about 1/3rd of their time in compliance. Basically every entrepreneur in this space needs to be an expert in compliance. 

Recently, we talked to another cannabis entrepreneur that is helping remove the negative stigma on cannabis by building a community of passionate leaders in the cannabis space. We talked to the founder of the first cannabis company that Y-Combinator invested in.

We talked to Hua… David Hua, founder of Meadow, a software company that is building solutions for cannabis entrepreneurs, especially on regulation. Meadow’s Point-of-Sale (PoS) system is what would be popular for consumers in California. If you’re a cannabis dispensary, you probably know Meadow for a lot of other things like Analytics and Reporting, Intake and Registration, and Enterprise Security.

Building the Cannabis Industry’s Back-end and Front-End Software Solution

Meadow has infamously been labelled as “…AWS powering the back end of the THC trade” according to Tech Crunch. Beyond the robust PoS system, they provide so much more expertise and infrastructure for every dispensary to comply with stringent regulation. Meadow prepares you for an audit and prepares you to scale. Their customers LOVE them. Just check out one of the cool videos that they’ve put online just about how much they highlight customers business and how much they like Meadow.

Why?

They’re a company that focuses on community-driven solutions. David and the Meadow team are there to help build the community. He himself is a part of a few groups that are pushing for better understanding and regulating of the cannabis industry. He’s a board member of California Cannabis Industry Association and Cannabis Distribution Association. He obviously cares… quite a lot!

The team also puts on this event called Meadowlands. It’s a gathering for the California Cannabis Industry. That might seem a little broad. But it is absolutely what you think it is: An event where regulators, entrepreneurs, enthusiasts, and activists get together to have a conversation. It’s a great place to learn and have an open dialogue about where the future of cannabis should be.

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2020 has pushed the coal industry to once-unthinkable lows, and the consequences for climate change are big. But let's rewind a bit..

How did we get here?

For a long time, Coal has been considered the least-cost option for power generation throughout the world.  That narrative is starting to fall, as recent reports show that as soon as 2030, it would be cheaper to build renewables than run existing coal in all major markets by 2030. The same report found that >40% of existing coal power-plants are unprofitable! So what caused the long standing narrative to flip?

• Carbon pricing and air pollution regulations drive up costs - any future regulation would make coal power still more unprofitable

This is incredible news for the renewable energy industry, especially Solar + Wind.

Solar photovoltaic cells are now one of the 'cheapest sources of electricity in history' (!!!) thanks to maturing technologies and policies that have reduced the cost of investments.

What's incredible is just in the last 10 years, the cost of solar and wind energy have dropped a 
staggering 88% and 69% since.. 10 years! That's it! 
Significant R&D innovations and manufacturing scale to achieve unit economics have made these exciting new energy technologies available to the masses.

But it's not all rosy. This is all encouraging progress toward cutting down fossil fuel use in order to limit the devastating effects of climate change. But there’s still a long way to go to reach the goal set in the 2015 Paris climate agreement of stopping the planet from heating up more than 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.  

Solar + Wind might not be enough to get us to that goal.. We think good ol' Nuclear might be able to get us there faster. Well it is 2020 and the THC team being optimists love to see and share  the brighter side of this equation :) 

Here comes the sun! 🎵🎵🎵

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How does one get into an elite media publishing house such as the Economist. What goes in to producing one of the most credible and listened radio/ podcast shows out there?  Well we have just the right person - Mr. Jason Palmer on Things Have Changed!

Post-doctoral Soul Searching: Science Journalism

Jason started his journey in the field of academia, as a physicist at the Lawrence Livermore labs. Initially, he thought his life was going to be spent in the lab, proving/disproving hypothesis. However, like any other PhD candidate, Jason had second-guessed his purpose and started thinking about where he would fit in. One of the things he had landed on was “Science Journalism”.

Speaking “Econom-ese”

In 2019, as The Economist wanted to take a more serious step towards podcasting (They actually their first podcast in 2006). They were serious about audio and this new podcast was supposed to display that. The team was lead by Tom Standage, Deputy Editor and lead for digital strategy. In a medium article, Tom describes this effort as a way for '“The Economist to come to life in audio everyday”. 

Check out this awesome medium article about how “The Intelligence” started”

Jason still currently hosts this podcast, probably coz he’s been doing a damn good job and his voice is, to quote an anonymous host on Things Have Changed, “sexier than the sound of my own name”. Also, to clear up the suspicion, Jason is 100% American but also 100% spent 20 years in Britain. I mean as far as his accent goes, it’s a Jason Palmer Accent. 

But admittedly, his voice isn’t the reason we love “The Intelligence”, it’s because we identify with the content. The “Intelligence” is a great way to keep in-tune with the world around you. From stories about the famine happening in Yemen, to the shift in American Politics, the show brings together a really global view of news. At Things Have Changed, we are a group of immigrants that have benefitted from the truly diverse collection of people in the United States. Jed is from the Philippines, Shikher is from India, and Adrian's family is from Poland. When we have conversations, we are bringing our different perspectives to the table, and we find that absolutely vital for personal growth. 

Learn about how Jason satiates his desire for learning and his incredible journey through science and journalism.

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Have you finally gone back to get a drink with a friend in an open-air bar? Have you gotten that much needed haircut? Although the Pandemic isn’t over, there is some ounce of normalcy that has returned. You’ve started going outside, started extending your “COVID-bubbles”, and have learned how to live in a world with a virus. How do I know what you’re doing? Because I am watching you..

I’m playin..

Economy Pulse Check

I know because consumer spending is back up! At least 3/4 of the spending that was subdued during the lock-down is back. We can attribute this to pent-up demand from the months that we were locked-in. The labor market is slowly creeping back in but has reflected unemployment hovering around 8%, which is not great but is much better than the near-15% unemployment in May. However, we are not at all near pre-pandemic levels of growth. Industries that still require gathering large amounts of people are still down: namely, travel, hospitality, and entertainment (Although that is evolving rapidly).

Federal Reserve Responsibility Review 

As the Economy starts getting back on its feet, there is an expectation from the financial community (Banks and other Financial Institutions) to experience the tightening of monetary policy. This generally means that as inflation approaches 2%, the financial community expects the federal reserve to raise interest rates to eventually slow down consumer spending and perceivably ‘control’ inflation.

Learn about how the fed raises and lowers interest rates

This time ist' different…

Beyond 2 % - Flexible Average Inflation Rate Targeting

Recently, Jerome Powell announced a ‘new’ approach to what the federal reserve will do in light of this new ‘recovery’. Instead of tightening monetary policy, the fed intends to ‘Let the economy run hot’, which means that as we get closer to 2% inflation, the fed will not commit to rate hikes. 

A technical note on Flexible Average Inflation Rate Targeting

We’re gonna have low interest rates for a very long time. Debt will remain cheap, and we are going to see the the announcements of the federal reserve become less relevant to investors. 

Jim Cramer was extremely pleased

The idea of the “New normal” of the federal reserve started before Jerome Powell, took the stage, in 2012. Rates were nearer to the lower-bound for the past decade. We’ve had cheap money! Lower rates often lead to cheap debt. 

If you remember what happened earlier in the year, the Fed had lowered the interest rate to near-zero. Along with that, the fed used a range of monetary policy tools (Even a Main Street Lending Program, that hasn’t been activated since the 1930’s).

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According to OECD estimates, technology will transform about 1/3 of the jobs worldwide (1 BILLION JOBS). Earlier in 2020 we had another Davos Conference, the economic conference where a lot of important people show off how much they've been doing for the good of the world. The conference highlighted the issues within Capitalism, and one of which that was focused on Shareholder and the value produced for them. The leaders of the world have suggested that companies should focus on stakeholders instead, including employees and the community.

"Stakeholder Capitalism"
Marc Benioff is one of the leaders that joined the panel on the "Reskilling Revolution". He stresses that Capitalism is DEAD and that Shareholder Capitalism has brought the world towards inequality and natural calamities one after the other. He champions the new approach of "Stakeholder Capitalism" means that we need to focus on improving the workforce. He himself had led the program for Trailhead, an online reskilling platform that currently has 2 million "learners" on it with a goal of jumping up to 10 million.

Reskilling, Upskilling, and Learning
Reskilling is basically when you've decided to do a career shift and you realized that you need some training in order to do that job! Lately, we've just heard that Scandanavian Airlines had to lay off about 90% of their flight attendants. They led the effort in a public-private partnership to retrain the cabin crew to be able to help in the Healthcare industry.

For How Much?
In-state public national universities grew by 72% in the period of 2008 to 2021. The value proposition of universities are dwindling because they cannot keep up with how fast the need for new jobs are changing. Can you find "Growth Marketing" or "Product Management" in your traditional universities? probably not. But sometimes, they do teach some random shit like underwater basketweaving (Here is a list of universities that do that)

More and more Massive Open Online Courses (MOOC's) are popping up to fill the demand for new jobs. We've just had Mehak Vorha on the show who built a company called OnDelta, which is an online bootcamp that is training the next generation of Growth Hackers!

Check out our episode with Mehak!

If you're interested in Reskilling yourself, check out this list!

THC is super excited to be part of FORWARD by EllisX, a conference designed to focus on the future of media! Get a glimpse into the media Renaissance, how it affects companies seeking exposure, and meet like-minded people! Grab your tickets!

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We live in the data mining age, where tracking data has become a very valuable currency. Many industries are growing to adopt more technologies that can help them track progress and productivity. Since the boom of popularity with Smart Agriculture growing to a $13.1B industry in 2020, the opportunity to build new products becomes more obvious.

We see companies like Texas Instruments (Yes, the company that makes your calculators that you failed math with), that develops drones that collect real time data on soil moisture, humidity, and crop maturity. AGCO Corporation makes the tractors, planters, and smart farming applications. But the Light Utility Vehicle space has a lot of opportunity to grow! Right now, companies like Alke have developed an Electric Utility Vehicle that leads the space in zero carbon emmissions! They've pioneered e-mobility space and have been selling 40 countries world-wide!

These technologies have empowered the rural farmers and the agricultural community to scale their business!

Boson Motors, e-L.U.V.

We met with one of the entrepreneurs that is trying to fundamentally revolutionize the transportation space within the industry. Arun Seelam founded Boson Motors, a company that created the first all-electric and intelligent Light Commercial Vehicle (LCV) or Light Utility Vehicle (L.U.V.). Farmers in these rural areas use LCV's to deliver payload and fulfill supply chain needs. Maybe it doesn't go 0-60 in 2.3 seconds, but it can deliver payloads of up to 1600 lbs and can run for 80 miles. But how is it intelligent? Glad you asked.

Big Android with Wheels

It is called the LP20. The truck is not only electric, but it can also track metrics. Within transporatation, drive length, GPS, and productivity per mile are very important metrics. With the LP20, farmers will be able to track these and make data-driven decisions. Arun had designed this to be a completely open source vehicle that can give programmers access to create applications with an android environment.

— Arun Seelam

Arun Seelam

Arun is an ex-Googler with a ton of database experience. Despite being a software engineer, he learned how to build the electric vehicle through bootstrapping and iterating (He talks about his first electric vehicle venture on the show!). He grew up in rural India, where he actually comes from a family of truckers. He founded Boson with Suri Bhupatiraju, also an ex-Googler, who now is the Chief Operating Officer. 

Check it out and learn how Arun and Suri are planning to disrupt the LCV Market ($20BN)!

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Higher education has been ripe for disruption for a long time as the skyrocketing costs has put college degrees out of reach for a significant portion of the population.

Another valid criticism of higher Ed through the years has been that schools do not properly equip students with real-world skills they need in the workplace, and leave them in debt for years as they struggle to pay back student loans.

Add to that a tricky field such as Marketing, where the knowledge gap between University and industry can not be larger than it is today! How do you scale a business in a digital world? How do you build a brand and gather a following, in what is a noisy internet!

Mehak Vohra, CEO & Founder of OnDelta, plans to tackle the above issues head on! OnDelta is a growth marketing school for people looking to kick start their career in growth marketing.
Utilizing a curriculum centered around learning the technical skills to be an effective growth marketer, OnDelta aims to bridge the gap to enable students to become effective growth marketers in the workforce. The biggest differentiator here is that OnDelta is free upfront, you only pay them back after you graduate and are making at least $40k/yr.

A college dropout, self starter, and marketing expert, Mehak has taken the unconventional route to learn everything there is about taking brands to the next level through social media and provides those learnings via OnDelta!

In this episode we cover how the marketing needs of companies are changing, Mehak’s journey to create a full blown online remote academy free of any tuition, and how Mehak is the youngest person to ever to run for mayor in the city of San Francisco!

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There is no surprise that new technology displaces jobs. This very sentiment was the cornerstone of Presidential candidate Andrew Yang campaign - How will automation and AI change the workforce in the future, and what can we do to prepare for it? 

Mr. Yang and his Gang brought this inescapable issue into the forefront.

A greater push toward automation will most certainly kill jobs — human workers will become redundant in certain spheres. An estimated 20% of jobs could be impacted by this technology wave. The top jobs in the US - retail, food service, administrative, transportation and manufacturing - are all subject to automation.

But it's not all doom and gloom. In many studies, it's been predicted that automation will result in net job creation as well. It might take the shape and form of something we've not seen before.
Today people are employed as an influencer, website UI/UX designer, vlogger, and database architect.. roles that were unthinkable 30 years back when the Internet was created. 

Dr Seth Benzell, in this episode talks about the jobs that are resilient to the imminent automation wave.  Jobs that requires lots of dexterity, hand-eye coordination and flexibility Eg -  skilled trade jobs like a plumber or electrician as well as jobs such as nursing that involve human caring and empathy would be the most resilient to a possible Employment Terminator!

Listen to our previous conversations with Dr Seth Benzell

• Taming the Tech Beasts in 2020
• How Tech Created a Winner-Take-All Economy – with Seth Benzell
  
  

Also, THC is super excited to be part of FORWARD by EllisX, a conference designed to focus on the future of media! Get a glimpse into the media Renaissance, how it affects companies seeking exposure, and meet like-minded people! Grab your tickets!

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