Taymoor Atighetchi is the Founder and CEO of British e-commerce stationary brand, Papier. The story of Taymoor’s rise in business is fascinating. He started out by selling antiques on Portobello Market before going on to co-found the now very popular news youth site, The Tab. Upon graduating Taymoor secured a role at Bain & Company as a consultant. It was there where Taymoor spotted the opportunity to disrupt the retail space by providing an online offering to what was once a very bricks and...
Apr 13, 2022•29 min•Ep 19•Transcript available on Metacast Larry Gadea is the Founder and CEO of unicorn workplace software provider, Envoy. Larry’s story is a remarkable one. After his family fled Romania as refugees Larry spent much of his early childhood perfecting his knowledge of computer engineering. His proclivity in this space would see him go on to secure prominent positions at both Google & Twitter. In 2013 Larry decided to go it alone and launch Envoy with the mission of improving visitor and host experiences in the workplace. The company...
Apr 06, 2022•42 min•Ep 18•Transcript available on Metacast Jimmy Williams is the Co-Founder and CEO of InsurTech, Urban Jungle. Jimmy started out in consulting before pivoting towards insurance following his own frustrating experience trying to secure a policy. In 2016 Jimmy launched Urban Jungle in the hope of providing an alternative offering in what he increasingly saw as an unfair, expensive and slow moving sector. Having recently closed an $11.4m Series A round the company hopes to continue building its reputation as one of the key disruptors in in...
Mar 30, 2022•41 min•Ep 17•Transcript available on Metacast Tom Leathes is the co-founder and CEO of Motorway. Launched four years ago by Tom and his long term friend and business partner Harry Jones, Motorway is harnessing the power of technology to deliver an amazing experience for customers looking to value and sell their car. In the four years it has been operating the company has already helped over 2.5m customers resulting in 300% year on year growth. Riding Unicorns were lucky enough to sit down with Tom and pick his brain on several topics includ...
Mar 23, 2022•39 min•Ep 16•Transcript available on Metacast Guy Podjarny is the Founder of cybersecurity firm, Snyk. Founded in 2015 the company specialises in offering developer-first security and was recently valued at over £8bn. Prior to Synk Guy worked as CTO at Akamai following their acquisition of his startup, Blaze.io. Guy has spent his career becoming an expert in web application security, a topic which he covers in depth on his own podcast, The Secure Developer podcast. Guy spent some time with James and Hector to discuss how a big vision starts...
Mar 16, 2022•37 min•Ep 15•Transcript available on Metacast Gordon Sanghera is the co-founder and CEO of Oxford Nanopore. With the help of some of the brightest minds around the globe Gordon, who has over 15 years experience in the design and development of biosensor devices, and his team have been able to develop revolutionary sensing technology that performs precise analysis of single molecules. Riding Unicorns invited Gordon on the show to explain in simple terms what the company does, the real world benefits to its products and how despite the diffic...
Mar 09, 2022•43 min•Ep 14•Transcript available on Metacast Ray Chohan is the co-founder of PatSnap, one of the global leaders in connected innovation intelligence. With more than 800 individuals located across three continents, Ray and his team really are at the forefront of revolutionizing the innovation process. During the episode Ray reveals the motivation behind founding PatSnap and exactly what problem the company is trying to solve. From an operational perspective Ray was able to share some tips for fundraising, hiring and how to become an exper...
Mar 02, 2022•46 min•Ep 13•Transcript available on Metacast Giles Andrews is the co-founder of British financial services company, Zopa, which in 2005 made waves by launching the world's first peer-to-peer lending service. Prior to revolutionising the financial sector Giles, a keen car enthusiast, worked at a car dealership but quickly turned his attention to other endeavours including becoming the Chairman of Carwow, a position amongst many others, which he still holds to this day. Giles joined us to share the story behind Zopa and its early years....
Feb 23, 2022•41 min•Ep 12•Transcript available on Metacast Philip Belamant is the founder & CEO of BNPL firm, Zilch. Philip started his career in mobile gaming in his native South Africa but quickly realised the potential of BNPL and decided to set up his own firm, which is now worth over £2bn. Philip explains some of the challenges he faced when initially trying to break into the market, how Zilch’s offering differs from the incumbents and his thoughts on the competition. Philip also goes on to pull no punches when questioned on VC’s and their suit...
Feb 16, 2022•48 min•Ep 11•Transcript available on Metacast Michelle Kennedy is the co-founder & CEO of social media app, Peanut. The former Badoo and Bumble executive used her experience in the social space to launch Peanut, which since 2017 has connected over 2.7 million mothers and helped them find advice and connect with other women on all manner of topics including pregnancy, childbirth and menopause. Michelle sat down with us to discuss how she managed the transition from lawyer to entrepreneur in such a quick time frame. We also dive deep into...
Feb 09, 2022•34 min•Ep 10•Transcript available on Metacast Jonathan Anguelov is the co-founder and GM of cloud-based call center software unicorn, Aircall. Jonathan has always had a passion for entrepreneurship. In fact, prior to launching Aircall in 2014 Jonathan had already amassed a great deal of business experience through his various ventures in real estate. In this episode Jonathan opens up about the struggles he faced during his childhood and how the challenges he overcame early on in life propelled him to pursue a life as an entrepreneur. Jonath...
Feb 02, 2022•47 min•Ep 9•Transcript available on Metacast Sacha Michaud is the co-founder of commerce start-up Glovo. Shortly after recording the episode with Sacha the company made headlines after it was announced that German multinational online food-delivery service Delivery Hero had acquired a majority stake in the company. The former jockey turned entrepreneur and investor sat down with Riding Unicorns to reveal what keeps drawing him back to entrepreneurship, the similarities between being an athlete and a founder and the areas of the business he...
Jan 26, 2022•34 min•Ep 8•Transcript available on Metacast Nigel Verdon the co-founder & CEO of Railsr (formerly RailsBank), the world's leading Embedded Finance Experience platform. Nigel has spent decades learning everything there is to know about payments and foreign exchange, first through his experience as an investment banker and subsequently as an entrepreneur of multiple financial start-ups. The serial FinTech founder sat down with James and Hector and opened up on the motivation behind launching Railsr so soon after his previous succes...
Jan 19, 2022•40 min•Ep 7•Transcript available on Metacast Ali Parsa is the Founder & CEO of HealthTech Unicorn Babylon. Ali’s knowledge and expertise on the topic of healthcare is unmatched by anyone else in the UK. In fact prior to launching Babylon the British Iranian entrepreneur co-founded hospital operator Circle Health. The former investment banker sat down with Riding Unicorns to give us an insight into his stoic approach to both business and life. We go on to learn that Ali is a big believer in going with the flow and not letting the little...
Jan 12, 2022•42 min•Ep 6•Transcript available on Metacast Felix Oshwald is the Founder of GoStudent, a venture-backed ed-tech unicorn, which has been disrupting the tutoring space since being founded in 2016. The company as Felis is keen to stress is now on a mission to become the world's number 1 global school. The Riding Unicorns team sat down with Felix to better understand how this mathematics enthusiast was able to find market fit and differentiate GoStudents from its competitors, how he built a culture obsessed with operations and how he mea...
Jan 05, 2022•34 min•Ep 5•Transcript available on Metacast Steven Mendel is the co-founder of ManyPets (prev. Bought By Many), the insurance provider that is revolutionising the way consumers purchase pet coverage. Rather interestingly the idea for the company came as a result of Stevens own rather disappointing personal experience when trying to buy private medical insurance for him and his familys. Like any good entrepreneur Steven took it upon himself to try and improve the customer experience, which going by the amount of awards the company has won,...
Dec 22, 2021•35 min•Ep 4•Transcript available on Metacast Aron Gelbard is the co-founder & CEO of Bloom & Wild, one of the UK’s most-loved online florists. Prior to launching B&W Aron spent time working as a consultant for Bain & Company, who he goes on to credit for giving him the ideal launch pad to pursue his dreams of becoming an entrepreneur. James & Hector sat down with Aron to discuss the early struggles he faced when getting the business off the ground, the on-going logistics of delivering flowers and why technology continue...
Dec 15, 2021•33 min•Ep 3•Transcript available on Metacast Andy Shovel is the co-founder of THIS, one of the leading plant based meat alternative companies in the UK. Andy is a true example of a versatile entrepreneur. Having succeeded with the beef burger chain, Chosen Bun, Andy then decided to turn his life upside down by giving up meat and going plant based. His ambition ever since has been to crack the meat free code in the hopes of providing people with a true culinary alternative to meat. The former carnivore spoke to us about the epiphany that le...
Dec 08, 2021•35 min•Ep 2•Transcript available on Metacast Alex Chesterman OBE is one of Britain's most successful entrepreneurs and Angel Investors. Through his unparalleled intuition and bravery Alex has carved out a reputation as a serial winner and disruptor of several traditional industries. His most recent venture, online car retailer Cazoo is proving to be yet another success having already raised over £1 bn in total funding. In this Season 3 opener Alex begins by reflecting on what entrepreneurship means to him, what has motivated him to ke...
Dec 01, 2021•40 min•Ep 1•Transcript available on Metacast Hector and James take a look back at the 25 episodes recorded in Season 2, their favourites and the most-listened to shows. Then they introduce the incredible line-up for Season 3. This is the first place to find out who is going to be on the show for the next 20 weeks.
Nov 25, 2021•17 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jon Coker is one of the Founding Partners of Eka Ventures. His work at the Impact VC fund has transformed him into one of the pioneers of ESG investments in Europe. Prior to Eka Ventures Jon led the investment team as a partner at MMC Ventures. The Oxford alumni sat down with James and Hector and shared some insights into his upbringing, his passion for maths and science and his life prior to entering the world of VC. Later in the conversation the trio touch upon topics such as, how VC has chang...
Nov 17, 2021•40 min•Ep 25•Transcript available on Metacast Rémy Astié is the founder & co-CEO of online investment platform Vauban. Backed by the likes of MJ Hudson, Pentech and Outward Vauban is looking to democratise private investment. Through its revolutionary infrastructure the company has already helped investors fund $700m in companies such as Airbnb, SpaceX, Tide and many more. In this, the penultimate episode of Season 2, James and Hector dive into Rémy’s decision to pivot Vauban away from hedge funds, his thoughts on the future of crowdfun...
Nov 10, 2021•34 min•Ep 24•Transcript available on Metacast Steve Tigar is the founder & CEO of Scottish based EV company loveelectric. With the ever increasing pressure to lower our carbon footprint leading more and more drivers to opt for electric cars, the company is hoping that through its car scheme, which promises to halve the monthly cost of any new electric car, it will soon be the number one choice for all new car buyers out there. Riding Unicorns invited the former CEO of Money Dashboard on the show to discuss the importance of hiring and d...
Nov 03, 2021•32 min•Ep 23•Transcript available on Metacast Irina Scarlat is the Chief Growth Officer at centralized crypto exchange Bitpanda. With over 12 years experience in tech marketing, which have included stints at Uber & Revolut, Irina is slowly carving out a reputation as one of the best project managers in her field. Irina sat down with James and Hector to discuss her time at both Uber and Revolut, her personal definition of growth and opinions on the current hustle culture trend. Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podca...
Oct 27, 2021•32 min•Ep 22•Transcript available on Metacast Mark Smukler is the founder & CEO of Flow, a location-based app that makes it easy to discover the best coworking spaces, gyms, spas and experiences around you. Flow is now available in 50 locations across London with the target being to have 300 locations signed up by the end of the year. The now exited founder of tenant & resident management platform, Bixby sat down to shed some light on the decision making process behind enrolling in a computer science course, his rather unconventiona...
Oct 20, 2021•40 min•Ep 21•Transcript available on Metacast A year ago today, we released S1E1 of Riding Unicorns with Sir Martin Sorrell. In this first edition of Riding Unicorns bitesize, we pick out the best bits from that episode and dissect some of the advice given by Sir Martin.
Oct 14, 2021•7 min•Transcript available on Metacast Jos White is a General Partner at VC firm Notion Capital. In 2000 Jos alongside his brother launched MessageLabs, the first company in the world to introduce anti-virus as a service, which incidentally at the time also made it the first SaaS business ever. Seven years later MessageLabs was acquired by Symantec in 2008 for $700m. The self confessed entrepreneur obsessive sat down with Riding Unicorns for what turned out to be a riveting conversation, which touched on topics such as how Jos overca...
Oct 13, 2021•35 min•Ep 20•Transcript available on Metacast Jonny Plein is the now exited co-founder of the coupon browser extension, Pouch. Jonny spent his postgraduate years working for EY before leaving in 2017 to work on Pouch full time. During his time Jonny and his team were able to win the MassChallenge startup accelerator award. Jonny is now the Director Of Business Development at the Global Savings Group. James and Hector sat down with Jonny to discuss the challenges in achieving product market fit, his Dragon’s Den experience and the lesson lea...
Oct 06, 2021•33 min•Ep 19•Transcript available on Metacast Hector and James discuss mega rounds, valuations, and the effect of public markets on private markets.
Oct 03, 2021•19 min•Transcript available on Metacast George Robson is a Partner at the renowned Venture Capital firm, Sequoia. Preceding his time at Sequoia George worked first with Morgan Stanley and then with Revolut as the Senior Product Owner. During the time we had with George we were able to cover the lessons he learnt from his time at the financial technology company, what it was like working alongside its renowned founder, Nikolay Storonsky and his personal thesis when looking to invest in start-ups. George also addresses the topic of age ...
Sep 29, 2021•29 min•Ep 18•Transcript available on Metacast 
