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00:00:00
00:00:01
Przemek Obloj
84 Plays6 months ago
We talk about going from McKinsey to private equity to a clean energy fund to being the CFO of a healthtech company in Cambridge.
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Transcript
Introduction of Chemick Obloy
00:00:01
joewaltman
All right, so today we've got Chemick Obloy. ah Chemick, thanks so much for joining.
00:00:06
Przemek
Thank you for having me on your podcast.
00:00:10
joewaltman
i First question, refresh
Career Before INSEAD
00:00:12
joewaltman
our memory. What were you doing prior to NCIAD and what have you been up to for the last 20 years?
00:00:17
Przemek
Cool. So I was one of the young, possibly two young students. So it was 25 when we entered. However, it didn't stop me from thinking I knew it all because I spent two years at McKinsey Warsaw.
00:00:30
Przemek
And before that, I worked for the Polish government running and large economic models, which I'm sure is really exciting, um basically modeling the pension reform for the country. And that was on the back of being a data scientist turned economist at at university. And before that, I imported a bunch of sports equipment into the country, which was way more fun. um So I had, depending how you calculate it, between a year and a half and four years of work experience. And I entered.
00:00:59
Przemek
but I was a kiddo and had to have plenty to learn.
00:01:04
joewaltman
Indeed, indeed. ah So how did, ah what what what happened afterwards?
Transformative Experience at INSEAD
00:01:09
Przemek
Well, so first first was INSEAD and that was was an amazing experience actually. So, you know, I landed and discovered there were all sorts of people who had very different experiences that than I did. And yet somehow we shared this I don't know whether what's aspiration or or view on the world, the curiosity about the world. And that was an incredible experience and and kind of made me kind of go headfirst into that community. um You know, because where I came from, we were all quite similar. So if you look at the at the kind of analyst cohort at McKinsey Warsaw, there were three of us per year.
00:01:46
Przemek
We were all from very similar schools. We were all very similar in terms of analytics. And so it really felt like a very uniform ah group of people. We're still very close friends for the record, but ah but inside was just much broader, much more interesting. I learned an awful lot. You you could do different things and still end up magically at the same spot. So you know I learned that I was clueless about the world. I learned to both even clueless about the finance.
00:02:14
Przemek
um There were all these bits and pieces of finance I had no clue about. I discovered banking wasn't just M and&A advisory that actually banks were making most of their money from prop trading on the back. I discovered was this thing called private equity because there was Justin in his little car and was Reshma talking about her, you know, a little soft punk gig ah before before school. So I did I did learn that I was pretty clueless. um um And that I think set me up for life. So it's been it's been definitely one of those pivotal experiences in life.
00:02:48
joewaltman
Nice, nice.
Career Decision Post-INSEAD
00:02:50
Przemek
Cool. So, post-Insead, I was meant to go back to Warsaw, to McKinsey. I decided I didn't want to do that. So, I got kind of one and a half other job offers, but I also got an offer to rebound, as it was called at the time, to London. That included proper interviews. There was a bunch of us who who did that.
00:03:11
Przemek
Um, and ultimately that's where I landed. So I moved over.
00:03:14
joewaltman
Wait, but with McKinsey.
00:03:16
Przemek
Correct. Yeah.
00:03:17
joewaltman
But it was kind of like applying for a new job there. You weren't guaranteed.
00:03:20
Przemek
Yeah. I mean, they really put us through the paces. Um, and it was a bunch of us doing that, um, particularly from Australia for some pizar reason, I don't quite know why they wanted to move to London, but they did.
00:03:31
Przemek
And so it was like a proper interviewing process. So I still don't know whether it was just for show so that we didn't feel too arrogant about it or whether it was proper inter interviewing, but, you know, we got the offers and moved on.
00:03:42
joewaltman
Well, I think, the quite did did anybody not make it? is that That would determine it.
00:03:46
Przemek
I don't know. I don't know. as As you know, people didn't exactly advertise the jobs they didn't get at the time.
00:03:52
joewaltman
Fair enough.
00:03:53
Przemek
We were, we're all pretty self-conscious about that. So I don't know.
00:03:57
joewaltman
Yeah, yeah.
Moving to London and Private Equity
00:03:59
Przemek
um Cool. So moved. to London, um a bit of a cultural shock, a very different experience. 300 people in the office as opposed to 30 when I was in Warsaw really felt like a different firm um and really felt like an army as opposed to the pirate ships that I was used to. Much more political correctness, much more politics.
00:04:22
Przemek
um And so I had to find my little new pirate ship and I found it in in the private equity group, which was pretty much a bunch of South Africans, you know, Iranian dude, and and a bunch of Eastern Europeans. So that's how we rolled. We worked incredibly long hours. I mean, hitting 100 hours a week was fairly normal at the time, but the job was super fun. I learned an awful a lot. I worked with an awful lot of very, very bright clients, ah but fairly quickly discovered was a really dumb way to be having a career at McKinsey. Because at the time, it was still the idea that you should have kind of um deep and counseling relationships with your clients. You really need to have two clients and a visibility for five years what you're going to do with them. Well, guess what? Private equity folks are not really into counseling, more often than not. They generally know or they at least they think what they know they want to do. And there is very little loyalty. So that was a way to
00:05:21
Przemek
work hard, learn a lot, but really not to make it department. so
00:05:25
joewaltman
Well, hold on. that's that's that's I haven't heard this. Can you explain any distinction between like what a private equity consultant at McKinsey would do versus what a normal consultant at McKinsey would do?
00:05:34
Przemek
Oh, so we would basically work on diligence assignments more often than not. And that meant there is a, typically a process, a private equity shop has been working on it sometimes for a year, they go into stage two of the process when they are free to spend the money. And suddenly, you know, you got parachute, you get parachuted into the situation with a bunch of so-called experts who might be more or less expertise.
00:05:59
Przemek
But basically, in three weeks, you need to learn enough about the business to be able to say something meaningful meaningful to your client, who may have spent a year on this and actually they' are pretty switched on to start with.
Private Equity Consultancy at McKinsey
00:06:10
Przemek
It is a very, you're essentially doing a sprint for three weeks.
00:06:10
joewaltman
Okay.
00:06:14
Przemek
The problem was, then afterwards, they go to buy the business or not. And then you get reposted to another sprint of that sort. So as a life, it's it's pretty tough.
00:06:27
Przemek
Now, Things have changed. Right now, private equity is the biggest practice for McKinsey.
00:06:30
joewaltman
Yeah.
00:06:31
Przemek
It's the biggest practice for BCG. It's been the biggest practice for a very long time for Bain. But when I was doing it, it was still this, oh, should we work with those people in the first place? So a lot a lot has changed since then.
00:06:43
Przemek
So um to kind of fast forward through through McKinsey, I spent four years, became a manager, and I was very, very convinced that I wasn't going to make a very good consultant for very long.
00:06:55
Przemek
I think, by the way, to to make a good consultant, you either need to be super humble because you generally want genuinely want to help people be successful, your client, or you need to be delusional and think that you are the center of the universe and everything that will surround you.
00:07:14
Przemek
And I wouldn't say it's actually just a consulting problem.
00:07:17
joewaltman
and i ah can Can I name some names of our colleagues and you tell me which one of those two they are?
00:07:23
Przemek
over drinks later on, but you probably know. I think we all learned an awful lot of humility over the years. so So hopefully the group of delusional is smaller than it was after we finished school. By the way, it's not just consultants. I mean, you you get the bankers, you get the lawyers. I had the situation with ah with a relatively junior banker many years later, and the guy introduced himself, he's, oh, yeah, yeah, I sold your company here and there. I'm like,
00:07:48
Przemek
I was on the board of this business and I don't remember seeing your face. So while I'm not gonna pick up a fight over that, you most certainly did not sell that business.
00:07:59
Przemek
You may have been a team, part of the team that helped us. So I think there's a general problem about...
00:08:04
joewaltman
there's There's a similar running joke in Silicon Valley that for every company, there are dozens of people who claim that they're the founder of that company.
00:08:05
Przemek
um As long as the company is successful, otherwise I assume there there are no founders.
00:08:10
joewaltman
when In fact, there's usually you know two or three real funders. yeah yeah
00:08:16
Przemek
I mean, okay, I guess i guess fairly fairly normal human psyche, but but entertaining at times. So, since I knew I wasn't going to be a good consultant for a very long time, and I knew I wanted to be in principle investing, I tried to move into private equity.
Career Transition to EQT in Munich
00:08:32
Przemek
That was bloody difficult at the time. There were still mostly bankers.
00:08:36
joewaltman
yeah i mean we're talking oh seven oh eight right now right maybe what's
00:08:37
Przemek
Yeah, we're talking O7, exactly. um And so I had to prove to a bunch of the shops I could the numbers, which was quite entertaining. um But I landed a job at ECT in Munich.
00:08:49
Przemek
So it was, you know, it still is a phenomenal firm, um really brilliant in in a number of the dimensions. The Munich thing was a bit of a curveball because that was before COVID and before working from home.
00:09:02
Przemek
Now it would have been perfect.
00:09:02
joewaltman
We're talking 0708 right now, right?
00:09:04
Przemek
But at the time I was on the first flight out on Monday, last flight out on Friday. I almost missed the birth of my first daughter.
00:09:09
joewaltman
Eh.
00:09:12
Przemek
And for all my appreciation and and and and admiration of the firm, after two years I've had it. and Because it was basic choosing between my personal and professional life.
00:09:24
Przemek
And and so when a another bigger firm at the time called me up and said, hey, do you want to do the same thing but from London, I jumped ship. And there was you know more money, bigger title. you know In theory, it was meant to be bigger and better. In the reality, I fairly quickly ah realized that it probably was a mistake. Now, it was still a great firm. It's one of the biggest names in the business. I spent seven years there. I did really well. But the culture is a bit more like Hunger Games as opposed to building anything. Actually, by now, EQT is bigger than they are.
00:10:00
Przemek
um So the tide has has turned, but again, I learned an awful a lot, but it was a much tougher place to work and...
00:10:07
joewaltman
you haven't You haven't mentioned the name of this company, is that is that on purpose?
00:10:11
Przemek
Well, I thought you said it's going into the world. it It is on my LinkedIn, so it is fairly really easy to see who that is.
00:10:15
joewaltman
Okay.
00:10:18
Przemek
Look, it's actually a firm pool of absolutely brilliant people. I have an awful lot of very close friends from from from there. um But the setup is a ah very difficult one.
00:10:30
joewaltman
Gotcha.
00:10:31
Przemek
That's just a very hostile place internally.
00:10:32
joewaltman
We'll leave it at that.
00:10:34
Przemek
Cool. So seven years came up and I was really ready to do something else.
00:10:40
joewaltman
Oh, wow.
00:10:40
Przemek
I got a call.
00:10:40
joewaltman
So you you spent seven years at this, at this ah this let's call this London based.
00:10:43
Przemek
Yeah.
00:10:44
joewaltman
Okay.
00:10:45
Przemek
Indeed.
00:10:46
joewaltman
Uh-huh.
00:10:46
Przemek
So, I mean, I did deals in beer, software, energy, I did really well. I mean, it it it was a good experience all in.
00:10:51
joewaltman
Uh-huh.
00:10:54
Przemek
But, you know, in the meantime, ECT went public. And so, you know, now I know it was the single worst financial decision of my life so far, to leave them. But you know, it is what it is, we learn, we sometimes do.
00:11:06
joewaltman
It's important to quantify how much money you don't make by by certain decisions you've made. yeah
00:11:10
Przemek
i I am incredibly well aware how much money I didn't make. But, and you know, whenever I start feeling sorry for myself, I remember that one of my closest friends, who was a partner, owned 2% of the QT, walked away from it all for free because he wanted to move back to California.
00:11:28
Przemek
So he lives not far from Eugeo, but he walked away from a billion.
00:11:33
joewaltman
o
00:11:34
Przemek
Now, I know you live in a beautiful part of the world, but but it still hurts. Cool.
00:11:42
joewaltman
Yes.
00:11:43
Przemek
so
00:11:43
joewaltman
yeah
00:11:44
Przemek
On to the next
Building European Operations for Canadian Pension Plan
00:11:45
Przemek
chapter. I got a call from um a guy who didn't really know, but who proves to be probably my best boss in finance, um whether I wanted to help him build Europe ah for his firm.
00:11:56
Przemek
And he ran one of the big Canadian pension plans.
00:12:00
joewaltman
what What year are we talking about here?
00:12:00
Przemek
um So we're talking 2016.
00:12:02
joewaltman
Okay.
00:12:05
Przemek
um And so it was a good ah opportunity for me because a there wasn't really a boss around me. This guy was in in in Canada managing out of Montreal. And I was employing number two in Europe. So it was a startup. It was a startup with a rich uncle, which is which is probably the best way to do startups. um So we started in office with kind of two people, cables on the floor, but the office was in May 4 and we had we had an awful lot of backup homes.
00:12:31
Przemek
And i it was also a good exit from my previous shop because they were a big investor. um And so he helped me negotiate my exit package, which which allowed me to save an awful lot of my money. um And it allowed me to build a team, hire the team, train the team, build a team from scratch, focus them on on healthcare and tech, and do an awful lot of deals. So in terms of where my deal tracker comes from, a lot of that comes from PSP, ah which was the name of the firm.
00:12:58
Przemek
And I focus on health contact for the first time. I was free to choose which deals I wanted to do. um I tried and somewhat unsuccessfully um to build the sustainability focus ah platform for them on a premise that, you know, if if if we give money to Canadian pensioners, but the earth has torched, we we failed. That was a surprisingly difficult task to get the board to acknowledge that.
Advocating for Sustainable Investing
00:13:25
Przemek
The irony is now they're all about that.
00:13:28
Przemek
um But in 2016, 17, 18, they really weren't on the same page and they were putting money into Canadian oil sands, which which is probably the highest carbon source of energy.
00:13:37
joewaltman
yeah yeah Yeah, I think you find out. Canadians don't really care that much when push comes to shove. I got a question. so so this This is just to clarify. you're so You're investing from a Canadian pension fund, specifically in in like Europe private equity stuff. so you're you're You're a little slice of their portfolio strategy.
00:13:58
Przemek
Well, so initially that was the that was a gig. So the little European piece grew from 0% to 30% of the portfolio. My portfolio grew from 0% to 10 billion in five years.
00:14:07
joewaltman
Oh, wow. um Awesome.
00:14:09
Przemek
The numbers are pretty big when youre when you put on a Canadian pension.
00:14:11
joewaltman
Yeah, that's fantastic.
00:14:13
Przemek
And I ended up running European private equity for them, but I also ended up starting and running globalbe what we called global, which really was European and American and growth investing. And that was a lot of fun. So that was the time when I was in San Francisco eight times a year, um you know, New York, probably five times a year, not great for the carbon footprint, by the way, or jet lag for that matter. But a lot of fun ended up learning an awful lot.
00:14:38
Przemek
and so and really doing most of the deals I've done. So of the 20 plus deals I've done in ah in a growth and buyout space, 15 of those sits in that relatively short five-year chapter.
00:14:51
joewaltman
When you say growth, do you mean like DC stuff or is that a...
00:14:55
Przemek
Anything from B onwards. So i'm I'm really not an early stage guy at heart.
00:14:57
joewaltman
Okay.
00:15:00
Przemek
And you've had some very good early stage people on this pod. um I need a company. i I need something to analyze. I need to worry about downside a little bit.
00:15:10
Przemek
I think after seven years at my PE shop, you know, where we really had the motto focus on a downside upside with healthcare, take care of itself. I find it very difficult to say, oh, I really love the energy of this founder. Let's give him a million, which I've seen some early-stage VCs do. But kind of round B onwards, I feel reasonably confident and incompetent.
00:15:34
Przemek
so So that was a fun chapter when it lasted. Unfortunately, my boss got, well, left abruptly to BlackRock after falling out with a board. It's actually funny how some of those institutions are not institutions at all. There's a huge key man risk. And basically when Andre left, the game was up for me over time, because I was seen as his person and a bunch of bureaucrats took over. So they really rolled back.
00:16:02
Przemek
a lot of the freedoms that I had at the time when he was when he was running it, and it became much less fun. um So my entire team by now is gone. I've been out for four years now, but that my entire team has turned out, which is which is a problem because you build all this competence, you train the people, and they aren and they end up leading very shortly.
00:16:22
Przemek
Now, they all went to good firms. There are people with KTRs, DNRs, Synven, et cetera, from my team. But but it's it's a problem with all these Canadian pension plans. I think they they got 80% of the model worked out, but definitely not. And then I had this grand plan. I'll take a sabbatical, long gardening leave. It will be awesome. I booked a trip to Nepal, Bhutan, Iceland.
00:16:47
Przemek
and then COVID happened. And my six months of gardening leave was spent in the garden. It was, it was just a really bad timing. um And it actually, ever ever since I decided I'm not really good at taking breaks from work, something always happens. And so COVID was a weird, weird moment, because I was disconnected from work.
Entrepreneurial Venture with Swiss Family Office
00:17:09
Przemek
I didn't have anything new running. So I ended up somewhat virtually ah starting with a Swiss family office, really focused on climate. I love the topic. I didn't really know the people very well because we were all doing it remotely. And so we built the team without meeting, which was bizarre. And that was my first proper brush with entrepreneurship. So we built a firm without any backing, raised a bunch of money, we did a bunch of deals, ah very focused on climate.
00:17:38
Przemek
um hired some absolutely amazing ah people from all over the world. Because at the time, we I don't know if you remember, we all felt where you were in the world didn't matter. um Now, it turns out it's not really true. But ah for a couple of years, it was this weird virtual world work where everything was virtual, fundraising was virtual, deal doing was virtual. I was flying to Zurich from London on one of the very few flights that that that took off I think there were three of us on A380, A320. So it really felt like a private jet experience, um but it was bizarre.
00:18:18
joewaltman
Well, elaborate a little. So so was this a fun that was investing in in like green companies or were you?
00:18:24
Przemek
So it started as a family office. and There was a chap who cared about these things. He'd made a bit of money in his previous life and he he put it to work in in climate. And initially he was very successful because the wave was carrying everybody who had early money into impossible foods, early money into Beyond Meat, um you know, quickly become becoming almost like a spokes for spokesperson for for the movement. Now, in reality, it wasn't really a movement, it was an investment theme. And so it played out. We actually made good money out of beyond me to be one of the very few people who did um we sold it for eight times money when it was still ah going up. But um I think the the challenge about a lot of the climate investing and I i still love it. I do a fair amount of it. I just need to flag it. It's people get into that for all sorts of reasons. And
00:19:21
Przemek
not everybody has this very steely filter of it actually needs to make money. yeah Now, without heavy investment into climate, it's not just energy transition, by the way, we're absolutely screwed.
00:19:27
joewaltman
Yeah, yeah.
00:19:34
Przemek
if If you look at the data, it's petrifying. One of the things that scared me the most is that insurance companies are really piling into that. Now, if the insurers who have the best data about what's really happening with the planet, because they pay for the damage, get scared that they want to pile into climate operations. That means it's really not good. And obviously, you live you live not far. I mean, you live a bit south of where the older wildfires are happening, I think. But you know take the fires in Canada, fires in Australia. Now every fund in Australia has a climate allocation. Why? Because the country burned two years ago.
00:20:13
Przemek
but I mean, humans are pretty good at at getting our act together when we get hit in the face pretty hard. My worry is that everybody wakes up only after their country burns. It would be nice if people actually did it a bit earlier. home But kind of back to the job, it was it was really interesting, but we never managed to get to to scale. I think investing is really a scale game by now, other than in seed maybe.
00:20:39
Przemek
um And the industry is very rapidly consolidating. So you're either big or you're not unimportant. So that's the that's that's a challenging challenging bit. But getting out of kind of the corporate world allowed me to build a really cool personal portfolio but that's carried me.
Personal Portfolio and Joining Advio
00:20:56
Przemek
And it was hopefully going to carry me for a while. And that is very, very much you know, technology that drastically lowers the cost or democratizes the but access to something that is critical and price inelastic. So healthcare, climate, um education, although I haven't done as much in education, um or or kind of saving slush money or fintech. So if you look at my portfolio right now, it just helps and fintech really needs to.
00:21:25
joewaltman
Hold on, I'm having trouble following. so ah we're We're now, we've moved on from this Swiss clean tech thing to now you're you're you're investing your own.
00:21:31
Przemek
Yeah. Yeah, so so that was me until a month ago. And I thought we would have this conversation in in person, because I would fly over at some stage to Southern California, hopefully would have some wine available. And you know, we would be both semi retired and chatting things. through Now, it's the first time in my life that my brother would argue I have I have an honest job.
00:21:56
Przemek
So basically, I joined my favorite portfolio company as a CFO ah less than two months ago. So it's a completely new chapter. It's a business that I invested in four years ago. So I actually looked at them, concluded they were outside of scope for my fund, but really liked what they were doing. So I invested a bit of money personally, and stayed in touch with a founder. It's a health tech business that's called Advio, which makes you know, creates and manufactures human cells. For research purposes, because 95% of R and&D on on on on drug developments get wasted, it's an incredibly inefficient pipeline, but we just don't know how to improve it. And for cell therapy, because we have all these therapies potentially available for people, a lot of those are for rare diseases, but not exclusively, the problem is they may cost a million per dose per patient.
00:22:53
Przemek
and which, to put it mildly, doesn't make them particularly relevant from a global health perspective. And so what we are doing is providing cells that, A, help with this R and&D um inefficiencies and may potentially lower the cost of those therapies by two orders of magnitude, by 100 times.
00:23:12
joewaltman
Cool. Cool. And you started this just a month ago or you joined on a month ago.
00:23:15
Przemek
Well, I think technically it's six weeks, but it's and it's ah it feels like much longer. It's been quite intense as it always is in scale-ups. I mean, the company has... It's a proper business. So we're commercial, we're selling you know roughly $16 million dollars worth worth of sales this year. We've more than doubled the business this year and the previous year.
00:23:37
Przemek
the The target market is 10 billion plus. The margins are great. So yeah every metric I look as an investor is tick, tick, tick. It's potentially a really big, really exciting business that but also does a proper positive change into the world. But, you know, against all of this positive backdrop, you know, it is still a difficult time to fundraise. We're in Europe, which is clearly less well-funded.
00:24:02
Przemek
than than America. And as any fast growing business, it has plenty of stuff that needs to get fixed. So to say I had my hands full for the last couple of weeks is the biggest understatement.
00:24:18
joewaltman
You kind of answered this question, but but I enjoy hearing this but more directly. How does it feel to, you know perhaps for the first time in your life, have a have a real job you know working for a real company?
00:24:29
Przemek
So I think almost every VC um and most private equity equityy folks will say if you ask them, you know, if you found a company you truly believe in and you can really help them because these two things need to be very, you know, in place. Would you jump ship? Would would you actually go all in?
00:24:50
Przemek
And I think most people would say, yeah, sure. Now, in the reality, very few of them do. So the funny thing is that everybody who has been an operator, I've spoken to a lot of people before making this jump, because you know it is quite a big transition. um Everybody who has been an operator says, yeah, go for it. It's amazing. You're going to love it. You know everything that's important about this job, and you're going to outsource the stuff that's less important. You will learn a lot.
00:25:18
Przemek
and you will be a better investor and you're going to help them. Plenty of private equity focus who were bankers before they never really interacted with a real business. Like, well, why would you live such a comfortable life? Because being in a private equity shop, particularly big private equity shop, is incredibly comfortable. Nice office, lunch is served at your desk or at the restaurant on the come. I mean, the level of being spoiled is insane.
00:25:48
Przemek
And so suddenly I need to commute to Cambridge, not quite commuting to Munich, but home is in London, the company's in Cambridge because all the tech came out of Cambridge, most of our senior scientists are ex-Cambridge, although it's a bunch of ex-Stanford people as well.
00:26:03
Przemek
um you know i need to i you know i I'm not exactly staying in a tent, as you can see behind me, but I need to pay attention. and I mean, we are still burning cash, which you go my key role as a CFO is not to run out of money. So part of that is raise more money, but part of it is make sure it gets spent sensibly. So I kind of need to live you know give the example as I live. It is a tougher gig in many respects.
00:26:29
Przemek
And this fact that you are working off a finite timeline, you actually have a runway that is not infinite. um That certainly increases the level of focus or level of stress, depending how we look at it. But so far, it's phenomenal experience. And, you know, the the West Coast model by now is very much you need to have been a founder, at least an operator in order to be an investor.
Reflections on New Role and Community
00:26:56
Przemek
um I think it's very,
00:26:59
Przemek
It's very smart, actually. And it's not necessarily because you learn any unique skills, you just appreciate how damn hard it is from one day to another.
00:27:09
joewaltman
Yeah, for sure. Sure. Um, let's, let's, uh, wrap this up with, with the same question that I ask everybody, uh, kind of a two parter. Uh, is there anything that we as the community can do to help you, uh, where you are and vice versa, or is there anything you might be able to do to help us?
00:27:28
Przemek
Cool, so starting with the second part. so um For all my sins, I seem to know private equity landscape reason of the well. So particularly in Europe, obviously, but also if you talk about big LPs in Canada and Singapore. So if you need to deal with any of those players, if you need to i don't know sell your business to a big PE shop, or you want to get a job there, then chances are I might know them, or at least I'll know somebody who does.
00:27:55
Przemek
um And I happen to know the infrastructure well, so not the infrastructure um investing that I don't know at all, um but kind of lawyers, bankers, all the providers, so to say, or or advisors. So a friend of mine was selling his business somehow, he ended up running a billion dollar company for some reason.
00:28:15
Przemek
And he needed a lawyer who would help him negotiate his deal. And I just knew the person. So and he's based abroad. I needed a lawyer in London. So that's the way I can help fairly easily. I also know a bit about climate and a fair amount of people in climate. So if you want to help in that space, which which desperately needs talent and money, then we'd be delighted to help.
00:28:38
Przemek
you know, on the other side in terms of what what it is that I i could be helped with. um And that will sound super cheesy. I think, you know, showing up is 80% of success. And I think, um on a kind of pretty serious, if not somber, but serious note, I think our interactions since the since the reunion were just off the chart. Fantastic. Literally every person I met, I was blown away how thoughtful, kind and interesting they were. And I think this is what your podcast has also illustrated. And, you know, possibly until this episode, um all of the previous ones were both interesting and entertaining. um And you learn how many layers people either have
00:29:23
Przemek
head or developed. And it just paints a much, much, much more interesting picture. right I mean, I'm, I literally want to call up everybody you speak to and say, Hey, like we haven't hanged out, you know, let's, let's book time. Now, in practice, I'm sure very few of those followers will get done. But I think we're, you know, we have just been very privileged to be part of this very interesting and, and diverse group of people.
00:29:49
Przemek
and And so just showing up and connecting is great. So if you are in London or if you're in Cambridge even more so, please ping me. If you want to go skiing, please ping me. If you want to go heli skiing even more so and so. So there's plenty of excuses to to connect.
00:30:06
Przemek
I think we don't invest together enough. So now I'm actually talking to a few people about either their funds or potential deals together. I mean, we have such a network that we just should have done a lot more.
00:30:18
Przemek
And I keep myself from not not putting money into some of the funds you had on the spot before, obviously, but you know hindsight is a beautiful thing. The other thing
00:30:27
joewaltman
Well, yeah, that's that that's when it gets real ah real spicy, doesn't it? and and you know on On both ends.
00:30:30
Przemek
Yeah, once you talk names.
00:30:32
joewaltman
but Yeah, carry on.
00:30:33
Przemek
The second thing is, you know, the second thing will be a shameless plug, because we will be fundraising. So if you happen to be a healthcare care investor, or you're you have a healthcare focus, a life sciences fund, do call me.
00:30:41
joewaltman
yeah Yeah, nice.
00:30:45
Przemek
And the third one is, I'm sure I know, I mean, i I don't want to take away
00:30:45
joewaltman
I should warn you, I take a very modest commission for any ah any deals done through the pod. What's what's the minimum check size? how much what's what's the What's the smallest you'll let me write?
00:30:58
Przemek
drinking money. um so So let's say if you have a few million kind of slashing around and you really don't want to do it, it then then it's helpful.
00:31:04
joewaltman
oo who Fancy. that's That's the fancy level. Okay.
00:31:09
Przemek
No, it's a scale up. It's just different stage. yeah and And it's also unlikely to be 100 times your manager.
00:31:12
joewaltman
Fair enough.
00:31:14
Przemek
So let's cut you into some of the smaller things. And the final one, which which somebody somebody flagged, but it's been surprisingly rare on on the previous ones.
00:31:24
Przemek
so I think we're at this stage now where, you know, most of us have done fairly well. And most of us are surprisingly at peace where we are. But we do have kids that are coming through that um stage of life where ah access to network, access to mentors and access to people who who maybe do other things than the parents is incredibly important. And so I'm delighted to help kids of of our friends. I would like to think that if my daughters meet some connection or mentoring, they will, they will get it from this group. I mean, without naming names, but again, you will get it pretty quickly.
00:32:04
Przemek
I introduced my older daughter to ah one of our friends who who you had on a pod. And within 30 seconds, she sold her going to UPenn. And so now it's it's it's it's it's really difficult to change that.
00:32:15
Przemek
So you know being being able to give my daughter access to extremely successful women in business is it's is' a part of my value ad as a broadly switched on dad.
00:32:16
joewaltman
Mm.
00:32:29
Przemek
And so I'm sure others have a similar issue. so you know, maybe moving the focus on help from ourselves ah to the next gen it would would be helpful.
00:32:39
joewaltman
I've got some sons that could that could learn a lot from some some hard labor in Poland. So I'll reach out to you when they're when they're of age. I appreciate it. and And thank you so much for your time. This has been this has been you've been way too modest. It's been very interesting. ah its it's been It's been really nice to catch up. Thank you so, so much.
00:32:57
Przemek
Well, thank you, Joe. Thank you for doing it. It's been amazing, and you're way too modest about europe your pod. Hope that's a new career for you.
00:33:03
joewaltman
Oh, shut up. All right. All right. I'm pressing the button now. Bye.