![I've taken INSEAD to space and I think I've been the first one to do that. image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=640,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
The rocket was emblazoned with the INSEAD logo and underneath that it said KacificOne, the name of our satellite, and a FORCE FOR GOOD and so it was the force for good logo from INSEAD.
Force for Food is part of the famous John Kennedy speech, when he declared that by the end of the decade he would send men to the Moon. I like that reference that space can be a force for good; money can be a force for good, capitalism can be a force for good and you can use money to do the right thing and to use the capital markets in the right way.
20 YEARS IN PERSPECTIVE:
I don't think I would change anything, I don't think I would be able to, honestly, I think fate has taken me where it's taken me.
After INSEAD, I was quite lost for about a year. In December 2004 I had a big wake up call. After a frivolous year of not knowing what I wanted to do, after a sailing regatta in Thailand I was caught in the Asian tsunami and laughing was over in a matter of seconds. I guess I lost the taste for partying at that point and I really wanted to change my life and do something useful.
It was a huge transformation I think, both INSEAD and of course this tsunami, that put everything in question again for me. So that took quite a bit of time to find my path, my way forward.
I'm here, a consultant on a bicycle, and I would need to raise 250 million dollars for this.
I needed to go back and convince my wife, which was probably the most difficult thing of all.
It took me five months to raise about half a million dollars, it took me another 6.5 years to raise 230 million dollars. So we snowballed that project from a little bit of money, and the more money I raised, the more contracts I got and then that was a nice kind of virtuous circle that we got. We bought a Boeing satellite in 2017 and completed all the financing and launched it at the end of 2019 on a SpaceX falcon 9 rocket.
And that was an amazing day that I'll remember for my life - it was like the birth of a third child, it was incredible.
Q: “What if the rocket blew up?” A: “It would have been a wonderful, a faithful firework and people would have clapped I guess.”
Raising money was a challenge but in the end I found a talent in me to be able to raise money.
ON TOPIC: Satellites and rockets, broadband, internet and more
There will always be, for I guess I don’t know how many thousands of years to come, this little satellite. And if nothing else comes out of this company, this little satellite will be floating in space and telling the story that this has happened and that I was the one starting this whole and putting this machine in space and it will be the testimony of the journey.
In remote parts of the world people want to be connected, people want to spend money, they just don't have the means. If you were to put fibre to all these places it would cost billions of dollars, but with a satellite you have the distribution system built into it, so that's the beauty of satellite.
We are providing sometimes lifesaving connectivity for critical cases that are seen in these regions, people live in very precarious conditions.
You can reestablish huge amount of connectivity in a blink, but we've also provided disaster response after many tropical cyclones, typhoons in the Philippines, Vanuatu, Fiji and even in New Zealand recently.
ON TOPIC: Entrepreneurship, start-ups, snowballing
The most difficult is to be lonely at times.
Raise more money than you really need because you'll need that money.
It's a bigger sandcastle, but it's still a sandcastle that the tide keeps chipping at it and denting it, tide after tide, and I'm on top of it, just piling up new sand on top of it to make sure it keeps growing. So it's an interesting journey.
![E28: “Let’s Play” - you just never know what kind of ripples you're going to create image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/f2c8568d-7f5a-42d5-aa74-db3ed25bce67.jpg)
![E27: "Okay, that's a message of hope for the future." image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/f2c8568d-7f5a-42d5-aa74-db3ed25bce67.jpg)
![And finally… “You had your eat, pray, love moment.” “I totally did. I won't be shy about it. I was very, very lucky.” image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![Keep humming.... “You're walking on this rope with a river full of alligators below you, and you're doing a dance basically” image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
!["Business appears to be 20 smacks in the face and 1 little tickle." image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/17993ae7-afd8-4e31-ac95-190261e44ba7.jpg)
![“My job is to make sure that when you wake up in the morning and decide to spend some money, you'll like spend it on me.” image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
!["If you can choose between being kind or being right choose kind" said our little Lapin image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![The monkey does it better than us, AI is going to do it better than the monkeys. image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![What I learned in politics is, you need to work with everybody image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![I now introduce myself as a farmer when people ask what I do and nobody takes me seriously image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![And so I said to myself “Whatever I do next, I want to work in a place where there's a longer term horizon of doing things.” image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![The fact that you can change the shape of the curve of life, like really bend the curve of life is amazing. image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![Please go fast, but we're going to give you the time that is required. image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![We got shipwrecked, luckily on this tiny island in the Filipino archipelago image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![Every time I get seduced into prioritizing wealth then I tend to make wrong decisions. image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![There's nothing like a crisis to force people to pivot and change: the world of travel, luxury and entertainment image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![“The tsunami in Asia was the first of 3 tsunamis I faced in my professional life.” image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)
![An INSEAD couple: Happiness is being able to do waffles on a Sunday morning for my daughters and my wife and spending time with them image](https://media.zencastr.com/cdn-cgi/image/width=90,quality=85/image-files/62e596469b1633017e01104f/de81ce80-0a63-4b6a-a078-7c0d5bc9c99b.jpg)