I started my MBA because I needed a break. After ten years of startups in Africa, I was burned out. Bad CEOs, broken deals, and a bit of corruption had worn me down. I’m still incredibly passionate about the African space, and the several bad encounters I had in no way diminish my respect for the excellent operators and entrepreneurs in that continent. But for me, it was the right time to step away for awhile. I’ll write about it all over the course of this year, and try to pull in my MBA learnings as well.
The scope of this blog is more about what has changed since I’ve been in Berlin. When I moved to this city, I was extremely passionate about Fintech. It’s the one sector that has a massive customer base (basically everyone involved in modern commerce), and there are so many problems that need to be solved. There’s a lot going on in Fintech in Berlin, but for some reason I wasn’t drawn to it. Maybe it was time to reset.
Over the last 7 months I’ve spent some time getting to know Berlin and one thing that has stood out to me is the sound of the city. The clubs, the DJs, the diverse languages on the street and the proliferation of bluetooth speakers have made me stand up and notice. The way we interact with technology is changing towards voice. People are spending less time typing on a screen, and now spending more time talking to it, or recording themselves. This trend is only going to continue as communities become more diverse and communication becomes more important.
So, this is a long way of saying I’ve decided to start working on some ideas in voice technology. I’ll spend the rest of my MBA mapping out some ideas and speaking to people in Berlin about them, with an aim to launch a company when I graduate next February. (I’ll do the course work too, Mom)
You can expect to read more about voice on this blog going forward, and if you have any good leads let me know!