Founds.
Bothers founders.
Writes things.
That, more or less, is how I spend my time. I help people build new things and worry about how to improve the systems around them. That means investing in technology companies, giving the odd talk about startups, and worrying where it’s all going.
I dropped out of a PhD in entrepreneurship policy to co-found 10to8, which we nearly killed, rebuilt and eventually sold. That formed the core of my not-particularly-unusual, fairly tough founder-to-exit story. Along the way, I’ve also bothered a large number of founders with my advice (usually at their request) and continue to learn from both my mistakes and theirs.
Most of my thinking is spent trying to understand why some technologies and companies make it into the world and others don’t, along with what economic growth actually is and means. Sometimes that thinking turns into blog posts, workshops, talks, and the odd book.
Some Recent Notes
The Human Stake in Accelerating Discovery
AI can accelerate discovery without making humans irrelevant—but only if we deliberately remain inside the feedback loop.
Starting a company is cheap. Being able to access the resources a founder needs to quit their day job and build something isn’t.
The same market forces that created the UK's historic funding gap are now eroding the effectiveness of a subsidy designed to counter them.
I wrote a book. Not 100% on purpose, but it has turned out to be useful to the founders I trusted it to for feedback.
It’s about the decisions founders have to make about themselves, their teams and the companies growing around them — including quite a lot of the things I got wrong. Basically how to f*ck up less, with context.
“The honest guide to startups — the one every first-time founder wishes they’d read before getting started.” - Vanela Bushi, Entrepreneur & VC (founder H-Tree Capital)