Jeffery: Welcome to Impact Investing, brought to you by the Supporters Fund. From the most sunniest days of year, coffee center of the country, Marseilles, France. I’m your host, Geoffrey Potvin. And let’s please welcome from the city. Built on gold in 1897 from Willow, Alaska, United States. Our guest, Brian Emerson from Starlight Capital. Welcome, Brian. It’s a real pleasure having you join us today.

Bryan: Hey, J.P., great to be here. Thanks so much for inviting me.

Jeffery: I’m really excited about this conversation. Not because we’ve had to try a couple times to make this all, all work with travels and everything else going on in the world. But you pretty much are running such an awesome show that you’ve been in this industry for. I think it’s 20, 25 years now, so you’re kind of like a pinnacle to how all this investing started and where it’s been going. And there’s so much learning that we’re going to gain from you today. Because again, when you’re in the trenches this long, you’re going to have a lot of good insights on what makes a successful company and what are the areas that people tend to falter on and don’t really pay attention to when they’re running and gunning their business? So before we dive into all that excitement, we’d love for you to share a little bit more about your background from your MBA days all the way across to what you’re doing today. And then one thing about you that nobody would know.

Bryan: Okay, great. Thanks, JP. so I guess the short story is when I graduated with my MBA in the mid 90s, some friends had put together a bought a little shell company for $0.20 a share with the idea of doing a roll up of Latin American telecom providers. So I moved to Mexico City for what would be three years. And at the end of the three years, we had six companies in the firm, doing about 150 million a year. The stock was trading about $24 a share. So I had the good luck of cashing in before the dot.com bust. And I moved back to Houston, Texas. And at that point I did two things. First, I started angel investing. And second, I started a small investment bank, a Fender registered broker dealer. And so those are the two things that I’ve been working on for the last 23 years. The short story on the investment on the, angel investor group is now we’re up to about 30,000 members in our network. We funded about 600 million over the years. And we’re we now meet each month on zoom, and we get probably somewhere between 500 and 1000 members. And we pick six companies to pitch to us. And then from the investment banking standpoint, I had sold my firm a few years ago, but still have all my securities licenses and tend to work on helping small public companies that need 20 to 40 million in equity. So that’s the real short story of of my business background.

Jeffery: I’m not sure we should do it any justice by doing it short, but we’ll we’ll let that go and we’ll start to peel into that because that’s pretty awesome and pretty exciting. And it’s not. And I guess the reason why it fits that category of being, awesome is because I’m not sure where it came across your mind to say, hey, I just built these companies, and we rolled up six companies, and now we’re diving in and we’re going into angel investing. 23 years ago, angel investing was, you know, very thin, like everywhere. There was very few. from my recollection, I started working in this space 20 years ago, plus years ago. And there was very few, like it was very refined on who you were going after and the types of people that would be interested in it. I heard so many great stories over the years of, the angel investors that were investing at the time, and it just seemed kind of ad hoc. It was meeting in a coffee shop, and the person’s holding a check for 20 grand, and that was her investment. And it was kind of like not structured the way it is today and the way it’s been done. So I’d love to kind of peel back on to what got you involved in this. But before I do one thing about you that nobody would know.

Bryan: So the one thing that not many people know is a few years ago, when the kids moved out, my wife and I retired to our lake house here in Alaska, and we just loved being surrounded by the mountains and, get outside and enjoy the fresh air. So there’s, there’s a little tidbit for, for your, listeners.

Jeffery: I love it. And the outdoors to the best. in the more recent podcast that I was doing, it was with, a lady investor out of Germany, and I find the tournaments are the best. and I’m going to compare it to the Canadians. And now to yourself that just love getting outdoors and exploring and just being part of that. So I think that’s exceptional. It’s pretty amazing.

Bryan: We love it.

Jeffery: So to take, a layer back to where this all started, and I love the story that you started off at $0.20 a share. And you kind of just started rolling up companies, and then within three years you were doing 150 million. Incredible. Can you share a few tidbits on what created that success? Was it, an area that nobody was doing anything and what kind of got you interested? And what I also love about this story is that you were all in, you moved to Mexico to do this. It wasn’t something that you just thought took lightly and said, oh, I can do this at home, or I’ll just go do this at Texas. You literally picked up and rerouted yourself to a whole new area and dove right into this. What was kind of the impetus of this? What drove you to say this is important, and I know this is going to be successful and what got you there? And maybe there’s a couple things you can share to the audience on why it took what it did to get you to make this big leap.

Bryan: Yeah. You bet. Well, you know, I think the old refrain is is appropriate here. A rising tide lifts all ships. This was a time when, MCI had, been battling against AT&T for a while, and the telecom markets were starting to open up worldwide, and I just happened to be in the right place at the right time with the liberalization. And, I can remember back in those days, if you wanted to make a call, from, let’s say, the U.S. to Central America, you were probably paying one or more dollars a minute to AT&T for those international calls. Well, as things started to open up and there were more competitors in the market and there were options like prepaid cards and dedicated lines, we happened to be in the right place at the right time and put together this team so that, we dramatically lower the cost of international, phone service. And we were able to benefit from that. That’s that’s, you know, so I would say for anybody who is looking to create a unicorn, there are these things that come around, a couple times in someone’s lifetime where they’re the game changers, where, you know, whether it’s now the, you know, I or, other things that, you know, social media some years ago, those are the things that if you happen to be there at the right time, you can really do well.

Jeffery: And what’s really cool about this is that you were able to pick up on the trend, and then you moved to Mexico, started to roll these companies up. What kind of gave you the idea that this business was the leader or the driver to make this happen? And it wasn’t just a whim, and you weren’t going to get crushed by AT&T or one of the other dominant players.

Bryan: Well, right. So my good luck started, probably 10 or 15 years before as I was getting ready for what would be a fun ride. So in college, I had spent my junior year living in Spain, so I came away from that speaking Spanish real well. I then, went in with a, telecom company that was starting to dabble in different areas, and I set up the first prepaid phone card from Latin America. So I kind of had an idea and started to see these things take shape, started to build my network. And then when we were ready to hit it, when I got out of, my MBA program, then all the everything was there aligned and ready to go. So it it took a lot of preparation and I happened to be in the right place at the right time. So, I think for, for those of your listeners who are working hard and building skills and talents and abilities, you know, those can pay off at the right circumstances as, as, as they find, those, those types of opportunities.

Jeffery: I love that. And there’s a couple things that you mentioned there. The biggest one is that you started to building your network. So going back that previous 15 years, you know, there’s there’s a great podcast out there by Jordan Harbinger. And he’s always talking about build your network. This is how you have to build it. And he gives a lot of cues on how to do that. And he’s one of the top 1% or 3% of podcast downloaded. And his whole thing was building that network. Now you’re going back, you know, 30 years ago and saying I was already building a network that I already had mentally sorted this out and started to grow and get into these areas. And then the next thing that kind of supported that was the language you started to pick up on the language, which of course, if you start to learn that you’ve got some of these key metrics that are going to really help you move into Mexico and start to dominate in a market, one you can speak a language to, you know, the culture, and three, you’ve got that focus and you’re hitting that runway of of a brand new company. So taking that energy and that that drive that you’re going after, did it help that, you had this MBA behind you? Did it was it a supporting feature that gave you the confidence, or is that just another tool in the tool belt? It kind of helped you move forward.

Bryan: it was it was hugely, beneficial and helpful. you know, I learned so much in the MBA program. I think going into the MBA program, I pretty much knew everything about business. And, of course I learned so much more and how to think in different structures. you know, there’s so many different areas of an MBA that I was able to get involved with as anyone does, who goes through those those types of programs. There’s a lot you’re going to come away with. So you have just more tools in the tool chest. So when you come across maybe an H.R. Problem, you kind of have some, initial ways to think about, well, how would I look at that problem, you know, new ways to employ technology. Okay, again, you look back to your toolkit. What do you learn? What are some of those authors that you read? How do they you know, with the case study method, what were the cases you saw that work then. And so you you wind that in with your experiences and, and your, intellect and hopefully it helps put the puzzle together quicker. It certainly did in my case.

Jeffery: that’s great. So it starts to unfold and you dive right in. Now you’re kind of shifted. You’re perhaps you’re doing some, entrepreneurship before. So what kind of intrigued you to take the dive into entrepreneurship world versus staying behind a big corporate, or what kind of drove you into this new, I guess, portion of what you were going to do in business? And what were the lessons that you gained from that three years? Because it’s rare to see a company go from 0 to 150 million, which is awesome. So what was some of the learnings that you gained from that?

Bryan: Well, you know, I guess I could go deeper about, my entrepreneurism. I mean, I can remember when I was, I don’t know, in fifth or sixth grade, I started shoveling snow in a suburb of Chicago and earning money so I could buy a better bicycle. And, these kind of things. I remember in seventh and eighth grade, I bought a snow cone and cotton candy machine and went around to all the fairs in the Chicagoland area and, started really making quite a bit of money as a young person. My parents would drive me around and in the, you know, in the family station wagon. And, then in high school, I started buying some trucks and, started an asphalt maintenance company. I think I ended up having about a dozen trucks and two dozen laborers. and most of them spoke Spanish. So I was kind of learning a little Spanish back then. and, had a software company I ran for a while, ended up selling, two branches of my asphalt company, just after college. So I ran that through college. So I had, a taste of entrepreneurism and and selling to companies, albeit, you know, very small, but, I think that kind of lit the flame for me, that I really wanted to be more in an entrepreneurial setting than I did in a big company. I realized there were a lot of people that start with a big company route, especially after business school, and learn a ton. so it’s a it’s a different skill set that they pick up in a different set of tools. And, depending upon your situation, they can all work out great. I just happened to try to put myself in a situation where I can best use my skills and abilities.

Jeffery: I love that, and it sounds like because you have this, background of entrepreneurship, that it kind of led you this way no matter what. You were kind of, built to be an entrepreneur. You started at a young age and you kind of made your way through. So taking the learning that you gained from getting these businesses to 150 million, was there any clean takeaways that you said, I’ll do this better next time or I need to focus stronger on these areas. Maybe it wasn’t as strong on. Is there something that kind of, helped you on your next your next build out?

Bryan: absolutely. Yeah. I think when I went into when I transitioned to angel investing, I looked at a lot of of what I learned. And, you know, there were a lot of failures and missteps and, you know, broken fingers along the way and that that I didn’t want to repeat. And I think one of them was invest in the jockeys, not the horses. Meaning I started looking for the best management teams I could as an early angel investor, more so than the business model itself, because whereas, you know, consumers change, business plans change, the markets change. You don’t really want the people you write the checks to to change. And so I really dug in to understand who are the people running these start ups or these early stage companies, and are they the ones that I want to be with, you know, for the long term? And, you know, clearly there were some several investments that went down the drain. They were learning experiences. But I think the idea of, of, of really focusing on can this manager or this founder or these, this team, take it to the next level and beyond? I think it was something that I learned. The human element is was very important for me.

Jeffery: And when you take that human element and I’m, I’m assuming that you impose a lot of this even in your own businesses when you started out and now taking them forward, have you kind of looked at it and said, well, if I’m an early stage investor, a lot of them don’t have the opportunity to build the right team. So are you kind of pushing for them to layer in the right team, or at least plan ahead on who they need to be in that team in order to make sure that that you’re willing to invest. Because not only do they have a strong, maybe 1 or 2 people, but you know that they’re going to grow into a better business because of the founder unit that they already have right now.

Bryan: I would say typically before they would, you know, hire a lot of folks in my case, I was coming in to companies very early stage, you know, maybe one of the first investors at a small amount. So I would probably want to make sure that that founder had a viable, minimum viable product and that there was some acceptance in the market. And it was probably the next round, which would be the first venture round that would have the kind of money behind it that would be able to allow them to staff up. Once they’ve proven out some of those initial, markers that I wanted to see. So I helped fund the very early, early, early products and then let the next election, the next group that was even more capable, fund the the build out of the of the staff.

Jeffery: So that makes sense. So taking this early, you’re almost like, an oracle on figuring out what new tax, what new products, what things would have that possibility of succeeding. is there kind of any I wouldn’t call them more stories, but are there any things that you predicted that would be become huge, that maybe didn’t make it in time and have now come out today, you know, like way ahead of their time, like it could have been a product business. Maybe Google Glass was out 20 years ago and it just didn’t kick it and it didn’t make it to market. Is there anything that you kind of that, you were almost betting on that the future should be buying into this and it didn’t make it because the future just wasn’t ready for it.

Bryan: Well, I’ll have to admit that, one of my biases was to try to invest in telecommunications. The problem with that is that there was so much deflation and the prices were going down so quickly. You have to scale up very fast, even on a thin margin. And, you know, you might have to have some intellectual property protection or some kind of an unfair advantage, to really beat out everyone else. So it was a little bit of investing on a treadmill where even though I could try to find some good niches within telecom, it was just so brutally competitive. So, for instance, I can remember investing in some very early stage, telecom equipment companies where somebody had invented something in their garage. And I can remember there was this fad of auto dealers. So I don’t know if you can think back to that time in, you know, I guess mid 90s roughly or so, where to get along if you didn’t want to use the phone company, that came with your service, like AT&T, then you would have to dial typically a long code to then route you over to a long distance, provider. And people just didn’t want to dial those codes. So these auto dealers came up and and they were very profitable for a little while, meaning, and then, you know, like a year or 2 or 3 and then, of course, all that was automated and you have to go to the next one. So, I also remember investing in Linux thinking that was going to be huge. And of course, Linux has done done well over the years. It, but, I invested with a small team that was focused on Latin America, and they had some inroads. The company was sold, so I probably broke even. But, you know, that my, my investment in Linux and Latin America didn’t do as well as as others, but I did try to build upon that experience. When I went further to learn certain lessons, like, you know, how long do we think this market’s going to be viable before it just gets, you know, swamped by competition? And of course, you had talked about the infrastructure. We’re way back then. There wasn’t a lot of infrastructure for angel investors and entrepreneurs. And now it’s just incredible. the sophistication out there between incubators, accelerators, angel groups, you know, capital is much more efficient and much more efficiently applied today, which is great. But, you know, there were there was a lot of lessons along along the way, but, it was it was fun partaking and learning of them so that that technology driver is, is a tough, steep curve. But, Sometimes you just have to invest in several different, hoping that that, you know, the one will be the unicorn.

Jeffery: It sounds like. And there’s a couple pieces I’ll unpack there, but it sounds like even 15, 20 years ago that the game was still speed. It was still about taking this product and getting it into market as fast as possible, because you’re going to have competition and you don’t know where it’s coming from. But it is smart to move quickly. And would that also set up for an acquisition quickly as well? Like do you see that? Has any of that changed over the last 20 years? Are companies staying around longer trying to generate more revenue? because they are the incumbent in the space, or is it changed? And they’re all just as much in a panic mode to build and sell.

Bryan: Well, you know, I think everybody wants to be first. And they’re in a panic mode to, to build. But then, you know, the date comes for the vast majority. Is it time to sell? Is it time for me to merge with someone bigger or, you know, take some chips off the table? Because again, the odds are against any one company, being the next unicorn. And, you know, there were quite a few, stock certificates that I’ve got that I can use to pay for a room with that, didn’t go anywhere. but there were others, that were acquired that went on to do real well. And so I would say that maybe 10% of what I invested in did well enough to cover up the losses for the others, and then some.

Jeffery: That’s great. So if if the the game is still build and grow and scale quickly and that hasn’t changed over the duration of 20 years, there is a bigger difference that’s changed, which is there’s a lot more companies coming into the space. There’s a lot more people looking to build entrepreneurship style, lifestyle, and there’s a lot more dollars coming into the market. So are you feeling today that the change really is more around the amount of money that’s being poured into the space than it was 20 years ago, and that the talent is also improved, or is it kind of all work itself out again, like it’s there’s no difference from 20 years ago to today. It’s still run, hustle, grow and sell.

Bryan: Well, I guess the message that I’ve learned, on my investments have been, what is the smart money for me to accept as an entrepreneur? And so what I’ve been doing for 23 years in the angel group is trying to connect entrepreneur with the venture funds that will fund them a few years in the future by twisting the arms of my friends that run those funds to see if they’ll invest now as an angel. Because if you can find, you know, six potential venture funds that you want to receive money from in the future, and you can get their principals, owners or managers to put in a small amount of money. Now, you probably don’t really have to worry about raising money going forward. If you do things right. And so the idea of really choosing wisely your capital sources and what do they deliver? Can they do the networking, leverage their networks because they’ve been out doing what they do successfully for maybe several decades. So let’s piggyback on them. Don’t reinvent the wheel. And, so I think looking understanding what that money source will deliver for you in your specific firm is, is the most important, aspect that I found in, in this in early stage investing.

Jeffery: Now, that’s very valuable. It’s a that’s a very good insight that if you can get the people later on that are going to come in at a larger scale, if you can get them in coming in for something a bit smaller into that phase, they can learn their way through. And then when they decide that you’re doing the right things, check their KPIs and it matches to what they’re looking for from a scalable business, then there’s a higher potential that they’ll want to keep investing to ensure that business grows. So it’s it’s a it’s a smart way of looking at it. And I guess as a founder, you may not have experienced these things. You may not understand when you’re first going into market as a first time founder, how you’re supposed to approach investors or the types of investors you want to get in with. So I guess you can learn from your, your fellow, startup founders and how they approach it. But this sounds like a pretty viable solution.

Bryan: You’re right. So, you know, there’s so many options you mentioned it’s really overwhelming for the first time entrepreneur to raise money again. You know, online, sources for connecting entrepreneurs and angel investors and networks. And it’s really confusing. So hopefully, entrepreneurs will get some good advice from their trusted colleagues and, and find the right people to get on their team.

Jeffery: Agreed. You mentioned one other piece, which was about the like, staying viable. Is there kind of a window for this? Like, you know, there’s the flashy stuff that’s just happening that’s kind of fly by night but may carry on for a year or two. Is there something where you’re looking at trends that you’re trying to decide? How? And will this company become a commoditized product so that it will be around for 20 or 30 years? How do you kind of look at a business today versus what you used to look at and say today? You know, this isn’t just a fly by night thing. This is something that people are going to need in ten years. You have some metrics on how you look at this is not being a one off type product that no one will ever come back to. Have you built any KPIs in your own system to make sure that the companies you’re throwing in front of your investor group have that longevity and potential for scaling?

Bryan: You know, I wish I were smart enough to know the answer there, but I’m afraid I’m not. you know, there’s so many good companies that I’ve seen that didn’t get funded, and there’s so many lousy companies that, did get funding. and it’s it’s really hard to tell who the winners are going to be. From my standpoint, I’m probably focused a little bit more on the singles in the sense that if I think there’s an area that’s good, maybe I have some insights on telecom or communications in general or some other area, then, then I’ll say, okay, let’s get to first base, let’s get our product up, let’s make sure we have enough cash in the bank to be able to come back and fundraise another day, because most companies run out of cash and they don’t get to first base. And so if you can, if, if you can get them to first base with enough cash there to help have someone else get them to second, that’s a win because you’re buying more time on that option for there to be value. And they might have developed enough to sell what they have at at a premium, which is great. So in terms of the final, you know, huge unicorn, you know, the next ChatGPT, I it’s hard to say, but, but getting them to first and second is something I think most investors could probably, work on and help with and run the numbers and get them to that next base.

Jeffery: Is there any, stories or companies that you mentioned? Of course, that have won and the ones that have failed, etc.? Is there any companies that you saw in the past, and it could be at any point in time that you really felt they had a really unique opportunity and a great product, but unfortunately, the rest of the world just couldn’t catch up to where they were from an innovation standpoint.

Bryan: You know, yes, I think certainly at the time I had mentioned that company that was doing Linux and Latin America, and it just seemed such a slam dunk. You know, I’d spent years in Latin America and I realized, a lot of monopolies existed down there. There were a lot of opportunities for startups and software. It just seemed to me as though it was going to work. And I think one of the problems is there there were such entrenched distribution channels down there in many different fields that to break out of those is was extremely difficult. And in hindsight, it probably took, you know, decades to do that in many fields. another example within telecom, I remember going down and offering big discounts on comics shipment at one point in my career. That seemed like a no brainer, but these firms that installed this telecom equipment had such alliances, and sometimes through marriage and blood that, you know, no price discounting was going to have them change their suppliers. And, so it took it took in that case, it took a lot longer than I thought. So that was one where I just, was more optimistic. I probably had my North American hat on that. Surely this is better, faster, cheaper. Everyone’s going to realize that and, know that there are human networks in place that oftentimes supersede that.

Jeffery: And that’s super valuable that you share that, because this is commonly in Japan, it’s the Korea Tsu model, which is the businesses integrate and invest in each other. So they float all their boats. So they all work together. so if one goes down, they’re picking each other up to continue to grow, which means that when someone tries to come in and sell to one, they have to sell to all, or they all dismiss it as a value. And to your point, this is very entrenched in other countries and other regions that we sometimes don’t think too deeply about. We think that, hey, we’re offering the best value, it’s the cheapest product for the best price, except for all these things are the other way around. But we don’t think about the human network. And you kind of really define that, that it’s super important. And, you know, I always say to to founders or to anybody when it comes to investing is you got to figure out how to make other people money. And if you can’t figure out how to make other people money in the chain, which is all the different layers of investing from seed up to series D and vice versa, they got to figure out how can you product, get in and help these people and make them money. If you’re just going in there trying to crush everybody, eventually you’re going to hit a brick wall because people realize that this isn’t going to work. You’re going to kill for other businesses, you’re going to affect the bottom line to these companies, and then they just choose not to want to work with you. So you have to really envision that, yes, you can make a change in cost and you can make a change in plan, but there has to be a better way to ensure that all the incumbents still can make their money and still make their value. if you’re going to squeeze into this new model or to this new business line.

Bryan: Exactly, I completely agree. Yeah.

Jeffery: It’s almost that there’s a learning that needs to shift in the mindset. You know, when you when you talk about change changes. The hardest thing for people to really grasp because changes very threatening to a person to anybody really. So it almost feels like there should be a course just in how do I integrate my company into a space? How do I get people to get behind me and support me? And then how do I make sure everybody finds their balance in making money and, and all those good things that come with supporting a business along the way?

Bryan: That’s right. And we can’t underestimate the uniqueness of culture in a business because businesses do have different cultures. maybe some for the better, some for the worse. and you can we’ve, we’ve talked about that geographically and different countries, different parts of the world. so we try to look at the culture, if you can. I know it’s very difficult, especially if you’re maybe new to business. You’re a younger person, maybe you haven’t had the chance to look at other cultures in depth, but really try to ask people either in that business if maybe if you’re applying to work for a startup or an early stage company or any company, what’s the culture like? What do you like? What you don’t like? Do your due diligence. You know, there’s a lot of due diligence out there, just, on the internet and talking to folks and reaching out to them through social media. So learn all you can. I think that’s another one of the big changes that’s happened over the last few decades. people will share information with you oftentimes if you ask. So, get all the information you can as quickly as you can know.

Jeffery: Very well. Shared. There was kind of you mentioned when you were talking about your shift and changing into another country and doing these acquisitions. Is there any advice or anything that you learned by doing that? Because, again, you could have run it out of the US, you could have run it anywhere. And I come across a lot of companies when they’re talking, they share things like, you know, I’m having a tough go in my country, but in my head I’m thinking, man, this would be a perfect fit for the Philippines. Why don’t you go sell it there? Do you ever make recommendations on where a company could be better fit to see if that’s something that’s of interest to the founder and how driven they are and say, you know, if you go there, then we’ll make an investment because we see that there’s a bigger window here for you. Like, is there that kind of, ideology that gets built into the investing side as well?

Bryan: Yes. And I think there are two big aspects to it from my standpoint. The first is obviously the quantitative meaning. Can we get our prices down? Can we get the product shipped out cheaply enough or delivered electronically? so the quantitative is pretty easy to figure out a lot of resources. What’s a little bit more difficult is the qualitative, in other words, by having, you know, my luxury brand based in Thailand or wherever, does that connote, higher quality? Does it connote that you’re living your, dreams and aspirations? in a way that’s going to make the product seem more genuine and more, easier to sell and so there’s a story behind most successful brands. And the idea of passion and what you were meant to do is important. So if someone says, you know, I really wonder if I should go to, say, the Philippines to start this call center, one of my questions would be, well, have you ever been to the Philippines? Would you do you think you do you know anybody there? Have you ever traveled there? Vacation there? You know what happens if you get there and you hate it or you don’t like the food or the people? So my going to Mexico, I think, was a little bit passion based in the sense that I had gone to Latin America a lot. I did like, Mexico, like the people, the food, the culture. And so there was a little bit of me that said, you know, I’m going to probably go through some difficult times. And I think of those five times that I went to the hospital because I got, you know, food poisoning or drink, drank the water, ate those great snacks off the food vendor on the sidewalk. but I wanted to be there. And that gave me more motivation, more inspiration to to power through the difficult times that you’re inevitably going to find. so, so passion is a part of it. And I think people need to answer the passion question. Joseph Campbell talked about following your bliss. So that’s something someone might read up on if they, have an inclination that being in a different place of the world might somehow help them or their business.

Jeffery: I love that follow your bliss. I think it’s, it’s a good motivation, and it’s a good way to look internally to figure out where you want to go and and what’s going to motivate you and drive you. And if being away and building something all on your own by yourself is a motivation, then take it and run with it and find the the supporting networks to your point earlier that can support you while doing that. So build that network right away. Start talking to people, sharing what you’re doing, and kind of build on it from there. Yep. That’s right I love it. All right. Well we’re going to kind of now we’re going to shift pace because I think we can go all day. I literally have a billion more questions on on the experiences that you’ve had and all the great things you’ve done. It’s so amazing what you’ve gone through. And, I guess maybe what we’ll before we shift into the, the 62nd rant, the question I’ll ask is, what’s the toughest lesson you’ve learned as an investor?

Bryan: I think the toughest lesson I’ve learned is when to quit. In other words, I’m a glass half full kind of guy and I want to ride something to the end. But I’ve tried to set a goal that if an investment or an experience reaches that goal or exceeds it, I need to start thinking very seriously about is it time to cash in the chips? Because I’ve set that goal. and, you know, I had an incredible experience back in 2013 when someone who owed me $350 said, gee, you know, I don’t have the cash, but would you mind if I paid you one Bitcoin? And I thought, what’s this Bitcoin thing? And, so, you know, I took a flier and, and I said to myself, you know, once that Bitcoin gets to X I’m out of here. It just looks, you know, like a fly by night thing. Well iterate I ended up selling that bitcoin for $12,000. it went way beyond my expectations. but I think you should have something in mind as to when it’s time to get out. So I got out too early, but, it was a good ride.

Jeffery: Well, I think from your increased percentage, I’m sure you didn’t. That you got out early based on where the market sit today. But at the time, that $12,000 probably made you another 50,000 somewhere else. So I think it’s, how you evaluate to your point, the exit side of it. And I think you had a great increase, and that’s really how you did the next investment from there and how it benefited from. So I’m going to say it was successful all around. So that’s a that’s a great way of, understanding even as an investor, we have to set goals and lines so that, we know where our thresholds are and where we’re willing to accept failure or where we’re willing to accept or wins that I think that makes, a really big, difference, for yourself to reduce your own stress, but also to build excitement in the wins that you do gain and take your wins when they’re there. Yeah, yeah, I love it. All right. We’re going to go into the 62nd read. So the way this works is that you’ve got 60s. You can rant about anything you like. I will work my best to put in one rebuttal and then you can close it off. I will let you know at 60s that you’re at 60s. I will also share that this has never happened. I everybody goes at least 2 or 3 minutes because, the rant is that good. So I will let you read and, we’ll go from there. But, you let me know when you’re ready and I will start the clock.

Bryan: I’m ready.

Jeffery: All right. You’re good to go.

Bryan: Okay, my rant is on renewable energy. The good news is that my house is off grid, and we have ten solar panels and a wind generator and a battery bank. So we live by renewable energy. It’s great. We are talking right now on yesterday’s photons. The bad news is it’s not always reliable. There are times when we get several overcast days. I’ve got to go start the generator. the gas generator. So what? I’m. Whereas I think this is a good solution for people who can deal with intermittency on a personal level, I’m afraid I don’t see it working out on the level of a country or a huge area. You know, we see what’s going on with, problems in Texas. We see that, you know, Germany’s committing suicide, but with this intermittency problem, and they’re having to go back to coal. So a lot of the wind projects that were offshore are now being deemed unviable without huge subsidies. So I think people should look very carefully about, renewable sources. And will it work for them? I hope it could work for everybody, but will it work in the larger picture? And for countries and the bigger scheme? I’m not so sure. There is. My rant.

Jeffery: I love it so my my, I’m heavily supporting, but I’m also going to counter for a second. Is there a way to balance these out where you’re having renewable and you’re having some form of backup storage? If it’s microgrids, whatever that might be, so that it is become a global impact, where in a country everybody’s committing to the grid, everybody’s utilizing this renewable energy, so you’re getting backup storage, you’re not having to run generators. Is there a way that you can have all of these different energies operating from nuclear? If you have to have a little bit of coal, whatever those pieces are, that all kind of collectively work together. Because I do know that in the US, there’s so much conversation around companies starting up building grids and they’re not doing anything with it shutting down. And failing and leaving all of the homeowners with all this storage that they’re not using and then can’t access it. And they got to pay thousands and thousands more to get access to it. But then on the other side, you’ve got in South Africa, where everything is battery backed up, so your lights are ready to go no matter what. So there’s so many different ways that we’re trying to tackle this, but it seems to be convoluted and not really one easy structures that they can support you so that you don’t have the intermittency. Is there a way that can support that or no.

Bryan: I think so. I think on the national level, and I am no energy engineer, expert technologist. So it could very well be that some technology will be developed tomorrow, that that will make all this moot. But I think given the technologies we have now, I think probably nuclear is going to have to be the lowest carbon, most efficient way to run a country or a nation. You know it. I think it converts something like 90% of the energy are basically carbon free. And so if we want to have grid scale energy, I think it’s going to have to be nuclear. On the other hand, I think everybody needs to learn to deal with intermittency. If you look at all the people around the world and when they need energy, you know, we don’t use much energy when we’re sleeping. Okay. I realize that our refrigerators and freezers are going and our clocks are being powered, but for the most part, and certainly in the third world, intermittency is something that that we all have to deal with. I’ve had to deal with for I am. Do I want to run the generator another hour or do I want to go, you know, read a book or, you know, read some, cached material that I downloaded on the internet? I can kill an hour doing that. I don’t need to have it up 24 over seven. And I think the more people around the world, especially in first, first world industrialized countries, realize that they can be fine with intermittency because they’re not having to pour molten steel 24 over seven. Then that’s going to be their solution. They’re going to find renewable sources, and it’s going to help them economically, as well as, psychologically. And we’re going to do just fine with a little intermittency.

Jeffery: Well said, I love it. I do agree, there’s, I think that’s the middle ground is the intermittency, but it’s also figuring out how do all of these technologies operate and coincide together, to be able to build that intermittency, reduce the latency, but keep it to a value that allows all of us to function and still feel that we’re part of the fast moving world that we’re in today. but I do agree, there’s got to be a balance and well shared. Well shared. All right. We’re going to jump into the business questions. So these are from the viewpoint of yourself as the investor. You choose one or the other. rapid fire. Here we go. Founder or co-founder.

Bryan: Founder.

Jeffery: Unicorn or a four year ten x exit.

Bryan: The latter.

Jeffery: Tech or CPG.

Bryan: Tech?

Jeffery: NFTs or web 3.0.

Bryan: Web 3.0.

Jeffery: AI or blockchain?

Bryan: Blockchain.

Jeffery: First time founder or second. Third time founder.

Bryan: Second. Third.

Jeffery: First money or series a for me.

Bryan: First money in.

Jeffery: Angel or VC.

Bryan: Angel for what I’m doing.

Jeffery: Okay. Board seat or observer.

Bryan: Board seat.

Jeffery: Safe or convertible. Note.

Bryan: That’s a more tough. That’s tough one. I’ll go with convertible. I’m. I’m. I set up a series of options. So that’s an option value for me. Go ahead.

Jeffery: There. leader.

Bryan: Follow a lead.

Jeffery: Favorite part of investing?

Bryan: Helping mentor the founder or management team.

Jeffery: A number of companies invested per year.

Bryan: probably two. I just don’t have the bandwidth for more than that now.

Jeffery: Okay. Vertical is the focus.

Bryan: Of verticals would be anything in communications. maybe some things related to social media. and I’m, I’m a junkie for just about any business plan. Love to look at them and critique them. But for me, I probably stick mainly with something related to communications.

Jeffery: Okay, two qualities for a startup to stand out to you.

Bryan: A one is that the founder or the fundraiser is willing to sacrifice something personally. Some kind of skin in the game. And number two, that they can show me that they have done that in the past with the goal that they wanted to achieve. Personally.

Jeffery: I like that that’s, that’s a good option, proving yourself along the way, right? Yep. What is nine? What what is the piece of advice you give founders? Nine out of ten times?

Bryan: Do your due diligence on the people that are looking to fund you and make sure you understand them. Their value proposition and how they make money and what they’re going to bring to the table, and make sure you put some clawbacks in there. If they don’t deliver.

Jeffery: I like the clawbacks. I like all of that, but certainly like the idea of throwing in the clawbacks. That’s, that’s brilliant. Do you have a philosophy or any rules that you stand behind?

Bryan: You know, I would say the one that keeps coming up most for me in the back of my head and among my fellow investors is invest in the jockey, not the horse. It’s really about the managers and the founder and the team then then the technology or the business itself, at least at the very early stage.

Jeffery: For sure. Who is your hero mentor and why?

Bryan: Oh, gosh. there’s so many that I, think back on, I would have to say, my hero is Don Quixote. He’s, up there with his, Lance and going after the windmills and, you know, and that’s me, trying to, maybe change the status quo and, kind of conquer the, the Goliath. And, a lot of times it doesn’t work, but I’m with Don Quixote.

Jeffery: I like it. What line do you find? You share to investors over and over.

Bryan: I do you know, the person in the company you’re investing in? Again, all about due diligence. And if they don’t deliver, clobber back.

Jeffery: Okay, if you could change one thing about venture, what would it be?

Bryan: One thing about venture, I would say. Continue to be open to as many people as possible. I think it’s gone from a little bit more insular model to an open model. And I think that continuing of opening is important, to try to give as many people as possible, at least the the chance to pitch and and be heard.

Jeffery: I like that double sided question. What is your favorite and potentially your toughest investment?

Bryan: The favorite, you know, I mean, in terms. So I guess my favorite type of investment is the one that, that I know best. And I feel that I can control. The downside of that is that’s the only industry or model or set of circumstances under which my wife says I can lose money.

Jeffery: Fair. Hey, you have to have you have to have your, guardrails and your rules to keep you moving forward so that, you don’t get carried away, right? Yep. Okay. Personal questions. What is the most famous person that pops in your mind?

Bryan: Most famous person is Alexander Hamilton. He’s the namesake for my college, Hamilton College.

Jeffery: I love it. Okay. First brand that pops in your mind.

Bryan: Nike.

Jeffery: Book or movie?

Bryan: Movie. I just saw police state it came out, and it’s a scary look at someone’s version of the future. I hope it doesn’t happen.

Jeffery: All right. Superman or Batman?

Bryan: Batman.

Jeffery: Fortune cookie or birthday cake?

Bryan: Oh. Birthday cake. And I hope it’s chocolate.

Jeffery: Five minutes with Bezos or Oprah.

Bryan: I’ll go with Bezos.

Jeffery: Okay. Mountain or beach?

Bryan: Oh, definitely mountain. No question. I’m not a beach person.

Jeffery: Bike or run.

Bryan: biking? Yeah. Especially if it’s a fat tire bike.

Jeffery: Big Mac or chicken McNuggets.

Bryan: Big Mac?

Jeffery: Trophy or money?

Bryan: I’ll go with trophy at this point in my life, but it generally was money. So I think I’ll stick with trophy now.

Jeffery: Okay. Beer or wine.

Bryan: Oh beer. I’m a home brewer.

Jeffery: Oh I love it. Ted talker book reading.

Bryan: I’m a video guy. Ted talk.

Jeffery: Okay. TikTok or Instagram?

Bryan: Instagram.

Jeffery: Facebook or LinkedIn?

Bryan: LinkedIn. By far.

Jeffery: Favorite movie and what character would you play?

Bryan: Favorite character? I would say that I would, have to say when Harry met Sally and I’m Billy Crystal.

Jeffery: I like it, I seen that in a while, but it was a good, good movie back in the day. favorite book?

Bryan: Don Quixote. I did my senior thesis in college on it.

Jeffery: Okay. Favorite sports team?

Bryan: Favorite sports team? I would have to say the Niners at this point. 40 niners.

Jeffery: They’re they’re doing what they did okay. They did okay. Yeah. Yeah. We’re almost there. What is the meaning of success to you?

Bryan: The meaning of success is waking up in the morning having a goal, a good goal, a worthy goal and accomplishing it. I realize that’s very small, but in the big scheme of things, if I. If I hit my daily goals and enjoy what I’m doing, the big goals will fall into line.

Jeffery: I like it. What is your superpower?

Bryan: My superpower is my wife. We we’ve been married 21.5 years and are completely in love.

Jeffery: I love it, that’s a fantastic superpower to have great team. Great team. I want to say thank you very much. Oh, go ahead, go ahead.

Bryan: No, please go ahead. I misheard something.

Jeffery: Well, I just said you guys had a great team and that’s what makes a big difference. So having that support and to be able to go out and, challenge the world and having the support behind you. And that doesn’t matter if it’s husband, wife or, family, friends or anything in the world. I think what you’re doing is fantastic. You’ve built out a massive network. And of course, being able to help all of those founders with the investor community that you’ve built is the same thing as you mentioned with your wife is having that support. So it makes a big difference in any founder to have that support behind them. And every little bit helps. So you’re you’re, you’re crushing it. So keep up the amazing efforts. And thank you very much for all of your time today, Brian. It was great to get to know you and to share and learn. I’ve taken lots of notes and you’ve got a lot to share, and I’m sure there’s a way more that we can dive into. But I’d like to say thank you on behalf of our community for joining and sharing. And the way we like to end our show is we like to to give you the last words, anything you want to share to the investor community or to the startups, I turn it over to you and please let people know how they can get Ahold of you.

Bryan: Well, JP, number one, I want to return the thanks. I’ve been following you for a long time, and I’ve seen excuse me a lot of your interviews. So impressive. You’ve built an incredible network. I’m so glad we hooked up. And I’m sure there’s a lot we’ll do over many years. So thank you for all you do for the entrepreneurial community. let’s see. my website is Starlight capital.co, and I have my contact information there. I am a sucker for business plans and helping, early stage companies. I, I give a lot of free advice. they don’t have to accept it. but, I always love helping out where I can, I love giving back. So, JP, thanks again for your time today. It’s been great. Look forward to our keeping in close touch. Bye bye. Likewise. Thank you. Okay. That was a great conversation with Brian. Fantastic. Like all the years of experience that he has in the investment world really makes a difference. But also with entrepreneurial journey because he started off taking risks and that’s what it was all about for entrepreneurs. You know, he mentioned some great stories of when he was a youth and the things that he did.

Jeffery: But as he progress through and he took that leap of faith and went to Mexico, he had a lot of background there already, but he still took the leap. And, you know, some of the great things that came out of the conversation was building that network and building it up right away. When, you know, early on, you never know when that network is going to become important and have some value in your business or in anything you do. You know, it’s the people you go to school with in college, university, high school that become leaders ten, 20 years from now. And those people to build those relationships with are going to make a big difference in the future. some of the other points that that he touched on, you know, set goals and achieve them, even if it’s daily goals or weekly monthly goals, but setting those goals and going and achieving them, and also the same thing for your investments so that you know when to exit, take the money when you have it, take the value and move on. I think we forget that we’re always going for this big, payout when at the end of the day, we could lose it all, or we could just gain a little bit. And I think we have to realize, what are we willing to gain and what are we willing to lose? And there’s a fine balance there. And he really stage that well on putting that together. And then of course, understanding the qualitative and quantitative side of business and risk, those are some other points that he made. and then I like the idea that what he looks for in a founder is that they’ve got skin in the game. What have they’ve proven in the past that they’ve gone above and beyond to make something work? What did they do to challenge themselves? What did they give up to lose in order to gain something better? And learning those things are pretty cool, because it’s the same thing he did by moving to another country to build a company. Same concept is what are you willing to do to make this work? Because those are the people you want to invest in. So thank you for joining us today. If you enjoyed this conversation, please feel free to share with your friends, subscribe to our YouTube channel, or please follow us on Spotify, Amazon and or Apple. Feel free to share an audio clip or video clip around our show, and we may include in a future a podcast if you can find us on all social platforms, including LinkedIn at Supporters Fund, your support and comments are truly appreciated. Please visit us at supporters fun. Com and or startup events at Open People now Worldcom. And thank you and have a fantastic day.