Meet The Serial Entrepreneur Building Seaweed Farming Infrastructure w/ Joyeeta Das | Samudra Oceans

00:00
Joyeeta Das
Some of it like epic level shit, like the stuff of novels.

00:03
Amardeep Parmar
That's Joyeeta Das, serial entrepreneur and currently building Samudra Oceans.Her goal is to make a massive difference to the future of this planet.

00:11
Joyeeta Das
Turning a piece of seabed into something that absorbs carbon, produces jobs fortier 3 towns and increases the value of the asset and actually produces returnsfor the financiers. I just couldn't have asked for a better solution.

00:25
Amardeep Parmar
Her experience and her team makes this possible.

00:28
Joyeeta Das
Like I'll give you all the training, I'll give you all the books, I'll workwith you, but I need you to have a low ego. If you start by saying I knowstuff, all this effort is wasted. You're not going to learn.

00:38
Amardeep Parmar
She's also deeply reflective on the journey of an entrepreneur.

00:41
Joyeeta Das
So I think we have to really internalise that. Most founders are deeply brokenpeople and happiness is like the flower that blooms if the rest of it is right.It's a bit like you cannot pull the flower out of the soil.

00:53
Amardeep Parmar
Hear her story and all the lessons for founders.

00:55
Joyeeta Das
Choose happiness above everything else and that's the source of everything Ido. I wanted to be an astronaut. It's crazy but yeah, astronaut, scientistperson who's on board a. Some kind of a ship in the sky kind of thing. Yeah.

01:17
Amardeep Parmar
Did you try and work towards that?

01:18
Joyeeta Das
I did work towards that quite a bit. It didn't work out for various reasons.Political and financial. When I say political really so and financial. And theneventually I ended up working in space quite a bit. So I did get my, I guessfantasy fulfilled to some extent.

01:35
Amardeep Parmar
And was it idea ever you wanted to start building your own stuff someday or wasit not really on the horizon? You were a child.

01:41
Amardeep Parmar
What I'm doing now? Would just any building being an entrepreneur at all?

01:45
Joyeeta Das
No, not even close. Never saw myself as an entrepreneur, never thought I'll bean entrepreneur. And to be honest, even when I accidentally became anentrepreneur, I tried to run from it multiple times actually it caught up withme but I was always running from it because there was no great plan to be it.But now I've fully embraced it and I see how I've always been an entrepreneurwithout realising it.

02:07
Amardeep Parmar
What were some of the early ideas you played around with on the side while youhad your other jobs going on?

02:12
Joyeeta Das
I still think about a few ideas that have like really wanted to do and probablywill try still at some point. So one is always been is wildly different idea.And I know a lot of people might think like why is this even an area I shouldget into. What makes me uniquely qualified? Probably nothing, except I'vethought about it forever. It's delivery. So how people come and they're notable to find you or you're not at home, you want to leave stuff from someone.And if you don't have concierge, since you know human labour is not necessarilyavailable in the meshed world, I wanted to create this smart box that justaccepts stuff but doesn't allow anyone to take from you. And you have an OTPthat only you can release for anyone who wants to access that box.

02:52
Joyeeta Das
It just literally makes your house a pickup and drop centre. I've always wantedto make it. I almost suggested it to my MBA as a project and I still think thatthere is something to it. Someone should do it. I've also looked at a wildlycrazy idea of culture. So how do. Because I'm obviously an immigrant and thereare lots of people like me, I always wonder how do you get people to experiencea slice of your culture without necessarily transporting them in a flight toyour home and adding to the carbon footprint. And I thought the few things thatget people to experience other people's culture, one is very popular food, theother I think is bath. I think bathing as a ritual is very different indifferent cultures.

03:38
Joyeeta Das
And I thought that if you could have some sort of a bathing spa with differentcountry rooms earmarked with people from there giving you that experience, it'sas intimate as food to get to experience what it's like a Moroccan buff or aKerala massage or a Turkish hammam or like in the same building. So you justchoose which country you want to bathe into today. So I have all sorts of wildideas, almost one every few months, but thankfully I've not pursued any ofthem.

04:06
Amardeep Parmar
What was the first one you pursued? Because obviously your five time founder,right?

04:09
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

04:10
Amardeep Parmar
What was that very first one you consider as like the real star of your journeythere?

04:14
Joyeeta Das
I think the very first one that I pursued completely on my own was a nonprofit.The idea was how can you raise money in a philanthropic way for people who arestuck international borders, especially women and children, and do that in away that is very scalable. So I thought that all the big Fortune 500 companiesI worked with, they all had a concept of day of service or sending theiremployees for some sort of a work or help or things like that. And I thought ifI could weave bespoke projects in each region where these people can come anddo A couple of days of service, then their skill sets would contribute towardsmaking a project and that project could actually heal somebody in that region.

04:53
Joyeeta Das
So let's say if a lot of women are stuck in a particular border and they don'thave identity cards, maybe a bunch of employees from a tech company can make a3D printer on the spot for four days. It's a great team bonding activity forthem. The company pays for it's a great activity and then these people have anactual problem solved. So I that for a bit and then I got absorbed in agovernment organisation. So my very first idea was how do you actually createsome sort of an impact or a social justice. So I guess at my heart I've alwaysbeen very obsessed with, you know, as they say, ESG maybe that's the right wordor UNSDG without knowing it, I don't know.

05:31
Amardeep Parmar
So obviously like making an impact there is great and. But many people thinkabout making that kind of impact but they didn't actually do it right. So whatdo you think pushed you to like, okay, this is a problem I care about, I'mgoing to go and do something about it. What do you think gave you that drive todo it?

05:45
Joyeeta Das
I think a strong bias towards doing as a personality wasn't my thing until Iwas say 23, 24. I was a very not biassed towards doing, more towards thinkingtype of person. I would think and discuss. I had great ideas, I'd tell myfriends at dinners but like most people I went home and forgot about it ortalked about it occasionally but never did it. I think the whole bias to actionhappened when I spent a couple of years at the bottom of a depression. Istarted seeking a lot of spirituality and I had just come out of a hugepersonal tragedy that had pushed me into depression and I started reallyquestioning life. What does it mean and what are we supposed to do? Where is itall headed, all the big questions?

06:30
Joyeeta Das
And I found that to me, and I'm not saying this is the right philosophy, but Ithought that the answer I came up with is that it's a bit like a video game weare playing with a limited resource on this planet and that's time. And theonly way to optimise time is to go to it. Because even if you make mistakes,you can then come back and iterate. Whereas if you keep thinking the oneresource you've not optimised this time. Do you have to think a bit to bestprepared for something? Sure. But do you have to overthink it or think it somuch that you never did it? No, because I think time is the one thing we areplaying with. It's the one slice that will never come back. Every year we onlyhave less time.

07:12
Joyeeta Das
If you believe in the concept of. They have this concept in Buddhism, but alsoHinduism, that you have fixed number of breaths and that's why tortoise thatbreathe once a minute, they live up to 100 years. Dogs that breathe muchfaster, they live 17 years. So the faster you breathe, the less you live. So ifthe number of breaths is constant, you're always every year getting close tothe last number. Morbid thought, but that should tell us that. What are youwaiting for? If you think this needs to be done, just jump in and do it.

07:41
Amardeep Parmar
I can't remember who said this, but I'm guessing If you read 4000 Weeks byOliver, but I think you might enjoy that. So there's the idea about the nextgood thing you can do, right? And rather than think, what's the best thing youcan ever do? So if you just think about what's the next good thing you can do,you'll probably end up doing quite a few good things in your life.

07:58
Joyeeta Das
Absolutely.

07:59
Amardeep Parmar
And once you've taken that philosophy, obviously you're able to then make animpact. You stimulated into the government. Would that then give you themomentum to think, wow, like, I tried to do something and it worked, and thatgive you the confidence to keep going and to try other stuff too?

08:13
Joyeeta Das
Yeah, absolutely. I think I totally agree. Perhaps. I guess it's like Picassosaid, in order to know where you're going to draw, you have to start drawing,is what Picasso said. How do you even know what you want to do if you don'tstart exploring what you're doing? A lot of people have this romanticised ideaof like, you'll be walking down the street and the perfect thing will land uponyour head. It never does. You know, you don't walk down the street and suddenlyfind the most perfect solution to your life's problems or the world's problems.You start by something. You get exposed to different problem spaces, you meetnew people, you find another one. Maybe you succeed or fail in this one, youmove to the next one.

08:49
Joyeeta Das
It's an unending story, but there's no way to figure it all out in your couchor on your desk without having ever tried it once.

08:58
Amardeep Parmar
So what was the next good thing for you? What was number two company.

09:02
Joyeeta Das
After this? So this was actually two already. The last. The one before this wasthe One which I didn't spearhead, but I was one of the co founders and it was aalgorithmic AI type of company. And then it was this one, this is the one thatI spearheaded completely on my own. And then after that was Ghana, whichhappened in uk. I came here to get my masters at Oxford and ended up makingthat. It was an AI company in 2014, 2015, before it became really sexy to doso.

09:30
Amardeep Parmar
Trendsetter.

09:31
Joyeeta Das
Yeah. But the funny thing is, at that time I thought that was the top trendalready. People like DeepMind had just gotten acquired. Magic Pony was in hugerounds. Basically for me, I thought that was the peak, but apparently I waswrong. There was more to come. And now obviously it is the thing to do, butwhen I started I thought it was the obvious next thing to do. And I famouslyremember saying this that I think my co founder at the time, David mentioned ina few meetings everywhere. I never thought AI is this big special shiny orbsitting in the middle of the room. I always thought it's the fluid that enablesthe entire room. So think of a spaceship, there's like a shiny orb in themiddle of it. That's the control centre and that's how most people think of AI.

10:17
Joyeeta Das
I thought it's the invisible fluid running through the entire ship, making itwork. And that's exactly what it has become.

10:23
Amardeep Parmar
I heard that because the AI hype cycle in a couple of years has gone verydifferently. Right. Where before it was. There's no point doing anything as awrapper and it's all in the LLM and then it's like all so many differentopinions. Right. And over time, eventually it's going to be like how we. Iguess we can say like the Internet. Right. It's just that it's just a tool thatpeople use rather than each thing being like you want to, like an intimate,empowered app.

10:46
Joyeeta Das
Right.

10:46
Amardeep Parmar
You just assume it. Right?

10:48
Joyeeta Das
Yes.

10:48
Amardeep Parmar
But obviously what you were doing at that time was much more innovative andpioneering because people didn't think like that yet. I wasn't a big thing.

10:55
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

10:55
Amardeep Parmar
And when you were going about that, it was obviously your first vintage scalebusiness too.

10:59
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

10:59
Amardeep Parmar
And how is that transition, what you're doing for into this different bubble inthis different way of doing things?

11:05
Joyeeta Das
Huge learnings. Huge learnings that I'm still using. I'm still learning. I'llsay. But I suddenly got exposed to this wild world of possibilities where therewere huge highs and huge lows. I also think that I. That I think I personallyalso thought that There was a lot of responsibility attached to building largethings because you do end up sitting on top of very influential decision makingthings that impact lives and economies for years together. And it's also thefirst time when I started thinking, does the entire venture skill world thinkthat way? And sadly the answer is no. We don't really think that way. We don'tthink that we're building responsibility. Neither funders nor the investors,the founders, understand the extent of the responsibility it comes with.Because think about large scale and repeatability.

11:59
Joyeeta Das
What you're saying is there's going to be a machine that I'm building that'sgoing to make millions of copies of something and therefore it will be huge.Millions of copies of anything, even if it's a piece of paper, should come withsome responsibility. Why are they needed? What are they going to do at scale?Are you going to deploy them everywhere? How are you going to remove thosepieces of paper? Aren't those pieces of paper toxic? You have to ask a millionquestions. I think in the race to make more copies, just because it's a coolthing to do, we don't, we just like get on with making the next copy. But whatrole does it play in the evolution of the world and the economy? I thoughtthat's a question we should be asking more of ourselves.

12:40
Amardeep Parmar
One thing that I'm seeing now, right, is we've done hundreds of interviews andthe challenge is, like you said, is that somebody who's at that stage wherethey've just raised their first round, what's going to happen is they're goingto get a ton of praise, right? They're going to send people like, oh,congratulations, well done. But that's a means to an end, right? The wholepoint is like, what are you going to use that money for and what impact is thatgoing to make? And the challenge is sometimes I think this, with anything youdo, right, you get the dopamine hit before you've actually done it. Because youjust said you're going to do it and everyone's telling you how amazing you are.Yeah, And I said it's that responsibility.

13:09
Amardeep Parmar
If you say you're going to do something, you've then got to work out how toactually use that money to make it happen and try to do it in a responsible waywhere you're thinking about these effects. And also as you build, going on overtime, how did that venture capital and that responsibility affect you in theway you made your decisions?

13:26
Joyeeta Das
It did affect me quite a bit. I think I did quite A lot of things there wrongas it was my first venture skill. I did some things right, I was learning andsome things I definitely screwed up quite massively. I think the one of theways it impacted me, I haven't probably said it everywhere but here. So I endedup getting mentored, running into two accidentally two really famous techfounders, probably one of the most famous people in the world. If a set of 10,these would be two of those 10. Don't want to name them, they wouldn't want tobe named. I found them quite by accident. They found me, both of them inSilicon Valley and they have gone through a journey of becoming really big andfamous and have made huge unicorn, multi unicorn level companies.

14:13
Joyeeta Das
And I wanted to ask them what did it feel like when it was all done. And asmuch as they had great achievement, they also felt that there were so manythings they couldn't do right in life. They couldn't spend enough time withmany people, they treated certain people badly and I was very surprised to findthat quite a lot of them were. I thought once you do it, you'll be so happy.They were not happy because the dopamine hit was over exactly what you said.They were in fact depressed and they were finding new causes, means to go onand they couldn't justify how they've lived the last 20 years. In fact, theywere quite against, you know, living that again.

14:51
Joyeeta Das
I was like, here we are trying to idolise these people and they're telling methe truth is they regret leading the path the way that they did. So that's whenI decided that the way I'm going to move forward from here is live firstprinciples. What makes sense to me, as Maya Angelou says, how do I define mypersonal success? Is the only bar I will live against. I don't care about somefamous magazine, I don't care about their cover, I don't care about whatLinkedIn loves, I don't care about what Twitter takes as a darling. I justdon't. What is going to be important to me is the only one I will live by.

15:28
Joyeeta Das
Because as hard as it will be to not be influenced around me all the time, Ithink when I get to 60 like these two people, I want to look back and say, youknow what? I'm, I'm pretty happy with how I did the last 20 years. I'm superhappy.

15:43
Amardeep Parmar
Oh, hello. Quick interruption to let you know a bit more about BAE HQ. We'rethe community for high growth Asian heritage entrepreneurs, operators andinvestors in the UK. You can join us totally free@thebaehq.com join. There,you'll get our CEO structure in your inbox every week, which is content, eventsand opportunities. You can also get access to a free startup fundamentalscourse by joining. Let's get back to the show. I've had the same experiencewith a couple, so I don't know if these are the same people or not, but Iinterviewed Ev Williams, so founder of Twitter, and Mark Randolph, founder ofNetflix. And as you said, you have this image of them in your heads and they'relike, yeah, like I didn't spend enough time with my kids. And I regretted that.

16:30
Amardeep Parmar
The other one was saying, well, I've got so many health problems now, like, wasit worth it?

16:35
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

16:35
Amardeep Parmar
And responsibility element, for example, with Ev Williams and Twitter, it'slike, I did this to try and do something good, but have I actually done good?

16:43
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

16:43
Amardeep Parmar
And it's almost a guilt level of like, count my responsible for all the badstuff that's happened because of Twitter. And it's something it's hard to thinkabout because you tell somebody at the beginning and they're like, oh, you'rejust saying that. But then when you get there and then it's like, oh, you werewarned many times about this, but you didn't listen. But I know that you thenused your influence you had at that point to then try and help other people inyour situation and other people in that industry and to try and champion like,other people. So can you tell us a bit more about that too?

17:12
Joyeeta Das
I do massively believe in upholding other people. I think a rising tide liftsall boats. So whoever is the cause of rising tide, me or you or someone else,we are all going to be uplifted. I massively believe in that. So I'm alwayschampioning whoever I can, whichever way I can. And a super pitch was myattempt to get women founders that are minority to pitch. I found that it wasmiraculously successful in the sense that hundreds of women that needed supportwere able to get support in some way or the other. I still continue many womenfounder forums that I run. Basically, I call them a place where you can't dococktails and selfies. You only have to talk about real shit is what I tellthem.

17:57
Joyeeta Das
If you're going to speak 100% the truth and not hold back, like take names,speak real experiences on the full Chatham House rules, then let's do it.Otherwise, let's not do it. What's the point? And I do a lot of that for my owncatharsis as well. I feel like greatly relieved when I see people around mebelieved it's like mass collective sigh of relief. And it's not just women. Ialso talk to a lot of young men who need mentoring in any way if they want it.Some of them ended up working with me eventually. After a couple of years ofmentoring, they're now working with me. I've had people who are actually seniorto me and mentored me one aspect, seeking mentorship in a different aspect.

18:33
Joyeeta Das
Like someone I'd always looked up to for corporate structuring and given meadvice had recently come to me about parenting. They're struggling with one oftheir teenage kids now. Miley is super small. How do you take it? But theywanted to know, what do I think? I don't know. For some reason he thought it'dbe wise enough to give me good advice. Even his wife. I think I was a hardteenager for my parents. So I actually understood why his daughter isundergoing the things that he. Things she's doing. And I was able to share. SoI try to give back in any way I can. It's really hard given my schedule. Buteven if I have five seconds, I will respond to that message, point them to theright person, do what I can, 100%.

19:14
Joyeeta Das
And that's probably a little bit of the spiritual, religious aspect. I thinkthat being of service is the most valuable time spent in life. I actually grewup in a very religious household. My grandmother was proper Vaishnava, like inher side of the house. In her side of the house. I can't believe I'm saying it.We could not bring onion, garlic or any non vegetarian food. Whereas my mom,dad and everybody ate everything. I was allowed to eat everything, but she wasallowed to coexist like that. And it was perfectly fine. And then my mom taughtin Khalsa for all her life, took an early retirement three years ago. And soshe took me to shoe service when I was what, 4 years old.

19:57
Joyeeta Das
So she would say, being able to help someone, you know, look after their shoesor give them water, or walk with them in a procession and give them food is thebiggest service you can do. Which comes from the Sikh religion and theirculture. And then I went to a Catholic school where we did lots of service andcharity and things like that. And then I eventually ended up in Sri Auravindashram, whose basically my entire education was more or less there. And thelast 12 to 14 years I've been with Isha Foundation. So, to be honest, I'vespent. And then I've spent quite a lot of time in monasteries near Ladakh andstuff. So, for me, the most important thing in life is to be of service. Idon't think you can lead a more valuable life. You cannot.

20:41
Joyeeta Das
If you have five seconds in life and you've spent that five seconds in serviceof someone, what we call upasana in Hindi or vipassana in Buddhism, if you'reactually able to do that, you could not have found a better of five seconds inlife. So I always give it my best at all times.

20:58
Amardeep Parmar
And I'm sure there's gonna be many people listening to as well, who personallyknow of things you've done for them too. And it's the whole element, I think,where you create ripples, right, because of the people you help. They then helpother people. And it just. Yeah, yeah, exactly.

21:11
Joyeeta Das
So Mother Teresa talks about it a lot. So when I was six years old, on mybirthday, my mom said it was a weekend. So she said, we can either have a niceparty all day, or we can just have party in the evening, but in the morning wecan do something special. And I was like, what is it? And she said, I'll takeyou with me to Missionaries of Charity very close to my house in Kolkata, andyou can volunteer with them. And I was like, what does that mean? And she waslike, come with me. So I went and we distributed them food and spent the wholeday with them, doing things with the sisters. And on my way back, they gave mea little locket to where Sister Georgina was Mother Teresa's right hand. Andit's basically a candle that's lit.

21:50
Joyeeta Das
And I was six and it was my birthday. So she put it on my neck and she said,now you're a candle. Do you know what's the best thing you can do? It's like,what? She's like, light other candles. And I went back every year, and fromthat point onward, I found the birthday parties to be super boring. I justwanted to be there. That's how my life of volunteering started. So a lot ofthanks to my mom and my grandmother, who are both extremely spiritual, piouswomen. But they introduced me to this concept. My mom's a scientist as well.Like, she's very successful professionally, although my grandmother's ahousewife with seven children. They're two different people, but at their core,they taught me that if you can be of service, they don't even call it help.Help is also like a superior word.

22:30
Joyeeta Das
It's like, for them, it's like, help is like, oh, I'm so big, I'm gonna helpyou. They think of it as service. So if someone comes up to you and you can beof service, in my family, that's the highest 10 minutes of your life,regardless of what else you could have done in that 10 minutes. So I thinkanyone who's ever come up to me, if they found that I had the opportunity, Iwill help them, no question.

22:52
Amardeep Parmar
So with what you're building today, right, that's going to help so many peopleto have such a huge impact. Where did that idea come from? Where did SamudraOeans come from?

22:59
Joyeeta Das
You know, it's insane that it actually came from my childhood and I didn't knowit all my life. Like, subconscious memories live under your skin and you don'tknow it. So I spent my entire life fighting with the concept that I would notdo anything my parents did. I was like, oh, I don't want to do this boringstuff. But my mom's a marine botanist and she spent an outstanding amount oftime doing sampling with me even when I was three years old. And I've learnedthings about the ocean in a very scientific way since I was, I think evenbefore I went to school. I knew enough about it, never thought much of itbecause it was table stakes in my house. If you have lunch or dinner at myhouse, you'll find that a conversation about conservation is not a specialtopic.

23:38
Joyeeta Das
This is our default topic. This is way before all this became cool. Yeah. Likeall our lives, I never thought it'd be a profession. And I went to Bora quite afew years ago. Until that point, I didn't know how to swim. And I actually toldmy partner at the time that I think I don't know how to enjoy this holidaybecause you're all doing these amazing things and I don't know how to do this.And he said, you know what? I'll teach you how to go underwater completely.Like, immerse yourself, like dive and tell me how you feel. I think, okay,let's give it a shot. And that was a moment I'll never forget. I wentcompletely underwater and I just knew in that moment that I have to dosomething with the ocean, whatever that takes.

24:22
Joyeeta Das
And I have to figure out how I can help the ocean, and I have to figure out howthe ocean can help us. There was no doubt in my head. It was experiential. Itwas like it was in my body. It wasn't about success or failure anymore. It'sjust what I wanted to do. Like, if this doesn't work, I'll do another form ofit. Like, there's no question of quitting. This is it. So over the years, Ifound various ways to approach it. And then Covid happened, which is basicallya time when you're forced to deal with your thoughts. Like, where will you go?It's you and your thoughts in your closed house. And I was also pregnant withmy daughter and I was quite severely ill. I had a very critical pregnancy. Soit was like, it was hell.

25:02
Joyeeta Das
I had to like sometimes inject myself up to 20 times a day. Like it was reallycrazy. Every hour I was injecting. It was just mad. And so I couldn't work,couldn't eat. It was just nine months. I was just, yeah. And I was thinking,when this child comes into this world, what is it we can do for her? And I knowthe usual thoughts came, okay, get a bigger house, get a bigger car, get abackyard, move out to the suburban area. But the more I read about the climatecrisis, I was thinking, none of that will matter if you can't go out into thegarden. If the food belt shifts and the way it is going, the temperaturechange, the cost of living crisis, none of this will matter.

25:42
Joyeeta Das
And I thought the best thing I can do for her and for children her age andeverybody else is leave a better world, not just a bigger house, because that'snot going to help any of them anymore. And that's how Samudra came, which is acombination of personal passion and commitment, living a life of service forother humans, combined with the fact that I've always known about the ocean andthe biology of it, and then combined with the fact that I'm an engineer. So Ialways like to make solutions.

26:08
Amardeep Parmar
So the people who don't know what it does tell us, what does Samudra Oceans do?

26:14
Joyeeta Das
So Samudra is centric for oceans. So what we do at Samudra is basically we takevery underutilised marine assets like seabeds that are not used or not in veryuseful areas, which is most of this planet, and we then transform them intovery high value assets by starting to deploy them with something that producescash flow every year and exponentially higher. And what we deploy there islarge scale robotics, very simple robotics, not rocket science, but  firstof its kind we deploy it. It sits slightly underwater and it grows commercialvarieties of seaweed. But it can also grow all kinds of multi trophicaquaculture. You know, you can look at different kinds of buy walls,crustaceans, wherever. The idea is to turn that asset into high yield asset. Soevery year you have an income.

27:05
Joyeeta Das
And once we are able to do it for a couple of years, we then start looking towork with project financiers or asset managers who then look to finance it orbuy off the cash flow of the asset for next 10 to 20 years. So a bit like anagricultural model, but we took it to the ocean. It is a wildly differentuniverse than anything I've ever seen. It's also an fo ak. There's likeliterally no precedent, but God, do I love it. Absolutely, 100%. Turning apiece of seabed into something that absorbs carbon, produces jobs for tier 3town and increases the value of the asset and actually produces returns for thefinanciers. I just, I just couldn't have asked for a better solution, more conin my life, honestly.

27:51
Amardeep Parmar
And you mentioned that as well. And we're talking about how it's not justhelping the planet, it's also a scalable business.

27:58
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

27:58
Amardeep Parmar
That's what that people should invest in. Not just because they want to dogood, but because it makes financial sense too.

28:04
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

28:05
Amardeep Parmar
And can you talk about how did you come up with a business model? How did you,how did it all start to piece together so you could showcase that to investorsthat look, yes, you're going to do good, but we can actually make you moneytoo?

28:15
Joyeeta Das
Yeah. Actually, funnily enough, unlike many propositions who pivot, we onlyexpanded our proposition over time because. So we started out by saying, youknow what? We'll make monitoring robotics that will go and monitor your farmand therefore you will save a lot of Capex and OPEX in boat trips and thingslike that. And then were like, why don't we automate the whole piece? And thenwere like, if we're going to automate the entire farm, we might as well own theasset because we are really fast, high speed. So we will become your assetmanagers. Then were like, if you've done it for one asset, why don't we do itfor 10 assets? Isn't that what the blackrocks of the world do? Let's do moreassets. So we just did that.

28:51
Joyeeta Das
And in this journey, if you see, we're not talking of just product, we'retalking of creating an entire systems change. So product requires iteration.Creating system change is four pillars. You have institutional, you havefinancial, you have technological, and you have social. And you have to workwith all of them. So it helped that the company had quite a lot of the skillsets. The tech is fine. I mean, I'm an engineer. My founder, Alex, everybodyelse, that's fine. So working on all of those pillars required a lot oflearning. So they were actual learning. How do you work with theseinstitutions? But I would say whenever you're on such a steep learning curve,the most important thing you need to learn is about yourself.

29:34
Joyeeta Das
Learning a lot is not hard if you're more than average, smart person, which Ithink I am, Most people are, or in my company. But it's. How can you learn ifyou're full of yourself? If you don't empty, there is nothing new that you candownload. So honestly, it has been an exercise in dismantling the ego, which isgreat. The part of me that's spiritual is loving it because I fail a milliontimes and then I have to dismantle my ego and learn and then solve. I lovethat. And that's also almost like a hiring policy for us. So every singlecompany in Sumadra, it's like, how low ego can you be as a person? There's ahuge opportunity here to ride on learning, like, use knowledge as a fuel to gethigh. Honestly, it's so much. But it's not going to happen.

30:17
Joyeeta Das
If you think you know everything, there is just no way. If you're ready to sayto yourself, you know what? Maybe I don't know. Even in things that you thinkyou've always known, then similar is the right place for you because there's somuch to learn. And I have to say that it has been great. The people that havejoined are like that. Absolutely every single person in my company. I mean,wow. I Sometimes I'm like, well, if. If this doesn't work, you start somethingand I'll join you. I'll be your employee. They're so good and they have verylow ego. There is no way to work in our company with high ego because we'relearning every day. You can't learn if you have high ego. It's just notpossible.

30:53
Amardeep Parmar
What you're doing is so innovative. Right. How do you find the right people tojoin the team? Like you said, okay, you're looking for low ego.

30:58
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

30:58
Amardeep Parmar
But to try and find those people who have this kind of traits that you think.

31:02
Joyeeta Das
Really difficult. Yeah. It's an intersection of two Venn diagrams, forinstance. A funny thing is, most of my engineers, they're also good sailors ordivers. They had to because we didn't have enough capital to have two differentteams to test the tech. Like these guys will go test. They are like Navy Sealsand you guys will just build it in a lab. I was like, no, I have big budget forthree people, so how are we going to do it? So every engineer who had to applywas a trained diver or a sailor, probably both. My co founder Alex is near proswimmer and cold water diver. Basically the same person was in the lab, got ona ship with me and went and then did it. So strange mix of skill sets.

31:41
Joyeeta Das
Similarly, lots of our salespeople are people who worked in policy before. Sothey know how to work with governments and public stakeholders to work on longterm carbon offsets or offshore wind kind of deals. Basically, you're notlooking at a very straightforward profile. Every single profile is mixed withsomething else. At the very least, if it's a profile that is not mixed withanother Venn diagram, then the way I find them is I'm like I'll personally helpyou ramp up, give you the books, give you the URLs, I'll sit with you, we'llbrainstorm, I'll introduce you to my contacts and give you our long sessionswith them, whatever.

32:13
Joyeeta Das
So for very rare instances when the person's very willing and they don't havean intersection of the skill sets, the way I work with them is like, I'll giveyou all the training, I'll give you all the books, I'll work with you, but Ineed you to have a low ego. If you start by saying I know stuff, all thiseffort is wasted. You're not going to learn. And I've seen that when peoplecommit to it, they do it. It's a hard exercise. There are times when, yes, theyfalter, but I, but one or two people I invested time in have actually pickedup.

32:41
Amardeep Parmar
So yeah, as you said, you shot fifth company now. Right. So you're going tohave made lots of learnings from all the different companies that you then tookinto Samudra as well.

32:49
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

32:49
Amardeep Parmar
So what do you think you've done differently this time in terms of whether it'shiring or whether it's anything? What do you think is the biggest change howyou built this one based on the previous learnings you had?

32:59
Joyeeta Das
The first one is about opportunities. Say no when it doesn't make sense. As afounder, you like to see all glittery things and say yes. I think the biggesttrick is to say no. It's hard because it sometimes means turning down money onthe table. But that will give you the power to select the Right things sayingno. The second thing is people. People. People in every way. From investors tofounding team to employee to suppliers, man. I cannot overstate the importanceof people. It's all about people. You can work around a contract, you can workaround a shortfall in your capital, you can work around salary, you can workaround everything if you have the right people. And if you don't, you can havemillions in your bank account in one work. So focusing on the right fit andjust getting good people.

33:54
Joyeeta Das
Oh, my God. I just cannot imagine having an Einstein who's an asshole. I don'tcare. I'm like, you can't be in it. Sorry, it doesn't work for me. You could besuper brilliant. But thank you. People. In and that means also investors, bythe way, because they're my team. My investors are incredible. This time. Oh,my God. They're like an extended team. We have 100% transparent communications.I've actually turned on. Turned on two term sheets that were on the tablebecause our vision didn't align. And then I ran after a few people who wouldn'teven give meeting because I was like, it's not even just about the money. Ireally think you'd be great. And they are great. So it's all about people inevery way. In every way.

34:35
Joyeeta Das
Wherever you're engaging with the person, whatever is the product or thefinancial incentive attached to it, I would over index on the person. The thirdthing is what I learned about myself. I think that I burned myself out veryquickly and a lot. I've done that frequently. I think I'm pacing myself now,even when my body and my mind refuse to listen to me, that I am tired. I takepeople's cue if they see me and they say, three days in a row, Joy, you'relooking tired. Or if I'm falling sick, which is usually an indicator of yourbody trying to tell you something. I do take time out. I never did before, butI do now because it's a long game. It's not a sprint, it's a marathon.

35:14
Joyeeta Das
And I don't want to burn out or reach the end and say what I found. Those twofounders say, like, was my health worth my life? I don't want to be thatperson. So definitely pace myself out. And it's a hard journey becausefounders, like, we don't like to stop. Like, even if I take two hours out,something in my brain is like, you didn't respond to this email. You could havedone this. But I force myself. And I'm like, no, you're walking in nature fortwo hours. The whole world can go. It doesn't matter. So those are the threethings I think I do very differently. So the last thing has really changed meas a person and how I value others times as well. But the first two haveresulted in, I would say, an even better company than I've built before.

35:58
Amardeep Parmar
So I love the first one. This is what I'm trying to do quite aggressively nowmyself where. Because the challenges of community. Right. Is that it means somany from things different people. And this, you may just say for me, this kindof grew out of a grief journey as well.

36:13
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

36:14
Amardeep Parmar
So then what happens then is that everything I do is like, is tied to thatlegacy. Something. If I upset anybody, then I'm a bad person. And that createsa huge amount of mess because then if I say yes to everything, what I then dois under deliver on everything.

36:29
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

36:30
Amardeep Parmar
Or I just feel guilty or just burn out, like you said.

36:32
Joyeeta Das
Yes.

36:32
Amardeep Parmar
So I think it's a hard one for people to accept and hopefully people listeningto this too. It's not just about what you turn down, but it's also, I think,like I said, the understanding of when other people turn you down.

36:44
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

36:44
Amardeep Parmar
It's not because you're a bad person or they hate you.

36:47
Joyeeta Das
Of course. Many things are going around. I think people have. Maybe they'reill. Maybe there's a bigger priority in house. Maybe they're going to a fightwith their partner. Maybe they're just recovering from a flu. You never know.Know it's not about you. You can't go to every event. And not everyone can cometo all your events, no matter how important they are. You cannot attend everyinterview, every podcast, every journalist request, and you just simply cannotdo everything in the company and be also present in every way. No. I think abit of this is also coming from the Zen part of me. I think we have especiallyfounders, as Farnam street will say, we are very broken people, which is why itshould such a the sadistic life for ourselves. It's because we have somehow alot of farmers. Founders are immigrants.

37:32
Joyeeta Das
Right. We have equated hard work and performance equal to my worth. Therefore,I should be loved by. Actually, they have nothing to do with you being loved. Achild is born. They barely do anything. They make demands most of the time. Dowe not love them? They're performing nothing. You love a child. You love deadpeople. The someone you really love is dead. You still love them. What are theydoing for you? Nothing. If someone's in coma and doing nothing in the world. Dothey not deserve love? Are you going to say that's just somebody you shouldkick because it's just on a coma? I think performance and hard work areseparate things. They're aspirations to create something. But our worth as aperson and to be loved has nothing to do with that.

38:15
Joyeeta Das
We all deserve to be loved the moment we are born. Because you pick up a littlechild. It is our slough, even if it has never performed in life. So I think wehave to really internalise that. Most founders are deeply broken people whohave come from either personal or professional backgrounds that has taught themthat if you work really hard and you perform well, suddenly you're going to beworth a lot of love and respect. You're worth a lot of love and respect anyway.You don't have to do all of that to get it. That's a separate track. And if youcome from the place of self worth and seeing that in others, regardless oftheir performance, then you will be okay to say no and you'll be okay to acceptyour failures. You're not a bad person.

38:56
Joyeeta Das
It has nothing to do with that. And you'll be okay to see others failures aswell.

39:00
Amardeep Parmar
I think you mentioned it even earlier as well, about how the magazine coversall that stuff doesn't matter. And I think it comes down to, as you said, likesome founders, they're coming from the position of needing to prove themselves.

39:11
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

39:11
Amardeep Parmar
But not to themselves. To other people.

39:13
Joyeeta Das
Yeah.

39:13
Amardeep Parmar
They need other people to think they did something external.

39:16
Joyeeta Das
Validation. And so everybody wants to be on the cover of TechCrunch. This isthe only way. You're great.

39:22
Amardeep Parmar
But as you said, there's so many people who've been on that journey don't saywell and aren't happy.

39:27
Joyeeta Das
No.

39:27
Amardeep Parmar
So like you said, it's got to be that separation between the professionalsuccess. Do that because you enjoy it or because you really care about whateverproblem you're trying to solve. But don't do that to make you happy. Becauseyou might be down 25 years. 20 years down the line and get.

39:41
Joyeeta Das
Exactly. It cannot be a source of happiness. The source is not outside. You'rejust chasing a completely wrong thing. If it's outside, it's just futile. It'slike a dog chasing its tail. You're never gonna get there. In fact, it's thereverse. If you find it inside you, then everything you do becomes anexpression of joy. It's easier said than done. I recognise that.

40:02
Amardeep Parmar
Is the pun intended there?

40:03
Joyeeta Das
Yeah, exactly right. Oh, it totally. I think I was that person until mymid-20s, as I said. And then I found spirituality in a big way. And I reallytried to find happiness within myself without like. Well, not as a pursuit,like I have to find happiness. Where is it? Not like that. But there arecertain situations you create. And happiness is like the flower that blooms ifthe rest of it is right. So if you plant seeds, there's no way for you to yankout the flower from the soil. You just got to water it, nurture it, give itsunlight and wait. So if you create the right conditions, happiness froze.People pursue happiness as a pursuit. I'm going to yank it out of the soil.This flower will be in my hands. No, it's going to come when everything else isright.

40:48
Joyeeta Das
And I think the few things that make that is physical fitness. If you're notsick in any way or worried about it, if you have a good conscience and yousleep well so you know your actions, how intentional and mindful are you aboutthem? And then your mental state. Are you constantly creating a situation ofstress for yourself, which is part of this not being able to say no kind ofthing. If you have all of these conditions and you have some good harmoniousrelationships, you've chosen how to engage with people. Happiness, just proudbecause the rest of the conditions are there and you feel like, oh, I'm happy.But if you pursue it as an end goal, that's. That's not a thing. And I thinkonce you are like that, you are able to do everything in a much more sustainedway.

41:28
Joyeeta Das
I think it gives you enormous energy. A lot of people ask me like, oh, you'reso high energy. I barely even drink coffee. I've never done any substances inmy entire life, believe it or not. And most of the time I'm vegan, so I don'teven. I can't take in much sugar because I'm diabetic. So my literally mysource of energy is nothing. It is, it is being able to find that happinesswithin myself. And it doesn't have anything to do with external world. I thinkthere's lots of crap that has happened to me, has happened to a lot ofimmigrant founders. Some of it like epic level shit, like the stuff of novels.What can I say? But I refuse to choose that to be my story. I still choose tochoose happiness above everything else.

42:13
Joyeeta Das
And that's the source of everything I do.

42:15
Amardeep Parmar
Just before we dive into quick questions, what we're doing now is we're over200 episodes in, so if we come back on in two years time, 200 episodes in. Andwhere would you have liked to have seen Cinemato Oceans get to? What servicewould you have liked to be happy? Because obviously we mentioned this, likeit's not going to be happiness from whatever Sumadra Oceans does, but youobviously got some targets in mind of where you hope you've been able to makethis level of difference for other people.

42:40
Joyeeta Das
Yeah. So Samudra is an expression of my happiness, not the source, as iseverything in my life. The source is here. But everything is an expression andthat's why I do it so joyfully and relentlessly and with high energy becauseI'm already super happy and excited and this is just how I'm expressing it, youknow. So the way I want this to, this expression to unfold in next couple ofyears, I think two things, three things. One is we should have grown anoutstanding amount of biomass in the ocean so that we've taken out actualcarbon that can be measured. So I'm not just saying nice stuff. There's anactual number attached to the megatons of carbon we've taken out that would bea real dent in the climate crisis that we would have created and salted to someextent.

43:25
Joyeeta Das
And the second would be the people who work with me on an average, are theyalways very happy? And I don't think that'll only happen by giving them afridge full of free food like I used to see in my Silicon Valley day. Workingin the top tech companies. I think it's also going to come from everythingelse. Do they feel free? Do they feel like their mistakes are okay? Do theyfeel appreciated? Do they feel seen and heard and recognised? If I'm able tocreate a company at all times that does that mostly for everybody, that wouldbe great because they are as much a product of the company as everything elseis. You know what 60% of people who've worked with me in co founding teams inlast 12 years went on to become founders themselves.

44:03
Joyeeta Das
So they have then set the culture of so many companies right. So for me, what Iset for those people is important. And the third thing would be my personaljourney that's important to me. In two years, am I able to look back upon whatI did and see that I've given it my best? Still not burned bridges or anythinglike that. To move fast, not hurt people, still manage to do that in anintentional way and still be very present for my daughter and showed up formyself and my own physical and mental health and the people who are closest tome that I care for. Have I managed to do that and allow myself to make mistakeswithout being too harsh? Because all of this is a full plate. There are times Iabsolutely screw up.

44:43
Joyeeta Das
Like I forget a really big thing that I should have done for my mom or somesuch thing and I'm moving to a place where I don't want to beat myself up forit because I have so much on my cape. I missed it. So what? Forgiving myselfthe same compassion I allow for others. If I'm able to do all of these three, Ithink the result would be phenomenal success for myself and company regardlessof what the world considers success.

45:07
Amardeep Parmar
So hopefully in two years time we come back and we'll play that back and seehow you did.

45:12
Joyeeta Das
This is so great. I love that. I love that like letter to myself in future.Okay, can I say something to myself for the future just so because you saidyou're going to play it back. So that would be really interesting. I'd like totell myself Joy, dream bigger and don't be afraid. Tell yourself the rightstories to go bigger and know that you can do it. You got it.

45:33
Amardeep Parmar
Okay so good note for quick fire questions now. So as you mentioned aboutbefore about how you work with so many incredible people. Right. So who arethree Asians in Britain that you think are doing incredible work and you loveto shout them out?

45:47
Joyeeta Das
Yeah, definitely. So Ayik mentioned Neena Julka. I think she's amazing. She'sdoing non profits and she started at an age when most people don't even thinkof starting a company and she decided to go ahead and do it post retirement andshe's killing it. I think she's amazing. I think the other Asian that youshould know about is Suraj Rajan. Just thought of him while coming up withthis. So he's a CTO at Snowflake and one of my repeat investors and I thinkmight be one of the kindest men I have known in my life. Like such a holisticperspective. Even when I sailed in one of the ventures he's invested in, hestill invested in my next one because he's supporting me. Incredible. I thinkthe third person you may have remember for already is Karishma Gupta.

46:37
Joyeeta Das
She's working on Eslando Circular Fashion and it is in the world ofsustainability. So I absolutely love her. I think I'll dry is phenomenal. She'sjust like unstoppable. Yeah.

46:46
Amardeep Parmar
Awesome, so if you will find out more about you what you're building. Where dothey go to?

46:51
Joyeeta Das
If you want to find out more about what we're doing, please goto. Sumudraoceans.com.

46:54
Amardeep Parmar
And if  the audience listening right now, what could they help you with?

46:59
Joyeeta Das
Don't think of climate tech as philanthropy or a trend. It's the future of theworld. It's the nest industrial revolution. As we run out of resources.Everything that we build, from data centres to the food that you eat to theclothes that you wear are changing. So this is the time of the world when weare building the infrastructure for the rest maybe next 500 years. It's a timeto participate in these horizontal infrastructures. So don't hold back becauseyou heard the word climate attached to it. It's probably an opportunity, not aphilanthropy.

47:31
Amardeep Parmar
So thanks so much for coming on, any final words?

47:34
Joyeeta Das
Thank you for having me. I love what you guys are doing. The fact that you'vegone on for 240 to 50 plus episodes highlighting incredible founders. This isalso a ripple effectiveness system. When you highlight them, they go back andhighlight others like we're directly doing. But also it just creates thiscamaraderie and community that is so lovely and warm. I get such a great vibejust being in your studio. So thank you very much for creating this.

47:58
Amardeep Parmar
Thank you for watching. Don't forget to subscribe. See you next time.

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