The Holdco Founder: Failing Loudly, Growing Quietly, Winning Weirdly w/ Muhammad Malik | Tijara Ventures

00:00
Muhammad Malik
Well, you're back in me crying, man. What the hell, bro?

00:02
Amardeep Parmar
That's Mohamed Malik, founder of Tajana Ventures.

00:05
Muhammad Malik
Tajara Ventures allows me to do a lot of random stuff, right? The red thread, I guess is venture building ventures, scaling ventures, also investing into ventures. And to be honest, man, I was a solo founder before and I went through mad stress in the past.

00:20
Amardeep Parmar
He founded several startups before running accelerators for the likes of NatWest. As two people helping the next generation of founders, me and him had a good riff.

00:30
Muhammad Malik
Pareto rule applied is 20% idea, 80% execution. But bro, I think, I beg to differ. I think now it's like ideas are really important because the execution is so easy. Now the typical thing that we're seeing is as soon as something AI related is launched, then there's a open source version, there's a cheaper version, there's a quicker version. Dumb money can come to you, but that might weigh you down.

00:52
Amardeep Parmar
This is a wide ranking conversation, including finding pmf, building a moat in the world of AI, expanding to emerging markets. Really what is a founder mindset and so much more. You can also find out what made him say this, but you gave me so much goosebumps.

01:06
Muhammad Malik
I was like crying. But.

01:12
Amardeep Parmar
So good to have you here today. And as we're just chatting about, you've done so many different things and for audience as well. Like I know Mohammed pretty well, so we're going to a bit more of a laugh today. But you've done so many things, it's quite hard to actually keep up with what you do. So you now have a holding company, right? And that's quite rare for people in this space. So can you explain what a holding company even is and what you do under that?

01:33
Muhammad Malik
You're being a lot nicer on camera, I think. Yeah, it's a bit of a madness. So essentially Tajaro Ventures allows me to do a lot of random stuff, right? The red thread, I guess is venture building ventures, scaling ventures, and also investing into ventures. And to be honest, man, I was a solo founder before and I went through mad stress. So today ventures is my vehicle to partner, man. And I'm looking at you to partner with you as well on a few things. But yeah, it allows me to leverage essentially partnerships, the network and we're able to support founders and that's where I feel my ikigai really is to help others get to where we spoke about prior to recording to a growth phase and hopefully build the most impactful startups that will benefit society for the Better.

02:20
Amardeep Parmar
And you literally just launched venture, right?

02:22
Muhammad Malik
Yes, man. Yeah. So. So we've got a motley crew together. Myself maybe more so on the, you know, mentoring, coaching, venture side, we've got somebody who's a UX UI designer, we've got somebody who's really good with the tech kind of side, and we've got somebody who's there really good with products. So we've come together and I guess maybe investment as well for me. And we're supporting founders, particularly those that are looking to, you know, focus on emerging markets and for us means Middle east, particularly Qatar and Saudi, but then also those who. Yeah, we call it underpriced. I love. I love the phrase underpriced. I think I learned this from black. Black Seed Ventures as well. Right. Black soil. Sorry, the idea, is it black soil? Remind me, who are we talking about? I know black seed. I know the black soil.

03:07
Amardeep Parmar
Black soil something.

03:08
Muhammad Malik
I mean, good soil. Good soil ventures. Okay. And propped already, but yeah, going back into it. So essentially, I love this phrasing. Instead of saying overlooked, underserved, where you're almost asking for pity, what we're saying is we're unlocking alpha for you by showing you the best founders who are underpriced. That's how we look at it.

03:30
Amardeep Parmar
And you mentioned as well, you're a solo founder before. You've done different things in the past and obviously from your background as well. Right. So you've come into this, like, as an outsider. You've. How did. From few founding journeys, like, tell us, like, how you got to having this holding company.

03:46
Muhammad Malik
Right.

03:46
Amardeep Parmar
Because it's not something you can just start out doing. It's because you've accumulated so much experience. Right.

03:51
Muhammad Malik
Yeah. No, you know, it's just. Yeah. Random bits of experience. It's very serendipitous journey. Started off as a good brand boy, you know, as a lot of brown, brown guys would understand. You're either a doctor, engineer, lawyer. I went for accountant. And that's how you say it. Right. So I'm like, you know, doing my book mom proud, did accounting and finance and then went into Deloitte. Right. Deloitted. To meet you. If anybody of my Deloitte alum are here. Right. So dad jokes galo, but I'm going back to it. I think for me, the thought process, even when deciding what to do was as. As. You know, it might sound soft when I'm saying this, but it's like, how do I help people? Right. Quite simply, like, how do I help people? For Me, okay, becoming a doct.

04:38
Muhammad Malik
I looked at that and I was like, okay, finance is interesting. I met finance leaders in, you know, partners and other people at the Big four that were able to do a lot of charity work, go back home and from Africa, Asia, they're able to support the community. But I thought, what's a 1 degree? Even more than that? And then came across people building their own ventures and they're able to, you know, shout out to people like Shaz from Moors, for example. We've got our own, you know, people that have been on this podcast are doing incredible work, right? They don't necessarily that their main focus might be scaling their startup, but through that, they're able to do a lot outside of that as well.

05:13
Muhammad Malik
So that's kind of what led me through to this idea of building your own venture and having your own impact and scaling that impact.

05:20
Amardeep Parmar
So what did you do? As a founder?

05:22
Muhammad Malik
Yeah, as a founder. So my first startup, I don't know if I've spoken to anybody about it, man, but my first startup was a watch brand, right? So back when, you know, influencer, you know, marketing was popping off the Kim K effect, right? I managed to somehow get an ambassador on board who is Drake's girlfriend, right? Yeah. Don, you know what? Don't google, don't googling, because she's now no longer, you know, she's no longer safe for work, right? She said if you want to Google that, no paperwork. But she at the time had close to a million followers at this time, by the way, Amar, man, you're going to. You know, it's going to sound really painful to hear, but I hadn't read any of these books. I hadn't come across somebody like you who would have taught me how to go about it.

06:08
Muhammad Malik
I spent a lot of money on, you know, developing this watch, not knowing anything to do with Lean Startup, not knowing to do anything to do with kind of, you know, pre sales or anything like that. I went straight in. I thought, I've got this, you know, censored name ambassador, and I've got a few others as well that were popping off at that time by dance prior to TikTok, right? So we have few Latino, Latino influencers. We had people. I had the whole world covered, right? I thought in my mind. But little did I know that I hadn't done big up the mom test. I hadn't done any customer discovery, I hadn't spoken to my customer segment. I had to understand the appetite for this particular brand, nor did I have any insight to the demand or pricing anything. Right.

06:53
Muhammad Malik
I just went straight in and that's. That was the journey that began. Okay, I need to research this crap. And just to parallel this, it was similar to my journey in public speaking. I thought I was a sick public speaker, man. All my schoolmates were like, oh, you're a sick speaker, you're funny as well. But then the real test of that for me was moving away from my trusted circle. I went down stand up. I did, I did stand up two, three times. At first I was an absolute flop, man. I sat down thinking, bro, I'm just really whack at this. But then I went and studied the craft six months. There was this wonderful comic guru and you can Google this person. His name is Logan Murray in Teachers Stand Up.

07:32
Muhammad Malik
So I learned the art and look, I actually did, you know, not to pick up myself. I did really well in my first gig, standing ovation. But I realised how difficult that was. I'm not going to. Not going to dedicate my time to that. So similarly start. I had to go and learn how to go about it. And then that became a bit of an obsession. I now teach entrepreneurship and innovation to younger people. Hopefully they don't go through the main same mistakes that I have. And now we're also helping build ventures as well.

08:00
Amardeep Parmar
Yeah, yeah. And I think one of the things about like that journey, right, Is that because even, for example, we teach it as well.

08:06
Muhammad Malik
Right.

08:08
Amardeep Parmar
I'm not teaching where I did it because I'm trying to get you to not have the pain I had.

08:12
Muhammad Malik
Right.

08:12
Amardeep Parmar
And I guess you have the similar experience of that. It's be smarter than us. That's what we're trying to put forward into the world. Right? Is that you can say like, oh, but you did it that way. But you did that. I was like, yeah, but it's such hard. It's like, don't do it our way. Do it the way that we're trying to help.

08:27
Muhammad Malik
You speak about our journeys, man. I'm still trying to lose that way. But you managed to lose all that weight, you know, following, you know, the difficulty of the path. And to be honest with you, I would go a step further. But in the last nine months, like I'm just seeing this right now, the news from Lovable and all these thoughts, incredible. The game has shifted so much that today when I was in class earlier at Imperial, I said to my. I call them my kids, but there are, you know, near Adults, right. I was like listen man, before we used to say 80:20 rule applies to business in this way. My, my first mentor with a thick New York accent said to me, Mohammed, you know I can't do the New York accent.

09:05
Muhammad Malik
You just came out from New York so maybe you can. He goes to me, man, ideas are 10 a penny. Execution is key. Pareto rule applied is 20% idea, 80% execution. But bro, I think I beg to differ. I think now it's like ideas are really important because the execution is so easy now it's like, you know, I can get an MVP. How long was it? 5 minutes or something with lovable or cursor replit. Now there's a new agentic AI YC spoke about two days ago which is almost N8N automated. So it's like. And that you can just prompt and create your own kind of, you know, agent. So what I'm saying now is something why I didn't do is now I'm focusing on the idea. I'm getting people to think about systems thinking.

09:48
Muhammad Malik
I delivered a workshop on first principles thinking which is how do you know the idea of boiling down to the fundamentals and then building back up takes a lot of mental energy. But I think that's where people are going to really thrive is those really innovative ideas, game changing ideas, sector shaping ideas. But of course look when it comes to vertical AI for example, YC according to them, they say that this is going to outstrip B2B SaaS by about 3.2x. Right. But then there's this idea of Johari's window, this idea that unknown unloads. Right. And that's what we talk about, you know, in our mentoring a lot is basically the, you can create something that doesn't exist, but you need to put in the mental energy to do so.

10:33
Muhammad Malik
And that's where I think now the founders that we spoke about are going to be the 1 percenters. The 10% is that's where they are going to be compared to everyone else. Yeah.

10:43
Amardeep Parmar
I think there's a really interesting topic to get onto as well because if some guy debated on my head about there's two areas of the AI, right. Words, lots of elements, but two conflicting ones. One is that it's a lot easier to start than it's ever been.

10:55
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

10:56
Amardeep Parmar
The secondary aspect, it's a lot easier to duplicate when it's over. So cool. You've got a good idea, somebody else before it could take them a year to copy your idea.

11:04
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

11:05
Amardeep Parmar
Now they can Copy it easily. If they've got better access resources, better access to funding, bigger brand, all that stuff. And you look at the lovable story, for example, is that when you look at it lovable as a product isn't necessarily better than cursor than the other ones, but they had a better branding in the way they did that. So even though there's other people had a first mover advantage. Yeah, that love came in. They did the branding really well. They got the highlights that they did. So the challenge now is like, let's say you come up with this out of the box idea, right? You come with something, could you. You'll see in the future.

11:39
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

11:40
Amardeep Parmar
Even if you've got this amazing idea, somebody else who's richer than you've got more money than you has venture capital, funding, they don't know what to do with, they're going to win. How do you defend it? And it's that battle, right? Like, okay, yeah, it's easier to get started than ever, but then it's harder to defend than ever as well.

11:57
Muhammad Malik
Oh, 100%, man. You know, I love how you frame that. Somebody mentioned this as a phrase. He said, don't let your launch become somebody else's lunch. And what was that? The typical thing that we're seeing is as soon as something AI related is launched, then there's a open source version, there's a cheaper version, there's a quicker version, there's a Chinese version. Not to throw shade on China. China is. And just a side point, right? People used to say this old adage is like, America innovates, China replicates. Europe particularly. London regulates. All we're seeing now is this idea that China is innovating, man. The deep seq moment really changed things. Right. But going back to what you said, how do you defend yourself in this ever, you know, shifting landscape, right. The winds have changed, you're just here.

12:44
Muhammad Malik
And it's crazy for a lot of people. They just wanted the dust to settle until there's a clear winner. But, you know, anyway, I'm not really good with my foresight as much, but I think the futurists that I do look up to, they say, look, right now is actually the gold mine time right now to develop if you do have that unique insight. And that's where I think when I'm obviously given what I, what I do, I think I'm a real, I'm bullish on this idea of person to person interaction. I say there's no amount of data scraping, no amount of Reddit, you know, forum scraping will get you the insights you can get and glean from a one to one conversation. Right? And that's where I'm bullish that maybe I'm wrong, maybe there's somebody out there that believes that.

13:27
Muhammad Malik
But I really believe in this, man. The fact that this idea of emotional delta as well this that you described, lovable compared to Castle. Look, I think tip bar for bar like or pound for pound like replit's like sick, man. It's really good. Curse is banging that, but lovable just the brand, the ease and how like just today I saw the post when just before I spoke to you, it said, man, we've got a 14 page guide, it's not a bloody 100 page guide. Curses this and that. And it's so easy to get started. They're the ones who are doing events, they're the ones who are. I met Nad Adam, the vet, Nadrishti who head designer. And he brought his baby along, man, and he's just chilling with us. That for me is lovable because they're person to person.

14:10
Muhammad Malik
Whereas these other guys, they don't really. Well in my opinion, and maybe yours as well, they don't really invest into community like lovable do. So that's where the differentiator is as you know, soft as it sounds, it is about the personal differentiator and connecting with the people.

14:27
Amardeep Parmar
They're going all piece here as well, I think so. One thing I'm saying now seeing from a lot of people is about how communities differentiate, Right. The thing I find is that somebody who's building a community is that what you're now seeing is startups who are doing community. Because that's new, the new thing and the new fad and it's less authentic and it's that challenge of like, okay, cool, you want to build a community, but we will know you're only doing that because there's reason, right? And it's that personality traits. How do you get the right people into a company where it does work? Authentic, like you said, like nad where he brought his kid along and he could just put a kid who's cheating you, right?

15:00
Muhammad Malik
We're playing with his kid, man. They're just chilling. He's like, look, take a picture of my kid and chill. I was like, man, this is what, this is. That. That feels authentic at least. Yeah.

15:07
Amardeep Parmar
And that's the hard thing, right? Because if you're saying like, okay, I'm gonna build this company, I'M gonna like out compete everybody because I'm gonna build the best community. But if you're going into with that mindset of like I'm gonna build this community, it's gonna help my product right at you've got to have some kind of natural affinity, you know, 100 that personality, right. Like are you personable? Because I know some people who build a communities like you don't have the chat. So how are you going to. You think oh you want to build this massive community but you're not very friendly.

15:34
Muhammad Malik
Not very friendly. And it reminds me of two things. There's this guy on Twitter on X right. He says about flipping the model completely. It's like instead of going product first and then you know, getting out there, just start with the community, start nurturing the community and then there will be. They will, you know, for those into marketing, know these idea of the thousand crazy fans, they're going to be the ones who unlock viral coefficient for you because they're going to be telling one or two people those are going to turn into your fans and suddenly you're a big deal. Right. But, but you touched on something that, which is another. Maybe it's another conversation but it's the whole thing that we actually were about touch on prior to recording which is the idea of archetypes and personalities. Right.

16:17
Muhammad Malik
And you spoke about this in the context of a struggling founder that in this day and age we know maybe you're limited in terms of your archetype, your belief, your. Sorry, your hours and whatnot. But that doesn't mean you can't bring somebody on that is good with community, does have the time to chill, does have the time to network. And I think there is the idea of personality and I think data driven vc. They spoke about this. I was pleased to meet them and they spoke by sadia. They do quite a bit of looking into the founder. What are the ethereal building blocks of a founder. And everybody talks, you know, from Harry Stebbings to like you know, local globe. Everybody's talking about, you know, which is the founder of Nikolai. Exactly. Nikolai, the founder of Revolut. Right.

17:01
Muhammad Malik
And they always talk about his intensity and stuff. We spoke about this offline. Right. But yeah, boiling down to it in this essence coming back to community. Not everybody's a good community builder. So there's this idea of a fractional community lead and I think that is a powerful way to get started.

17:18
Amardeep Parmar
I think yeah, if anybody wants to spend loads of money on me as a Fraction hit me up. That's cool. But, yeah, it is. This idea now where we're seeing a lot of people who want to. Like, it's in the last year or so, everybody's now trying to start a community.

17:30
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

17:31
Amardeep Parmar
And I look at it as all about consistency, is that if you do one event or you do two events, it's like, actually, it's really hard on making any money. The. The snowball effect. Right. Is like, we are where we are today because we've been going for a while.

17:44
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

17:44
Amardeep Parmar
And there's first events. People don't realise we didn't always fill up the room. There's been events I've been to. It's like, oh, crap, this is kind of bit dead.

17:50
Muhammad Malik
Wow.

17:50
Amardeep Parmar
But we carried on going anyway. And I think that's the hard thing is that with AI, it's like, okay, yes, it's easier to build maybe the tech than it was before. Even then, in reality, it's easier to build the mvp. It's not easy to build the actual product necessarily. We still need somebody who actually knows how to. Otherwise you're just going to have something full of bugs. And that's the challenge. Like, you get your. The NDP is to get in a way to get the funding to hire somebody who actually knows what's going on.

18:21
Muhammad Malik
Yes.

18:21
Amardeep Parmar
If you don't, if you're not a CTO yourself, if you haven't got that beginning and it's a whole nature of, okay, cool. It's quick to get started. At the same time, you don't have a billion lovables. Right?

18:32
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

18:32
Amardeep Parmar
It's still really hard.

18:34
Muhammad Malik
It's still hard, man. I think, you know what, without blowing your trumpet for you, right. Is the idea that, like, you're a living example of somebody who's started off and continued persistently, man. Tenacity. Look, the majority of podcasters, they don't go past what's the 18th episode according to studies or whatever survey. And. And the idea that, look, things are going to get better. Right. Mr. Beast in his playbook. It's a wonderful playbook, man. I don't know why people don't read his stuff, man. Just because he's, you know, all over the place. Because his playbook, he talks about this idea of, like, not his playbook, but he talks about it generally, is the fact that it's just dead in the beginning, bro. It is dead. But then suddenly something kicks off and then you've got this exponential rise. And you know, to.

19:18
Muhammad Malik
To your point is so difficult being you Know, being the one who's running the event, there's nobody there. And then you're like. But you have this thing in your mind that this is only going to get better. And you just keep going in this. So I actually want to ask you the question, man, what's in your mind? Like, we know back then what was in your mind. So I know this is a common thread through karate, Bo Bangra, like everything that you're doing, community building, startups, investment. What goes through your mind in the difficult. When you're in the trenches, man, what is in your mind?

19:49
Amardeep Parmar
I think it's the obsessive nature of figuring stuff out. And it's a bit of a, you know, the whole thing. I enjoy the journey, not the destination, all that crap. But it is the way I look at things. Of I'm the nerdy guy. Like you said about when you're thinking about stand up comedy, right? Is that you only do that if you actually liked the process of figuring out, right? I like the process of figuring stuff out. I like that new challenge. So say, for example, the podcast. I get bored as hell when it's following a script. Once I kind of worked out, okay, this is how I can make it flow. I can make people feel comfortable and even. But you're coming on this now, where the podcast has been renamed that I made a bunch of changes.

20:26
Amardeep Parmar
I need to keep making it hard for myself.

20:28
Muhammad Malik
And even right now you're talking about.

20:31
Amardeep Parmar
This, you know, for example, like I at the beginning, I used to prepare for the podcast. I'm prepared for the podcast the past 200 episodes. You can literally, like, you can do. I actually asked you before you came in, like, what the hell do you actually do? I'm so confused by your life.

20:44
Muhammad Malik
Like, what is this?

20:45
Amardeep Parmar
And the confidence that comes with the reps.

20:49
Muhammad Malik
Right?

20:49
Amardeep Parmar
Is because I know that I've done so many reps, I can figure stuff out on the spot and that makes it challenging for me. If I spent the whole last week researching you, cool. I'd be able to just walk, insist and do it. But it'd be so formulaic. Same old, right? Whereas now we can go off peace, we can go into different directions and I'm comfortable doing that. Whereas I always think when I go to community events, when the person hosting the event is looking at a script or looking at their phone or their notes, like, how the hell can you not remember? You only talk to people for like half an hour. That I just do it. And to me, that's always something which from my background, the way I think about. Yeah, I'm gonna go with the flow.

21:24
Muhammad Malik
Like figure out, figure it out.

21:26
Amardeep Parmar
And it's also. I say go with the flow bits. You've got to work yourself into that position, right. All these events which wasn't full up, all these podcasts. I know we listened to worse stuff. It's the reps. It's reps, it's reps, it's me getting better. And when you think about it in that way, right, whatever you're trying to build, how long are you willing to suck to get good at it?

21:43
Muhammad Malik
Geez.

21:44
Amardeep Parmar
Say bungalow, right? Look at me dancing at the beginning. I'm crap, I'm terrible. But you can't, you can never get good initial willing to suck.

21:52
Muhammad Malik
Well that. But you gave me goosebumps all over my arms. But honestly, like real talk. Because one of the most paradigm shifting realisations for me was from Tom Bilyeu. He is the founder of the impact theory. Yeah. And he made. He earned his tripes through a nutrition brand which has nothing to do with tech, but now he teaches AI implementation. That's what he's going. He gone hard on. But he. I remember like sitting. I was in my balcony when I heard this and I was like bro, I have to sit in my balcony for a while. But to encapsulate what I'm hearing from you, right? And, and look, we have to celebrate people like you because through that others would be like okay, I can do it too. Right. This is, these are the, the whack days for you.

22:31
Muhammad Malik
Only going to get better, right? And that's hopefully the audience resonates with this is I'm going to shift my self esteem Bun all the accolades, burn everything that our brown families celebrate. Burn all of that. And I'm going to put my self esteem on the fact that I'm the best learner in the room. I don't give a damn if I'm looking like an absolute waste man or a waste girl. I'm going to go and do this and the tenacity and then one day you're going to be celebrating with me, right? And that takes a certain level of self belief. So I want to. It feels like I'm flipping the script side. But would. How would you say your self esteem is built on. Is it.

23:10
Muhammad Malik
Is it that learner thing or is it the fact that I've done the reps in something else and that's translating into this?

23:17
Amardeep Parmar
So one idea I use for this right in my Head. I don't know if it comes out well. So if it makes no sense, just, like, call me out and take this.

23:23
Muhammad Malik
It's fine.

23:24
Amardeep Parmar
So it's two times confidence, right? Egg confidence and avocado confidence. Egg is what I'd say. A lot of people stunting on social media, all right, it's hard out of shell. You look confident, but as soon as you get a bit of pressure pulled to, you crumble. And there's nothing in size, right? And it's just gooey with avocado confidence. Okay. It's a bit rough from the outside, maybe, but you squeeze into the centre. That core is really strong, and you can crush it, but then you can plant and it grows again, Right?

23:52
Muhammad Malik
Wow.

23:52
Amardeep Parmar
You crush an egg, you can't. Like, that's it stuff. And how I look at it is how you build that core. And you said. I think you hit the nail on the head when you said about the stuff I've done in the past.

24:03
Muhammad Malik
Right.

24:04
Amardeep Parmar
Is I'm just some random freaking nobody. And with a crafty is one element.

24:08
Muhammad Malik
Right?

24:08
Amardeep Parmar
It went from where I grew on that journey. But then you look at the writing journey of some nobody who then grew to following that. The podcasting. I started podcasting, they did have the.

24:18
Muhammad Malik
Crime and what the hell broke.

24:20
Amardeep Parmar
But it's the whole thing.

24:20
Muhammad Malik
It will come, bro.

24:22
Amardeep Parmar
I've had these consistent things where I shouldn't have been able to do what I've done. So I'm like, well, I can just do it again. And if I. If I fell, it's fine because I've done this other stuff, bro.

24:31
Muhammad Malik
You're motivating the crap out of me, man. I've got tears in my eyes, bro. It's crazy, man.

24:34
Amardeep Parmar
That's all it is. And what I struggle with and when I'm trying to help other people, is that if you don't have a story like that for yourself, how do you get that story?

24:43
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

24:44
Amardeep Parmar
And it's just, you've got to do something. You suck up for long enough until you're good at it and prove to yourself that you can do it and you can't shortcut that. And I struggle with it, man, because, like, how do you. How do you teach somebody that? Because, yeah, you want instant results, but you've got to be willing to suck at something and it. Whatever it is, right? And then you can prove yourself. I was terrible at that, but I got good at it. And once you can tell yourself that it's the same skill. Same skill. Whatever you're doing oh, hello. Quick interruption to let you know a bit more about BayHQ. We're the community for high growth Asian heritage entrepreneurs, operators and investors in the UK. You can join us totally free@thebayhq.com join there.

25:28
Amardeep Parmar
You'll get our CEO structure in your inbox every week, which is content, events and opportunities. You can also get access to a free startup fundamentals course by joining. Let's get back to the show.

25:43
Muhammad Malik
Bro. It's amazing, man. There's one quote, I hate to quote a samurai in this moment, but I mean, he's the author of the Wave, the Five Rings. He said that when the path becomes clear in one. But you gave me so much goosebumps outside crying. But it's like when the path is. When you understand the path you see in everything, right. Sometimes I think about, you know, the likes of Richard Branson, the others, you know, like Virgin Media, Virgin Music, Virgin this, everything. So the idea that, yeah, it is an idea. You, you killed it in one thing and those are the reps that you can now translate into other parts of life. This is why they quote that, you know, Fortune 500 CEOs, a lot of them had, you know, martial arts backgrounds or military backgrounds.

26:24
Muhammad Malik
Because of that, the idea that I've done something right, I'm able to do something. So that's why I say to, to my, to my kids, as I call them, that look, kill, do something. Well, the gcse, the A level, whatever it is that you're doing is actually building the idea that I can see something through to the end and then that will pay dividends later on.

26:42
Amardeep Parmar
Whatever you do as well is that Bayhu hasn't won a single award. As a founder of BayHQ, I've won no awards because I just don't give a crap if I really wanted to win awards. You just promote yourself, you nominate yourself, you get all your friends to vote for you and stuff. Right? But is it what's more important? Because I think by doing things that we have, we're actually gaining the respect of people because they can see why we're doing it.

27:05
Muhammad Malik
Exactly.

27:06
Amardeep Parmar
We get loads of awards and you might get people who see that from the external process, like, oh, wow, you're doing so well. But in reality it's like I'm very transparent about the struggles had with cash flow when things are going wrong because it's. What's this way I look at things as well, right. And we just see how you feel about this with your incubator and Your people you're working with. Right. Are you doing it to impress people or to actually be good at the thing? And it's a lot of people. You can look at them from the outside and it's insecurity, whatever it is, it's all driven towards how do I impress people about what I'm doing as opposed to how do I actually do the thing that I'm trying to do?

27:41
Muhammad Malik
Really? So look, you reach out. So we've been, you know, we've been in touch for a while, man. A long time. And even it took to tell me to come on the podcast. One of the reasons why I didn't want to come on any podcast was because I want to build in silence, man. And I feel like obviously raising this back to the AI. The AI phase we're in right now. A lot of the times building a stealth is very. Is preserves your sincerity, I feel like. Because if you, as soon as you know, blow your own trumpet back, which is. Which is also a good go to market strategy, don't get me wrong, you suddenly start having external drivers, right. And then you move away from the intrinsic motivation to do something, which is love of itself.

28:23
Muhammad Malik
What we described your journey, which got me emotional and stuff. Right. Is that because it's the beauty of that, man, the beauty of the human spirit. You know, the way that you explained that, I was like, man, like, if only we could teach that. That was. That was a part of me that was like, oh, man. In a way, you just have to experience it. And that when you feel that, you know, that becomes something that you become.

28:47
Amardeep Parmar
You know, I mean, yeah, I know people. So they call it unteachable lessons, Right?

28:50
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

28:51
Amardeep Parmar
What do you feel like? Some of those unteachable lessons where you know, the end goal, if you could just tell somebody that, they're not going to listen to you. The classic one is like, money doesn't make you happy.

29:00
Muhammad Malik
Right.

29:01
Amardeep Parmar
And everyone's like, yeah, you're saying that because you're rich. But then they get. They're like, oh, actually, you're right. You're right. But you can't tell somebody that. Do you feel like there's other lessons that you. When you're working founders, they're not paying attention to what you're saying.

29:13
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

29:13
Amardeep Parmar
And they just have to go through that experience themselves.

29:15
Muhammad Malik
Yeah. So half of the week, I'm mentoring founders, right. And one of the things I keep. I say in the first call is like, you are the company and the company is you. So Sometimes they don't want to talk about. I'm like, cool. Like we normally look at growth levers, we do like sprints, we'll go into like numbers and that kind of stuff. But there's an element of personal growth. You are the business is you. Particularly in the early phases. Are you spending time to align yourself? Are you spending time to, you know, with your family? Man, at the end of the day, nobody's going to give a damn about you apart from the ones that love you, man. Damn. Again. But, but really man, like 30, 40 years from now you've had your accolades and stuff, bro.

29:59
Muhammad Malik
It's like how your, you know, what you call like your mom looks at you or your dad, your other half and kids and bro, that's why I literally say to these guys, like, and girls, why are you spending enough time with your family and stuff like that? One day you're talking to me about profit and go to market and now you're talking to me about family. And that's the thing. It's like you learn that one day it might be too late when the love wants that were with you. Damn, man. When they were not there anymore, you know. Yeah.

30:32
Amardeep Parmar
And that's the thing is that, okay, you need to work exceptionally hard if you're going to build a startup to do well. But then you've got to have the people along that journey to make it worth it. Otherwise you can work as hard as you can have all the money in the world. But if, and it all depends again, it's archetypes. Right. Some people, they're just lone wolves and for them that's not important.

30:53
Muhammad Malik
Right.

30:53
Amardeep Parmar
But for many of us, it's like if you miss those, let's say kids first steps or is it from things that look passive stories. You've got to make sure that it's.

31:00
Muhammad Malik
Worth it for you and you've got.

31:02
Amardeep Parmar
To know what you're sacrificing.

31:03
Muhammad Malik
100 no thank you for nuancing that. Right. The idea that, yeah, I don't know if it's a personal philosophy too much, but I think generally speaking you have to sacrifice in order to get somewhere. There's no doubt about that. Founders that I've spoken to that are VC backed, I think it was a local globe event I went to, man, they're like, man, I feel so bad that I'm not being able to be there for my little daughter and stuff like that, but I'm like, I'm doing this for you as well. I'm doing this for my daughter as well. So every situation is. Is. Is, you know, I can't give an objective truth here, but ask your gut. Ask your. Your. Your. Your. Your inner. Inner self, right? And be like, okay, am I sacrificing too much here? So it's all. Life is a balance.

31:45
Amardeep Parmar
I think the big thing is, like, it's knowing your sacrifice, because your sacrifice, you bring somebody else's sacrifice. You've got to do that, like, internal work of, like, is, am I saying the truth here or not? Could we lie to ourselves all the time?

31:57
Muhammad Malik
All the time.

31:58
Amardeep Parmar
So it's like, if you're saying you're doing this for your kids, you've got to be sure that you actually doing it for your kids, you can't use as an excuse. I'm doing it for a better future. It's like, if you're already worth, like, 100 million, they're already sorted. You're now doing it because you want to do it. And if it wants to, just say that.

32:14
Muhammad Malik
Just say it.

32:14
Amardeep Parmar
Just say it. So just know your own, like, understand your own motivation, right?

32:18
Muhammad Malik
You're right, man. You reminded me of a classical example that we often speak about in our family, right, Desi? Families often, you know, a lot of us came through the corner shop route, right? So wonderful father loved his kids, but he spent literally 24, seven in the corner shop. And then one day he found his daughter, like, doing, you know, on a path, you know, doing something illegal, right? And he's like, what is going on here? Like, you know, it's an illegal activity. It's in the home as well. And it's like, dad, oh, man, when.

32:48
Amardeep Parmar
I say this, I get the chills, bro.

32:49
Muhammad Malik
He said, dad, you weren't there when I needed you. Yeah. And it's like, but I loved you know? And she's like, that's not love. I just needed your time. But you're there grinding out, and then it's like, woe is me that everything didn't mean. All that money, all that corner shop time, it didn't mean anything in that moment because he's lost his daughter, man. And so I fear that for myself. I fear that for the people that I work with, because, yeah, it's cool, but, like, make sure you try. Look, my philosophy is, like, try to balance as much as you can. If you're in a phase where you're able to sacrifice, then go ham. And Steve Job talks about it. The younger founders are able to do it, but, yeah, man, don't let go. Don't let go of that.

33:34
Muhammad Malik
Which means the most in your life, man. Yeah. Yeah.

33:37
Amardeep Parmar
It's all about the phases of life, right?

33:39
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

33:39
Amardeep Parmar
The seasons. Right.

33:40
Muhammad Malik
The seasons of.

33:41
Amardeep Parmar
Sometimes you have to go sprinting hard, right. But then that can't be forever. Well, it can be forever. It's like, is that the life you want to live? Right. It's like, for example, like, I am fundamentally lazy. I don't like how hard I work. It's not. It's by mistake. It's not by design. If I can get this to a stage where this runs without me and I can just chill out, I'll happily chill out. I'm not addicted to the hustle. The hustle is a consequence of me caring about what I'm doing and having, like, high standards of what I'm doing. But then I don't. I'd rather like if I could do this and I could just chill out most of the time and everyone's being helped and we're making the change you want to make. Great. I don't want to work hard.

34:21
Amardeep Parmar
And for example, we've said about like, I've got the karate, I've got the bungo. There's always other interests I have that I'm not nurturing because I'm focusing this right now.

34:30
Muhammad Malik
Yeah, yeah. About New York as well. Yeah, yeah.

34:33
Amardeep Parmar
We're mentioning, like New York and you were mentioning about your faces.

34:36
Muhammad Malik
Right.

34:36
Amardeep Parmar
You're one of the things you'll focus on. Emerging markets as well.

34:38
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

34:39
Amardeep Parmar
How did that come about and what you doing there?

34:40
Muhammad Malik
Yeah, man. I actually began tajara in Arabic, Turkish, Urdu, I think would you call it in other languages, in Farsi means trade. Right.

34:50
Amardeep Parmar
You know, I'm not gonna lie, when I've seen the name. I thought it was Mexican.

34:53
Muhammad Malik
You. I was like.

34:54
Amardeep Parmar
I was like, why?

34:55
Muhammad Malik
Why say Tihara? Yeah. So that actually came abroad because of my trip to Saudi. And were in a place called Al Ula, which is. Which has only recently become a tourist destination where a lot of meditation retreats happen. There's also this, like, you know, cursed place. This is Kirka City. But what happened while I was on the outskirts, not in the curse part, was we met. We met with founders, we met with people that are local. And there's a local plant in Alula that it grows nowhere else, but it has so many applications from medicine to like, rehabilitation and, like, also taste wise is really good, apparently. And they're looking for local founders to build. And then were having a Conversation with a co working space over there called Waves. So it's called Vibes. Vibes, Ala. Right. Absolute vibes.

35:45
Muhammad Malik
They're like, how do we explain startup and Series A and all that to these people that are essentially Bedouins, right? They literally like live their lives in the desert, bro, and they're coming out of that. And then the way that we spoke about it was it's tajara, it means it's trade. It's literally the modern, post modernity like way of talking about trade. Because essentially what you're doing is you've got a product and you're selling it to people and then people invest into it. We call it seed, whatever it is. So that was the beginning of this idea of all the crazy stuff. I'm doing it. Let's set up a company, let's do something that also helps local founders to expand to that market and then interestingly, from there to here. But yeah, mainly our interest that we get is startup founders.

36:31
Muhammad Malik
Those are, you know, even larger incumbents as well. We've, we've helped them explore the market, shall we say, in Saudi, and also get things like the premium residency, which is actually quite a big deal, man. It's like the golden visa in Dubai, except it is for Saudi. You're able to own property as somebody that's not a Saudi national, which is a huge thing for Saudi opening up to the world.

36:53
Amardeep Parmar
And obviously you've like born raised here, you've done so much here. Where do you see opportunity in these different places? Like what makes you look elsewhere?

37:02
Muhammad Malik
Yeah, no, it's a little. So, so being really. A lot of people talk about this idea that the fact that the UK is a brilliant incubator economy, but it's not the best place to scale. And the typical thing that I'm seeing, right. I work a lot in Imperial is and ucl, for example. We're in conversations with UCL in terms of incredible talent, right? But they don't go to the local incubators because the incubators take ste. Take a lot of ip. They don't really support them as much. And they see places like America as scaling markets.

37:32
Muhammad Malik
What we're trying to do is connect that to a new market which is essentially, you know, Saudi, Qatar, who have the capital, right, and are looking for solutions to what we call an RFP list, the list of problems that are happening in their government space in the kind of, you know, the railroads, the hospitals. And we want to connect that talent because. And the underlying notion is the definition of justice, I was taught, is to put the things that, you know, have value into the right places. And I think when I see Bay, for example, what you're doing is you're connecting people together. I see it as you're enacting justice through your, you know, what you're doing is justice and that's why that's one of the values. I want to be a just person.

38:17
Muhammad Malik
The incredible talent we have, let's connect it to the right places that can nurture and help grow that time.

38:22
Amardeep Parmar
Is there any tips you give people when they're trying to go out there and like how the system's obviously different?

38:26
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

38:27
Amardeep Parmar
The culture, the way it works. Is anything in particular you'd say? Like, if I'm listening right now, it's going to be okay. I wouldn't expand Saudi other than contacting you, what could they start doing to.

38:37
Muhammad Malik
Make sure that they're yeah, well positioned? I mean people talk about it in Dubai as well. Right. But so interestingly, nudge the region of Saudis where a lot of people from the Emirates they're from. Right. From particularly Tatar as well. From there. They all have very similar traits. The idea is a people first. I'll give you a quick example. A friend of mine from Birmingham went to Saudi and he's having a conversation with a particular investor, a particular partner and he's like, the whole time they're meeting over food, there's no conversation about business. And he's like waiting for the opportunity. No conversation at all. And then right at the end of like an hour and a half, two hours, the guy goes, by the way, you know that thing that you wanted to consider it done. Why? Because he trusted that individual.

39:20
Muhammad Malik
So it's a trust based, you know, society. I can go into a little bit of detail about saying that. Riyadh, for example, a lot of people that want a slice of vision, 20, 30, they'll go in, but they'll forget this trust based kind of society that's focused so deeply on individuals. For example Amar, they'll be like, Omar, that's an interesting name. Where are you from? So this is the thing, complete different culture. They're going to ask you about your background, they're going to ask you about your village. But okay, which part of Punjab? I know Punjab. Oh, I know. But which part of Punjab? What did your family do? Were they, were they the Raja clan or this? Because they go deep map with me. So for example, over here I can say I'm Asian. It's Enough. It's like, no, where are you from?

40:02
Muhammad Malik
They. They say that you're Aval Rajul, Kashmiris. This man, he's a Kashmiri man. Right. They want to know particularly which part of the Indian subcontinent I'm from. So. So, yeah, be prepared to go deep. Be prepared to be in for the long term, as long. And it will pay dividends, man. In places like Saudi and Qatar, you know.

40:22
Amardeep Parmar
So when I went to Jordan, they didn't believe that it was an Arab. They're like, oh, it's an Arab.

40:27
Muhammad Malik
You're Egyptian.

40:28
Amardeep Parmar
Yeah. And it's like, no. And then they kept talking me through an Arabic. It's like, I don't know what's going on. And they didn't believe in it for us. Lying. And I was like, no, like, it's. It's also name. It's like. So I don't know if went to Jordan anytime soon. Hopefully they listen to this. But it's like I was almost like detained because they didn't believe that I was in Arabic.

40:45
Muhammad Malik
Yeah. Oh, my God. Yeah, I can see the Egyptian. The Egyptian in you right now.

40:49
Amardeep Parmar
But they're like, oh, I'm.

40:50
Muhammad Malik
You're Arabic.

40:51
Amardeep Parmar
And then it's like, no. I was like, I don't know what you're saying. And it's like, why are you lying to us? I'm like, I'm not lying.

40:55
Muhammad Malik
But one of the most famous singers is Abdiab. He's. Yeah, a lot of his songs were spun out into Bollywood songs, interestingly. Right. So his name is Amar as well. So they were like, no, man, you. You're our cultural icon. You're named after him. So we can't let you go. Can imagine that. Yeah, I know.

41:11
Amardeep Parmar
Like with imperial as well. You help me with like pmf, right?

41:13
Muhammad Malik
Yeah, yeah.

41:13
Amardeep Parmar
Is there. Can you use the same models both here and in other countries in emerging markets, or do you think about it differently? How do you go about the.

41:20
Muhammad Malik
Has a good question, man. So like I'm researching into this right now. So each market has its own constraints. The issue that Saudi has had. So look, our friends at Strategy Tools who actually do deep dive, researching into ecosystems and VC ecosystems, they're very surprised in terms of how good the market is in Saudi in terms of growth and stuff. But they still have an exit problem. They still have a valuation problem. Typical thing that's happening is a lot of startups that are backed by venture studios and places like incubators. The biggest one being the garage. Wonderful place. It's a play on the idea that Amazon and all these guys were building their literal garage. Right. They call it garage. SAUDI ACCENT they value companies.

42:03
Muhammad Malik
There's a valuation problem happening whereby they get backed and suddenly they've got a huge valuation and then the actual revenue, the actual kind of cash flow isn't matching. So that's an issue as well. So what we're doing is still, however, tweaking an existing model. That kind of, I've gathered over the years, there's other models, there's the Hundred Tasks by Martin Bell, for example. I'm actually really impressed by that because it's like a list of 100 things for me. We'll call it the prove model. P R O V E. The idea is like you've got five phases. You go from finding your customer to then, you know, building an offer. Then that offer then should elicit some sort of a currency and that currency allows you to then create, move from a minimal viable product to a minimal lovable product which has stickiness.

42:47
Muhammad Malik
And then we go into scaling. I can go to the phases later on sometime, but what we will do is we'll look at a startup founder who thought that this person, oh, what backing, man, I'm on the Saudi weather list of bigger entrepreneurs. And then we do it all. They'd be like, you know what, man, you're actually in phase one right now. Despite the amazing investment you've got, it's hollow inside. And that's not to say that's the case. I'm not being condescending here, there's some wonderful startups. One to look at Ninja in Saudi grocery kind of delivery thing, they've absolutely smashed it. In fact, I would say some Saudi startups are so good we can learn from them in the UK and particularly maybe in the US as well. But I'm just saying that this is the current situation over there.

43:34
Muhammad Malik
And yes, if you have a model to ascertain PMF that can be tweaked and nuanced in different markets.

43:41
Amardeep Parmar
So interesting on that point about some of these companies, they're getting like large valuations very quickly.

43:46
Muhammad Malik
Yeah.

43:47
Amardeep Parmar
And obviously in the UK and like when you talk early stage founders, they all want funding, they want external capital, they want that.

43:54
Muhammad Malik
Right.

43:55
Amardeep Parmar
And I guess one of those unseat lessons that having too much funding is actually a big problem because then you aren't being as resilient and as efficient as you can be.

44:04
Muhammad Malik
Right.

44:05
Amardeep Parmar
So can you talk about that? What are the problems that semis facing when they're essentially overfunded?

44:10
Muhammad Malik
No, for sure, man. It's a bit of a Debbie Downer when, for example, as soon as you've got that investment in, you got this deal room, you've got everything, you got your pitch set, everything sorted. Soon as the funding comes in, as you know, Amar, like the clock starts ticking, you're having to, you know, answer to other. Another set of people. So this is why I think, you know, what you're doing with the Angel Syndicate is really powerful. Right. It's people that are with you. They essentially maybe have operator skill. They're not going to put as much of a stress on you as a Visa. And that's why we're also using that angel model for those startups looking to move into emerging markets. So, yeah, I mean, the thing is, as soon as you've got that funding, brilliant.

44:52
Muhammad Malik
You're going to be asked loads of questions about it now. But sometimes, depending on the model, that's probably the only route to scale, depending on the model as well. So. And look, you probably heard this a lot, but I really do believe it's the truth that try to entertain and elicit funding, bring the funding in when you don't really need it, when you've got other suitors. That way the power dynamic shifts. You're not begging for it, you're not dying for it. I'm asking for it. No, you're not, Pooja. Essentially, you're now in a very strong position. You're able to actually have a real analysis in terms of who's a value add for me, who's a market lock for me and who's able to, yeah, essentially contribute to our growth in a meaningful way as opposed to just capital.

45:39
Muhammad Malik
Dumb money can come to you, but that might weigh you down.

45:43
Amardeep Parmar
I love the niche Pooja reference. I'm not going to explain, I'm going to see who understands it.

45:49
Muhammad Malik
Right. So, yeah.

45:51
Amardeep Parmar
All the things going on at the moment, Right. What are you most proud of?

45:55
Muhammad Malik
Right.

45:55
Amardeep Parmar
What are you most happy about, of what you've done, that you've had these different things. I've worked together and obviously worked with NatWest incubator and all these were incubators and now you're like an imperial. But what is it you feel like you've made the biggest impact on that? You feel like that? Sure, yeah. Of your very early career so far, your many years to come. But what is it that you feel like? That's what. Yeah, I've been out of that, man.

46:16
Muhammad Malik
You know when you ask me, man, like, I I'm a. You've got me emotional before. So like, I think it's just the one founder, like being able to tell them that, you know, are. You got this right. I remember a particular mentoring call that I had. I think the thing is, for mentoring and coaching was a huge unlock, man. It's like a mirror that's placed in front of you that you would never see. There's a big like sty in my eye. I didn't know about it until somebody spoke to me about it. That's what I tried to be for others. And that's why, like, I'm pursuing this in a master's level. I'm doing an ILM Level 7, which is a master's equivalent in coaching and mentoring. So there was a conversation I had with the founder who was literally crying on the call.

46:52
Muhammad Malik
She, she believed, like, you know what? I just. Imposter syndrome was there. I'm not good enough. This is too scientific of a methodology. I'm more of an arts person and just saying to her, look, you've got this right? And then just literally it doesn't mean anything. It's an empty platitude to many people, but just being there for the person. Because I learned in that conversation that the catharsis happens not in the solution we give others, but the space that we give others. And those who are leading in companies would be able to resonate with this. Somebody comes to you with a complaint, just listen in. So I just listened.

47:25
Muhammad Malik
And in that conversation now I can be very proud to say I don't know if she wants to be, you know, pulled out in this way, but she went from that to running a startup that is doing really well and then also being a thought leader in space and having a book published. So she works in the kind of the greening space. She's a wonderful, you know, people call her an eco warrior considered to have to be changing the narrative for public spaces and also greening, essentially. So seeing her now, like she's killing it. She's a public speaker, she's got a startup. And I remember that point. I was with her and that's what I'll go back to sometimes it's conversations like that.

48:01
Amardeep Parmar
So what we're saying now, right, is that 250something episodes in whenever this comes out, is that people can come on again 200 episodes later. So about two years time, right? So let's say you're sitting here in two years time and ask you the same question again, like, what are you most proud of what you hope has happened in the next two years.

48:18
Muhammad Malik
Yeah, very good question. So sometimes, you know, people talk about this mapping kind of future mapping exercise and stuff like that. I've mapped it and this changed so many times that I've. That I've. That I've forgotten how many times I've done this. But then I guess I'll do this live in the flesh right now with you and say that hopefully in two years we have created a community of, you know what we call it, mutually beneficial kind of stuff. It's almost like, you know, they're building off on each other, is more of a community created and they're supporting each other and they're supporting their wider communities. Right. So we hopefully the viral coefficient is unlocked. One of them then pays it forward and suddenly we've got the desi Wall street, you know what I'm saying? So, yeah, that's my future goal essentially.

49:08
Muhammad Malik
And let's say, I don't know, one community developed like this.

49:11
Amardeep Parmar
So in two years time we're gonna get a TV up there, right? So if people come back on the podcast again, we'll play that little clip of what you just said and then see like what actually happened.

49:21
Muhammad Malik
Gooseies, bro. Goosey. So see what happens, man. See, I appreciate that, man. I appreciate that, man. I want to ask you this as well, but I don't know if it's. Yeah, I want to ask you this as well, man.

49:29
Amardeep Parmar
Two years time, that's not fair because I'm on I this every episode.

49:32
Muhammad Malik
My. So I can't.

49:34
Amardeep Parmar
If I answered, I'd be answering every.

49:35
Muhammad Malik
Single, every single week.

49:36
Amardeep Parmar
Like twice a week.

49:37
Muhammad Malik
Yeah. So you got, you, got you. That's cool.

49:39
Amardeep Parmar
That's always a good cheat.

49:40
Muhammad Malik
I have. Right, sorry.

49:42
Amardeep Parmar
So we're going to get quick five questions now.

49:45
Muhammad Malik
Right, cool.

49:45
Amardeep Parmar
So who are free British, Asians? Asian and Britain? You think you're doing incredible work and you'd love to shout them out.

49:52
Muhammad Malik
I want to shout out my man. Would you call it? Obviously Ash, my boy. Big up Ash. Every single time. Ash Ali is a founder of. Sorry. One of the first marketing director at Just Eat. He's now the, you know, the co author of the Unfair Advantage. I also want to give a shout out to a wonderful Shiza Shah from Upper Effect. So she is essentially founder of Upper Effect. She's a social entrepreneur. She's also phenomenally talented. Like whenever you have a conversation with like, oh my God, like she's. There's something new that she Teaches us in her cause as well. And then I want to give a shout out also. So Odessi, I was going to give a shout out to non Desi who's helping Desi's Megan Loyce from Diversity VC as well. But I'm going to give a shout out to Nikita.

50:39
Muhammad Malik
Hold tight Nikita. Come on. Yeah, they got what you call included vc.

50:44
Amardeep Parmar
I definitely think you're going to like spike the mic for in there. It's like on the recording that's gonna.

50:49
Muhammad Malik
Be like noise now I want to big up Nikita man, because look, we need capital is a big issue for us, right? The more Asians we have. I say desi because this is a wonderful. I love the word desi. It feels when I hear it. I remember, I remember Mango last year, like time in the village, you know, speaking Punjabi so loudly you think you're fighting. So our fellow Desi's and we need more investors, man. We've got a lot of entrepreneurs in my opinion, right. And we need more high achieving entrepreneurs but we need more investors and that's why I think, you know, big up Nikita every single time.

51:25
Amardeep Parmar
So that's Nikita Thakkra from.

51:28
Muhammad Malik
Yeah, exactly. Yeah. So we've got three and then she's a shah, she's from Upper Effect and then we've got Ash Ali from Unfair Advantage.

51:35
Amardeep Parmar
Yeah. So and if people want to find out more about you, what you're ups in the future, where they go to.

51:39
Muhammad Malik
Yeah man, you can shout me on LinkedIn. Mohammed Malik's ventures. Also I work at BSMBF which is a small business forum. So malik@smbf.global is my email if you want to shout me as well. LinkedIn is probably the best place as well.

51:54
Amardeep Parmar
Yeah. Anyway that the audience could help you today, man.

51:58
Muhammad Malik
Help me buy. We were looking for founders at the moment, right. So we're looking for founders that's particularly focused on emerging markets as well. So anybody interested in that, give us a shout. And also we're looking for educators. So I'm teaching, you know, young people innovation, entrepreneurship. So if you have an expertise, whether that's via coding, whether that's deep understanding of psychology, come. We want to pay you to teach young people obviously.

52:23
Amardeep Parmar
Great to have you on. Good to have a good laugh as well. But any final words from you?

52:27
Muhammad Malik
A bit of a cry as well, my bro. I, I really appreciate this. I just want to give a shout out to Bay hq, man. You're doing a phenomenal job, man. And like I said, we need this. You're doing justice. And this is the idea, like when I started off in the startup space, look, there was diversity meant just a particular, you know, ethnicity, essentially. You know, I think there's so much, you know, diversity in diversity. And that's what you're doing a phenomenal job with, man. So hold tight, fq, man. Every single time.

52:56
Amardeep Parmar
Thank you for watching. Don't forget to subscribe. See you next time. 

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