EP129: "Risk, Resilience & Reinvention: The Eman Pulis Story: Founder SiGMA World"

Speaker A: Hello and um, welcome to another episode of the Dan Assor show. Inspiring and insightful conversations with event professionals. Be notified first about new episodes by hitting the follow button. And please Visit the show's YouTube channel where you can watch episodes of the show and enjoy bonus content. Good morning to Eman. How you doing today?

Speaker B: Doing great, Dan. Thanks for having me.

Speaker A: It's nice to be going to a new location for the show. I believe if I'm not mistaken, you're in Malta, is that right?

Speaker B: I am, um, based myself in Cyprus, but the shows, we have seven shows around the world. It started in Malta.

Speaker A: Yes, that's true. Sorry, so I, I thought you were in Malta, but you're actually in Cyprus today. But anyway, that's still a new territory. I've been all in many places around the world, but, uh, not in Cyprus. So thank you for joining us. You've built an incredible career. The founder of Sigma World, which is the leading Igaming, ah, platform. More recently, ikei Ventures. I probably pronounced that wrong, but you can correct me and we're going to talk a lot about that before we do. So, Eman, it would be good to understand a bit more about you as an individual. So I'd like to take you back a number of years and just share a bit about your upbringing and how you think it shaped you today.

Speaker B: Yeah, I come from very humble beginnings. Today, I wonder how my mom, my dad, my parents raised a family of five with, you know, 600, €700amonth.

Speaker A: Wow.

Speaker B: You know, I, I look back and I'm like, but, but how, how? Like, because I, I grew up never questioning how poor we were, you know, so, so I'm eternally grateful to that because, um, that also shaped who I am today. You know, that was my childhood going into adolescence. It was my dream to become an elite athlete. I wanted to represent my country, my tiny island of Malta, right, in the Olympic Games. I wanted to become an Olympian. And it's there where I realized that despite having the potential to become an Olympian, the financial means weren't there for me to achieve that. And that, you know, made me think that, okay, moving forward, I want, um, financial freedom. You know, I don't want this to ever happen again. So I, I diverted my frustration, I diverted my discipline in competitive sport into business. I knew nothing of business. My family doesn't come from a background, uh, of business. So you can only imagine the countless times I up, you know, with, with trying to build a business.

Speaker A: Yeah, okay, interesting. An Olympian. Was there a specific sport that you Were interested in, um, representing your country at the Olympics in.

Speaker B: Yeah, I was training competitively, doing track and field. Triple jump was my event. And I'll tell you one thing, it's. It's tough on your knees, it's tough on your back at that event. Very few people do the triple jump. It's probably the least popular.

Speaker A: Yeah, I was gonna say, uh, I've. I've never had a guest on the podcast that has told me that they've attempted the triple jump, never mind attempted to be in the Olympics as a triple jumper. How do you get into triple jumping? I'll just have to ask. Why. Why?

Speaker B: Yeah, that's a great question. You get into track and field.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And then, you know, then what your. What your body is best for, you kind of start drifting into, whether you're a sprint athlete or a long distance athlete or a jumper, Then you start drifting into your event as you progress, you know. Interesting. And triple jump happened to be the event where my body type excels.

Speaker A: Right. Okay. So I guess what you're telling me, Iman, is that not the struggle, but the fact that you couldn't necessarily do what you wanted to do because you didn't have the financial means drove you and gave you the appetite to have your own independent financial freedom? Would that be correct?

Speaker B: I was driven by that.

Speaker A: Correct. Because other people I speak to, and I guess people you speak to and listen to as well, come from very privileged backgrounds and they still have the drive to do that as well, I guess, sometimes the fear of losing what they had. So I'm always interested in. In this sort of balance between nature, nature and nurture. Were there sort of any pivotal moments or mentors or experiences in those formative and early days that help sort of guide you to the path that you've taken now?

Speaker B: Yeah, um, Great question. So I wasn't. I had no clue how to enter the business world.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: But I always loved people. You know, I love helping people. I love being, Being useful to someone. That has always been something that has been part of who I am. I think I got that from my mother, who's also that type of person.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And I remember during campus days when I was a university student, someone approached me to organize a party with them. And I said, yeah, sure, let's do it. And from 4,000 delegates, I was responsible for bringing 3,000 of those with delegates. I call them delegates because now I'm in the conference business. Partygoers. So from 4,000, you know, party goers, I was responsible for selling 3,000 of those. And I remember standing next to the DJ Boot. This was a New Year's Eve of 2004, so I sold the tickets in 2003. Okay. I remember standing there feeling impressed. Goosebumps everywhere. Realizing that everyone in front of me is having the time of their life because of something that. Well, I didn't think of it at the time. It was my then partner. Um, but because of that, there's all these people having a great time of. Of the life. And it was there where I had this eureka moment. I said, this is what I want to do for the rest of my life.

Speaker A: Interesting. You're not the first person to have said that to me. I've had a few people that started with family parties, you know, or big family get. Big family get togethers. And it's interesting. Lots of people that don't understand the events industry will say to me, oh, you. You're in events, you organize parties. But. Because they don't understand conferences or trade shows. But it's interesting that you. Those early days. So you continued that for what, a number of years, Right? Was it about.

Speaker B: Yeah, this actually, what you said is very interesting. I don't blame people for thinking that events is just parties. I did parties for 10 years. I didn't even know there was a way out of parties, uh, into conferences until 2013, when I had the second eureka moment. And I'll tell you one thing, I. I love doing events. It's what I want to do. But I started becoming frustrated because I didn't want to do parties anymore. I didn't feel fulfilled by getting, you know, 4,000, 10,000 people hammered. You know, that. That wasn't driving me anymore.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker B: Um, until the day I realized, listen, there's actually a way out of parties. I can still do events, but I pivot into conferences. And 2013, 14 was when this shift. Drastic shift happened.

Speaker A: And is that because you attended a conference yourself and you saw.

Speaker B: No. No. I had no clue.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: How to run conferences. I had never been to a conference myself, but the people who spend the most at my parties was the gaming community, the online. The iGaming community.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: Those were the most affluent in Malta. Uh, they're the ones who popped bottles at my parties. So I said, let's stop focusing on this. Focus on this, because that's where the money is.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And the idea of organizing sigma. Sigma is an acronym for Summit of igaming IG in Malta. Ma. The summit of igaming in Malta is represented by the acronym sigma, which nowadays is more of a brand encompassing all we do. And that's how it took off Year one. We had a thousand people coming to the conference and it was mostly exhibitors who loved my parties and just trusted me. But from then on it took off like wildfire.

Speaker A: So it's interesting because when you launch an event, obviously I guess you have to be confident that you're going to get attendees, you know. So I guess you had, whilst you don't know, you had some confidence because almost you were like transporting your existing contacts into a, uh, just a different, different setup to a certain extent. You weren't starting from zero, you weren't going into it.

Speaker B: Yeah, yeah, I'd say confidence, a mix of confidence, brute force. You cannot let anyone doubt you. And a decent dose of naivety.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Because looking back, like, I, I knew nothing of I gaming and yet I wanted to do a conference. I didn't know what made the I gaming like I was clueless, clueless. So looking back, I was completely naive, but I just put the blinkers on and went for it.

Speaker A: It's interesting, uh, because sometimes lack of experience and lack of knowledge actually helps drive us forward because if we have too much knowledge, we then have evidence in our brain to suggest this isn't going to work because, you know, it hasn't worked for someone else or I did something else and it didn't work in, in that space. So again, a bit of less, I guess, education for people that are listening, you know, if they're on their own journey and they're like, oh, this is going to work, not work. I guess sometimes it's, you've got to go for it and feel the fear and do it anyway. I think there was a, a book that was released with that title. Would you agree with that?

Speaker B: Living proof. Couldn't agree more.

Speaker A: Yeah. So for people that, because this, this podcast goes around the world and definitely outside of, of of Europe, people that don't understand Malta, where it sits, the location, the job. Just tell us a bit about Malta and then we're going to talk more about Sigma World.

Speaker B: Yeah. Malta is a very tiny state. Half a million people make the Maltese population, um, very industrious people, extremely industrious people. Government, um, has always been voschifeous at embracing new sectors. So Malta did an exceptional job in financial services back in the 90s. Malta did an excellent job regulating the online gambling space. Right. Uh, in the early 2000, 2001, it set up the Malta Gaming Authority, which basically regulated a space that was still embryonic, you know, we barely have the Internet yet. Malta has a framework telling companies, listen, there's no framework in Sweden, so you don't know if you're breaking the law or not. You can come to Malta, uh, you can set up an office here, you can employ people. We have a regulatory framework where you can operate. So with this, hundreds of gaming companies came for the Malta license. And that's how the gaming industry flourished. Malta has done a, uh, good job regulating those spaces. It has done it on artificial intelligence, more recently on blockchain technology, on medical cannabis, on pharma, on vessel registration. Like after Panama, Malta has one of the most densely populated, uh, uh, registration for, uh, sea vessels and, uh, planes. So Malta is very good at finding these niches and going for it. Yeah.

Speaker A: Interesting. Thank you. It's always good to sort of put that into context. And I guess at the time you started Sigma World, there were other large gaming events right around the world. And again, people listening, you know, a bit of education if they're looking to launch an event in a market where, you know, they're ready players, because it's very rare that you will be able to launch something where nothing else exists. And that's not always a good thing because it doesn't suggest there's a market. What gave you the confidence that you thought you can, you know, get the exhibitors, attendees of one thing, because they might be local to the, to the, to the region, exhibitors that were maybe elsewhere and convincing them that Malta was the place to be.

Speaker B: Yeah, so when I started, I, I, I had no research as, again, as I told you. Yeah, more naive than anything. But I soon realized that, you know, the Internet is there to stay. People will always, uh, want to gamble. And the only way for governments is to regulate the space. Saying igaming is illegal and trying to ban it completely will only result in sending players underground where they play on rogue websites which are not protecting the player, which are unregulated. As a government, you don't want it. You don't want your citizens to play on rogue websites using VPN and be at risk like that. Governments also want to collect taxes from this activity. So the only way to go is regulate, regulate, regulate. Looking around us, we saw that very few countries as of yet had a regulatory framework for online gambling. So when you were here, and there's a long way to go for this sector to flourish, couple that with the fact that there's hardly any barriers for any company to expand beyond its comfort zone. So if today we're operating in Sweden Tomorrow we can start operating in Brazil. All we need is to change, you know, the language, do some other tweaks, and before you know it, you've opened up to a market of 250 million people. So very little barriers to entry. So, you know, these are explode. This is an explosive formula for the industry to grow.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: You know, and because of that, we had the confidence that the demand for conferences will expand.

Speaker A: Yeah. Talk us about the first few years, because obviously now Sigma M World, I guess, is a global brand. You would describe it. You've, um, taken the event to other territories, which we're going to talk about in a minute, and how you did that and why you did that. But the first few years in that first territory, I think maybe up to 2019, uh, or just definitely before the pandemic, talk about the trajectory of growth, some of the things that you did to grow the event again, people listening. They might be interested in that journey

Speaker B: with pleasure. So, yes, we stayed in our comfort zone in Malta until 2018. Okay. 2018, I packed up, went for Manila. Went to Manila. And we wanted to replicate the formula in Asia.

Speaker A: Okay.

Speaker B: Market of 4, 4.5 Billion People, you, uh, can't go wrong. So we set up in the Philippines where there was a license. And, uh, then Covid had other plans for us, so we had to delay launching the show in Asia. Went, uh, back to Malta again, back to our comfort zone during the pandemic. Then shortly after, actually during the pandemic, we launched the first show in Dubai. The reason we launched Dubai was because the Emirates was vociferous in vaccinating its citizens and was at the forefront in opening up again its borders. So we felt comfortable. You know, it was a do or die situation. Unless we do an event, we're gonna die. We're gonna file for bankruptcy. So 2021, in the midst of COVID we couldn't do a show in Malta. Um, we did it in Dubai. So you can safely say that Covid was a, ah, beautiful silver lining in the sense that it pushed us to get out of our comfort zone.

Speaker A: Interesting. So. And, um, give us a sense of the size of the event up until that point. So from when you launched, I guess that would make it, what, seven or eight years before the first edition? To that point, maybe just before the pandemic or the show in Dubai. Can you give us a sense of size? You know, exhibitors, delegates, maybe?

Speaker B: Top. Yeah. In Malta. Yeah, in Malta, 2018, we had around 14,000 delegates.

Speaker A: Wow. Yeah.

Speaker B: In. In 2000, close to 20,000 delegates. And then 2021 we opened up again. 2020 was, uh, brutal.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: Um, trying to keep a sinking ship afloat. Then 2021 with Dubai and the feedback was amazing. Imagine, imagine, uh, all the delegates hungry to start flying again after a whole year and a half of hiatus. You know, going out again, conferences, meeting people. The energy was electrifying in Dubai.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And, and, and then shortly after we did the show in Malta again. So 2021 we had two shows. A big one in Dubai. A big one in Malta.

Speaker A: Sure. And then, I mean, I read, and if this is, uh, not correct, correct me if I'm wrong, that around before the pandemic maybe, and this wouldn't be a surprise that you were looking to maybe sell the show or merge with uh, uh, another company. But obviously the pandemic changed those plans. But as you said, it allowed you to then catapult into other territories and now give us a sense of Sigma world as it is today. How many locations are you in, how many shows you're doing, the total volume of delegates and so on.

Speaker B: Yeah, thank God for the pandemic again there because, yes, we were entertaining the idea of an exit, which now fast forward five years, we're looking at the valuation that's forex. What, what it was pre pandemic. So I'm, um, glad we didn't do that at the time a bit. Where we stand today, we have seven shows worldwide covering most geographical, uh, locations for the industry. We have the largest, uh, representation of gaming when it comes to events, when it comes to media. So that is something that we cherish. We are very, very proud of that fact. We have over 100,000 delegates that come to our shows. Unique delegates. So we have delegates who come to multiple shows.

Speaker A: Right.

Speaker B: Unique delegates is around 100,000, uh, delegates. And yeah, something that we're pushing now is besides the events.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So we're very Strong on the B2B side. In iGaming, we like to use this term of prosumers. It's consumers who are extremely knowledgeable about the industry. They know all about the regulation about, um, who's producing the games, the slots. They know everything about odds, so they're very meticulous about which sites to play on. So because of this we, we decided to turn Sigma into the most trusted authority where the regulators, the B2B industry, but also the players converge. So recently we embarked on this project where we're trying to turn our site, our platform, into the most trusted authority where players can find reviews of games, reviews of casino and sports betting sites, and they also can come to us for adr. ADR is alternative dispute resolution. So both operator and players, they agree to settle any disputes they may have with us arbitrarily. And that has been working really, really well. So when you talk about Sigma, it's not just B2B events.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker B: But it's also C, uh, platform.

Speaker A: Thank you. And do you see that continuing? Like, if you take the pie of income or profitability, do you see the growth more in those other areas of, uh, the. Of the business?

Speaker B: Yeah. Great question. As things stand, the B2C is representing 5% of our revenues.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And, uh, for sure, we do see huge potential for that to grow. We won't be surprised to see a hockey stick coming along, because SEO, good SEO, like good food, takes time to cook, and we've been working on this project for the past two years, and the results are extremely encouraging.

Speaker A: Sure. Let me just pause for a minute. You know, we spoke about when you started the first event in Malta in 2014.

Speaker B: Okay.

Speaker A: You said there were a thousand delegates. Pretty much. And, um, those delegates were people that you knew from your parties. And you've just said to me, you now have 100,000 coming. Okay. And it's easy to sit, you know, to not look at your successes. Right. You, you just carry on and carry on. I mean, what pride do you take? And are you, you know, do you look in amazement and think, wow, look where we've come from to where we.

Speaker B: I should do it more often. We don't have the luxury to, you know, pull the handbrake and, you know, just soak it all in. But, yes, I see myself extremely lucky to be in a space at a time where we grew together with the industry. You know, you have to acknowledge that demand for iGaming has exploded in, uh, 2014, 15. That was exactly the time when we stepped into the industry. And so that has been, you know, extremely helpful in us, uh, expanding so aggressively. Ah, we realized this early on, so we went for it. And, yeah, I still don't see any signs of plateau in the nearby future, you know, because there's huge, uh, demand. Governments are regulating the space. No, governments are reversing such decisions. So it's, quite frankly, a great sector.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: To be involved with. And, you know, you see the, the mood of private equity, large firms today, whereas in the past they frowned upon the vertical, you know, they shied away from embracing it in their portfolio, we see the mood changing drastically. You know, nowadays, if you have tier one countries The UK Nordics, the US regulating the space. Why shouldn't it feature.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: In such portfolios.

Speaker A: So it's interesting the fact that there is regulation because regulation is not always a, can uh, be seen as a positive thing. But the fact, what you're saying is the fact that there is regulation and you're in the territories where it's regulated gives confidence to investors that this is something that they should be okay to get involved with.

Speaker B: Correct? Yeah, we, we're all for regulation in gaming. That has always been our mantra and it has enabled us to work closely also with governments.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker B: We do get approached by a uh, lot of governments who want to see the conference taking place in their countries and that has enabled us, you know, to expand so aggressively as well.

Speaker A: And let's talk about the different um, countries that you're in because um, there's a lot of talk about geo cloning. And then I had the, the chief executive DMG events, Jeff Dickinson and his team ban the word geo cloning. They call it geo adapting because it's not just as simple as just taking one event to another. Right. You have to adapt to the, the territory we spoke about, Malta, size different. Somewhere else different. How do you, how do your events show up in different regions? What are the sort of nuances? How do you make sure that you get the culture right and so on.

Speaker B: Yeah, I love that term. We like to use another term which I copied from a very, very good author, Thomas Friedman, who talks about globalization. Globalization. But it's globalization because you go global but you act local wherever you are. And we use that mantra in our business. Rather than having one central office in let's say Malta or the uk we have seven offices around the world. An office in Sao Paulo, an office in Manila, an office in Noida, India, an office in Malta, um, Cyprus and Belgrade. And we have more offices in the pipeline. One in Las Vegas is being planned. And the reason we do this is one, to have local expertise, you know, curating the networking events. We need to understand where to go, what to do, how to do it. If you look at our website, it's in 10 different languages.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So any piece of content reaches far outside English speaking markets and that has helped us tremendously as well with, with many, many different communities. So yeah, I, I, we believe a lot in this term globalization. And we do empower our teams in all those offices to take decisions, to make mistakes. Yeah, we try and instill a culture where it's okay to mistake, uh, to do mistakes. You know, we don't want our workforce to shy away from taking calculated risks because the fear of getting punished outweighs the reward of doing something good. So, you know, I'm obsessed about. About this. This element, you know, and so when. Whenever the team comes to me with a problem, I joke, I tell them, don't come to me with a problem. Come to me with an apology and the solution. And let's discuss that together. And they love. They always come, hey, yeah, man, I apologize, but I have a solution.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So we joke about it. And it's good because it empowers, you know, decentralized decision making.

Speaker A: Sure. Thank you for that term, globalization. It's the first time that I've heard Thomas Friedman.

Speaker B: It's not my term.

Speaker A: Well, we'll say it's your turn. And how many staff do you have at the moment, across the group?

Speaker B: Yeah, we're around 200 people.

Speaker A: 200. So your leadership style would have had to evolve. Right. You know, when you're launching the first event business might be just you and a partner and a few staff. You're getting involved in absolutely everything. I'm sure we still get involved, but how was your journey? Uh, evolved as a leader over the last 10, 15 years.

Speaker B: Yeah, I wish I worked in a company before or even as an employee. I wish I had that experience. But I never worked in a company, so I had no clue how to, you know, how to dissect a company into different departments. I never knew what marketing team does or what a sales team does or what, because I never was exposed to it. You know, I always did parties. After graduating, I did parties, and the only employees I had were freelancers who you recruit for the party, bar stuff, DJs, security. That's it. I had absolutely no experience, so I did a lot of mistakes, you know. You know, uh, looking back, I cringe at, uh, some of the mistakes I did. I used to be frustrated a lot, and this stemmed out from the lack of understanding. But, yeah, experience does help. There's no textbook that prepares you for the shrewd life of entrepreneurship as good as real life experiences do. So. So nowadays, I feel I'm. I'm a lot more grounded, better prepared. I. I've realized that, yeah, you. You need to empower your team to take decisions. You know, if you want to scale, you cannot. You cannot be the one and all, you know, it's. It's impossible. It's impossible. And then having my two daughters. In 2018, I had my first child. Having my two daughters, also two, you know, made me A lot calmer, you know, A lot, a lot calmer. So, so, yeah.

Speaker A: Well, that's interesting. What, what has being a parent taught you about yourself and leadership and have you managed to take that into your, your business life?

Speaker B: I think so. I, I honestly, I don't know how, how it panned out. But um, yeah, nothing, uh, it's, it's, you know, mistakes. It's not a big deal. It's okay. It's fine.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And, and it has helped me a lot to deal with much bigger problems. You know, if, um, you know, with a big company you um, become a target easily. You know, it's, it's much easier to become a target when you're a startup. You're allowed to make mistakes. You know, the clients, they give you a tap on the back, you know, it's, it's okay. Um, sure, sure. When you, when you become this multi national corporation, you're not, you're not allowed to make mistakes. You, you know, on the outside.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: So, so this, the stakes are higher, the stress is higher. So you need to be able to control those stress levels.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: By empowering your team a bit better as well.

Speaker A: Makes sense. I want to move on to the VC fund that you, you set up three years ago. I think now Ikigai Ventures. Talk to us about that. Why you decided to, uh, I guess pivot to, to use it, to coin a phrase, um, into the, the world of uh, venture being a venture capitalist, what type of companies you're investing in, how it's gone and so on.

Speaker B: Thank you. Um, yes, Ikigai Ventures took off in the midst of COVID 2020. The idea took off. I felt like I was becoming redundant because events weren't happening and I needed, you know, to, to chant my energy into other stuff. Couple that with the fact that I know a lot of rock stars in the industry, you know, a lot of billionaires, multi millionaires, they love what I do, they trust me and do I keep using this wealth of a network to sell a stand, you know, is that all I can do? Yeah. So the idea of Ikigai Ventures took off. I brought these rock stars to pitch in with some cash. We launched this UK fund and you know, it was a steep learning curve for me, learning what a GP is, what an LP is, how uh, to run a fund. It's, it's been a beautiful experience because of the platform Sigma and because we use the platform as an unfair advantage to defund and we've been doing exceptionally well with it. So we invest in individuals who have found their ikigai. Uh, it's a beautiful Japanese word, ikigai, which means you have found your ikigai if you're good at what you do, if you love what you do, if it pays you well, and if you're contributing to solving a problem in society. So we invest in people who have founder ikigai and people who are in the igaming business or in the frontier tech business. We also incubated a number of project through Ikigai Ventures. It's now in its third year running and we have another five years to go before we need to close the fund and return 6, 7, 8x or more to the LPs who have trusted us with their pennies.

Speaker A: Interesting. Thank you. I was doing my research and I believe it actually translates as reason for being. Is that right? Yeah.

Speaker B: Correct.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: I love everything Japanese.

Speaker A: Tell me why. What excites you? And about the Japanese culture?

Speaker B: Well, look, take a look at longevity. The place where people live the most is, is in this remote place called Okinawa. You've had sociologists flying in to try and understand what leads a person to live so peaceful and long, you know, and they've attributed all of this to this way of life which is ikigai. Anything goods manifested, you know, the way they eat, the way they look at their way of life, the way they work, if they enjoy doing it, if they love doing it, if it contributes to society. So I'm fascinated by, by everything Japanese. Another, another fascination of mine is kintsugi. I'll tell you very briefly, I don't want to deviate too much. Kintsugi is the art of fixing pottery with gold. Okay. Ah, so using this analogy, whenever something breaks in the western world, whenever something breaks, whether it's a washing machine or a relationship, the tendency for us is to throw it away, you know, because we don't like the scars that come with it. In Japanese culture, the scars are now made of gold. So actually the scars become the most beautiful part of this object of the pottery. And it's a way of seeing things. Right? So if you see the scars moving forward as the most beautiful thing, there is dependencies. You will not part ways with anything that's broken. So you know, that's another philosophy which is Japanese that I really, I'm really, really fond of.

Speaker A: Interesting. Thank you.

Speaker B: Japanese I'm a sucker for.

Speaker A: That's an education, entrepreneurship. Not for everybody and not for the faint hearted. Again, if people, you've got someone listening on their sort of entrepreneurial journey, what advice, what's the one piece of advice that you might give them.

Speaker B: Yeah, I like to be very careful before giving advice to anyone.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: You know, because not everyone wants to be an entrepreneur. So me telling them, ah, entrepreneur, being an entrepreneur is great. You need to do this. No, there are people who are happy writing someone else's book. You know, I, I wanted to write my own book. You know, I dreaded the idea of working for someone else who doesn't have, you know, the same ideas, um, that I have. In a way. I was always scared of becoming addicted to the paycheck as well, so. So I never had a job in the sense that I never really settled for a full time job in my life because I was always scared that that check will diminish, uh, my hunger to do what I wanted to do, you know, but. But that's me. It doesn't mean that, you know, it's the only way, you know, so I'm very careful before I start ranting about entrepreneurship because other people that have absolutely no interest in, in those sleepless nights or in all the stress that comes

Speaker A: with entrepreneurship, you know, they have to find their own. Ikaika said it wrong.

Speaker B: Ikigai. Correct. Correct. Correct.

Speaker A: And finally, if you were going to give a piece of advice to young, uh, mn who was doing the triple jump all those years ago and when you were just starting out on your journey, what would that advice be if you had an opportunity to speak to your younger self?

Speaker B: I wish I had that luxury. Um, nurture the fire, keep it alive, do, um, keep taking risks. So from that point of view, I don't regret anything. I wish I had mentors I could, uh, bounce ideas off with. So I learned a lot by doing rather than by listening. So, uh, the only advice I would give to my younger self is to reach out for those who have been there before me.

Speaker A: Sure.

Speaker B: And to listen, maybe a bit more. But other than that, you know, I love, I love, uh, the journey. I love all the stress, the sleepless nights that I've had. It has made me who I am today.

Speaker A: Thank you, Eman. It's been, uh, a, A pleasure. We've been on a journey from your childhood through to, uh, Sigma and Japanese culture and beyond in a relatively short period of time. We wish you the best of luck for the future and look forward to seeing what's coming next for you.

Speaker B: Appreciate you for having me. Thank you, Dan.

Speaker A: I hope you enjoyed the episode. Be notified first about new episodes by following me on Apple podcasts and Spotify platforms and by subscribing to my YouTube channel Search Dan Assor.