The 25-Year-Old Who Raised $6M From Early Facebook Investors

00:00:00.080 Most 25-year-olds are figuring out their 00:00:01.920 first job. Finnlay Morcombe built Fluency, 00:00:03.929 [music] a platform that maps how work 00:00:06.080 actually happens in Fortune 500 00:00:07.919 organizations. 00:00:08.720 >> We went to market with it and within one 00:00:10.240 week we're like, "Okay, we're hard 00:00:11.120 people." 00:00:11.519 >> And convince investors behind Facebook 00:00:13.840 to lead a $6 million seed round [music] 00:00:16.079 before he even unpacked in San 00:00:18.320 Francisco. 00:00:18.880 >> We would rather company die trying. 00:00:20.400 >> Yeah. 00:00:20.880 >> Than be like a $50 million 00:00:22.240 >> fluency. [music] 00:00:23.199 15 million in pipeline. Fortune 100 00:00:25.600 partners built by self-taught deaths 00:00:28.640 from Melbourne. 00:00:29.359 >> Agency is so powerful. What's going to 00:00:31.279 happen? Hi, I'm Finnlay and I'm one of 00:00:32.880 the co-founders of Fluency and this is 00:00:34.559 the best podcast ever made. Founders in 00:00:36.559 Motion. [music] 00:00:40.640 >> Quick thing before we get started. We 00:00:42.800 have a huge goal this year of hitting 00:00:44.800 10,000 subscribers. Yes, it's ambitious, 00:00:48.160 but it lets us help more people build 00:00:50.640 really great companies. So if you enjoy 00:00:53.039 the content, learn something new, the 00:00:55.360 best way to support us is by 00:00:56.960 subscribing. Okay, let's get back to So 00:00:59.600 let's start at the most recent news. You 00:01:01.840 just raised 6 million from Accel, but 00:01:04.319 had only been in the US for a few weeks. 00:01:06.560 You weren't even fully booed in yet. So 00:01:09.200 walk me through how the round happened. 00:01:10.960 >> We weren't really sure we were going to 00:01:12.479 raise at the beginning. 00:01:13.920 >> Mhm. we have enough traction to not 00:01:16.240 really like a raise wasn't imperative 00:01:18.240 for us at the time and we're like let's 00:01:20.720 just write two pages send it to some VCs 00:01:23.280 and see what happens that was it and 00:01:25.040 then we sent like a literal two pager we 00:01:27.200 had no deck no data room didn't have a 00:01:29.759 data room till right at the end for DD 00:01:31.600 with Accel I sent it to like 10 funds 00:01:33.759 had some conversations got some intros 00:01:36.000 probably spoke to 18 funds or less total 00:01:38.880 for the whole thing and I'd met like a 00:01:40.720 couple of US funds just in my travels 00:01:43.280 generally 00:01:44.146 >> [snorts] 00:01:44.159 >> when I went to the US with Ollie like 00:01:48.000 7 months ago. 00:01:48.799 >> Put it into context. Say if an 00:01:50.159 Australian founder is looking to raise 00:01:52.079 from US investors, what is your 00:01:55.040 recommendation in terms of the best 00:01:56.560 things that helped you guys? 00:01:58.560 >> First of all, two misinterpretations 00:02:00.399 from Australians raising capital in the 00:02:02.159 US. 00:02:02.640 >> Yes. 00:02:03.360 >> One is the fact that they think it's 00:02:04.880 like really easy. You just go to the 00:02:06.479 valley and you can just raise a massive 00:02:07.759 round. 00:02:08.160 >> Mhm. 00:02:09.119 >> I don't think that's inherently true. I 00:02:11.038 met a bunch of founders NSF who like 00:02:12.959 come from other countries like I'm going 00:02:15.040 to raise around and you see them a week 00:02:16.480 later and like I have to go home my 00:02:17.680 visa's up I didn't raise around. So I 00:02:20.080 don't think it's inherently like this 00:02:21.200 magic button that gets pressed. The fact 00:02:23.120 that it's possible like or you can at 00:02:25.120 the same time so I guess it's kind of 00:02:26.640 like a cognitive dissonant sort of piece 00:02:29.360 like there's everyone kind of thinks 00:02:30.720 like really easy but then like you can 00:02:32.480 just go and do it as well. They kind of 00:02:34.080 both coexist together. What worked for 00:02:35.760 us though is like one I was like I am 00:02:37.200 moving I've moved here. 00:02:38.560 >> Yeah. whilst I was in the process of 00:02:40.400 literally moving there like regardless 00:02:41.760 of whether we raised or not. 00:02:43.680 >> The second was the attitude we had 00:02:46.000 politely was we have enough capital in 00:02:48.480 the bank anyway and we're going to get 00:02:50.160 it done. Thirdly, it was that we did 00:02:53.440 have a good amount of traction on the 00:02:55.280 new product. 00:02:56.160 >> And then the fourth piece was for Accel 00:02:57.840 specifically, 00:02:59.440 >> what we were building perfectly hit a 00:03:01.120 thesis they had internally. 00:03:02.400 >> Yeah. 00:03:02.640 >> So that was some serendipity. So, it was 00:03:04.640 like meeting one with the partner and 00:03:06.959 then like 2 hours later. Maybe that's a 00:03:08.720 bit of hyperbole. It felt like 2 hours 00:03:10.239 later within a 24-hour period. 00:03:12.080 >> Mhm. 00:03:12.560 >> There was like another separate partner 00:03:14.239 meeting. 00:03:14.800 >> Yeah. 00:03:15.440 >> And then it was like I see the next day 00:03:17.360 with like 24 partners on the call. 00:03:19.440 >> Yeah. 00:03:19.840 >> And then it was like a lot of back and 00:03:22.319 forth between myself and our investor, 00:03:23.760 our partner. And they were awesome 00:03:25.120 actually. They were 00:03:28.000 >> so sophisticated in their relationship 00:03:30.799 building. I would say like they were 00:03:32.799 conscious that there was a deadline 00:03:34.400 approaching 00:03:35.760 >> and they were really trying hard to 00:03:37.440 build a genuine relationship despite the 00:03:40.400 timeline. 00:03:41.200 >> Yeah. 00:03:41.840 >> Um and then we [clears throat] went to 00:03:43.040 DD which was 12 background calls pretty 00:03:46.480 much just on myself. They called my 00:03:48.000 brother whilst he was so my brother's a 00:03:49.680 chippy. They called him whilst he was on 00:03:51.440 site. There like hammers and stuff going 00:03:53.360 in the background. Ex employers, 00:03:55.280 customers, friends, other founders. So 00:03:58.480 like yeah like six odd hours of 00:04:00.080 background calls data room DD but 00:04:02.480 there's not much in the data room so 00:04:03.760 that was pretty chill and then they were 00:04:05.360 like helping us find the right other 00:04:06.879 partners to help to to jump in. Biggest 00:04:09.040 thing we wanted was like talent 00:04:10.959 attractiveness because we're 00:04:12.560 >> unknown people from relatively unknown 00:04:14.879 unis especially over in the US. 00:04:17.040 >> So we had no network over there to 00:04:19.040 attract really great talent. So yeah. 00:04:21.120 >> So okay you've already had Australian 00:04:23.120 customers like A PBH and Spec Savers on 00:04:26.639 board. Um, there is this notion going 00:04:29.840 around about US investors discounting 00:04:32.479 Australian revenues. So, did you ever 00:04:34.800 feel that US investors discounted your 00:04:37.440 revenues because they were in Australia? 00:04:39.680 >> No, not for us. 00:04:41.120 >> Yeah, 00:04:41.759 >> cuz I we'd heard that a lot as well and 00:04:43.280 I was like, "Oh, they're going to 00:04:44.160 discount it to zero." Um, maybe if you 00:04:47.040 like vertical software, 00:04:48.880 >> but we're like extremely horizontal. 00:04:51.120 Like one of our Achilles heels is like 00:04:53.199 how big the opportunity space is for 00:04:54.720 what we're building can do. 00:04:56.000 >> Yeah. in terms of like you have to make 00:04:57.120 the right part decisions blah blah blah 00:04:58.240 but back to answering the question is no 00:05:00.320 I I don't think we really had a massive 00:05:02.000 amount of discounting to zero 00:05:04.080 >> to be honest um Accel didn't anyway the 00:05:07.199 revenues maybe half and half 00:05:09.680 >> at the time of the seed but the big 00:05:11.360 logos were the US side 00:05:13.840 >> maybe even less than half and half no 00:05:15.039 it's probably more predominantly 00:05:16.080 Australian revenue split but the bigger 00:05:18.479 logos were on the US side 00:05:20.160 >> so now that you've experienced both 00:05:21.759 countries Australia and the US what do 00:05:24.000 you think is the hardest thing about 00:05:26.000 building in Australia the founders face. 00:05:28.720 >> I've just got back from the valley a 00:05:30.960 couple weeks ago. First time back to 00:05:32.240 Australia in like 5 months is I just 00:05:34.000 want to put my feet up and kick back. 00:05:36.080 Like there's like no 00:05:38.560 exttrinsic pressure here. Like in the 00:05:40.479 valley it's like if you're not working 00:05:41.520 you feel like you're falling behind and 00:05:43.199 that's awesome. Like that's what you 00:05:44.639 should optimize for if you are a founder 00:05:46.320 and you do want to have like a venture 00:05:47.759 scale outcome. 00:05:48.720 >> I think it's a positive thing. 00:05:49.759 >> Okay. So maybe let's zoom out for a 00:05:51.360 second. What does fluency actually do? 00:05:54.400 How it works is Fluency is deployed onto 00:05:57.440 let's say everybody's laptop inside of 00:05:59.759 an organization and for all intents and 00:06:02.560 purposes 00:06:04.000 >> we see everything that happens. We take 00:06:06.080 screenshots. We scrape like system logs. 00:06:08.000 We get ingress egress for like network 00:06:10.160 logs. We get a lot of information 00:06:13.440 and we're getting this every day as time 00:06:15.759 passes across the whole organization. We 00:06:17.840 build what's called a work ontology. 00:06:20.240 >> Mhm. 00:06:21.600 An ontology is just like a tech word for 00:06:24.960 a queryable graph where a graph is a 00:06:29.360 form of data store where you have nodes 00:06:32.080 and edges. A node represents some data 00:06:34.800 and an edge is the relationship. So this 00:06:36.800 is being built over time and it's 00:06:38.080 constantly changing depending on new 00:06:39.600 context we get. It's non- monotonic, 00:06:42.080 which means that the the present can 00:06:44.400 affect the past because sometimes you 00:06:45.919 might get an email or a communication or 00:06:47.680 something changes in your business which 00:06:49.600 affects what we thought was the truth 00:06:52.240 previously. 00:06:53.600 >> And there's three levels to our 00:06:55.520 ontology. The first one defines what 00:06:58.160 work is. So we're like working on 00:07:01.039 software or this is a process for 00:07:02.880 invoicing. Just making sure we know 00:07:04.639 who's who in the zoo. like cuz like to a 00:07:07.360 computer perspective you are different 00:07:09.599 in emails in Slack in the CRM that you 00:07:12.560 use but we just want to make sure that 00:07:13.919 we always know it's you 00:07:15.440 >> and the third layer is we understand 00:07:18.240 what is being built through these 00:07:19.840 processes you know whether it's an 00:07:21.199 invoice or a PowerPoint presentation or 00:07:24.319 a unit of code what that empowers from 00:07:26.400 an outcome perspective today is a couple 00:07:29.759 of things so there's like three main use 00:07:31.280 cases for fluency 00:07:32.720 >> the first cab off the rank is businesses 00:07:34.880 don't actually know what their process 00:07:35.759 processes are how they get done, what 00:07:37.199 are the edge cases, what are the 00:07:38.479 exceptions, if you know this weird tiny 00:07:41.520 bug happens, I have to elevate it over 00:07:43.599 here, whatever. We capture and give them 00:07:45.680 that information. 00:07:47.120 >> The next value prop is once we've found 00:07:50.400 all of your workflows, processes, and 00:07:52.400 tasks, we tell you how to improve them. 00:07:54.479 Usually that's through automation. So we 00:07:57.520 give them the map, the data, the APIs to 00:08:01.280 build that automation on top of our 00:08:02.960 platform in you know a very short amount 00:08:05.680 of time accurately. Whether it's aentic 00:08:08.000 or otherwise doesn't really matter. 00:08:09.840 Flavor of the day is agentic though. 00:08:11.520 >> Yeah. 00:08:11.919 >> The final use case we enable today is 00:08:14.800 measuring the ROI on change itself. 00:08:17.199 >> Yeah. 00:08:17.759 >> So this to put it in a question. I'm a 00:08:20.720 CFO at Acme Core and I want to answer 00:08:23.599 the question for people in my team who 00:08:26.560 are the biggest power users of Microsoft 00:08:28.560 Copilot. How much more effectively do 00:08:30.720 they get their work done? How much 00:08:32.399 capacity is freed up? Do they access 00:08:34.000 documentation less? We can answer any of 00:08:35.839 those sort of questions and then you can 00:08:37.679 attribute it to financial dollars or 00:08:39.200 generic productivity tracking in 00:08:40.719 aggregate because we don't allow 00:08:41.919 individual employee monitoring or 00:08:44.000 productivity indexing. Um but in layman 00:08:46.880 terms what fluency does is they look at 00:08:50.399 how work is done across your 00:08:51.920 organization. Figure out what are your 00:08:54.399 processes where the areas that you can 00:08:56.640 optimize further and create a more 00:08:59.360 intelligent workflow for all 00:09:00.800 organizations. 00:09:01.680 >> Couldn't have said it better myself. 00:09:03.040 That's what I meant. [laughter] 00:09:05.360 >> You can steal that next time. 00:09:06.560 >> Yeah. Yeah. I will. And that's just 00:09:08.160 today. 00:09:08.800 >> And that's just today. So this is 00:09:11.040 already like a really huge product and a 00:09:13.200 really huge vision to understand how 00:09:15.120 work is being done and how to make it 00:09:17.120 better. Do you see an even further 00:09:19.680 evolution of fluency? 00:09:21.200 >> Yes, absolutely. We kind of expand the 00:09:24.000 vision every month. What it is today and 00:09:25.519 what we've started working on is 00:09:28.640 actually step 1.5 is we will run the 00:09:30.880 automations ourselves on top of our 00:09:32.320 ontology. So the ontology or the map of 00:09:35.279 work is really really good at helping 00:09:37.600 you automate things without needing 00:09:39.040 developers, without having to worry 00:09:40.560 about agents hallucinating as much 00:09:42.959 because it has all of the examples of 00:09:44.720 all that ever was. But it still requires 00:09:47.279 a good amount of setup and work to do 00:09:48.800 that. It's not entirely accurate. 00:09:51.760 What we're moving towards next is 00:09:53.279 building our own foundational models. 00:09:55.839 Not large language models though, what 00:09:57.360 are called world models. So a large 00:09:59.360 language model, as I'm sure everyone's 00:10:01.040 used chat GPT, it predicts the next 00:10:04.160 sentence, word, what's called a token, a 00:10:06.160 small subset of text. It's effectively 00:10:08.720 predicting like the future in a very 00:10:10.959 discreet discrete manner. What a world 00:10:14.079 model does, it uses the same 00:10:15.600 architecture to predict the next most 00:10:18.560 likely event. 00:10:20.480 >> It's still trained on text or like 00:10:22.640 binary because that's what a computer 00:10:24.000 is, but it's not representing text. 00:10:25.360 It'll represent something like a video 00:10:26.880 game or represent a manufacturing floor. 00:10:30.000 For us, it represents how work gets done 00:10:32.560 in a business. So, it's graph based. 00:10:34.399 It's that work map based. To rationalize 00:10:37.440 that, you put work map in and it'll 00:10:41.279 predict what's going to happen next. 00:10:42.640 Work map out. So, what we think is going 00:10:45.920 to happen inside of our early R&D is you 00:10:48.720 can have like effective super agents on 00:10:50.399 top of your process. It can run it all 00:10:52.399 like fully autonomously almost zeroot 00:10:55.760 workflows and orchestrated workflows 00:10:58.720 like almost like um department based 00:11:02.000 work without needing to like set it all 00:11:04.079 up. And the other piece is you should be 00:11:05.440 able to put in like what a future state 00:11:07.519 looks like into our world model 00:11:09.600 >> and we'll predict what's going to happen 00:11:11.440 like how is it going to affect the team? 00:11:12.640 How's it going to affect your revenue? 00:11:13.680 How's it going to affect your finances 00:11:14.800 productivity? All of that sort of piece. 00:11:16.800 >> Yeah. 00:11:17.120 >> So that's where we're heading and we 00:11:18.399 believe the best way to do this is like 00:11:19.839 a sovereign 00:11:21.279 world model per customer. So most of our 00:11:23.600 customers are more larger enterprises 00:11:25.200 which would be able to afford this. 00:11:26.880 >> Yes. So my simple understanding here is 00:11:30.320 that because you are able to build such 00:11:32.480 a deep context map of how work gets done 00:11:34.480 and how operations are currently done, 00:11:36.800 you have kind of you have a very unique 00:11:40.000 understanding of the organization. Then 00:11:42.160 you're able to predict better because 00:11:45.839 it's [clears throat] trained all on that 00:11:47.120 kind of unique data set. 00:11:48.399 >> Yeah. like you send an email and we see 00:11:50.399 in a time series graph basically what 00:11:52.959 happens next every single time and that 00:11:55.200 happens for anything you do on your 00:11:57.279 machine we abstract it and build it out 00:11:59.360 for the whole organization one of our 00:12:01.120 investors heads up AI at Princeton and 00:12:03.440 she's super focused on building out 00:12:05.040 world models so working closely with her 00:12:07.120 to you know make sure we do it right 00:12:09.519 >> yeah yeah and like when you think about 00:12:11.360 this next stage of fluency the 1.5 or 00:12:14.160 the number two act when do you think 00:12:17.440 this can see the light of day 00:12:19.279 >> 1.5 8 to 12 weeks. 00:12:21.279 >> Mhm. 00:12:21.920 >> Two 9 months. 00:12:23.680 >> Speaking of like uh agents and your idea 00:12:26.399 of like super agents, I remember a while 00:12:28.160 back you said to me that agentic AI is 00:12:31.120 currently just robotic process 00:12:32.800 automation on the cloud and that VCs are 00:12:36.480 overhyping it and getting it wrong. So 00:12:38.880 this is kind of a hot take. Do you still 00:12:41.839 agree with this and why do you think the 00:12:43.839 current hype cycle is missing the mark? 00:12:45.760 >> I don't agree with it anymore. 00:12:47.013 [laughter] 00:12:48.639 Yeah, I [snorts] don't agree with that 00:12:49.680 anymore. I think the opposite's now 00:12:51.040 true. 00:12:51.360 >> Yeah, 00:12:51.760 >> I think pretty much everybody is quite 00:12:53.360 flippant about the current capabilities 00:12:54.880 and like like when I said that I think 00:12:57.200 it was probably true at the time. 00:12:58.720 >> Yeah. 00:12:59.680 >> And now I completely disagree. I think 00:13:02.079 we've gone the other way. I think we're 00:13:04.000 like undervaluing especially as like a 00:13:06.240 broader people outside of tech. 00:13:08.079 >> Yeah. 00:13:08.959 >> What is coming 00:13:10.560 >> Yeah. 00:13:10.959 >> what's possible. Like assuming there's 00:13:14.320 no like mass extinction event in our 00:13:16.079 lifetimes. Mhm. 00:13:18.160 >> There's probably multiple futures where 00:13:19.839 you could say like the only limit is 00:13:21.440 really our imagination. 00:13:22.800 >> Yeah. 00:13:23.360 >> It first start in like computer space 00:13:25.839 where the only limit is your 00:13:26.800 imagination. And then once we have these 00:13:30.000 world well actually world models but for 00:13:31.680 physical reality where they're like 00:13:32.800 augmenting a humanoid robot or I don't 00:13:35.120 know some factory thing. 00:13:36.959 >> Well, what do you think the workforce 00:13:38.560 will be in the next 10 years? 00:13:39.920 >> I agree. Roles will be created. 00:13:41.600 >> Mhm. 00:13:42.320 >> But I don't think it'll match the 00:13:43.519 displacement that'll happen. 00:13:44.959 >> Yeah. as in like I don't think Oh, maybe 00:13:47.360 though, as I said, you know, the 00:13:49.680 abstraction floor comes up. 00:13:51.120 >> Yeah. 00:13:51.440 >> The abstraction ceiling comes up with 00:13:53.839 it. Maybe when we get to that point, 00:13:56.000 there will be sufficient rolls created 00:13:59.360 to supplement the displacement that'll 00:14:01.120 likely occur. 00:14:02.320 >> Yeah. 00:14:02.800 >> Um I can't see it right now though, but 00:14:05.120 that's probably because like the 00:14:06.160 acceleration is faster than the floor, 00:14:08.399 and there'll be like some sort of 00:14:09.519 uncomfortable period, but then it'll 00:14:10.880 come up to it. But maybe we'll just 00:14:12.800 become like really really productive. 00:14:14.880 Mhm. 00:14:15.519 >> And we'll learn to like work with this 00:14:18.000 much productivity. So they'll just be 00:14:19.279 like 00:14:20.079 >> same amount of jobs. 00:14:21.279 >> Yeah. 00:14:21.519 >> But everyone's just like 100x more 00:14:22.959 productive. 00:14:23.600 >> Okay. So you've had your fair share of 00:14:25.440 pivots. Before the current iteration of 00:14:27.600 Fluency, you were doing standard 00:14:29.440 operating procedure capturing. 00:14:31.920 >> What broke that made you realize that 00:14:34.079 the first version wasn't going to work? 00:14:35.839 We had the plan of going from what we 00:14:37.760 called pickum process creation module 00:14:39.440 which was SOP creation to POM process 00:14:42.160 observation module which is kind of 00:14:43.519 where we were today to PAM which was 00:14:45.360 process automation module which is also 00:14:47.440 kind of where we are today. SOP product 00:14:50.399 yeah got a decent amount of revenue got 00:14:52.160 some decent customers but it wasn't we 00:14:54.000 didn't feel the product market fit. 00:14:56.160 Didn't even feel like we really had 00:14:57.199 inklings of product market fit. 00:14:58.880 Everything felt like grind. 00:15:00.639 >> Yeah. 00:15:01.040 >> Like for selling that product it was 00:15:02.639 just like Copus pushing the ball up the 00:15:04.720 hill. for every sale [snorts] 00:15:07.519 >> there was a use but the buyer like the 00:15:10.240 user wasn't really the buyer and the 00:15:12.240 buyer didn't have that much pain 00:15:14.320 associated with the user there were some 00:15:16.240 companies who were really appreciative 00:15:17.600 but they were few and far between 00:15:19.839 >> um so we're like let's just bring 00:15:21.440 forward and see how that goes 00:15:23.360 >> and then [clears throat] we slowly 00:15:24.720 worked on it for a while took a ton 00:15:27.120 of time to work out how to get it to 00:15:28.959 work 00:15:29.519 >> cuz like how do you define what work is 00:15:31.600 subjective 00:15:32.399 >> y 00:15:32.880 >> how do you know what is a process and 00:15:34.079 what isn't a process across anything 00:15:36.399 anyone could possibly be doing on a 00:15:38.079 computer. 00:15:38.639 >> Yeah. 00:15:39.040 >> When a process is really like a human 00:15:41.920 applied definition for a pattern of 00:15:44.480 action. 00:15:45.279 >> Yeah. 00:15:45.760 >> So trying to work out all those problems 00:15:47.360 eventually got it to work. We went to 00:15:49.040 market with it and within one week we're 00:15:50.480 like okay we're hard pivoting because 00:15:52.160 the reception was completely different. 00:15:53.920 It was like all right this is definitely 00:15:56.160 what we should do. M 00:15:57.600 >> so the old product still kind of exists 00:16:00.560 in in the new product today. But it's 00:16:02.079 like if you assume building process 00:16:04.800 documentation was 100% of the old 00:16:06.959 product. That's like 00:16:09.600 10 basis points like.1% of the new 00:16:12.399 product in terms of like capability and 00:16:14.320 value creation. 00:16:15.440 >> So we're still maintaining it. We still 00:16:17.199 still got a couple of deals. Still got a 00:16:19.040 lot of customers on it. Um most of them 00:16:21.360 still love it to be honest. 00:16:22.800 >> Yeah. 00:16:23.199 >> But we're very much focused on Yeah. 00:16:25.360 Fluency. We just called it Fluency 00:16:27.199 again. 00:16:27.519 >> Okay. So, when you first started 00:16:29.120 Fluency, you were in your early 20s 00:16:32.079 trying to sell to really large 00:16:33.759 enterprises in Australia and like you 00:16:35.839 said, like pushing up the hill like 00:16:39.519 >> did anyone ever look at you and just not 00:16:41.680 take you seriously? 00:16:43.519 >> Honestly, I never felt that to be 00:16:45.920 honest. No, not really. 00:16:47.279 >> I never felt like I got disparaged 00:16:49.759 against my age. M 00:16:51.279 >> I never felt we got disparaged against 00:16:54.320 >> unreasonably as a startup. 00:16:56.240 >> Like I always felt like the businesses 00:16:57.759 were de-risking appropriately. Like I 00:16:59.360 never like 00:17:00.800 >> Yeah. Yeah. I mean at the core of it, 00:17:03.040 right? It's solving a problem for a 00:17:05.199 customer 00:17:06.079 >> and it's amazing when that problem is 00:17:08.079 like the number one problem that they're 00:17:09.599 thinking about on a day-to-day basis. 00:17:11.199 >> If the large language model is the 00:17:12.959 ocean. 00:17:13.599 >> Yeah. 00:17:14.559 >> And the waves are the problems. 00:17:17.280 >> We're like surfing one of the waves 00:17:18.720 right now. M 00:17:19.760 >> but hopefully we'll become part of the 00:17:21.119 ocean too. 00:17:22.000 >> Yeah. 00:17:22.240 >> And create waves. 00:17:23.439 >> Yeah, why not? Okay. And then so you 00:17:26.240 went from Melbourne to SF. In Australia 00:17:28.559 there's this thing called toe poppy 00:17:30.160 syndrome. 00:17:31.200 >> Um it's essentially when people hate 00:17:33.360 when you stand out or are too ambitious. 00:17:35.679 I think you actually told me about this. 00:17:37.600 I didn't even know it existed. 00:17:39.440 >> Did you feel that living here? And how 00:17:41.760 is that different in ASF? 00:17:44.400 >> I actually don't think I or we 00:17:48.559 >> as fluency has experienced that much 00:17:50.240 here in Australia. The only like times 00:17:52.240 I've seen tall poppy syndrome in 00:17:53.840 Australia 00:17:54.640 >> is either when someone obviously has 00:17:56.559 money and has like a really nice car. 00:17:58.240 Like I've got a mate who's 22, really 00:18:00.000 successful, just bought like a half a 00:18:02.000 million dollar Porsche. 00:18:03.039 >> Mhm. 00:18:03.440 >> And people like old people like scoff. 00:18:05.679 You can see them scoff when you're in 00:18:06.720 the car [laughter] 00:18:08.000 and they're like this like assuming it's 00:18:09.520 parents money. I think that's actually a 00:18:11.039 form of tall puppy syndrome [snorts] 00:18:12.720 like you don't assume that the person 00:18:14.799 like worked hard for it etc. Um the 00:18:17.760 other one is more like I don't know if 00:18:19.840 this is tall poppy syndrome. I think 00:18:21.919 it's just more like Australian lifestyle 00:18:23.520 propagation but it's like 00:18:25.440 >> when you make work your priority 00:18:29.120 >> and do 14 hour days you know six days a 00:18:31.919 week and you don't really take much time 00:18:33.440 off you hang out with your friends less. 00:18:36.000 There's a bit of like, oh, why the you 00:18:37.679 doing that? Like, it's your 20s. Like, 00:18:38.960 you're wasting your 20s. 00:18:40.400 >> Um, 00:18:41.520 >> there's a little bit of that, but I 00:18:43.520 think it's just like wrong frame of 00:18:44.480 mind. Like, if you're a professional 00:18:45.440 tennis player player in Australia, 00:18:47.120 people like, 00:18:47.919 >> "Yeah, keep it up." Like, don't you dare 00:18:50.000 drink that beer. [laughter] 00:18:51.679 >> But then to go back to the work side, I 00:18:54.320 mean, again, super privileged, 00:18:55.600 obviously, very lucky, but I get to 00:18:56.960 travel like kind of around the world, 00:18:58.480 around the States, new places, meet new 00:19:00.720 people, see all that sort of stuff. So, 00:19:02.960 I don't feel like there's any 20's 00:19:04.640 wasting, but they're like the only three 00:19:06.480 examples I've seen of tall poppy 00:19:08.080 syndrome, and I don't really feel I've 00:19:09.760 experienced much. A little bit of number 00:19:11.440 three, 00:19:12.400 >> but I don't really care. 00:19:14.320 >> Yeah, I agree. I actually don't see it 00:19:17.280 too much during my time. Um, and and 00:19:20.160 yeah, but I do agree with the third 00:19:21.679 point in the sense that like sometimes I 00:19:23.120 get asked like, "Why are you working so 00:19:24.559 hard?" blah blah blah, but it's really 00:19:26.720 actually it's just really fun to have 00:19:28.080 conversation with people that are way 00:19:29.360 better than you and you can learn 00:19:30.480 something new. And that is actually 00:19:32.640 pretty fun and interesting. 00:19:34.640 >> Like we're lucky that I guess like work 00:19:36.160 is one of our hobbies. 00:19:37.919 >> Like it actually 00:19:41.440 makes me money. It makes me feel 00:19:43.679 fulfilled. I get to like have impact. I 00:19:45.840 know the team feels that way. Like we 00:19:47.840 >> like the opportunity space for which 00:19:49.120 we're solving S could be huge. 00:19:51.360 >> That's exciting. It's like why wouldn't 00:19:52.720 we grind? 00:19:53.840 >> Yeah. You know, like 00:19:54.720 >> still exercise, still friends. 00:19:57.120 >> Yeah. When you're tired just like invite 00:19:58.480 them over to the speak easy, right? 00:20:00.240 >> Exactly. The fluency bar, the flaw. 00:20:02.400 >> Yeah, that that that's like the hot 00:20:04.000 place to be in SF right now. 00:20:05.520 >> It is SF's most hidden bar. 00:20:07.600 >> Okay. So, you raised 6 million. That 00:20:10.080 means people are expecting a unicorn or 00:20:12.720 decagon outcome. 00:20:14.880 >> Do you ever feel the weight of that? 00:20:19.200 >> Um, no. I feel like investor pressure a 00:20:23.120 little bit, 00:20:23.679 >> but I'd actually think that's more like 00:20:25.039 internally manufactured. All of our 00:20:26.480 investors are quite chill. 00:20:27.840 >> Mhm. 00:20:28.159 >> They're like, you know, let's work it 00:20:29.120 out. Obviously, work hard, we'll help 00:20:30.480 you where we can. I feel like an 00:20:32.320 invisible investor pressure that I don't 00:20:33.840 think actually really exists. Yeah. 00:20:35.600 >> But I don't feel the weight of 00:20:38.799 >> having to be a billion dollar outcome or 00:20:40.720 $10 billion outcome because 00:20:42.880 >> for us as a team, we're all aligned on 00:20:44.720 the fact that we want to try to get 00:20:46.000 there. 00:20:46.480 >> Yeah. 00:20:46.720 >> And we would rather die trying like 00:20:48.799 company die trying. 00:20:49.840 >> Yeah. 00:20:50.480 >> Than be like a $50 million company. 00:20:52.559 >> Yes. 00:20:52.880 >> So we would rather spend all of our 00:20:54.159 money and die at 100 million. 00:20:55.679 >> Mhm. then, you know, play the more 00:20:58.559 conservative game, nickel and dime, move 00:21:00.400 to a profitable model earlier and be the 00:21:02.400 $50 million$100 million company. 00:21:04.080 >> Yeah, 00:21:04.480 >> we all want that. We've made our peace 00:21:05.760 with that. 00:21:06.480 >> So, I don't really feel 00:21:08.400 >> the pressure cuz I'm kind of aligned 00:21:10.000 there, you know. I want to try and get 00:21:11.520 that done. 00:21:12.320 >> Yeah. 00:21:12.640 >> So, we'll do our best to get there. And 00:21:14.400 if we don't, I don't know. Cost of 00:21:15.919 playing venture. 00:21:16.880 >> Yeah. And then the other thing, too, is 00:21:19.120 like you're 00:21:20.799 >> You will. You will. Of course. Um you're 00:21:23.760 working so hard. You're traveling 00:21:25.600 everywhere at every other week. You've 00:21:29.760 basically uprooted your whole life from 00:21:31.440 Melbourne to SF. Do you ever feel like 00:21:36.159 lonely or missing in your personal life? 00:21:39.120 >> I miss my family. I miss my brother. 00:21:41.039 >> Yeah. 00:21:41.280 >> I miss my family's pets. I miss my 00:21:42.799 girlfriend. 00:21:44.240 >> That's about it. 00:21:46.320 >> I miss my friends as well, actually. No, 00:21:47.919 I miss my friends back here a little 00:21:49.440 bit. 00:21:49.919 >> Yeah. 00:21:50.320 >> But 00:21:51.120 >> I mean have I like the people I work 00:21:53.039 with. M 00:21:54.159 >> a bunch of my friends are my colleagues, 00:21:56.400 >> so it hasn't been so bad. When I first 00:21:59.120 moved, I definitely really missed my 00:22:00.640 like nuclear family, like my parents and 00:22:02.240 my brother, cuz we're all quite close. 00:22:04.000 >> Yeah. 00:22:04.480 >> But kind of made peace with it now. 00:22:06.240 >> Building fluency has cost you something. 00:22:08.720 What do you think that is? 00:22:13.120 >> My skateboarding ability. 00:22:15.200 >> Here are you really good? 00:22:16.799 >> I wasn't. No, 00:22:19.039 no, I was okay. I really enjoyed it. 00:22:21.440 mountain biking ability, I guess, like a 00:22:23.840 more extended friend network. Like 00:22:25.679 friend circles become a lot closer now, 00:22:27.679 but kind of happy with that as well. Um, 00:22:32.159 obviously like time with family, that's 00:22:33.840 probably like the number one cost to be 00:22:35.360 honest. 00:22:35.919 >> If you had to redo this entire process 00:22:38.080 all over again, building fluency from 00:22:40.240 scratch. So like going back to 2023 00:22:43.039 Swinber accelerator days 00:22:45.120 >> with what I know now, 00:22:46.080 >> with what you know now, 00:22:47.520 >> what's like the one thing you would do 00:22:49.440 differently? You can be like super 00:22:51.200 ambitious from day one and you can just 00:22:52.799 do things. I know like everybody says 00:22:54.480 that, but like agency is so powerful to 00:22:57.760 just like do Just like try and do 00:22:59.120 like what's going to happen. 00:23:00.400 >> Hey, I love that. Um, agency, guys. 00:23:02.960 That's a wrap. If you like this episode, 00:23:05.039 please hit the like and subscribe 00:23:06.320 button. It helps us bring on more 00:23:07.919 awesome guests, level our production, 00:23:09.760 and bring on new series you'll want to 00:23:11.520 watch. And if you want to hear more 00:23:13.520 early stage builder stories, check out 00:23:15.360 our other episodes. Okay, see you next 00:23:17.760 time.