The AI rollup transforming property management

This week on Riding Unicorns, we sit down with Dan Lifshits, Co-Founder & COO of Dwelly — the AI-first lettings and property management platform reinventing how landlords, tenants, and agents interact.

Dwelly is on a mission to modernise the UK rental market by acquiring traditional letting agencies and rebuilding them with technology at their core. The business is growing fast, backed by General Catalyst and other leading investors, combining the operational rigour of real estate with the scalability of AI.

Before founding Dwelly, Dan was one of the youngest associates at McKinsey, then helped scale Gett (the ride-hailing company) from early stage to over $1bn in GMV and 1,000+ employees — experience that now shapes Dwelly’s operational DNA.

In this episode, we dive into:
 🏢 The rollup model — why Dwelly is buying agencies instead of building from scratch
 💡 Applying AI to traditional services — from lettings to maintenance and communication
 🌍 Moving to Hull — and why the founding team relocated to be closer to their first acquisition
 🚀 Turning investor scepticism into conviction: why rollups might define the next decade
 🤖 Using data to discover the “perfect process” across thousands of lettings
 💼 How to balance being a product builder, operator, and M&A organisation
 🔥 Lessons from Gett and McKinsey on scaling complex, real-world businesses

Dan also shares his view on the coming wave of AI-enabled rollups, why the UK rental market is “crying out for disruption,” and what founders can learn from industries still running on manual workflows.

Hector is joined by Gauthier van Malderen, Founder and CEO of Perlego, the “Spotify for textbooks” and one of Europe’s leading edtech scale-ups.

Gauthier shares the remarkable journey of building Perlego from a personal frustration with expensive university textbooks into a global subscription platform transforming access to educational content. He reflects on early failures, the turning points that led to success, and how COVID accelerated the company’s growth.

The discussion dives deep into topics including:

• Solving the chicken-and-egg problem of marketplace growth
• The power of B2B partnerships in edtech
• Building a resilient and mission-driven culture
• Hiring mistakes, founder evolution, and staying authentic as a CEO
• Lessons from scaling internationally and the differences between European and US venture ecosystems

Gauthier also shares his thoughts on leadership, founder ambition, and why being “more American” changed his mindset on growth and success.

A candid and inspiring conversation about persistence, humility, and global ambition from one of Europe’s standout founders.

This week on Riding Unicorns, we’re joined by Carmen Palacios-Berraquero, Founder and CEO of Nu Quantum, a pioneering company building the networking layer for the quantum computing era.

Carmen’s journey started in academia, researching quantum photonics, before she spun out Nu Quantum from the University of Cambridge. Now backed by top deep tech investors, the company is on a mission to connect quantum processors and make quantum computing commercially scalable.

🎙️ In this episode, we discuss:

🧠 What quantum networking is — and why it’s essential for unlocking quantum advantage
 📈 Nu Quantum’s pivot from photonic components to full-stack infrastructure
 🧬 How to build a team at the bleeding edge of science and engineering
 ⏳ Why quantum adoption is closer than most people think
 🔐 The importance of entanglement, secure comms & UK leadership in quantum
 💡 Lessons on commercialising research and navigating long deep-tech timelines
 🏗️ Analogies to cloud infrastructure and what Carmen learned from traditional data centres
 🌍 Carmen’s take on the global race to build the quantum internet

This is a fascinating look into a frontier technology that could reshape everything from national security to pharmaceuticals. A must-listen for founders, investors, and anyone curious about the future of computing.

Startup Spotlight with Chris Priebe, Founder at Zelt.

Zelt is a cloud application you can use to onboard new joiners in 2 minutes and manage HR, payroll and IT from a single system of employee record. They have raised from Episode 1 Ventures, The Fund, Lakestar and Portfolio Ventures.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Tony Jamous, CEO @ Oyster™

Oyster is a distributed talent enablement platform that allows growing companies to tap into the global talent pool and offer their remote workers around the world, a great employment experience. They have raised over $220 million from the likes of Connect Ventures, Slack Emergence, Salesforce Ventures. PayPal Ventures and others.

Tony joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss the future of work, the traits of successful founders, creating a healthy schedule and much, much more!

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Mayowa Ogunremi, Investment Principal @ Form Ventures

Form is a new early stage venture fund investing in startups disrupting regulated markets, or building in new markets that will face regulation. They use decades of experience to help founders break down policy barriers and shape winning regulatory strategies.

Mayowa joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss her route into venture, her experience as a therapist turned VC, Founder appetite to build a huge business and much, much more!

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Crowdcube Co-CEO Matt Cooper.

Crowdcube is a leading equity crowdfunding platform for investing in high-growth opportunities across Europe. They help entrepreneurs of start-ups and growing businesses to connect with potential investors. Dedicated to helping UK-based entrepreneurs raise finance to start or grow their business, Crowdcube gives investors real equity in the companies they fund.

Matt joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss the evolution of crowdfunding, the democratisation of private market investing, work-life balance and much, much more!

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Startup Spotlight with Blair Hawthorne, CEO & Founder at LoopFX.

They've just come out of stealth mode to improve the efficiency of high level foreign exchange trades. LoopFX have secured funding from some of the best finance angels in the country with participation from Portfolio Ventures.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Believe in Science Founder & CEO Anthony Fletcher.

The  Believe in Science mission is to prove people can indulge responsibly, helping consumers make better decisions when it comes to food, starting with The Urban Legend Doughnut - the ultimate treat food, sticky, sweet, delicious yet never high in fat, sugar or calories.

Anthony joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss how the business stared, the dangers of sugar, working with supermarkets and much, much more!

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Alan Chang is the CEO of Fuse.  As former Revolut-er #5, Alan was involved in the disruption and innovation in banking, and now, he is bringing that same energy and passion to Fuse.

Fuse was founded to generate affordable renewable power and solve climate change. Their mission is to build a Terawatt of renewable capacity to power the world. They have raised $78m from top tier investors like Balderton, Lakestar, Accel, Creandum, Lowercarbon, and Ribbit to date.

Alan joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss the Revolut journey, where the idea for Fuse came from, never settle culture, the future of the energy industry  and much, much more!

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Fearless Adventures Founding Partner David Newns.

Fearless Adventures invest in and support entrepreneur-led businesses with their expertise in growth strategy and support building great teams. Their founding team have built and scaled their own businesses from scratch to multi-million-pound exits and are now looking to use that capital and expertise to help new founders on their journey to reach the same peaks.

David joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss his entrepreneurial journey, building the Fearless Academy, habits to stay efficient and much, much more!

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Left Lane Capital Principal Magnus Karnehm.

Left Lane is a global venture capital and growth equity firm investing in high-growth internet and consumer technology companies that are fundamental to the lives of customers. The foundation of Left Lane’s strategy is built on four main elements: specialization in internet-first businesses, proprietary sourcing at every level, deep data rigor and best practices, and a genuine philosophy around partnering with founders.

Magnus joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss what drew him to VC, what to look for in an investment, hiring, and much more!

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Georgi Ganev, CEO of Kinnevik.

Kinnevik’s ambition is to be Europe’s leading listed growth investor, they back the best digital companies for a reimagined every day and to deliver significant returns. They have a strong and expanding portfolio in ClimateTech, HealthTech, consumer services, food tech, and fintech. Kinnevik’s shares are listed on Nasdaq Stockholm’s list for large-cap companies under the ticker codes KINV A and KINV B.

Georgi joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss leadership habits, investment committees, hiring, and much more.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

In this episode, we're joined by Patrick Haede, the founder of Superscale AI, a breakout new startup transforming how digital products are marketed. 🚀

Inspired by Lovable’s success in democratising product-building, Patrick saw the next major frontier: distribution. In a world where anyone can now build a product, how do you market it effectively? Superscale AI is the answer — a platform that lets you instantly generate performance-ready, AI-powered video ads for TikTok, Instagram, and Meta, using just a product URL and a few prompts.

Patrick’s vision is big: turning every founder into a full-stack marketer, and replacing marketing agencies with a prompt-based AI interface that’s actually performant.

We dive into:

📈 The origin story – from digital product studio to pivoting into the AI-native future of marketing
🤖 Why “prompt-first” is the new UI – and how GenAI is changing how people interact with software
🎥 How Superscale creates hyper-performant UGC-style ads at scale using AI-generated actors
💡 Getting creative at speed – empowering users to produce 100s of high-converting ads with minimal effort
🔥 Why performance data should drive product development, not just UX or engagement
🧠 Agentic workflows – how Superscale is building an agent that can ideate, iterate, and deploy ads automatically
🌍 Who their power users are – from indie hackers and Shopify merchants to Lovable app founders and performance marketers
🧪 What makes an ad “work” in 2025 – and how creative risk-taking is becoming an AI superpower
🔮 The future of marketing – closing the loop between performance data and automated content creation
💰 Business model innovation – the potential of usage-based pricing, rev share, and agency-in-your-pocket experiences

We also chat about Patrick’s fundraising journey with Creandum, investor feedback loops, and what it takes to win in a competitive GenAI market where everyone's launching an “agent”.

This is an essential listen for:

• Founders building digital products
• Growth marketers trying to scale content
• Builders excited about the next wave of AI-native tools
• Investors tracking the next Lovable-style breakout

🎧 Tune in now to learn how Superscale AI is giving every product the power of a top-tier marketing agency — at lightning speed and near-zero cost.

Our guest this week is George Richardson, Co-Founder & CEO of AeroCloud.

AeroCloud’s modular intelligent airport management platform is built on
leading-edge technology & uses predictive AI & machine learning. Combined with common-use passenger processing & self-service solutions, they deliver an innovative answer to the complex operational challenges experienced by airports across the globe. AeroCloud’s market share has been steadily ramping up since 2019 with their platform currently supporting operations in 32 airports across the US & Europe, & serves over 120 million passengers annually with a strategy to expand into MENA in 2023.

George joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss George's background as a racing driver. Data and AI. What it's like helping a fragmented industry get super efficient. The impact of COVID on the airline and airport sector and much more.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Startup Spotlight with Kadence. They've just announced a $10M Seed funding round led by Kickstart Fund with participation from Portfolio Ventures, Manta Ray, Hambro Perks and Vectr7 as well as Shadow Ventures and Forward VC.

Our guest this week is Jamie Beaumont, Founder of Playter.

Playter helps fund the global community of startups and scaleups by helping them convert any invoice into Buy Now, Pay Later. Playter is the growth platform that helps businesses scale quicker, reduce their burn rate, increase their runway and take control of all payment terms regardless of the supplier.

Jamie joins James Pringle and Hector Mason to discuss the rise of Playter, fundraising growth competition, and much more.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Gordon Midwood, CEO of Anything World.

Anything World is an innovative platform that combines AI, voice computing and 3D rendering with layers of behavioural intelligence. They enable users to request and play with any object imaginable. It’s the easiest and fastest way for developers to create AI-driven 3D experiences powered by voice.

The Anything World Mission is to simplify and redefine 3D content creation for everyone across the metaverse. We want to eliminate the barriers to 3D creativity.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Dr. Ben Maruthappu, Co-founder & CEO of multi-award-winning technology company Cera.

Cera is a digital-first home healthcare company, delivering cat nursing telehealth and repeat prescriptions. In less than five years, we’ve grown from scratch to a team of almost 10,000 professionals, providing over 40,000+ in-person healthcare visits in homes throughout the UK every day. They have raised over $400 million to date.

Ben joined James Pringle & Hector Mason to discuss his secrets to high performance, motivations, fundraising and how he has been building an amazing healthcare company for the future.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Our guest this week is Jacob Waern, Founder & CEO of eduMe.

eduMe gives your deskless workforce seamless, passwordless access to embedded onboarding & training with native integrations into software such as Microsoft Teams, Fountain, Braze, and Beekeeper. eduMe is the leading mobile-based training platform for the frontline workforce used by modern companies in more than 60 countries worldwide. They've raised over $27 million to date.
 
Jacob joined James Pringle & Hector Mason to discuss the impact of the EduTech sector, managing deep integrations with clients such as Uber, Rocket Internet SE's role as a breeding ground for entrepreneurship, culture, product and much more.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

Welcome back to our latest Startup Spotlight, our mini-series, which will provide insight into an early-stage company that we are very excited about.

This week's spotlight shines on 5mins. 5Mins.ai is the TikTok of L&D. With 13,000+ bite-sized lessons tailored to each role . Live in 80+ countries with leading tech brands such as SmartPension, Perkbox, Spenmo etc - our customers find that with our bite-sized learning approach, employees upskill 3X faster and it delivers 8X better return on spend than traditional long-form learning platforms.

Founder & CEO Saurav sat down with James to discuss the importance of building such a culture within a company and how their unique platform helps companies succeed via learning through bite-sized video content.

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast never to miss an episode. Also, don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Welcome to Season 5 🥳

Our first guest for the new season is Victor Trokoudes, Co-Founder & CEO of Plum.

Plum is an app that empowers you to put your money into action, wherever you are on your financial journey. You can save, spend, earn and invest, in one app with ease. Using AI-powered saving tools and investment features which make building and diversifying your portfolio seamless, Plum has helped customers save and invest £1.2 billion.
 
Victor joined James Pringle & Hector Mason to discuss crowdfunding, FinTech, Super apps, North Star metrics, and much more.

Don't forget to like, subscribe and follow The Riding Unicorns Podcast on our socials and your chosen podcast platform to stay up to date! 🎙️🦄

This episode was recorded in front of a live audience at The Oval in Vauxhall as part of our first live event. Guests and friends of the show gathered to celebrate 2 years of Riding Unicorns. 

Welcome back to our latest Startup Spotlight, our mini-series, which will provide you with an insight into an early-stage company that we are very excited about.

This week's spotlight shines on Kuai Commerce, a startup focused on helping western brands sell Direct to consumers in the Chinese market. James sat down with co-founder Jonny Plein to discuss the opportunity the Chinese market presents and how Kuai provides western brands with access to it.💹

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also, don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Paul Anthony is the co-founder of Primer, a rapidly growing payment orchestration platform with over 200 employees and more than £70 million in funding from top-tier investors including Seed Camp, Balderton, Accel, and Iconic. His journey began as the first employee at a FinTech startup (now called Depay), followed by a stint at PayPal's Braintree division, before founding Primer to solve the complex payment infrastructure challenges he witnessed amongst enterprise merchants. Paul is now also a co-founder of Colossal, an innovative new venture that leverages AI and LLMs to help digital goods creators build customised commerce experiences through a prompt-based interface.

Key Topics Discussed:

• The Payment Orchestration Insight - How Paul's experience at Braintree meeting enterprise merchants face-to-face revealed the need for a unified payment infrastructure layer that didn't exist in the market
• Hypergrowth Challenges - Scaling Primer from a three-person team to Series B funding (nearly half-billion valuation) within just 16 months, whilst building a robust enterprise product during COVID
• Hiring Philosophy and Culture - Paul's approach of interviewing 20-30 people for every hire, treating "autonomy as a requirement not a benefit," and maintaining a "we're not a real business yet" mentality to drive innovation
• Product Development Approach - The importance of building POCs and technical spikes to understand how products "feel" rather than just look good on paper, especially when serving enterprise customers
• The Colossal Vision - Paul's new venture described as "Lovable for commerce," using AI to help creators build sophisticated customer journeys without technical knowledge, targeting the £400 billion digital goods market

Tune in to hear Paul's fascinating insights on building payment infrastructure for enterprise clients, navigating hypergrowth whilst maintaining product focus, and his bold new vision for democratising commerce through AI. This episode offers invaluable lessons for founders tackling complex technical problems and scaling rapidly in competitive markets.

Justina Tartilaite is the Co-Founder of Adsum, tax credit specialists. Adsum is pioneering innovation in tax-based financing and is at the forefront of leveraging modern technology in order to provide businesses with much-needed tax credits in real-time. Prior to launching Adsum, Justina worked as a Director at Deutsche Bank and in various capital markets roles for ABN AMRO Bank. 

Justina joined us on this, our penultimate episode of the season, to discuss her career leading up to Adsum, why she decided to become an entrepreneur and what the early bootstrapped days looked like. Later in the episode, Justina opens up about her love of referrals, building an exceptional culture and what it was like to finally seek external capital. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast never to miss an episode. Also, don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Welcome back to our latest Startup Spotlight, our mini-series, which will provide you with an insight into an early-stage company that we are very excited about. 

On this weeks episode we will be discussing Monet, an embedded fintech for the creator economy - enabling platforms and agencies to offer borderless credit and payments. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Pietro Bezza is the Co-Founder and Managing Partner of thesis-led venture capital firm, Connect Ventures. Specialising in investing in seed companies, Connect was the first to invest in unicorns such as TrueLayer, Typeform and Oyster. 

Long-time listeners will be aware that this is not the first time we have had a member of the Connect Ventures team on the show. In fact, in Season 2 we invited Sitar Teli to discuss all things product. 

This time round though we invited Pietro onto the show to double down on product and to discuss a myriad of different subjects. In fact, the episode kicks off with James and Hector learning about how cheese played an essential part during the early part of Pietros career. Following this, the trio also go on to cover the topics of whether founders should be using Doc Send and if having board members is worth it or not. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast never to miss an episode. Also, don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Welcome back to our latest Startup Spotlight, an entirely new series, which will provide you with an insight into a company that we are very excited about. 

On this weeks episode we will be discussing Deployed, which is looking to help simplify the way we write and build effective dialogue. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Joe Curtis is the Director and Co-Founder of 11 Investments, a seed-stage investment and accelerator program for recruitment businesses. Not content with one running one recruitment business Joe also works as a Director at Recruiter Labs, a recruitment consultancy business that he also co-founded and as if that wasn't enough he also finds time for a third role, that of Director at 3Search. All in all then we think it is fair to say that when it comes to speaking on the topic of recruitment there is no one better than Joe. 

James sat down with Joe to discuss what led him into recruitment, why he chose to bootstrap his businesses and what he is looking to achieve in the long term. The pair also go on to discuss some of the common misconceptions of recruitment, why founders should look to build strong relationships with recruiters and how to develop a strong culture within an agency model. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Welcome back to our latest Startup Spotlight, an entirely new series, which will provide you with an insight into a company that we are very excited about. 

This weeks episode features the co-founders of Inveztor, Katee Hunter-Sharpe and Alastair Sharpe. Inveztor is developing a simple, efficient and collaborative digital platform for issuing and maintaining European debt securities. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Yoko Spirig is the co-founder & CEO of Ledgy, an equity management and investor relations platform for startups and high-growth companies. Yoko comes from a Physics background and such was her proclivity for the subject as a student that she was invited to become the project lead of Swissloop, an initiative which was looking to build the first Hyperloop pod in Switzerland. Upon graduating Yoko and her co-founders Ben-Elias Brandt and Timo Horstschaefer, who she met at university decided to launch Ledgy to help scaling companies make ownership simple. Since its launch in 2017 the company has gone on to secure investment from the likes of Sequoia and a number of high profile angel investors. Clients to-date have included Wefox, Kry, Bitpanda, Gorillas and Trade Republic.

The boys invited Yoko onto the show to better understand what problem Ledgy is trying to solve, how long it took the founders to validate their idea and how they were able to attract investors early on. Yoko then goes on to explain how the culture at the company continues to evolve and what she is looking to achieve as a founder, both in the present and in the future. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Welcome back to our latest Startup Spotlight, an entirely new series, which will provide you with an insight into a company that we are very excited about. 

This weeks episode features Awabah, a digital pension platform for self-employed Africans. The co-founder & CEO Tunji Andrews joins us to explain exactly what the business does and how be plans to achieve his big vision. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Matthew Wilson is the Co-CEO and Co-founder of Omnipresent, one of the leading global HR providers. Matthew is an experienced entrepreneur and in fact had, prior to Omnipresent, already founded and run a number of businesses including an enterprise software business. Matthew launched Omnipresent alongside his fellow co-founder, Guenther Eisinger, in the hope of solving many of the challenges companies face when managing a remote team. His work and career achievements have been recognised by Forbes who in 2019 named him in their 30 under 30 list.

The Oxford alum sat down with James and Hector to discuss what it was like to launch a company in the midst of a pandemic and some of the practical steps he undertook to accelerate growth. Matthew also went on to explain why he isn't afraid of operating in such a competitive space and what future opportunities lie ahead for Omnipresent. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Riding Unicorns is delighted to announce an entirely new series called Start-up Spotlight. These new weekly bitesize episodes will provide you with an insight into a company that we are very excited about. 

Our very first Start-up Spotlight episode features Raffi Salama from Passionfruit, a UK-based Gen Z freelancing platform that recently closed a seed round of $4.3m. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

In this episode of Riding Unicorns, James and Hector sit down with Simone Maini, CEO of Elliptic, the world’s leading blockchain analytics company. Simone’s career path is anything but conventional — from a history degree and Deutsche Bank to leading a $100M+ funded crypto intelligence powerhouse.

🧠 After 8 years in banking and a stint in anti-money laundering consulting, Simone joined Elliptic as Head of Product. What began as a pivot turned into a mission: tackling financial crime in the digital asset space. When Elliptic hit an inflection point, Simone stepped into the CEO role — enabling the founder to focus on product while she scaled operations and managed the board.

👥 One of Simone’s most powerful lessons? Hiring an experienced Chair who had been a CEO — a move that transformed how Elliptic operated at board level and beyond. From transparency to over-communication, Simone shares a refreshing and tactical take on what it really takes to lead through complexity.

We dive into:

🚀 Founder to CEO transition — The playbook for scaling when roles are clearly defined
📊 Mastering board management — Running better meetings, communicating through chaos
💾 Business model evolution — Moving from SaaS to data-as-a-service for enterprise clients
📉 Crypto market cycles — Leading through volatility without losing focus
💪 Building resilience — Fostering curiosity and discipline in fast-moving markets
🏢 Enterprise adoption — Why crypto infrastructure is still early — and full of potential
This is a must-listen for founders, operators, and anyone navigating leadership, growth, and the wild world of crypto. Simone’s thoughtful, candid approach is packed with wisdom on how to scale with integrity.

🎧 Listen now on your favourite platform and don’t forget to like, subscribe, and follow Riding Unicorns for more inspiring episodes. 🦄

Ben Kaminski is a Partner at leading technology investment firm, Target Global. Prior to joining the firm, Ben spent over a decade working in Investment Banking where he was responsible for overseeing several high-profile M&A transactions. At Target Global since 2018 Ben now heads up the firm's dedicated Mobility 2.0 Fund. His investments include Auto1, Delivery Hero,  GoEuro, Flink and numerous others. As well as all this Ben still finds the time to be an active angel investor in over a dozen startups across a number of segments, including mobility, logistics, marketplaces and software. 

Ben stopped by to discuss his time at Goldman Sachs, why crisis often leads to opportunity and open up on the mistakes he has made as an angel investor. James and Hector also probe deeper into what makes Target Global different to other firms, what the future of mobility will look like and Ben’s career objectives.

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Tom Wilson is a Partner at Seedcamp, an early stage seed fund investing in European businesses that are solving real problems using technology. Prior to his time in Venture, Tom worked in Law where he specialised in VC fundraising and M&A. Since joining Seedcamp In 2014 Tom has been helping the fund source and select companies to invest in at the early stage of their inception. Some of their investments to-date include UiPath, Wise, Hopin and Revolut. 

We invited Tom on the show to discuss the Seedcamp model, look back on how the fund has evolved throughout the years and to better understand the core characteristics of what they look for in a founder and a business. During the episode we also go on to learn how the fund plans to scale in the next few years, what it is about the team dynamic that works so well and their plans for the future. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Francesco Simoneschi is Co-Founder and CEO of TrueLayer, a fintech development platform. TrueLayer is not, however, Francesco's first experience in founding, managing and growing a successful tech company. In fact, prior to launching TrueLayer, Francesco helped develop an angel fund called Mission and Market, which was able to provide investment to more than 50 startups. Following a period working in mobile game development Francesco became VP of Strategy for FOVE – the world’s first eye tracking virtual reality headset. With TrueLayer Francesco is looking to grow the Open Banking economy by creating a truly global platform for companies to develop new financial services and products. 

Francesco joined us on the show to discuss his time working as a VC, what inspired the idea behind TrueLayer and what plans he has for the business moving forward. James and Hector also go on to quiz Francesco on what he believes the future of Open Banking will look like, what he looks for when picking a seed investor and whether the founder mindset can be taught. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Haakon Overli is the Founder and General Partner of Dawn Capital, a VC firm investing in European founders in the hope of helping them build the next generation of global software companies. During the early stage of his career Haakon worked in investment banking before eventually taking the decision to go out on his own and become an entrepreneur. In 1999 he launched Self Trade, an on-line stock broker, which he eventually sold in 2000 to HypoVereinsbank for €911m (US$1.1bn). Haakon now spends his time developing relationships with founders and providing them with advice in an attempt to help them grow their businesses. 

Haakon sat down with James and Hector to discuss his time with Self Trade, the various investment models currently at play in venture capital, and what he considers to be a red flag when investing. Haakon also goes on to share his personal philosophy on business and life, which as we go on to learn, much of which is informed by his neurodiversity.

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Aidan Corbett is the co-founder and CEO of Dublin-based Wayflyer. Founded in 2019 the company supports e-commerce businesses worldwide by providing a range of financing and analytics solutions that improve cash flow, drive sales and optimise supply chains. Since launching in April 2020 the company has already gone on to provide over $500 million to businesses, a fact which has meant that Aidan and his team have been able to build a unicorn in just 20 months. Wayflyer now has more than 800 customers across 11 countries, and employs 250 people between Dublin, London, New York, Atlanta and Sydney.

We invited Aidan to learn more about how his time at Conjura led him to founding Wayflyer, his thoughts on the future of B2B finance and why the Irish start-up scene is thriving. Aidan also left us with plenty of practical advice such as how best to prepare for international expansion, how to attract talent and the best ways to build a solid workplace culture. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Martin Bysh is the co-founder & CEO of Huboo, an award-winning order fulfilment service for eCommerce sellers. Martin spent the early part of his career working in a number of industries including everything from video games to dating sites and market research. After years of toiling in different ventures Martin finally decided to launch Huboo in 2017 with his co-founder Paul Dodd. Since then the company has grown at a remarkable rate and is now responsible for shipping an average of five million packages a year. This has led the Bristol based company to open new fulfilment centres around the globe in locations such as Madrid, Eindhoven and in the very near future, Leipzig.

Martin sat down with us to reflect on his many career moves to date, explain how he met his co-founder Paul and shed some light on why he always found it difficult to maintain focus throughout his career and how founding Huboo helped him finally achieve that. We also go on to learn how the company has managed to align all its products whilst simultaneously building a great company culture. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Charles Delingpole is the Founder & CEO of ComplyAdvantage, leaders in AI driven fraud and AML risk detection. Founded in 2014, ComplyAdvantage works with over 500 clients across 75 countries to tackle the risk of money laundering, terrorist financing and corruption. Prior to ComplyAdvantage Charles founded the world’s largest student discussion forum The Student Room Group. He then followed this up by co-founding MarketFinance, a corporate financial solutions company. 

Charles joined James and Hector on Riding Unicorns to discuss how his passion for coding helped him to become an entrepreneur, the secrets behind his three successful start-ups and how his role as a CEO continues to evolve. This episode also goes on to cover the motivations behind his journey and what legacy he hopes to leave behind.

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Tom Goodwin is the co-founder of innovation consultancy, All We Have Is Now. Tom is however much more than just an entrepreneur. Tom has spent over 20 years studying topics such as the impact of new technology, changing consumer behaviours, and trends in digital marketing and as such is regarded as one of the experts in his field. He is also the author of Digital Darwinism, a business book that explores the current digital transformation in business. As well as this Tom is a much sought after public speaker and has spent much time educating audiences all over the world on digital transformation and innovation.

Tom sat down with Riding Unicorns for what turned out to be quite a lively debate on the topic of venture capital. Tom makes his feelings on VC’s abundantly clear throughout the episode. We go on to learn that Tom’s main gripe is his belief that VC’s have become unimaginative in their approach to investing, which in his mind, is resulting in a slew of uninspiring and in some cases copycat companies. Towards the end of the episode the conversation turns to brand building, a topic Tom is very familiar with. Unsurprisingly Tom is full of fascinating insights and even goes on to provide founders with some sage advice on the subject. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Katie Marrache is a Partner at JamJar Ventures, a VC firm founded by the people behind the hugely popular Innocent drinks. Katie is the definition of a go-getter. Whilst at University she secured an internship with Dragons’ Den investor, James Caan, which saw her manage the entrepreneurs portfolio of consumer investments. After a short stint working in television Katie joined Innocent drinks as a category manager, which once again saw her manage an investment portfolio. In 2017 she made Partner and with it became Europe's youngest ever female venture capital partner.

Speaking to Riding Unicorns Katie reflects on her career to date, how she as a VC quantifies the size of a market and the benefits of focusing on product. In what turned out to be a discussion full of fascinating insights and opinions James, Hector and Katie also go on to discuss the trends that most excite them in the consumer space and the marketing strategies they feel are most effective when going to market. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Kevin Diestel is a Partner at Sapphire Ventures, a venture capital firm that primarily invests in Series B technology companies. Before moving into private equity Kevin worked as an Analyst for Merrill Lynch. After two years working for the Investment Bank Kevin began working for Shamrock Capital Advisors, a Los Angeles-based private equity firm. During his time there he was responsible for evaluating investments in the media, entertainment and communications sectors. Having joined Sapphire in 2012 Kevin now focuses his time primarily on innovative consumer businesses and vertical software applications. Kevin holds a board seat at a number of companies including Culture Amp, Current, Degreed, project44, and Sun Basket. 

In this episode Kevin starts off by explaining his role at Sapphire Ventures, his approach to investing and how he and his team deal with downturns in performance. Kevin also goes on to detail how he strikes a balance between intuition and data when investing. Finally James and Hector quiz Kevin on how he avoids bias during the decision making process and what the ultimate goal is for his career. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

From international math olympiads to high-frequency trading to leading deals at Accel, Andrei Brasoveanu has carved one of the most impressive careers in European tech. After a decade on Wall Street as a quant, he joined Accel’s London office and quickly became one of their top investors—backing breakout companies like Celonis and, more recently, Polar.

In this episode, we explore the mindset, methods, and milestones behind his success.

What You’ll Learn:

• 🧠 “Founders are the constant” — Why Andrei trusts people over metrics when chasing outliers
• 💶 The Celonis origin story — How a €100k pricing bet helped three inexperienced founders build a global leader
• 🌍 Accel’s European edge — Why they focus on non-obvious founders across Europe and Israel
• 🔁 The art of pattern recognition — Tactical advice for young VCs on fast-tracking their investment instincts
• ⚙️ No-code and AI — Why technical founders may have more of an edge than ever
• 🧊 Inside the Polar deal — How Andrei convinced a former Shopify exec to raise a round he didn’t plan to
• 🧩 Strategic angel orchestration — Why top VCs pull unicorn operators into early rounds (hint: it's not just for PR)
• 🔐 His future unicorn pick — A cybersecurity company from an unexpected European hub building with open-source DNA

This episode is a masterclass in European venture strategy. Whether you’re an investor, a founder, or just obsessed with how unicorns get made, this one will shift your perspective.

Freddy Ward is the co-founder of D2C cosmetics company, Wild. Freddy started his career at Hello Fresh and is actually credited as being its fifth ever employee. After working his way up to Marketing Director Freddy decided to start his own company, Wild, with lifelong friend and former Director of Fly Hiring, Charlie Bowes-Lyon. Wild is best known for its refillable deodorants and range of exotic fragrances, which customers seem to have really warmed too. In fact the company has already sold over 300,000 deodorants in little over 18 months. The company is hoping that by focusing on natural ingredients and by cutting down on plastic waste it will be at the forefront of a new wave of environmentally friendly consumer products. 

In this episode Freddy explains what marketing means to him, how he went about starting Wild and how he later developed its brand. The episode also covers how one should go about experimenting with new marketing channels, the thought process behind launching new products and what value Freddy believes he brings to the business. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

James Routledge is the Founder of Sanctus, leading providers of mental health coaches. After starting his first business at University James was hooked by the idea of being an entrepreneur. His first business venture, MatchChat, a social media app would however ultimately go on to be unsuccessful. As is often the case in life there is a silver lining to all supposed failures. James would ultimately go on to reflect more deeply about the stress he felt around this time and how it affected his mental health. Spurred on by this experience James launched Sanctus in 2016 and the company has since partnered with some of the biggest brands to help them transform their mental health culture. In November 2022 James took the difficult decision to step down as CEO but as he mentions during the episode he continues to have a very strong relationship with the company to this day. James now spends much of his time writing and is in fact a best selling author. His first book, Mental Health at Work, shares his stories, learnings and guidance on the topic of mental health. 

Riding Unicorns invited James on the show to discuss the highs and lows of working on MatchChat and the inspiration behind launching Sanctus. Mental health was of course a huge topic throughout the episode. James went on to share some practical advice on how to improve mental health in the workplace. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.

Paul Murphy (@paulbz on Twitter) is a Partner at Lightspeed, a global venture capital firm focusing on multi-stage investments in the enterprise technology, consumer, and health sectors. Prior to his stint at Lightspeed Paul worked at Microsoft, Betaworks, Giphy and Northzone to name but a few. Paul also has extensive experience as an entrepreneur having set-up several companies namely Mobile Games Studio, Dots and calendar app, Katch. Paul is now sharing his knowledge of what it takes to build a successful business with the next generation of founders and helping Lightspeed identify the game changing businesses of the future. 

Paul spoke to Riding Unicorns to shed some light on the decision making process behind his career moves, the lessons he has learnt from incorporating businesses and how his experiences in business has informed his approach to investing. The guys also go on to probe Paul on why Europe is becoming attractive to U.S funds, what common traits successful founders share and what he aims to achieve moving forward. 

Make sure to like and subscribe to the Riding Unicorns podcast to never miss an episode. Also don't forget to give Riding Unicorns a follow on Twitter and LinkedIn to keep on top of the latest developments.