Generating the next 50000 robotics startups by bringing 4-year-olds to tech events.

The speech delivered by me at Venture Day Minsk 2018.

Hi everyone!

I have to start my speech by first thanking the Venture Summit Minsk team for putting together such a wonderful event.

I came here without any particular expectations. Yet, 15 minutes after arriving at the venue, a lady whose husband works in the field of robotics approached me. An hour later, I had met the husband as well. And now we are already talking about bringing Robotex to Belarus. Thus, the event has been a success for me!

However, most events are not that valuable.

In fact, I constantly leave some of them early, as they provide no value at all. Which is unfortunate as it takes at least a full day to get to such events. The time that could be used for getting some actual work done.

Therefore, I have listed a few tips in my following speech which hopefully will be implemented by all the event organisers. Because doing so would make any event a much more enjoyable experience for everyone.

But before listing down the beauty tips, I have to focus on a much bigger problem.

Let’s start by looking at those pictures.

Take your time.

Would someone want to share their initial thoughts on what they notice?

***

When I look at them then I see that they are full of adults. Maybe there is also a student or two. But there are no kids.

Why does it matter, you might ask. After all, these are all pictures of tech events. Full of people conducting business. And kids would only be disturbing the setting. Running around. Asking too many questions. And eating all the candies the exhibitors have put out.

Wrong!

They would be there learning like any of us. They would be listening to the speeches. Looking at exhibits. And perhaps attending a workshop or two.

Yes, they might not know how to implement most of the ideas right away. But neither are we changing much in the way we conduct business after attending a single event.

So why should they join the events if not for learning something they could implement right away? For the same reason, we attend events. To get inspired.

Okay. Yes! Many of us actually go to various gatherings for getting contacts that would help us set up new partnerships. Or look for the latest products we would love to use by ourselves. Myself included in both cases.

However, most people attending tech events do not do anything such. Instead, they hope to hear or see something that would help them get new ideas. Better yet, support their existing beliefs and make it easier to go on. Because building any business is hard! And only a small part of us can keep ourselves motivated without the outside help.

Same goes for growing up!

Becoming an adult who could one day build something meaningful and life-changing takes hard work. It might not take as long as the making of a king, which apparently starts twenty years before one’s birth. But it does take 10–20 years of continuous learning and failing to get ready for greatness.

Why else does the statistics say that the average age of a European founder is 40+?

The answer is quite simple.

Most of us spend the first 20–25 years in schools of various kind. Not conducting any business! Instead, learning facts and getting ready to be a good employee. Which is not bad, as we need specialists who would actually do the work.

However, they will usually not start new projects taking the humanity to the next level.

And most of those that will, shall only start thinking about entering the world of entrepreneurship after graduation. Which is when they have to start learning again — this time, how to become a business leader.

For most of us, the first business tends to fail. Usually followed by at least one more bankruptcy. And only then, maybe, one shall have its first big victory. By the time which they will be somewhere around 35–45, starting to think about spending more time with the family and retiring.

Of course, there shall always be outliers. Those that start their first business and win right away. Or at least early on. For example, the founders of Apple, Facebook and Snapchat all succeeded in their early twenties. But even a blind mouse will sometimes find cheese. Which means we should not put our bets on having such luck.

Unless we start our first business when we are 4 years old. Or at least before entering the teenage years. Because this way we enter our 20s/30s having had enough time to learn and still have the power to start something awesome.

What kind of business could a kid that young start? Nothing too special. It might be a lemonade stand. It might be a YouTube show. Or it might be their first robotics company.

Yet I’m willing to bet that all kids who have started something like that have had a supporting ecosystem around them.

In many cases, it has been that their parents have already been entrepreneurs. Thus pushing the kids to follow the same path.

For example, I would not be doing any of the things I am currently doing if it weren’t for my parents who started taking me to business events when I was 14. Actually, it started already when I was 4-years-old and had to play a secretary for my father by picking up the phone at home, saying “Papa netu doma” (Father’s not at home) and taking the messages.

But this is not a particularly scalable way for getting more kids to start businesses.

So what other way is there?

To have them enrol through programs that teach entrepreneurship. As well as attending business events where they get motivated by the older people that have already started great things.

Which is the reason we should enable kids to attend tech events and prepare other programs for them.

Thankfully, we do finally have different global programs that help kids learn the entrepreneurial mindset early on.

For example, Vivita is a program for teaching kids how to start businesses already while in the elementary school. It is started by the Japanese venture capital firm Mistletoe — guys and gals who might know what they are doing.

In short, generating future deal flow.

And they have now set up their first international franchise in Estonia which lets us experience this experiment firsthand.

Meanwhile, at Robotex we have also taken up the focus on teaching kids from age 4 and up on how to start companies. Tho, we do not have just programs for getting them start new businesses.

Our focus is on something much bigger. Building a global network of robotics programs that will help to generate the next 50’000 robotics startups, worldwide.

Why such a focus? And why 50000?

Because after having started various software-based on-demand startups, I felt it is time to focus my energy only on building frontier tech solutions. The failure rate might be higher. And time to get something done is longer. But at least we would generate something that has a capability to change the course of humanity.

Something that the next marketing automation tool or social network will just not do.

In any case, out of all possible frontier tech fields, robotics is something I understand a bit. Where people can produce innovation that actually is achievable in a shorter term. And in which we already had an educational program that could help us reach a bigger audience.

One that just did not focus on building startups before I joined the team.

And 50’000 because this looks like an achievable sum within the next three to five years, across 25 countries that we are about to be operating in. Also known as 2000 per country.

Moreover, every year people start over 1.5 million startups. Making our goal only 3% of the total amount which again is not impossible at all.

We also must notice that these 50000 will not be working companies. More likely projects started out of which 2% survive the first year. Thus we will hopefully end up with 1000 robotics startups.

But how are we achieving the goal?

As of now, Robotex consists of three parts: education programs, festivals and innovation programs. All in the field of robotics. In which, on one side we are helping people of all ages learn how to build autonomous systems. Meanwhile, on the other side, we have started a platform for enabling global teams to showcase what they have built, get feedback and find mentors as well as potential partners or investors.

And this last platform is divided into three categories: projects for kids in the age 4 to 12, prototypes and real products/services with existing customers.

In all levels, we provide all sorts of help to the teams. Including an award pool of 10’000 Euros and connections with other investors and accelerators. As well as a window to Europe via the partnership between us and Estonia’s Startup Visa project.

All this is already being run in 12 countries over 5 continents with 24 more in works.

The plan is to cover at least 25 countries by the end of 2019. Running the same programs in all those countries.

Let me know if you’d love to get involved!

By the way, these are not some small events.

Last year, our main event in Estonia gathered 27’000 people and 1346 robots. Making it the biggest robotics festival on the planet with plenty to do for everyone. Including Industry 4.0 companies looking for partners and families wanting to learn about the latest tech.

But enough marketing talk.

The point I want you to go home with is that it is crucial for all tech events to include kids.

SLUSH is already showing a good example for involving students.

We now just need more initiatives like Robotex to also include the younger kids. Because not only will they generate the next startups. But at some point, they could also come and work for you — if you plan to stay around for some time.

Last but not least, let me leave a few beauty tips on how to make any event better:

• Use signs to make the wandering easier — I have constantly had to look for many meeting areas and stages for too long, and it is not nice at all;
• Divide exhibitors into easy to understand groups — not based on countries but different fields, as none of us wants to go through all the booths;
• Don’t let a random big corporation who wrote a big check on the stage — they provide no value to the listeners, e.g. 1.5 hours of Nestle at 4YFN was not necessary;
• Have a real VIP lounge, including glasses to drink from — small things matter but are too often not done;
• Have enough volunteers and make the registration and wardrobe work fast — nothing worse than wasting precious time in lines;
• And again, bring the kids and students to the event.

Thank you for giving me a chance to speak at this stage and good luck for organising the next event!