Alex Torres - VP of Moovit

Full transcript: Alex Torres on London Real

1:26 Silicon Real. It’s about the people. This is Silicon Real, the weekly talk show dedicated to the people of the London technology startup scene. I am Brian Rose. My guest today is Alex Torres, who recently joined the public transit app company Moovit as vice president of global product marketing.

1:47 Prior to this you worked at Google for more than 9 years, including working on products like Google Maps. You worked under Marissa Mayer, who’s now the CEO of Yahoo. For now she’s the CEO and you also started product marketing operations in Japan and Latin America. Moovit has just raised $50 million with funding from Nokia, BMW, yes, the car company BMW, and Sequoia. You guys are, I think, our first Israeli-based startup.

2:11 I’m excited about that. Alex, welcome to Silicon Real. Thank you so much, guys. Thank you, thank you very much for having me here. It’s always nice to get here to London.

2:18 It’s good having you, and I’m glad we can sit down and have a good chat. Before we get into anything, I’ve got to ask about you, because I heard that you’re Spanish and Irish and French and Scottish, and then, you know, is it true that you’re all of these cool nationalities? And how does it mix together? French, not really. Okay, what is your background?

2:38 So I hear the Scottish accent a little bit. Well, that’s, that comes from my husband. My husband is Scottish, so maybe I picked up some of the accent, but I’m born in Seville, and I’ve also lived in Dublin for 9 years. Okay, I lived in Northern Spain. I’ve lived here in the UK also for two years.

2:58 Japan, South America, and also now for like 8 years back in California, in San Francisco, so very good experience. Where in Latin America did you live? So Buenos Aires and São Paulo, coming back and forth. That was the time that I was doing all the crazy stuff back at Google with Google Enterprise and all the cloud computing solutions and everything. Okay, and I want to definitely talk about that 9 years is a long time.

3:24 I know a lot of Google employees kind of average three, you know, three and a half, because they keep going. So I want to get into that, but let’s talk about Moovit. You know, for a bit here, including this funding round, which is pretty interesting, and I want to talk about what you do you were talking about, you know, these words get thrown around in the Valley a lot, but not as much here in the UK. That’s like Social Mobile Local. I know, I was watching that Silicon Valley television show, and they had them all there at the TechCrunch event, and they were like, “We’re so, we’re Mo, we’re low bro,” and so I was laughing.

3:52 But I mean, what does it really mean to have something that’s mobile and social and local? Well, it’s it’s basically you need to have a product that’s global but also local. That’s the local social, because you’ve got some components that you need to involve your community with. So, like, in our case we have many different ways for the user to provide feedback, and also to help us build a better product. On mobile it’s quite evident because it’s an app, so it’s a mobile ecosystem.

4:18 So that’s kind of like, and you’re right, it’s one of the buzzwords that we use on Silicon Valley. We love having all those categories, you know, for how to define people, how to define products, right? It sounds interesting from a European standpoint, because we don’t like that. It’s been fully European you know, it’s one of the funnest things. But yeah, is there any other o that people are throwing around or is it really more so low and Mo?

4:43 No, it’s just so Low Mo, glow glow. Yeah, no, no, that it’s just so Low Mo. It’s also one of the buzzwords that analysts, you love to use as well like a SoLoMo product could be something like Yelp, for instance, so that people know, as well, of some of your viewers, or it could be, um, quiet by the time before it got acquired, as well. That’s a SoLoMo product, or or Google Maps is a SoLoMo product as well, right? So it’s a new, interesting world as well.

5:14 It’s challenging as well, because, as I was saying, you need to have a global product, but at the same time you need to appeal to a local audience, which implies that the localization of the product, the look and feel of the product should also be unperceived as local, right? Which is key for you, because you’re in 500 cities or you’re expanding to 500 cities. Tell me about Moovit as if I had never heard of it before. So what we want to do with Moovit is basically to make public local transportation easy, useful, and very intuitive for our users.

5:47 So what we’re trying to do is to gather different data points of different public transport, public transportation systems that we may have in a city. That could be underground train, it could be a bus, and just to drive them all together and put them on the same product. And also, which is a great distinctive element for us is to power the product by the community. And when we say the community, it’s basically how other community members so people who live in the same cities can help us make a better product.

6:21 How can we perfect it? It’s easy to launch a product which only uses open data, like basically static data, or data that you can, all that you could get from local authorities. The difficult part, the next step, the higher level, is when you can manage to perfect that data with all the feedback that the users are giving. How do you get feedback? Because I was thinking about Moovit today and I was thinking, okay, I’m going to catch the Tube later and go down to Leicester Square.

6:47 So if I’m on the Tube, would I give you access to watch my phone move, or would I just be like, “Trains on time, right?” don’t. So there’s something we call a passive way of providing the information, which is the one that you mention, if you’re on open mode. I mean, you can provide some of the information that you’re using on the phone, and it’s what we call passive. But there’s also mechanisms that you can, for instance, evaluate the quality of the service in a line, or you can evaluate the quality of a specific bus.

7:23 So you can also provide us feedback on how we can improve the results that we’re providing. So there are, well, not millions, but there are tens of 20 different ways of direct feedback, apart from the passive way that it’s when you have the phone on open mode, just for you to have a kind of sense of how big that is. We currently collect more than two billion pieces of feedback every one to two months, and that feedback really allows us to perfect and make the product better, right?

7:54 Which is crucial, because, no, I mean, a static, static information app, it that that’s not going to sell these days, is it? The thing is that our product is very crowdsource-based. So there are some people that always want to give that information. They want to build a better city. They want to they believe in the altruism of building a better us, better London.

8:16 So there are people that really want to do that. There are some other people that may not want to do that, so they’re going to use different products and that’s some of our competitors. They don’t believe in that model, and they use something different. So but we do believe that we do want to build a better city. We do want to build a better community model, and that’s the reason why that we use that same community to help us perfect, you know, and to improve the product.

8:43 I’m reading the book Hooked right now, and so it’s fascinating to see, you know, as humans, what we’ll actually go out of our way and do. And one of them is, like, you know, write product reviews, answer technical questions on websites, and give all this feedback to the community, because it gives us this tribe feeling or this pack mentality or something. So it’s always amazing to me that people go out of their way and do that. And so always gives me hope for humanity, you know.

9:05 I do believe in that, to be honest. The past, yeah, five, six years, that’s what I’ve been working on. It’s a user-generated content. I know the buzzword UGC. Tell me before it gets here, UGC.

9:19 So it’s everything that people could contribute, like pictures or reviews. We’re very familiar. I mean, it’s also already available here in London like Yelp, that you can actually write reviews about your places that you love. You can add pictures and everything. I I do believe that that’s the future of everything, of it, and also how we can scale products locally.

9:43 Is the days of hiring thousands of people to work in a specific country or in a city. Those days are nearly over when it comes to local products, so you really need to have that help and that support from your community. Okay. Okay. You know I’m a big fan of, you know, Google Maps, one of your creations, and Google Now I use, and they track me, and you know it does some creepy things sometimes with Google Now, and it tells me, you know, that something’s been placed in my calendar, and I don’t know what’s going on, but that’s okay, and but my girlfriend loves Citymapper.

10:14 She just swears by it, and I’m like, “What’s the difference?” And she’s like, “Oh, it’s the best. Oh, it’s the best.” And so why, why are there so many different, why is there so much space in this community for different people to like different things? Because when Google jumps in on something, you think they might have figured it out, but they haven’t really figured it out.

10:32 So why is there room for people like you and Citymapper and others? Yeah, it’s, um, coming back to the SoLoMo, yeah, side of things. It’s a very broad ecosystem. We, I mean, checking some competitors and doing some competitive analysis, we could easily say that we have more than four or 500 local public transportation apps in the world, or even more. I just simply checked on the 500 cities that we have presence.

11:00 These products could appeal to different audiences depending on the look and feel, the branding, the data quality component or the community component. So there are some people that they’re going to love Citymapper because of the look and feel, or what, or because that’s what fulfills their needs. They don’t want to do certain things with the product, or some other people that they’re going to use Google Maps because they know the brand Google, and they have that affinity towards the brand.

11:25 There will be some of peers as we see in our, like, we have 15 million users already worldwide, and these guys love the product because they, like, they do it, they move it, icon, and/or they like the kind of the way that we show the information, or also they like the fact that they can contribute, and they feel hur, and you know, uh and they feel that they’re contributing to a better community. So I think there’s a lot of space, due to the fact of the ecosystem that’s very broad, and also due to the fact that we’re talking about apps. Apps generally they could come and go.

11:58 It’s all about quality at the end of the day, and luckily we’ve been on the market for already for, yeah, nearly two, yeah, 2 years, two years and a half, and we’ve managed to grow in question of two years, from 1 million users to 50 million users, and even more. So it’s an interesting field and ecosystem as I mentioned beforehand. You were at Google before, where I guess it’s not as app-based, and now you’re in the app game, where the rules completely are changed, right?

12:26 And if you can’t get traction in the app world, like you’re, you’re, you’re, you’re up the river, right? You’re stuck. You’re in the middle. You’re like, lost in space, right? You’re completely right.

12:35 I mean, it’s a completely different format. The app world, the way that you reach users, the way that you interact with users, the way that you analyze your users, the way that you target the users, the way that you build products for users is very different. The desktop years are gone. I mean, we all the time with our smartphone, we need to design products according to this smartphone world, and you need to do it in a way that is going to be easy and quick, because you’re always on the go.

13:04 You’re going to be on the go, smartphone, you’re going to need, oh, I want to get from here to, I don’t know, S panras, I want to get from here to any hotel in Nightspire or whatever I am, but you need to have that information very quickly. It’s not like when you’re at the desktop, that some people even start Googling and everything. So yes, it’s a completely different way of considering the world and approaching the users and designing the product, which is quite exciting.

13:30 Um, and it’s also a lot of responsibility. You need to do your homework, and for me the main important homework is that one of getting to know the user. Put yourself in your user’s shoes, and then really understanding what you need to deliver so that you’d really impact their lives positively, right? And you could be gone like that. You know, they could forget about you, find a new app, and then it’s all over, and there’s no amount of Google advertising that’ll save you.

13:54 It’s just gone, right? Apps, the apps ecosystem is very fragile, as you will mention. I mean, uh, uh, the beauty of certain apps is that they may stay for long. They may stay for long. I mean, you may have seen this, like on the gaming industry we have a lot of examples.

14:09 I don’t know if you got addicted to that Flappy Bird that you were jumping over. I didn’t. I played. I played it, but I never got hooked, but gaming is. I did.

14:20 Gaming, gaming is a very, very, very interesting industry when it comes to UPS. Uh, the uh, Solarity, and the way of launching new apps for gaming is like crazy. What could be a smash hit one day, that, as you will say, to next week is going to be nothing. You may make some money through contextual ads and banners and everything, but it’s a very quick and high-pace environment, which requires a lot of innovation, creativity, and design, right? Right.

14:51 So I guess you are forced to constantly be making your product better and to constantly be making people come back and contribute, otherwise you know they can be over quickly. We’re very lucky with our product, to be honest. I mean, the user retention rate and the user engagement rates, I mean, they’re very high, higher than industry of our age. I mean, we’re very lucky because we, we’re having a lot of love from our community and unknown members. Uh, but that doesn’t mean that you can rest on your laurels.

15:18 I mean, you really need to think what’s next. One of the things that, um, and I really love this from an Israeli ecosystem, is where Israeli company is very quick at delivery, at delivering things. We deliver a new product version every single month. That’s unthinkable in any other company. The sincerity of saying, okay, I need to have something ready in like, uh, three weeks, and I’m going to do it, and everyone is going to pursue the same goal, and we’re going to go for the focus on the same goal.

15:48 It’s incredible. I mean, our team is, is, is top-notch. Wow, let me ask you about Google. You know, they kind of own, well, they’re in the map space. You know, they kind of own the video space with YouTube.

15:58 They’re very good at the email space, so a lot of people would say, oh, well, they’ve got this kind of map and local thing done, but then if you look at their main forms of revenue, it probably has very little to do with this. So is it by definition that they’re never going to win when, when you know, when they’re not completely correlated to winning in that one market? I mean, you were there. I mean, there’s so many different things they do. It’s, um, it’s a complicated market.

16:22 The local market is extremely complicated. Um, and it gets a more complicated when you have a very large organization of 55,000 people, like it’s Schogol nowadays. I mean, I love Google. I mean, I had one of the most important years of my life over there professionally, and I think the company is doing things greatly. I think it’s, it’s like any challenges that any other company would have when they grow so quickly and big.

16:49 Like you really also need to know how to execute things and how to do things quickly, and things like that. But the local ecosystem and everything that we’re discussing is very complicated. Like, uh, the main goal when you launch a local product is that the look and feel needs to be local. Like, uh, the bus, the bus stops, the Metro stops, the Tube stops and the Tube stations, they need to have the logos that people are expecting to look at. It doesn’t mean that you’re going to have something that’s different.

17:17 You need to have it the same, because that’s what the expectations are. But at the same time, as you will say, the local ecosystem and the local world opens a new door for revenue, and that’s not been highly exploited. I mean, Yelp is trying to do that. There’s some other players that they tried to do it, like at the beginning, for Square. I mean, they tried to do it as well, not revenue-wise.

17:38 Twitter is going to try to do it, or will be doing it, so there’s a lot of players that they’re doing it. But the problem is that, I mean, to focus on the markets and really to get to know what the users need, is revenue a priority at all for you? Not at the moment. Uh, we’re very lucky because our investors have openly told us that our main focus is to become the number one app in the world for local transportation, and also to be focused on delivering the best user experience and the best product.

18:12 So we want to focus first on that. Once we get more critical mass, we get to hundreds of millions of users, that’s when I think the monetization will come in a natural way. Okay, because that’s also when you will get to know users better you will know that. Oh, why don’t you offer them a ticketing system, or why don’t you offer them any other solutions that could be great for their user experience. So we want to do our homework first.

18:38 Okay, well, one of your investors, Uri Levine was an investor in Waze, and that sold to Google for a billion dollars. So does that kind of help you in not being too critical about revenue, when you know you might be building something that would have that kind of value to another company in the future. No, I mean, I think monetization is always, uh, in any, our company is a business-to-consumer company, B2C company. The monetization piece will come naturally, will come when it needs to come.

19:09 Um, we’re also very lucky to have Uri, who is part of our board of directors, and he’s a very wise person. And we always get very great insights what we need to do, and with all these great guys who are in our board of directors. I mean, including Square Capital and some Israeli funds as well. They’re really helping us. I mean, that’s where we keep focused.

19:31 That’s one of the risks for startups, to lose focus. I mean, right now our focus are those points that we’re mentioning, and just try to follow them religiously and being very methodological about that. I mean, and on the rest will come. What was Waze doing? Was it something similar?

19:48 Did it get integrated into Google Maps and Google Now? Is it all part of that? Right now I was actually off my radar. I didn’t know about Waze. So the latest thing, sorry, the latest thing that Waze have been doing is just a natural integration of some of the incidents on Google Maps and some of the reporting activities.

20:07 I mean, I think that’s a natural form of product integration while preserving the identity of the product and its own platform, and I think that’s a great addition for Google Maps. I mean, Google Maps is a very good product. I mean, it’s got very great features and on traffic, and um, but I think that enriches, in a sort of way, that user experience and brings more value. Okay, talk to me about BMW. I’ve never seen them invest in another company.

20:35 Is this a new thing for them? And how and, yeah, what’s that like? We’re very proud and very happy to work with BMW. I mean, they’re going to be great partners. They’ve already been very great partners.

20:46 I was in Munich last week with them, and it’s very exciting to be part of BMW. I mean, as I mean, I don’t drive. I don’t have a driver’s license. Never had a driver’s license, right? But I mean, BMWs for me have been one of the brands, I mean, one of the references, you know, for, they’ve done such a great job with the Mini.

21:07 I mean, they revolutionized, you know, the concept of drive-in, and they’re very innovative. So all those ideas of working with them, I think it’s going to bring a lot of value to us. Also the way that we see the company evolving, Moovit evolving, is we, we, we do want to offer more than local public transportation. We also want to offer private transportation on the local level, like in the US we have a partnership with Lyft, so BMW comes in a very natural way.

21:34 I mean, they have great products like DriveNow, which is also available here in London, and I think that could be a great way of offering car sharing to our users. At the end of the day, we want to build a platform that allows people to decide what to choose, if it’s private or local transportation, and do it in the most efficient way, and according to their budget. Some people will want to spend the money on car sharing. Some others will not want, or they want to take a bus or a train or just a taxi.

22:06 So all, any of the options, in a democratic and agnostic way, right? BMW is such a good brand. I just think of integrity when I think of BMW, and yeah, you know, they’ve done an amazing job. So that’s going to be a lot of fun working with them Give me the Google story. What was it like when you started versus when you left?

22:22 You know, if you had to summarize it all in a couple of minutes, you know, what would you tell us? Because everyone always wants to know. It’s very exciting. I started at the Dublin office. I think it was, uh, 26, I can’t remember, employee number 26 No, no, I was 20.

22:38 I was 26 years old. Oh, 26 years old. Yeah, okay, 26. 26, I think, is, uh, no Maris was 14, or I can’t remember, but it was very exciting. It was one of the first people to be hired at the Dublin office.

22:51 I mean, and that was when the Dublin office was open, and we were like 800 employees worldwide, so it’s like a little startup. Wow. Um, my first day at the office was like, okay, this is your desk you should just arrange yourself and do things. I’m like, do things, what? So it was exciting.

23:11 Um and it’s exciting. Um, and I’ve been very lucky. I mean, my nine years, I mean, I’ve got great memories. I’ve been through the most important divisions of Google, product marketing, product management. Um, I’ve learned a lot from my colleagues.

23:25 Um from, um, Marissa. I mean, Bernardo. I mean, there are a lot of people that really, really, really have, you know, high consideration for them. And learning is also there. When you learn, there’s also suffering as well.

23:41 I mean, those elements are there. So there, it’s not all being like a fairy tale that everything is nice, and there’s also, it’s an intense place to work. It’s a very intense, like everything in life. If also, if you’re a perfectionist, and also depends on where you’re at, when, where you’re at in your life. I mean, you also need to know how to manage your energy, and how to put some emphasis, or, as we said, to pick your fights, right?

24:08 I mean, and, uh, and and of course when a company grows, gets bigger and bigger. I mean, you need to work with many different people and understand many different people, different styles, management styles. And so I think I’ve learned, I learned a lot. I have a very good, nice recollection of working for the company, and I’m very excited now for Moovit, because I think there’s a lot of things that I’ve learned that I could apply, um, at my new company, and my colleagues that Moovit are great.

24:40 I mean, I love, I love chatting in all the record. I mean, I love the Israeli way, it’s very straightforward, right? To the point, no b******t. Oops. Yeah, what is the Israeli way?

24:51 Because I’ve had a few guys on here straight from Israel. I had Jonan YZ Freeman from Kano, he was fantastic, and, uh, well, I had Easy VRA as well, you know, he who spends time as a boy in the side as well, but, um, yeah I know, Easy, he’s great. Go adventures. They’re both cool dudes. They’re both guys that would probably have your back in a dark alley, and, uh, and but also would give you a big hug, you know.

25:12 So what have you found out from it? It’s very human. Okay, in all good and bad ways. I mean, you would have someone in the meeting telling you, in front of your face, “You’re f***ing wrong,” or “You’re very right,” but I mean, been there for 5 months, but the image that I have is like, it’s very human. It’s very family-driven.

25:34 It’s very straightforward. I mean, very hardworking individuals. Um, they know when they have a goal, they know where they need to go, and they execute, and there’s no drama in between. And it’s very exciting. It’s very different to what we are accustomed to back in, um, the Valley.

25:53 The Valley is, it is what it is. It’s highly political, I mean, many, many times, which is fine. I mean, it’s what it is. It’s cultural based. There are some other good elements as well that you learn, but for me it’s very interesting.

26:06 I’m based in San Francisco, heading to the San Francisco office and working with my manager, the CEO, um, in Israel, and we have a great time. We, I mean, we’re really enjoying the ride. I mean, it’s very good. I mean, the success stories in Tel Aviv are huge. I mean, someone was saying that when it came to, like, NASDAQ listings, you know, Israel was, I don’t, number three in the world or something, you know, something very high.

26:30 So you know, it’s exciting times down there. It’s a startup nation. I mean, um, it literally is a startup nation. I think it’s a, I mean, the Israeli people I mean, they’re just very self-determined. I mean, to succeed in life, I, that’s great, from, uh, how people think how their mentality is, how their mindset is.

26:51 I mean, uh, and I see that every time that I try to get back to Israel, Israel at least twice a quarter, and every time, with my colleagues, you see it at the office. Everyone has a strong opinion about things. People are not like, um, divided. I mean, they would tell you like, oh, I think this should be done, this shouldn’t be done. Um, it’s interesting.

27:12 I mean, it’s an interesting disruptive way of working, right? That sounds fascinating. What was it like working with Marissa Mayer at Google? I mean, everyone says she’s very Google, and she brings all of these attributes that are known for Google over to Yahoo. I mean, is that a good characterization?

27:27 I don’t even know what that means. But what was it like? She’s, uh, I think she would have been Israeli. I mean, Israeli in that, I mean, she’s a, I mean, I had a lot of respect towards Marissa. I mean, Marissa, first as a woman in an environment, not only Google in general, of a very macho-driven IT world, with a lot of macho geeks and all over, which also raises a lot of question marks and stupid comments, and we’ve seen that.

27:55 I mean, I highly respect her for that, because she’s managed to position herself as a great executive, great product person, great product marketing person, and with a great vision. I mean, I’ve learned a lot. I mean, I do remember some created review meetings where we may be discussing about the color of a call to action, should it be blue, should it be red, should it be, it will be one hour, but with it reasoning behind it, and with the passion behind it.

28:24 So I think she’s doing an outstanding job for Yahoo. I mean, a great challenge, and um, I think she’ll succeed anywhere she will go. I mean, she’s, uh, she, and also, from a, she’s from a personal level. I mean, she’s also a very loving person. I mean, uh, I’ve seen interacting with all my colleagues, and she’s a person who really takes care of others.

28:46 I mean, it’s, it’s great. It’s a full package. I mean, of course you’re going to hear stories from many different people. I mean, there’s also a lot of jealousy and a lot of, uh, psychological projections and everything, but there she is. She’s the CEO of Yahoo.

29:02 Yeah, yeah, she’s doing it. you know, she took the challenge. It was always going to be a challenge, and so, uh, yeah, you’ve got to give more power for going ahead and stepping up and doing that. So absolutely, it’s going to be exciting to watch. What are your thoughts when you come to London?

29:14 You know, I mean, I’ve been doing the show now for 18 months, and it’s been amazing to watch the Silicon Roundabout, which is where we are right now, and the way it’s improved, and, you know, we just had a big announcement this week where Ben Horowitz of Andreessen Horowitz is taking a board seat on TransferWise. Who was in that seat 14 months ago? Um, Taavet Hinrikus was the guy from Estonia, you know, and now it’s a billion-dollar company. And you know, these kind of things don’t happen that often in the UK.

29:39 We’ve had some billion-dollar exits last year. I think about eight or 10. So it’s happening here. What does it feel like to you also? We’re still about a 10th or a 20th the size of VC investment compared to the Valley.

29:49 So what are your thoughts? I think that we Europeans need to know how to sell ourselves better to the outside world. I’m European. I mean, from a European, I spent 10 years in the States. Um, Americans know how to sell themselves very well.

30:04 They have an idea. They’re very assertive. They know how to sell it. They know how to talk to the right people. They know how to network to the right people.

30:11 They know how to position themselves very well, and, uh, this is something that you learn as a kid. You need to speak up if there’s something that you don’t agree with. You need to say it, and you need to find your ways, and you need to be independent. You need to think that there’s an outside world. I do believe that Europe has a huge potential to become another three times or 10 times more Silicon Valley.

30:33 It’s just more of a question of really speaking up, arranging ourselves, finding the right talent, empowering the right talent, because it’s not a question of university degrees whatsoever. I mean, I’ve, I work with people that they started, that studied in Stanford, Harvard, Yale, whatever. To be honest, that maybe my colleagues are going to get upset with me. I mean, some of my friends back in the US, but I don’t, I don’t see a dramatic difference in terms of formation, degrees, and everything.

31:03 Um, I think, uh, European education is one of the best in the world, as it could be in Japan and in other places. It’s also very cultural, so, uh, I think that I would say in the case of London, and in the case of uh, startups, and the case of funding, I mean, people really need to find the right person to talk to. I mean, and don’t be scared about sending an email out of the blue to a big guy who may be running a Andreessen Horowitz. So whichever, I mean, you really need to take the steps and not just nothing.

31:33 Oh, no, I’m not going to do it. I’m a bit scared. They, and, and take risks. Don’t say, I don’t know if they’re going to reply. No, well, just try it.

31:41 Find the right way. I mean, maybe you go to a press conference, and the guy’s there, and after the press conference you, you, you hand him a presentation of your company. I mean, just, just, that’s what entrepreneur means. Not just stay at the office and have a video conference or a call. Just try to find ways.

31:58 Right? Are we on the radar in Silicon Valley? Do people say, oh, fintech is coming out of London, or this or not? I do believe that there, that there is. The only problem is that it’s also a question of how people work.

32:10 I mean, in Silicon Valley tends to be a tend a bit indog gamic I mean, there’s a lot of information that gets and remains in Silicon Valley, and it could be the same case in London. I mean, I think that there are some media outlets that are doing a good job of promoting, uh, certain, um, companies and things like that, but I think there’s still more work to do for media, right? For getting the word out, for promoting ourselves. Basically, absolutely, absolutely.

32:37 That’s, that’s one area. I mean, I think Europe is doing a much better work in terms of specialized media when it comes to funding, and when it comes to announcements, when it comes to venture capital, when it comes to different things. Like, uh, the case of, um, you were mentioning, Easy. I mean, he is a, he’s a great friend. I mean, he’s a great guy, and now he’s the head of Google Ventures.

32:56 I mean, is doing an outstanding job, I mean, with the resources that he has. So, and like some of my other friends, s Watchers, she’s the head of campus here in London for Google. I mean, so these are people that they’re really working hard in order to improve that perception that you mentioned about London. So let’s just support, and then just try to network and try to get higher. Right now, you know, as well said, I think it is kind of a believing in yourself, a selling it, a perception.

33:22 And I agree. I mean, there’s great, really intelligent, hardworking people here in the city from all over the European Union, and everyone brings like a different kind of a slice and different idea. Talk to me about um, things that didn’t work out so well for you. I know you went to Japan for a while and tried to develop a product there, and you said the culture was tricky to break into, but you learned a lot from that, as in why the culture is important to a product.

33:42 Can you enlighten me? I have a little experience with Japan from my youth. Yeah, I, Japan is one of the countries that I love. We were in Japan for Christmas, and we had a blast, and we always tried to go there once a year or twice a year if possible. It, you you learn.

33:58 I mean, I mean, there’s a lot of failures that you could have in your personal life, and, of course, in your professional life. And in the case of Japan, I think I remember we were trying to launch a Google site search, or was it the GSA? Well, one of the products I work with. Japan is very high. Japanese people consider uh quality as one of the main things to achieve.

34:20 High, they have high standards when it comes to quality. Right? We were talking about Jiro Dreams of Sushi earlier, which is a documentary about a guy who spends his whole life making the perfect piece of sushi, which is rice and raw fish, but not to him, and like he has his son make like rice for 20 years before he can graduate to the, the fish. Is that a good representation of the Japanese obsession with perfection? I think you need to listen.

34:42 You need to listen to the people there. So my mistake was that I didn’t listen. That I’m like, I was doing the American thing of saying, oh, I need to launch. I’m going to, uh, in this way. I don’t want to.

34:51 I don’t want to have a QA test on this and this and that. The localization, I’m going to do it myself. I’m not going to double-check the localization, and it didn’t go very well. It was a flop. We had to back up, I mean, before we launched.

35:02 So I think the kind of this, is, and this just not for this case in general. Just listen to other colleagues and listen to other cultures. I mean, there’s always something you’re going to learn, and also there’s something that you’re going to affect people’s lives positively if you listen to that. was something that, um, it started like that, but now it’s, I tried to do it even though there are times I could be very stubborn. That’s a defect I have, uh, but yeah, listen.

35:30 I mean, and just try to put yourself in the other person’s shoes. I mean, it’s quite important, right? And must be crucial for the local markets you’re going for, because everything’s different. Um, I mean, yeah, everything’s different. We had Nicolas Brousse from BlaBlaCar in here a few weeks ago.

35:46 And he’s going into, yeah, he’s fantastic. He’s going into Turkey, and he was like, “You know, Brian, we’re learning so much there, and it’s Ultra Mobile, and it’s Ultra this, and you know, they have a very local market, well, very social as well, very mobile as well, but he didn’t drop those words on me. But it sounds like they’re really learning a lot, and each local market for them is very distinct, just like you. I mean, you have so many different cities and cultures.

36:10 You’re going, yeah, it’s, you need to be versatile. I think that’s one of the things I really like about what I’m doing, because, um, I mean, I’ve been so lucky and so fortunate to, I mean, have lived in so many different places and speak different languages and then do so many different things like that. It really opens your mind a lot, and opens your brain, and the way of perceiving things. Like now you’re more like, we’re launching. We’re complete phenomena in Brazil with like two or three million users.

36:38 It’s just something out of this world. I mean, and you’re like, and my first question is why. I want to talk to the users. I want to know why this is the case. And I talked to one of our co-founders, Roy.

36:48 He’s a great guy, and I, we’re we talk and discuss. Oh, this, the community is very, very lively, and they love this, and they love to contribute. They love it. I mean, that’s an exciting thing. You know, you launch a new country, or you get surprises.

37:01 Like we launched in Helsinki, and we’re like, oh, it’s going to be a flop. No, we got like a 50, 60,000 users. It’s like, wow, they’ve done nothing. So it’s exciting. On this, you get a lot of great surprises.

37:14 It’s always a surprise. It could be positive or negative, but it’s a surprise because you don’t know. I mean, until you launch you try to do your homework. You did it great, or you think you’ve done it great, but afterwards it’s like, oh, no, you didn’t do so great. So it’s exciting.

37:26 That’s super exciting. Talk to me about your personal habits. I know that you have a few that keep you in order. I think sleep is one of them. Also, I want to hear how you unplug.

37:34 I guess I call it lately my information diet, and how you know when to respond to the email and when to wait till Monday. How do you do that? Yeah, this is something that, uh, especially with the Yanks, it’s a learning exercise. Even though I mean, my good friend, our CFO, Serita, she loves me a lot. I mean, we always talk about that.

37:55 She always tells me, don’t reply to emails on the weekend. It was all love, but it’s something that you need to learn. I disconnect, and disconnect at the right moment, the right time. Like, as I was telling you before we came, I mean, I came here, so I was like, okay, if I’m going to start checking work email, and we’re going to have such a great interview, I mean, I’m going to be all thinking about, oh, this email, this person, this needs to be done. Just relax, find the moment.

38:21 I mean, things, I mean, seize the moment in the right way. Like, don’t, don’t think that you need to reply to an email straightaway. Just give it some time. Especially if it’s a difficult email, don’t reply immediately. There’s no need to have immediate communication at that moment.

38:37 That’s something. The other thing is a great habit I think that I’ve managed to get: you need to sleep well. Sleep, how many hours do you get a night? I need, I need to get minimum seven or eight good. You’re right, we actually all do, in my opinion, so otherwise my brain wouldn’t work very well.

38:54 Right? And if you think, if you try to shave an hour or two, that if you think your performance drops even 10, 15, even 20%, I mean, that’s enough not to get things done, and I mean, to miss opportunities, and you know, not make a good connection, and not be present. And you know, but yeah, it’s one of those things that at times we think that we’re present, but we’re not present. And then, that’s sorry for the expression, it pisses me off at times when I’m talking to someone.

39:18 I’m like, I want to devote my attention to that person. So at times I say it. I say, I’m sorry, I can’t talk right now, because I’m not going to be ready to give you my full attention, and I don’t want to be in a meeting thinking about two million different things and not paying attention to you. I think it’s a lack of respect. Yeah, TOS.

39:35 The other person, maybe some people won’t say it, and they will be like, oh, yes Brian, yes blah blah blah, oh, yes Alex, blah blah blah blah, but they’re not listening. You need to have active listening, right? Yeah, I mean, this is that’s the way I try to work. Yeah, it goes with sleep and email. I’m a little concerned about the Apple Watch, because it’s already hard enough for me to, I mean, I insist that people get their phones out of my face when I’m talking to them, but I can’t imagine when there’s a watch that’s going off on someone’s wrist.

40:02 I’ll be like, are you kidding me? You know, it’s, I don’t see how that’s going to work. I think the iWatch is going to be interesting. I mean, it all depends on how the different applications are designed. I mean, there’s a lot of things, um, this is something that Moovit could also do in the future.

40:17 I mean, it will be interesting, because public transportation on the go, that would be stunning. But it’s, it’s, it’s very exciting to see how technology could help people. It’s our duty, it’s our responsibility as people developing the product and creating the product, to do it in a way that’s not going to be intrusive, as you were mentioning. It’s going to be a natural way that it’s not going to be like, I don’t know if you still remember all these old phones that they started beeping.

40:46 It needs to be something natural that maybe it’s a slight, slight little alarm, you know, indicating that something’s happening, or something that vibrates, you know, something gentle, because I agree with you. There’s, you need to have your moments in your life. Technology is great for what it is, as it is, is a great thing, and but it’s how we use it and how we design it. Yeah, I think everyone needs to take a break for a few days. And just because you talked about checking your email, you said you’re coming in the taxi over here, and you could have checked your email and you decided not to, because you know, a lot of people check it because they don’t know what else to do, and they’re hooked on this little shot of dopamine they’ll get from just checking their email.

41:25 And so if you can take a step outside of yourself and just say, okay, why am I doing this? Do you need to do that? Can you look outside and see the beautiful city, or just relax with someone or do nothing? That’s another concept, right? Yeah, that’s a great point.

41:37 That happens to me now when I TR now that I’m, I’ve always been traveling quite much in the past seven, eight years, and, uh, at times I think about it when I’m on a taxi, and I’m thinking, or take B transportation. I’m like, wow, I’m checking my email. I mean, maybe the boss is going to stop for a minute and just going to slam my face into someone else, and and like, why don’t you just start staying outside and smell the roses, you know? And then just try to enjoy the moment that you’re in Paris, or you’re in Milan, or you’re in Madrid, or here in London.

42:08 You know, just take, take the time, and you’re going to be more effective if you really manage that energy, and you display that energy when you need to display it. I mean, you’re going to be more productive, and you’re going to, and you’re going to be more affected, and you’re going to be happier at the end of the day, because when you see, at least I’m a perfectionist. If I see that I’m not delivering what I need to deliver, I get frustrated. So you always need to analyze it, because I don’t have the right energies, because I’m not balancing things in my life.

42:37 So things like that, very good. And think about your information diet. Think about when, yeah, I do that sometimes. I take a day. Sometimes I reply to emails when I know that I’m maybe a little bit, you know, upset.

42:46 I’m just, and just come back a day later. And you do the right thing. The other thing about emails too is, if you time a quick response, you’re almost opening yourself up that you will respond that quick, and so that can easily escalate into a multiple message, you know, yeah, yeah. Anyways, um, Alex, I always ask everyone that comes here a few questions. I’m going to ask you, if you can make a phone call to the 20-year-old Alex Torres and give that young man a bit of advice, what would you tell him?

43:12 Where was he at the time? Wow, 20 years old. I was, I was in university, probably, pmon, in Nara. I mean, uh, I would say to myself, take more risks, be more bold. I mean, um, I was always very prudent with everything, and I was very, uh, scholastic at that time of my life.

43:33 I was very methodological. I mean, still very methodical. I mean, and things like that, but at times, I mean, you need to be more practical about things. That’s good. It’s interesting, as I get older, I can tell myself, force myself to take the risks, and be like, no this is okay and this is what you should be doing, but like 10 years ago I think I was just risk averse, and I would just avoid them without knowing I was avoiding them.

43:54 So, uh, that’s good advice. Uh, best advice you’ve ever received, business or personal? Maybe something Google, or maybe something personal? Wow. Um, there’s never a best advice, because there’s always going to be a next one, which is going to be better than the other one, but if I have to choose, I mean, I would say, I mean, professionally, even though it was tough to leave Google, it was one of, right now I see it as one of the best decisions in my life.

44:20 To go, yeah, just let it go. Don’t get yourself attached. Is life after 9 years, it’s like, I mean, I cannot say this, because luckily enough I’ve been with my husband for nine years, and eight years, and and and we love each other a lot. So, but it was, it was sounded like a relationship, right? It’s a detachment period.

44:38 Was it hard the first few weeks? And I, I think it’s a detachment period. I mean, you, that starts maybe one or two years prior to leaving, and, uh, also you have to check, and you also, um, you really analyze if you’re really growing as a person. Is Alex growing, yes or no? Am I becoming a civil servant, probably?

45:02 So it’s a tough decision, but I think it was professionally a very good decision. Um, personally, um, um, one of the best decisions in my life, um, moving to San Francisco with my husband, with Stefan. Okay, going to America and doing that whole thing and seeing how that half works, and, uh, my last part of that question is to the 20-year-old that’s listening to us, you know, that knows a little bit about what we’re talking about, but you know, someday wants to be involved in the tech industry, whether that be in the UK or in their local market, or in San Francisco.

45:37 I mean, I know the problem with tech now is it gets kind of a little bit of a rock star status. We see the outliers that are mythologized, which, you know, about from the Valley, and we hear about Zuckerberg did this, and this guy did this, when there’s a lot of failures too. But what do you say for people that are entranced by the whole, you know, technology scene? What should they do? Be themselves, be prepared, be authentic, have clear ideas, take, take risks, and and don’t, don’t get disappointed if things do not happen.

46:08 I mean, when I, in my case, when I left, I mean, when I left university and everything, all the degrees or masters, whatever, and I started my own company, uh, and then, two, three years after, I, I said to myself, I want to work for Google. It was when Google was starting and everything, and I put that goal, like, I want to work for Google. I want to work for that company, and I’m, I’m going to be in, uh, operations, product marketing and product management, and after that I’ll leave.

46:37 I did it. I, I, I think you need to really focus on what you want to deliver, and take, and, and don’t. We have great tools nowadays, like LinkedIn and, and Facebook. I mean, just contact people who know about this stuff and openly ask them. I, I love mentoring people.

46:55 I love, give, I mean, I love helping people, I mean, and I love networking, so people want to reach out, happy to help. I mean, s on my possibilities on time, but uh, yeah, learn from other people who’ve done it. I mean, just, and just try to do it. And uh, I think that’s one of the worst things that I’ve seen in Europe, like unemployment rate for young people, like in Spain, is 25%. I mean, that’s horrendous.

47:20 I mean, you’re basically destroying a generation. Yeah, so I mean, let’s let’s just help them. Right? No, it’s such a good thing. And if you’re, if you’re a young person, and I used to be a young person, uh, when you’re that age, you’re thinking, you know, why would these people help me?

47:33 But when you get a little bit older, you realize that you love to see young people with a spark, or someone that reminds you of yourself, and people really do want to help you, and they don’t really have any other ulterior motives. I think it’s part of our, our clan mentality, that we just do want to see people succeed. So like, you know, like Alex says, don’t be shy about, you know, going out there, trying to contact someone, telling them your crazy idea, taking a risk, because there are people out there that will really go out of your way and mentor you, give you advice, maybe give you a job.

47:59 It’s just all about contacting, uh, and be unconventional about it. You know, we had Philly Bo here from Excel Partners, and he was just like, he’s like, he said, what you said, yeah, go to a press conference, you know, pass me something, do something unique. You know, just find a way. Uh, don’t necessarily, you know, send me the cold email. You can do that too, but try something else.

48:16 So that’s great advice. Alex, thanks so much for coming on here. I’m going to download Moovit right when I’m finished. I’m going to give it a test drive, and I’m going to go head-to-head with my better half, as far as her sitting MPP, and see who wins. So, uh, thanks so much.

48:28 Congratulations on this. Moovit really is a startup. It’s like a total mind, mind change for you. It is, and uh, but like you said, if you’re not climbing a steep learning curve, then it’s probably time to get out. You know, AG, great, that could be the takeaway.

48:39 How do people contact you if they want you to be their mentor, et cetera? Is it Twitter? What’s the best? Twitter, LinkedIn, any of the social media? I mean, I’m, I’m on LinkedIn, on Alex Stores, so happy to help.

48:49 I mean, apologies if I don’t reply, um, right ahead. I’m traveling a lot, uh, but yeah, I’m happy to help, and if anything, uh, I think LinkedIn is more personal, like Twitter, because Twitter, I mean, at times people would see everything that’s happening, but happy to help. I mean, anything you may need. And thank you very much for inviting me over. It’s a privilege for me to talk to someone like you, and I like very much what you guys are doing, and, uh, it’s nice to have this kind of conversation.

49:16 It’s very different to what one is accustomed to, like, uh, the usual interview. It’s all about ego. No, I like what you guys are doing. Thank you. I appreciate that.

49:25 Confidence. You’ve been running around today on London Real. I know you’re the economist and do all these things, so it’s always nice to hear. I do hear that a lot, so that’s always good, you know, to hear we’re doing something nice, and it is nice to slow down and actually have a conversation. So nice coffee.

49:36 Yeah, it’s a good coffee, a little Bulletproof in the house. So, uh, thanks so much. As we say on Silicon Real, it’s about the people. Uh, it really is about the people, and, uh, I wish you all the best. Thanks so much, Alex.

49:49 Thank you so much. All right, take care. Take care. This week on Silicon Real we have Daniel Glazer of the technology law practice Fried Frank. It’s a tough story to sort of rock up in London and say, hey, I’m an American lawyer, I’m here to help the tech community.

50:07 We, we practice law, absolutely, but it’s also being a helpful member of the community, helping to put people in touch, you know, to make connections that wouldn’t otherwise happen. You should be able to use your lawyer and your other adviser, you know, for their network. This is an amazing time, these days, to start a company, an early stage fintech. London is the global leader. Silicon Real presents Daniel Glazer, Fried Frank.

50:32 Technology, don’t be afraid to fail