Inside HEAVY.AI’s Startup Journey with Dcode | The Pair Program Ep39

Tim Winkler: 00:00:05

Welcome to The Pair Program from hatchpad, the podcast that gives you a front row seat to candid conversations with tech leaders from the startup world. I'm your host, Tim Winkler, the creator of hatchpad,

Mike Gruen: 00:00:15

and I'm your other host, Mike Gruen.

Tim Winkler: 00:00:17

Join us each episode as we bring together two guests to dissect topics at the intersection of technology, startups, and career growth. So hey everyone, welcome back to The Pair Program. I'm Tim Winkler, Mike Gruen joining me per usual. Uh, Mike, I messaged you about this earlier, but I read a, I read this stat, um, regarding like the new Grand Theft Auto game that's coming out next year. And, uh, the trailer just came out yesterday and it received, you know, millions and millions of views. Um, but it, it created this chain reaction to where a Tom Petty song, love is a long road. Spiked by the number was 36, 000 percent in streams. Uh, I just think that's fascinating how just like one little thing leads down to that next big spike. Um, when, when, when something goes a bit viral, I've done this before. Uh, with HBO's series, the last of us, um, they played this Linda Ronstadt song called long, long time, and I was obsessed and just had it on repeat. So I looked up that that was actually another top performer. That was 4, 900. Percent and then stranger things was another one that had something like that's like, is there anything that caused you to like from a series of movie or a game that caused you to like, just start streaming an audio track?

Mike Gruen: 00:01:44

So what's funny is I can remember the audio, but I can't remember like what cause I can't remember what show or movie or whatever it was that I caught. But there was something that like brought Dolly Parton back into, like, into, into, like, like into my playlist a little bit. And, um, just a phenomenal performer. I'm not a big country fan. Uh, it's like well on my list of like genres I listen to. Um, so I don't know what caused that. Um.

Tim Winkler: 00:02:10

The dog is trending right now as well. That's funny. Yeah, she is. Yeah, that's

Mike Gruen: 00:02:15

funny. Cause that was, she's back. That was a couple of years ago even. Um, but yeah, I think it's like when, uh, when, if I see a modern show that set back like, like that, like whether it's stranger things or something that will sort of bring some stuff back into my like rotation. Um, there was something that happened, I think real relatively recently that brought REM playlists and stuff like that. And that's stuff that like I listened to mostly cause my sister listened to it.

Tim Winkler: 00:02:39

So. Yeah, it's exactly, that's a good point because it's usually, um, older songs that they bring back to be current and they, they spike. So Linda Ron said, obviously, right. Uh, classic older, um, artists, but all right, cool. Good talk. Um, all right, so, uh, let's, let's, uh, let's, let's talk about today's episode. I'm, I'm excited to, to share this one with our listeners. So, um, particularly, you know, those that might be curious about, you know, how commercial startups can serve areas that are high priority within the government. Uh, and again, this is a theme that we've been building on here, uh, across the hatchpad community. Uh, this concept of commercial innovation within, you know, regulated industries like defense and national security. Uh, today we're going to break down an actual use case of how this is, how this is being done. Uh, we've got some excellent guests joining us. We've got John Kondo, the CEO of Heavy AI, uh, an analytics and location intelligence platform. Uh, they serve both commercial and public, uh, sector customers. And we have Rebecca Gavalt, uh, managing partner of Decode Capital, a company that helps tech companies enter the federal market. Uh, John, Rebecca, thank you both for spending some time with us here on The Pair Program. Thanks. Happy to be

Jon Kondo: 00:03:51

here. Same. Oh, I don't want to date myself with the songs you were naming, but some of those are not necessarily old songs for me.

Tim Winkler: 00:04:01

all right. Fair. Yeah. I mean, Hey, everybody loves a little Tom Petty, Linda Ronstadt and, uh, timeless, timeless, uh, artist. Um, before we dive in, we're going to kick things off with, uh, with our favorite segment, uh, pair me up. Um, here's where we kind of go around the room. Mike, you kick us off, uh, lead us with, uh, your, your pairing for, uh,

Mike Gruen: 00:04:23

for the day. Yeah. So, uh, I gave it some thought. Um, one of the things, uh, as. Anyone who listens regularly probably knows, uh, my, one of my sons plays baseball. Uh, I get involved in some of the coaching and one of the things that a number of his coaches have brought up with regard to baseball is how important it is when you make a mistake to have a short memory. And I've always thought that was interesting. Right? Like you, okay. You made a mistake, whatever. Like you got to put it behind you. Baseball's like a game of like small things. Like don't, don't like focus in don't get. Beat yourself up because you know, you struck out or you missed a, a, a, a defensive play or whatever it is. And why I brought, why I bring it up is because I think, like when I think about careers and profe being professional, like, you know, when you make a mistake, you wanna make sure you learn from it. But I think it's also important to not beat yourself up about it, to have a short memory, to be like, you know what? I'm going to take that one, put it behind me. Let's focus, let's look ahead and so on and so forth. So, um, I thought that was like a good life lesson at like a little kid baseball level. That's just, it's an important part of life and, um, make mistakes, put it behind you, have a little bit of a short memory, take what you can from it, move on. So that's my, that's my

Tim Winkler: 00:05:30

pairing. It's solid. Yeah. I think it's so important to get, get the, those lessons in for kids at early ages, you know, especially through sports. It's a great channel to do so. Um, I mean, we deal with startups all day. We talk to startups all day. I mean, let's call it what it is. You know, it's like a 90 percent failure rate. Uh, I was reading a really interesting article about this. Where it's just not, it's not talked about much of like the, the failure, you know, the failure stories. And. Uh, some of them were, were really, um, you know, uh, I don't know, they kind of hit to a core, uh, when they kind of show, you know, show a little bit of vulnerability of like, Hey, this is a failure story. This is what happened could have sold at 25 million. Instead. We, we, we went bankrupt, right? We doubled down and yeah, you know, and it's sometimes all timing, but, um, anyways, failure, you know, and, and, you know, not, uh, not letting that hit you so hard, but rather learning from it, I think is such a great lesson. Um, cool. I dig that. Um, all right. Well, I'm gonna really go lighthearted here with a food pairing. Uh, I haven't done a food pairing in a while, so I'm gonna hit it. I'm gonna hit y'all with the, um, ketchup and horseradish. Um, so obviously just a brilliant combination of sweet, tangy, spicy. Uh, it's one of my favorite condiments, cocktail sauce. Um, and so obviously like going into the swing of The holidays, uh, you know, everybody's gonna, you know, spike their, their shrimp consumption here real soon. I'm sure it's some, some parties. Um, but if you don't have like a really good cocktail sauce on the table, um, that shrimp's just not going to, it's not going to hit like it should hit. So, uh, I'm giving a big shout out to the staple continent for any yeah. Yeah, any seafood restaurant or like home, home kitchen cocktail sauce can't be prepared without ketchup and I like a hot horseradish, like a little really spicy one, um, gives it a good burn. So that's, that's what I'm gonna go with. Um, ketchup and horseradish sauce. So, that's, uh, that's the food pairing. Pass it over to Rebecca. What, uh, quick intro and, and, uh, your pairing for the day or

Mike Gruen: 00:07:35

feel free to trash Tim's if that's what you want to do.

Tim Winkler: 00:07:39

That's not very nice. Mike.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:07:40

It's just disgusting. There's really, there's a lot

Tim Winkler: 00:07:45

of judgment. I could eat it by the spoonful. I'm being real. I love it so much.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:07:51

Yeah. I mean, I didn't know this before I agreed to come on.

Tim Winkler: 00:07:55

Hey, this is a no judgment zone, Rebecca. It's an

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:07:57

indicator of questionable decision

Tim Winkler: 00:07:59

making. Maybe I failed, but I'll learn from it. You

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:08:05

know, it's great to be here. So I am, uh, one of three managing partners of Decode Capital. Which is a venture capital firm, um, and very excited to be here. And so my pairing, uh, when you emailed me to tell me to be prepared for this, I looked around and said, well, what am I doing right now? Um, so I was sitting in front of the fireplace working later at night, uh, and I had a mezcal old fashioned, and if you haven't had a mezcal old fashioned, highly recommend best type of old fashioned. And a fireplace and ideally not doing work. That was the bad part of the pairing, but the rest of it was good.

Tim Winkler: 00:08:37

Nice. Great. I do like it. Fire. So I haven't had an old fashioned. I definitely do a Mezcal Marg, um, but the old fashioned. It's a really good, yeah,

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:08:46

it's more

Tim Winkler: 00:08:46

wintry. Yeah. A little smoky. Mm hmm. Throw a little cocktail sauce on the, on the rim. No. You should not do that. You should not do that. Um, any specific type of mezcal that you're, you're drawn to, or is it just any,

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:09:01

um, Yeah. So there's, there's, um, Iligal is pretty good. The Anejo. And then, um, there's the one that's the four rabbits, but rabbits is in Spanish and I can't come up with the word for rabbits right now. And I don't want to embarrass myself when this gets put out, but

Tim Winkler: 00:09:17

We'll plug it in the show notes. We'll, we'll, we'll Google it. Um, I'm taking, I'm taking notes because I, I love a good, a good recommendation on a bottle of booze. Um, awesome. Well, yeah, thanks again for joining us and we'll pass it to John. John, quick intro and, and your pairing.

Jon Kondo: 00:09:33

Well, thanks and, uh, happy to be here. I'm John Condo, uh, CEO of Heavy ai. Um, been on board for about, uh, two and a half years. Um, and it's funny, Rebecca, you're pairing, because when I started to think about it too. You know, outside of, you know, but a very typical pairing would be a bourbon and a cigar, but that's, you know, I thought I could be a little bit more deep than that. And, uh, so then it was like, okay, a bourbon and email, because every now and then I am working late and do an email. And there's nothing like winding down with email and a glass of bourbon. But I didn't really, you know, what, what, what I came up with was. A good bottle of red wine and cooking and it doesn't matter what I'm cooking, but just having that. I think the important part of that is really, it's, it's not so much the pairing of the flavors and things along those lines. It's kind of the mood that it puts you in. And so, you know, I, I have a pretty busy life during the week and, uh, on the weekends and such, both with work and with family and things along those lines. But cooking is my getaway, right? It is, uh, it's my time. It's my thing. If I've got a good glass of wine going with it, uh, try not to try and do all the chopping before I do that, but, uh, you know, doing that, so it's a good parent, that's, that's my kind of, I think, favorite parent, but, uh, you know, Rebecca, next time we're sending emails late at night, I'll think of you drinking a mezcal fast and you can think of me with it.

Tim Winkler: 00:10:56

Just sitting there, make it stop. strong, strong, uh, alcohol showing on this round, guys. I, that's, uh, kudos to everyone. Uh, John, what is the, um, what's your, the last meal that you cooked? What, what, what were you cooking?

Jon Kondo: 00:11:09

Geez. What is the last meal I cook? We've been, you know, I barbecue a lot. Uh, just this week, what did I make it? Uh, and then this week I did a, uh, I did a. Cause it was during the week meal, so I had to do it pretty quick with salmon, um, you know, made some homemade Mongolian barbecue sauce, marinated that, seared on both sides and then put in the oven for a little bit and stuff that came out really well. So no cocktail sauce. No cocktail

Tim Winkler: 00:11:36

sauce. The cocktail sauce. Save it for the shrimp. I do

Jon Kondo: 00:11:40

love cocktail sauce and I love really fresh, good horseradish. But I'm not sure about the ketchup and horseradish. Yeah, ketchup and

Mike Gruen: 00:11:46

horseradish. I'm not, I didn't, that's not, anyway. But we can move on.

Tim Winkler: 00:11:51

I mean, that's how cocktails made, but. I know it is, but you know. Can't have one without the other. It's just when you say ketchup, it just, you know. I know. It actually used to be a punishment. Uh, when we were kids, we would, you know, you lose, you have to eat a spoonful of ketchup. It's a punishment still. It's torturish. All right, moving on. Um, let's get to the heart of the discussion here. So this is how I kind of envision the conversation flowing. Uh, I'd like to have like each of you just kind of give a brief breakdown of your, of your companies. John, I'll actually start with you just to hear a little bit more about the product you're building at, at heavy. ai, the mission, some of the types of customers that your technology is serving, then we'll pass it over to you, Rebecca, to shed some light on how decode capital operates and then from there, I'll just have you just go straight into how. Heavy AI was introduced, um, you know, went going through the decodes program. Um, and then we can kind of riff from there. So John, why don't you begin and just, you know, hear, hear, hear a little bit more about, you know, what, what you guys are doing over there at heavy. ai. Sure.

Jon Kondo: 00:12:55

Happy to. And, and I think, you know, one of the things that I think is always an interesting story is how we were founded. Uh, and I, and I like to start there and then I'll talk a little bit about what we're doing currently and stuff. But Todd Mosack, who's our founder, uh, and now our CTO Todd, uh, was uh, one of those brilliant minds in the world that was, uh, running his dissertation at Harvard on the influence of social media on the Arab Springs. Not necessarily a traditional place to start a database company, but when harvested, this is about 10 years ago, when harvested, you know, hundreds of millions of tweets that were in most of them are geolocated trying to do analysis on those. And as he loaded it up, found that everything he loaded that much data into just came to a screeching halt and thought. You know, so in his spare time, I thought, Hey, maybe I can write a program to do this, spend some time, had a little bit of background starting to start hanging out with MIT computer lab. They said, people started to see it. They said, geez, if you can do this, you know, what can you do? And his, his notion then was, you know, which today looks very obvious, but back then was to use GPUs. And if you think back 10 years. I go, GPOs are really thinking of just really for gaming, right? And not for analytics or certainly not for AI and what it is today. So, you know, fast forward, what we've developed is a GPU accelerated platform that helps people do in primarily geospatial types of analysis, but it's where there is. You know, there's a few critical things that come to mind, right? You have to have a moment, you know, you have to be able to make a decision within a time period. So many of our applications are, we need to make a decision. We have an impending deadline, whatever that is. There's, you know, some investment needs to be made or decision. You know, a mission critical decision that needs to be made and we have to do as much analysis as we can, but that decision can't be put off. Right? And so to be able to take as much data, different types of data, often geospatial data, satellite, LIDAR, things along those lines. Bring that together and be able to get quick answers doing that quickly has allowed us to be really successfully in some of the big heavy industry. So you think about telecommunications when you're looking at, you know, uh, call records and such. And there's billions of those and looking at where you have network issues and stuff. We're thinking about where to put your next power to improve service. Um, you've got things in the federal government that are looking a lot of geo intelligence and stuff in the intelligence community and such seeing some, you know, great use cases in the energy space, oil and gas and renewables and such. So there's. You know, where there's big data sets, lots of different types of data and decisions that have a window in which they need to be made, you know, we do

Tim Winkler: 00:15:29

really well there. Yeah. Very interesting. Yeah. It certainly seems like a lot of use cases popping up, um, with the innovations happening in space tech, right? You know, a lot more satellites being shot out. Uh, into orbit and, um, you know, the amount of data that's being aggregated as a result of that, certainly,

Jon Kondo: 00:15:50

as you know, there's all kinds of stats, but it just shows that, you know, we always talked about forever more is law, right? The doubling of compute power. Now you look at it and your data is quadrupling almost every month, right? The amount of data being collected. You know, if you think about the amount of video streaming that is collected, or just all the types of data, you know, not getting into all the privacy issues and all those things, but just satellites, right? You look at the stats are incredible. The number of satellites that are being launched and then your ability to intake that ingested, analyze it, make decisions. You know, and that's where we do really well is we help you do that really fast.

Mike Gruen: 00:16:26

Yeah. It's interesting the, um, that you say that cause like the, I was at a talk a while ago. Uh, it was, um, it was an ISP, essentially the provider to, to our, um, to part of the campus, whatever, talking about like the large amount of data that they're pushing through their networks and how they needed data science and scientists to actually start looking at the network trap. Like they're like the things that you guys are doing, you guys are all, these are huge scientific. Projects it's billions of, of records traveling over our network. If you got, you know, the data, data generates, generates data type of concept of like, now we just need you guys to also apply some of that same stuff to some of the network stuff that we're doing just to figure out how we can optimize and there's just so much. Um, and it's funny, the Moore's law aspect of it as well, where data just keeps generating more data, which generates other data and so on and so forth. So

Jon Kondo: 00:17:12

cool. Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's just, it's a growing problem, right?

Tim Winkler: 00:17:17

Yeah. Well, I'd love to expand more on, on how, you know, decode and, and, uh, heavy. ai is kind of led more down this, this pathway for national security and defense customers. So before we talk about that, Rebecca, yeah, let's, let's hear a little bit more about, you know, what, what's going on at decode capital. And then you can kind of just segue that right into, you know, how you got introduced with heavy. ai.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:17:41

Yeah, sure. Happy to. So, um, do you go capital? Our tagline is that we're the VC firm that knows federal. So that is the space that we plan. And we invest in, um, what's called dual use companies. So, companies that have large plays in the private sector that want to either launch or expand into the Fed market. Um. So our, our thesis there is, you know, the U S government should really stop paying some of the large primes to rebuild what already exists in the private sector, um, just fix your acquisition processes and, and how you're engaging and take advantage of the tech that's better and already out there, um, you know, particularly in the very innovative startup space that the U S has. So, um, that's where we invest. We invest at the growth stage, I should say. So we're at the late A to C range. Um, and then we actually launched the fund from an advisory firm that we've been running for about 7 years. And that's how we worked with with heavy. Um, so the advisory firm, it's, uh, you can think about it as a dual facing marketplace. So, on 1 side of the firm, we work directly with the federal government. So we have contracts with. Primarily, though, we are government wide, and we're providing them training and advisory services on how to find and contract with innovative companies like heavy. So we've trained now about 1600 people across the. And a lot of times people would think, well, why is an outside company training the government on their own acquisition processes? But. Um, it's pretty complex stuff, and that's what I don't specialize in it, but the team does. And so we help the government, you know, figure themselves out to be able to engage with companies like heavy. And then on the other side of the business, we work directly with tech companies. So. Um, we've worked with about 160 over the years, and what we're doing is sort of teaching the fundamentals of the federal market. And making sure that companies, once they decide they want to go into federal, well, 1st, we help them decide if they even want to do it because it's painful. Um, and then once they decide that they want to do it, what we try to do is. Equip them with the knowledge and know how they need to actually stay in the market, be successful and hit revenue faster than if they were just sort of doing it. Um, on their own. Um, the, we actually, the, the founder story from the advisory firm, I just think it's cool. It's super fast. My partner, um, serial entrepreneur herself, always in the GovCon, GovContracting space, GovCon space. And she wrote an email to all the big VC firms in Silicon Valley and said, um, I can help your portfolio companies figure out the federal market. Are you interested? And she got like a 40, 40 or 60, which 1 it is percent hit rate. Um, and she launched the company from there because there was such. Everybody knows that the Fed market is big. It's sticky. There's a lot of money there, but it's also pretty opaque and pretty hard. And so, um, that's how we were, we're founded. So we found heavy, um, back in 2018. So we've been working together for a while. Um, so back in 2018, the way the decode program worked back in the day, it's different now, but back in the day, what we did is we took applications. Um, for classes, we ran classes 4 times a year, um, around specific tech areas, and then each class was about 2 month long, 2 months long. And during those, you know, classes, there were 2 in person weeks in DC, but otherwise it was, you know, virtual, virtual learning and, um, us providing a lot of, um, you know, instruction on all the different aspects of the market, marketing, pricing, use case mapping. All the different contract vehicles, things like that so heavy had applied to the program. And then my partner, Megan actually went out to California to get a demo of the tool. I'm sort of blown away. Um, at what they were able to do, but also, you know, our perspective is always okay. This technology is really cool. We can see the private sector use cases, but can the government use it? Um, and it was huge to be able to see. The sheer amount of data that they were able to manipulate and inside the government. It's actually illegal for them to erase data. So it is a growing and continually growing problem for them to be able to analyze the data sets that they are constantly ingesting. So it was a very clear fit between what heavy was doing in the private sector and what they could do in the government. So it was a pretty easy decision on our part that we wanted them in the program. So then, um, there were some personnel changes that happened in the interim. And so eventually when they joined the program, they had a really phenomenal fed salesperson, um, who we loved working with. And we just really started the relationship from there. Um, and then I personally had worked with heavy separately. I had worked with In Q Tel for a bit. Um, and In Q Tel is the venture capital arm of the intelligence community. And so I had been working with them and had seen the amazing things that Heavy could do. Um, again, working within the IC. And so it was a pretty easy decision for us to see the value. And then it was, you know, Heavy clearly saw the value of getting into the Fed market. So it was pretty much a great match. Yeah, that's

Tim Winkler: 00:22:34

really interesting. So it's, I'm curious on your, your background. Um, what, what were you doing before decode capital?

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:22:42

Yeah, sure. So, um, I was in the government actually. So I was at the CIA for about 13 years. Um, within the CIA, I primarily worked in counterterrorism. So, um, I was working on Taliban, Al Qaeda issues in Afghanistan. Pakistan, um, did that for several years. Went out to Afghanistan a few times, and then I worked a bit with the Israeli Mossad on some other terrorist groups. They were most interested in and, um, really the way that I describe it to people is that I was the end user of what is theoretically the best tech in government. Right? So this is post 9 11. A lot of the government budgets were going toward the counterterrorism mission and the use cases. There are really finding a needle in a haystack. So you're, you're inundated with information gathered from across the intelligence community agencies, whether it be N. S. A. N. G. A. So N. S. A. to cell phones and G. A. does geospatial overhead. Um, so you're, you're gathering all this kind of data and you have to find the bad people in that data. And so, um, the tools that, that we were able to, that the tools that we had were honestly not that great. Um, and so then I, when I left, I did that for about 10 years and then decided to go over and work with In Q Tel, um, because what they were doing was going out to find the best technologies. And I wasn't alone at CIA with having these problems right across the intelligence community. People are struggling to manipulate data sets. And manage significant data overload and try to derive insights from it. And so working with you tell, for those 2 and a half years was fascinating to be able to see all the tools that were out there in the private sector that we're doing similar things. And the parallel use cases, whether the use cases in. The financial sector or the telecommunications sector was a similar use case. It was just different data sets. And so working with and seeing what heavy could do is sort of mind blowing. And then when I ultimately joined decode, heavy had joined decode as well. So, for me, personally, I had been able to work with heavy when they were with and then also when they were, um, with decode. So able to see, to work with them both places and has been super rewarding.

Tim Winkler: 00:24:48

Yeah, really neat. How that's all kind of, how that all kind of came about and are connected, uh, through some past lives there. But, um, so I am curious, like, um, you know, when we first connected, you, you kind of pointed out like, you know, we're not. I don't know. We're not like an accelerator. Um, you know, we're not like a, not like a Y combinator or something here. Um, and just kind of like pulling on that thread a little bit, because I want to just kind of expand a little bit more on, you know, how decode capital, uh, and your consulting arm or advisory arm is unique. So do you all have a certain number of companies? Like, do you have like a, you know, a cohort or is it kind of hand selecting one? By one and giving this kind of like white glove experience, uh, per engagement.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:25:30

Yeah. So we've, we've iterated over the years in terms of how we provide that support. And the driver for us is, you know, from a business perspective, um, you know, we wanted to make sure it was scalable on our side, but more importantly, we wanted to lower the barrier to entry for tech companies. So when heavy came through the program, it was, um, classes four times a year, eight week intensive sort of stuff. Um, and. Now what we've what we've and it was more expensive, quite frankly, it was probably 3 times more expensive than what it is now. No more than that. 4 times. I can do math. I can do math. It's 40. It was 4 times more expensive than what it is

Tim Winkler: 00:26:05

now. So, just to expand on that, we don't talk specifics of the numbers, but you charge you charge these companies a fee to to get that advisory.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:26:14

Okay, exactly. And so what we're doing is and that's why you. Whenever people try to call us an accelerator, I would try to correct it because when people hear accelerator, they think you're taking investment rights. You're taking equity in return and your early stage. And that's not what we're doing. So we are a fee for service model. We don't require an equity or investment rights. Um, when I was working with tell. You know, they require investment rights to work with them. And for a variety of reasons, companies at any given time might not be raising, or it might not be the right transaction for them. And so we would miss out on working with really great companies and we didn't want to replicate that at decode. So it's always been a fee for service model and then it's not necessarily early stage. You know, the companies that we work with, like heavy have solid product market fit in the private sector, because what they're trying to do is expand into a different market. So we're experts on the market. We're not requiring companies to give up equity and we're not requiring any sort of modifications to technology to be in order to work in the government. We're trying to take the companies where they are. So where the pro so the program was more intensive and a little bit more expensive. Previously, where we are now. We really wanted to, um, again, like lower the hurdle to work with us. So we now have a bootcamp that we run quarterly because that just makes sense for staffing for us to know it repetitively where it's going. Um, but we run a bootcamp that's, um, about an hour or 2 per week. And it's 8 weeks long and each week covers the fundamentals of the Fed market. So again, that marketing pricing, use case mapping, budget. All the different contract vehicles, and then we have an online platform. So we're always sticky with these companies if they ever need help. We're there. Um, it's full of vendors as well. So if they need a proposal writer, compliance experts, or anything like that, you might need for the Fed network or for the Fed market. It's sort of at your fingertips. And then we have events twice per month, and companies can go to that in perpetuity. And those events are hour long sessions with the Air Force or the Navy, where they come in and they talk about different opportunities that are great for companies. And so the price point for that is pretty inexpensive. Um, and then it's, you know, as many seats as the company want wants for 1 price. So, um, we're trying to hit as many companies as we can that that models ultimately more scalable for us. And honestly, more beneficial for for tech companies at their earlier stage. Inexpensive cost to figure out, do I really want to go into the Fed market before I make some very expensive mistakes, hiring a lobbyist, hiring sales people before you need to. And if you're a growth stage company, you know, a CRO or VP of sales trying to figure out why is my fed sales team telling me what they're telling me? Um, I don't quite understand the market. So that's really where we're trying to help the most companies we can. I think one of the

Mike Gruen: 00:28:53

other things I worked at 2 companies that got In Q Tel investment. Um, and one of the things I saw was sort of this, like, it was great. It opened some doors. I'm not going to say that, like, it wasn't. beneficial in some ways, but at the same time, some of the doors they opened, it was like us just trying to fit a square peg in a round hole or, you know, whatever was like, great, we have this introduction. We have like, there was just this pressure on us to do these things because of the In Q Tel relationship and how we got into the IC and other things. And. I think it took us off mission. I think it, it sort of took us from, like, you know, we had this product that has a commercial use, it has a government use and it sort of bifurcated those things in some cases, because we were sort of being pushed by In Q Tel into, into areas that maybe weren't the best, you know, for our product or for where we wanted to take it. So I really liked that fee for, you know, that the model that you guys have. Um,

Tim Winkler: 00:29:47

interesting. So I, you know, I understand too, though, you know, you all partner with venture capital, right? So there's this strategic partnership that comes into play where if that's from a lead source, um, you know, they generating, you know, deals and leads, um, or is there an actual You know, financial piece to, uh, what decode capital is doing that is helping with maybe, you know, really earlier stage companies that could use a little bit of a, you know, a check or something is that, is that something that is cafeteria style or it gets brought up on occasion, or it sounds like it wasn't applicable for heavy dot AI, but I'm just generally curious on how that partnership with the VCs work.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:30:30

Yeah. So we, we only launched the fund a couple of years ago. So companies that have been going through the program again would come in for fee for service. But ultimately what happened was a number of companies would ask us for investment because they wanted that federal expertise on their cap table. Um, as a board observer, you know, they wanted that kind of help and we didn't have any money. So we grew out an angel network partnered with a couple of VCs to invest in a few companies that had been through the program. So we made 6 investments, um, pre fund before we decided to go ahead and launch a fund and it got it that exact problem, right? Like companies were coming through. They really wanted, they really wanted, um, to give us equity, obviously in return for money. So, um, we tested, we tested those waters and then ultimately decided to launch our own fund. So, you know, we've been running as an advisory firm for about 8 years and the fund is only the past 2 years. So now what we do is, um, we are investing our own money now into companies that we have known through, um, the advisory firm or actually we recently invested in a company that has not gone through the firm, but it's going through now. And so heavy, we actually made an investment and we were Super thrilled to do that. Um, love what they're doing. Love the team. Obviously, that's why john and I are here. Um, we've been friends for a while. And so now decode. So companies go through decode, they're in the pipeline for decode capital. It's not a given. It's not a requirement. It's not, you know, it's it's We make a bet on ourselves that will be enough value adds of the companies that they will want us to invest. Um, and I'm always very upfront and honest with companies that if they're joining our bootcamp, a decode capital investment is not a given. We've invested in, um, 10 companies over our lifespan and 160 have gone through the program. So where are you really using it as an opportunity to invest in, in great companies and continue to support them, particularly the ones like heavy, where we're able to help them win government contracts. They've got solid. Product market fit in both sectors. And it just, it made financial sense to us and to them, um, to increase the partnership that way.

Tim Winkler: 00:32:34

Very, very interesting, very unique. I haven't heard much, much like it, uh, out there in the market and John, I'd love to hear your, and your two thoughts, uh, your two cents on this as well as somebody that's kind of been a part of the program and worked closely with decode capital and, um, you know, after maybe graduating from the program, right. What, what, what did you, what did you see as a, you know, a value add, you know, going through it and then like even post program, like what are, what are you still seeing from it today?

Jon Kondo: 00:33:02

Yeah, it's interesting. So, as I mentioned up front, you know, I've been on board for about 2 and a half. Uh, I guess a little more than that. Now, it seems like it goes by fast. Um, and, uh, you know, when I came in, I had, you know, I'd run other companies and such, and I'd had some federal experience. And so this was obviously, uh, or this company had the deepest relationships in the, in the IC community of any company. And so there was a lot more. Yeah. Intricacies to, uh, you know, working with that because I don't have clearances, so I can only, you know, I get told what my team tells me and such. And so to Rebecca's point, sometimes, you know, you're like, so why are they telling me this? And what are these things? And you learn a lot about 3, 3 letter acronyms and. But I think 1 of the things that was super refreshing from decode, I got introduced, you know, as kind of my early introduction is joining the company to run the company. And Todd had done a great job running the company, they had gone through the program, you know, our head of federal at the time, uh, you know, spoke super highly of decode and such and things. And, you know, candidly, we've gotten a couple successful contracts, you know, with the reference through through decode. So, um, and I think what's developed and I think what ultimately led to us, you know, taking the investment and them investing us was. That building relationship. And I think that's what you want to call it an accelerator or be on a call, you know, and it's not an accelerator as the cure definition, but one of those where you're going and learning, you know, as a small, uh, as a small technology company, the most valuable resource, you know, obviously cash is super important, but it's time, right. And it's, it's, it's focused. Uh, we don't have a ton of time or resources to, you know, spread thin. So you want to do that. So being able to have somebody that you can call. And, you know, I talked to Rebecca, her 2 partners all the time and, you know, about, hey, what do you guys think about this? Or this is what happened. You know, we got. Um, you know, quite candidly, we got kicked in the shins a little bit this year with a surprise. They were great. Right? They were great on. Hey, here's how we should think about it. Here's what we're going to do it. And thanks. And so they're a great sounding board because you're talking to people who understand the space. You know, I can talk to. I have a, uh, I have a great strong board of directors, big institutional VCs and such, and they're great. When it comes to federal stuff, you know, Rebecca and team are who I call. We just, uh. You know, how to transition in our, in our federal leadership, they were part of the interview team and a big part of that. So, um, I think it's, it's, you know, 1 of the things that I would say to any of the companies that have either are going through or gone through is. Leverage that network leverage the network that the code brings to you and stuff like that. You have to invest in it. Right, I mean, I think that it's something, but the federal piece is an important part of our business. Uh, we're excited about what the prospects are. We're finally getting to some. A couple of programs, some really strong maturity where we're going to move to. Program a record on a couple of things and such, and when you do that, you really get instantiated. Um, but, uh, you know, having the help of going, okay, so what, what they're asking us to do this, they're asking us to do this, and there's this term and what's it mean? And all those things that having that help is, is super important. Yeah, I think, uh, it's kind of funny to talk to every now and then.

Tim Winkler: 00:36:25

So, yeah, that's really what you're paying the fee for really is a little comic relief when you get kicked in the shins. And a lot of companies got kicked in the shins this year. And, you know, when you think about, I love the point you make about time. Yeah. Because the amount of time it takes to tap into a market like the Fed space, if you're not familiar with it, um, you know, it's, it's, it's very important to have some realistic expectations of what it's going to take to, to start to seize.

Jon Kondo: 00:36:52

Yeah, sorry, but the other thing too, is it's re if you apply a commercial mindset to the federal space. You will wind up driving yourself crazy, uh, just because you're like, look, they used our stuff. They, they, they accomplished a really important mission critical thing. They can't not use this. Why aren't they buying it? Right. I mean, it's like you guys cure cancer with our stuff, but yet, oh, you're, you didn't pass, you know, this score on this thing. And so it can really, like, it can drive you nuts. And to have somebody that's like, calm, this is normal. You're not the only person that this has happened to. This is, you know, here's what you got to do. Yes. The fact that you have that strong omission case will help you get through all of that stuff. But doing that, but having, you know, and I think those, especially that have started in commercial going to federal, I can't tell you how valuable

Tim Winkler: 00:37:55

that is. Yeah, that's, that's well said. And, um, you know, one of the things that's fascinating or interesting about the program, Rebecca is like the, the events, uh, because for folks that maybe aren't familiar with how a lot of business is done in defense or, um, areas of, of, you know, DOD is, you know, these events are very important to meet folks, uh, in person, shake hands, like this is, you know, sometimes a little bit of an old school style of how business is done. And Very, it could be very different from commercials. So the fact that you all are facilitating this meet and greet scenario where it's like, Hey, here's, here's folks from, from Navy. Here's folks from the army. I think it's really, uh, uh, a really smart move. Um, but I am curious too, cause you know, we, we also deal a lot with recruiting, um, as a part of our, our business. And it seems like an organic almost add on for you all, uh, as a way to, you know, Help with the break into the federal space for folks that maybe don't have that federal person intact just yet. Have you ever helped in other areas of like operations of it be like? Staffing, recruiting, uh, you know, in, in injecting, you know, uh, actual, like human capital to help them break in because, you know, this person is well plugged into X, Y, Z agencies.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:39:18

Yeah, for sure. I mean, one of the. One of the things that I, you know, the reason, one of the reasons that I decided to jump from the government to work for decode is because of the mission that was still there. Like, that was still very important to me to, to fix the government, to make sure, you know, I still had to focus on national security. And one of the best ways to get the government to use something is to introduce them to other people in the government who are using it. So it's a much better sale if you can get 2 different agencies to talk to each other about how they're using a particular product. And this is 1 of the ways that we were able to get heavy. Some additional contracts across the government. Because they had so many champions in other agencies that were willing to say, oh, my gosh, this tool is amazing is helping us do stuff. We would not be able to do otherwise. And so from a, from a human capital perspective, what we, what we've been able to do is. Leverage the relationships that you're talking about across the D O D. So across the Navy to the air force, and then over, you know, to DHS to say, Hey, this is how this, this group is using heavy. Here's how you could be using it too. Let's connect you guys and then bring heavy in after that. So we do that. We also, you know, as John mentioned, we helped him with his interview process for his fed salesperson. Um, we see a lot of fed salespeople. There's a lot of good ones. There's a lot of bad ones. Um, and so your debt, there's definitely certain things that you look for and certain answers you look for. Um, and then, you know, we had a, this is this did not happen to happen to heavy. This is a horror story from another company. But, um, we ended up, we invested in the company, but after they went through this, so they were going after a contract with the air force and the air force has certain rules around ownership. In order to qualify for certain contracts, so how much what percentage of your company is owned by VCs and the company closed on an investment round 2 days before they were going to be awarded millions of dollars from the Air Force that they were now no longer able to get because the ownership structure of the company changed 2 days before they were going to sign this Air Force contract. Hey, you know, the Fed sales guys, you know, that's a lot of money for him that he was going to get in variable comp that he just lost. Um, and so, you know, he was, can you please talk to my C suite, help them to understand this, talk to the board. You know, there is some significant. There are significant effects on. Um, revenue and, and how you go after the Fed market with decisions that you're making solely in the private sector. Um, when you're thinking about your private sector business, so we, we, we try to help with those things as well. You know, if you make a decision to move to a purely SAS product, this is what will happen to your gov contracts. You know, there's all sorts of things that that companies don't think about because they haven't had to, um, with what happens in the Fed space.

Tim Winkler: 00:41:58

I'm, I'm curious about like from an acceptance rate of, you know, you all, you know, wanting to, you know, to collaborate or partner with a company that's, you know, looking to, to go through the decode, uh, capital program is, um, do you turn away a lot of, a lot of companies, I mean, I, that, that think they have this as Dual use, uh, scenario, but you know, you're, you're going to save them a lot of time by not going down that path. Or, you know, I'd imagine like a little bit differently. It's a, it's a, you know, paid for service, you know? So I'm just curious to know like how much work you're trying to turn it away. And the truth of like, this is really not going to be a good path for you.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:42:36

Yeah, and this, this honestly gets to how we iterated the business. So when heavy went through the program, um, it was a competitive application process. So, um, we selected heavy because they were so amazing at what they do, um, where we are now. What we, with the, the bootcamp that we have, what we're trying to hit is as many companies as we possibly can. So we're not turn. And 1 of the use cases that we want companies to have when they come to us is. Do I want to get into the Fed market at all? So, I mean, I'll talk numbers because it's relevant for this conversation. But the price for our bootcamp is 9500 dollars. So that's a very inexpensive way for companies to figure out. I'm thinking about the Fed market. Do I really want to go into it? Should I hire? You know, somebody who recently left the government and retired and is claiming to have a good Rolodex short answer is no, do not do that. Um, but, uh, you know, what, what do I do? And so we want them come to us. As long as you're a product company, we don't do services. As long as you're a product company, come to us, take the bootcamp. It's inexpensive. And then you can make an informed decision on what you do next and who you hire next.

Tim Winkler: 00:43:38

That's awesome. That's great. Yeah. That, that 9, 500 is a drop in the bucket compared to what you'd be spending on your opportunity costs of figuring it all out. Like, Oh, we're the wrong person. I,

Mike Gruen: 00:43:50

the whole, Oh, this person has a good Rolodex. That's a very common, terrible mistake.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:43:58

Or hiring a lobbyist immediately. Like that, that's not how you get, that's not how you make sales, right?

Tim Winkler: 00:44:03

Yeah, well, that's great. I, I appreciate the, um, you know, just kind of like that guiding light, uh, mentality because, you know, a lot of folks would just, you know, take the money to take the money. Right. Um, you're really trying to make sure it's a good fit. And, uh, for that reason, it's, you know, it's priced the way it is, but it's also, um, You know, it's not, it's not forced on them. It's not, you know, opt in kind of course. Um, so yeah, that's great. Um, I guess, uh, just kind of putting a bow on the conversation before we transitioned to our final final segment, any, um, any closing remarks or advice that you have for those companies out there, Rebecca, that are looking to maybe make that leap in, you know, some things that those, those leadership teams might. Want to ask themselves to, to see if it makes sense, uh, or to, to consider, you know, uh, a program like decode capitals.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:44:54

Yeah. I mean, I would say if you, if you were, if you want to go directly into the government space and that's going to be your prime customer, then, then you make that decision. If you want to be a dual use company, build your company in the private sector first, build it, get the money, get good customers, build it there. And then if you can do something creative and lightweight in the government, which is going to be rare, there's a couple of programs inside DOD where you can, but make sure it's in line with what you want to do in the private sector. But we tend to tell companies if you're launching a company, if you're early stage, Figure it out in the private sector 1st, because you're more likely to survive than if you go after a Fed contract too early in your in your lifespan. Um, that's

Tim Winkler: 00:45:31

what I'd recommend. Very nice. And then John, I guess, you know, without getting too specific, but any exciting, uh, you know, avenues that you all are, are channeling going into defense or national security in, in 2024 that you want to share? Yeah, we're, we're

Jon Kondo: 00:45:48

excited about, uh, you know, the process we've had a couple. You know, I think, you know, Mike, you were talking about all the new satellites and things that are being launched. There's just tons of new sensors that are being deployed. Um, and, you know, we're part of some of those programs and the response we're getting is overwhelmingly positive. You know, the fact that, you know, they've been able to 1 of our, 1 of the. Our largest competitors, they were able to put a day's worth of data in and another 1, they could put a weeks in and ours, they can analyze over a year, right? In faster time. Right? So the fact that we're able to help do that, it's good. Uh, you know, it's delivering on the mission. And, you know, I think 1 of the things too, that I would say a couple of things that is, I think about the Fed space. Um, you know, to kind of tag on, uh, Rebecca is, you know, number one, believe you got to believe in the mission, by the way, because you need people who actually believe in the mission of what we're, what is trying to be done. The other thing is, you got to be patient. Uh, because it just it's 1 of those things that I wouldn't build a business plan built on. Okay. We're going to get this deal by this time by these things. You have to look at it and say, yes, we will make an incremental. And by the way, you're going to get early indications. You'll get put on to a research contract. You know, we've made it still got to find a home. So there's a lot of things that need to happen, but it can be a really fulfilling. Um, it can be a really fulfilling piece of business. And, you know, I think it's, it's dual uses the right way to go. Um, but to Rebecca's point, go build your private stuff 1st, your commercial stuff 1st, and then go do that.

Tim Winkler: 00:47:27

Yeah, no doubt. I mean, it's, it's an area that we are seeing more and more of. Uh, it's just, it's a smart, if, if there's a play there, it's very smart to diversify. Um, and in today's market, it's extremely tough to, to raise capital right now. Um, and call it what it is, you know, in times like this, when there's instability, people lean into stable verticals. Um, Maybe, you know, it doesn't always seem like it from the outside in, but the the government's got a lot of money to spend. Uh, he does. There's, when they spend, they spend and there, and there's a, a clear call to, to a need to revamp our defense. And, you know, in, in today's time, when, when, when war is sadly prevalent. So, um, certainly a need for, you know, the heavy do AI use case and, and certainly a, a need for, uh, what you, you all are doing at Decode Capital. So, uh, kudos to both you all and, um, let's, let's kind of wrap it up with some. Uh, rapid fire Q and a. So we're gonna, we're gonna switch to our, our last segment here called the five second scramble. Um, this is, you know, try to keep your answers within five seconds. If you don't, you know, you're not going to get, you know, the air horn boot. Um, but, um, you know, some, some business, some personal, we're not getting too personal here. Um, I'm going to start with, uh, you Rebecca, and then I'll jump to John. So are you, uh, you ready? Ready. Okay. Okay. What would you say is unique about the culture at Decode

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:48:51

Capital? Um, there's a significant focus on having fun. If you check out our website, everybody had to put up gifts underneath their photos, and it's actually hilarious how well it matches up with people's personality. It's amazing. I was actually looking at it last night. Because all the new people join and they have to pick one, and it's really great. That's

Tim Winkler: 00:49:08

so good. I mean, gifs is a can't, can't lose scenario. Everybody's got something that's a little worried. Is it gif? Is

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:49:14

it gif? I don't know what you guys

Tim Winkler: 00:49:15

gif. I go gif. I go gif. But yeah,

Mike Gruen: 00:49:18

I know what the owner or the inventor wants, but I don't care.

Tim Winkler: 00:49:22

John. John, you need to settle this. gif. Gif

Jon Kondo: 00:49:25

I. I go. But that's, you know, I.

Tim Winkler: 00:49:35

All right, moving on. So, uh, what can folks be most excited about with decode capital heading into 2024

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:49:42

more investments? We're excited. Um, you know, we've raised more money and we are excited to be deploying it into. Uh, great companies, and then I personally am very excited to continue helping heavy out with, uh, some of the work that they're doing in the I. C. it is. Beyond pool and super rewarding.

Tim Winkler: 00:49:59

Uh, morning routine. So what, what's the first thing that you do when you wake up?

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:50:04

Are we still on me? Or is we, when, when do we go to John?

Tim Winkler: 00:50:06

After you've got, you've got 10 questions. So you've got, yeah, you've got, you're on your third.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:50:12

Uh, first thing I do, I mean, after like going to the bathroom, I walk the dog. Yeah.

Tim Winkler: 00:50:19

Um, what, uh, aside from your phone, what's one tech gadget that you can't

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:50:24

live without? Honestly, that's it. So my husband kept trying to get me to wear the Apple watch and I cannot do all the notifications. I just can't. Deal with it. I don't watch a ton of TV. Um, I would like to throw my laptop out the window most of the time. So I'm not a big, I know I'm in BC and I should say I'm a big tech person, but

Tim Winkler: 00:50:44

yeah. I love that answer. That's the same way. I'm, I'm anti, uh, Apple watch as well. Just get me away from the notifications. Don't boost them. Uh, you rather work from home or in the office. Um,

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:50:58

just had a conversation about this in the office, but in the office as office culture was pre COVID post office culture is tough because nobody's actually there. People are in and out. But I loved because at the CIA, you have to be in the office, right? There's no option. Otherwise you're you get arrested. So if you're looking at classified information outside the office, you have a large problem on your hands. Um, love, love and office culture pre COVID.

Tim Winkler: 00:51:23

Yeah, that's a good, good answer. Uh, what is a charity or a corporate philanthropy that's near and dear to you?

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:51:30

Uh, my in laws, uh, helped found, uh, puppies behind bars. Um, very cool organization where they use, um, inmates to train. Uh, dogs that then become, uh, seeing eye dogs or bomb sniffing dogs. And actually when I was in Afghanistan, one of the dogs that they trained, um, was actually at the gate sniffing for bombs. So it was a cool, very full circle kind of moment.

Tim Winkler: 00:51:52

Very neat. What does your go to dessert?

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:51:56

Anything chocolate, anything that's not chocolate is not dessert.

Tim Winkler: 00:52:02

Do you have a favorite quick stress relief activity?

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:52:09

Going for a walk. So that whatever I'm about to write doesn't actually get sent.

Tim Winkler: 00:52:14

Mixed with the mezcal margarita afterwards. If you could time travel, which period would you want to visit first? Can I go

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:52:25

to the future? Yeah. Yeah. That's where I would go. I would go to wherever Star Trek, the next generation took place.

Tim Winkler: 00:52:31

Oh, very nice. And then last question. What's one thing that's on your bucket

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:52:36

list? Oh, I try not to think like that because otherwise, why am I not doing it now?

Tim Winkler: 00:52:43

Well played. Well, you just flipped that question on his head. Awesome. All right. You, you are all through John. Uh, you're up. Are you ready? All right. Sure. All right. Um, explain heavy, a heavy. ai to me as if I were a five year old.

Jon Kondo: 00:53:04

If you want to find a needle in a haystack and the haystack is an immense assortment of hay. Or geospatial data, customer data, all those kinds of things. We help you find it. What's your favorite

Tim Winkler: 00:53:16

part about the culture at heavy. ai?

Jon Kondo: 00:53:20

Um, it is an amazing amount. Everyone that's here has an amazing amount of grit. And I think the other thing that's kind of cool is they're all a bunch of geospatial, uh, just

Tim Winkler: 00:53:30

freaks. We kind of touched on this earlier, but what, what can folks be most excited about for, um, heavy. ai going into 2024?

Jon Kondo: 00:53:42

I think the product continues to evolve and I think more importantly, the product and us understanding where it fits in the world, both in the commercial sector and in the public sector is really coming into focus. And I think what I look at next year is our ability to then really go expose that expose that fit. And have people see it, you know, I think our issue has been, um, it took a while for people to see and have that. Oh, my moment. Um, we, we call it something else internally, but, uh, the, uh, the old what moment, you know, and now we want to be able to have that to be a much broader, uh, so people see that. Yeah,

Tim Winkler: 00:54:22

I mean, this is an R rated show. You can say, oh, shit, if you want to, but we'll, we'll, we'll take, oh, my, we'll take the, oh, my moment. Um, yes or no to pineapple on pizza. No. Oh, Rebecca disagrees. Um, what's the last, what's the last, um, uh, video movie, uh, series that you binge watched?

Jon Kondo: 00:54:48

Uh, so I just totally unexpected, but all I had was my phone and all I'd had on it was Apple TV. So I, and all that was available was slow horses. It's, uh, it's kind of this, and I watched the first season and of course our flight from, as it always is from Dallas to San Francisco, boarded on time, going to get in early, ended up being an hour and a half late. So that's the whole thing,

Tim Winkler: 00:55:15

right? So classic. Um, what's a charity or a corporate philanthropy that's near and dear to you? So,

Jon Kondo: 00:55:22

uh, one it's a local one and, and, you know, uh, sadly I had a ex founder. He, he just recently passed away, but he was retired. One of the things he did in his past time was the cost of the program, which was, I think court court appointed special advisor. What it does is it works with troubled youth and he did this and the success he had with his. Guys that he worked with was amazing. I mean, these guys were, you know, coming out of tough home situations, gang situations to the point now that, you know, they're being productive members of society. And so, uh, it's 1 of the things that. And sadly, he just passed in the last couple of months, um, unexpectedly. And so, you know, it's 1 of those things that I'll. Was this actually thinking today that I need to send my support for that?

Tim Winkler: 00:56:08

Cool. Yeah. Good way to honor them. Yeah. We'll, we'll have both of those one reason to the show notes as well. Both sound very, um, very neat. Uh, if you could have dinner with any tech icon past or present, who would it be with? Uh,

Jon Kondo: 00:56:27

that's a tough one. Um, I, I would probably say, uh, I would probably say Steve Jobs because I think it would be one of the most interesting, uh, just to see that mind work. I don't know that it'd be most pleasant dinner, but I think it'd be, I think it'd be a riveting dinner.

Tim Winkler: 00:56:46

Yeah, good answer. What's your favorite productivity hack?

Jon Kondo: 00:56:53

Uh, geez, uh, I think it is, uh, blocking out work time, right? It's just, you know, I will, I will purposely put blocks on my calendar that I know I'm going to just, I can put on, uh, if it's during the day, may not have a glass of bourbon, but if it's night, have some bourbon, but also it always has the music with it. Right. So, yeah,

Tim Winkler: 00:57:16

yeah. Well said. All right. One of my favorite questions. What is your, what is the worst fashion trend that you've ever followed?

Jon Kondo: 00:57:27

Uh, so this will date myself, but you know, in high school, there's pictures of me probably wearing a velour shirt. Nice.

Tim Winkler: 00:57:39

We got to get pictures of these. I honestly, Rebecca, what's your, what's yours? Everybody's got a good answer for this. I mean, there's usually something that really.

Rebecca Gevalt: 00:57:49

I mean. Nothing is immediately coming to mind, not because I don't have it, but you can submit a picture. I grew up in a very strict household. So there, I was not allowed to do the trends. And then by the time I got to college, I don't know, maybe those terrible, like, platform shoes. The platform slides, you know, the, the rocket

Tim Winkler: 00:58:11

dogs, you know, I'm just still picturing John in a velour shirt. It's really, really distracting. We're going to have to get a picture of this, John, uh, I

Jon Kondo: 00:58:23

do have an investor on the phone. So yeah,

Tim Winkler: 00:58:27

this immediately gets shut down by your PR team once the picture gets released. Um, all right, last one. What was your dream job as a kid? Um,

Jon Kondo: 00:58:41

yeah, I think I probably wanted to be an astronaut. Uh, my, my dad and I shared, uh, you know, he was a aerospace engineer his whole career. And, uh. So space was, you know, and, and I kind of grew up during the moons, the moonshot error and stuff. Right. And so, uh, that was one of the things that we all shared together. And so I think that was, uh, you know, one of the things that I think, um, you know, had you asked me

Tim Winkler: 00:59:06

then. Probably plays into why you're so passionate about, you know, working with a bunch of folks, you know, tackling geospatial challenges right now, too. So, you know,

Jon Kondo: 00:59:17

it's funny because I always, you know, not to get into a long philosophical, but, you know, career wise, you know, I wish I could say that every 1 of my moves has been planned for the next and for where I end up today. But I think if you look at the. The collection of experiences that kind of led to that, but I do think, you know, uh, not to get too gushy, but, you know, growing up in a house where my dad was in defense, you know, he's in the defense industry. That's what I was raised in and such. And, um. And, uh, I think it got me, it's why I'm passionate and really pleased that we have this federal, uh, practice because it is, there is an important part of, um, you know, what we do is private industry to help our country with national defense. And, you know, I, I don't wanna get into politics and people can argue that, but whether we like it or not, we need it. And Mm-Hmm. uh, you know, so, uh, I'm proud of that and I think that probably was instilled in some of my values growing up.

Tim Winkler: 01:00:12

Yeah. It's scratching that itch for you. And, and we're all about gushi on this show, so don't worry about, you know, show showing your emotions. Uh, we, we enjoy that. All right, that's a wrap. Y'all nailed it and uh, you know, that's all we got. So I just want to thank you again both for spending time with us and shedding light on, you know, how this relationship works. I think it's, it's one unique, unique use case and um, love the work that Decode Capital is doing. I, I think it's something that's super needed. Uh, just kind of knowing all the intricacies of tapping into the space here, so. Uh, appreciate that and, uh, appreciate you all. And, uh, thanks for spending time with us on the pod. Thanks. Thanks.