The Entrepreneurs

Firm Favourites

Intelligence gathering
What the UAE has planned for AI.

The UAE is not known for doing things by half measures. It usually goes after the next big thing with gusto, whether that’s importing the world’s biggest museums or investing in the metaverse. Today, however, the country is betting on the future being powered by artificial intelligence (AI). One plan for 2031 envisages generative AI as a way for this ambitious young nation to supercharge the provision of services for its citizens and become an economic hub for the technology.

Omar Sultan Al Olama is the world’s first dedicated government minister for AI. He compares the present moment to the invention of the Gutenberg printing press in the 15th century. He says that the Arab world was fearful of the disruptive new technology at the time and was subsequently left behind because of that.

By contrast, the UAE’s government has today wasted no time in buying up thousands of high-performance chips from US manufacturer Nvidia. These chips are the engine for resource-intensive AI language models. The question now is how all of that processing power can be tangibly put to the service of the people – and power the economy at the same time. At the centre of this is G42, an Abu Dhabi-headquartered holding company that has Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the country’s national security adviser, as its chairman.

With backing from sovereign wealth fund Mubadala, G42 has been on a charm offensive in Silicon Valley and Shenzhen, buying stakes in firms on the frontier of AI that have set up outposts or opened headquarters in the UAE. Among them is the Applied AI Company, which received $42m (€39.7m) in backing from sources including g42 as well as European funds. It creates intelligent processes that seek to eliminate much of the tedious back-end administration in insurance, healthcare and financial services (or “work”, as many of us used to call it).

“We often say that our tagline could be: ‘The world’s most boring AI company,’” says the Applied AI Company’s founder and CEO, Arya Bolurfrushan (pictured), a former Goldman Sachs banker. “But boring is where the value is.”

To get around concerns about how sensitive information is handled, Bolurfrushan’s firm keeps all of its data in the countries where it sells its services, while the engineers building the systems are based in Abu Dhabi.

With its global team, the Applied AI Company is progressing rapidly in its work and growing exponentially. “We are exporting AI out of the UAE and into the US and UK,” says Bolurfrushan.

Brewing success
Today’s coffee scene is full of beans.

A love of coffee runs deep in Arab culture and the beans have been perking people up in this part of the world since at least the 15th century. Unesco has bestowed Arabic coffee with Intangible Cultural Heritage status but its importance isn’t just historical.

A new wave of Emirati coffee businesses is fuelling the country’s entrepreneurial scene. Take, for example, Things Speciality Coffee & Concept Store in Abu Dhabi’s Khalifa City. Its founder, Sulaiman Khamis Alalawi, was the first Emirati winner of the UAE Cup Tasters Championship, a barista award. The Espresso Lab is another homegrown success story, with outposts in Abu Dhabi, Dubai’s Design District and a roastery in Al Quoz, among other places. The best of the rest include Orijins Café in Dubai and the UAE outpost of Grind.

Another native brand, Saddle, has even been exporting the UAE’s take on the black stuff to Cannes, while also mooting the opening of new sites in the UK and Saudi Arabia.

There’s an app for that

Investment in the digital economy in the uae is on the up and everyone has an idea for an app. The following are five favourites offering everything from cheaper meals (while taking a bite out of food waste) to recruitment – and even for refuelling your boats.

Cafu
Tank patrol
This uae-based start-up was founded by Rashid Al Ghurair in 2018 and specialises in on-demand fuel delivery. Its 210 trucks, carrying petrol or diesel, arrive at the click of a button, while the firm also offers car washing and other services, including the refuelling of boats at several marinas. There’s money in it too: Cafu’s daily revenue can exceed AED1m (€260,000).
cafu.com

Eduployment
Working better
Eduployment seeks to provide trade workers with skills to help them gain access to legitimate jobs and connect employers with the best labour in 16 countries across the world. The uae-based app helps economic migrants to learn English, matches them with trusted employers and eliminates potential recruitment fraud. More than 160,000 candidates spanning 190 nationalities have already registered.
eduployment.com

DarDoc
Healthy profits
Entrepreneurs Samer Masri and Keswin Suresh started DarDoc to help patients access healthcare from home. The pre-seed funding round of $600,000 (€568,000) is proof of the appetite for the app, which has already helped more than 4,000 patients. Services range from flu jabs to more serious procedures including dialysis.
dardoc.com

Zofeur
Key personnel
If you have ever needed to leave your car somewhere inconvenient after a drink or just felt too tired to drive, then you will appreciate Bunty Monani and Ishrath Hsamin’s app. Zofeur, which has more than 50,000 users in the uae, arranges for trusted chauffeurs to drive your vehicle wherever you want. Next stop? Expansion is now being planned into Saudi Arabia and Bahrain.
zofeur.com

BonApp
Taste, not waste
Every year in the uae, 3.27 million tonnes of food, worth more than AED13bn (€3bn), is binned or wasted. Dubai-based trio Erika Daintry, Malin Raman Delin and Alice Kaboli started BonApp in 2018 to help restaurants list unsold meals and spare produce at a discounted price. The firm has already moved into Abu Dhabi and aims to cut food waste in the uae.
#bonappuae

Hitting refresh
Slash design studio is bringing a clean, modern aesthetic to the UAE.

“In Portugal, I could well be designing logos for local butchers – but not here,” says Nuno Abreu, founder of Abu Dhabi-based design studio Slash. Abreu left Portugal in 2012 and brought his family, studio and staff with him. Slash began at a steady pace, working on branding projects for the likes of bike-maker Kingdom and Japanese furniture-maker Ishinomaki Laboratory.

“In the beginning, there was a lot of low-hanging fruit,” says Abreu. “Design could be a little gimmicky in the uae.” Today, however, he looks out at a city on the up. The studio’s recent move to a new office by the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque, reflects its growing reputation for clean, modern design. “We are Helvetica guys,” says Abreu. “It took time for that to catch on here but it chimes with the leadership’s ambitions,” he says of the government work that his studio now routinely advises on.

“Recently we launched the rebranding for local TV channels, radio, newspapers and magazines in Abu Dhabi,” says Abreu, as he peers over the collage of tabs on a designer’s screen. “The team can be a little stretched,” he says with a grin.

Next up, Slash has been charged with helping to find the right firm to design Abu Dhabi’s forthcoming national library and parliament buildings. With such a big commission in the offing, Abreu set out to build a dream team of architects. International stalwarts including Snøhetta, Bjarke Ingels and Thomas Heatherwick were invited to camp in the desert, climb a mountain and sleep in the Louvre Abu Dhabi to get a sense of the place. Bringing the best creatives to Abu Dhabi and helping firms to pitch their vision here is another task for Slash. “It’s no mean feat pitching to people who built all of this from sand just over 50 years ago,” says Abreu, gesturing towards the skyline.

Silicon oasis
Technology is the focus in Ras Al Khaimah.

“If Dubai is New York, then Ras Al Khaimah is California,” says Sameer Al Ansari, CEO of Digital Asset Oasis (DAO), a new free-zone cluster for digital businesses based in the northern emirate. It’s a bold claim but he does have a point. There has been a surge of people and businesses moving to Dubai over the past few years; rak, meanwhile, has plenty of affordable space where people can put down roots, as it has largely escaped the uae building boom of the past 20 years.

Now the emirate is aiming to position itself as a centre for technology, offering licences to businesses that want to operate in the digital economy, whether they specialise in artificial intelligence, gaming, cybersecurity or anything else besides.

“Our focus right now is on the unregulated space,” says Al Ansari. “It’s often very small start-ups that are trying to create a process, a system or a solution.” dao already has 20 businesses signed up for launch in late October, including Romanian metaverse platform Humans.ai. The next step will be investing in the infrastructure to help make the emirate an attractive place to move to as well as somewhere in which to empty out your digital wallet.
rakdao.com

Nancy Paton
Desert Rose Films

Australian-born Paton is the founder of Desert Rose Films, which bills itself as a pioneer for independent female film-making in the uae. A director, screenwriter and producer, Paton has made Abu Dhabi her home since 2017. Her productions include the Saudi-set Postpartum, about an expat mother with postnatal depression, and soon-to-be-released uae production Mountain Boy, filmed across two different emirates.

Paton features in our look at the uae’s pitch for a slice of the international film business.

How did you end up in the UAE?
I was in Saudi Arabia when film was still illegal there. I had a big project and it was easier to register in the uae, so I set up Desert Rose Films in Abu Dhabi. I fell in love with it and made it my home; I just don’t see myself going anywhere else now. And I want it to prosper. I want it to be a place where people like me in the industry can work continuously, thrive, grow, do well and have opportunities.

Tell us about your latest film.
We have just finished Mountain Boy, which is based on an Emirati children’s book series that I discovered. It’s about a boy with autism who was ostracised in his village and so lived in the mountains for four years on his own. Then he kind of saves a girl and goes on a big adventure around the Emirates, uniting the people but also finding his way home to his family.

How are you getting more women into film?
When I hire, I try to make sure it’s 50-50 men and women and also that women are put into roles that they might not normally get. So it’s about not assuming that a man has to be the director and saying, “No, a woman will do it.” That’s something that I have done with all of my projects. And that’s what I plan to do in all of the films that we have in the pipeline.
desertrosefilms.com

Trading places
Displaced by war, Ukrainians have been a boon to UAE business.

The number of Russians in the uae is believed to have risen considerably since the country’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022. The war, however, has also brought a steady arrival of Ukrainians seeking stability and opportunities.

Mykyta Doroshenko, vice-president of the Ukrainian Business Council in Dubai, estimates that there are about 1,500 Ukrainian-owned companies in the UAE, with expat arrivals doubling this year. Among the firms – many of which are involved in technology, property and finance – is Digis, an Odesa-founded software start-up with clients around the world. “Dubai seemed an oasis of stability,” says founder Nick Nagatkin, who pitched up in the uae amid the chaos of 2022. “The government here has been actively investing in technology and innovation so it’s fertile ground for a business such as ours.”

Artem Zverev and Artur Sharf, founders of Kyiv architecture studio Yodezeen, arrived before the invasion but agree that the influx has been good for business. They say that the newcomers have increased demand for their services and this helped them to open an office in the uae. “By the summer of 2022, we had a team on the ground working on residential complexes, hotels and restaurants,” says Zverev. “We have plans to expand to yachts and boats.”

Another business built on the new market is that of Kharkiv-born entrepreneur Pavlo Moroz, who saw an opportunity to offer new arrivals a taste of home. Moroz was already living in Dubai, having founded a group of steakhouses seven years ago, but his latest venture, Yoy, is the first restaurant in the uae to dish up Ukrainian fare.

Yoy (“Wow” in Ukrainian) opened in November 2022 on the Palm Jumeirah and is largely staffed by Ukrainians. “It’s a meeting point for people who miss the flavours of home and speaking their language,” says Moroz. In March, Olena Zelenska, Ukraine’s first lady, chose Yoy as the venue for an official meeting with the uae government.

When we visit the restaurant, Vasilisa Frolova, a familiar face on Ukrainian television, is at one of the tables. She was on holiday here with her husband and two-year-old son weeks before the war began. The family had only a single suitcase with them but decided to stay. “Everybody knew who I was in Ukraine yet suddenly I found myself a stranger in Dubai,” says Frolova. Nevertheless, she and her husband, TV producer Dmytro Kotelenets, found work and began rebuilding their lives and livelihoods.

Despite the heat and the blue waters of the Gulf beyond the restaurant’s windows, Moroz tried to make Yoy feel Ukrainian. He spent months shipping furniture from his war-torn homeland, including a traditional wood-burning stove and ceramics from the city of Kosiv. Pride of place, however, is a long communal table. “People like to sit together here,” says Moroz. “They want to feel the unity.”

Seeding progress
Material innovation.

“We’re a company born and based in the uae so we wanted to look at something that is consumed and produced to an extremely high level,” says Alhaan Ahmed, co-founder and CEO of Dateform. Founded in late 2019, the firm turns date seeds into a solid construction material used for everything from cladding to coasters.

It’s a canny use of an otherwise wasted by-product of the uae’s date-farming industry. It is estimated that the annual date consumption per capita here is more than 10kg. “There’s a big appreciation for these materials,” says Ahmed. “Not only is it sustainable but it really connects with the uae on a social and cultural level.”

The company’s sustainable credentials often result in bespoke requests to replace wood or plastic materials, or to create personalised corporate gifts, such as phone covers. “We do a lot of vip gifts for the government,” says Ahmed. “The material inherently tells a story of the country and where we come from, so it’s interesting for them to show our products.”

For Ahmed, it’s the sort of project that makes sense here. “The uae strongly encourages innovation. It celebrates anyone and anything out there that pushes the boundary. There’s an appetite to show what the region is capable of.”
dateform.ae

Rebooting the environment
Climate-tech tenants are transforming Masdar City.

Masdar City, Abu Dhabi’s Foster + Partners-designed urban experiment in the desert, certainly looks impressive – a blend of smart-city ideas and Arabian architecture – but it seemed to be searching for a direction in the years after it opened in 2010.

No longer: its well-shaded streets have now become home to a community of climate- technology start-ups seeking a base in the region. Volts, for instance, is developing the next generation of at-home batteries that can be used to store solar and wind-derived energy – while looking nifty on your living room wall – and Catalyst is an accelerator set up in Masdar to incubate climate-technology businesses (even if it does get its funding from BP). Anchor tenants, including Siemens and the Global Carbon Capture and Storage Institute – a think-tank that opened a regional HQ in Masdar in 2022 – are bringing talent and fresh ideas to the area.

Things move fast
Seven improvements in UAE business.

In the past few years, shifts in uae law and business rules have helped modernise the mechanics of industry and grease the wheels of commerce.

1.
Businesses can now be 100 per cent foreign-owned.
Prior to 2021, any business started in the uae had to have majority ownership by a local partner. Now, free zones dedicated to various industries offer tax incentives.

2.
You can now go bankrupt.
This measure allows for greater risk-taking in business by reassuring entrepreneurs that they won’t end up in debtor’s prison.

3.
The working week now runs from Monday to Friday – Rather than Sunday to Thursday, as it had been for many years.

4.
The ban on Zoom, Microsoft Teams and Google Meet no longer applies.
Meetings are starting to fill diaries. You still can’t make WhatsApp or FaceTime calls, however.

5.
Tourists no longer need a licence to drink alcohol, while the process for residents has become much easier too.

6.
It has become slightly easier to get UAE citizenship, especially if you’re deemed to have made an exceptional contribution to society. Residency requires a visa and retirement here is subject to permission.

7.
Labour laws have been significantly reformed in recent years.
There is still scope for improvement, however, particularly with regards to construction and domestic work.

Daryl Barker
Group managing director, Sanipex.

The uae has a reputation for importing most of what it needs but bigger players are bringing manufacturing home. Sanipex Group, which makes tiles, bathroom fixtures and fittings, opened its state-of-the-art Jebel Ali facility in 2022 and employs 550 people in Dubai.

Why set up here?
I found the UK frustrating. If I wanted to have an appointment with a decision maker, it would take me three months. Here, I could knock on their door and we would start doing business.

Who are your clients?
Our Bagno Design line is a $70m (€66m) business. It’s a significant player in the bathroom industry; 90 per cent of sales are in the Middle East and Africa.

What do you make in the UAE?
First, we started to manufacture whirlpool baths. We buy the shell and the client can customise what kind of system they want. We moved into spas, making custom-built steam rooms. And then we opened a facility to convert porcelain slabs from Italy and Poland into washbasins, sinks, planters and even pieces of art.

How is the business atmosphere here?
I love the way of working in Dubai. It’s a centre of commerce for the whole region. I’ve been here a long time, so I’ve seen lots of companies that were small shops and are now multinational retail or distribution businesses. It’s vibrant and inspirational.
sanipexgroup.com

Creative enterprise
Arming the artists.

As the uae aims to bolster the creative industries and more than double their contribution to GDP by 2031, intellectual property is more important than ever. One player making the most of the opportunity is Anghami, the first legal music streaming platform in the Middle East and North Africa. It was founded in Beirut in 2012 by Elie Habib and Eddy Maroun, before relocating to the uae in 2021. With access to some 57 million songs and more than 200,000 Arabic and international podcasts, Anghami’s 70 million users are spoiled for choice. The fruits of this success are shared too, with 50 per cent of streaming revenue going back to the artists.

Anghami has played a key role in securing a stable piracy-free model that protects musicians and labels alike. Meanwhile, a new song “performed by” an AI version of legendary Egyptian singer Umm Kulthum drew attention to the complex issue of intellectual property earlier this year. Resolving such issues would help investors to feel confident in funding research to provide protection for investment. The same argument for better scrutiny extends to publishers, the arts, museums and libraries. The prize? The Middle East happens to be the fastest growing region in the world in terms of music market revenues.

What’s The Big Idea?

Lightning in a bottle
Meet the beer brand that’s a fine addition to any menu.

Beer might be the world’s most widely consumed alcoholic drink but at a fine-dining restaurant even its most ardent enthusiast is likely to feel pressured to peruse the wine list. The founders of Japanese luxury beer company Maison Rococo decided to test this theory. Surveying Tokyo’s vast fine-dining scene, they found that the pressure was real but not only for the patrons.

“Serving a beer that could be bought at a supermarket or convenience store was not an experience that chefs and sommeliers were comfortable with,” says Yohay Wakabayashi, co-founder and CEO. So was there a market for a new type of beer that befits a special occasion? It turned out that there was – and a significant one too. Within a year after launching in 2018, the Rococo Tokyo white beer gained entry into more than 100 Michelin-starred restaurants in the city. Restaurants in Singapore and Taiwan soon followed.

“It’s a subtly flavoured hefeweizen with a touch of sweetness, which makes it easy to pair with a range of cuisines,” says Tokyo-based food and drink writer Melinda Joe. Hisashi Udatsu, chef-owner of a sushi restaurant in Tokyo, calls it “a partner” that enhances Japanese cuisine’s delicate taste.

Apart from the spring water that they source from the Mount Fuji area, Rococo’s founders would rather not reveal the ingredients. The craft beer movement in recent decades has spawned thousands of beers that rely on geo-specific hops and other grains to create unique flavours. But Rococo, they say, is focused solely on creating an experience that elicits emotions, which they consider the core of luxury.

“It’s true for all facets of our product, from the gift box to the glass,” says co-founder Keith Martinez. “One of our early Japanese partners wanted to keep our bottle because she wanted to put flowers in it.” Rococo’s goblet-shaped glasses, made in Slovakia, are quietly elegant, with the beer’s name etched almost unnoticeably on the stem.

Wakabayashi and Martinez confess that they are not beer nerds but they count this as a blessing. It helped them to spot an underserved market: female beer drinkers. While they set out to create a gender-neutral product, they responded to the feedback from women on beer’s bitterness and chefs’ grievances about the pairing difficulties that they had encountered. The message is in the bottle.

Taking responsibility
One entrepreneur’s journey to running ethical ventures that also turn a profit.

For Nachson Mimran, entrepreneurship equates to problem-solving. In his eyes, businesses have the potential to solve global issues, from overproduction to social inequality. Mimran has applied this mindset to his own ventures, which range from the Alpina hotel in Gstaad and fashion label Grounded Absurdity to numerous investments in businesses such as Switzerland-based material innovation lab and clothing label Pangaia.

Spending much of his childhood in West Africa, where his family runs a large agroindustrial business, Mimran (pictured) witnessed the influence that a company can have on a market’s socio-economic development. He was handed the reins of the family business shortly after he turned 21 and held the role of CEO for five years, before venturing out on his own to explore his many interests: investing in property projects in Europe and Africa, taking on the role of head of international affairs at the Senegalese Olympic Committee and becoming the creative director of the Alpina in Gstaad, where he is now based with his family. In 2015 he also co-founded To.org with his brother Arieh, a foundation and venture fund that supports ethical businesses – and all before his 30th birthday.

Running a viable business that also does good in the world is demanding but, for Mimran, solving tricky issues often leads to incredible creativity, as well as a lot of fun along the way. “It’s about understanding the diversity of interests involved,” he says from his standing desk in Gstaad.

Reframing the narrative around business is part of the process that entrepreneurs need to embark on when setting up a responsible company. “If we don’t make ethical business aspirational, then we won’t be able to achieve the type of momentum needed to make changes,” he says, explaining that customers sometimes shy away from the didactic messaging often associated with ethical brands. “I don’t want to be lectured. That’s why at the Alpina, we are always rethinking hospitality and our roles as hosts,” he says. ” You can communicate important messages through art or culinary events – for example, a 1970s ice-cream van from which you can video-call a creative in a refugee camp. There are ways in which you can nudge people to look at previously unattractive stories in a new light. It doesn’t have to be this sad, load-bearing mission.”

Mimran is also a believer in the power of challenging the status quo, from making unexpected hires – when working on a sustainably made doll for Mattel, his team consisted of a material scientist, an artist, a brand consultant and his young daughter – to embracing new business models. His new fashion label Grounded Absurdity uses the open-source platform Spaarkd, which offers access to a library of existing patterns and eco-friendly materials. “All you have to do is be creative and do some marketing – the rest is taken care of by Spaarkd,” he says. “In the music industry you can self-publish on Spotify so why not apply the same thinking to fashion? Why should this $3trn (€2.9trn) industry be dominated by the same 15 or 20 players? I couldn’t believe in the open-source opportunity more.”

Setting up an ethical business that can also turn a profit is clearly complex but if you are willing to get creative and think outside the box, Mimran suggests that it’s both achievable and worth the challenge.

Offices in paradise
Asia’s islands offer fun in the sun alongside blissful working conditions.

Work and workplaces have changed over the past three years. After the initial shock of the pandemic, employers and employees adapted to remote working and long-distance meetings. While companies around the world have now embraced a return to the office, several Asian countries have designed new visas for remote workers that are flexible enough to accommodate short business trips and long-term stays, and broad enough to encompass freelancers, start-up founders and intrepid investors. Indonesia, Malaysia and Thailand are three such nations. We recommend the best tropical island in each country to enjoy a poolside workday.

Phuket
Best for: Mid- and late-career professionals looking for a slower pace of life

Phuket is famed for its beach life but its cultural and culinary attractions are equal draws, from the colourful Peranakan shophouses of the Old Town to a spate of cutting-edge southern Thai restaurants launched by ambitious young chefs. New luxury developments such as Tri Vananda, offering private-pool residences and an integrated wellness resort, are cropping up as mid-career professionals from across Asia and Europe seek out more peaceful outposts from which to take calls and run businesses.

Phuket’s location – an hour’s flight to Bangkok, less than two hours to Singapore – makes it an ideal spot to work in peace without sacrificing connectivity. In September 2022, the Thai government launched the Long Term Resident visa, a long-awaited initiative that will grant 10-year residencies for eligible foreigners to live and work in Thailand. It’s part of a broader plan to bring one million “wealthy or talented foreign residents” into the country over the next five years. Those who qualify for the visa enjoy fast-track airport journeys, lower taxes on domestically earned income and full tax exemptions for any money earned abroad. Remote workers earning at least $80,000 (€74,555) a year or anyone looking to invest at least $500,000 (€465,930) in Thai assets can apply.

Langkawi
Best for: People in creative industries and early-career technology workers

Situated off Malaysia’s northwestern coast, tranquil Langkawi has the clear waters and white sand of popular Southeast Asian islands but none of the crowds. Restaurants serving freshly caught squid, crab and lobster dot the coastline.

Malaysia’s De Rantau scheme, launched in 2022, offers a multiple-entry visa to live in the country for up to two years, as well as discounts on food, transport and accommodation through participating companies such as Air Asia and Grab. Children and spouses can come along as dependants. At a cost of RM1,000 (€199) and open to applicants who make at least RM109,103.95 (€21,750), it’s one of the most affordable digital nomad visas going. It’s aimed specifically at technology industries but the category is broad enough to include sectors such as digital marketing and creative content.

New arrivals to Langkawi should explore its burgeoning art scene. During the pandemic, beach resort Bon Ton launched an artists’ residency that has now expanded to include music recording studios and workshops for textile designers, painters and other creatives who live on-site in Bon Ton’s guest pavilions, work on their projects and share their art with visitors through exhibitions and performance nights.

Bali
Best for: Executives and entrepreneurs with money to invest (and time for surfing lessons on the side)

Bali has long been Indonesia’s most popular tourist destination but in the past few years it has transformed into an enticing hub for remote workers. Co-working spaces with networking events (and swimming pools), affordable prices and a built-in expat community make it ideal for itinerant employees who also enjoy exploring jungle waterfalls, scuba diving among coral reefs, surfing or volcano trekking. Meanwhile, the island’s food and drink offerings range from roadside warung serving classic Balinese dishes to cliffside cocktail bars.

Indonesia wants to scale its technology industry and attract more international talent – and investment – to its shores. Bali is key to this plan. the country’s new Golden Visa offers five- and 10-year residency permits as well as other perks. It is aimed at high-net-worth individuals who want to launch companies in Indonesia, as well as people working for corporations investing in the country. Remote workers on a smaller budget can opt for the B211a visa, which allows a stay of up to six months – plenty of time to perfect your paddle.

How to fundraise
Raising capital in a less-than-favourable climate.

The past decade in the fashion start-up sector was all about the unicorn: investors made high-risk bets on a new generation of brands – usually digitally savvy and direct-to-consumer – and pushed them to set aggressive growth targets. In turn, founders chased high valuations and triumphant exits, which created a competitive market with venture capitalists embarking on bidding wars for a stake in the latest sportswear label or online retailer. But the bubble burst as the realities of managing complex supply chains hit and inflation rates derailed growth. Today, if you are looking to raise funds for your business, it takes a lot more door-knocking and convincing investors to part with their money.

“It has become more difficult in the current macroeconomic environment, given higher interest rates,” says Eshita Kabra-Davies, founder of fashion rental start-up By Rotation, which offers customers the opportunity to rent designer clothing or to become lenders themselves. “Capital and funding is no longer as cheap as it used to be.”

Kabra-Davies, who worked as a trader before venturing into fashion retail, still managed to raise $3m (€2.8m) last spring to fund her company’s US expansion plans. She believes that there’s an appetite for companies such as hers, offering new consumer models and addressing the climate and cost-of-living crises. “Independent investors such as angel investors and family offices are very important,” says Kabra-Davies. “They don’t just invest in trends, markets and numbers but in people and ideas. They are more likely to support what’s best for the business, not just their own investment targets.”

Investors agree that there is still opportunity for those offering smart solutions to modern-day challenges. “If you read the news and follow funding trends, it would be easy to conclude that this isn’t the time to start a business,” says Georgia Stevenson, partner at Index Ventures, a firm based between London and San Francisco. “What we have seen over three decades of investing is that times like these give rise to some of the most successful companies.”

Entrepreneurs could also consider alternative methods, such as crowdfunding, says Déborah Neuberg (pictured), founder of menswear label De Bonne Facture. Having found herself at odds with traditional investors’ demands for aggressive growth, Neuberg – who favours working with specialist manufacturers in Europe – decided to try a community crowdfunding platform last summer. “This is an innovative fundraising method, which allows you to stay independent,” she says. “They’ll tell you that it’s impossible to find partners but there’s always a way; there are people looking to invest in brands doing the right thing.”

How to make co-working spaces work
Create spaces that combine functionality with a sense of fun.

Co-working spaces were once the reserve of start-ups, solo entrepreneurs and freelancers seeking a bit of company. Nowadays, it is remote workers who are pitching up, preferring to work at a hot-desk hub rather than toil away at home. But keeping such spaces vibrant and functional, community-focused but not distractingly noisy, is tricky. Big, anonymous players such as WeWork have lost their appeal for many and the company has been left floundering financially. So how do you create spaces that tick all the boxes?

1.
Create an industrious culture.
This is straightforward and begins with having staff who set a welcoming but professional tone. This should feel like a place where you can focus, not a raucous members’ club. (So kill the music; no one wants to have to talk to clients over the racket of the IT guy’s Spotify playlist.) For inspiration, go to the Loker Reading Room at Harvard’s Widener Library – rather than total silence, there’s a steady hum of industry with everyone aware that this is a space where you go to get things done.

2.
Choose your location with care.
Being inside an ornate 19th-century ballroom or historic film studio might sound evocative but these spaces weren’t built to accommodate people working at desks. Find somewhere with an appealing human scale, abundant natural light, good transport links and set in a pleasant neighbourhood for you to stroll around at lunchtime. Neuehouse’s most recent opening in Venice Beach, Los Angeles, is a fine example.

3.
Sell office essentials.
Many co-working spaces don’t have somewhere to buy a notepad or a pencil. Pair your supply shop with a simple newsstand stocking newspapers and global magazine titles to offer inspiration and moments of escape.

4.
Provide ample space to work.
People who go to co-working spaces are looking for an upgrade on their home office so don’t expect them to sit elbow to elbow on shared tables. Invest in proper desks with a lamp and space to spread their work out. Daniel Korb’s Sense tables for MillerKnoll are a roomy option with a low glass partition. And do get rid of the phone booths for private calls, which get colonised early in the day as someone’s personal office. Instead, create gardens and courtyards where people can go to make sensitive calls and maybe even find a new connection.

5.
Never put inspirational quotes on the walls.
Bin those dodgy prints about success being down to “99 per cent perspiration and 1 per cent inspiration”. Opt for plants to freshen up a space instead.

Training ground
The Food School in Bangkok is prepping the next generation of culinary entrepreneurs.

On the second floor of The Food School in Bangkok, under the watchful eye of Chef Tang, a class of nine students is quietly preparing a menu of Thai dishes, including the popular appetiser kratong tong. Nattitda Kiatphattanachai is standing in front of her cooking station, stirring a yellow curry. The 30-year-old accountancy graduate has enrolled on a three-month intermediate course with the intention of opening her own restaurant next year in her hometown, which borders the Thai capital. “If I’m going to be an owner, I want to understand the whole process and the kitchen is the heart of the business,” says Kiatphattanachai, while pouring a two-litre carton of coconut milk into the curry.

The Food School opened in January 2023 with the aim of training food entrepreneurs, rather than chefs. The full course lasts only nine months and can be sliced into three stages, from essential to advanced. Students learn how to run a restaurant, as well as follow a recipe, and the topics taught by industry experts range from marketing to kitchen design. The practical approach and focused learning are proving popular with food enthusiasts who want to make a career change but can’t quite stomach a four-year course at a traditional culinary school. “It’s a different world these days,” says Prim Jitcharoongphorn, chairperson of Allied Metals, a supplier of high-end kitchens to top hotels and culinary schools. “People want to open restaurants because they love to cook, even though they have no idea about professional kitchens or how much they cost to build.”

Allied Metals is one of The Food School’s three founders. Co-working space Glowfish, founded by Gavin Vongkusolkit (pictured, on right, with Jitcharoongphorn) and hospitality giant Dusit Thani are the other two. Through Dusit Thani, The Food School has brought together three prestigious culinary schools and three creative cuisines under one roof: Thailand’s Dusit Thani College, Tsuji from Japan and Alma from Italy. Instructors from Osaka and Colorno are seconded to the Bangkok outpost and standards inside the building in Block 28 – a new development by Thailand’s top university Chulalongkorn – are on par with a top international restaurant.

Graduates have an option to rent an “incubator kitchen” on the ground floor to test their ideas before investing in their own premises. Teantan Valairuecha was one of the first to complete Alma’s pastry course and within weeks of graduating, he founded his dessert business Palindrome.

“Renting here lowers the financial risks of opening my own place,” says the 27-year-old engineering graduate, who worked as a project manager before realising the growth potential of Thailand’s food industry. His ice creams and sweets will be available at The Food School’s café, a mix of canteen and co-working space, which attracts a lunchtime crowd of university students and local businesses.

The recipe for a successful restaurant might always be shifting but The Food School supplies its students with all the right ingredients.

What happened to the briefcase?
Today’s commuters have a more open attitude to the office bag.

It’s not long ago that office dress codes were so strict that getting ready for work was reminiscent of putting on a school uniform. Many men were expected to wear trim suits every day and some accessorised with structured briefcases. However, professionals have lately found themselves facing sartorial confusion – a trend accelerated by the pandemic, new streetwear trends and working-from-home arrangements. Some started dressing for video calls by pairing smart shirts and blazers with terry shorts, or abandoning tailoring in favour of humble T-shirts as their go-to business look. Over the years, briefcases got completely lost (inside wardrobes, donated to charity shops). Today, they seem like relics of a forgotten world.

Even workers who have returned to the office with a renewed appreciation for a good suit – albeit in looser, comfier cuts than before – seem reluctant to grasp a briefcase on their commute, preferring something a little softer and more versatile. “We’re still selling the same amount of work bags but today’s styles are a lot less uniform,” says Kasper Hostrup, owner of Copenhagen-based retailer Goods. “After the pandemic, people came back to shop for something more interesting and also anonymous. It’s less about logos and a lot more about design and utility.”

At Goods, you’ll now find an array of bags by the likes of Yoshida Porter and Mismo, and sporty styles made from feather-light Japanese nylon – perfect for when you’re riding your bike to work and transporting not only a laptop and papers but also your gym kit and lunch. “People are still attentive to how they dress,” says Hostrup. “They aren’t getting sloppy. But now you can bend the rules a little bit and wear the same bag in and out of the office. A nylon bag paired with a more formal suit creates an interesting contrast.”

Global online retailers such Mr Porter have spotted similar demands and have chosen to “invest heavily” in totes, weekend bags and messenger bags for this autumn, according to the site’s buying director, Daniel Todd. On Mr Porter, utilitarian bags by Bleu de Chauffe and large, luxurious totes by Loewe and Gucci keep rising in popularity. “Men’s bags have now expanded beyond traditional shapes that adhere to strict dress codes to fun, imaginative styles,” says Todd. Case closed: informality is on the up.

Long in the tooth
Suri’s plant-based brushes are designed to last.

According to Mark Rushmore, co-founder of London-based electric-toothbrush brand Suri, the dental market is saturated with gimmicky, unattractive models. “Pharmacy shelves are brimming with cheap, disposable electric toothbrushes that aren’t made to last,” he says. “And there’s no plan to repair or recycle them. Meanwhile, at the other end of the spectrum, the overpriced models are packed with pointless innovations that no one even uses. Who really needs seven brushing modes and an app to clean their teeth?”

That’s why Rushmore, who has worked with the likes of Procter & Gamble in the past, decided to take matters into his own hands by launching his brand in 2022. “We set out to create an electric toothbrush that champions design, performance and sustainability without compromise,” he says.

Fitted with recyclable plant-based heads made from corn starch, Rushmore’s aluminium-handled brushes are light, durable and made from recyclable materials. “We want them to spend more time in your bathroom and less time in a landfill,” he says. Rushmore hopes that, leading by example, it can show other firms what’s possible. “The future of sustainability lies in high-performance, beautifully designed products that fit seamlessly into people’s daily lives,” he says. “We’re aiming to be a catalyst for the wider industry.”

Inside scoop
The next big thing in food? Slavic and Balkan dips. Here are three to prep.

London-based, Israeli-born chef Yotam Ottolenghi has made Levantine food a pervasive presence on dining tables in recent years. But while we never tire of his toothsome concoctions, food entrepreneurs should be on the lookout for what might be next. With Italy just about exhausted of its kitchen secrets, Japan plundered for umami recipes and Peruvian delights such as ceviche available in every city, we have a hunch that Balkan, eastern European and Slavic dips will be the next big dishes to invest in. These three spreads are delicious but little known beyond their regional borders. Time to tuck in.

1.
Ajvar

Peppers and aubergines grilled over a charcoal fire give this spread a smoky sweetness. The recipe is thought to originate in Serbia (some call ajvar “Serbian caviar”) but the spread was, well, spread throughout the region during the Yugoslavian era, which explains its relatively standardised recipe. As far as condiments go, ajvar is a unifier of regional identity, from the beaches of Croatia to the mountains of Montenegro. Not bad for some grilled veg.

2.
Ljutenica

Popular in Bulgaria, North Macedonia and Serbia, ljutenica is a relish made from peppers, aubergines, carrots, garlic and tomatoes. In other words, it makes full use of the vegetable plot. Some prefer it smooth or chunky, hot or mild, but this spicy-sweet dip is a staple in most Balkan households and sometimes referred to as “Bulgarian ketchup”. It’s the perfect accompaniment for grilled meats but is equally satisfying simply spread on a piece of bread.

3.
Gzik

Originally from Poland’s Wielkopolska region, where farmers feasted on the simple recipe, this spread consists of fresh cottage cheese, milk, yoghurt and chives. You can even add radish, onions, smoked mackerel or hard-boiled eggs to liven up the creamy dip. Gzik is best served alongside boiled potatoes, on a sandwich or as a dip for crudités.

Profile: The Great Room
The Singapore-based firm runs a suite of seemly workspaces across Asia. We meet its CEO, Jaelle Ang.

Before co-founding her own company in 2016, Jaelle Ang worked in banking for several years and earned degrees from Imperial College’s MBA programme and UCL’s Bartlett School of Architecture, both in London. Ang’s business training and love of good design was invaluable when it came to launching The Great Room, a small-scale co-working company in her native Singapore that now has a growing number of outposts across Asia.

The Great Room stands apart from other flexible workspaces with its focus on design and premium events and a hospitality-led approach. “We take our inspiration from hotels, which need to be highly functioning, high-performance spaces but, at the same time, there’s always something magical when you walk in,” says Ang, who serves as the company’s CEO. She hires hotel designers to work on The Great Room’s spaces to achieve that same mix of functionality and beauty, and makes sure staff are service-oriented and friendly, taking inspiration from luxury hotels and private members’ clubs.

Ang also looks out for unique properties. The six Singapore locations include one within the historic Raffles Hotel and another in a restored 1910s shophouse. There are also branches in Hong Kong and Bangkok; the first Sydney location is expected to open in early 2024.

“These are all key cities – wonderful places to live, work and play,” says Ang. “Really, we think we can exist in any cosmopolitan financial hub in Asia.” Different markets require different strategies: broadly speaking, every country has its own property environment – Bangkok’s crop of new skyscrapers, for example, and Singapore’s well-preserved heritage buildings. Work cultures vary between cities too, which is a crucial consideration when it comes to programming events for members, from leadership seminars to after-hours networking drinks. “Thais are extremely fun-loving, and need no big encouragement,” says Ang. “In Hong Kong, it’s changing but traditionally they wouldn’t want to be seen having a tipple in front of their colleagues or bosses. In Sydney, which has a casual, fun, very ‘matey’ culture, we realised that they start work a lot earlier. They tend to cycle, walk, do a lot of stuff – and they like to get out by 16.30.”

In 2022, New York-based co-working business Industrious acquired The Great Room and another co-working firm for a combined $100m (€93m). Members now have access to more than 160 offices around the world. “As an entrepreneur, it’s a great milestone: six years after you’ve built something, somebody recognises that there’s so much value in what you’ve created.” Ang will have more support and opportunities for growth but will keep operating the business with her Asia team and retain the Great Room brand. “It allows us to act rather nimbly and in a very localised way. So we have the best of both worlds now. It has really expanded our horizons.”

Ang is confident that Asia’s co-working market is here to stay. She adds that businesses need to recognise that their customers are more discerning than a few years ago. “Developed markets start segmenting and people demand more from their workspace. They don’t just want flexibility, they want beautiful design, great events and amazing, like-minded people. So we’re seldom the first-mover player. When the market starts maturing, that’s the perfect time for us to come in.”

Knowing Where To Look For Opportunity

What makes a successful entrepreneur? Is it their belief that there is always going to be a solution to even the knottiest of problems? Or their willingness to fail, learn and move on when necessary? Perhaps it’s just that they are the sort of person who wouldn’t be able to cope working in a corporate structure or spending their days making somebody else wealthy. While it might be hard to easily summarise the attributes that unite entrepreneurs, one thing does seem to connect them all: they sense when – and where – there’s an opportunity to be seized.

For this outing of The Entrepreneurs, our annual about the world of business that’s aimed at everyone from the founder of a fledgling start-up to the owner of a fast-moving empire of scale (and anyone who just wants the company they work for to be more dynamic), we headed to the UAE. The pace of change there is remarkable and the country has shifted from being somewhere that people dipped into for a few years for tax-free work and a quality of life top-up, to a place where people are founding businesses that they intend to run there for the long term. The scale of investment in new technology, design and infrastructure is also remarkable. We hope that our survey of all that the region has to offer entrepreneurs will provide some surprises and make some of you wonder whether this is where you should be anchoring your next enterprise. It feels like a whole land of opportunities.

You’ll also find a cast of opportunity hunters in the Toolkit pages that kick off this issue (page 21). We’ll take you to Japan to meet the founders of Maison Rococo, the beer company edging its way into fine-dining establishments, drop in on the woman who founded a Singaporean co-working powerhouse that’s now moving into Thailand and Australia, and catch up with a dapper fashion investor whose love of sports is giving him a winning streak. And we’ll also offer some moments of levity as we get a dispatch from an office dog and investigate the disappearance of the briefcase.

The Entrepreneurs, of course, is not just an annual handbook but also a weekly programme on Monocle Radio – and we round out this issue with an Expo inspired by the programme’s companion show Eureka!. Just in case you need bringing up to speed, this is where we ask business owners to reveal the moment when they spotted the valuable gap in the market, the opportunity waiting to be seized. And it has all been finely produced on page by that show’s astute and wise presenter, Tom Edwards. How’s that for multi-platform? (Although, personally, I prefer multi-platform to mean an escape-in-all-directions railway station). So as you head into the issue, keep an eye out for where your next business venture – and adventure – could be set and discover where opportunities await.
If you have ideas, thoughts or feedback, please feel free to contact me at [email protected]

Partnership: Owning the future

The UAE wants to be a leading nation in the field of artificial intelligence (AI) by 2031. As this AI Office, UAE x Monocle partnership reveals, the work to hit that target is long underway – and already paying dividends.

1.
Introduction

The road to now

Whether you view it as a boundless force for good, a potent existential threat or something broadly in between, one thing’s for certain: artificial intelligence (AI) will change the world.

From the roll-out of automated robotics in storage facilities to the machine-learning algorithms helping healthcare professionals provide more accurate diagnoses, the development – and popularisation – of AI technologies is quietly transforming operations across various sectors. “Big four” accountancy firm PwC predicts that it could contribute up to $15.7trn (€14.8trn) to the global economy by 2030.

For the UAE, a nation that embarked on a journey of digital transformation at the turn of the century, the opportunities are abundant. In 2017, shortly after announcing a national strategy for AI, Omar Sultan Al Olama was appointed minister of state for AI. Aged just 27 at the time, he was the first person to hold such a role anywhere in the world. His Excellency’s objective? To identify and invest in new tools, then spearhead their application across different sectors. His remit was later expanded to reflect the importance of the work: he now holds the title of minister of state for AI, digital economy and remote work applications.

His Excellency is one of countless Emirati success stories and the AI office has helped the UAE to keep pace with the technology through a combination of investment, infrastructure and legislation: there are golden visas for coders, research centres for testing, accelerator programmes for startups and much more. While the strategy is far reaching, the UAE’s ultimate goal is clear: to become a world leader in AI.

2.
Q&A

Leading the way
Omar Sultan Al Olama, Minister of State for Artificial Intelligence, Digital Economy and Remote Work Applications

With a pioneering governmental role, His Excellency is perfectly positioned to understand AI’s benefits and challenges.

What was your brief as the world’s first government minister dedicated to AI?

The post came out of our leadership’s belief that AI will be one of the most important technologies going forward. My brief is not to be optimistic or pessimistic about AI, it is to be neutral. My job is to maximise the opportunities and minimise the challenges by being proactive rather than reactive. What we’ve done in the UAE on the AI front is a few things. The first is build the infrastructure necessary to ensure that we have an advantage compared to other countries. The second stage now is to translate this infrastructure and talent into tangible outputs.

The are calls for a global framework around AI. Can the UAE take the lead?
I just came back from speaking about this at the United Nations. We are a neutral country: we work with everyone, we are quite pragmatic in our approach and we understand the challenge of AI for what it is. Sometimes you speak to government officials in other countries and they cannot grasp what AI can and can’t do, or what the risks are. There is a need for us to play a role in that. The UAE has, over the past decade, built the infrastructure and ecosystem required to create the unicorns and digital economy companies that we needed.

You are the world’s first AI minister. Do other governments need to get with the programme?
So, it was a very lonely post. However, to my pleasant surprise, there is another AI minister in Spain. So now we are two; hopefully, we’re going to multiply. But I will say this: historically, if you look at technological trends, government portfolios were created to match technological trends, albeit later.

Let’s talk quality of life. What does that look like over the next few years when it comes to AI in this country?
I don’t think anyone can forecast the future accurately. Today your life is indirectly dependent on AI. Every question you have is answered by AI. It’s called Google, right? When you get lost, you depend on AI through Google Maps. When you want to buy something, you use AI with Amazon and other platforms. When you want to watch content, you go to YouTube. AI is a big component of quality of life. So, you think about where AI can improve government offerings. Why does a person need to ask for a service? It makes absolutely no sense. The government needs to be so smart that, before a passport expires, it tells you that your passport is near to expiry and provides you with a new one.

I’m sure you talk with Silicon Valley companies all the time. What do you tell them about coming to the UAE?
The conversation has changed, we don’t need to sell the UAE. You see very, very few Tesla adverts or Rolls Royce adverts; when you have a very, very good product, you don’t need to sell it. I think the world has seen us and paid attention to us. But we cannot grow indefinitely so what we’re focusing on now is quality of interaction. At one point in time, we wanted quantity, we wanted to go and invite anyone and everyone who has worked in this sector. Today we want to become a country where we have the highest quality of talent and the highest quality companies because that is what’s going to ensure that this becomes sustainable.

What are the benefits of basing a company in the UAE?
Companies can operate in the global market from here in a way that they can’t do anywhere else. Firstly, you are in the perfect time zone: you can wake up in the morning and serve Asia, you can serve Europe at noon, you can serve the US in early evening and get a full night’s sleep. Secondly, you have incredible connectivity. You can get on an aeroplane and fly to any city in less than a day and attend your meetings. And finally, safety and security here is paramount. When you are an entrepreneur building a business that is going to change the world, it’s not about how much more money you generate. What will matter is the fact that you can leave your family at home, attend your meetings and travel abroad without worrying about their safety and security.

There are concerns surrounding what AI might become. Do you ever worry?
I don’t think that there is any change in the world that doesn’t bring with it an element of fear. The region has already been at this juncture. From 813 until at least 1515, the Middle East was the beacon of science, technology and innovation. Today we’re not ahead, so what happened? Fear got in peoples’ heads. And the fear was a technology that had the same capacity for disruption as AI – or less even – and it was embraced by every civilisation in the world except the Arab Muslims. That was the Gutenberg printing press. It was banned in the Middle East for years. And why was it banned? If you look at the conversations, they are very similar to the ones that I’m having today: the calligraphers were worried they would lose their jobs, the religious scholars were worried about it corrupting society, and the leaders were worried that they were going to lose power because people were going to be enlightened.

If we want to learn a lesson from that, it is that technology creates leaps and bounds for those who embrace it – and limits those who don’t. The UAE wants to embrace it for good, that’s why our motto is “building a responsible artificial intelligence nation”.

3.
Case study

State of the nation
From renowned education institutions to blossoming businesses, the plan to accelerate AI in the UAE has resulted in a number of success stories across different sectors and spaces.

Ideas and innovation
Ebtesam Almazrouei, TII

The UAE boasts a roster of research institutions developing solutions to real-world problems with a global impact.

“We are a small country in terms of size,” says Ebtesam Almazrouei of Abu Dhabi’s Technology Innovation Institute (TII). “But we have a lot of capabilities in terms of what we can deliver.”

As co-founder, acting chief researcher and executive director of the applied research organisation’s AI cross-centre unit, Almazrouei is one of the driving forces behind Falcon, a large language model (LLM) that just launched its most powerful iteration, Falcon 180B. Almazrouei sees generative AI transforming the likes of healthcare, engineering and coding with its ability to analyse data, automate tasks and more. It’s why TII ensured that Falcon 180B is accessible royalty-free for research and commercial purposes, making it the world’s largest openly available LLM. It’s a real statement of intent – and proof of the UAE’s commitment to shaping the sector on a global scale.
tii.ae

Ambitious infrastructure
Khalifa Al Qama, Dubai Future Labs

For people to flourish, they need dedicated space and resources. A robotics lab in a repurposed retail hub is just one example of that.

When you think of creating space and infrastructure in a city such as Dubai, the mind immediately jumps to newness: fresh commercial developments, shiny skyscrapers that tickle the clouds. So to learn that the Dubai Future Labs (DFL), an applied research lab focused on robotics and AI, exists in the repurposed lot of what was previously a Hakkasan restaurant and bar is something of a nice surprise. “When we started, we called the project the ‘robot kitchen’,” says DFL director Khalifa Al Qama. “The building that we’re in was a mall; now it’s an ecosystem of innovation.”

Built in 2020, DFL serves as proof of concept for the UAE’s ability to develop robotics. Its researchers and scientists build solutions for challenges facing both the government and private sectors, working with partners that range from logistics firms to automotive brands and watchmakers, all while developing their own technologies to take to market. What binds these streams of work is a deep-rooted belief that these tools will improve peoples’ lives. “We’re creating useful tools that humans need,” says Al Qama. And it’s in the robot kitchen that he and his team refine these recipes.
dubaifuture.ae

Developing talent
Dina Fares, Ajman Digital Government

The UAE is growing as an AI destination by attracting the world’s best experts and also supporting homegrown talent.

To establish itself as a top AI destination, the UAE placed time and resources into attracting expertise from overseas – for example, issuing 100,000 programmers with golden visas that grant long-term residence. Just as important are efforts to develop homegrown talent. Dina Fares was part of the first graduating class from the National Program for Artificial Intelligence, a scheme launched in 2018 to equip participants with the knowledge and skills required to successfully adopt AI in their respective field. As the director of Digital Transformation at the Department of Digital Ajman, Fares used the experience to develop and launch a new tool on the Ajman One government services app, which allows users to feed back on their experiences directly. “AI is touching every aspect of our lives,” she says. “If the landscape changes, you must be brave enough to change with it.”
ajman.ae

6.
Teaching moments
Dekyi Liang, MBZUAI

The world’s first AI university is more than just a place to educate students – it is aiming to increase AI literacy for all.

Amid the construction sites and eco residences of Abu Dhabi’s Masdar City lies the Mohamed bin Zayed University of Artificial Intelligence (MBZUAI), the world’s first research-based AI university. Its president, Eric Xing, has assembled a world-class faculty here, aided by his chief of staff, Dekyi Liang, who relocated from Beijing, buoyed by the institution’s potential. “There are so many opportunities to build a business, but you find very few opportunities to build a university,” she says.

With a background in everything from investment funds to sportswear, Liang can see beyond the often-narrow purview of academia. She has been instrumental in organising events and incentive programmes to engage with decision makers and increase AI literacy across the region. “A university alone cannot be called an ecosystem,” she says. “Our mission is to support and foster both the startups and the transformation of local organisations.”

MBZUAI has already collaborated with governmental departments and played a key role in the recent launch of the world’s first Arabic LLM but it is still early days: the university has only just employed an alumni officer after its first class graduated in December 2022. Nevertheless, Liang is enjoying her newfound responsibilities: “We want to make sure that we are not only training good scientists and technologists, but also training good human beings.”
mbzuai.ac.ae

7.
Sustaining success

Right at home
A business leader reveals how he has benefitted from a dynamic, enterprising climate – plus two more success stories.

In May, Checkout.com became the first global-payments platform to secure an acquiring licence from the Central Bank of the UAE. It’s just one instance of a leadership committed to supporting businesses and the digital economy at large. Checkout.com founder and CEO Guillaume Pousaz praises the country’s dynamic mindset. “For entrepreneurs like me, this means an incredibly stable, open and business-friendly environment, where challenges are resolved quickly so that everyone can benefit,” he says. Further examples include Omar Al Mheiri, who founded online workspace platform LetsWork after serving as “entrepreneur in residence” at Emaar Properties’ in-house innovation lab. Meanwhile, in 2022, UAE University graduate Eman Al Shamsi joined Amazon Web Services as chief digital advisor, demonstrating the nation’s commitment to producing talent that can contribute on a global scale.

Looking ahead

Beyond 2031, the UAE has its eyes on another significant milestone: 2071, the country’s centennial. With this in mind, the government has laid out a roadmap consisting of four key pillars: future-focused policymaking, excellent education, a diversified knowledge economy and a society that is both happy and cohesive. As AI continues to evolve at a rapid pace, it is clear that the technology will shape all of these focus points in various ways. Spend some time in the UAE and you might observe signs, billboards and the like that feature a quote attributed to His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the country’s Vice President and Prime Minister: “The future belongs to those who can imagine it, design it and execute it.” For many, AI is that future. As it moves, the world will move with it.

Partnership: Shaping our digital world

The Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy (DCDE) is dedicated to strengthening the city’s reputation as a digital business hub. Monocle has partnered with the DCDE to explore this forward-thinking organisation’s key offerings and long-term vision.

As part of his remit, Omar Sultan Al Olama heads up the Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy, a body dedicated to strengthening the city’s reputation as a digital business hub.

The Dubai Chambers building is situated next to the glistening waters of the city’s creek. To one side, a cluster of dhows hark back to its maritime history and status as a regional trading hub. To the other, the iconic skyline that represents its present – and future.

Ahmad Bin Byat, founding chairman of the telecoms provider Du and former managing director of Dubai Holdings, remembers swimming in the creek as a child. On his way to school he’d pass the British embassy overlooking the water, where he’d trade dates with the children of diplomats, receiving biscuits in return. Over a glittering career, he hasn’t just witnessed Dubai’s transformation but actively shaped it. “But people don’t think about history or what you’ve done before,” he says. “They live now.”

As vice chairman of the Dubai Chamber of Digital Economy (DCDE), one of three entities under the Dubai Chambers umbrella, he plays a leading role in the city’s evolution. The DCDE continues to attract emerging tech companies to the city and create an ecosystem in which they can thrive. “We are preparing the ground for digital companies and entrepreneurs who wish to set up or move here so they have a good system and infrastructure. Secondly, we know that the majority of companies in Dubai will transform into digital one way or another. We want this to be easy and efficient for them.”

1.
Key offering

Hard at work

Do you have a big idea for a digital business? Here’s how the DCDE is making Dubai the place to be.

Education
The DCDE oversees a number of educational and research drives that not only help people better understand the digital economy but also help them become part of it. The recently launched Emirati Training Academy is part of a wider initiative to encourage the development of apps in Dubai, providing participants with a foundational understanding of mobile application development. Elsewhere, reports are regularly made available for those looking to furnish their understanding of digital enterprise in the city.

Events
Meeting entrepreneurs in person is a key component of what the DCDE does, from intimate workshops with industry leaders to larger-scale summits. The pinnacle of these is Expand North Star, an annual four-day tech show that is part of Gitex Global and connects forward-thinking start-ups with ambitious investors. This year’s edition welcomed about 50,000 visitors and 1,800 start-up exhibitors. The goal? To demonstrate Dubai as a gateway to the rest of the world.

Initiatives
The aptly titled Business in Dubai Program helps firms to secure in-country funding and assists with setting up once they arrive, from banking to housing. But in its bid to empower the city’s next generation, the DCDE also oversees schemes that seek to galvanise interactions with the digital economy more broadly. The App Olympics, a six-monthly city-wide competition, launched in October 2023 with a view to challenging participants to create the world’s best apps in Dubai.

2.
Vision

Why Dubai?

DCDE vice president Saeed Al Gergawi on what the city has to offer for entrepreneurs and business owners.

1.
Safety and security:
“To operate a business, raise a family and do what you need to thrive, you need this foundational aspect. Dubai has that.”

2.
Bang for your buck:
“The competition for talent elsewhere is costing businesses. With Telegram, they were able to compete with Facebook or WhatsApp with a tenth of the team.”

3.
Quality of life:
“We have some of the best schooling systems, infrastructure, retail and leisure. Companies are able to move their families and their businesses.”

4.
Complete connectivity:
“Emirates Airlines and FlyDubai operate direct flights from Dubai to almost everywhere. The geography allows people to cater to clients from east to west within working hours.”

5.
Freedom to fail:
“People can experiment here. The attitude is, ‘Go and try – if there’s a positive outcome, it will happen.’”

Long-term ambition

Looking ahead, the DCDE is committed to amplifying the success of Dubai’s digital ecosystem – and positioning it as one of the most agile hubs in the world. With priority sectors that include cybersecurity, e-commerce and fintech, plus dedicated strategies that enable emerging technologies such as virtual reality and blockchain to thrive, there’s a clear plan to showcase how Dubai is not only a testbed for new tech but also a welcoming environment for businesses that are brave enough to execute it.

Soft-power dressing

Arpenteur × Monocle Contour wool jacket
€425

Arpenteur is run by two cousins from Lyon who bring an unfussy, modern feel to traditional workwear. With every item of clothing made entirely in France, the brand seeks to spread the history of French menswear with references to utilitarian workwear, outerwear and sportswear. This jacket, made in Lyon from boiled Pyrenean wool, has a stand collar, raglan sleeves and neat, angled side pockets.

Material: Wool.
Colour: Grey.
Made in: France.

Shop now

De Bonne Facture × Monocle knit sweater
€450

Before the textile industry decided that it preferred white wool owing to its dyeing possibilities, fibre from black sheep was the norm. Now they are outliers. But one passionate New Zealand breeder wants to celebrate their wool, which comes in a range of luminous undyed hues, from bronze to ebony. Parisian menswear brand De Bonne Facture has turned this soft, fine-gauge pecora nera (Italian for “black sheep”) wool into a gorgeous tawny sweater. Wear this and you’ll stand out from the flock.

Material: Wool.
Colour: Tawny.
Made in: Italy.

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Porter × Monocle zip tote with pouch
€365

Our most versatile bag is now available in limited-edition olive. It’s fitted with multiple interior pockets, a detachable pouch, a top flap, two zippered pockets for quick access to necessities and a detachable shoulder strap.

Material: Cordura.
Colours: Olive or black.
Made in: Japan.

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Bally × Monocle curling boot
€435

Bally has been linked with curling ever since it kitted out the Swiss team for the 1956 Olympics. Back by popular demand, our collaboration with the luxury Swiss brand puts a spin on its beloved, high-performance, water-resistant boot. The rubber-coated leather upper, comforting wool lining and sturdy Vibram sole makes it perfect for mountain hikes and city strolls alike.

Materials: pvc-coated leather (upper) and wool (lining).
Colour: Olive.
Made in: Switzerland.

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Valstar × Monocle Milano raincoat
€795

Valstar was the first Italian company to make water-repellent raincoats. We’ve teamed up with them to produce a slim-fitting trench with a detachable goose-down insert for chillier days.

Materials: Cotton and polyester.
Colour: Olive.
Made in: Italy.

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Mühlbauer × Monocle Traveller hat
€265

This dramatic, lightweight fur-felt creation from Mühlbauer, Austria’s master milliner, will have you turning heads for all the right reasons. As the hat’s name, Traveller, suggests, this headgear will see you travel-ready with its flexible shape and narrow brim making it comfortable for all-day wear. Gone is the need for a bulky protective hat case as the Traveller hat, available in either a brown or grey, can be dented, moulded, folded and packed into any travel bag.

Material: Felt.
Colours: Grey or brown.
Made in: Austria.

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Treuleben × Monocle envelope folio
€245

This A4-sized folio will keep all of your important documents handy and secure. It’s made from Italian full-grain cowhide and fitted with viscose lining.

Material: Leather.
Colours: Navy or tan.
Made in: Italy.

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Treuleben × Monocle credit card caddy
€95

Treuleben is a German bookbinder and accessories-maker with more than 100 years of experience. This caddy has two inside nooks, outside envelope pocket and slots for credit cards. It’s handmade from full-grain Tuscan leather.

Material: Leather.
Colours: Navy or tan.
Made in: Italy.

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Doppler × Monocle carbon-steel umbrella
€140

Olive-and-blue check canopy with a carbon-steel frame and automated open-close. You’ll be hoping for the odd shower.

Materials: Carbon-steel frame with polyester canopy.
Size: 31cm length closed, 100cm diameter canopy.
Colour: Olive-and-blue check.
Made in: Austria.

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Treuleben × Monocle passport caddy
€145

Treueleben’s full-grain Italian leather passport caddy in navy or tan has compartments for cash, credit cards, boarding passes and a back envelope pocket that enables your passport to be scanned without being removed.

Material: Leather.
Colours: Navy or tan.
Made in: Italy.

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Rier × Monocle fleece overshirt
€545

Rier founder Andreas Steiner puts a fashionably youthful spin on traditional Alpine craft. A Paris-based Tyrolean designer who cut his teeth at Prada, Miu Miu and Louis Vuitton, he now works with artisans across Austria, Italy and France to create elegant unisex designs. This fleece overshirt is ideal for when the summer linens have been packed away but it’s not yet chilly enough for a coat. Made from Austrian natural wool fleece, it’s lightweight and biodegradable. Throw it over any casual outfit to smarten your look or, for a more relaxed vibe, leave the horn buttons undone.

Material: Wool fleece.
Colour: Natural brown.
Made in: France.

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Photography & styling: Lock studio

Top 25 entrepreneurs to watch

Small, medium and large. Third-generation and fresh starters. Technology players and fashion rethinkers. But all with one thing in common – they are proud entrepreneurs.

Below we introduce you to 25 businesses driven by people who, at some point, decided to be their own boss and plot their own path through business. Sure, there might have been stumbles, the equivalent of scraped knees, but in the end they knew that had to tap into Frank Sinatra’s useful entrepreneurial rallying cry and do it “my way”.

We have chosen to highlight people we admire and who we think have some lessons worth sharing. They are also people who might encourage you to take the leap – to become an entrepreneur. Read on and, who knows, perhaps next year you could find your face staring out from these pages.

1.
Adriana Domínguez
Adolfo Domínguez
The artist who’s brought a painter’s eye to her family’s 45-year-old company.

Even for the fashion sector, naming an artist as CEO is a bold move. But Adriana Domínguez’s sensitive and sanguine approach arrived at just the right time for Spanish fashion house Adolfo Domínguez. She was tapped to help her father’s financially flailing firm in 2017 and her swift decision-making, financial trimming and captivating marketing campaigns have helped to bring the company back from the brink. In 2020, the 45-year-old was named chief executive, continuing the brand’s bold restructure during the pandemic, while shoring up the house’s identity as both idiosyncratic and pioneering.

“In such a commoditised fashion landscape, differentiation is a key asset,” says Domínguez. “I often find myself in strange company at the top,” she adds, referencing the lack of women and younger faces in the upper echelons of Spanish business. “But my ‘quirkiness’ is a source of strength.”

Founded by her father in 1976, the brand became part of Spain’s cultural vanguard by embracing modernity with free-flowing forms that excited a country emerging from a dictatorship. Early success led to international expansion and today there are 343 shops in 17 countries.

Star recruits from the automotive and the technology sectors have reflected a push to innovate beyond the fashion industry status quo. A recently launched personal-shopper service, for example, combines algorithms with human specialists, while a focus on near-shoring has increased production in Galicia and Portugal from nothing to 23 per cent. Notably, more than half the company’s board are female.

“As a family we share resilience, a capacity for change and courage,” says the CEO, whose sister, Tiziana, is creative director. “Seeing how the previous generation dealt with stumbling blocks is a source of guidance to confront future crises.”
adolfodominguez.com

2.
Barnabé Fillion
Arpa
The perfumer combining scents with electronic music and original sculpture.

Paris-based independent perfumer Barnabé Fillion tries not to think too much about the giant fragrance businesses that his small company Arpa will compete against. Having established his business creating scents for brands such as Aesop and a major show at New York’s Guggenheim Museum, he’s made the brave decision to launch a “cultural brand” this season. After 10 years learning about the industry and building connections, Fillion looks to follow in the steps of niche labels, such as France’s Serge Lutens and London’s Perfumer H, with Arpa. He says that the company’s aim is to stimulate all of a customer’s senses. As such, its initial three fragrances come with a vinyl LP featuring electronic music inspired by each scent.

How will Arpa separate itself from competitors in the fragrance industry?
I always try to work with collaborators that I share a mutual respect with. Of course, the financial success of the company is important but this will be a very curated brand that doesn’t make compromises on quality. In many ways I actually have to protect myself. You can almost compare the modern perfume industry to the pharmaceutical industry, where the creation of new ingredients can lead to more profit. There are a lot of elements in this industry that I want to veer away from.

And how will you do this?
We’re not talking about building a niche perfume brand but a multi-sensorial project. We’re trying to curate a coherence around the fragrances, music production and the commissioning of sculptural work.

How do you plan to build a global community around your brand?
I’m excited to see how it can live online. We’ll have a part of the project where people are engaging with us digitally and the other part where they come together. This physical side will manifest as events and exhibitions in Paris, Mexico and Kyoto. In combining the digital and the physical, we’ll create an offering where people are comfortable buying our fragrances online. But if they’re not convinced, we can send a sample first.
arpastudios.com

3.
Cindy Spiegel and Julie Grau
Spiegel & Grau
The publishers defining the cultural moment with their independent imprint.

Cindy Spiegel and Julie Grau (pictured, on left, with Spiegel) have been working together for more than 25 years. As editorial directors of Spiegel & Grau, which was originally part of Penguin Random House, they oversaw titles by writers such as Ta-Nehisi Coates, Trevor Noah and Suze Orman. When the publishing giant was restructured in 2019 and closed their imprint, Spiegel & Grau decided to resurrect it independently.

“We built our careers on discovering new voices,” says Spiegel. “We realise what books can do; that’s what drives us.” This innovative spirit also led Spiegel & Grau to become a multi-platform publisher; though books remain at the heart of what it does, it works across audio, video and print. It is now co-producing podcasts with Lemonada Media and there’s a deal with Amazon Studios to develop projects from its roster.

Still, the success of the new venture depends largely on the duo’s reputation as exceptional talent spotters. Colleagues followed them from Penguin Random House because they believed in the mission. Big investors such as William R Hearst iii and the Emerson Foundation bought into the project; the enthusiasm was such that the pair found themselves with far more money than they initially hoped to raise.

This backing has let them be selective. “We’re excited about giving resources to our books and we can do this by keeping the list small,” says Spiegel. “Fifteen to 20 books at a time is our sweet spot. That’s the number we feel confident we can publish with our full attention.” The imprint’s first release, published in July, was Fox and I, a memoir by Catherine Raven, a debut author whom Spiegel met at a conference in late 2019. It was this encounter that gave the duo the idea of having a platform “to get an amazing project out into the world”, she says.

Their greatest skill is finding titles that speak to the cultural moment. “We’ve seen our books change the conversation: The Kite Runner changed it about Afghanistan; Orange Is the New Black made incarceration very personal,” says Spiegel. “We want to make money and we have been very profitable. But we also want to publish with integrity.”
spiegelandgrau.com

4.
Manfredi Catella
Coima
The developer investing in the long-term health of Milan’s communities.

“Normally with real estate, you think that someone will want a house or office so you build it, you sell it – next,” says Manfredi Catella. Over lunch at Ratanà restaurant, the CEO of Milan-based developer Coima explains how his experience has been the opposite. “By developing a larger-scale part of the city and operating it, we learned a lot about people. So that makes you have a different approach when you develop next.”

Catella is referring to the vast Porta Nuova development beside Ratanà. A decade in the making, it includes a landscaped park and accompanying cultural calendar, retail space and sparkling office blocks. Crucially, Coima also manages the site and organises events through its foundation. But while the regeneration of this former wasteland near Garibaldi train station might be well known, Coima isn’t stopping in its bid to transform Milan. Over the next few years, it is set to develop two new chunks of the city – railway depots in Porta Romana and Farini – which will continue to make the city a benchmark for urban reuse. The Porta Romana project near Fondazione Prada includes a park and housing, part of which will initially serve as the Olympic Village during the 2026 Winter Games. “At Porta Romana, the fundamental layer is at ground level,” says Catella. Thinking about how people move is an integral part of development, while the firm takes sustainability “very seriously”, according to Catella’s US-born wife Kelly Russell, who has worked alongside him for 20 years.

As well as further ambitious building around Porta Nuova with architects including Stefano Boeri, Diller Scofidio 1 Renfro and Norway’s Snøhetta, Coima is also eyeing Rome. Catella says it would be a “lost opportunity” if the Italian capital didn’t open up to smart redevelopment. “We will move forward in doing what we love where we are loved.”
coima.com

5.
Johanna Stein
Gato Sem Rabo
The bookseller shining a spotlight on women’s literature in Brazil.

As an art student, Johanna Stein was carrying out research for her degree when she realised that finding books written by women was frustratingly difficult in São Paulo. No physical space that gathered their voices existed in Brazil. So, after graduation, she started a bookshop devoted exclusively to literature by female authors. Gato Sem Rabo opened in May 2021 in one of São Paulo’s oldest districts. Stein says she hopes that it will help to broaden people’s understanding of female perspectives, “especially those from the global south, like me”.

Women struggle for equal billing in South America. More than 70 per cent of Brazilian books printed between 2005 and 2014 had male bylines, according to a University of Brasília study. But at Gato Sem Rabo, minimalist wooden shelves showcase about 2,800 titles by more than 1,400 women, ranging from non-fiction and poetry to illustrated books. Demand is high; lines of shoppers formed around the block when the shop opened. “It’s been a huge surprise [to see] what sells,” says Stein.

This early success is testament to Stein’s good entrepreneurial instincts. Though a dedicated reader, she had never worked in bookselling before. She called in the services of publishing consultants Marcelo Zanon and Maria Borin but her freshness to the sector allowed her to take risks with her choices at a time when the high street was struggling.

“People trust our curation. We’ve tried to reintroduce classics that echo themes shared by younger Latin American authors,” says Stein. She is proud that her hunch about the importance of opening a physical space in São Paulo turned out to be correct. “The more things become digital, the more readers and authors will demand a proper meeting place,” she says.

That’s why she has organised book-themed debates and has also opened a café in the shop, with further seating outside. A 1970s structure that had been abandoned for years, it sits beside a busy overpass and was redeveloped to host Gato Sem Rabo and other businesses, including an art gallery and a rooftop restaurant. Their arrival is allowing the whole neighbourhood to turn over a new page.

6.
Greg Lundgren
Museum of Museums
The curator breathing new life into Seattle’s homegrown cultural scene.

Looking out of a second-floor window of his Seattle art space, the Museum of Museums (MOM), Greg Lundgren notices that someone has tossed a rag onto an installation on the roof of the extension below. The 51-year-old curator makes a mental note to scamper down there himself and remove it before opening to the public for the day.

Such tasks aren’t beneath Lundgren, who spent much of the past two years transforming a derelict medical office into a prototype of what is possible for art in a city with as much wealth, technology and creativity as Seattle. “mom is a low-budget example of what an art centre can look like,” he says. “It was largely self-financed because I wasn’t willing to hold my breath for a billionaire to call me up [and help].”

Lundgren secured the three-storey building for the nominal sum of $1 (€0.80) a year from its owners, who were eager to see improvements to what had become a graffiti-covered eyesore. He invested $400,000 (€340,000) of his own money into its refitting and cleared 50 tonnes of rubbish and rubble with his small team.

The building now features large-scale installations as well as smaller pieces. “Our mission is to increase the artist population of Seattle,” says Lundgren, who wants to encourage young people to see art as a career rather than just a hobby. He also recognises the importance of keeping artists in the state. “If we want to fix the art ecosystem in a city, we need to have a conversation about collecting,” he says. “Not only collecting the work of blue-chip artists from New York but also the artwork from your region. That’s how you get them to stay: by supporting them financially.”

Lundgren hopes one day to transform the block into a creative campus, offering cheap housing for artists, studio spaces and a sculpture garden. “I put out ideas that I can’t afford to act on but that are important to the city,” he says. If a billionaire philanthropist walked through mom’s door, Lundgren would be ready with a pitch. “My hope is that mom seduces our wealthy community to engage in a more significant, longer-term way,” he says. “This building is designed to inspire [people to believe] that we can be a great art town.”
museumofmuseums.com

7.
Stephen Burks
Stephen Burks Man Made
The designer and gallerist championing real representation in design.

Stephen Burks Man Made is the studio of New York-based designer Stephen Burks. Its aim is to produce work connecting tribal and artisanal craft techniques with contemporary aesthetics.

Tell us about your work championing diversity in the design industry.
For us, it is not a topic: it’s our life. I use the studio as a vehicle to create a more pluralistic vision of design. I talk to my clients about the lack of diversity as I tend to be the first and only African American with whom they’ve ever worked. It’s important that we not only lead by example but that we also educate and find new ways to communicate and accept one another.

How do you use design to communicate ideas about sustainability?
We want to make objects that people want to keep. In terms of sustainability, we like to work with noble materials and think about how we’re always in the service of the customers buying our work.
stephenburksmanmade.com

8.
Spandana Gopal
Tiipoi
The designer dispelling stereotypes surrounding traditional Indian craft.

Spandana Gopal’s design brand Tiipoi was born of a frustration with stereotypes about Indian craftsmanship. After leaving her native Bangalore to study in London, Gopal became aware that consumers often romanticised traditional craft techniques. “I wanted to create handcrafted products that were more functional and less like souvenirs,” she says of the company that she started in 2013 and now has 16 employees.

She enlisted designer Andre Pereira to develop a range of products including brass candleholders, glass jars and stainless-steel teapots, all made by the brand’s craftspeople in Bangalore. “We try to keep as much as possible in-house because it gives us a lot of control over the quality and the working conditions,” says Pereira. “We have two master craftsmen, a metal-spinner and a ceramicist, each of whom has a team.” Tiipoi has expanded its offering to include colourful home textiles, vases modelled on Bangalore’s brutalist structures and traditional Longpi ceramic cookware.

“I kept thinking, ‘Why isn’t there an Indian version of Muji?’” says Gopal. “There are lots of stereotypes around Indian craft and much of it is based around nostalgia.”

It wasn’t always smooth sailing when it came to making the products, explains Pereira. “There’s a big ‘yes’ culture when it comes to manufacturing in India,” he says. “People will tell you that they can make something without having the know-how so you really have to explain what you want. At the start we had to push to visit manufacturers’ facilities to see what they could actually do.”
tiipoi.com

9.
Nick Shelton
Broadsheet
The founder of an independent media company that’s taking on the big guns.

Of the many threats facing independent media, one of the most dangerous is social media’s advertising landgrab. In most countries big players such as Facebook have gobbled up marketing budgets and other people’s content without anyone trying to control them. Australia has made headlines by forcing the social media company to make deals with the country’s main news organisations but smaller titles have been left out. Some aren’t willing to sit in silence.

Melbourne-based lifestyle-focused company Broadsheet has decided to pick up the fight. “There’s still a swath of independent publishers that need to be supported,” says its founder, Nick Shelton. “We’re talking with government, making sure we’re getting through to the right people. We’re pushing.” If he succeeds in this David-versus-Goliath fight, it could have global consequences. “Australia is a test case,” he says. “It’s going to be used as a precedent around the world. It’s important to us as a business but I think it’s important beyond that too.”

Fortunately, Broadsheet has a business model that makes it a solid venture. Started in 2009 as a one-man operation, it launched as an online guide to the best spots to eat in Melbourne. Its remit and team soon grew bigger; it now has editions in Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth, with stories covering everything from culture and sport to music and retail. “Our role is to inform our readers about all the wonderful things we do as a city,” explains Shelton. “We see ourselves as news journalists. The rigour behind everything we publish is top tier.”

Over the years, Shelton has experimented with quarterly newspapers, a book-publishing imprint, pop-up restaurant collaborations, a branded content studio and framed editions of photographs; a forthcoming membership service offers early access to events, openings and shows. This might seem like a mixed bag but Shelton says that these offshoots are simply different expressions of the same brand. “You have to have a clear vision so you can adjust, change and evolve,” he says. “It’s about not accepting conventional wisdom. The world changes so we need to challenge our ideas. We need to experiment.”
broadsheet.com.au

10.
David Neeleman
Breeze Airways
The airline entrepreneur helping smaller cities to take off.

Aviation hasn’t had a good 18 months, with the industry nursing losses of more than €250bn in 2020. That might make the idea of launching a new airline sound like commercial suicide – but not for David Neeleman. “When coronavirus hit, I could have just said, ‘No I’m not going to do this,’” says the serial entrepreneur. “But I had already hired 55 people at the airline. Those people were dependent on me so I said, ‘What the heck; we’ll make it work.’”

Neeleman, a Brazilian-American based in Salt Lake City, is referring to his latest venture, Breeze Airways, which started flying in May with 39 routes to 16 US cities. Yet it’s his track record that speaks volumes. He has launched four other successful airlines, including New York-based JetBlue and Brazil’s Azul. And that explains the current investor interest: in August, Breeze raised a further $200m (€170m), adding to a pot of more than $100m (€85m).

Breeze’s model is based on low-cost airfares but it’s usp is that it runs what the airlines calls “under-served routes” that link smaller cities and towns without having to route via a hub. “Say you live in Hartford, Connecticut, and you want to get down to Charleston, South Carolina,” says Neeleman. “You can do it with us for half the price – and twice as fast.”

The airline head says that – alongside smaller planes that cost less to run – he is banking on technology and app-based customer service as the keys to success. Currently flying Embraers, Breeze has ordered a fleet of fuel-efficient Airbus a220s, which it hopes to start rolling out from the second quarter of 2021.

Breeze plans to stay nimble too, being flexible on routes and partially pivoting to charter in the winter when demand is lower. “I don’t think size matters,” says Neeleman. “It’s just creativity and structuring it.”
flybreeze.com

11.
Hao Tran
Vietcetera
The media company celebrating a richness of views in a single-party system.

Every successful start-up eventually finds an office to match its ambition, allowing the team to draw a line under a restless first few years of rapid growth and frequent relocations. That was the case for Vietcetera earlier this year when the Vietnamese media company moved into a new address, its fourth since it was founded in 2016, on a quiet street in the centre of Ho Chi Minh City. The four-storey building in District 3 marks an important moment for CEO Hao Tran (pictured, on left) and his team of 80 employees.

Vietcetera’s main source of income is turning popular articles on its flagship Vietnamese-language website into audio content that is then sold to sponsors. Tran cites The New York Times’ “Modern Love” newspaper column about relationships, which was turned into a TV series, as inspiration. Mastercard, Nestlé, drinks producer Diageo and insurance firm aia are some of the top advertisers using Vietcetera to tap into consumers from Vietnam’s emerging middle class. But governments of countries, from the US to Australia and Italy, are keen to get involved too. Even Vietnam’s communist government is spending marketing money on Vietcetera.

The publisher, which only received its official media licence earlier this year, occupies a rare position as a private media company in a single-party system in which almost all of the news is state-controlled. Journalists have to stay away from political coverage and they choose to avoid covering celebrities and entertainment. Vietcetera does, however, tackle socially taboo topics, which makes it a valued source of information in a conservative country. Sex education has been an early hit, both editorially and commercially. Also attracting plenty of interest is its coverage of personal finance, higher education and mental health.

Later this year, Vietcetera’s visual and audio content will be created in new studios: soundproofed recording rooms with green screens are currently being built on the same road as the new headquarters. It might sound as if the company is already running out of space but it’s most definitely not short of ideas.
vietcetera.com

12.
Saeed Abu-Jaber and Mothanna Hussein
Turbo
The hometown heroes putting Amman on the map by hosting events at its adaptable city-centre office.

In a refurbished split-level studio in downtown Amman you’ll find two designers refashioning the Jordanian design scene. Small but ambitious branding agency Turbo was founded in 2015 by Saeed Abu-Jaber and Mothanna Hussein (pictured, Hussein on left) after their paths crossed in Beirut. “We were both big fans of posters and we liked each other’s work, so we decided to partner up,” says Abu-Jaber. “Small design studios are quite scarce in Amman so we knew there was a gap in the market here.”

The brand’s office is imprinted with Turbo’s logo but its offering goes beyond branding: while the mezzanine is used for the agency’s design work, it hosts events including exhibitions, print sales, workshops and lectures on its ground floor. The pair also values its freedom to run projects as they see fit. “We like the flexibility to choose how to deal with certain situations,” says Abu-Jaber. “The office has given us the opportunity to expand on what a design studio can be. We wanted it to play a part in the cultural scene of the city.”
turrrbo.com

13.
Matt Alexander
Neighborhood Goods
The London-born CEO who reinvented the American department store.

There was a time when department stores were inspiring places to be, where thoughtful lighting and smartly presented wares made them the perfect places to browse rows of pressed shirts or buy a new pair of shoes with the help of a willing attendant. But over the past few decades, these shopping meccas have lost their sheen: formulaic business strategies, compounded by lazy salesmanship, the rise of online shopping and, more recently, the effects of the pandemic, have left many conventional department stores reeling and their selections looking decidedly drab.

For London-born Matt Alexander, who is now based in Dallas, Texas, it was clear that it was time for a different approach. “I wanted to create relevant, community-driven retail that would offer something vibrant,” he says. So Alexander launched Neighborhood Goods in 2018. “When my co-founder [Mark Masinter] approached me, he wanted to see if we could create a more permanent version of my previous project Unbranded [a pop-up market for small brands].” It opened its first department store in Plano, Texas, with the aim of providing a physical space for independent designers who wouldn’t otherwise have a base from which to sell their wares. The spaces also host events.“We care about community,” says Alexander.

This initial store worked so well that two more spaces followed, first in New York City and then in Austin, Texas; more are planned. While bricks-and-mortar stores struggled during the pandemic, Neighborhood Goods continued to thrive by expanding into groceries, opening a new sales section. Its food and drink aisles, much like those for clothing and homeware, are stocked with brands that would never have made it onto the shelves of conventional supermarkets.

Neighborhood Goods is a reminder that success doesn’t always require reinventing the wheel. Sometimes all an entrepreneur needs is the simple realisation that an established business model, like that of the department store, needs a slight correction to get things back on track.
neighborhoodgoods.com

14.
Pedro and Agustín Otegui
Lanas Trinidad
The father and son proving that some old methods can be timeless ones.

In the countryside just north of Uruguay’s capital, Montevideo, is a family-run wool-processing factory where old and new techniques are blended in a closed-loop production process. The fourth generation at Lanas Trinidad, founded in 1916, uses rainwater to clean wool and traps methane gas to power its facilities. It is keeping old traditions alive while turning raw materials, sourced from the region’s flocks managed by gauchos, into the highest-quality wool top, a semi-processed fibre for spinning into yarns and fabric.

Following this strategy, the company is picking up new clients in the form of mills and weavers that are looking for sustainable suppliers. “There is a different attitude among my generation,” says account manager Agustín Otegui, great-grandson of the founder. “More people now support the original concept behind Lanas Trinidad.” Otegui works alongside his father, Pedro, who runs the company and has built a reservoir on its land in which rainwater is collected to wash the wool. This water is then kept, treated and used for irrigation.

In the early 2000s, the family spotted an opportunity to capture greenhouse gases released during the manufacturing process and convert them into heat and light for the factory. Natural by-products such as lanolin, a refined wool that can be used in cosmetics, are also collected and sold on. These innovations have helped Lanas Trinidad secure some standout environmental certifications in recent years, turning the company into the biggest and most sustainable supplier of wool top in Uruguay.

But being socially responsible is nothing new to the Otegui family. “There was always an understanding that we had to do things well: be competitive but do it well,” says Pedro. What is changing is that manufacturers and mills are placing more value on fabrics that are environmentally friendly than in the past.

Lanas Trinidad’s work, then, is a reminder that in a fashion industry that is often preoccupied with newness, there is still room for established players with skills honed over more than 100 years to set the pace for change.
lanastrinidad.com

15.
Ia Adlercreutz
Co-founders
The Finnish consultancy bringing new creativity into the art of business.

The notion of hiring a company to help you use culture to improve your business’s operations might conjure up the image of a team-building salsa class but that couldn’t be further from what Helsinki-based consultants Co-founders offers. The firm uses art forms such as creative writing, acting, dance and photography in a more expressive and abstract manner as it provides its services to some of Finland’s leading brands. “As a strategy consultancy we work with companies’ top management and help them develop their businesses in a very holistic way,” says the firm’s founder and CEO, Ia Adlercreutz.

“[Art] can reveal a company’s internal culture to management in a way that no questionnaire can,” she says. “It can help to unify different ways of working when two companies merge; it can also help staff to internalise a new brand promise.” In practice, that means workshop attendees, both leaders and employees, either creating artworks or observing artistic performances. “A piece of music or soundscape has been proven to bring up feelings that reveal people’s sense of purpose and set of values, which show whether they connect with the purpose and values of the company as a whole,” says Adlercreutz. It may sound a little complicated but it seems to work, judging by the number of clients that Co-founders has.

The company was launched in 2018 and consists of Adlercreutz and a small team. It works with a network of advisers and professionals on a case-by-case basis, keeping its core staff minimal. It has enjoyed steady growth since its launch and is aiming to reach a turnover of €500,000 this year. Most members of the team have extensive business experience: Adlercreutz has managed renowned brands such as Kekkilä and Fiskars, while strategist Max Mickelsson has worked in top leadership positions for most of his career. This has helped the company to reach the right audience for their services. Often, however, what attracts new clients is that Co-founders’ methods have their basis in science. “This helps us convince some of the more engineer-driven companies that art works,” says research and insight manager Sonja Lahtinen. “Companies tend to view the world in objective terms but both consumers and other companies are made up of subjective human beings. Art can change and reveal the narratives that they use to frame their reality.”
co-founders.com

16.
Eva Chen
Qdy magazine
The editor bringing print media to young Taiwanese in the digital era.

Qdy magazine (or Qiudaoyu) is an award-winning lifestyle magazine that covers Japan and Japanese culture from a Taiwanese perspective. The colourful quarterly is produced by a small team in Taipei and is written in Chinese. Each issue whisks its young Taiwanese readership through the latest in Japanese fashion, music, design, cuisine and travel. Most of its readers are aged between 20 and 35 and share a fascination with Japan.

Editor in chief Eva Chen is one of Qdy’s founders. She jumped into the magazine business straight out of university at an interesting time for publishing – especially for those who were enterprising in terms of securing funding. “We were recent graduates and we secured funds through online crowdfunding, advertising sponsorships and a youth entrepreneurship grant,” says Chen of the modest €6,000 that she and her team secured for Qdy’s first issue.

By the early 2010s, digital technology had begun to disrupt traditional media business models in earnest but was creating new opportunities for plucky independent publishers that were entering the market.

After experimenting with a few ideas, Chen and her colleagues settled on Japan as their editorial focus. Within four years Qdy magazine was turning a profit and being lauded at Taiwan’s annual media awards.

“When we established Qdy the publishing industry was at a turning point,” says Chen. “Consumers were looking for even more rapid and interactive information. In the face of this we try to emphasise the virtues of printed matter.”
qdymag.com

17.
Laura Pujol and Zineb Britel
Zyne
The two Moroccan co-founders using footwear to keep ancient traditions alive.

Sustainability is now perhaps the biggest buzzword in fashion. It is bandied about in reference to everything from material choices to production methods. While this is ultimately a good thing, there is also something to be said about using fashion to sustain and reinvent traditional manufacturing cultures.

This is what Moroccans Laura Pujol and Zineb Britel have achieved with their footwear brand Zyne. After stints at Louboutin and Dior in Paris, the duo founded the brand in 2016. Zyne preserves traditional Moroccan manufacturing methods and footwear styles by using a neglected female workforce to craft contemporary versions of the traditional babouche slipper.

“Most artisans in footwear in Morocco are male,” says Britel. When she founded Zyne with Pujol, the sophistication in finishing and attention to quality needed to make their designs didn’t exist in the region’s labour market. Recognising an opportunity to start afresh by training women in Moroccan weaving and shoe-detailing methods, they built up a team of female petites mains, artisans with the dexterity required for elegant craftsmanship. These women now use ancient techniques to knit raffia, tinted using dyes made from vegetable scraps and spices, into modern versions of traditional shoes. “It can take between 13 and 26 hours to make a pair of our raffia slippers,” says Pujol. It’s time-intensive work that seems to have paid off.

Over the past five years, the pair have seen their atelier in Casablanca become self-sufficient and have a client list that ranges from fashion-savvy locals to royalty. Despite wholesale trade being put on hold during the pandemic, sales have continued to increase, thanks to e-commerce partners such as Matchesfashion.

“The brand appeals to a conscious buyer,” says Pujol. “That means people who are inspired by the convergence of cultures, who have a taste for handcrafted and comfortable luxury and who want to help Moroccan women thrive.” On top of this, wearers of Zyne’s shoes can walk easily in the knowledge that they’ve played a part in sustaining a traditional craft.
zyneofficial.com

18.
Mark Richards
Grand Banks
The boat-maker who steered his firm against the headwinds of a pandemic.

Many businesses have found themselves on choppy waters during the pandemic but not Grand Banks. The boat-maker, which has offices in Singapore, Australia, New Zealand, the UK, the Netherlands and the US, recorded an increase in net profits of more than 300 per cent in June, largely as a result of a spike in demand for luxury yachts from US customers.

Much of the brand’s success can be attributed to its CEO, Mark Richards, a boat-builder and a skilled competitive yachtsman who took the helm when Grand Banks acquired his boutique brand Palm Beach Motor Yachts in 2014. The past 18 months have been the busiest of his life: Grand Banks launched a new sales division in Australia and took on three years’ worth of custom yacht orders.

The coronavirus pandemic isn’t the first crisis that Richards has steered the 64-year-old company through. When he joined as CEO, the Singapore-listed firm was beset with production inefficiencies and had a stagnant workplace culture. It was also losing money. In his first week Richards took the bold decision to cut ties with yacht dealers and bring sales in-house, eliminating the 25 per cent commission that the firm was shelling out to contractors. He overhauled the management team and revamped the product line.

He spent most of the next six years overseeing production on the factory floor in Johor, Malaysia, and working to expand the firm’s US presence in Florida. He is now eyeing European expansion and a new facility in Malaysia. “I’m CEO but I’m still very hands-on,” says Richards, who designs the yachts himself “from the keel up”.

Aside from running a company, Richards skippers a maxi yacht called Wild Oats XI. “It’s very similar to running a business,” he says. “You can’t sail a boat like Wild Oats without a fantastic team and you can’t run a business like Grand Banks without the same.”
grandbanks.com

19.
Shiho Umemori
Ume
The innkeeper offering urbanites a chance to reconnect with nature.

“I used to think that working in a skyscraper and wearing high heels were cool,” says 33-year-old Shiho Umemori, laughing. Lured by country life, Umemori left her job at an IT company in Osaka to help her parents run their sushi business in Nara city. Soon, however, she saw an opportunity in the rural community of Yamazoe, a village of about 3,330 residents in the northeastern corner of Nara prefecture. She started a small but beautiful inn, where she supports the area’s farmers by paying higher than the market price for their fresh produce to serve to her guests. “There are Yamato-cha green tea and forestry industries here,” Umemori says. “That’s about it.”

Things began when Umemori’s parents introduced her to farmers in the village, from whom they were buying wasabi leaves. When she moved to Yamazoe and got to know its people, she discovered that its way of life – from homemade pickle recipes to the traditional skills practised by its elders – was at risk of disappearing. “I thought that these precious things could be lost if nobody sheds light on them.”

So Umemori started tea-picking classes and inviting people to the village, which turned into the idea of opening a three-room inn. It has been a long journey of planning and earning the support of neighbours. For her, it was essential that the business was accepted by the community of seven houses right below the inn.

A stay at Ume inn, which was renovated by Kyoto-based architect Satoshi Takijiri, is about getting back to nature and a slower pace of life, from chopping firewood in the front yard to planting herbs in the garden before a trip to the sauna. “I want to create harmony,” says Umemori. “I want to create a circle to give back to the people in the village. And I want to do it working with nature.” And luckily for Umemori, there’s not a high heel in sight.
ume-yamazoe.com

20.
Joshua Millard
Joshua Millard
The womenswear designer whose farm-to-fashion label doesn’t follow the flock.

A sheep farm in Dorset in the UK is perhaps an unlikely place to find a high-end womenswear designer but Joshua Millard, who founded his eponymous label in 2016, is a regular visitor to these 1,000 lush acres that are home to his very own flock. It’s the fleeces from these sheep that will be spun into the wool used for his label’s tailoring. Millard has recently opened a studio-shop in London.

Where did the idea for your own farm-to-fashion supply chain come from?
My family are tenant sheep farmers, so I grew up in and around flocks. I wanted to get back to a more honest way of production; to connect with the product, including the cloth. We have become so lost in our habits of over-consumption.

How difficult was this idea to implement as a business?
My supply chain for the shearing, spinning, dyeing and weaving is done in the UK. It’s slow: the process of making the cloth can take four to six months. It was hard when I was starting out as there is no contacts database [for British manufacturers]. I spent a lot of time on Google.

Tell us about the business benefits?
This is a transparent supply chain, which cuts out middlemen and reduces transportation air miles. It supports British industry and skilled artisans of dying crafts. We know that our animals are treated fairly. And we’re also utilising a biodegradable material which today usually goes to waste because shearling is worth so little in the UK. My customers really appreciate our backstory. We have a unique offering and a homegrown British product. It adds to the brand’s ethos.

Why did you decide to open a shop?
It was a natural progression. I moved away from the relentless cycle of ready-to-wear and shifted my focus to bespoke tailoring. Having the atelier below the shop helps carry that message of transparency; it means I can work directly with the seamstresses on customisation.

Having a garment made to measure is a luxury that requires face-to-face fittings, which also allow clients to touch the cloth. I’m not trying to be a Savile Row tailor; that doesn’t interest me. What I’m offering instead is a fresh approach to English tailoring for women.
joshua-millard.com

21.
Yarden Gross
Orca AI
The CEO using machine learning to make the seas safer.

Water has always been a big part of life for Yarden Gross, who grew up by the Sea of Galilee. In 2018 he and Dor Raviv co-founded Orca AI, a software company that works with shipping operators to reduce accidents caused by human error. Costs associated with shipping mishaps are high: “One blockage can disrupt the entire global trade system,” says Gross.

Orca’s system, which automatically spots dangerous obstacles with smart sensors, helps captains to recognise problems earlier. “Our product lowers the overload of information and enables fleet managers to have a more comprehensive picture,” he says. Its AI-powered algorithms also continuously analyse a vessel’s environment, becoming smarter as it gathers more data. The company has been trialling an autonomous vessel with shipping company nyk.

Pulling in $13m (€11m) in funding in April alone, Orca is growing. “We’re building a team of talents in deep learning, AI and system engineering,” says Gross, who hopes that Orca’s system will one day be on “every vessel in the world”.
orca-ai.io

22.
Marly Manku
La Clinique du Jean
The French tailor bringing Savile Row precision to vintage denim repair.

Unable to find a repair shop that could maintain the distressed effect of his beloved jeans while fixing their malfunctions, French tailor Marly Manku took matters into his own hands. “When I found that a service that could do this didn’t exist, I decided to launch it,” he says. So he started La Clinique du Jean in 2012. Today it provides a lifeline for all kinds of vintage and much-loved jeans with which his clients – collectors as well as passionate denim-wearers – cannot bear to part.

Following his training with a Savile Row tailor, Manku cut his cloth at Levi’s before settling in his studio just outside of Paris in Ivry. With his Union Special sewing machine he stitches tears and enlarges or shrinks jeans for a bespoke fit. An expert at reviving clothing from military gear to workwear, he offers tailored customer service too: he will not only collect a garment but also deliver it a week later looking almost as good as new. Though a hard worker, his advice to entrepreneurs is: “Take a break – you’ll be more effective.” When he started his business, Manku explains, he “barely stopped for several years. Even when I wasn’t working I was thinking about the business. I thought that kind of dedication was good but I ended up making mistakes because I was exhausted.”

He is also proud to have kept the company manageably small. “[I like] the ability to make quick decisions,” he says of being his own boss. “You don’t have to get approval from lots of different people before you do something.”
lacliniquedujean.com

22.
Nada Debs
Nada Debs
The furniture-designer with a positive vision of modern Arab identity.

When Nada Debs moved to Beirut in 2000, she discovered that there was a lack of furniture made there that honoured the area’s rich craft heritage. The Lebanese designer, who grew up in Japan, where her family runs a textiles business, filled this gap with a new aesthetic in which clean lines and extravagant patterns collide. “I look at the region’s beautiful craftwork and apply it to contemporary forms,” says Debs. “My furniture gave me the answer to my identity crisis, which was torn between Japanese and Arab cultures.”

Debs’s studio in a large 1930s mansion block had to be completely overhauled after the 2020 port explosion. The building, with its Carrara-marble flooring and terrazzo tiles, is now back in a shape that’s empathetic to her work’s character. “Designing furniture has shown me that you can apply opposing elements and the hybrid will work,” she says. “I want to push the boundaries of craft in my region.”

What was the idea behind your studio?
By the time I had moved to Beirut, my work was instilled with the importance of heritage in design. I was curious about Middle Eastern craft and experimented with it, ultimately creating a new identity in Arab design that I call “neo-Arabian”.

Who are your customers?
We have many different types of customers. My clientele tends to be cosmopolitan: I sell to expats and foreigners who love the idea behind the brand. I also work with embassies, government offices and institutions, because for them this represents the idea of the modern Arab identity.

Why has it been important for you to continue to produce in Lebanon?
The skills involved in Lebanese furniture- making are a dying craft, so we must bring the craftspeople work to keep it going.
nadadebs.com

24.
Kristin Hjellegjerde
Kristin Hjellegjerde
The gallerist who made a splash by taking the path less travelled.

Stories of industry outsiders who go on to run internationally renowned galleries aren’t frequent in the art world. But ever since she opened her first outpost in Wandsworth, south London, in 2012, Norwegian-born Kristin Hjellegjerde has gone against expectations. “People were, like, ‘Good luck down there,’ but it was all I could afford,” she says from her airy space in London Bridge, her second outpost in the city, which opened in 2019.

Hjellegjerde studied literature, criminology and history and worked jobs ranging from modelling to property sales in New York, Los Angeles, Singapore and Bangkok before moving to London. It was here that she finally decided to pursue her passion for art. “If I worked for somebody else I would have had to start at the bottom so I decided to open my own gallery,” she says. “I had worked in real estate in New York so I knew I was good at selling.”

This no-nonsense approach has helped her to amass 41 artists, many of whom have stayed with her since day one. Hjellegjerde specialises in up-and-coming creatives and her shows now frequently sell out within days. But money was initially tight; it took about six years for the business to become profitable. “Nobody knew who I was,” she says. But her perseverance paid off. “If I had allowed myself to have a plan B, I would never have succeeded.”

While many of her competitors are experimenting with pop-ups in locations close to holiday destinations for the wealthy, Hjellegjerde has decided to invest in two new ventures that are not on the art map. First, she has taken over a derelict German castle. “The whole place was run down. But it was a win-win situation because the owner needed us and we needed him,” she says. Then, last summer, she transformed a former shrimp factory in Norway into another new space; the opening show sold out before she could even hang it and the gallery now receives about 100 visitors a day. “I just want to build great connections: it’s about having a great life and my artists having a lot of joy when they present their work,” she says. “Be nice and generous and something good will come out of it.”
kristinhjellegjerde.com

25.
Dan Keeling and Mark Andrew
Noble Rot
A magazine has grown into restaurants, a wholesaler and a shop.

In 2006 Dan Keeling was managing director of Island Records. He was based in an office on London’s Kensington High Street but found himself spending a lot of his time in the nearby wine shops. Mark Andrew, a Mancunian whom Keeling describes as having “more front than Blackpool Pleasure Beach”, was working in one such establishment and the pair bonded over their love of wine. Neither knew at the time how their meeting would influence their careers but their shared passion led them to found a magazine in 2013 with the stated aim to “de-twattify wine”.

That magazine, Noble Rot, swiftly grew into a business that includes a restaurant on Bloomsbury’s Lamb’s Conduit Street, which opened in 2015, and another in Soho that launched in 2019. By telling the stories of the wine-making community in their magazine and in their book, Wine from Another Galaxy, published in 2020, the pair forged strong bonds across the industry. This allowed them to start a wholesale company, Keeling Andrew & Co, which now supplies the trade and provides lesser-known wine-makers with a platform for selling their bottles in London’s best bars and restaurants. But they weren’t done there.

“The pandemic spurred us into action,” says Keeling, explaining their decision to open a new wine shop called Shrine to the Vine, close to their first restaurant on Lamb’s Conduit Street, earlier in 2020. “It was a good time to negotiate and we love old buildings.” The pair signed a lease on a former bike shop in June, before tapping Steven Saunders of London-based interior design practice Fabled Studio to transform it into a more welcoming space.

Despite their expertise and passion for learning about wine and meeting the people who make it, Keeling and Andrew wear their knowledge lightly and still fizz with enthusiasm when discussing an old Latour or a punchy Umbrian sagrantino. “Opening a restaurant taught us to cater to everyone,” says Keeling. “That means both the 80-year-old who just drinks claret and the 20-year-old hipster who wants to try natural wine.” As for the pair’s own preferences? “We’re still exploring,” says Keeling.
noblerot.co.uk

Insider knowledge

1.
Dare to be vulnerable
by Adi Goodrich

Designers are expected to have all the right answers, all of the time. Yet the most rewarding collaborations require humility and an acceptance of uncertainty.

It’s 15.00. In an hour I’ll have a meeting with a client about the interior design of a creative office for between 40 and 60 employees. I’m racing to put the final touches to my presentation.

Fifty minutes left. I think to myself, “Why did I rush into having this meeting?” In all fairness to ourselves, we have been pushing hard to get everything together in time but our ethos at the studio is to leave room for collaboration.

This project came to me via text: “Adi, I’m such a big fan. Will you design my new retail space?” The message was from a dream client, the kind you simply don’t turn down. So I agreed and then daydreamed and night-dreamed about the magic that we would create together. “Together” – that’s the most important word. This is also a huge project for a tiny creative studio like mine.

Thirty minutes left. Deep breath. We can do this. Interior design requires a lifetime of interest in materials and construction, as well as an education in how to build things first so that you can design them second. It’s the outfit that a room wears to present its best self and the backdrop to life’s key moments: falling in love, the big work meeting, a child’s memories of the home they grew up in.

It’s go time. The client is calling from Australia. For the next 40 minutes I present my ideas. In the social-media age, people often share their thoughts as soon as they think them but I believe in mystery and surprise so I’ve kept mine close. The client is anxious to see what I’ve been working on and now is the time to reveal how I’ve distilled months of conversation into a plan for a physical environment.

I don’t give options in my presentations. I choose one colour for the walls, one couch for an office, one pendant above a stairwell. I have sifted through thousands of choices; it’s my job to present a single vision. This leaves me open to criticism but that’s precisely when I thrive. This is the magic moment when collaboration happens. By presenting ideas that could miss the target, I will get to the true essence of what my client wants.

Designers who come into situations such as this with huge egos do so because they assume that they need to have all of the right answers. I disagree with that approach. It’s true that designers are hired to make good decisions but we are also here to serve as an interface between the client and the project. We facilitate creativity by presenting our ideas to be dissected.

Collaboration is ultimately a conversation and we all know that the worst kinds are one-sided. So I encourage everyone in our industry to be a little less certain, to take a few more risks and to make it known to your clients that you’re working through your ideas. Allow yourself to be vulnerable and let yourself be embarrassed. Don’t wait until you’ve landed on perfection. Instead, be confident in your uncertainties. Presenting bad ideas will sometimes lead you to the best ideas you’ll ever have, especially if you leave room for others to join in.

This rather counterintuitive ethos is summed up by one of my favourite quotations from French film-maker Michel Gondry, which has been taped on the wall beside my desk for about a decade. “Every great idea,” he said, “is on the verge of being stupid.”

2.
Education, education, education
by Ruchika Sachdeva

Being the creative force of a business doesn’t excuse you from number-crunching. Keep on top of all aspects of your brand and never stop learning.

While I was studying at university, my friends and I would joke that financial struggles were a sign of creative genius. By this we meant that if your creations were commercially viable, you probably weren’t original enough. But how do you run a successful business and come up with ground- breaking designs? This was my biggest dilemma when I started my clothing label Bodice 10 years ago. Little did I know that it’s the cushion of cashflow that gives you the freedom to take risks, hire great talent and experiment.

Fashion is a creative field that thrives on ideas but in the end it’s a business. My guiding principles are data and planning. Data analysis sounds intimidating but it can be as simple as keeping a diary. Record information such as who your customer is, why they’re buying your product and how. Small details such as these can deliver valuable insights.

Running your own business requires you to educate yourself constantly. A university degree is wonderful but you need to keep learning when you step out into the real world. Entrepreneurs should know about the entire ecosystem of their business, from managing employees to accounting. You can hire people to do these things but no one knows the larger vision better than you. I’m a creative director but most of my time goes into setting up systems for other departments. I have a great team but when they’re stuck, it’s my job to step in.

No matter how well you do your homework, however, being an entrepreneur is a risky business. You should save up for rainy days and you can take loans when you need to but it’s important to have contingency plans for when everything else fails. If this happens, you’ll need to persist, find creative solutions and take tough decisions. Success is often attributed to finding a winning idea but in reality it largely depends on the execution. So always be prepared for challenges.

3.
Don’t wait for the green light
by Ben Page

Polling shows that the global public wants bolder action on climate change. For it to happen, however, governments and businesses must take the initiative.

The climate is getting hotter. It’s not just scientists who believe this: consumers do too. According to leading market-research company Ipsos Mori, global concern about climate change has risen over the course of the pandemic. Even in the US, a country with strong undercurrents of climate-change scepticism, 73 per cent of people now believe that we are heading for disaster if we don’t act urgently. Meanwhile, 83 per cent of Germans think so; in China the figure is as high as 92 per cent. In the UK, following another summer of floods and fires around the world, spontaneous concern doubled in a few weeks from 16 per cent to 32 per cent.

If we interpret these polls literally, people all over the world are ready to act. The vast behavioural shifts that occurred over a few weeks in 2020 in response to a respiratory disease that had then killed a tiny proportion of the global population show what humanity can do when it feels threatened. Yet the challenge with climate change is that many people feel hopeless or cling to the hope that governments or technology will come to the rescue without requiring them to fundamentally alter their lives.

One problem is that we overestimate the benefits of relatively easy actions, such as recycling and reducing packaging, while underestimating the positive effects of more difficult ones, such as flying less, reducing our driving and having fewer children. Giving up meat and taking up a plant-based diet would make far more difference to an individual’s carbon footprint than eating locally produced food; however, 57 per cent of people around the world believe the opposite.

Despite consumers’ good intentions, most are also unwilling to pay more for environmentally friendly products. They expect businesses to provide them at the same price. And brands and industries don’t make it easy for us. If you go to a supermarket in the UK hoping to buy products that are less damaging, you’ll be faced with more than 85 different types of eco labels. Globally there are about 450 different eco labels.

All over the world the public wants action but is often waiting for business and political leaders to take it. The evidence suggests that there is latent permission for governments to make transformative changes but if they hold off until people vote for them, these changes will come too late. Since 2003, London has had a congestion charge: motorists must pay £15 (€17.50) to drive in the city centre. Ken Livingstone, who was mayor when the scheme was launched, introduced it without a referendum or a public vote and the idea was initially unpopular. Yet not long after it came into effect, Livingstone was re-elected with 55 per cent of the vote. The measure was seen as fair and it worked in reducing traffic. Plastic bag taxes have also been introduced all over the world with barely a murmur.

The changes that we need in the 2020s to hit net zero are more daunting: decarbonising transport and replacing gas boilers in millions of homes will be far more difficult than schemes involving plastic bags or recycling. Governments will have to step up. The question is whether they will.

4.
Image management
by Megan Gibson

The post-Zuckerberg generation of entrepreneurs may have cracked the code of projecting success – but what ultimately matters is your brand’s performance.

For years, aspiring entrepreneurs looking for successful role models have consistently been offered two options by the media: the “tech bro” and the “girlboss”. The former, exemplified by Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg and other Silicon Valley wunderkind billionaires, was initially lauded for what he was not: a slick corporate type following the yuppie path. Tech bros were portrayed as visionaries who broke dress codes (think Zuckerberg’s grey hoodie) and forged new ways of funding and building companies. Venture capitalists, it seemed, couldn’t throw their money at them fast enough.

The girlboss evolved as a kind of counterpart to the tech bro a few years later. Pioneered by Sophia Amoruso, founder of the fashion line Nasty Gal and later Girlboss Media, the girlboss was almost always the head of a millennial-focused brand who leveraged both the ideals of second-wave feminism and the power of social media to sell themselves first and their product second. Like the tech bro, the girlboss was young and ambitious. Unlike the tech bro, however, she was almost always polished and camera-ready.

But as entrepreneurs sought to inhabit these roles, seemingly putting as much effort into crafting personal celebrity as they did into building their companies, glaring flaws became apparent in the glossy façades. The more eccentric and notorious of the tech bros, such as Wework’s Adam Neumann or Uber’s Travis Kalanick, publicly wilted as they were confronted with bad press and difficulties in turning an actual profit. A slew of girlbosses stepped down from, or were pushed out of, leadership positions in their own companies as torrents of employee complaints revealed everything from mismanagement to abuses of power and racial bullying. Too often, it seemed, publicly projecting successful personae had become the primary goal and the job of successfully running companies had been neglected.

The lesson for aspiring entrepreneurs is this: make it about the business. That’s not to say that you can’t or shouldn’t act as the face of your company: doing so could be a smart move if it makes sense for your brand’s image. Neither does it mean that you shouldn’t look to examples of success for inspiration. But rather than looking for a CEO-turned-celebrity you’d like to emulate, think instead about which businesses you would like your company to take after. Few people want to run a company that is in chaos, could collapse at any moment and has a reputation for being built on smoke and mirrors rather than results.

So don’t follow the trend of focusing on how to sell yourself as the latest iteration of the entrepreneurial success story. Your time would be better spent first ensuring that your company has all of the elements it needs to thrive: a target market, a product that you believe in, a cracking business plan and the right team. Once your brand begins to grow, so can your profile. But rather than being an imitation of those who have come before you, you’ll be able to forge your own path and paint a new picture of a successful entrepreneur.

5.
Slow and steady
by Ana Andjelic

Quick fixes and fast cash won’t elevate brands into lasting cultural institutions. What consumers crave is a more meaningful, longer-term investment.

Like genetically modified food, GM brands are monstrous, tasteless versions of the real thing. They show up out of nowhere and grow rapidly, thanks to the steroid effects of venture capital; they reach outsized proportions before imploding or rotting away. And they follow the Silicon Valley playbook of “rapid brand-building”. This is when a company funnels its venture capital funds into a brand’s aesthetics and its tone of voice, which are then pushed relentlessly via witty blasts of PR (and are supported – equally relentlessly – by the business media). But this isn’t enough to build a lasting brand, let alone lasting brand loyalty. Everyone from budding entrepreneurs to those trying out a new venture should remember the following.

Tone of voice is not a brand
Being chatty, clever and approachable can mask the missing cultural link that ensures a brand’s durability. It can also mask the missing unique value proposition. GM brands don’t compete on the actual business value, such as technical innovation, design or product quality. US mattress company Casper’s popular riddle adverts, placed in stations across the country, did little to improve its lacklustre IPO. Tone of voice by itself is not a real, durable advantage.

Don’t confuse having a lot of followers for having a cultural voice
A cultural voice is built over years and through experience. It’s not just about telling a tale. “In the early 1990s, we were all rooted in some sort of subculture,” says Erik Brunetti, the designer behind Los Angeles-based clothing label Fuct. “For example, there was skateboarding or graffiti or punk rock. Compare that to some brands today that aren’t rooted in any subculture; they sort of appeared out of nowhere.”

PR doesn’t build brands
PR agencies aren’t in the business of brand-building, no matter how much they’d like to be or claim to be. They might optimise the brand for a cultural moment and engage in the modern version of propaganda – repeat, repeat, repeat – but they don’t have the strategic and creative know-how that is necessary to build iconic brands.

A well-executed media blitz isn’t a creative campaign
A perfectly planned rollout creates momentary awareness but rarely makes lasting brand associations. In contrast, great creative work stays with you for decades: think of vintage Coca-Cola ads, Apple ads from the 1980s and 1990s (from “1984” to “Think Different”) and Lego campaigns from any time. Their appeal is in their craft; sometimes even their art. They provide an infinite number of references and myths that assume a life of their own.

Delayed gratification is a feature, not a bug
Performance marketing and paid social-media carpet-bombing, no matter how well targeted, do not create the kinds of human connections that all truly durable brands have. A quick rush of sales after a social-media campaign or a stunt should be interpreted not as a sign of a positive return on investment but as an inverse measure of brand loyalty.

A successful brand has genuine empathy for a particular group
Many brand founders – for example, those of Dôen, East Fork and Fly by Jing – are members of their target audience. They respond to the gap that exists between what this audience looks for and what the market is offering. The outcome is that people recognise the brand as unique.

A good brand asks what would be missing if it didn’t exist
Often the answer to this question redefines a category, expands it or creates a new category altogether. If cosmetics brand Fenty Beauty didn’t exist, many women and men wouldn’t have access to a foundation that exactly matches their skin tone. Companies with a clear idea of their role in the world, such as Fenty, Ikea and Veja, can achieve a far larger growth in brand value than companies that are focused purely on profit generation.

GM brands ultimately do very little for the wider culture or for their company’s long-term business. Without its cultural connections, Coca-Cola is just carbonated water and syrup. Today’s venture- capital time horizons make it difficult for the next generation of Coke-level legends to emerge and establish themselves. What we get instead are equivalents of Coke Life: churned out, gimmicky and quickly forgotten.

6.
In it for the long haul
by Pete Davis

Keeping our options open has become a way of life, but the magnitude of the challenges we now face demands a sustained commitment to our goals.

It’s an experience that we’ve all had, especially during lockdown. Night falls and you start browsing Netflix, looking for something to watch. You scroll through different titles and even read a few reviews but you just can’t commit to anything. Suddenly you realise that it’s been more than 30 minutes and you’re stuck in infinite-browsing mode. So you just give up. You’re too tired to watch anything now. You cut your losses and go to bed.

Infinite browsing is an apt metaphor for our time, which is the age of keeping our options open. Polish philosopher Zygmunt Bauman called it “liquid modernity”: we never want to commit to any one identity, place or project, so we remain like liquid in a state that can adapt to fit any shape.

Browsing and the flexibility and novelty that it brings can be thrilling. But we should be careful. Keeping our options open for too long will lead to unhappiness. Nobody wants to be stuck behind a locked door but equally nobody wants to live in a hallway either. It’s great to have options when you lose interest in something but, as American psychologist Barry Schwartz notes in The Paradox of Choice, the more options we have and the more times we jump from possibility to possibility, the less satisfied we are with any given option. And the experiences we ultimately desire the most aren’t rushes of novelty but deep, simple joys: the perfect Tuesday dinners with old friends, the quiet afternoons honing a craft, the feeling of creative flow when you hit your stride at work.

We encourage the young to keep their options open, particularly when it comes to their careers. Yet the people who end up earning our respect are often those who ignored that advice. It’s the long-haul heroes, those who have taken the radical act of committing themselves to particular projects over an extended period, who capture our admiration. Nearly everything that we cherish today originated in an effort that was sustained over many years. Healing a community, rectifying an injustice, revitalising a town, solving a tough puzzle, launching a start-up: all of these things come slowly. Meanwhile, the singular moments that Hollywood likes to celebrate – the epic speeches, the dramatic confrontations, the sudden flashes of insight – rarely move the needle in the real world.

There might be a cinematic moment at the end of some long hauls but it often looks less like waving a sword at a dragon than a well-tended garden finally blooming. Folk singer Pete Seeger liked to talk about long-haul projects through the parable of a large seesaw. One side of it is planted firmly on the ground, weighed down by heavy boulders. The other side is in the air with an empty basket on top. A small group patiently works to fill the basket with sand, one teaspoon at a time. A crowd of people who are watching scoff because nothing seems to be happening. But the whole seesaw will one day flip, not little by little but suddenly. People will ask, “How did it happen?” The answer, Seeger explains, is all those teaspoons over all those years.

Despite our admiration for people who have clicked out of infinite-browsing mode, many of us have difficulty following suit. Three fears seem to account for this hesitation. First, we have a fear of regret. We worry that if we commit to something, we’ll later regret having not committed to something else. Second, we have a fear of association. We assume that if we commit to something, we will be vulnerable to the chaos that this commitment will bring to our identity, reputation and sense of control. Finally, we have a fear of missing out. We are afraid that the responsibilities that come with commitment will prevent us from being everything, everywhere, with everyone.

If you choose to let such fears dominate you, you might be fine – at least for a while. You might even make flashy headlines for riding the waves of liquid modernity, surfing from one hot new thing to another. But our time calls for courage. There are so many big problems to solve, institutions to rebuild and breaches to repair today. And perhaps the biggest barrier to tackling these challenges is that there are simply not enough people willing to set forth on and sustain the decades-long journeys that are necessary to address them. To put it another way, our increasingly liquid world needs more solid people.

But here’s the good news: long hauls aren’t necessarily ordeals. Dedicated people will tell you that on the other side of the fear of regret is the serenity of purpose; on the other side of the fear of association is the comfort of community; and on the other side of the fear of missing out is the power of depth. Good work gets deeper and deeper, sweeter and sweeter, with every day in and day out, year in and year out.

There’s no better time than now to click out of infinite-browsing mode. This is the moment to begin to experience what American poet Jack Gilbert once called “the beauty that is of many days, steady and clear… the normal excellence of long accomplishment”.

7.
Out of adversity
by Kunlé Adeyemi

Nigeria might not be renowned as a business hub but it offers plenty of opportunities for entrepreneurial growth – especially if you’re an architect.

Doing business in Nigeria’s biggest city can be challenging. Lagos is congested and competitive and there’s always a lot of resistance when you’re trying to get anything done. For example, you might expect there to be some minimum infrastructure to help people get on with their lives but that’s not the case here. Instead, you’re constantly having to deal with a variety of simple challenges.

When I explain this to people who are unfamiliar with the city, I say, ‘Imagine waking up to find that there’s no power.’ You try to turn on your generator only to realise that you’re out of petrol. So you go out to buy some but the petrol station is closed. And when you try to make a phone call to fix the situation, you find out that the network is down.

Lagos is huge and highly competitive. There’s a scarcity of the kinds of infrastructure that you might take for granted in many other parts of the world, such as transport, health, education and technology. These factors, together with all the small day-to-day challenges, have encouraged people to find ways of going around things. They have to make the best of what they have.

This has built resilience in the people of this city. You’re always thinking of multiple solutions to every problem. Lagos is not about making fixed plans and then executing them. It is about analysing possibilities and trying to make the right choices as you go along. While that isn’t guaranteed to make you a good businessperson, it will at the very least make you tenacious.

All of this generates vibrancy and fosters ingenuity. And it creates an environment in which you can truly innovate. Working as an architect, you see this in the way that people here use space. Public space is sometimes treated almost as though it were privatised and seemingly every inch of the land is used in one way or another. There’s no waste.

If you look at my work on “water cities”, which began in the lagoon-side Makoko community in Lagos, you will see how the people there have occupied such a zone. A scarcity of land in the area has led people to adopt watery spaces as places of urban living. While some would consider the idea of living on the water in this way to be a problem, we saw it instead as a challenge – an opportunity to innovate and to create something that would improve the existing situation, all while learning from those who had already built hundreds of homes in the area.

Lagos, then, is a place where we can still add critical value in a way that would help to spur development and make better forms of civilisation. We have a rich history in Africa that we can tap into but we have also seen what has been successful and what has failed in developments in the West. There is potential here to learn from other parts of the world and make improvements.

In many cities in the West, development is often about reappropriating and rethinking what has already been built. In the global south, there is more focus on the new built environment. Lagos now has the option of doing something new. But, hopefully, we’ll do it completely differently.

Images: Nikolai Senin (Parkol Design)

From the ground up

Liz Dunn
Founder, Dunn & Hobbes, Seattle

Canadian Liz Dunn was 10 years into a software career in Seattle when she realised that her passion was for bricks and mortar rather than bits and bytes. So she launched a property development firm in 1998, specialising in mixed-use developments. Her best-known project, Melrose Market food hall, opened in 2010 and sold in 2019 for $15.5m (€13.2m). Dunn now has a staff of 10, managing a portfolio of 10 buildings that span nearly 14,000 sq m, with two developments in the pipeline.

Chophouse Row, her flagship address in Seattle’s Capitol Hill area, was completed in 2015. Combining handsome apartments, office space with shops and courtyard music, it has hardly missed a beat throughout the pandemic. Here, Dunn lays out her approach to renovations, retail and the return of the office.

What do you look for in a building?
There’s always something I can do with even the ugliest building: cut the back off; cut a hole in the roof; stick storeys on top. I’ll do whatever it takes to leverage the bones of the building in a way that is relevant to its new use.

Can you give an example?
That’s how Chophouse Row’s courtyard happened: we cut the back off two buildings. You have these old landlocked warehouses that go to the centre line of the block with no natural light. If you cut the back off those buildings, you lose space but you’ve created new, valuable, light and bright retail frontage.

Outdoor spaces have been key recently…
I lived in London and Paris, and I have been influenced on my travels by amazing urban spaces carved out between buildings in cities such as Melbourne. Seattle doesn’t have many examples of those intimate outdoor alleys that I’ve been carrying around with me my entire adult life.

Is tenant curation an art or a science?
Both. Property development is a people business and the right tenant won’t always be the most experienced. Sometimes it’s their first endeavour so we scrutinise them a little more. I’ve become smarter about looking at those elements because I don’t want to take their money if they won’t become successful; that’s heartbreaking to watch.

Is the future of the high street all about F&B?
We are holding the line and maintaining a certain amount of retail. It’s challenging in this world of Amazon and e-commerce so we look for a hybrid model and things that justify having a retail footprint. For example, my tenant Good Weather is fundamentally a bike shop: it builds custom bikes and runs a repair shop. But it also serves beer, wine, sandwiches and espresso.

How have you balanced longer-term tenancies with short-term pop-ups?
Capitol Hill has bounced back quickly from all the challenges but the restaurant and retail environment is still unstable. Of our three pop-up spaces, we’re not pushing anyone to convert into a long-term lease because we care about having vitality. We want the place to be full.

What do your investors care about?
We are aligned. The goal is to keep independent, small businesses in their spaces. Back when I started work on Chophouse Row, I was picky about investors. There are 45 and they are all community-minded. After Melrose Market, I had a number of people who said, “Call me.” By the time I needed to raise money again, I had a long list.

Are they calling now to check on their money?
None of them represents more than $300,000 [€250,000], so it won’t make or break their portfolio. I like to experiment and don’t want to have to ask for permission. They have to trust me.

Beks Ndlovu
CEO, African Bush Camps, Cape Town

Beks Ndlovu is walking down a narrow hippo path. “There are animals moving through here,” he says with a smile, pointing to a pair of eyes blinking in our direction from the treeline. “Can you see that giraffe looking at us?” he adds, slipping back into his former career as a safari guide. The founder and CEO of African Bush Camps (ABC) is in Botswana’s Okavango Delta, where he’s set to build his 17th safari lodge. abc’s newest site wasn’t easy to obtain but the land was well worth the wait. All around, there’s nutritious grass for animals to feed, trees to shade the tents where guests will stay and water channels for game-viewing in mokoro (dugout canoes).

By now, Ndlovu knows exactly what to look for. The 45-year-old has spent the past 15 years opening lodges in and around national parks and reserves in Botswana, Zambia and his native Zimbabwe. “Coming from within the industry is one of my biggest advantages,” he says.

Ndlovu grew up in Lupane, a small village where animals were a legitimate danger: elephants raided crops and one charged at him when he was 10. He started working as a guide and later founded his own guiding company via stints in hospitality at home and abroad. The Cape Town resident vividly recalls the moment he decided to set up a small, 12-bed camp of his own. “I was on a game drive with guests and heard a camp manager shouting at another guide over the radio that he was going to be late because one of his guests had a spa treatment booked.”

Experiences with wildlife cannot be scheduled and, in Ndlovu’s mind, a massage shouldn’t come at the expense of an electrifying encounter with a cheetah. “I thought, ‘I have to change the narrative.’” He decided to switch the focus of modern safaris away from high-end amenities, such as private pools and Egyptian-cotton sheets, and back to the bush he knew as a young guide. “Luxury for me is about having one of Africa’s naturalists help you to understand the dynamics of the natural world,” he says.

But that is not to say that African Bush Camps are a low-budget option. Guests at Khwai Leadwood, which opened on the edge of Botswana’s Moremi Game Reserve in 2020, enjoy a sleek camp with six tented rooms shaded by leadwood trees, and an inviting plunge pool, which almost rolls into the river. Ndlovu admits that his original idea – to build a single camp in Zimbabwe – was naïve. Scale is important in the safari industry because tourists tend to move from one park to the next, often across multiple countries. Having a group of lodges allows abc to create more meaningful journeys for guests, retain custom and avoid partnering with other companies who might not share the same vision.

Expansion was made possible with the support of clients with whom Ndlovu had previously guided and gone on to build long-standing relationships with, and investors introduced by friends. Some abc shareholders are wealthy Africans who are working overseas but want to give something back to the continent. Others have wanted to make a quick buck. One financier tried to flip the business and then almost bankrupted the company by recalling loans. He has since been bought out. “His values didn’t align with mine,” says Ndlovu.

Shareholders in abc must buy into the company ethos and balance financial profit with a small environmental footprint. Investing in solar kits and waste-management systems that recycle water is expensive and abc has taken a leaf out of Patagonia’s book by giving 2.5 per cent of its gross turnover to community projects and conservation.

Further expansion is unlikely as the business focuses on its conservation work and its company culture. “One of the differentiating factors of abc is that it’s not a corporate machine; there’s a face behind the product,” says Ndlovu, who claims to know almost all of his 600 employees by name. Staff are visibly delighted to see the boss arrive; one shakes the boss’s hand as though he were greeting an old friend. Ndlovu wants to provide more managerial opportunities for local people and his star is rising in the safari industry, in which it is still rare to find black owners.

On a game drive the next day, a guide from another safari company passes and asks whether Ndlovu, who is casually sitting barefoot in the back seat, is, “Mr Beks from African Bush Camps”. He smiles at the compliment; everyone wants to work for him. Ndlovu then signals for our guide to take a different route to see a tree he loves – an ideal spot for a coffee and a chance to see some elephants. Ndlovu is the CEO but at heart he’s still a safari guide.

Yuichiro Hori
CEO, Stellar Works, Shanghai

What do Denmark’s richest man and the Japanese government have in common? They each want a seat at the table with ​​Yuichiro Hori, CEO of furniture brand Stellar Works. Wealthy entrepreneur Troels Povlsen became the brand’s exclusive distributor in Europe and Asia in 2020 after selling his stake in Danish furniture brand Hay. Then, in quick succession, Hori’s home country became a minority shareholder through its Cool Japan investment fund. “We signed those two big deals during the pandemic,” says Hori, from Tokyo where he is stopping over en route to the US.

Hori founded Stellar Works in Shanghai nine years ago. The Japanese entrepreneur has ambitions to double the business’s current revenue of $50m (€43m) a year by 2025. Furniture collections account for about half of turnover; bespoke hospitality interiors bring in the rest; and the pandemic has provided opportunities such as the chance to expand the brand’s retail footprint in New York.

“It’s important for us to have a beautiful showroom so people can come and feel our products,” he says, and rattles off a string of recent and forthcoming openings from Los Angeles to Singapore. “It’s impossible to sell furniture online, unless it’s cheap.”

Hori’s creative teams are spread across the US, Europe and Asia. They work with a growing roster of global collaborators and are expanding their product lines. The New York team is working with Departo, a lifestyle brand launched in partnership with Yabu Pushelberg, and the Tokyo outpost is planning a collection of mid-century Japanese furniture. Cool Japan has been a helpful calling card in discussions to reproduce iconic works by the likes of Sori Yanagi and Isamu Noguchi.

Sourcing, producing and designing in Japan is increasing but Hori is upfront about the brand’s regional heritage. “I’m Japanese, manufacturing in Shanghai, using plenty of Asian materials,” he says. Europe and the US are his biggest markets but the business in China is expected to jump to a third of overall revenue this year, in part because of the pandemic and also due to maturing consumer tastes. “The Chinese consumer mindset has changed; they hate buying copies,” says Hori, who first started a trading company in China in 2004.

Hori’s willingness to travel out of his comfort zone has been a hallmark of his success. One of his earliest business decisions was to convince gilded French furniture manufacturer Laval to open a high-end factory with him in China. Realising, after several bad experiences in China, that he needed to control his own production and employ his own workforce, he turned up at Laval’s Paris head office with an idea but without an invitation.

Their now co-owned workshop in Shanghai is home to some 400 staff, a mix of Chinese craftspeople, Japanese managers and French technicians, who turn out both furniture for Laval and every piece of furniture that carries the Stellar Works name. “Controlling the quality is our lifeline – we can’t outsource,” he says, sounding more like a Toyota executive than a trained interior designer.

Hori cuts a unique figure in the industry as the founder of a global design brand based in China. Although Stellar Works makes all of its own furniture, it took several years and some notable design awards to shake off the “Made in China” stigma. A key turning point came when European designers started approaching him. Italian architect Michele de Lucchi even turned up at Hori’s headquarters in Shanghai, eager to see production. Stellar Works launched a sofa collection with the Italian designer at the latest Design Shanghai and Hori hopes to debut a “very special” follow-up at the next Salone del Mobile in Milan.

These days the product speaks for itself. Troels Povlsen came across Stellar Works at a hotel where he was staying. The Danish businessman found out who created the furniture and invited Hori to a meeting in India. While investment discussions are ongoing, Povlsen’s company Nine United is in the process of converting Hay showrooms across Europe to Stellar Works.

The Nine United partnership is not only raising brand awareness on high streets, at tradeshows and online, it is also reducing three-month lead times – a perennial furniture industry headache. Stellar Works now has plenty of stock held in Europe and an upholstery factory has just opened; made in Shanghai frames will soon be finished in Lithuania.

Hori is committed to manufacturing in China and he is currently working on a new-look campus with architecture practice Neri & Hu. The designs include a small hotel, entirely furnished by Stellar Works, so designers and hoteliers making the trek to the out-of-town Jiading district can stay the night and experience the brand up close. “Our workshop is our real showroom,” he says.

Le Gammeltoft
Founder, Heartbeats, Copenhagen

When Le Gammeltoft quit her DJ gig at national broadcaster Danmarks Radio (DR), launching her own media company was always going to be an uphill battle. Denmark is a pioneer in many fields but media isn’t one of them. DR still dominates the TV and radio landscape, while print media has hardly changed in decades (and is funded in part by the state). All were very late to the podcast party. Heartbeats went live in 2014 and its Danish-language podcasts, videos and online articles have become a hit with young Danes. Topics cover cultural, lifestyle and social issues and attract some 150,000 listeners every month – impressive reach in such a small nation.

Aller Media, one of the Nordic region’s largest magazine publishers, acquired an 80 per cent stake in 2019. “We could do things that they couldn’t do in digital,” says Gammeltoft from her studio in Copenhagen, where the 43-year-old still gets behind the mic. The investment provided her with time to grow Heartbeats’ list of advertisers and the Heartbeats advertising agency, which produces content for clients such as Mercedes-Benz and Denmark’s state railway. “Lots of companies want to talk to younger people but we proved that we can reach them,” she says.

Why leave DR?
I was tired of playing Coldplay every hour. Cultural coverage was narrowing and the media industry was going the same way as the music industry, which I’d seen struggle with digitalisation and fail to create new business models. I realised that we needed to translate what journalists did for the modern user. If I’m on my bike, I’m not reading an article, I’m listening to a podcast.

Did you follow any business models?
Not really. We didn’t have many podcasts in Denmark and no one knew how content producers could collaborate with commercial partners. There are two types of entrepreneurs: the business-school graduate who sees a gap in a market to make a few million and there’s someone like me who does something they love. I was a literature graduate and a club DJ but I discovered that I was also a salesperson.

Where did your initial funding come from?
I put in my own money, about 500,000 kroner [€67,000]. Every krone we earned went back into the company and I kept on DJ-ing at weekends to earn a living. We started with a couple of unpaid interns and I hired my first employee in 2015. Now we have 35 people working here – our own in-house journalists, editors, sound designers, photographers and software developers.

What gave you a lift in the early years?
I had an insane network because of my work as a DJ. I don’t distinguish between work and my social life. That got me a great board, our first client and first investor. But after a couple of years, I needed more expertise, which is why I sold a stake to Aller.

Any major challenges since?
Lots of entrepreneurs think that when you get a big backer you’re off but you have to think of it as a marriage to a lot of people. It took time to adjust but Aller let us stay independent and this year our earnings are up 90 per cent; we will make our first profit.

How do you keep editorial and commercial content separate?
The teams are separate but even with branded content the client doesn’t have any influence beyond signing off on the idea, the host and the type of guests. That takes bravery but clients are now realising that this is what they need to do if they want to reach younger people. The advertising agency side of the business is growing very strongly and that’s what we are focusing on now. It’s fun to build a new company within the company.

What’s it like to run your own business?
You get a lot of alpha males who boast about sleeping under their desks and a lot of women are scared off by all the macho shit you see in Dragons’ Den. But I have kids and a lot of my employees have kids. Sometimes I have to leave at 16.00 but as long as we are productive, in our own way, that’s all that I care about.

How can the government encourage more entrepreneurship?
Danes can be lazy. The state gives them great security but that makes them entitled. At school I’d like to see kids taught how to make budgets, come up with ideas and follow through on a plan.

Club rules

1.
Nåpoleon Komplex
Berlin

It has been 24 hours since restrictions were lifted in Berlin to allow vaccinated clubbers inside venues without a mask. At Nåpoleon Komplex, one of the city’s newest nightlife spots, almost 1,000 revellers have come together to celebrate. They’re dancing in a euphoric haze as Whitney Houston’s “How Will I Know” booms across the courtyard of this former train depot.

The pandemic has posed an existential threat to clubs around the world, particularly in places such as Berlin, where nightlife is not only an industry but also a crucial part of the city’s identity. However, entrepreneurs are working to ensure that venues can survive and are pressing ahead with new openings to capitalise on people’s pent-up desire to party. Nåpoleon Komplex’s owner, Michel Niknafs, is one of them.

While other clubs in the city are marking the occasion with techno marathons, Nåpoleon Komplex is hosting a Cher-heavy pop night called Engtanz. “It’s the only trashy night that’s cool,” says Niknafs, who is bouncing about like an excitable pinball. Wearing red overalls and a black beret, he is effervescent as he greets guests, chats to staff and swings behind the decks to wrap an arm around the DJ.

Growing up in Berlin in the early 2000s, Niknafs developed a fascination for the city’s empty spaces and how they were being repurposed by creatives. One venue in particular sparked his imagination: the Kunsthaus Tacheles, an artist colony housed in a derelict department store. Sadly the venue shared the fate of many others: the building was sold to developers in 2014. “Tacheles had the spirit I wanted to capture with Nåpoleon Komplex,” says Niknafs.

After graduating from high school, Niknafs sold merchandise for legendary German band Die Ärzte. This led to a job in events management at Universal Music Group. His Spree-side offices were opposite the legendary Watergate club, where he often pulled all-nighters, rolling straight to his desk in the morning. At 22, he co-founded his first club, Prince Charles, in the former employee swimming pool of a piano manufacturer in Kreuzberg.

Two years ago, Niknafs decided that it was time for a new project. “I saw [Prince Charles] like a work of art,” he says. “I could keep adding touches here and there but it was already complete.” He sold the club and searched for a new venture. In late 2019 he signed the lease on a pair of former Deutsche Bahn warehouses in the Berlin district of Friedrichshain with business partners Jamina Stärke and Marek Spak. The venue opened under the name Neuzeit Ost but only managed to host a few events before closing in March 2020.

Niknafs wasn’t disheartened. A seasoned entrepreneur, he viewed the pandemic as a challenge to be overcome rather than a death knell. He put out an open call to the city’s artists, inviting them to use the empty warehouse as a studio. “I thought if I still had to pay the rent, someone might as well be using the space,” he says. “In the end we had more than 35 artists working here for free, doing everything from painting to performance art. It was a huge success.”

All the while, Niknafs and his team transformed the central courtyard into a beer garden that could hold live music events once restrictions were lifted. Since opening in June, the space has hosted events ranging from the launch of South Korean DJ Peggy Gou’s latest record to a warm-up party for electronic music festival Melt.

Despite the financial blow dealt by the pandemic to music venues, Niknafs sees a silver lining. “It re-energised the scene,” he says. “People have stopped taking nights out for granted and DJs are really happy to be playing again.” It also generated a stronger sense of community among those running Berlin’s clubs. “I’ve come together with the owners of places like Ritter Butzke, Kater Blau and Berghain because we’re facing the same problems. I’m happy about that.”

Optimistic about the bounceback of the nightlife economy, which could flourish into something not too dissimilar to a reprise of the Roaring Twenties, Niknafs is also opening a permanent club later this year in an adjoining warehouse. It’s called Exil Elba – a reference to the Italian island where Napoleon was sent after abdicating in 1814. “I love stories,” says Niknafs. “Our beer garden is named after another island that Napoleon was exiled to, Sankt Helena.”

Niknafs learned some valuable lessons in flexibility during the pandemic. The complex also contains 25 ateliers and spaces that are rented out to woodworkers, video-makers and others. It’s also home to the offices of Niknafs’s event agency Lå Boom, which counts Sony and Adidas among its clients. “I sort of see myself as Robin Hood,” says Niknafs. “Working with these bigger brands brings in money for the collective. We put it back into noncommercial events, such as art exhibitions.”

Niknafs believes that the survival of Berlin’s nightlife depends on this willingness to adapt to, rather than fight against, the bigger players in the city. “People who are building soulless buildings ask me how to give them life,” he says. “I’m always thinking about how we can work with these players and not just say ‘no’ because a ‘no’ doesn’t mean anything to them. Money always wins.” As long as the new projects look and feel as lively as Nåpoleon Komplex, many will be glad that he said yes.
napoleon.berlin

2.
Faye
Hong Kong

Hong Kong’s Lan Kwai Fong nightlife district has had its highs and lows in recent decades but now it’s firmly on the up. New nightclubs have opened in the past year, while some of the established venues have been remodelled or have moved to bigger spaces. Among the newbies is Faye, which welcomed its first revellers to the top two floors of the iconic California Tower in spring 2020. On Friday nights, office workers gather on the rooftop to clink cocktails as the sun sets. Then the space fills with night owls and dance music.

Faye’s founder and co-owner, Ray Ng, is best known for his late-night institution Volar, which closed in 2020 after 17 years. Without missing a beat, Ng opened his new rooftop space as soon as it was possible. “We moved up to the highest point in Lan Kwai Fong from the lowest point – the basement where Volar was,” says Ng. “We brought the whole thing to the sky.” He attributes the success of his new venture to “revenge clubbing”: revellers compensating for lost time. “Everybody was trapped for so long. People want to go out.”

Faye is also benefiting from a captive audience. Because of Hong Kong’s strict quarantine regulations, residents are effectively stuck in the city. “People would normally be travelling around Europe and Asia,” says Ng. Closed borders, however, pose challenges for a club in an international city. Non-residents can’t enter, including touring DJs. For now, Ng is taking the opportunity to feature homegrown acts.

Despite all of the recent disruptions, he remains undeterred. “Going into the nightlife industry was a total uncertainty but I’m glad that I did,” he says. “You have to love what you do.”

3.
El Silencio
Ibiza

It’s golden hour in Cala Molí and DJ Jaime Fiorito is electrifying a small dance floor. Ibiza’s raucous party scene may have splintered into smaller soirees during the pandemic but the energy on display this evening proves there’s a market for making people feel free. El Silencio, an offshoot of the Parisian nightclub designed by David Lynch, is offering people a place to feel just that.

But how do you start a new beach club on an island that’s so closely associated with superclubs? Silencio’s answer is to tone things down and explore connections with other disciplines. “Music has always fused with fashion and art on this island,” says Coralie Gauthier, director of exhibitions and programmes for the Silencio group, which operates six other venues, all in France. “This summer we’ve embraced intimacy and surprise.”

The club features a restaurant overseen by French chef Jean Imbert and a playful installation by artist Miranda Makaroff. The adjoining pool bar’s sunloungers are regularly used as theatre seats; storytelling workshops and concerts by the likes of Belgian singer Claire Laffut take place here.

Music still binds it all together but El Silencio’s arrival in Ibiza suggests that the island’s clubbing scene is ready for a change. Tourist numbers here were high this summer, even with most of the clubbing giants closed. Smaller venues have filled the void. “This season proved we can offer something new while still feeling like a safe haven,” says Silencio’s founder and owner, Arnaud Frisch. “People just need a place they know will make them feel good.” A quick glance at the revellers by the DJ booth suggests that he’s on to something.
elsilencioibiza.com