This is just a recorded version of post #4, published on June 5th. And in case you missed the post, here’s the text:
The magic wand
It was like discovering one of your friends had a secret other life as a wizard.
I had assumed Sam’s offer would net perhaps five introductions. It was over 30. They rolled in over several days. Some were part-time investors, early unicorn PMs and hedge fund executives making side bets. Others were genuine Silicon Valley/internet heavyweights. This, in addition to other introductions made by other friends, mentors, and associates meant that I had nearly seventy conversations lined up by late January.
As Sam had advised, each call had a simple script: introductions, description-of-problem I wanted to solve, q-and-a, then be-prepared-to-answer the inevitable, “how can I help?”
You don’t get what you don’t ask for.
At the time - late January - I thought I was on the road to starting an insurance company specializing in big digitally connected industrial control systems infrastructures. My asks were pretty simple:
Talk to folks in the insurance industry
Talk to risk managers at large, internet-connected industrial firms
Talk to investors interested in security
Here’s a visualization of the conversations I had (and at ~110WPM I get fairly good notes) in that first month:
Key takeaways from these early conversations.
Nearly every investor (with the exception of two who kindly explained that they were refocusing exclusively on blockchain) viscerally understood the problem of industrial control system cybersecurity. This was a good sign, especially since most of these initial conversations took place before the Tampa water treatment facility hack.
For those who were particularly keen on thinking through how to address this problem, I broached the topic of an insurance company. Here, the reactions forked: For those investors who only had “buy-side” exposure to the insurance industry, things were quite positive.
But for investors who knew something about the insurance industry, I got a very different reaction. And it would throw my entire plan into disarray.
Next post: “what happened to insurance?”
*audio version* - "how can I help?" - talking to angel investors about industrial cybersecurity