STP5: From a Machine Learning Externship to running an early-stage Fintech startup
Setting the scene
My Externship story starts around mid-2022, when I contacted a company in Sweden (Adamass AB) that had developed a prototype of a stock market trading platform using machine learning. During a brief visit to Sweden in June that year I submitted an externship proposal with the company founder to the Technology and Innovation Platform (TIP). The plan was to do an externship during the last three months of the year, improving and testing the machine learning core of their prototype.
That summer I also received an email from the TIP, advertising the Innosuisse Business Concept Training that would commence in fall. To fully immerse myself in the entrepreneurial spirit I signed up and got admitted, meaning that I would be doing both the externship and the Innosuisse training during the same period.
Launching the project
The Innosuisse course started mid-September and required students to pitch an entrepreneurship idea. After discussion with the CEO of Adamass (who is involved in many projects) we agreed that I could pitch the stock market trading idea at the Innosuisse course and see if I could develop a proper business plan around it. My project was selected, together with ten others and I acquired four team members that would assist me for the following three months to develop ‘my company’: suddenly I found myself as acting CEO!
The externship & business concept training
Figure 1: Berry at the Innosuisse Training final pitch, that was won by his team.
The following three months I fully dedicated much more than full time to this project, thanks to the TIP Externship grant that freed me from my research duties. I approached it as if it would become a proper company one day, so I spent a lot of time organizing all meetings, documentation, and workflows in a way that could be easily expanded on in the future. I could also draw majorly from the knowledge I gained earlier that year from the PlanetS organized leadership course (which I can recommend to anyone, even if you don’t intend to ‘lead’ a team!).
This paid off, as we managed to work efficiently with a very diverse team of people, including two very motivated mentors, all contributing a significant part to the development of the project. During the course, basically all relevant aspects of setting up a company and testing/building out our ideas were touched upon.
It should be said that to gain the maximum from it, one needs to dedicate much more than just one or two evenings per week, especially if you are the project lead, like in my case. Luckily, because of the externship, I was able to dedicate my time not only to developing the machine learning part that I originally set out to explore, but it also allowed me to interact with my team and work on assignments for the course whenever needed.
During this period I worked from Switzerland (to attend the Innosuisse training classes) while regularly exchanging ideas and updates remotely with the CEO of Adamass, who was happy to have me take the lead on this project.
At our final pitch we had done a lot of work, which was rewarded. We were selected as the best project, and awarded a trip to London that took place begin of February 2023 together with the winning teams from the other Innosuisse training locations in Switzerland.
Running an early-stage Fintech startup
After this success, I obviously wanted to see where this could lead further, and thus I continued ever since (writing this May 2023). Of the original Innosuisse Business training team, one person stayed on, and together with the CEO of Adamass we are continuing to drive the development of the project.
An important change occurred on the first of January 2023, when I was again 100% back to my astronomy job, thus now managing this project in extra time on the side (5-12 h per week) with still weekly meetings amongst our team. This honestly is tough, especially if you also have a family like in my case, so it requires some serious determination.
Doing the business course during the externship had an effect that I had not anticipated and that took me time to appreciate. I expected to have the full trading algorithm prototype completed and validated by the end of my Externship, but this was not the case: the tech still needed a lot more development, and worst of all (in my own view of course): I had not even touched some of the new deep learning techniques I had set out to explore and utilize. From the researcher perspective I thus felt I underdelivered on the initial goals I set.
From the entrepreneur point of view, however, this proved to be not an issue, on the contrary! The major advantage is that from early on we had a pretty good idea of the market opportunities, as well as a significant number of interested contacts through the interviews that we had conducted. The good aspect is that we have a good idea of the requirements of potential customers and that we now target our developments directly toward them.
Our plan is to try to reach a tech-validation milestone in a few months, and then make a hard decision: to continue or not. Because we are all working on ‘sweat-equity’ basis (i.e., if we make it, we get a part of the company, else there is zero compensation), this hard cut will allow us to justify the current overdraw on time we spend on the project, knowing it will not be for an undetermined time.
If our fintech ideas pan-out and we indeed attract some potential investors/partners to bring it to market we will likely incorporate, and I will reduce my astronomy work contract to be able to dedicate proper (official) time to this company.
Expanded horizon
I’m committed to make it work in the coming months and am very eager to see what we can achieve. Whether this startup will make it or not, the project so far has already allowed me to reach two major personal milestones: introduce myself to the world of entrepreneurship and explore what I could potentially do outside of academia. On top of that it taught me a great deal about the arts of good leadership and management.
A huge (unexpected) bonus is the network that I have now built, and the great many people that have provided me with many valuable insights. All these experiences are benefitting me now in both my academic and entrepreneurial work, making me very grateful for having had the opportunity to do the Planet-S externship, to step-out of my existing frame of reference and to expand my horizon.
