Meeting Title: Uttam <> Jorrel Date: 2024-12-16 Meeting participants: Jorrel Sto Tomas, Uttam Kumaran
WEBVTT
1 00:08:40.030 ⇒ 00:08:40.890 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Hey, Tom!
2 00:08:41.020 ⇒ 00:08:42.679 Uttam Kumaran: Hey, man! How are you?
3 00:08:43.380 ⇒ 00:08:44.260 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Good. How are you, man?
4 00:08:44.320 ⇒ 00:08:46.709 Uttam Kumaran: Good. How’s traveling?
5 00:08:47.600 ⇒ 00:08:55.980 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Traveling is a challenge. I will tell you that. But you know, there’s some things you can’t avoid.
6 00:08:56.400 ⇒ 00:09:09.709 Uttam Kumaran: Hopefully. This one was chill. I mean, yeah, I’ve been. I went. I traveled to India last this, I guess, this year, and then last year as well. But I don’t know. I I used to travel so much, and so I kind of just one big bus for me like
7 00:09:09.880 ⇒ 00:09:17.699 Uttam Kumaran: it’s not really as it’s not as interesting as it was as a kid. It’s just like, Get on the bus, and I’m like, just make sure I can get to where I need to go.
8 00:09:19.140 ⇒ 00:09:42.988 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, I think I think the mysticism around traveling has kind of gone away like when I when I started midplex with my co-founder a few years back. We were traveling so much and like, you know, New York, or we’d go to travel to see investors and random spots in the Us. And then, yeah, I was like, like, Wow, this is like, not romantic anymore
9 00:09:43.725 ⇒ 00:09:46.053 Jorrel Sto Tomas: like this, is not that?
10 00:09:46.450 ⇒ 00:09:51.890 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, especially if you go to New York. And you’re like, Oh, I got it. It took an hour to just get anywhere.
11 00:09:52.430 ⇒ 00:09:53.510 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Exactly.
12 00:09:53.510 ⇒ 00:10:05.950 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You’re taking the subway and everything else. And so, yeah, no, it’s yeah. So here in the Philippines, it’s, I think, the 1st few times that I was here with my dad. It was like, Oh, it’s, you know, cool to see new things. And then
13 00:10:06.257 ⇒ 00:10:30.260 Jorrel Sto Tomas: you know, being be an interesting kind of situations that I I’ve never been in before since. You know, we’re us starting this business. But now it’s like, okay. Well, this is more or less routine. It’s like, Oh, am I gonna be able to make this meeting? Am I? Gonna because they they operate on a different time scale here. It’s like, always they’re they’re perpetually like 2 h late to everything. So
14 00:10:31.026 ⇒ 00:10:34.750 Jorrel Sto Tomas: you know, sometimes we’re just like, are they even gonna show up like.
15 00:10:35.250 ⇒ 00:10:36.440 Uttam Kumaran: That’s awesome.
16 00:10:36.745 ⇒ 00:10:37.659 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. So it’s
17 00:10:37.660 ⇒ 00:10:49.010 Jorrel Sto Tomas: it’s definitely been. It’s it’s it’s a. It’s been an adjustment. That I’m thankful that I’m not the one I’m not the one handling our our Philippine operations. We definitely have some really talented people here doing it. So.
18 00:10:49.300 ⇒ 00:10:50.510 Uttam Kumaran: Really awesome.
19 00:10:51.000 ⇒ 00:10:56.179 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. But anyway, you know yeah, I think this is our 1st time talking to Tom so nice to meet you.
20 00:10:56.180 ⇒ 00:10:57.700 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, you too.
21 00:10:58.210 ⇒ 00:11:25.477 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I I see you post all the time on Linkedin, so I try to engage with it as much as I can. But, you know, on the other end of that as well. Robert has been talking highly of you for for basically the last like year, or so and so. Yeah, I was really, really excited to to be able to chat with you, and I know he told me that you expressed interest in in talking to me as well, and so really glad we’re we’re able to make this happen. You know, despite all the time zone.
22 00:11:25.730 ⇒ 00:11:39.850 Uttam Kumaran: No, no, and holidays and everything. Yeah, no, I’m the same way, I mean, I’m really happy. Me and Robert have been working together, you know, for about a year, and kind of started journeys into just starting a business, you know, kind of on this on similar timelines.
23 00:11:40.210 ⇒ 00:11:51.840 Uttam Kumaran: I think for me. I you know, I I worked in data for a while and you know, I I knew that. Okay, there’s an opportunity in consulting, but I never wanted to be like a consultant. I was like, that’s gross.
24 00:11:52.010 ⇒ 00:12:02.470 Uttam Kumaran: But I I realized that like, okay, there’s actually an area where I do think that having a variety of skill sets can help a lot of clients. And then also, it’s like, Look, I think
25 00:12:02.730 ⇒ 00:12:29.702 Uttam Kumaran: a lot of data consultancies don’t do what they promise and they overcharge, and I do think there’s still avenues to to get clients, but also, like I just worked in startups like my whole career, and so just got like once you see how like every part of the sausage is made. These, I’m someone who starts to wonder like. Why, I can’t start making sausages like myself. And that’s just maybe my chronic illness. But
26 00:12:30.620 ⇒ 00:12:33.490 Uttam Kumaran: I’m not someone who can like
27 00:12:33.850 ⇒ 00:12:44.500 Uttam Kumaran: sit there and see that I can like do everything except for one thing. And so it was. It was. It’s been a really really interesting ride, you know. So far, I think it started it all with, like my own money, and
28 00:12:44.985 ⇒ 00:12:53.409 Uttam Kumaran: had to get, you know, clients and get people involved. And thankfully, I think I you know I’m an engineer. So I worked with engineers, and I know it’s kind of speak there
29 00:12:53.540 ⇒ 00:13:10.689 Uttam Kumaran: their language, but also it’s my language. So I know kind of like what they need. And so that solves a little bit about the supply side of this problem. I think the demand side has definitely been something for me to learn. How do we actually, you know, do sales and things like that? But it’s been the most rewarding, you know. Experience, I mean
30 00:13:10.990 ⇒ 00:13:14.920 Uttam Kumaran: again for me. This is my 1st business. It sounds like, you know you’ve been in.
31 00:13:15.090 ⇒ 00:13:29.820 Uttam Kumaran: You’ve been in different businesses for a while, and it’s different when you know, you represent a brand, but it’s different when, like me and the brand are like the same thing. And so it’s really lovely to be able to just be so proud of what we we’ve done so far, and
32 00:13:29.940 ⇒ 00:13:52.310 Uttam Kumaran: excited for the future. And then, just like, have conversations where I’m like, how can we take this even further, you know. And so that’s what a lot of where me and Robert’s relationship started. And then, really, luckily, like, we started working on deals together, and we have very complementary skill sets. I would say, I think I’m definitely have like a deeper breath on the technical side in terms of data engineering data modeling. And then
33 00:13:52.380 ⇒ 00:14:13.899 Uttam Kumaran: we’re also starting to do a lot of AI work as well. I think definitely, he’s a lot more disciplined on the business side. Definitely, probably more conservative than I am. In a couple of ways. But also I think that helps a lot, too, because I have taken some calculated risks that that I’ve really paid off, and since the beginning thought.
34 00:14:14.100 ⇒ 00:14:17.100 Uttam Kumaran: you know that this can be something way bigger than just like
35 00:14:17.220 ⇒ 00:14:19.510 Uttam Kumaran: balancing a couple of contracts on my own.
36 00:14:19.961 ⇒ 00:14:30.280 Uttam Kumaran: So that’s like a little bit of it. I mean, I’m based here in Austin. I was in New York. For about 4 years. Before this. So a lot of my network is like New York based. And then.
37 00:14:30.560 ⇒ 00:14:31.219 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Kind of building up.
38 00:14:31.220 ⇒ 00:14:39.789 Uttam Kumaran: Bigger network here in Austin. And then I grew up in the Bay area kind of maybe like 2 h north of where Robert is from like in the South Bay.
39 00:14:40.680 ⇒ 00:14:47.480 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I see, I see. Well, well, that explains a lot you’ve you’ve done the whole route area.
40 00:14:47.480 ⇒ 00:14:51.239 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, New York. And then. Now, Austin, you know.
41 00:14:51.240 ⇒ 00:14:54.080 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, not at the heart of the country somewhere in the middle.
42 00:14:54.220 ⇒ 00:15:00.450 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I don’t know. I like Bay Area growing up there. You you hear a lot about tech, and it’s that’s all that like.
43 00:15:00.770 ⇒ 00:15:05.669 Uttam Kumaran: that’s all I knew there. So and then, when I went to, I went to school in Bucknell, which is like Central PA.
44 00:15:06.290 ⇒ 00:15:07.300 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, okay.
45 00:15:07.300 ⇒ 00:15:16.799 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And then that I was the 1st time I was like on the east coast. And I was like, Oh, this is like just learning about all the different people there and then. Being in New York was like a crazy ride. I think.
46 00:15:16.940 ⇒ 00:15:39.309 Uttam Kumaran: I think you know, Job Wise. That was the best thing like, I really got to accelerate a lot of stuff and move super quickly and meet so many people. But life wise, not sustainable, like I was definitely not gonna live there, especially during Covid. It was like sucked and then I kind of found I like was driving around the country actually for like 5 months during Covid, just working.
47 00:15:39.720 ⇒ 00:15:52.120 Uttam Kumaran: I bought a truck and was like driving around different parts of the country I wanted to live in, and then I came to Austin. And I was like, okay, this place is really, really dope and and then, of course, everybody got the same idea. Looks like, so
48 00:15:53.750 ⇒ 00:15:59.339 Uttam Kumaran: and yeah, it’s been really, really nice down here. I’m almost. It’s almost 3 years now. So it’s
49 00:15:59.650 ⇒ 00:16:00.970 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, God! Oh, wow! That’s.
50 00:16:00.970 ⇒ 00:16:02.060 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
51 00:16:02.210 ⇒ 00:16:11.399 Uttam Kumaran: thank you. I mean, I don’t think professionally it’s the best decision. But I I’m motivated enough myself that I don’t need a lot of like.
52 00:16:11.860 ⇒ 00:16:21.629 Uttam Kumaran: I don’t need a lot of external pressure, actually would rather not that that May. That may tip me over. So I feel like it’s been really really nice to have the balance here, so.
53 00:16:23.050 ⇒ 00:16:25.999 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, I mean, hey, you know, there’s more to life than just work.
54 00:16:26.000 ⇒ 00:16:26.735 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
55 00:16:27.470 ⇒ 00:16:41.661 Jorrel Sto Tomas: But but you know, I say that as being an entrepreneur, and you know, 99% of my time is work. Even when it is just hang out family, like, you know. Obviously, I started this business with my dad as well, and
56 00:16:41.970 ⇒ 00:16:45.535 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, you’re you’re really in business with family. Now, yeah, that’s great.
57 00:16:46.110 ⇒ 00:16:52.579 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I mean, yeah. And also, like I, I launch projects all the time with my brother. Who’s a software engineer and growth guy. So.
58 00:16:52.580 ⇒ 00:16:53.160 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, nice!
59 00:16:53.160 ⇒ 00:16:57.509 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Like, yeah. So it’s it’s like, I said, it’s a constant basis for us. But
60 00:16:57.980 ⇒ 00:17:07.768 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, I mean, you know, it’s it’s good. You’re finding that balance, you know. That’s definitely something you know, I I found in Los Angeles. And so you know, I’m I’m la based, and it’s
61 00:17:08.040 ⇒ 00:17:08.450 Uttam Kumaran: Nice.
62 00:17:08.450 ⇒ 00:17:11.549 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, it’s been incredibly rewarding over there. And it’s
63 00:17:11.990 ⇒ 00:17:18.291 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, something that’s you know, if if you can get it early enough, it. It really sets a good foundation for you.
64 00:17:19.170 ⇒ 00:17:24.589 Jorrel Sto Tomas: because it’s stressful like, you know, you you running like and I see this with Robert.
65 00:17:24.930 ⇒ 00:17:27.774 Jorrel Sto Tomas: you know, running, running the business full time is,
66 00:17:28.270 ⇒ 00:17:32.610 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, it’s it’s stressful. You’re always thinking about money. You’re always thinking about.
67 00:17:32.610 ⇒ 00:17:34.960 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, you’re thinking about everything all the time, you know.
68 00:17:35.312 ⇒ 00:17:36.370 Jorrel Sto Tomas: So it’s like.
69 00:17:36.370 ⇒ 00:17:58.589 Uttam Kumaran: It’s just like it’s all fucked up all the time. So, and it’s tough, because, like, you know, for me, I always wanted to have a team. I always want to work, you know. I think about us 1st and foremost, as an engineering company, you know, over just like a consultancy. So I always wanted to be able to bring in the best engineers and build a great engineering culture. But I also can’t. Some of the problems I’m doing. I can’t make it their problem, you know. So that’s the thing I learned.
70 00:17:58.590 ⇒ 00:17:59.050 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
71 00:17:59.050 ⇒ 00:18:12.129 Uttam Kumaran: Is like, I’m really transparent, like, I’ve been a lot of startups where they hit a lot of stuff. And it’s because they were just not constant, or they kind of sucked like. I hated that mentality and startup world where they hide like.
72 00:18:12.300 ⇒ 00:18:27.419 Uttam Kumaran: who are the customers? How much are we charging stuff like that. I’m like, I don’t care whether people know that or not. The only thing I’m worried about is like, I don’t want people to be stressed about that, you know. So so that’s why I feel like I learned a lot working in like a bunch of Vc back companies on like
73 00:18:27.700 ⇒ 00:18:34.570 Uttam Kumaran: how to do things a little bit calmer, a little bit more focused and like without a lot of ego but
74 00:18:34.570 ⇒ 00:18:40.589 Uttam Kumaran: definitely like, I think this has been the toughest thing I’ve ever done since, like for this long, like.
75 00:18:40.760 ⇒ 00:19:01.350 Uttam Kumaran: you know, takes takes a lot of work, and I think you know, I think we’ve done a good job, both of us being in business, you know, over a year, which I would say it’s just one thing to be happy about that like, we’ve made it that far. But I also am like, you know, we can make it 2 years and still fail. We can make it 3 years still fail. So for me, I try to think about like, how do we build us?
76 00:19:01.500 ⇒ 00:19:02.750 Uttam Kumaran: Build up a moat
77 00:19:02.890 ⇒ 00:19:08.179 Uttam Kumaran: between us and failure? Then also like, how do we stack the deck? And you know that’s why I think me and Robert really wanted to work
78 00:19:08.290 ⇒ 00:19:16.580 Uttam Kumaran: a lot closer together, because I think both of us figured out different parts of the business that really work well, and then we both. We both still have a lot to learn.
79 00:19:16.680 ⇒ 00:19:22.440 Uttam Kumaran: and I think both of us are kind of hitting a wall in some ways where it’s like we could both keep crawling, and
80 00:19:22.550 ⇒ 00:19:38.329 Uttam Kumaran: you know, maybe we keep the endurance up. But I was like, Look, I want, I know that this can scale beyond us in a small team like we want to build a bigger company, not just people wise, but, like, you know, revenue and everything. And we have all the contacts, all the like sort of like market
81 00:19:38.480 ⇒ 00:19:50.545 Uttam Kumaran: support. You know that we’re riding the right waves, and I’m like we. We totally have everything it takes to go bigger. We should, you know, we should team up and and you know, try to get a win out of this
82 00:19:50.820 ⇒ 00:19:51.570 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah.
83 00:19:51.570 ⇒ 00:19:58.810 Uttam Kumaran: So yeah, that’s really where a lot of the last, you know, 2, 3 months. That’s where we’ve been talking a lot closer. And you know we’re starting to
84 00:19:59.170 ⇒ 00:20:10.460 Uttam Kumaran: you know, sort of merge things. And even in the past 3 weeks that we’ve been working together, you know, feel free to ask him. But I think it’s been going amazing, like I feel a lot a lot of weight off my shoulder.
85 00:20:10.830 ⇒ 00:20:14.119 Uttam Kumaran: I feel like we should have a path towards that versus just like
86 00:20:14.320 ⇒ 00:20:24.060 Uttam Kumaran: the previous path was like, can I just have like, can I just have like a hundred 80 good days in a row like now, we can actually have, like some structure towards that. So.
87 00:20:24.750 ⇒ 00:20:38.810 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah, no. I mean, yeah. When I heard the news that that Pungo was gonna merge with Brainforge, I was incredibly excited. Because you know, I was. I was trying to act as that partner for for Robert earlier this year.
88 00:20:39.260 ⇒ 00:20:59.820 Jorrel Sto Tomas: but I think it was more of a level of just like commitment on on my end. Like I, I’m obviously I start a whole bunch of things like as an entrepreneur. There’s a lot of different kind of identities that I have to embody. And yeah, when he was when he started talking to me about like brain forge and like what you were doing, I was like, Oh, man, like.
89 00:20:59.920 ⇒ 00:21:02.810 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I think this might actually be like the best move.
90 00:21:04.010 ⇒ 00:21:14.909 Jorrel Sto Tomas: because that was like a big thing that I was telling him, like, you know, the the biggest you know. I’ve you know, I’ve worked at 12 different that work for, or with 12 different startups in in their data, you know, their data.
91 00:21:14.910 ⇒ 00:21:15.750 Uttam Kumaran: Awesome.
92 00:21:15.750 ⇒ 00:21:27.100 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You know, some of the biggest things I’ve been telling Robert is just like, you know. Maybe we should really be looking into into doing, you know, more of their analytics, engineering, or or, you know, starting there, because that’s usually the pipeline is like.
93 00:21:27.100 ⇒ 00:21:27.570 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
94 00:21:27.835 ⇒ 00:21:35.260 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Most companies will hire data, scientists or data analysts being like, hey, we have this data do something with it. And then guess what their 1st guess? What?
95 00:21:35.260 ⇒ 00:21:35.670 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
96 00:21:35.670 ⇒ 00:21:37.220 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Thing they didn’t realize.
97 00:21:37.530 ⇒ 00:21:40.069 Uttam Kumaran: 100% fucking data stack. You don’t even ask.
98 00:21:40.070 ⇒ 00:21:40.830 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
99 00:21:40.830 ⇒ 00:21:47.810 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Warehouse. We can’t even leverage a a bi tool, because nothing is structured. You know all that lovely bullshit right?
100 00:21:49.072 ⇒ 00:21:55.067 Jorrel Sto Tomas: but the problem was that it was you know, the the South cycles were confusing, right?
101 00:21:55.420 ⇒ 00:22:11.559 Uttam Kumaran: And it. And like, this is just what I’ve I’ve done that for a while. Led teams doing that like that’s like my second language is speaking about that world. So it helped that like, yeah, for me, I’m like my job. I’m like we got it. We’re gonna get more technical. We’re gonna start deploying more models. And
102 00:22:11.938 ⇒ 00:22:21.499 Uttam Kumaran: I also know that the stuff on the data analyst side, though we’re our our positioning is toward Ceos and executives. So they want to hear that stuff. But then we still need to be able to
103 00:22:21.660 ⇒ 00:22:32.323 Uttam Kumaran: do the data engineering data modeling to finally get to that outcome, and they may not care how the sausage is made. But like for us to cook the right thing, we need all those pieces.
104 00:22:32.620 ⇒ 00:22:33.630 Uttam Kumaran: yeah. And yeah.
105 00:22:33.630 ⇒ 00:22:37.620 Uttam Kumaran: And for me, like in my network, in terms of talent, that’s my core network is like.
106 00:22:37.850 ⇒ 00:22:46.199 Uttam Kumaran: you know, I had a lot of people that just gave me favors to help out clients, and thankfully, I’m now able to pay everybody and but like, I just have a
107 00:22:46.360 ⇒ 00:22:53.300 Uttam Kumaran: dope group of like people that are like Aes des, who are super super sharp, that I’m like cool as soon as we start scaling up
108 00:22:53.420 ⇒ 00:23:06.200 Uttam Kumaran: and start to bring on the best people. But that’s kind of where we are now is like basically figuring out the path towards, you know, building a scalable data analyst function, which is the one thing that I always had a very, very tough time
109 00:23:06.420 ⇒ 00:23:25.130 Uttam Kumaran: figuring out, because I mean, I think I’m probably like A B analyst. I learned to do everything in data. So I know how to do every job. But like, I’m not the best. And I haven’t worked with like really, really great analysts. And so for me, even like thinking about how to recruit those people. How do we train the right people
110 00:23:25.270 ⇒ 00:23:33.490 Uttam Kumaran: like we can’t recruit. Then we have to train and then equip to train like, how do we do that? And you know that’s where we’re really kind of stuck and figuring out.
111 00:23:33.954 ⇒ 00:23:37.079 Uttam Kumaran: How do we get those great analysts to come in. And
112 00:23:37.380 ⇒ 00:23:42.580 Uttam Kumaran: the the problem is, it may be the last mile, but it’s the deliverable that matters
113 00:23:43.086 ⇒ 00:23:46.469 Uttam Kumaran: the most, which is really tough, really, really tough.
114 00:23:47.564 ⇒ 00:23:58.805 Uttam Kumaran: You know, like, I can do data engineering data modeling. And then I would just be like, people would ask me. Okay. Now you know everything in our business. Can you just tell us what to do? And I’m like, well, sound like what we signed up for?
115 00:23:59.170 ⇒ 00:24:04.670 Uttam Kumaran: and I can figure it out, and they like it. But then I’m like that’s not scalable. And the only good analysts I know are like.
116 00:24:04.950 ⇒ 00:24:10.109 Uttam Kumaran: once an analyst gets technical enough, they go become an Ae, or you know something like that. So.
117 00:24:10.740 ⇒ 00:24:11.230 Jorrel Sto Tomas: It’s gonna.
118 00:24:11.230 ⇒ 00:24:13.389 Uttam Kumaran: Where? Where my head’s at with the whole thing. But
119 00:24:13.570 ⇒ 00:24:21.630 Uttam Kumaran: and I don’t even know. So probably the great profiles that we’ve had are people who are like ex bankers, and a lot of it’s just hustle. And being able to work with, like.
120 00:24:22.110 ⇒ 00:24:31.440 Uttam Kumaran: you know, execs and kind of like, figure out what people need to hear, so partly is subjective. But that’s kind of like where we are a little bit on the on the analyst side.
121 00:24:32.900 ⇒ 00:24:51.400 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, no, that totally. That totally checks out. I mean the the biggest thing I would say. What’s it called like that? Robert is really good at and I think we’ll kind of fulfill your kind of the the gaps that you’re feeling. Is he? He definitely knows how to train good analysts.
122 00:24:51.400 ⇒ 00:24:51.840 Uttam Kumaran: Awesome.
123 00:24:51.840 ⇒ 00:25:04.838 Jorrel Sto Tomas: That identify good analysts. And yeah, I think you know, just from just from a a professional opinion. I think Robert is probably one of the best, like data analysts, or or
124 00:25:05.210 ⇒ 00:25:05.690 Uttam Kumaran: Oh, hell, yeah.
125 00:25:05.690 ⇒ 00:25:22.750 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I guess, like analysts I’ve ever met. And I tell him that all the time I’m like the the process that he follows like, you know, I’ve adopted and have brought to to other companies, just because it’s just a smart way of of doing product analytics. Right? Very, very lean and and very, very
126 00:25:23.500 ⇒ 00:25:29.119 Jorrel Sto Tomas: scalable right? And so that’s why I think this partnership, or at least you know, with Brainforge, I guess.
127 00:25:29.120 ⇒ 00:25:29.490 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
128 00:25:29.490 ⇒ 00:25:34.999 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Merging or Pongo insights merging into Braid Forge. I think, providing a more full service.
129 00:25:35.490 ⇒ 00:25:35.960 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
130 00:25:35.960 ⇒ 00:25:38.250 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Kind of data service.
131 00:25:38.707 ⇒ 00:25:40.649 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Kind of redundant but full service data.
132 00:25:40.650 ⇒ 00:25:41.310 Uttam Kumaran: No. Yeah.
133 00:25:41.310 ⇒ 00:25:53.274 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Is is so much more powerful. Just because that’s what they demand from me. You know, in every single data job I’ve had where it was like I got hired on as an analyst. And then they’re like, guess what you’re doing. Everything like
134 00:25:54.340 ⇒ 00:25:55.530 Jorrel Sto Tomas: it’s tough because.
135 00:25:55.530 ⇒ 00:25:59.439 Uttam Kumaran: And they don’t know any better. And you know someone gets screwed in the process.
136 00:25:59.920 ⇒ 00:26:06.380 Uttam Kumaran: And it’s unfortunate. Yeah. And then also, you know the the problem is is like, this is what I tell people is like, you know, the the worst.
137 00:26:06.590 ⇒ 00:26:14.819 Uttam Kumaran: The worst data engineer is probably pretty good, because it’s kind of hard. I think the worst data analyst the the data analyst spectrum is very wide, like
138 00:26:15.020 ⇒ 00:26:20.629 Uttam Kumaran: you may not make it. You may get the paid the same. But you may be way better than someone else who’s called a data analyst. So like the
139 00:26:20.770 ⇒ 00:26:33.060 Uttam Kumaran: the range is really really wide, and it makes it hard to kind of define and find those great people and also like typically data, analyst salaries don’t get past like
140 00:26:33.200 ⇒ 00:27:01.549 Uttam Kumaran: high amount, although I. That’s like so dumb. I think it’s a lot because you’re flooded the market with people who are just not good. And so that kind of deflates the salaries a lot instead, the the work that we’ve done together, you know, we’ve been able to increase the rate we charge because we offer this like full service where it’s like. Don’t worry if it’s de work ae work, whatever it is. We’re just gonna charge a flat 200 hourly. And they’re like, okay. And you know, instead of sort of breaking it up by role or
141 00:27:01.650 ⇒ 00:27:21.040 Uttam Kumaran: for them to kind of go, do like a look at Comps for analysts. And so that’s exactly the feedback we’ve been hearing. And and then just in the market, too, is that they get a lot of people that can either do like one of the pieces, or they get people who are like more interested in strategic services, not like implementing. And I’m like, we’ll do the whole thing like, give us the whole pie.
142 00:27:21.230 ⇒ 00:27:25.449 Uttam Kumaran: And hopefully, that sort of like vertical arrangement gives us a lot of advantage.
143 00:27:26.560 ⇒ 00:27:31.197 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah. I mean, I think I think the the couple of other things, too. Is that
144 00:27:32.370 ⇒ 00:27:45.399 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Most companies don’t wanna don’t wanna or don’t know how to attribute value to their data teams. This is kind of this was like my my issue. When I I just left Popple. This data business card company.
145 00:27:45.400 ⇒ 00:27:48.139 Uttam Kumaran: You. Well, you know how I know Poppel. I worked at Floco.
146 00:27:49.680 ⇒ 00:27:50.470 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, really.
147 00:27:50.470 ⇒ 00:27:55.129 Uttam Kumaran: Yes, I worked. I was like the I was one of the early employees there.
148 00:27:55.440 ⇒ 00:27:56.900 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, wow! We talked.
149 00:27:56.900 ⇒ 00:27:59.880 Uttam Kumaran: About Poppel like every day, for, like
150 00:28:00.380 ⇒ 00:28:04.040 Uttam Kumaran: my entire 2 years there, all we fucking talked about was like.
151 00:28:04.310 ⇒ 00:28:08.620 Uttam Kumaran: look at what Pop was doing because we tried to build like a comparable competitor product.
152 00:28:10.350 ⇒ 00:28:10.610 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And.
153 00:28:10.610 ⇒ 00:28:13.399 Uttam Kumaran: And then, yeah, I know so much about QR,
154 00:28:13.660 ⇒ 00:28:17.700 Uttam Kumaran: yeah. So I. So so I built. So I was a 1st data engineering hire there.
155 00:28:17.820 ⇒ 00:28:23.480 Uttam Kumaran: built out like internal reporting, and then also built out our like product, our customer facing analytics. There.
156 00:28:24.360 ⇒ 00:28:25.360 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, that’s super cool!
157 00:28:25.360 ⇒ 00:28:27.733 Uttam Kumaran: So, yeah, very, very familiar with pop hole.
158 00:28:28.310 ⇒ 00:28:42.959 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You know, it’s funny. They’re you know, they they’ve literally been a 2 man data team for like the last 4 years. And they decided this last like year that they needed another person. And then, as soon as I got in, I’m like, you guys like, literally don’t
159 00:28:43.070 ⇒ 00:29:02.359 Jorrel Sto Tomas: like, yeah, y’all don’t know what you’re doing, and they don’t even want they. And the problem was that they didn’t even want to. They didn’t want to put more money out. they like I and I. And I think this just comes down to like how you view data as an enablement tool or an enabler in your business. It’s like, is it a cost or a profit center? Right.
160 00:29:02.360 ⇒ 00:29:02.900 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
161 00:29:02.900 ⇒ 00:29:06.150 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Is it gonna help us make money? Or is it something that we need to have.
162 00:29:06.150 ⇒ 00:29:06.730 Uttam Kumaran: Totally.
163 00:29:07.040 ⇒ 00:29:10.449 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You know, to to prevent us from from losing money right.
164 00:29:10.450 ⇒ 00:29:11.460 Uttam Kumaran: No, I tell our Guy, I see
165 00:29:11.460 ⇒ 00:29:20.349 Uttam Kumaran: I’m like we need to be as close to the revenue side as possible, like if we take on cost cutting type work. That’s fine. But we cannot come in
166 00:29:20.490 ⇒ 00:29:24.420 Uttam Kumaran: primarily working because cost of a floor like, you know.
167 00:29:24.420 ⇒ 00:29:28.619 Uttam Kumaran: And we’re gonna quickly hit that if we do a good job, and so we need to be close.
168 00:29:28.620 ⇒ 00:29:28.960 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
169 00:29:28.960 ⇒ 00:29:43.539 Uttam Kumaran: We need to be at close to the revenue of Profit Center and meet with those people because those people are dreamers, the Cfo’s office. And these guys are like SMS. And that’s just the way that works, you know. So we have to quickly find the people that are like
170 00:29:43.690 ⇒ 00:29:52.039 Uttam Kumaran: and who are data driven who know that data can help them. Some people just fundamentally don’t have that belief. And so you can’t change that. But
171 00:29:52.280 ⇒ 00:29:56.540 Uttam Kumaran: for the people that do you basically were like, Okay, why don’t we champion you guys? We’ll we’ll
172 00:29:56.680 ⇒ 00:30:01.489 Uttam Kumaran: we’ll help you get a win. And then that way you can show the whole org, and then quickly, we’ll kind of spread.
173 00:30:02.680 ⇒ 00:30:18.049 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah, exactly. And then and that’s the funny thing is like you having those champions inside the business are very hard to find. And that’s kind of what ended up happening. I mean, I I left for a multitude of reasons. But one of the reasons like with papa was like I was like, you guys are not
174 00:30:18.170 ⇒ 00:30:27.190 Jorrel Sto Tomas: like y’all are so focused on like dashboards that the CEO can use that it’s like you guys are are considered operations at this point. It’s not.
175 00:30:27.190 ⇒ 00:30:27.660 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
176 00:30:27.660 ⇒ 00:30:51.674 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Like, you know, you guys are finding new opportunities. You aren’t like being. You’re not able to attribute real dollar value to every you know additional thing. You know, that data uncovers and so you know that, and that it’s just one of those things where it’s like over time. I just think there’s going to be less and less internal data teams. And they’re going to be like relabeled as like AI people.
177 00:30:51.990 ⇒ 00:30:52.740 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly.
178 00:30:52.740 ⇒ 00:31:03.650 Jorrel Sto Tomas: That’s where folks, you know believe that the value attribution can be. It’s like, Oh, well, we’re we’re the AI enablement team. It’s like, okay, well, all you guys do is like fix data data workflows. You know.
179 00:31:03.650 ⇒ 00:31:04.219 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.
180 00:31:04.220 ⇒ 00:31:04.610 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Exactly.
181 00:31:04.610 ⇒ 00:31:05.150 Uttam Kumaran: Bye.
182 00:31:05.790 ⇒ 00:31:28.480 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And so, yeah, no. Just in general like to to kind of circle back to to the opportunities for for you and Robert like I I do, I do truly believe. And I’ve told Robert this like there, there’s just like there’s so many opportunities. But it’s just not something that, like, you know, you can really do on your own and like the the cool thing is like, I think, putting you guys together, will
183 00:31:28.490 ⇒ 00:31:36.529 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I? I think, just open a lot of new opportunities that before you couldn’t so one of my old mentors she used to work for Ph data. I don’t know if you’re.
184 00:31:36.530 ⇒ 00:31:41.300 Uttam Kumaran: Yes, yes, really familiar. Yeah, yeah. And so, she was
185 00:31:41.300 ⇒ 00:31:54.920 Uttam Kumaran: like, I basically have a list of competitors. And I just tell people like, we need to act like these guys. These guys are winners like, look at Mckinsey. Ph, data I’m like, and we need those are who we are. We’re not competing with the other people
186 00:31:55.130 ⇒ 00:32:11.329 Uttam Kumaran: like we’re not looking left to right. We’re looking up, you know, 2 2 levels above us, like, I don’t care about the other small players don’t care about copying them, you know. So definitely, I look at Ph data as like one of our north stars of like the size and scale like we want to get to.
187 00:32:12.110 ⇒ 00:32:21.659 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah, no, that’s absolutely an ambition that is warranted. I mean, she would complain to me about ph, data is like prioritization all the time.
188 00:32:22.012 ⇒ 00:32:46.510 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And one thing that was like not like, I I think that that she was highlighting as something that. Phd, that they’re having issues with is like they don’t know how to focus. So she was a solutions architect for them for for about a year. And they? Yeah, they, they basically just chase enterprise contracts. And they don’t think about like, how can we increase our business with a single client?
189 00:32:46.710 ⇒ 00:32:59.750 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Right? Like, cause, you know, a lot of a lot of stuff in data is that upselling? And if you’re not upselling like you’re leaving a lot of money on the table, and she was telling me that that was like one of the biggest things Ph. Data wasn’t doing properly
190 00:32:59.810 ⇒ 00:33:28.049 Jorrel Sto Tomas: is, they wouldn’t approach it from a holistic. You know, a data services perspective. It was all right. We’ve done your snowflake, you know, because Ph, data is like a platinum partner for Snowflake. So they would do the snowflake like implementation and boom it was that that was it. Like there was no upselling into data. There was no upselling into you know, how do we? How can we have consistent retainership projects? It was just like these huge, you know. 6 figure 7 figure deals. And then it was one and done
191 00:33:28.496 ⇒ 00:33:41.579 Jorrel Sto Tomas: and so that’s why I think there’s a huge gap in the market. Because the the reason a lot of these contracts were lost to was like once again. These businesses they work with viewed them as like a huge cost center, like, oh, we’re paying you a million for this.
192 00:33:41.580 ⇒ 00:33:42.300 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
193 00:33:42.300 ⇒ 00:33:50.460 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Like, Oof, okay, well, we’ll do one. We’ll do an engagement with you. And then, after a year like, you know, we’re gonna save a million dollars by not continuing the engagement.
194 00:33:50.460 ⇒ 00:34:17.440 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, exactly. And they don’t see that as strategic, like one of our clients. You know, this was really important for me to hear is one of our clients is going through potential M and A like. They may get a huge. They may get acquired like a huge sort of infusion. And you know, for me, I was like, Okay, I don’t know, like, I mean, that’s probably going to be bad for us. But then, basically, he was like, no, you guys being part of it and building out our platform was one of the key things we described as why
195 00:34:17.570 ⇒ 00:34:24.699 Uttam Kumaran: they should give us a premium. And you guys were one of the key things that we wrote as you guys need to be part of the plan
196 00:34:24.889 ⇒ 00:34:34.480 Uttam Kumaran: moving forward. And I was like, Oh, great like, that’s exactly. That’s the way we want to be considered. And you know, hearing that was really really
197 00:34:34.699 ⇒ 00:34:46.928 Uttam Kumaran: great, because he was like, no, no, you guys are coming on. It’s like we have a data platform. That’s why we should get a premium valuation. And and we have a team like that. I was like, yeah, I mean, I I agree, like.
198 00:34:47.280 ⇒ 00:35:12.000 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, I I couldn’t agree more. And and for those guys, you know, I think it, it depends like for us, you know, we don’t have a a full sales force we don’t have like a lot of the motions that they have. But for me. I’m like, Look, we can get the best talent. And if we just continue to deliver really really amazing work like go above and beyond and just communicate and like, be better communicators than their best employees like we’ll quickly.
199 00:35:12.150 ⇒ 00:35:16.439 Uttam Kumaran: you know, sort of beat everybody out just on the quality of our work.
200 00:35:16.610 ⇒ 00:35:37.999 Uttam Kumaran: and then, hopefully, like, I think, Robert, and we’re gonna kind of put more stuff to sales. We’ll figure out sort of how to get a reliable sales motion. And then the last thing is like, Okay, how do we take on more long? How do we take on longer stuff? That’s a little bit harder that we can charge 6, 8, 6, 9, 12 months, you know, for bigger projects, migrations, things like that.
201 00:35:38.521 ⇒ 00:35:41.780 Uttam Kumaran: And then start to also do AI work which I think is
202 00:35:42.199 ⇒ 00:35:57.169 Uttam Kumaran: is really paramount for everybody. So yeah, I couldn’t agree more that that’s like super super important to be on that like, not be on the hey, what are these guys doing like someone the Cfo looks at like this cost line item is like, Yo, we should just delete these guys like, what did they do recently? You know.
203 00:35:57.650 ⇒ 00:35:58.390 Jorrel Sto Tomas: So
204 00:35:58.870 ⇒ 00:36:11.150 Jorrel Sto Tomas: exactly. Exactly. And and you know, I, yeah, and that’s and that’s a big thing, too, is like cost cutting right? I mean, I I heard from Robert. That a good chunk of your your data, your data engineering team is is based out here in in the Philippines.
205 00:36:11.150 ⇒ 00:36:40.719 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. Yeah. So we so part of it was for 2 reasons. One, I I’ve hired and let go a bunch of people just like. It’s just what happens. You just learn what you need at different moments. And so I was lucky to find some really really good folks there, you know. And also I found some people that definitely were not that great. But I also. And it’s 1 it’s costing like definitely, I think, cheaper. The second thing is, I think the people in the Us. Are just so lazy, like some people in the Us.
206 00:36:41.420 ⇒ 00:36:42.580 Uttam Kumaran: It’s getting lazy. It’s brutal.
207 00:36:42.580 ⇒ 00:36:45.908 Jorrel Sto Tomas: I was gonna say the same thing, you know. I don’t wanna be that guy.
208 00:36:46.130 ⇒ 00:36:52.430 Uttam Kumaran: No, I mean, I don’t know like I it’s so hard like, and a lot of my friends like it sucks
209 00:36:53.061 ⇒ 00:37:00.770 Uttam Kumaran: so my friends are so late. They’re like they want like a hundred bucks an hour, and then they also don’t want to go to meetings, and I’m like Dude. I can’t
210 00:37:01.240 ⇒ 00:37:26.900 Uttam Kumaran: do that, especially when I’m seeing that there are people outside the Us. That exist that cost a 3rd or half of that, and we’ll put every like are like we’re in this, you know, and I think there still are people in the Us. That you know resemble that. But I think it’s a lot fewer, and I don’t care where people are as long as they’re great at what they do. Who gives. I don’t give a shit like I just want to create people on our team.
211 00:37:27.312 ⇒ 00:37:43.479 Uttam Kumaran: And yeah, we’ve gotten lucky. And also on the AI side, we, we have 2 people that are in the Philippines. So yeah, we have a strong team out there. Then we have one Pm. In Argentina, and then we have a couple of contractors in the us that kind of cycle in and out of projects. So that’s that’s most of our like.
212 00:37:44.140 ⇒ 00:37:45.580 Uttam Kumaran: You know, the mix.
213 00:37:46.530 ⇒ 00:38:01.269 Jorrel Sto Tomas: No, yeah, that’s that’s awesome. Yeah. The the big thing that we’ve learned here, especially like, you know, we do. Cyber sec cyber security snaplog is is like, yeah, they’re just so much more hard working. And they have, like a hunger, a hunger to like.
214 00:38:01.390 ⇒ 00:38:09.590 Jorrel Sto Tomas: just get shit done. Which is like, it’s funny. It’s like a it’s a rare commodity these days, like you can see the ones who really succeed in the Us.
215 00:38:09.590 ⇒ 00:38:10.260 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
216 00:38:10.260 ⇒ 00:38:15.309 Jorrel Sto Tomas: But here, it’s like a commonplace thing, right? So it’s.
217 00:38:15.310 ⇒ 00:38:19.060 Uttam Kumaran: Here. The software is, people just raise a ton of money and then pay like
218 00:38:19.200 ⇒ 00:38:22.250 Uttam Kumaran: exorbitant salaries. And I’m like, no, that’s not like
219 00:38:22.790 ⇒ 00:38:27.879 Uttam Kumaran: that’s that’s just not the way like companies can survive like, I can’t afford to pay
220 00:38:28.310 ⇒ 00:38:37.960 Uttam Kumaran: that amount of money for people. And most of the senior software people. I know it like apple spotify. They’re just sitting. They do like 2 h of work a day. They get 200.
221 00:38:37.960 ⇒ 00:38:38.929 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yours, man.
222 00:38:39.240 ⇒ 00:38:44.859 Uttam Kumaran: And so it’s fine. It’s good for them. But, like dude, I want to hire wherever great people are.
223 00:38:44.990 ⇒ 00:38:54.630 Uttam Kumaran: and people who are grateful to do that work. And then, you know, I also think, like at times coming for those people like they’re gonna get fired, especially
224 00:38:54.820 ⇒ 00:39:00.020 Uttam Kumaran: now that AI is here like, and we’re gonna start doing a lot of AI on the engineering side, like
225 00:39:00.310 ⇒ 00:39:06.690 Uttam Kumaran: those people are going to be out of a job like you know, and I think a lot of those people fear to lose their job right now, because they know they couldn’t get.
226 00:39:06.910 ⇒ 00:39:09.640 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Something cushy again. So yeah.
227 00:39:09.640 ⇒ 00:39:10.220 Uttam Kumaran: Exactly.
228 00:39:10.220 ⇒ 00:39:11.190 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
229 00:39:12.719 ⇒ 00:39:31.510 Jorrel Sto Tomas: No. I mean that. That’s yeah. That’s that’s exactly kind of, I think. Why, we’re starting to find our stride here. With regards to to staff augmentation. Cybersec is that there is that deficiency in in network engineers globally. But also it’s another the other aspect to it is. Yeah, it’s just
230 00:39:31.710 ⇒ 00:39:45.243 Jorrel Sto Tomas: cheaper, and they’re they’re always on time. They’re always making meetings like it’s it’s it’s baffling, like I’ve hired like hundreds of contractors in the Us. At this point in my career. And it’s it’s a staggering difference.
231 00:39:45.590 ⇒ 00:39:46.120 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
232 00:39:46.610 ⇒ 00:40:03.209 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, I I just, you know, and and you know that’s that’s kind of thing. I think the the other thing that Robert mentioned that you were interested in was like, Okay, how could we? How could we create a a you know, a talent funnel here? Maybe for for Brain Forge definitely.
233 00:40:03.210 ⇒ 00:40:30.080 Uttam Kumaran: I mean. So to give you a sense of like sort of what we. What I did is I started to find sort of recruiting partners in Mexico, in Latin. And then I basically for everything in the Philippines, we we did through online jobs. But of course, would love to partner with somebody that has an incoming stream of talent, but also, like, you know, we have Jd’s and everything that we can send your your way so certainly definitely interested in like
234 00:40:30.220 ⇒ 00:40:33.470 Uttam Kumaran: sort of the types of roles that you guys are staffing for. And
235 00:40:33.650 ⇒ 00:40:37.410 Uttam Kumaran: even here to hear more about how the business itself operates.
236 00:40:38.350 ⇒ 00:40:42.890 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah. So I I I don’t know if you have a hard stop at 7 45.
237 00:40:42.890 ⇒ 00:40:43.669 Uttam Kumaran: No, I can keep going.
238 00:40:44.120 ⇒ 00:40:44.659 Uttam Kumaran: I know I.
239 00:40:44.660 ⇒ 00:41:07.122 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, I can go on for another 5 to 10 min here. So but yeah, just for long story short, the fusion. Node kind of started out as like a we were gonna do a security operations center here in the Philippines. Just because we saw like this huge kind of gap in the cyber security space here. But what we quickly found out was that
240 00:41:07.550 ⇒ 00:41:23.020 Jorrel Sto Tomas: there was this hotbed of talent. You know, one of our partner universities that just weren’t getting these opportunities. And there’s a huge push in the government, as we were, as you know, as we continue our journey to basically create 1 million
241 00:41:23.020 ⇒ 00:41:45.686 Jorrel Sto Tomas: cyber security professionals, you know, in 10 years. So so we found out, I was like, oh, cool. Okay. So there’s there’s a demand side that is like desperate for more cyber security talent. And then there’s a supply side where there’s these these amazing new grads. With like, very, very like technical capabilities. That, you know, they’re being thrown into game development.
242 00:41:46.030 ⇒ 00:41:46.510 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
243 00:41:46.510 ⇒ 00:42:05.919 Jorrel Sto Tomas: It’s like, but there’s no money in game that it’s like there’s, and and that’s the thing is like my dad. He’s he’s been a Ciso for 25 plus years. And so, you know, been in security was one of the 1st one of the 1st guys to create like a forensic slabs. At the end of that Bi uses right for cybersec, and so.
244 00:42:05.920 ⇒ 00:42:06.370 Uttam Kumaran: Nice.
245 00:42:06.370 ⇒ 00:42:15.730 Jorrel Sto Tomas: He comes in. And all of a sudden there’s like this credibility that him as a Filipino could come in and be like, Yeah, no, I can legitimize a lot of these programs. Right?
246 00:42:15.770 ⇒ 00:42:41.160 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And so, yeah, so this all this stuff happened. And now, all of a sudden, you know, through my dad’s network. We’re we’re working with some of the biggest cyber security companies, and we’re augmenting we’re we’re providing them with, with, you know interns, you know, for cheap, very, very cheap, probably a 10th of the price that they normally would be paying for. And yeah, we’re now we’re we’re we’re prepping up to actually start doing
247 00:42:43.170 ⇒ 00:42:47.739 Jorrel Sto Tomas: How do I say? A technical account management for their entire Apac region for
248 00:42:48.180 ⇒ 00:43:06.360 Jorrel Sto Tomas: enterprise contract? So it’s so. That’s kind of the relationship that we have with a few of the the folks who contract for we do like we’ll provide staffing like we’ll be the Eor. That’s you know, employer record, and we’ll provide training for for a lot of these. what’s the word for it new grads or.
249 00:43:06.360 ⇒ 00:43:07.000 Uttam Kumaran: Yes.
250 00:43:07.000 ⇒ 00:43:28.830 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Like early on engineers. And then, yeah, they just go. They’ll they’ll functionally just be a part of the company that they’re that they’re contracted with. But yeah, at the end of the day, like, we take away the complexity of having to figure out benefits and all that other stuff that I think you know the locals, which is like what deal.com, and a bunch of those other.
251 00:43:28.830 ⇒ 00:43:29.580 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.
252 00:43:29.580 ⇒ 00:43:49.939 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Global contracts try to do. But you know, for us, it’s way more specialized and concentrated on on. You know, those specialties because we also help recruit. So like, we have this relationship with the 1st engineering university person, only State university. So all of our, all of our talent here are like some of the best.
253 00:43:50.020 ⇒ 00:44:09.330 Jorrel Sto Tomas: like engineering talent, like talent that you can find in the Philippines. And so we’re we’re getting this full, constant funnel of new folks that are just hungry. They’re so hungry because Botangas is actually like one of the poor, not not super poor. It’s my hometown, but it’s not like those private schools in Manila.
254 00:44:09.330 ⇒ 00:44:16.430 Uttam Kumaran: That’s why. So we have some people from one of some of the big universities in Manila, but also scattered like through Cebu City. And every.
255 00:44:16.930 ⇒ 00:44:18.749 Uttam Kumaran: But I’ve been learning a lot about like
256 00:44:18.860 ⇒ 00:44:47.800 Uttam Kumaran: the schools there, because it’s kind of similar to India like India. I think some similar dynamics. But I think India was like it’s like the darling, for like it. You know, for a long time. So like there, it’s all very structured and set up. But I’ve definitely been super impressed with the people that work for us from the Philippines, and even the folks. We have 2 new grads who are the 2 people working on our ait. One of them is 23, and the other is like 22. And they’re both illegit, like, very, very good.
257 00:44:48.159 ⇒ 00:45:01.020 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And I’m like, Dude. Put me in touch with your university like, let’s get a I’ll give you. I’ll send you. Send you materials. We’ll get a poster printed and like, Go do a go get a stand at like, you know, but that’s the sort of stuff that I want to start to do.
258 00:45:01.377 ⇒ 00:45:05.730 Uttam Kumaran: So tell me, like, how are you guys like, are you guys thinking about doing this for data or like, how do you guys think about.
259 00:45:05.730 ⇒ 00:45:06.250 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah.
260 00:45:06.250 ⇒ 00:45:07.650 Uttam Kumaran: Ranching beyond cyber.
261 00:45:08.190 ⇒ 00:45:29.619 Jorrel Sto Tomas: No, we’re we’re we’re actively we’re we’re actually trying to pilot something with Pungo. Well, now, it’s since it’s gonna be merging into praying forge. We’re we’re Javi was looking for a full time data person, for basically a quarter of the price. And we we have a candidate. He’s actually somebody who’s who’s who’s doing some work for us, anyway, here in the Philippines.
262 00:45:30.010 ⇒ 00:45:51.260 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And yeah, like, we, we are actively wanting to do that because data does fall there’s actually the 1st AI stuff that ever got put into production was within the cyber security space. And so there’s a lot of reasons, because cyber security has probably the largest data pools you’ll ever find in any industry. So there’s a lot
263 00:45:51.530 ⇒ 00:46:03.509 Jorrel Sto Tomas: exactly exactly and so that’s why. Yeah, we were exploring data services as something that we would. We would love to to staff augment as well as you know. Do
264 00:46:03.960 ⇒ 00:46:27.699 Jorrel Sto Tomas: do more direct, you know. servicing for. And so that so yeah, like, that is that. That’s why I think. Robert was really excited. He’s like, Oh, yeah, you need to talk to, because he’s really wanted to do this and and before Robert and I, during the summer, Robert wanted to start exploring, fully outsourcing. You know, the analysts to to the Philippines building out a full outsourcing team. And so
265 00:46:28.240 ⇒ 00:46:43.349 Jorrel Sto Tomas: so yeah, like, I’m totally like we’re. We’re totally prepped to do it. There’s a lot of folks here that are interested in doing more, you know, data and AI stuff and the only limitation is like we don’t have like a you know, partner, you know that that, you know, like you or Robert.
266 00:46:43.350 ⇒ 00:46:43.740 Uttam Kumaran: Man.
267 00:46:43.996 ⇒ 00:46:53.739 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, exactly. That has like, Oh, hey, you know, we, we have Jd’s that you can. You can put up like we have training programs like those were all things. One of our enterprise partners provided for us.
268 00:46:53.740 ⇒ 00:46:54.630 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah.
269 00:46:55.209 ⇒ 00:47:06.480 Jorrel Sto Tomas: But we can do all the basic stuff, like, you know. Okay, hey, here are the tools. You need to learn all that other stuff. But at the end of the day it’s like these folks are new grads, or they don’t have that professional exposure.
270 00:47:06.480 ⇒ 00:47:06.880 Uttam Kumaran: Totally.
271 00:47:06.880 ⇒ 00:47:14.899 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And so that’s why those those are the type of partners that gap could benefit from from kind of the services or the the staff log that we provide.
272 00:47:14.900 ⇒ 00:47:41.925 Uttam Kumaran: No. So for me, the biggest thing is one we we basically have all the Jd’s ready. The next thing we need to do is basically start to do trainings. For, like the very easy stuff I mean, the the toughest thing on our world is like data, engineering and data modeling is definitely hard to learn the data analyst stuff, but even less of the customer facing stuff. The actual, like nitty gritty of pulling data and finding things is much more manageable. And and the AI stuff is brand new. So you can learn can learn that in a month.
273 00:47:42.410 ⇒ 00:47:50.200 Uttam Kumaran: So why don’t? Maybe I’m just gonna put together some Jd’s and kind of share them your way, I think, Robert mentioned. I think it’s Michael who’s starting with Javi. I think we just.
274 00:47:50.476 ⇒ 00:47:51.029 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Matthew Matthew.
275 00:47:51.030 ⇒ 00:47:53.460 Uttam Kumaran: Matthew. Matthew, yeah, we’re just talking about it today.
276 00:47:53.801 ⇒ 00:48:17.419 Uttam Kumaran: And then, yeah, I would love to just see, like, maybe for the next role we’re going for to just see like what’s possible. I mean the you know, the I think the biggest thing is one, I think, for people that are junior. We definitely have some work that that needs to be done. And then we’re trying to basically segment out some clients. So we have, like a almost like a senior architect person as your strategic work. And then they’re paired with someone junior can actually get like the the analyst sort of stuff done
277 00:48:17.430 ⇒ 00:48:26.779 Uttam Kumaran: so that we’re all formalizing this month. But like I would love to, you know, partner, on this, and see whether we can gather enough demands to kind of help. You kind of kick, start this.
278 00:48:26.810 ⇒ 00:48:29.249 Uttam Kumaran: but definitely, very much needed.
279 00:48:30.560 ⇒ 00:48:51.560 Jorrel Sto Tomas: No, absolutely. I mean, like, like I said, these these students are stellar and that’s like the the great thing is they’re they’re hungry. They’re like sponges. They know how to like. They know how to learn stuff really quickly, like you know, off off the record, friend da here, we one of our enterprise. customers we work with. Netscope. They’re.
280 00:48:51.560 ⇒ 00:48:57.709 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah, friend, that works there in like some account management or sales or something.
281 00:48:58.310 ⇒ 00:49:16.190 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. Yeah. So my dad is very close friends with the CEO and so they, they basically. One of our trial runs with them was they just wanted to hire 6 interns from the Philippines. And we’re just like, Okay, cool. Let’s just do that for you. And then they’re like, Oh, hey! Can you make sure they pass these certs?
282 00:49:16.545 ⇒ 00:49:26.019 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And they were. They were just so quick they were able to finish all the certifications that they needed within, you know, 2 months of, and which is crazy because when.
283 00:49:26.030 ⇒ 00:49:46.780 Jorrel Sto Tomas: like, the expectation is usually like, okay, within like a 3, 4 month period. So they’re very hungry to learn, very hungry to learn new tools, and you know their certifications, because all the tools that they’re exposed to are archaic, like their basic systems use like windows. Xp, that type of deal. And so there’s like anything that looks new
284 00:49:46.780 ⇒ 00:50:03.070 Jorrel Sto Tomas: is exciting for them. Which is why, I’m like extremely excited, you know, to to kind of bring tools like amplitude, bring tools like Dvt. You know all those other things. As as you know, as potential like baseline train training programs for for these students. Right?
285 00:50:03.070 ⇒ 00:50:16.920 Uttam Kumaran: And the nice thing we already, since we already have staff there, too. The one thing is like, I want to find ways for even some of the staff that we have there to start contributing to like training programs, or even, you know, pair them up with people. So I do think that there’s a great opportunity. It’s not like.
286 00:50:17.130 ⇒ 00:50:18.710 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, yeah, I mean.
287 00:50:18.710 ⇒ 00:50:19.740 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, perfect.
288 00:50:19.970 ⇒ 00:50:38.867 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah, these these like, for for some of our more tenured network engineers, they actually are paired with a couple shadow trainees. And because it’s so cheap to hire them like it, it just comes off the same like, you know, the the same amount of money that that is getting paid off for you know, for for the contracts that we have so.
289 00:50:39.150 ⇒ 00:50:39.540 Uttam Kumaran: Wow!
290 00:50:39.540 ⇒ 00:50:57.690 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You know. So so it’s like for the price of 2 engineers in the Us. Like we can hire, you know, 6 here in the Philippines like that type of deal. And so that’s why when we have these contracts, it’s like, okay, hey, you know. There are like 3 full time, you know, on staff, but we have, like another 3 that are shadowing those 3 right? Because.
291 00:50:57.690 ⇒ 00:50:58.240 Uttam Kumaran: Wow!
292 00:50:58.240 ⇒ 00:51:13.263 Jorrel Sto Tomas: You know. That’s how you create that. That that feedback loop, that training funnel, right? So we can do the same exact thing like, if if you wanna like, we want to coordinate some like workshops or or something like that here like we’re, we’re actually in the process of getting another office space.
293 00:51:14.270 ⇒ 00:51:23.182 Jorrel Sto Tomas: and so, yeah, we could definitely formalize something like, you know, we can run a trial run, do some contracts, and then, you know, you can check it out yourself.
294 00:51:23.480 ⇒ 00:51:38.799 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, perfect. I mean. So I think one thing, maybe let’s plan on that. We’re this is a basically our 1st month sort of like working me and Robert kind of merging everything. So we’re just kind of settling everything. Kind of like dust is settling on a bunch of stuff. So we probably need, probably until, like January.
295 00:51:38.970 ⇒ 00:52:07.921 Uttam Kumaran: probably, like mid January, it’s probably start kicking stuff off. We. We’re finalizing all the Jd’s. I will have to think about training materials and stuff. That’s basically as we finish Jd’s and the technical interview process, I’m gonna start working on trainings. I mean, I know a good amount of how to do it for a de and a work. So I can get that. And then, if you have any guidelines on like what that training process sort of looks like structure, wise on your side that you can share or what’s worked. I can sort of mold what I do research wise into that.
296 00:52:08.340 ⇒ 00:52:14.619 Uttam Kumaran: it’s just a lot of online courses like courses and certifications from like Dvt, 5 tram stuff like that. So I can get a lot of that.
297 00:52:14.620 ⇒ 00:52:26.213 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, we have. We have the same exact. We have the same exact ones for for data analytics. Yeah, let you know we we should we? Let’s schedule a longer call, actually and like, go through kind of what a what a journey would look like.
298 00:52:27.100 ⇒ 00:52:38.370 Jorrel Sto Tomas: and yeah, we can, you know, get more specific around that. But yeah, I think the 1st thing that we’re doing is is getting Matthew on this joby on this joby contract. So I think that’ll be a good way to.
299 00:52:38.370 ⇒ 00:52:44.179 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah. And he’ll be working directly with our team, too, on that one, because we’re just gonna run him through our normal Pm. Process. So he’ll
300 00:52:45.030 ⇒ 00:52:58.990 Uttam Kumaran: with my project manager the the data, the analytics engineer that stopped on there. So he’ll kind of get a sense of working with us, too. That way, and he’s supported there. So yeah, I just heard about that today. So that should go really? Well.
301 00:52:58.990 ⇒ 00:52:59.550 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Perfect.
302 00:52:59.750 ⇒ 00:53:17.020 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah. So that should that should give you a little bit of a insight as to like how we’re we’re gonna be doing the relationship. And, generally speaking, it’s it’s very like, you know, Matthews like on our, you know. Fusion, Node. That’s the company here in the Philippines and us like he’s on our fusion. Node, payroll benefits everything. And then, like.
303 00:53:17.350 ⇒ 00:53:29.010 Jorrel Sto Tomas: yeah, like the way that we would do it. Like at least the way we’re doing it with our, you know, net scope and a couple of other contracts is like they just send us and we just.
304 00:53:29.250 ⇒ 00:53:30.069 Jorrel Sto Tomas: we said.
305 00:53:30.728 ⇒ 00:53:46.169 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And like, you know, whatever job is like, either Javi could have a direct relationship Node, or they have a direct relationship with with you guys. Honestly, that’s just better for us, because then we don’t have to deal with the client management. And then, yeah, we just.
306 00:53:46.610 ⇒ 00:53:48.760 Jorrel Sto Tomas: you know, whatever it is, whatever.
307 00:53:48.760 ⇒ 00:54:05.849 Uttam Kumaran: No, no, I’m also thinking about the benefits and stuff for the whole for everybody there next year as well. So yeah, let’s definitely do a follow up conversation about a couple of items. Maybe I’ll grab time like I mean, I guess, next this week is kind of last week. But maybe, like early January, we’ll follow up, and then.
308 00:54:05.850 ⇒ 00:54:06.970 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
309 00:54:06.970 ⇒ 00:54:12.900 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, I would love to talk because I want to try to offer benefits and stuff for everybody sometime next year. So it’s like perfect timing.
310 00:54:13.730 ⇒ 00:54:15.729 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Oh, oh, yeah, for oh, for your Philippine staff!
311 00:54:15.730 ⇒ 00:54:17.510 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.
312 00:54:18.080 ⇒ 00:54:33.700 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, I mean, like, I said, it’s it’s, you know. If if you want to use fusion, notice like a vor, or like everything else on that end, like we’re, we’re fully equipped to do it. And even if they want to have an office like, it’s like I said, like, that’s that’s kind of what we’re doing for for our network engineers and
313 00:54:34.090 ⇒ 00:54:36.670 Jorrel Sto Tomas: our staff here, like they’re literally having.
314 00:54:36.670 ⇒ 00:54:37.949 Uttam Kumaran: Place the Guarcat Guy.
315 00:54:38.560 ⇒ 00:54:42.299 Jorrel Sto Tomas: And they love it like I’m I’m here actually at at our our bsu the office.
316 00:54:42.300 ⇒ 00:54:42.689 Uttam Kumaran: Oh no!
317 00:54:42.690 ⇒ 00:54:45.639 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Have. It’s full like everyone loves coming in, which.
318 00:54:45.640 ⇒ 00:54:46.210 Uttam Kumaran: Have sex.
319 00:54:46.210 ⇒ 00:54:47.609 Jorrel Sto Tomas: That’s amazing.
320 00:54:48.510 ⇒ 00:54:49.610 Jorrel Sto Tomas: So that’s a way
321 00:54:49.610 ⇒ 00:54:57.990 Jorrel Sto Tomas: we’re upgrading. We’re upgrading to a big to to a big office next year. So yeah, so there’s there’s a lot of lot of exciting stuff in the pipeline.
322 00:54:57.990 ⇒ 00:54:59.210 Uttam Kumaran: Nice. Okay.
323 00:54:59.520 ⇒ 00:55:03.940 Uttam Kumaran: Okay? Awesome. Well, this is great. I appreciate the time. Thanks. I know it’s early there. So
324 00:55:04.200 ⇒ 00:55:15.160 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Yeah, yeah, and also, you know, let’s let’s set up when we have that call. Let’s also get Robert in in here as well, we can discuss. But yeah, I’ll be. I’ll be talking to Robert Async on on slack. So.
325 00:55:15.170 ⇒ 00:55:15.910 Uttam Kumaran: Cool.
326 00:55:16.520 ⇒ 00:55:20.199 Uttam Kumaran: Okay, dope. Well, thanks for all, I really appreciate it. Yeah, this is great. And then.
327 00:55:20.200 ⇒ 00:55:21.830 Uttam Kumaran: yeah, I’m really excited.
328 00:55:21.830 ⇒ 00:55:22.510 Uttam Kumaran: Yeah, yeah.
329 00:55:22.510 ⇒ 00:55:26.180 Jorrel Sto Tomas: Thank you. Yeah, we’ll have a lot. We’re gonna be working a lot together.
330 00:55:26.602 ⇒ 00:55:29.139 Uttam Kumaran: Definitely. Let’s make some money, please.
331 00:55:29.140 ⇒ 00:55:30.610 Jorrel Sto Tomas: It looks like it happened. All right.
332 00:55:31.070 ⇒ 00:55:31.569 Jorrel Sto Tomas: We’re going back.
333 00:55:31.570 ⇒ 00:55:32.360 Uttam Kumaran: Thank you. Bye.