Edouard Renard The Maverick

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Ibi

Why did you want to become a nomad? How long have you been a nomad? Tell me something fun about being a nomad.

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Edouard

Oh.

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Edouard

Yes. I mean, it comes back to, It was 2014. It was between two university. I was still university 1914. Wait wait wait wait wait for it. So, no, I was it was in university. I didn’t think of anything. Nomad. I have never traveled, for instance, in my life, but I did. So we had to travel. We had to.

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Edouard

We had to have, like, like, like a work experience outside of France for our university.

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Ibi

Like as part of the course.

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Edouard

Yeah. So you could do an internship or what I did with a friend is just do some kind of moving stuff within two months in the US and Canada and talking with these because, like, when I did this, I realized, oh, then I want to travel like, not just not just going one week holiday somewhere, but spending like one month’s travel.

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Edouard

Yeah. Like spending a long time, one month, two months in one place, meeting the people. Like discovering the culture of the people. And I think this is kind of the like the thing that. Yeah it’s like the I want to do like awakening or whatever but something like that.

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Ibi

Like the.

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Edouard

Spark. Yeah. The sun. Yeah. The kind of an asset.

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Ibi

And then where did you go. I went to.

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Edouard

Brooklyn.

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Ibi

Okay.

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Edouard

And then I went to Ontario in Canada. Okay. Then I went to North Carolina.

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Ibi

North Carolina.

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Edouard

I went to Tennessee. Okay. Kings. Kingsport, Tennessee.

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Ibi

And how long did you spend there?

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Edouard

I like to two weeks each. And. Yeah.

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Ibi

Random places. And then you wanna fuck. Two weeks is not enough. Like the seed is planted.

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Edouard

It was not about two weeks. And, you know, it was like the whole thing was two months. And I was like, wow, that’s great. I want to do that again. But I never did, because then, you know, it’s so good to see you again. Another internship job. I mean, get a job. I co-founded my own startup, which is even worse because it’s not like you went to, j you you create your own jail.

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Edouard

In terms of, like, you cannot travel.

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Ibi

Because the startup was local. It was fake.

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Edouard

Robotics startup, like physical hardware startup. So you kind of, yeah, you can just say, oh, I’m going to be remote. It’s not like it’s fancy, fancy, like website. Is it startup? Everybody’s remote and stuff. No, it’s like a proper hardware engineering to be on site.

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Ibi

I see.

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Edouard

And so how I become a nomad, like. No, I’m not sure. I was, like, fully nomad, but, Yeah. Late 2019, I decided to quit that.

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Ibi

But it was your own startup.

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Edouard

Yes.

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Ibi

So you didn’t quit, you know, closed it.

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Edouard

I don’t live co-founder, so I just, I just left. I know it’s weird. Like, usually people quit their own style to when things go wrong.

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Ibi

Yeah.

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Edouard

Nothing did go wrong. I just decided I didn’t want to come to live another one. And I wanted to travel. And also I was not so align with where I was going. I didn’t like I had the so I left after three years. I was very motivated at the beginning, but then at some point I didn’t really like where we were going till it made sense to go where we were going.

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Edouard

But I didn’t really like myself. I didn’t feel that motivated to continue. Like so we were focusing on it. So it was a we did a robotic arm and just like, you know, this thing that that, in a car factories that, you know, thing to place and stuff to build the cars. Yeah. But you see, you see what I mean?

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Edouard

Like, because when I say robotic arm, people think I would do like an arm like prosthesis or something, but it’s like those industrial robotic arm. But it was not for industry. What for education?

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Ibi

How does a, help in education world.

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Edouard

So basically, I mean to make it shop the price of one robotic arm like this was 10 to 20 times cheaper than the robotic arm that you could buy the real one. So for education universities, that was that was like a real thing because instead of buying one robot for like three universities, they could buy a few robots for each class and actually use that.

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Edouard

And so that was educational market that we did. And then it made sense to go more into the industrial market, which is so much more complicated.

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Ibi

And did you get the robot out to some universities? Yeah. So this sounds pretty successful.

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Edouard

Yeah. We selling. Yeah, we were selling was sitting between like I don’t know, 30 to €50 per month.

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Ibi

Okay. Yeah okay. And how much is each robot worth. Just to give me an idea.

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Edouard

Oh about to we study love and than 2000.

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Ibi

Nice. Okay, so this was a full. This was a full running startup.

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Edouard

Yes. We didn’t even have, like, outside investment yet.

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Ibi

Yeah.

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Edouard

So I actually I lived yeah, I live for for three reasons. It was because I was not aligned with changing from, I like the the educational market in the industry market was something completely new. Went to a to all the certification and staff. It was just like and and something, you know, like a lot of things I didn’t know.

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Edouard

And I was studying to manage a team of engineers and I was like, I have no idea what I’m like. I’m not even interested in learning that. Yeah. And then it was also before we were going to raise some money from this is.

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Ibi

So you were going on for funding.

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Edouard

Yeah. Well so it doesn’t make sense as a co-founder to just do that and quit after that because you have to, you know, badly work clothes and stuff. So yeah. So it’s like, yeah, you you don’t go into the deal is like if you either you go into the dealer and you stay for like what, seven, ten years or you don’t go into it.

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Edouard

And so that was the right moment for me to just quit because I so wanted to travel. And so that’s where I quit. And I was like, let’s. Okay. Let’s.

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Ibi

And it started from that whole 20. So between 2014 and 2019, you were focused on university and the startup and all of that stuff, and then afterwards you were like, fuck this, let’s go.

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Edouard

Yeah, yeah. Kind of. So I had to I did the trip, so I left my setup in, let’s September end of September 2019. But in this so in March 2019, I had a two week holiday in France. We went to Vietnam. And I was like, okay, I needed this break because I’m like, I’m going to be recharged.

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Edouard

You know, I’m going to go there. I’m going to feel recharged. It’s going to be nice. I go there, it’s nice, I come back, I don’t need to recharge. I came back, it was like the first day I have to come back. It was like, oh my God, no, no, no. And so I took the decision at this point.

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Edouard

So like, okay, I need to it was a long it was a hard decision to tell to my co-founder that I’m leaving. So it probably took me like a month or two to like properly decide that and tell him. And then I stayed for another five, six months to, you know, probably finish this because, you know, the co-founder is like, you don’t just replace a co-founder like that.

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Edouard

There’s nobody who can just pick the same role. You have to.

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Ibi

It’s a hard thing to do, especially if the business is established as well as.

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Edouard

Yeah, yeah.

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Ibi

So that puts you at like early Covid then, right?

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Edouard

Yeah. So late 2019 a, a a quit that I decided to do nothing for two months because I was like, I want to do nothing. Doing a thing is not a good idea.

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Ibi

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Edouard

But then yeah, it was around Christmas. So I did stuff with my family.

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Ibi

And you had some like savings to like back you up for that period.

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Edouard

Yeah. And in France you get government money. I’m not blaming that unemployment. Yeah.

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Ibi

It’s not isn’t it the best I can unemployed this line of it.

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Edouard

Yeah. But did you get government money?

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Ibi

I got like 300 pounds a month now.

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Edouard

It was more than that. It was not much. It was basically minimum wage, but, you know, like it’s enough.

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Ibi

Countless friends.

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Edouard

Yeah. Like we pay a lot of taxes. But then, yeah, if you get fired, if you want to start. Yeah. That’s okay. You don’t.

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Ibi

Know, you can get government.

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Edouard

Money. And then I started to travel. First destination was Mexico. I landed this, I think early. No, like January or early February.

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Ibi

And this was. No, this is not a nomadic travel. This was just a full travel. This was just like I’m going to go travel.

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Edouard

No, I was like I was having my, my, my computer with me and working. And then I didn’t. It’s kind of like, you know, you start this new life and was I was I didn’t know really what I wanted to travel, what I wanted to do. I already had the idea of because now I’m doing like those, online courses, robotics, online courses.

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Edouard

Yeah. So basically teach what they learned before and we started.

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Ibi

Yeah.

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Edouard

The tech part. Okay. And.

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Ibi

Yeah, but you had that in Mexico or you made that in Mexico. Like, when did you start working on the robotics courses?

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Edouard

Oh, after I quit my still, I started to it’s not I mean, it’s hard to draw like a line. Exactly. To say, you know, he’s the story of that one, two, three. It’s a bit of a mess.

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Ibi

Yeah.

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Edouard

But yeah, I had I had a backup. Like when I left, I had already decided, like, I had to plan a backup plan. Okay? I didn’t leave, like, yeah, I’m going to just just like go to, play like.

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Ibi

Okay, okay. That was a plan going to.

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Edouard

Play happen in, in a hostel in Thailand, you know, like.

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Ibi

Okay, what was the plan? Tell me the plan. What was the plan then?

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Edouard

The, the plan was that.

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Ibi

To the the plan was. So you knew that you were in robotics and you were an expert in that field. Were you an expert in the field?

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Edouard

I mean, it depends who you talk to, you and. Yes.

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Ibi

Yes, it sounds like you were.

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Edouard

Yeah, we could say so.

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Ibi

And then the plan was to sell that robotics skill set.

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Edouard

Yeah. So actually the is like I realized that so I was I’m quite good at robotics. I know, I know my stuff in robotics. Right. Then I see my setup. I need I need a lot of marketing. So I learned marketing from scratch. I mean, I’m not saying, like, very expert on marketing, but like, SEO, writing blogs, landing pages, basically like creating a sales and selling stuff online.

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Edouard

Right. So I learned that. And there’s also the educational part that I kind of liked in I’ve done like some, educational stuff before. I did like some math class, like, know private, matched, teaching. Yeah, I did some stuff like that. And so I was like, maybe I could combine that and then sell. Yeah.

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Edouard

Because it’s, it’s, I think if when you have like different skill sets that are not necessarily matching, but it can be a very good combo. Because how many good robotics engineers are going to be good at explaining what they do? You know, it’s like you take a very expert engineer technical lens.

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Ibi

Yeah, they’re all technical mindset and then business mindset.

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Edouard

Explaining to beginners.

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Ibi

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Edouard

Most people are not able to do that. And then how many engineers like marketing. Not so many. So it’s like I think it’s not about being most expert in one domain is about just like me being an expert at the whole combination of, you know, so basically not I wouldn’t say like I’m an expert in robotic. I’m an expert at teaching robotics online.

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Edouard

It’s not the same thing.

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Ibi

Exactly. And that’s a it’s a good solopreneur skill set, right, that you build up in your startup where you’re like, okay, I understand how business works. I understand how marketing works. I have the skill set that I need, and it’s very impressive that you recognize that it’s it’s you’re not an expert in robotics. You’re an expert in teaching robotics.

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Ibi

Yeah. And that’s awesome. Okay. Okay. So when did you record your first course?

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Edouard

Well, I started quite soon after. Yeah, after the the startup thingy. Yeah. I was also so I started to write actually tutorials. I have websites, like written tutorials. Yeah. And then I like blogging. Yeah, kind of blogging, but like a tutorial. Okay. Yeah, but really like, go into these SEO like people, you know, who search how to do this with that.

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Edouard

Yeah. Yeah. Then I started to record and yeah, I saw that, it was it was working, meaning that I started to get a bit of money from that. Nothing I was doing, like, on government money like this was not enough to break the, the government money stuff, but, yeah, it was it was starting to work.

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Edouard

I mean, I kind of validated the concept quite early.

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Ibi

And.

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Edouard

Then I didn’t know exactly how I wanted to do it if I wanted to go, because now I’m teaching on Udemy, mostly. But if I wanted to follow me or do my own, my own platform with, you know, different pricing and different packaging and stuff. So I tried different things, like mostly like 2020, 2021. I tried different things.

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Ibi

Like what?

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Edouard

Like, like for example, one of my first courses, I sold it on my own website for. So for the context of Udemy, for, I don’t know, like you didn’t need to sell the courses very it’s very cheap. So it’s like you said you have a high volume of courses but it’s cheap. So in the end you earn money because it’s volume.

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Edouard

It’s like a book right. You’re not going to make a lot of money by selling one book. But if you said 10,000 books then that’s how you the money comes with kind of royalties system. So I was thinking yeah, I mean the best would be to sell my own platform, with premium price. Yeah. That’s what I tried to do.

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Edouard

Lots of effort. And then yeah I had some sales but not much. And then I put it on, then me and then I had double CS with no marketing. That was in 2022. And it’s not the same anymore today, but.

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Ibi

Interesting.

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Edouard

Also because I think the niche I am in is very specific is developers. So you can you can it’s like you can sell a lot of things to a lot of people. But to like developers is very like they don’t want to pay for stuff.

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Ibi

And is that way it works better on Udemy because the prices were lower.

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Edouard

Yeah. And also my engine is international. It’s not just the US in Europe like my second country is India.

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Ibi

Yeah. So I mean there’s like a billion people there, right?

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Edouard

Yeah. So it’s like you cannot say to Indian people who learn to code like they 100 US dollar, they’re going to say no.

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Ibi

But if you pay $20 an.

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Edouard

Hour and even like you, then you have this is, geo targeting price.

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Ibi

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Edouard

So you pay even though you pay like ₹400, which is me, I don’t know, $3.

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Ibi

Oh really.

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Edouard

I don’t look commission but yeah. So it depends on the country. So it’s quite nice in a way that everybody in all the country can actually pay something that’s affordable for them. So in the end you just get customers from all over the world.

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Ibi

So you left the startup with the skill set that you needed. You started with the technical guides, the blog type website stuff you tried to sell on your website, but then realized that Udemy was better. Yeah. Then what happened?

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Edouard

Then I studied to democracies and put them on Udemy, not just Udemy. I was also using all the platforms like Skillshare and other stuff. And yeah. So I was like 2022 when I was doing that. And so just creating more courses, more tutorials, I also started, video tutorials on YouTube. Yeah. So yeah, it was just like creating more stuff of what I, you know.

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Ibi

And what did that success look and feel like? Was the success then? Did you, did you feel that like it was working?

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Edouard

Yeah. I mean, it’s like every course that they put you know, it says more brings additional revenue. So yeah, it was it was working like that kind of building my, my audience in a way it was, it was never like, I didn’t have like a big bump, like a big buzz or whatever. It was always like kind of linear growth.

00:16:09:09 - 00:16:36:21

Edouard

But I like is like stable growth. So it also doesn’t come down like to create. But yeah, it’s like basically I was like the more work I put in, the better the result. And also it’s like it’s not just about the, the, you know, and symbol like also when you get nice reviews of people saying, hey, thanks to you, I could actually, you know, get my career into these, like, motivate me to know it’s cool.

00:16:36:21 - 00:16:40:06

Edouard

Like, motivate me to, to do this project. And finally, I can understand.

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Ibi

You were helping people. You were benefiting the world. Yeah. By the way, it sounds like you come across as a very successful person. You’re like, I did my startup. Oh, good. Yeah, fine. You know, we did some universities, we did some industries. We were going to raise funding. And then I just quit and not like, oh yeah, I did Udemy and, just made some money and now, well, good.

00:17:00:17 - 00:17:22:07

Ibi

It’s very inspiring. By the way, when did you feel like you had when did you feel like it was really working, like you quit your job at the end of 2019? Yeah, right. What year or months or whatever. Were you like then? It’s working.

00:17:22:09 - 00:17:27:08

Edouard

I would say.

00:17:27:10 - 00:17:49:08

Edouard

Yeah. I mean, after maybe 1 or 2 years that I could see, I could see like who was growing and I could see that if I would put more, I thought it would keep growing. I mean, in terms of business. Them in terms of knowledge, overall life, satisfaction. It’s I mean of course you need the money.

00:17:49:08 - 00:18:15:02

Edouard

But then I think it’s also that I realized I could actually travel and actually when I went to first co-living, it was one year after living in a startup. Then it was like late 20, 20. At this time, my business started to grow a bit more. Nothing really too much, but it grew a bit more. And then I went to this co-living and I realized that’s also what I want to do.

00:18:15:02 - 00:18:34:12

Edouard

Like I want to go to college things and I could find, community. And then I could have, like, a good life, like work life balance. And then the thing is like, yeah, this is, this is wealth, and this is what success looks like. It’s not just it’s not just the business. It’s also like having the time, having the people.

00:18:34:14 - 00:18:43:08

Ibi

So the real success felt, present and that when it enabled the lifestyle, is that. Well, where is that when we’re getting it?

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Edouard

Yeah. Kind of. Yeah. The success for me is not just about the I mean, it depends if you’re talking just about business. Yeah. There’s like success. But for me, success is also like just living the life you like. Yeah. Spending good time.

00:18:56:22 - 00:19:06:18

Ibi

And I have one last question on this side before we go on. How long did it take you to leave the government money?

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Edouard

Bother. Yeah.

00:19:08:00 - 00:19:12:02

Ibi

About a year. Is it around the time that you went for the co-living?

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Edouard

Yeah. About that. Yeah. About that. Yeah.

00:19:15:00 - 00:19:25:10

Ibi

So it sounds like. It sounds like that’s the point where the lifestyle was enabled, where the business was taking off and things sort of came together.

00:19:25:12 - 00:19:52:07

Edouard

Yeah. But I wouldn’t even say that because it’s like, I, I mean, I’m quite frugal and I think I can live for cheap. And it’s like if you tell me you need like €2,000 per month to live like this, okay. But I could have also done stuff for just €600 per month. You know, I’m like it’s I think I don’t know like can you can manage to.

00:19:52:09 - 00:20:01:17

Edouard

You can actually for cheaper. So I’m not. Yeah. I don’t know if it’s like a clear answer for a podcast, but.

00:20:01:19 - 00:20:15:08

Ibi

Everything is a clear answer. In fact, sometimes there’s no clear answer. Sometimes it’s just people, humans living their lives. Okay, so then what did the co-living look like for you? Because you’ve been co-living for a long time.

00:20:15:12 - 00:20:22:04

Edouard

Yeah, like five, five years. I mean, not just clearly it has. At some point I had, I was renting a flat.

00:20:22:06 - 00:20:23:01

Ibi

In France.

00:20:23:03 - 00:20:25:05

Edouard

In Spain, in Spain.

00:20:25:06 - 00:20:44:21

Ibi

Oh, okay. Right, guys. And, what was the, what was the feeling like being in co-living? I mean, you were obviously working in tech. You, Well, working in tech, you’re working online as a as a digital nomad. You were in this pre pre-COVID? No, you were in the Covid world.

00:20:44:21 - 00:20:45:19

Edouard

Right. And the Covid.

00:20:45:19 - 00:20:49:07

Ibi

Right and the Covid. What did it look like in co-living.

00:20:49:09 - 00:20:50:22

Edouard

What did it look like.

00:20:51:00 - 00:20:53:01

Ibi

Yeah I was Covid for you.

00:20:53:03 - 00:21:16:19

Edouard

Coming was great. I did get Covid. It was but so for two weeks. But then it was quite fun. But it was, it was, I mean, it was also the time I was studying this, so I had lots of time to actually work on on that, you know, like, and then, yeah, I did manage to get to, like, some clear things before, like in France we had different lockdown.

00:21:16:19 - 00:21:39:10

Edouard

But before the second lockdown, I managed to escape the I didn’t been co-living. So we were basically lockdown together. Which was much better than being lockdown alone in a flat. And how does it. Yeah I would say that for me co-living is like when you, when you’re nomadic, when you’re traveling and working online, it’s hard to.

00:21:39:11 - 00:21:56:17

Edouard

Yeah, yeah. There are two things I would say it’s hard to find, like proper, accommodation with like, good working set, a good Wi-Fi good. You know, it’s just being it’s such a basic thing, you know, like having an ergonomic chair, an ergonomic desk, Wi-Fi silence. And it seems easy, but it’s not.

00:21:56:21 - 00:21:57:16

Ibi

It’s not.

00:21:57:18 - 00:22:18:17

Edouard

And so when you travel, it’s super hard to find. And then when you find that you also need because you travel and you, you, you know, it’s hard to meet people. You go to a hostel, but everybody’s living in three days or you go to a new city, but you know, it takes time to meet people. So familia co-living is really like you go, you have a good, environment to work.

00:22:18:19 - 00:22:38:02

Edouard

You have lots of space to, to leave the kitchen. Lots of different spaces, like maybe a gym or it depends on the co-living, which has their own specificities. But then you also have the, the community. And what they like is you don’t need to like when you have your own flat, you always need to make your own efforts to go out like finish.

00:22:38:02 - 00:22:46:18

Edouard

You don’t need to go out. Do the for meeting people and you go. Living is as simple as just going into the living room, sitting down and just being there.

00:22:46:18 - 00:22:50:05

Ibi

And they all come to you. Exactly. And they’re all looking for the same thing.

00:22:50:05 - 00:22:57:04

Edouard

Exactly. So, so that to me is like a real like problem solver. Yeah.

00:22:57:06 - 00:23:13:07

Ibi

And in the five years that you, co-living and nomad ING and being around, did you feel that it benefited your nomad business, your robotics business?

00:23:13:09 - 00:23:25:14

Edouard

Well, I mean, for the like for the audience and the like, definitely. No, because I’m, I’m selling to, like, robotics engineers and, like, PhD stuff, like, there’s nobody, nobody travels in and, like.

00:23:25:18 - 00:23:28:03

Ibi

So you weren’t benefiting people that you were traveling with?

00:23:28:06 - 00:23:53:17

Edouard

No. But benefiting in, I don’t know, like, I mean for sure more like the business, the marketing and stuff. You know, it’s like you exchange ideas and people kind of understand what you do. Because other than that, it’s always hard to explain to people. So I would say in co-living, if you have other people working online, they understand better your business.

00:23:53:19 - 00:24:08:03

Edouard

So, so yeah I mean I would say probably benefited in, in that way that I could exchange like I, and like the business side, marketing side. Yeah. I had some good conversation with people. Yeah.

00:24:08:06 - 00:24:12:03

Ibi

Did you mean other people that were doing similar things to you.

00:24:12:05 - 00:24:15:02

Edouard

You mean like other, like, online robotics?

00:24:15:04 - 00:24:20:03

Ibi

No, I can imagine there’s not that many. Oh, but it’s teachers at the.

00:24:20:03 - 00:24:35:22

Edouard

I, similar. I mean, there are people. Okay, so the thing is, up there, a lot of people like, you know, doing those online courses, about. But the end you have to go to Bali.

00:24:36:00 - 00:24:40:01

Ibi

Just. Did you ever go to Bali? I oh, my.

00:24:40:01 - 00:24:58:14

Edouard

Gosh, it’s just for a few days to visit friends. Okay. No, but it’s like, you know, I’m doing online courses, but I’m not teaching. I’m not teaching dropshipping. Yeah, I’m not teaching how to invest in crypto. I’m not teaching how to create online courses. This is like the golden thing is, like you do an online course about how to create an online course.

00:24:58:16 - 00:24:59:21

Ibi

What the fuck even is then.

00:24:59:21 - 00:25:20:13

Edouard

What I’m noticed is those people actually mostly decided to create an online course business because they watched somebody teaching how to create an online course. So it was like, oh, I’m going to do that. It’s going to work. And then they realized that, I mean, they have no, like, tangible thing to teach. And they feel about that. So what they do instead is they teach other people how to teach.

00:25:20:15 - 00:25:22:16

Edouard

That’s what I’ve noticed. The same for dropshipping.

00:25:22:20 - 00:25:23:19

Ibi

It’s ridiculous. Right?

00:25:23:22 - 00:25:29:06

Edouard

Oh, and then you have the the coach and the coaches coaching are the coaches. How to coach coaches.

00:25:29:11 - 00:25:30:12

Ibi

How to coach coaches.

00:25:30:12 - 00:25:35:19

Edouard

So yes. No, I’m not I’m not into the.

00:25:35:21 - 00:25:50:03

Ibi

Honestly, this is one of my biggest grievances about people teaching online courses. And, At least you didn’t go and live in Bali and teach online courses.

00:25:50:05 - 00:26:00:06

Edouard

I mean, I I’ve been to Thailand and checkmate. I’m guilty, but I like, I like, I like the I don’t know yeah, I thought I was not but it’s nice.

00:26:00:07 - 00:26:01:19

Ibi

It’s sad, but it’s nice.

00:26:01:20 - 00:26:04:23

Edouard

Yes. I’m guilty.

00:26:05:00 - 00:26:16:13

Ibi

Okay. So did did your online business enable your lifestyle completely and comfortably for five years?

00:26:16:15 - 00:26:20:04

Edouard

Yeah. Yeah, I would say yeah.

00:26:20:06 - 00:26:46:10

Ibi

Another success story of one of these success stories. Oh okay. So look, usually people at the beginning phase where they’re like, these the listeners to this podcast would be like, oh yeah, I want to launch my online business. I want to I want to enable that lifestyle. I want to do that and stuff and live five years from my online course.

00:26:46:12 - 00:26:56:14

Ibi

But you’re actually at a very different stage in your life now from what I’m from, what I’m gathering from you. You’ve had enough of this five years and you’re like, I want to start a new project. Yeah. What’s the new project?

00:26:56:16 - 00:26:58:17

Edouard

Ooh, a co-living.

00:26:58:19 - 00:27:02:12

Ibi

Yeah, I’ve got to launch a co-living. Logically, why.

00:27:02:13 - 00:27:06:20

Edouard

I may I mean, because that’s the way I see it.

00:27:06:20 - 00:27:10:10

Ibi

Again. Why? Why are you going to launch a co-living? It just so excited.

00:27:10:10 - 00:27:15:13

Edouard

Yeah. Maybe I’m stupid.

00:27:15:15 - 00:27:22:14

Ibi

You know, your track record would say otherwise, so there must be some, like, there’s some brain going on, and then that’s not.

00:27:22:14 - 00:27:44:06

Edouard

So here’s the thing is, is, I know it sounds a bit weird, but. So I was talking about teaching robotics and stuff. I’m not that passionate about this. And I’m like, I’m so down with the, I don’t find the motivation to continue on this. So I would say for somebody, I mean, I know somebody else would, could be like really passionate about that.

00:27:44:06 - 00:28:12:16

Edouard

And sometimes I wish I would be passionate because then I could go much further with that was business and just continue traveling and but some it’s just not fulfilling anymore that much. So I continue to do it. It’s it’s nice. But I yeah, I don’t, I don’t find that much motivation from it. So I was looking for a project that gives me more purpose and not necessarily is about like doing a business for business.

00:28:12:18 - 00:28:35:15

Edouard

Yeah. And so I like, I really like co-living and I, I had this, I have several ideas of like many different things project that could be like could be like completely random different I opposite ideas. But this co-living thingy, I would say it’s like an idea I had basically since I’ve been to co-living, I was like, oh, maybe one day I could create my own.

00:28:35:17 - 00:28:57:13

Edouard

But just as an idea, you know? And so this, came well as a project, I don’t know, I was traveling and then I had this is kind of realization. Yeah, it’s I think it’s a good time to do it. And also having seen other co-living is like I see how co-living evolves because the co-living in. Yeah, one is not the same as the co-living in your site.

00:28:57:15 - 00:29:16:14

Edouard

Of course it evolves because of the owner, because of like different values, the changes, the project, the changes and stuff. And I was like, yeah, I would like to actually create my own co-living with my own values in, in basically like having my own boats kind of, you know, and yeah, nice.

00:29:16:16 - 00:29:32:01

Ibi

Nice. And in the co-living, what values do you imagine that you would want to create? I mean, you’ve been doing this for five years now. So what what do you imagine you want to to bring into the world.

00:29:32:03 - 00:29:53:09

Edouard

Yeah. So for me like at least at the beginning, this is my like initial vision is having like a place that it’s kind of like a, like a homey place, that is open most of the time so that you can come. It’s kind of like the kind of the tagline will be something may come, you can come home, like, feel like home, and then you can come back.

00:29:53:11 - 00:30:14:12

Edouard

This kind of stuff. Yeah. Like in places like very base, like authenticity, like sharing stuff with others. They’re spending time with the and, yeah, just the bit of fun cannot hurt. And then, yeah. Just fitting home.

00:30:14:14 - 00:30:17:17

Ibi

Yes. What’s your definition of a co-living?

00:30:17:18 - 00:30:32:18

Edouard

Then it, well, my definition of living, it’s it’s, Yeah, I don’t know. What’s my definition of a actually, I mean, depends who you talk to.

00:30:32:20 - 00:30:35:16

Ibi

You’ve been co-living for five years, and you’re trying to launch a co-living.

00:30:35:16 - 00:30:54:06

Edouard

It’s hard to define like I was, I was I was going to the the bank because, you know, the bank accounts for the company. And I’m like, well I’m like, what are you doing? I’m co-living. I’m like, oh, what is it creating? I was like, they’re going to explain to the banker, what’s it like? No, but I would say, wait for somebody who’s like the Nomad.

00:30:54:08 - 00:30:59:11

Edouard

Yeah. Okay. Gen, what is the co-living jam?

00:30:59:11 - 00:31:01:13

Ibi

What is it? Co-living. What is it called it?

00:31:01:15 - 00:31:03:21

Edouard

It’s very hard. Define, oh.

00:31:03:23 - 00:31:10:19

Ibi

That’s exactly what it. It’s the feeling, you see.

00:31:10:21 - 00:31:11:03

Edouard

It’s.

00:31:11:08 - 00:31:15:10

Ibi

Did you say it’s a feeling? It’s a feeling.

00:31:15:12 - 00:31:16:03

Edouard

It’s a feeling.

00:31:16:04 - 00:31:17:18

Ibi

It’s a feeling.

00:31:17:20 - 00:31:24:19

Edouard

It’s a it’s a feeling that’s very feeling. Okay, you can I could.

00:31:24:21 - 00:31:29:15

Ibi

Measure good living is a feeling that’s very, you.

00:31:29:17 - 00:31:55:04

Edouard

Know, yeah, I would say co-living is a place. So if. Sure, it’s not necessarily for nomads, it could be for nomads, but for people who also want to just spend a few weeks or a few months outside of their own. Please. It’s not necessary yet for Nomad full time, but yeah, it’s a place you can, you can come live, you can work.

00:31:55:04 - 00:32:18:10

Edouard

There’s all the facilities and is the community is kind of what I said before about like, you have the proper working environment and the community. So you have all of that in one place. I know community is a broad word, but it’s, Yeah. It brings like, those two together and, and then, yeah, you have all those networks of co-living.

00:32:18:10 - 00:32:45:17

Edouard

So it’s also you. Yeah. You tie into a community that’s bigger than just one place. So then you have, you can make friends like, we can then travel together and you can just create a new network of people and, then yeah, each co-living is going to be different, but also a bit similar. And that also with what is it creating also is a good question I think is also another question is like why is not to co-living?

00:32:45:19 - 00:33:11:03

Edouard

Because it’s not like, okay, a hotel is very clear. What’s a hot region is like regulation even knows about what the hotel is. Or you can call an hotel and not call it hotness. Same for hostel and then different like status of accommodation for different countries. But a co-living is like anything could be a co-living. You could have somebody buying a big flat in the city doing like shared rooms.

00:33:11:05 - 00:33:31:12

Edouard

And instead of calling that roommates the can I call that a co-living. And we have maybe like cleaning once per week, maybe like the kind of a small sim, room with Netflix and stuff. And they’re gonna call that a co-living because then you can charge more. And then. Yeah. And then you have those co-living, like those kind of more rural co-living.

00:33:31:14 - 00:33:54:02

Edouard

And we don’t in the city, but mostly like rural co-living is focused more on the community aspect, and it feels less like a business. So yeah, there are many, many places that you can find that are called co-living. That would not necessarily meet the definition that I have of my like, this co-living.

00:33:54:04 - 00:34:04:03

Edouard

So it’s hard to explain. But yeah, I would say, yeah, a place like you can come for work and, and the community.

00:34:04:05 - 00:34:17:16

Ibi

So Jan just said it’s a feeling. What feeling does the co-living give you. Does echo the thing. What feeling does the ideal co-living give you. Like the feeling that you might want to create in your co-living.

00:34:17:20 - 00:34:39:18

Edouard

Yeah that some is like feeling of family. Like everybody has a different definition of family. But for me it’s also like you feel like you. Yeah, you feel just good here with other people. And it’s like a family. Yeah. Family fitting. And of course it’s not because, you know, that everybody’s going to move on with their life and go different places.

00:34:39:18 - 00:34:49:08

Edouard

So it’s, it’s, it’s for a few months, two weeks, a few months. But I would say yeah, it’s like family saying, yeah, I’m going to stay on this one.

00:34:49:10 - 00:34:56:08

Ibi

If we think about your track record, two track record, a track record, that’s.

00:34:56:08 - 00:34:57:01

Edouard

A nice word.

00:34:57:03 - 00:35:22:00

Ibi

Yeah. So you had the the start up, which did pretty good. And then you were like, oh, I want to try something new. And you’re like, okay, then you launched this robotics teaching business and it did pretty good. And now you’re like, okay, now I want to try something new. And I’m lucky because I get to see you at this point when you’re launching the co-living, where do you imagine you’ll be in five years?

00:35:22:02 - 00:35:32:06

Edouard

I have no idea. I don’t know, in five years, I mean, yeah, five years is a long time.

00:35:32:08 - 00:35:33:13

Ibi

No, but hit me with three.

00:35:33:13 - 00:35:55:12

Edouard

Isn’t three okay? Three years? Yeah. No, the three years. I imagine that the co-living is going to be. It takes at least like 1 or 2 years to set up properly with a renovation, and then you launch it. And then the first year is very experimental, I guess, and the second year is a bit less experimental. You start to know a bit more like, you know, a bit more stable on everything.

00:35:55:14 - 00:36:17:12

Edouard

And then on the third year. Yeah, I think these three years and going, my, my ideas, I’m going to be late in my, in my co-living maybe like stay there as a homies, keep traveling for a few months. But yeah. And then in five years maybe, I don’t know, maybe I’m going to have another project.

00:36:17:14 - 00:36:18:09

Edouard

I don’t know if.

00:36:18:11 - 00:36:19:16

Ibi

That would make sense.

00:36:19:18 - 00:36:20:14

Edouard

Yeah.

00:36:20:16 - 00:36:28:18

Ibi

I can see you in another project. And where are you going to keep your robotics teaching business running for this whole period?

00:36:28:20 - 00:36:32:22

Edouard

Yeah. So because it’s like online courses. So.

00:36:33:00 - 00:36:34:14

Ibi

Passive income.

00:36:34:16 - 00:36:51:08

Edouard

I don’t like that word that much. Because, you know, it’s passive income. Then I can oh, I could teach how to. I could do an online course or what? Passive income. That would be real passive income. No, it’s passive in a way. That’s the money I earn this month has nothing to do with what I’m doing this month.

00:36:51:10 - 00:37:12:07

Edouard

That’s how I define passive. It’s because of the work before. But then if I stop working on it, it’s going to go down because, well, especially for, software and robotics, things keep evolving. So I have courses I need to rerecord every like 3 or 4 years. Otherwise it becomes obsolete. And then competition comes and then they just go down to zero.

00:37:12:07 - 00:37:28:02

Edouard

So yes, I’m going to keep working on that. But less hours because I have the I have the foundation now so I can be more in, maintaining mode than developing mode for the business.

00:37:28:04 - 00:37:40:12

Ibi

So it’s not fully passive income. It’s partially passive income because you need to keep working on it to maintain it. But if you do a certain amount of maintenance, you can keep it running.

00:37:40:17 - 00:37:41:23

Edouard

Yes.

00:37:42:01 - 00:37:50:04

Ibi

What do you imagine that level of maintenance to keep the passive income running is a day, a week, a month or what?

00:37:50:06 - 00:37:52:11

Edouard

Then I was doing.

00:37:52:13 - 00:37:53:11

Ibi

You worked it out?

00:37:53:13 - 00:37:54:02

Edouard

Yeah.

00:37:54:04 - 00:37:58:22

Ibi

You know it. Yeah. Have you been doing ten hours per week before?

00:37:59:00 - 00:38:03:16

Edouard

A bit more. But yeah, I know ten hours per week should be fine to maintain.

00:38:03:18 - 00:38:13:00

Ibi

And if you, maintaining a ten hours per week, we don’t have to go into specifics of numbers yet, but would you be able to keep your lifestyle running as it is right now?

00:38:13:02 - 00:38:35:03

Edouard

Yeah. We’ve, yes, but this is something like, yes for sure. Yes. Because the industry changes so much. Competition changes so much. The everything like we know with AI but you know AI and teaching online is like it is a big challenge with that. And then the platforms, it change the model and the change the commission rates.

00:38:35:03 - 00:38:58:11

Edouard

And then some of the platforms that are if possible, I was on Skillshare, I’m not sure anymore because just they’re just I don’t know, they’re just shooting themselves in the foot and with other instructors as well. But it’s like the answer is yes for a few years. But then for example, I, I’m, I have no, expectation that this is going to work for ten years because, you know, in 20 years I’m out of this business.

00:38:58:13 - 00:39:20:14

Edouard

It’s impossible. I need to really adapt, keep adapting. And it’s and adapting is not just about maintaining, it’s about using all the new trends and the new ways of teaching and the new. And just like completely transforming your business. So it’s like, can I keep, having this lifestyle and everything with this business? Yeah, it’s for a few years.

00:39:20:16 - 00:39:25:19

Edouard

And at some point is going to crash. I know that five five years, ten years I guess.

00:39:25:21 - 00:39:29:12

Ibi

But you’re going to be ready for it because you’re already adapting.

00:39:29:13 - 00:39:48:09

Edouard

Yeah. Yeah I mean my level of adaptation, I feel all the rage. So my level of adaptation for that, I’m not doing a full in, like, transformation. Transform me, transforming everything. Yeah. So I know at some point is going to crash. But, yeah, I’m going to be all other things.

00:39:48:09 - 00:39:57:05

Ibi

You’re going to be you’re going to be in your living, you’re going to be in your castle creating the vibe that you want with your family, with your family vibe that you’re trying to create. And yeah.

00:39:57:07 - 00:39:58:01

Edouard

Yeah.

00:39:58:03 - 00:40:25:00

Ibi

Damn, man. What I would say is you come across as a super duper successful and your track record is incredible. I wish I had more time to ask questions, but I’m actually running low on time. We’ve even, I think, gone over the 30 minute mark, so I’m going to have to call it, and, but I would, I get to live with you for another week.

00:40:25:03 - 00:40:26:00

Ibi

Ooh.

00:40:26:02 - 00:40:28:21

Edouard

Wow. Thank. See.

00:40:28:23 - 00:40:29:18

Ibi

It was a measurement.