00:00:00
this company that you started 10 years ago. Current valuation 3.4 billion. >> Pala is ultimately like an a tech
00:00:05
product. So we have a collar that goes on a cow and an app on the farmer's phone. The collar does a range of
00:00:11
things, but the core thing that's really unique is it trains an animal to respond
00:00:15
to cues on the collar. >> The founder and CEO of New Zealand's fastest growing company, entrepreneur of
00:00:19
the year finalist, New Zealand innovator of the year 2026. How does the view look from here?
00:00:25
>> We still feel like we're really at at the start of the journey. Um but it's been fun. Do do you think in New Zealand
00:00:30
a lot of us just aren't don't have the ability to think big enough? >> I think we have less role models and
00:00:34
examples. >> So it seems crazier. The progress of of halter and the company can be defined in
00:00:40
many ways by our ability to be uncomfortable. Motivates us is running a globally in a more productive and
00:00:46
sustainable way. If we can do that, that will have a huge impact on the world. >> I've got a photo here.
00:00:50
>> Oh, what what would what would that kid that that little boy with um red bands
00:00:54
and denim shorts? What would he make of the uh the tech entrepreneur sitting in front of me? Now, this episode of the
00:01:00
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00:01:41
Craig Pigot, welcome to my podcast. >> Thank you for having me. My pleasure, >> mate. It's been a long time, long time
00:01:46
coming back and forth on this one. Um, we were going to connect earlier in this year. Uh then for some reason that fell
00:01:52
through and your team reached out to me. You're back in New Zealand for a limited
00:01:54
time only for field days and here we are. >> Yes, it's I'm glad we got it on the
00:01:59
calendar. Can be it can be hard to play calendar jinger sometimes. >> I'm so excited about this. So you're the
00:02:04
founder and CEO of New Zealand's fastest growing company. Uh entrepreneur of the
00:02:07
year finalist, New Zealand innovator of the year 2026. How does the view look from here?
00:02:14
>> Uh the view's positive. We're um uh there's lots to do and there's, you know, plenty of things to fix and and
00:02:21
we're always trying to make halter and build halter to be better, but I think everyone everyone's feeling pretty good.
00:02:26
Farmers are in a good mood. Um products doing well. So, no, I think optimistic. Lots of work to do. We still feel like
00:02:33
we're really at at the start of the journey. Um but it's been fun. >> What is Halter?
00:02:39
>> Good question. Uh Halter is uh it's ultimately like an a tech product. So we have a collar that goes on a cow uh and
00:02:46
an app on the farmer's phone. They're the two parts of the system which uh like a farmer would see or use. The
00:02:52
collar does a range of things, but the core thing that's really unique is it trains an animal to respond to cues on
00:02:58
the collar. So that means the collar can play sounds and and vibrate like when you park your car and it and it beeps at
00:03:05
you to warn you about walls and and the cows learn those cues and so you can fence them virtually fence them and then
00:03:13
shift them from a phone. So for a farmer that means obviously you save a bunch of
00:03:17
time which is great. Labor's quite hard on a farm but more critically you actually can be a lot more precise and
00:03:23
you can manage your land differently and that lifts the productivity of the land.
00:03:27
we make more food like it's good for farmers, it's good for the world. Um, and we do that in a more efficient kind
00:03:32
of sustainable way. So, that's the core of the product. It it does over time and
00:03:37
as we've added to the team, it's it's really growing and it does a lot more than that now. But
00:03:41
>> yeah, that's the that's the heart of it >> and it it can do away with the need for
00:03:44
fences. So, it creates like an invisible fence. >> Yes. Yes. that is most people when they
00:03:50
see hold well especially in the early days when people saw halter the default assumption was like okay Fitbit for for
00:03:56
cows and we do do that we monitor health and all those types of metrics and fertility and but the unique part is the
00:04:03
fence is like able to set a virtual fence and shift um so most farms already have fences you know they do a good job
00:04:10
it's about being more precise in that and more granular than that um if you look to some other markets so like say
00:04:15
the US big ranches in the US where they don't have heaps of fence Then that's even there's even more value
00:04:21
there as well. >> Accounts dumb or smart. >> Cows are smart, >> are they? >> Yeah, totally.
00:04:28
>> Can't one of them go, "Wait a minute. Hey, I'm getting this uh little little vibration, but there's no actual fence
00:04:32
here. We can go over there." >> Yeah. Cows are uh we get questions about training all the time. So cows are
00:04:38
already trained to physical fences. So if a cow cows don't walk around like bumping into the fences, they know what
00:04:44
they are. And if they touch a fence, they get a shock. And so they they learn okay I don't touch that that visual cue
00:04:50
they see the fence and the secondary cue is the is the electric shock. We do it's
00:04:55
a similar concept. So same training uh but our primary cue isn't vision it's sound. So they hear the fence initially
00:05:02
when they don't know what that is. We have to train them and so we train them with a low energy pulse. It's a lot less
00:05:05
energy than a than a fence. It doesn't need to be a lot because then they just learn what that what that means and then
00:05:10
they respect the sound. And so then the system just runs on sound and it's like >> it's not very loud. If we were this far
00:05:16
apart, you might just hear it. Um the collar vibrates as well to um reinforce the right thing. So no, they learn very
00:05:24
quickly. >> Why Halter and what other names were on the short list 10 years ago?
00:05:30
>> So um Halter was uh you know when you start a new project, well most people probably do
00:05:38
this. I definitely do this. you start a new project, you click new folder on um on your computer and you got to name the
00:05:44
folder something. It's this unknown folder. And so this is I hadn't done any work so far. I was like, "Okay, I'm
00:05:49
going to need a name." And I sat there for maybe 30 seconds and thought, "Halter." And that's it. That's the
00:05:54
story. >> I Okay, so it was there was no other names on the short list. But what did it
00:05:58
mean at the time? Like halting halting cows from going over an invisible boundary?
00:06:02
>> Uh no, more than inspirations like when you lead a cow or a horse around on a
00:06:07
rope halter. So you you put a rope halter on their on their head and that guides them around.
00:06:12
>> They're not used well they're definitely not used very often in farming. They're
00:06:15
still used in um ecoin a little bit. So that was the inspiration. It was like a product that was going to guide cars
00:06:20
around. >> I thought it was a cool word. >> And [ __ ] I just outed myself as a town,
00:06:26
didn't I? Know what I um so um so I'm guessing your your life is sort of spent halfway with um tech people and half
00:06:34
half the time with with farmers as well. Yes. >> Um, who are you like who are you more
00:06:39
comfortable with? Is it tikis or cockis? >> Oh, >> um, probably farmers >> really
00:06:45
>> I think I think so. I think farmers are >> more genuine. Eh, more >> yeah like very they're very pure and
00:06:51
grounded and I think it's honest work. Um, obvious my parents farmers so I grew up on a farm
00:06:56
>> and I think I love that. I I actually thought for probably a big part of my childhood that I would be a farmer. Um
00:07:03
there I just think there's something about the you know long hours and and physical labor that's yeah quite honest
00:07:09
and and quite satisfying. Now I love the tech community as well and I think we can learn a lot from from both but the
00:07:16
optimism and the drive and the belief that you can do anything in tech is is pretty contagious.
00:07:24
>> How is your dad Malcolm I've I've done so much research for this and I've heard a couple of things about
00:07:28
him. Number one, um, initially he told you the idea wasn't going to work. Uh, and number two, he now claims it was his
00:07:34
idea. >> Both of them truths. >> Yeah. Uh, yes, both of them are true. Um, no, my my parents have been amazing.
00:07:42
Like they I had I was had a very fortunate childhood. They were very supportive. They taught us to work hard
00:07:49
and the value of hard work. And that's easier when you're on a farm. You can just these infinite jobs to do. So, and
00:07:54
then the whole way through they've been supportive. and Halter wouldn't be here without all the work we did on their
00:07:59
farm like the which we call the halter test farm. It still is today. >> Uh that was I just don't know how you'd
00:08:05
build this product if you didn't have kind of free 24-hour access to a to a working farm.
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>> So no, they've been they've been awesome and I think they love it. Like they they
00:08:14
still run the farm, but I think a lot of the excitement is we have a you know we
00:08:19
have an office there and a team there and they get to be part of something bigger than just farming. Um and so
00:08:25
yeah, I think that's something they still they still enjoy. >> Fantastic. Um yeah, I can always hear your voice
00:08:31
often when you talk about your family. >> Yeah, I think um I feel I feel grateful
00:08:36
for sure. >> So So this company that you started 10 years ago uh current valuation 3.4
00:08:42
billion. Is that right? >> How is that number decided? >> So that is just based on what the last
00:08:48
investors um uh what they were willing to buy shares for. Um, and so our series E financing round earlier this year was
00:08:57
what set that price. >> Yeah, I might ask some dumb questions here. Um, but I figure if I don't know
00:09:01
these things, a lot of other people might as well. So, so, um, venture capital. Yep.
00:09:05
>> Like what what does that sort of mean in real terms? >> It's a like a kind of a specific or a
00:09:10
specialist class of investment. So, >> um, yeah, ultimately they're investors. They're people that have funds from
00:09:19
somewhere. Um, often it's not their own funds. They're investing or they've raised money themselves and they're
00:09:25
reinvesting it. And those investors get trusted with other people's money because they they either have a track
00:09:30
record of of making good investments or picking good ideas or good businesses. And so, yeah, we have we have uh venture
00:09:37
capitalists or VCs here in New Zealand like the Ice House is a good example was one of our first. I think there's lots
00:09:43
of Kiwis that are that are part of the Ice House. um Blackbird in Australia and then uh we have a range of investors out
00:09:50
of the US as well. >> And 10 weeks ago you got $200 million from one of these um what's that like?
00:09:56
Is it like Dragon's Den or Shark Tank? >> Uh not quite. Um there there's uh yeah,
00:10:01
it's a bit different to that. So it's more like onetoone. So at especially at the later stages of of raising money
00:10:09
that we have a track record, we have a lot of data, a lot of financials. And so you would go meet with these firms one
00:10:16
to one rather than it being a panel. Um and really they're trying to understand the business, the team if they feel like
00:10:22
they can work with you. Um lots of things like that. So yeah, Founders Fund led that round. Awesome venture capital
00:10:29
firm or VC firm. >> You know, they've backed some some big names. >> So you get their money and do they get a
00:10:36
do they get a slice of the company for that? >> Y how much of the company do you have?
00:10:39
Is that is that public knowledge or you keep that to you? that's not public. We keep that to ourselves. But between
00:10:44
myself and the team, we have like a pretty healthy stake. Um, everyone at Halter has
00:10:49
>> has ownership in the company. Um, and >> yeah, when I remember when I was at Rocket Lab and it it's easy to get maybe
00:10:59
quite concerned about dilution or giving away parts of the company. But when I started Hala, I was 21 or 22. I was a
00:11:07
student. I had no money. Like we're trying to build a hardware product. we were going to need a lot of a lot of
00:11:11
capital. So, do you want a 100% of nothing or you know a slice of something? And so,
00:11:17
>> uh yeah, we've I think we've always tried to make the right call for Halter along the way and that's been to bring
00:11:22
on like good investors and give them slice of the pie. >> Yeah. So, it was formed in late 2016.
00:11:28
>> Um so, 10th birthday coming up. Do you know the exact date? >> Well, it depends where you measure from.
00:11:33
So, we incorporated the company I think like July 2016. I was actually I was still at uni
00:11:41
at the time and I was procrastinating from some study I was doing. I was in the like the library at uni and I I was
00:11:49
obviously bored about whatever I was studying and so I was like a I should started like I'd already been thinking
00:11:54
about this and so anyhow registered the company I think at that point. Uh but then we didn't really the first capital
00:12:00
we got was like December 2026 and that's I guess really when you're a real company like we had some money we got an
00:12:06
office we started to hire people. So, in my head, I'd say like kind of Christmas
00:12:11
2026 was when we started the business. >> Oh, 2016. >> Sorry. 2016. Yes. >> Um, did you imagine back then or like
00:12:19
have like a big blue sky vision about how the company might look at 10? >> Could could you I suppose what I'm
00:12:24
asking is could you did you imagine it was going to be this this big thing? >> You hope a small part of you hopes
00:12:31
because otherwise why are you >> doing it? Why are you trying? Um, but you can't actually think that far ahead
00:12:38
because it's it's way too intimidating. You you imagine if you It'd be like someone starting a
00:12:47
new hobby and then convincing themselves they're going to be a gold medalist. It's like, well, for that to be true,
00:12:52
there's got to be >> 100 things have to go right. And that it's it would be it puts you off, right?
00:12:58
Like it just feels like an impossible journey. And so we we didn't realize this at the time, but I think because we
00:13:04
were young, you end up breaking it down to things which are still exciting. Like
00:13:08
even just having your first office is pretty cool, you know? So and so you kind of just look at the the thing the
00:13:15
things to cross and the challenges to solve in front of you and just take it like a little bit at a time.
00:13:19
>> So >> but yeah, small part of your hopes, small part hopes that it can be something big.
00:13:23
>> If um if if you knew how hard it was, would you ever start it? >> No, definitely not. That was a quick
00:13:28
answer. Definitely not. I yeah I um very glad I did. Like it's it's uh it's been awesome. It's like one of
00:13:37
the greatest uh joys in life I guess. But uh no, it was pure naivity that meant we got started and that naivity
00:13:44
kept us going for >> for many years in the beginning. >> Yeah. People talk about blood, sweat,
00:13:48
and tears. Um I actually saw a thing last night on the news, one of the astronauts from NASA talking about
00:13:54
blood, sweat, and tears and then he corrected himself. He goes, "Actually, if I'm being honest, there hasn't been
00:13:58
any blood. >> There's been a lot of sweat. There's been a few tears." Well, you're you're
00:14:03
in in offices and you're on the farm as well. I'm guessing there has been literally all those three things.
00:14:07
>> Yeah, totally. Yeah, there would be plenty of all of them. Um, >> yeah, it's been
00:14:13
uh the first maybe the first five years, probably half the journey. Um it was every year you were just you were
00:14:23
finding more things to solve or more problems to solve along the way. >> Um obviously we believed it was a worthy
00:14:29
problem and if we could solve it >> it could potentially have a huge impact on our industry and and a big impact on
00:14:37
my parents and and other farmers. uh we didn't think it was probably we didn't really know if it was probable or highly
00:14:45
likely but it just seemed worth trying. >> The the tears component of that uh blood, sweat, and tears. Um have there
00:14:52
been like more frustration tears or or like gratitude and excitement tears? >> Yeah. Uh all definitely all of the
00:14:59
above. There's sadness, frustration. Yeah. Joy. Uh yeah, >> [ __ ] there's a lot to unpack. Yeah,
00:15:10
>> there's a lot to unpack. So, we've got a couple of hours and then um you you're
00:15:13
pretty much going straight to the airport after this, flying out of the country. Um okay, so let's wind it back
00:15:17
and go all the way back to the beginning. So, um you're a madam farm kid, >> uh no TV in the house, no gaming
00:15:24
consoles. Um what did you want to be when you grew up? >> Uh initially a farmer and then something
00:15:31
farm adjacent like a vet. I remember my old man told me that you study as hard as a doctor and get paid terribly. So I
00:15:38
was like, okay. Um, and then I think for a long time I wanted to be a mechanic. I
00:15:43
was really curious about how things worked. Uh, and on a farm you were kind of always fixing stuff and and solving
00:15:50
problems. And so that was probably the strongest like thought or I had in terms of what I
00:15:57
would do when I was older. And my parents, neither of them went to university, but they were like, "Hey,
00:16:01
it's it's probably a good idea that you at least go to uni. Uh, and if you don't
00:16:05
like it, that's fine. You can come back to farming at any point." And so I studied mechanical engineering, which
00:16:10
was really just the university version of a mechanic. >> The the primary school you went to, was
00:16:16
it like other farm kids or were they town kids as well? >> All farm kids. Farm kids. Yep. Small
00:16:21
rural. Uh, I went to a school uh in South Wetau between uh Petara and Takara. And then one just outside of
00:16:29
Madam Mana. >> Oh, so you didn't realize you were missing out on things like with the
00:16:32
gaming console and stuff cuz they're all kids that are just working from morning
00:16:35
to night. >> Totally. You turn up and bare feet and run around and play sport and
00:16:39
>> Yeah. >> What were your favorite and least favorite um farming jobs? >> Uh as a kid um I used to love
00:16:47
uh anything like contract uh like making silage or like big machinery was always
00:16:52
very cool. Fixing things was was quite cool. Um, and yeah, I've got I'd say I've got some
00:16:59
fond memories in like the workshop with my old man and just the long days. Long days like driving tractors or cropping
00:17:05
or whatever it was. >> Uh, the worst jobs at a farm probably milking cows. >> Um, it's
00:17:09
>> really what getting [ __ ] on you or >> just um any farmer would say this like
00:17:14
it's a it's a pretty repetitive >> monotonous job like it's 2 hours in the morning, 2 hours at night. Uh it's early
00:17:20
starts and it's kind of just the same thing over and over. You do do some of your best thinking putting cups on. Like
00:17:26
you just get in a bit of a zone and and you you have some awesome thinking, but it's it's not like particularly fun.
00:17:33
>> Yeah. >> I used to get sent to I'm from Palmer North. I'm very much a towny. I used to
00:17:39
get sent to my cousin's farm in Leven as like punishment for the school holidays.
00:17:44
Dairy dairy dairy. So you mentioned silage before. That that's one smell you never get used to.
00:17:49
>> Yeah. Yeah, that's true. I was always the slowest out of bed in the morning as
00:17:53
well. So when we were like feeding out, I'd always be the last on the tractor. So I'd get I'd get, you know, the the
00:17:58
[ __ ] seat. Um, so I'd be sprayed with [ __ ] and >> Oh, I hated it. E. >> Yeah. I think you learn
00:18:04
>> most farmers, >> I'd say most farmers enjoy what they do. Like they you learn it's just as much a
00:18:11
lifestyle or, you know, as a job. Um, you're obviously living on the farm. It's it's kind of 24/7 at times. So, um
00:18:18
I now that I you know live in Oakuckland and well between all these cities and uh
00:18:23
there's many days that I miss just you know being on the farm and just being you and the in the job to do.
00:18:31
>> I've got a photo here. >> Oh, what what would what would that kid that that little boy with um red bands
00:18:37
and denim shorts leaning against a green John Deere tracksuit? What would what would he make of the uh the tech
00:18:43
entrepreneur sitting in front of me now? Oh, that's a good question, man. Um, I think
00:18:57
I think we we grew I'm assuming. I can't remember. I don't know how old I was there.
00:19:01
>> What do you reckon? Like, yeah. Seven, eight. >> Yeah, probably. >> You look really small compared to that
00:19:06
dream. >> Yeah, probably. Um I think we like the uh my parents and and the family we kind of grow up in always
00:19:15
valued yeah just like hard work and and like being grounded and just like I guess
00:19:23
like honest work in a way. And so I think that's still true in the halter culture today. I suspect that that kid
00:19:29
or maybe it's similar if you ask my old man. They're not that worried about the the awards and you know the numbers and
00:19:37
that's not really the reason we do it. Like I think it's it's the impact. It's being very pure and true to who we are
00:19:44
and being quite grounded. Um we try to roll that through the halter culture and I hope our farmers would say the same
00:19:49
thing where >> you know we don't get carried away with all the it hasn't changed us I don't
00:19:52
think in any way. We we try not to let it change us any of the the deemed, you know, success. So, I don't know if
00:19:59
that's the right answer, but >> what's your answer? So, it's the right answer. There's no wrong. Um, was was he
00:20:05
ambitious? Were you always ambitious or did the ambition arrive later? >> No, I think I was always ambitious. I
00:20:12
was never particularly smart. Um, I was you just a completely middle of the classroom kid at school. Um, I always,
00:20:23
yeah, I always thought I wanted to I always like to try hard. >> Maybe that's the the kind of theme
00:20:29
throughout. So, yeah, I'd say I was ambitious and my parents kind of pushed that as well. Um, but yeah, school was
00:20:37
like I'm still kind of shocking at English and spelling and and lots of that type of stuff. So,
00:20:41
>> we got AI now. >> You don't need to be good. >> Wasn't until uni when I was studying
00:20:45
engineering that I was like, oh, actually this is I enjoy this and >> um did a little bit better.
00:20:50
>> Yeah. Yeah. Well, I've got on my cards there. Um, in one of your early uni exams, you got 0%.
00:20:54
>> Yes. First, very first test at university. >> We'll get to that. Oh, first of all, um,
00:20:59
Twinkle. What happened to Twinkle, your pet cow? >> Twinkle. >> Twinkle here. >> Yes. What a cutie. Um,
00:21:06
she >> Did you Did you eat Twinkle? >> No, we didn't eat Twinkle. She's buried somewhere on the farm. Um, I think she
00:21:11
lived till she was maybe 15 or 16. So, that was maybe when I was 20. >> Wow. Was she like a pet calf?
00:21:18
>> She was my first ever. So, as a you might know this as going to a rural school like calf club day where every
00:21:24
year you bring a calf. So, um yeah, she was my very first like pet pet calf. I was four and she had I think she had a
00:21:32
star on her and my favorite song at the time was Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star. So, that's how she got named. You can
00:21:37
tell the naming regime and >> in my life is pretty simple. Um, and yeah, so you look after her and and you
00:21:47
train them to like walk next to you on a lead. She's wearing that's like a halter, I guess, that white thing. Um,
00:21:53
and yeah, and that was actually when we started halter. Having pet cows is pretty instrumental because you're
00:22:00
constantly putting collars on and taking them off and having to like update software. And if you're working with an
00:22:05
animal that you can't even get close to in the paddic, that whole process takes a lot longer. So,
00:22:11
>> how did you get it over over the line um with your parents that she was allowed
00:22:15
to live until a ripe old age and then die? >> Uh we do that with all the pet cows. So
00:22:19
any Yeah, it makes obviously no like financial sense, but if uh we would if you have myself and my sister and often
00:22:28
we have a cal and so >> by the time we're 15 there might have been like 20 p cows on the farm. Uh
00:22:33
yeah, they kind of earn a a cruisy life >> when they stop stop producing milk or
00:22:39
you dry them off and you don't get them in calf again. >> They just hang around in the paddic and
00:22:42
eat grass. >> That's cool. >> Yeah. >> And then then you went to St. Peters in Cambridge. Um where you struggled
00:22:47
academically. What was your nickname back at school or nicknames? >> I had many. Um uh I'm curious to know
00:22:54
what you've got down. >> I don't have any down, but the last name I'm thinking like um Pigo, Piggy.
00:23:00
>> Yep. All of them. Uh, pig [ __ ] was one for a while. Oh, >> god. Kids kids are monsters.
00:23:07
>> It was all in I think good good humor. Uh, at work. Um, so for a while it was
00:23:13
Big Pig. Um, >> that's quite a cool name. >> Yeah. So, >> is this halter? >> This is halter. Yeah.
00:23:20
>> Yeah. >> Please tell me that's on your business card. >> No, I don't actually have a business
00:23:24
card, but it's uh it does get used a bit. >> Yeah. In your school reports in secondary school, what do they say about
00:23:29
you? Uh probably said lots of potential. Uh if he Oh, no. Yeah, probably average kid got
00:23:40
potential. Um, I was quite I think as a boy at high school your predominant focus is sport like which I also wasn't
00:23:49
very good at but but I so I think it was mostly sport and then especially because
00:23:55
you're doing such a broad range of of studying so you're doing stuff that you don't even you're not that passionate
00:24:00
about. Um, I always enjoyed maths and sciences more than English or arts or history or social studies, but um, yeah,
00:24:08
pretty just run-of-the-mill. >> So, you never never top of the class, never bottom of the class, never
00:24:13
prefect, head boy. >> No, no prefect, no head boy. I think I tried, but no cigar.
00:24:18
>> Um, the only there was an engineering class and you >> engineering was like metal work and we
00:24:24
had to make a little steam engine, like an actual a working steam engine. And I remember finding I just loved it. It was
00:24:31
so fun. And because on the farm, you're always in the workshop making stuff and welding things and like I kind of knew
00:24:36
how to use all these tools and so I found it quite easy. And I made this steam engine. I remember the engineering
00:24:41
teacher pulling me aside. I forgot his name. I wish I could remember it. And he he didn't really say much. He just said,
00:24:47
"What's your plan after school?" And I said, "I'm going to go to uni and do engineering." This was in my last year.
00:24:52
And he was like, "Good. Just wanted to check." >> And that was all he said. And but it
00:24:56
stuck with me. I remember thinking, "Ah, he obviously thinks I'm doing good work
00:25:00
or that's that's good." And so you suspect all these little things probably add up and or definitely add up and have
00:25:05
a little influence on >> where you go. >> Yeah, it's it's wild the impact um a good a good teacher can have on a on a
00:25:11
kid's life and career path. E um I know we'll get to your association with Sir Peter Be shortly, but um I had him on
00:25:17
the podcast and >> he talked about a metwork teacher he had during secondary school who gave him and
00:25:21
a couple of mates the keys to the workshop so they could use it in their own time. Yeah,
00:25:25
>> you just can't underestimate the impact that has on a young kid. >> Totally. I think teachers are saints.
00:25:30
Like, um, if only society by default, I think, valued them more. They're so impactful. I'm not
00:25:38
sure. >> I don't Yeah. Not sure how and how you fix that or how you kind of lift that up
00:25:44
in a in a culture, but I think it needs to. Yeah, >> they're so impactful. >> So, you were determined to study
00:25:50
engineering. What did you see yourself doing at the end of it? Um I think I as I learned more about
00:25:56
engineering or mechanical engineering you you're like okay planes, rockets, race cars,
00:26:03
um helicopters, yachts, that type of stuff. So I think that was the hope. >> I didn't think about it much more than
00:26:09
than that, but they seemed quite cool. So >> and um yeah, what was it like being this
00:26:15
like teenage boy from Madame Matter and the Yet Movie up to Oakuckland? Did you do you ever wear an air tech shirt to
00:26:20
bar 101? >> Yeah. I I don't even know if bar 101 was there when I first turned up at uni. I Yeah.
00:26:27
You move into a university hall. Oh, I So to get into engineering, especially in Oakuckland, these thing I don't know
00:26:32
if it's the same now, but there's this thing called rank points. You needed 250 I think rank points to get in. I think
00:26:38
they're the right words. >> And I remember looking at my grades in year in year 12 and like there was not a
00:26:44
chance. So far away. And so in year 13, I had to get very strategic about how I was going to get the most rank points.
00:26:50
And so I was looking at like cooking thinking okay I can probably I could probably do a good job you know am I
00:26:56
going to get better grades in cooking or better grades in biology cuz you didn't
00:26:59
need biology for for engineering so why would I you know choose to study it and so I kind of designed my subjects in a
00:27:05
way that >> and one of them was sport science would you believe it you can get credits for
00:27:10
this and literally one of my final grades to come back was nine holes of golf and uh as it all as all the points added
00:27:22
up I to get the 250 um I had to get 250 I got 254 and like that was the difference between you know
00:27:29
merit excellence in that golf assessment and so I used to joke to some of my mates like the only reason I'm here is
00:27:34
because of my golf skills which just not that good and then to your earlier comment like so you sit down in
00:27:40
engineering class and the lecturer is like you guys are all insanely smart and I'm sitting there being like well I'm
00:27:44
probably the dumbest one here in the room because I only just got over the points and then you do your first maths
00:27:49
test and I score zero and I'm like, okay, this is going to be a long road. Um, so
00:27:54
>> did you ever consider dropping out in in particular when you got that zero? >> How did that feel? How did that sit with
00:27:59
you at the time? >> No, I didn't think about dropping out. >> Was that crushing though, getting a
00:28:03
zero? >> Um, you get to reset it, >> which I then got zero the second time. So, so yeah, I think it was it was maybe
00:28:14
sobering. I that stuff though I I kind of for some reason my personality I find it quite quite motivating. I remember
00:28:22
thinking okay I am in for all I'm in the trenches here by the end of that year um
00:28:29
I made friends with someone and this is just your friends are influenced you so much right and so somehow maybe just by
00:28:36
luck some of my friends in the halls were were very smart at school head boys you know thought it was very cool to
00:28:43
study they knew how to study and so these became my friends and all of a sudden I was like okay learning how to
00:28:49
study and you go to the library and and you you can just anyone can be good at it if you put a lot of effort in. And so
00:28:57
um that also I guess shaped me in a way and by the end of that year I remember looking at my stack of 1B8 um notebooks
00:29:06
and I had like eight full book complete pageto page just on maths which was the test I had failed. Um and so I guess
00:29:15
there's just this big drive to like I think I can do this if I try hard. Um, and so by the end of the year, my grades
00:29:20
were actually back, you know, kind of on track. Um, >> little side story. So, one of my friends
00:29:25
called Chris Brunt, he was like head boy of Burnside High, and he, I think it was
00:29:29
at Oakland Union on a scholarship studying law. Anyway, it's very smart. I think in his first semester, he got four
00:29:34
A pluses or something like that. And the head of I was sitting with him at dinner, and I had I don't know like a B
00:29:40
minus and a few other grades. And the head of hall, Jacob, was like, um, are you proud to me? Are you proud of Chris?
00:29:49
He's so smart, isn't he? Look at this kid. He's so smart. And I remember thinking to to Jacob like he's not that
00:29:55
smart. Like he just tried hard, you know? And so we actually had a bet where uh I bet Chris a box of beer that uh
00:30:04
this is I used to drink at the time, but a box of beer that I would get better grades than in the second semester. And
00:30:09
that just became everything, you know, like waking up at 5:00 a.m., studying till midnight, just
00:30:16
throwing like hours at the problem. Um, and >> just laser focus. >> Yeah. Just >> determined to get that box of export
00:30:24
gold. >> Just determined to prove that >> I could do it, you know. And so anyway,
00:30:29
by the end of second semester, we both had three A+es and an A each, so we were drawn on grades.
00:30:35
>> Incredible. >> So no box of beer changed hands. Incredible. Um, yeah, something you said
00:30:40
before is really, really good about your, you know, your friends and that you teaching you how to study cuz
00:30:45
there's that saying, you've probably heard it that you're the sum of the five people you spend the most time with. So,
00:30:48
>> I love it. >> If your best if five of your best mates vape, you'll vape. If they're negative,
00:30:52
you'll become negative. If they're positive and driven, you'll be Yeah, huge. >> It's so true, I don't have kids, but the
00:30:59
I imagine as a parent that is one thing you worry a lot about like who are their
00:31:04
friends? um to is so so impactful. It's maybe especially for me I feel like I'm maybe easily influenced but it's also
00:31:11
how I think about building halter and the people we hire like ensuring that are these people that you want you know
00:31:18
you want to influence you and and you want to spend a huge amount of time with um are they do they make you better
00:31:25
people like that type of stuff so no I I remember learning that saying a while ago and it's awesome
00:31:30
>> yeah it's good it makes so much sense and when I first read it for the first time it was like an epiphany for me I
00:31:35
thought oh that's why my parents would you know if if you're hanging out with um start hanging out with the bad crowd,
00:31:38
they should try and sort of steer you away. >> Yeah, it makes you the moment you start
00:31:42
being intentional about who you give a lot of time to and who you let influence you, I think your life is better for it.
00:31:48
>> Sure. >> Yeah, 100%. So, you met um Peter Beck now, Sir Peter Beck, in your last year of uni, he
00:31:54
offered you an engineering position. >> Um yeah, what did he see in you? >> Um so, I applied to Rockab a couple of
00:32:03
times. um didn't get in and I was still at university and I don't know if they were hiring grads. They probably were,
00:32:10
but let's just pretend they weren't. >> Well, by the way, worth pointing out this is like 10, 11 years ago. Rocket
00:32:15
Lab hadn't put a rocket into space yet. They've got thousands of stuff now. I think then it was like 60 50 60 stuff.
00:32:21
>> Yeah, it was I think they'd raised a series B, maybe a series C. >> Yeah, very early. They were a startup.
00:32:26
Um and uh yeah, so I applied um didn't get in and then he was coming to speak at
00:32:33
university at a some form of conference and so I went along and like I'm going to get a job. I'm going to try and
00:32:41
corner him afterwards >> and that's kind of how it went. Cornered him afterwards.
00:32:46
>> I can't we were chatting about startup ideas or something. Um, I can't remember
00:32:51
what I said, but I said something that he latched on to and then yeah, I think I went out there to have lunch with him
00:32:56
and and that like started this relationship and ultimately landed at Rockab. >> Wow.
00:33:01
What's an average day like at Rocket Lab? I'm sure it's different now to what it was then, but
00:33:05
>> yes. Uh, at that point, for me at least, every day was pretty different. Um, I was reporting to Peter
00:33:14
Beck, but just doing kind of whatever was important at the time. um from engineering stuff to not engineering
00:33:22
things just across the board. Um it was good the long hours. Um the thing that when I turned up there I had previous
00:33:28
jobs at Fresh Healthcare which is where a lot of engineers go milmech a few different places. Um they were all just
00:33:35
normal jobs. >> You turn up to Rocket Lab and I just couldn't believe how like passionate and
00:33:42
excited and how much people cared about the mission and what we were doing. And it was like the most contagious thing
00:33:50
I'd been a part of. I remember within like a few days thinking, I never want to work somewhere that isn't like this.
00:33:56
Like this doesn't even feel like work. It just feels like we're a team, you know, a sports team on a mission to
00:34:01
>> to win. Um and so that's some of the core stuff we've tried to carry to halt.
00:34:07
But >> yeah, that was probably the thing that stuck with me, the first thing that
00:34:10
stuck with me at Rocket Lab beyond the fact you're trying to build a rocket. That's obviously crazy and amazing. But
00:34:15
yeah, that kind of collegial motivated team. >> So, so you were there for 9 months.
00:34:21
>> Y >> um and then you told um you did did Peter Beck sort of take you under his
00:34:26
wing at the time you mentioned before you reported to him? >> Mhm. >> Um did did he did he see something in
00:34:32
you, do you think? Or was he like that with everyone? Was Rocket Lab so small then that everyone was reporting to him?
00:34:37
>> Not everyone was reporting to him and I actually didn't want to report to him.
00:34:40
Um that shows how young and dumb I was. >> Why? cuz you were intimidated or >> I for some reason I I think I when I
00:34:47
asked for a job uh I wanted to be part of the propulsion team and that was being led by I think I could Lachlan um
00:34:54
and so that was my I would have taken any job let's be clear but there um yeah I think as a as a mechanical engineer I
00:35:02
thought that was probably the most interesting part of of the team or the problem. So, I asked to be part of of
00:35:08
that team and I turned up on the first day and you knock on the door. There's no receptionist at that point and so
00:35:13
someone let you in. I'm like, "Yeah, it's for my first day." And they're like, "Who interviewed you?" And I was
00:35:16
like, "Nah, no one really kind of just Pete." And so I sat on the chair and then waited for a while and Pete came
00:35:22
down and he was like, "Welcome to Rockab. Let's go." I was like, "Cool. What team am I part of?" He said, "No
00:35:29
team. You're working for me." And I said, "Okay." Um, and in my head I thought, "Ah." And within within a day
00:35:36
it was clear I was like okay this is actually I'm very lucky. Um it was an awesome opportunity
00:35:44
>> the I don't know if you put too much thought into that but there's something odd about this like like he obviously
00:35:48
saw something in you that maybe you didn't see in yourself yet. >> Yeah. I don't know. I
00:35:53
>> you never had that chat? >> Uh no not really. Um >> it's pretty cool. >> Yeah. Well, you you think of the the
00:36:00
smart people that he sees on a day-to-day basis and there was something about you that he thought this kid's got
00:36:05
something. >> Yeah. My guess like that that place was full of extremely talented engineers that had
00:36:12
been, you know, from the US and had been at crazy other companies beforehand. So,
00:36:17
it clearly wasn't intellectual horsepower or experience or any of that stuff. So, I think my guess is like
00:36:24
attitude. Um I think that's I I think probably his upbringing and you know South and boy also is like a
00:36:33
few of the values that he really appreciates. Um >> I suspect uh he felt that that I had
00:36:41
them. Um and so and that was I remember turning up feeling quite lucky. I signed
00:36:48
the contract didn't even know what I was getting paid. I was like it just doesn't
00:36:50
care. Like it just doesn't matter to me. Like I would almost work for free. um and thinking I don't know quite how I'm
00:36:57
here, but that I know I can work hard and so I'm just gonna I'm just going to do that. I'm just going to pull the hard
00:37:03
work lever as hard as I can. Um, >> and yeah, reporting to the bosses has another problem, which is they're he's
00:37:11
obviously very busy. And so if he gives me an instruction, I can't then spend half an hour with him being like, "What
00:37:15
do you mean by this?" And where am I going to find that? And and so I take the little he throw like a oneliner at
00:37:21
me and be like, "Okay." And then run off and googling all these words and asking
00:37:25
other people that, "What does he what would Pete mean if he said this?" Um, and just try to be useful. Um h you're
00:37:32
so young at this point like >> yeah I think >> just eager to impress and yeah >> um what what are his what yeah what what
00:37:40
are some leadership lessons that you've taken from him? What are what are his biggest strengths do you think as a
00:37:44
leader? >> He is a lot um he says exactly what he's thinking like he prioritizes progress in
00:37:54
the mission over um maybe like feelings. Um, so he's like quite he's quite clear
00:38:01
about what he wants. >> Um, >> some people could take that the wrong way, I guess.
00:38:05
>> Yeah. I think you've got to you got to know it's for a bigger the bigger purpose. Like he's doing the he's trying
00:38:10
to do the best thing for Rock Lab and ultimately that's the best thing for the team. So um I think that I think he is
00:38:17
he thinks very big like which is actually quite uncommon in New Zealand I think to the degree that that he the
00:38:25
ambition that he had and the belief that he had. So, I think that um I think he's
00:38:30
very he's pretty grounded and he's just pee back, you know, like um I think that
00:38:36
was a big part of it for me like watching this guy didn't go to university. He was just passionate about
00:38:40
rockets, go to the US, raise money, hire awesome people, motivate them. Um uh that made me think I can do that and I
00:38:51
eventually I could but I was wrong, you know, like it was there was more to it than I than I realized.
00:38:56
Um, >> oh look, look, look, if if a kid from Invagle, you know, the city city at the
00:39:00
bottom of the world can send rockets into space, then nothing is too big. >> Totally. one wild
00:39:06
>> one common just while we're on Peter back >> when he was um nighted the thing that I
00:39:11
I think I I don't write many LinkedIn posts but one I wrote about is like how the whole way through that journey he's
00:39:18
just been so passionate about New Zealand innovation and and like New Zealand founders and ways that he can
00:39:25
help New Zealand beyond Rocket Lab like probably when I first got a job at Rock Lab there's a good chance that he didn't
00:39:32
hire me because he thought I was going to be that helpful at Rock Lab like there's a chance that he thought this is
00:39:37
a kid that might go on to start something or and so this is a you know good breeding ground for him or
00:39:43
>> um and even today like why is he on the halter board and he he's not from a farm
00:39:48
you know he he's passionate about helping uh and he's obviously busy like he's clearly a very busy man so I think
00:39:55
and I see this with he invests in lots of companies and he he helps lots of founders he's just so passionate about
00:39:59
that and so that's also I think um I try to where I can I'm obviously no pie back, but when people come to me for
00:40:07
pitching advice or want me to look at their pitch decks or whatever it is, how to start a business or whether they
00:40:12
should do it or I'm like I trying to pay it forward in that regard because I was
00:40:16
without Pete, there probably wouldn't be a halter to be honest. Um, >> so >> do you remember the day after 9 months
00:40:23
when you told him you were you were leaving? >> Yes, vividly. Was it? Oh my god. Is that one of the
00:40:29
toughest conversations you were you sh like how long how long were you um building up the courage or
00:40:35
>> Yeah. So the reason this was probably tougher than it should have been is cuz
00:40:38
I hadn't been I had never lied to him, >> I don't think. But I had been slightly
00:40:45
misleading because I was technically at university as well. This was all happening in my fourth year of of uni.
00:40:51
So, uh, I was doing three maybe four days a week, probably doing still 40 or 50 hours, but, uh, maybe more. Um, but
00:41:03
most people there are working at that point working six days a week and sometimes seven and and big hours. And
00:41:09
so there's there's always more work to do. And he would be pushing me at times to be like, "Hey, can we any chance we
00:41:15
get this done tomorrow?" I'm like, "Hey, I can't work tomorrow. I've got university." Um, but truth be told, I
00:41:20
wasn't really doing uni. I was kind of cooking on this like halter idea. So when I came to tell Pete I had to also
00:41:28
like kind of come clean on by the way of some of that time that I was meant to be
00:41:33
at uni like I was actually spending on this other idea. And so I was a little bit nervous about that. I remember
00:41:37
making quite a nervous phone call um where I said hey I've been working on this and I thought
00:41:44
90% chance 95% chance he would say awesome. Sounds like you're busy. I'm pretty busy. Like, thanks for your time.
00:41:52
Um, you know, good luck. But he he was so excited. He was just like, "This is awesome. What the heck?" Like, um, let's
00:42:02
let's uh if we like get in here tomorrow morning and and he cleared his calendar
00:42:06
and we spent I think like 2 hours or 3 hours. He's like, "Bring in everything you've been working on. Let's go through
00:42:10
it top to bottom." And he just grilled me for to like, "Okay, what about the you know, how big's the market? How you
00:42:16
going to where's the value? What about this? Have you done this? and we just went top to bottom through the whole
00:42:20
business and by the end of it he's like sweet how am I involved like this is awesome and I I just remember at the
00:42:25
time thinking okay think quick think quick um board member I want you on the board and he also said uh he also
00:42:33
offered to invest he's like I want to um can I invest I said no I don't need your
00:42:37
money um I'll go you know I don't want to hand out from my boss I I want to go raise from investors and then the next
00:42:45
day I thought that's actually dumb no I do want your money um having your previous boss obviously invest is like a
00:42:50
good endorsement. And so um yeah, that's how he >> Wow. >> Hold got started. >> If he had said um on that phone call, I
00:42:58
think it's a flawed idea, but I wish you well. Yeah. >> What would you have done?
00:43:02
>> I think I probably would have Oh, good question. I'd like to think I would have
00:43:06
still started the business. >> Probably I would have said, "Okay, you know why?" and tried to
00:43:14
dig in and then maybe tried to still work at Rock Lab and run it on the side a bit longer,
00:43:19
>> which is a bad which is not how you start a business. You don't like at some point you do have to burn the boats like
00:43:24
you've got to >> go all in. >> Go all in. Otherwise, when it gets hard, >> it's too easy to just go back to to the
00:43:32
safety of what you were doing. There was in those first few years I halted there
00:43:35
was many points if if someone had given me the option to take my job back at Rock Lab and not have started, I would
00:43:40
have taken it in a heartbeat, you know. So that's yeah, I think you do have to go all in and um part of
00:43:50
part of Pete backing me and being on the board and being like you can do this ups
00:43:55
the stakes, right? I don't want to now like >> don't want to let him down. >> Yeah, I can't let him down.
00:44:00
>> Was he investing in the idea or the person or both? >> Uh I think I probably think the person
00:44:08
>> I know that's maybe not the most humble thing to say, but I think No, no, no.
00:44:12
Um, it makes it makes perfect sense. >> Yeah. I think at that stage of any business is pretty much all the
00:44:19
person like the idea is going to get squished and morphed and forged and sliced apart and you don't know, you
00:44:25
just don't know enough at that point. So, I think all seed stage or pre early investing is pretty much all like team.
00:44:31
Um, >> well, there's some some quote about entrepreneurship something like I'm going to botch this up, but it's
00:44:36
something like 1% is the idea and then 99% is the execution. >> Yes. I think these um yeah idea is cheap
00:44:43
now if it's a good idea it's also easier to execute so >> it's kind of a bit of both but yeah
00:44:48
>> okay so how did you manage to to spot a gap where nobody else had >> um I I think most people when you
00:44:56
explained the idea of halter to most farmers they're like yeah that that would be awesome
00:45:00
>> but most people just didn't think that like you're crazy this not going to work
00:45:03
there's too much stuff to solve and and they were right like there was it was crazy and there too much stuff to solve.
00:45:10
But because we were probably because I was a little bit drunk on how Rock Lab was running and what they were trying to
00:45:17
achieve, I just thought this is doable. Um, yeah, back to the, you know, the naive point. So, uh, I think that's
00:45:25
probably this the key insight and then as you hire good people and you go on this journey, the idea evolves
00:45:31
massively, right? like Halter today is much bigger than the the first idea, the different products we have and and
00:45:37
that's >> all a function of the team that's been built and their progress and what
00:45:43
they've contributed to to Halter. So, >> um yeah, that just happens over over time.
00:45:49
>> You you said before people you spoke to were like, "Yeah, that's a a great idea." Who who thought you were crazy?
00:45:54
And is there anyone that's really close to you that loves you um that tried to talk you out of it? Oh,
00:46:01
>> from a good place. >> Um, my parents were concerned when I left my job at Rocket Lab. They were
00:46:07
like, "What?" Uh, so they never said, "Don't do this." They definitely thought it was crazy. Um,
00:46:16
and they didn't gauge much, you know. I was like, "Hey, I need I'm going to can I have a few cows to learn to train?"
00:46:22
They're like, "Yeah, whatever. Do your thing." Thinking, "No, it's probably not going to go anywhere." Uh but yeah, the
00:46:26
Rock Lab thing I think was probably the most pointy part of that. >> But no, no one else, thankfully no one
00:46:33
else tried to tried to talk me out of it. Um when you're young, like as a grad effectively, like what's the downside?
00:46:40
Like I was getting paid >> $50,000 as a grad anywhere as an engineer or I started hold and was
00:46:46
getting paid $50,000. No downside. Like you don't have kids, you don't have a mortgage. It's just now it's a hard time
00:46:53
to start a company because you've also got to learn how to work and how to manage anybody. The first person we
00:46:58
hired quit within three weeks. Um like clearly you have to learn everything on top of starting the idea. So
00:47:07
>> there's these other problems but >> you've got nothing to lose. Like there was no people asked me like what about
00:47:13
how was it scary the big jump all this? Not really. like there was just um because of the situation it was yeah why
00:47:21
not >> what was harder in the early days ironing out kinks and getting the tech right or convincing farmers to trust it
00:47:28
>> in the early days we didn't have any like the product didn't work so it was all engineering problems um all tech
00:47:37
issues how do you power the device how do you build the hardware how do you train the cows how do you talk to the
00:47:42
device um I I think I I said to a lot of investors in the early days. Um, the only hard part of this business is
00:47:49
working out how to train the cows. Once we can train the cows, >> apps, you got loads of apps on your
00:47:54
phone. We can build an app. Hardware is everywhere. You look at this microphone.
00:47:57
Heaps of people build hardware. So, that'll be easy. And and I actually believe that obviously that's not true.
00:48:03
Like >> hardware is very hard. Software and good product is hard. Sales and marketing all
00:48:09
that's hard. But early days is all engineering. How long before you were able to pay
00:48:16
yourself? >> Uh when we first raised uh that first round, so end of 2016, we'd been working
00:48:24
on like part-time until that point. >> We had a few credit cards that were >> relatively maxed out, but
00:48:29
>> it's also it's kind of cheap at that point, right? Like yes, your time, but >> we're building software and we had
00:48:34
bought a bit of hardware. We'd maybe spent >> five or 10 grand to that point. But that
00:48:38
seems like a nauseating amount of pressure for me like having other people like um really like important
00:48:43
wellrespected people investing in you and >> yeah when you get the money you like oh
00:48:47
this is cool or are you like [ __ ] this is so much pressure. This is why we never took money from my parents or or
00:48:54
family or friends. Like that would have just been crippling. >> Like so I think because we took money
00:49:02
from like institutional investors where they totally get it that that >> it's a gamble.
00:49:07
>> They know that. Yeah. Um I didn't that wasn't too bad in the beginning. >> Um
00:49:14
>> yeah. Yeah. And if you get the right investors, they also work pretty hard to
00:49:19
>> for you to know that >> like they're not >> when whenever there's a mistake or a
00:49:24
setback, a good investor is like, "Yeah, we get it. You know, this is part of the
00:49:27
journey." Like what do you need from us? >> Not you're an idiot. We want our money
00:49:32
back. You >> well aware of the risks going into it. Yeah. Do Do you still have the original
00:49:37
haltered collar? I believe it was made from like a Helenstein's belt or something.
00:49:41
>> We don't. Um, we've got some early callers, but not the like OG OG one. >> Where's that? I feel like that should be
00:49:47
in a case somewhere in HQ. >> It should be. But the reality is you we did like an office clean up in I don't
00:49:54
know year three. And at that point, still nothing works. So, it's not even it's not a relic. If anything, it's like
00:50:01
you don't think like that at that point. So, no, we didn't I think we just threw
00:50:04
it out. I think we were like, man, we don't need this anymore. You you just said then yeah we did a
00:50:10
clean up in year three and at that point nothing worked. >> Why did why did you keep going?
00:50:16
>> Were there green shoots as the saying goes? >> Yeah I think there was we were making
00:50:19
progress. Progress is obviously helpful. I think we still believed that the core
00:50:23
idea was good and if it worked then it would have a huge impact. So I think there's a few logical reasons for it. I
00:50:34
actually uh so I started the company with a guy called Max Olson. Um who was like my kind of my closest friend in
00:50:42
engineering school. Um and he was a mechanical engineer. I was a mechanical engineer. We just got on quite well. And
00:50:48
so you if you were to think logically you'd pick like a software engineer or something to start the business with,
00:50:53
but it was just my my mate. So I said, "All right, let's you can be the CTO, I'll be the CEO. Big titles to get
00:51:00
started." Um, and I actually think the main thing that keeps you going is that you just enjoy the people that you are
00:51:09
doing it with. So even though it was hard and things weren't working and it was taking longer than we thought, it
00:51:15
was just fun. Um, so I think that's and I didn't know that at the time, but in hindsight, I think that was the only
00:51:22
reason that it like we were working the huge hours and the nights and the weekends the whole way through is you
00:51:27
just you enjoy the problem, you enjoy the people. Um, yeah, it's probably the most important part.
00:51:33
>> Yeah. Yeah. What did that work look like back then? Was it all day every day? Was
00:51:37
it all consuming? >> Yep. >> Yeah. >> Yep. It was Yeah. We'd have dinner in the office more nights of the week than
00:51:44
not most nights. Um, you'd be working every weekend for sure. Um, yeah. >> Yeah. When I had um Pete on the podcast,
00:51:52
he he had a quote that stuck with me. I use it all the time in keynotes. It's like something like nothing great is
00:51:57
achieved on a 9 to5 Monday to Friday schedule. >> Yeah. >> If you want something that's going to
00:52:02
have a real impact, um yeah, it takes longer hours than that. >> Yeah. If you want like unlikely or if
00:52:08
you want abnormal results, you >> you're not going to get it on normal inputs. Like you probably need abnormal
00:52:13
inputs. It's no different to any athlete or any sports team or any like it's I haven't quite wrapped my head around
00:52:22
this so this is very unformed but if an athlete or yeah a sports team or a singer or a DJ whatever if they go above
00:52:32
and beyond dedicate their life to it every hour is Mr. beast, whatever. Like >> every hour is that is refining that
00:52:39
craft. They held up as like a hero. Everyone's like, "Oh my god, that's so inspiring." But if you do that with your
00:52:44
work, >> lots of people view it negatively. They, you know, burn out or um or that's
00:52:52
unhealthy. And and I I suspect it's because there's a lot of people that haven't actually worked in a place where
00:52:58
they truly love what they're doing. Like it is truly fun and they look forward to
00:53:02
>> going to work on a Monday. Um, yeah. So, I don't quite know, but for us it was it was that. So, we would look at
00:53:09
these sports teams and athletes and think, awesome, you know, like we this is what we want to be doing. And so,
00:53:15
>> yeah, mate mate, I I've done over 300 episodes of this podcast and it's one thing I've realized like um hard work is
00:53:21
the only cheat code there is. And whatever whatever you're talking about, whether it's um Peter with Rocket Lab or
00:53:27
um Anna Mo with Zuru or Dame Lisa Carrington, whatever it is, it's like the one thing the absolute only one
00:53:35
thing that all these high achievers have in common is is work ethic. That's it. >> Totally. I think I would I think trying
00:53:41
to pretend to like the younger gener kind of young, but trying to pretend to other people
00:53:48
sound like a boo. trying to pretend to other people or even trying to to say to my friends whatever that like you don't
00:53:55
need to work hard to be success just feels like a disservice like it feels dishonest like
00:54:00
>> maybe that you can but I wasn't smart enough to do that like >> Halter would not be here if it wasn't
00:54:06
for some of those like absolute long hours and just the sheer effort you know you just keep rolling the dice like just
00:54:14
through effort so I think I I definitely subscribe to The one thing I would say is like it should be
00:54:21
fun. Like >> championship winning sports teams that are working their ass off, they're also
00:54:26
having fun. So I think yes, don't don't slave away for hundreds of hours at a place that doesn't value it and and
00:54:34
you're not enjoying it. Like don't do that. But if you're having fun, go for it.
00:54:39
>> Well, I think you're not going to be able to you can't trick yourself if if you're [ __ ] hating every minute of
00:54:43
it. You're not going to be able to do 15 hour days. >> Totally. Just not sustainable. How so?
00:54:49
You're so you're 31 now. You're the CEO of this um CEO and founder of this company that you've had for 10 years.
00:54:54
You've also you're wearing a wedding ring. How have you managed to find a wife and get married in all this?
00:54:58
>> You took a half a day off somewhere for a wedding. >> Yes. Hannah, my lovely wife. Um we met
00:55:05
at engineering school. So she's an engineer. Um so actually I started to date Hannah. It was like a week before
00:55:13
that very first term sheet. So our whole relationship Halter has been there as well. So I think we've just both grown
00:55:21
up with Halter. Um she is >> she's like very driven and determined. Um loves her career and so I think she
00:55:31
>> she's never been like worried about me working too hard or she's been working
00:55:35
just as hard herself. So I think it's kind of we're both on the same page. >> Um
00:55:39
>> you need that you need a partner that gets it e fully. >> Yeah. I think if if she was home, you
00:55:44
know, every night eating dinner by herself >> that you could see how that would cause
00:55:48
probably eventually cause friction. And so, um, yeah, we haven't got we clearly don't have it all figured out. Like
00:55:54
you're always trying to, uh, as things change and we were talking before the show, like we're about to have a kid in
00:56:00
a month, but so things will obviously change and we have to work out how to how to work through those things and
00:56:06
make it work for both of us. But like she's been there the whole time. She's been so supportive to the blood, sweat,
00:56:12
and tears. You know, many times I picked up the phone to her in tears. Um, and >> really actual tears.
00:56:18
>> Yeah. >> Like about what? >> When Max, my co-founder, quit. Lots of things, but like, you know, that was
00:56:25
probably one. >> What was that? A falling out or >> uh >> we just ran its course or what?
00:56:30
>> Uh, it was so today we're like very good friends. M um I was in his uh like uh
00:56:38
what do you call it? Groomsman at his wedding and >> um uh he lives around the corner from
00:56:43
me. So um but at the time it was a little bit of a falling out. I I actually think Halter to his credit
00:56:50
Halter was probably better off without him. And so in some ways it was probably the
00:56:56
right call for the business and and you could say quite selfless. But we were both we didn't really know how to manage
00:57:01
each other. I didn't know how to manage him. We could barely manage ourselves at
00:57:06
that point. And so, so he left and then we didn't talk for a bit. He started Vesive, that um foiling, the foiling
00:57:15
boats you see in the harbor. >> Oh, sick. >> Yeah. And so he started that company,
00:57:18
which is awesome. Get on them. Um and >> yeah, then some distance, you know, a couple years go by and you you resolve
00:57:26
your differences. >> Also, I was the CEO and he was the CTO. That has this tension. When he started
00:57:31
his business, he was the CEO. there was another head here at a different CTO and
00:57:35
so I think you you build a bit of empathy for like the other way around. So >> yeah and there's there's that saying
00:57:41
like you don't miss mix um business with pleasure and I suppose it's a like a potentially a warning about getting into
00:57:46
business with mates. >> Yeah. No, >> we hire lots of I have lots of friends at work or have hired lots of friends. I
00:57:53
think >> like yeah there's definitely some caution to it but there's also some massive
00:58:00
>> upsides I think as well. So no I he was instrumental in starting the whole journey and to that point before about
00:58:08
like it being fun the whole first year where we were going to farm every weekend or whatever it was trying to see
00:58:13
if you could train a cow with a collar and it just doesn't work you know nothing works like if you're doing that
00:58:18
with someone who you don't want to spend a lot of time with you're probably going
00:58:23
to pull the pin quite early so >> I actually think there's there is advantages to it for sure.
00:58:28
>> Yeah. Um, well, thanks for sharing that that stuff. That's that's it's really
00:58:32
cool. And it's it's funny that that's the when you talk about, you know, phoning home and and tears, that's the
00:58:37
first thing that comes to mind because it's that's >> I mean, it's a business related thing,
00:58:40
but it's a personal relationship thing as well >> where it says you I think you care about
00:58:44
people. >> Yeah, totally. Yeah, >> I think you I do think that's a hack to being a good manager. Not saying I'm a
00:58:50
good manager, but all my all my current trick reports have be like, "Oh, yeah, sure."
00:58:56
Uh I do think if you care for someone at a personal level like beyond them as a team member employee being a good
00:59:03
manager is a lot a lot easier. Yeah. >> Well that will lead us nicely into this next card I've got here which is um
00:59:08
labeled culture and team. Okay. >> Um because at at 31 like it's been um >> it's been a steep learning curve. E like
00:59:16
right through your 20s where most people are having the most fun decade of their
00:59:19
life. Well I'm not saying that you haven't had fun. Um, but you've you've learned so much so much about so much
00:59:24
[ __ ] that you probably never imagined learning about. >> Um, first of all, finish the sentence.
00:59:29
Work life balance is >> overrated. >> That's the word I had in mind. Interesting.
00:59:39
>> That's what I thought your answer was going to be. >> Yeah. He's incredibly um polarizing and
00:59:44
probably not the best entrepreneur to sort of bring up, but um like when Elon Musk took over Twitter and renamed it X.
00:59:50
>> Um he said there's no more working from home. I want people that want to be here
00:59:53
and do long days. like there is um I picked you know I didn't say [ __ ] or >> or you know worthless or like there is
01:00:05
clearly a time and place for it and I think >> um halter the halter culture has evolved
01:00:11
to ensure it does work with parents and people can still have a life outside of halter
01:00:16
>> um but we still work hard so I think overrated is a carefully >> thought out word because I think it's
01:00:21
just thrown balance is thrown around maybe more It's almost like pushed on people like this is something you should
01:00:27
it's unhealthy not to have balance >> when it's actually fine to not have balance like what is balance you should
01:00:33
just be thoughtful about it. Um >> so >> yeah I I I think I think individuals should do whatever makes them happy.
01:00:39
Totally. Um and people can say like working long hours is toxic or whatever but it's like if someone enjoys that
01:00:46
then [ __ ] do it. If you don't enjoy it don't do it but then don't complain when those people get ahead of you.
01:00:51
>> Yeah. Totally. And I think this is >> we our c we try to have our culture be a
01:00:56
place where people do the best work of their lives and often achieve things they never thought they could achieve.
01:01:01
And so that's you're not going to do that if you're holding people back. If people want to go, if they're trying to
01:01:08
do more, it's our job to to support them and make sure they do that, you know, and and help them achieve that. And so
01:01:14
>> I think we Yeah, if anything that becomes the goal more so than forcing upon them balance.
01:01:23
Now if also they have a young family and they need and they want to be home every
01:01:26
night for dinner and put the kids to bed, totally fine. Do you do you trust you? Um they might log on after, you
01:01:33
know, after dinner and do another couple hours. Fine. Like get the job done. That's okay.
01:01:38
>> When is there a point that stands out that you started thinking more about cultures than culture than callers?
01:01:43
Yes. Um, so when I Wow. Yeah. When you when I started Halter, I obviously hadn't
01:01:53
managed anybody. I never It was kind of my first job. I could have had other jobs. It was really my first full-time
01:02:01
permanent job. So, I think quite quickly you realize, okay, I I know very little
01:02:06
and for this company to be successful, I'm going to have to find awesome people and I'm going to have to make sure they
01:02:13
want to do awesome work. >> So, it's kind of forced it wasn't like I was particularly smart and
01:02:19
um was it was more so that was just the reality of how we were going to get something done. Um then over time you
01:02:25
you realize, oh, actually that's also quite a good way to run a business. Um uh and then our first non-engineering
01:02:32
hire, a guy called Mark Mloud, Mark Mloud Smith, we call him MMS. Um he used to be at the Ice House. He actually was
01:02:39
kind of like the first person I used to invest in us and he was on the board with Peter Beck at the time. He joined
01:02:44
the business after a while and he he was he's always been very big on culture. Um
01:02:51
and so he was a big influence on me and a huge influence on Halter. Um he was the one that's like, "All right, you
01:02:56
know, let's write down our values." And I wrote down like honesty and integrity and and he was like this is [ __ ]
01:03:00
Write down your actual values. So I learned a lot from him and yeah it's it's really over the years grown.
01:03:07
>> Was that um um with are they the values out think out work out care? >> No they came later on. Um they've never
01:03:15
really been the values. That's just like a I think we saw that slogan or that line. It might have even been like a
01:03:21
Stanford scholarship. >> Um which is just a nice summary I think of how we think about work. Well, you
01:03:26
can have words on a wall, but you got to live them every day, don't you? So, so when when he called you out on your
01:03:30
[ __ ] with your values, and you went away for a good long hard think about it, what did you come back with?
01:03:36
>> Um, we came back with a a much more like authentic set of values. I can't remember them all at the time. There was
01:03:44
maybe eight of them, >> but we we got the message on this isn't >> this isn't a PR exercise. this is just
01:03:52
what you two at the time like actually believe you want the how you want the team to
01:03:59
operate. It's a shared set of like understanding and rules. Those values have evolved. We're on to like kind of
01:04:05
our fifth version of it. As you go through the journey, you you have these moments that are awesome and you try to
01:04:10
work out why they're awesome. You're like, why was that period so cool and so performant? And you unpick the the value
01:04:17
out of it or the principle out of it and you try codifier. And then same with tough times. that you are proud of and
01:04:23
so that kind of shapes the culture over time. So we keep iterating it. >> Yes. Startup life's definitely not for
01:04:29
everyone. What's the shortest shortest period of time a person stayed at halter?
01:04:34
>> Um >> is there some someone that didn't make it a week? >> Yeah, we've had a person that didn't
01:04:38
make it a week. We had an intern that didn't make it a week. Um, uh, if someone doesn't make it to like 3
01:04:46
months, it's I'd say it's our fault, not their fault. Like, I think >> that's a that's the hiring process gone
01:04:55
wrong. Like, >> if someone doesn't last a week, what did we do wrong in the hiring process? And
01:05:00
hiring's hard. Like, it's you, it is hard to be perfect at hiring, for sure. But I I actually find it this might
01:05:09
surprise you. I find it kind of unfair on the person if when we mishire like that because someone's changed job. This
01:05:14
was an intern at the time, but often someone's changed job and taken a risk and then if they don't even make it like
01:05:19
to their 90-day not, you know, notice period, you're like, "Oh, that's not great." So, um,
01:05:24
>> in those cases, do is it the employee that usually comes to the realization or
01:05:28
do you need to have some hard conversations? >> Um, we're not afraid of having the hard
01:05:32
conversations, but often it's the employee. Like I think we >> we try to be very clear with feedback
01:05:38
and not have any surprises and stuff. So if someone isn't at the bar, we would be
01:05:42
communicating that and then of at some point the employee would say like actually that's just kind of not what I
01:05:48
want. That's like not for me. Um and so then that's it's it's quite amicable. But
01:05:53
>> yeah, I think I mentioned before the very first hire we made I think he lasted 3 weeks
01:05:57
>> and that wasn't you know we didn't fire him or anything. He he quit. Um, but probably for good reason. Like we I was
01:06:06
completely unaware. I didn't see it coming at all. And I think that's that speaks to how bad of a manager or how
01:06:14
just I just had no clue what I was doing. So, >> by the way, I I love I love the extreme
01:06:19
ownership. It's a book I really like by this uh Jo Willink. Extreme Ownership. It's like just owning owning everything
01:06:26
you can in any scenario. >> Yeah. I think if you I wrote an email to this like >> preserve your agency by like owning
01:06:34
everything. Like if you don't believe if you don't own the thing, you have no control over it. And so
01:06:42
>> too short to be good at basketball, it's your fault. You know, that sounds crazy
01:06:45
cuz it's kind of not your, you know, but you have this responsibility to then be
01:06:49
the fittest person on the court or the most to train the hardest or be the most. And so you
01:06:54
>> that's inspiring. Right now I can do something about it. Awesome. I'm not a vict like a victim of so I
01:07:00
>> I love that if you're the shortest person on the basketball court you can [ __ ] about everyone else being taller
01:07:04
but it's not going to serve you or anyone >> and like let me be clear I've had obviously Hal's been we've had lots of
01:07:12
lucky moments along the way and and I feel yeah I had a a great upbringing and so there are things that clear these
01:07:19
situations that are hard to overcome but just as a general mindset I think it's helpful.
01:07:25
What parts of being CEO have been hardest for you personally? >> Probably just the rate that the role
01:07:33
changes. >> You just feel like you've got your head around how to do a good job of it and
01:07:37
then it's totally out of date, you know, like it's >> um probably that I think there's lots of hard decisions that
01:07:46
impact people. they might be the right thing for the company, but they still like during co we did you know like a
01:07:51
layoff because everyone was like worried about funding and it was super uncertain
01:07:57
and we wanted to be it seemed like the fairest thing to do for >> the the right thing to do for the
01:08:03
company and the fairest thing for the team we were going to keep. >> But you've also got to let people go.
01:08:08
>> Um that's never fun. >> Oh yeah, I forgot about co years. So the company's just 10 years old and three
01:08:16
two to three years of that was um >> it's like 30% of the company's life it was during um a pandemic.
01:08:23
>> Yeah. >> Yeah. Not good for a hardware company where you trying to like all work on the
01:08:26
same collars and you need a lab and Yeah. >> Were you were you guys did you manage to
01:08:33
be deemed essential workers or No. >> Yes. We had I think like one or two farms running at the time and obviously
01:08:39
when you're >> we're like a core part of how you run a dairy farm or at the time a dairy farm.
01:08:44
>> So yeah, we were deemed an essential service because if didn't work on those farms that was going to be a problem for
01:08:49
the farmers. So I think the first lockdown we took the collars off >> we weren't. But then later on um we were
01:08:56
>> How's your leadership style changed from the early startup days to leading a much
01:09:00
larger company? How big is the team now? >> The team now is just shy of 500. >> Jeep has. Yeah.
01:09:05
>> So, when you first started it was like six. >> Yeah, it was two, I guess. >> Yeah. Me and Max. Um,
01:09:13
>> yeah. How's it changed? Uh, lots of ways. Um, I obviously you learn all the like
01:09:21
tactical things of management. Uh, and you read a lot of books and you get a lot of things wrong and you,
01:09:28
uh, and you learn from your mistakes and you have mentors and coaches and all of
01:09:31
that. So, I think that's all to be expected. I think the number one thing that I have learned which is probably a
01:09:38
big unlock for me uh was not trying to be not trying to copy some other leader or
01:09:47
be what be a type of leader that people tell you you should be just trying to be
01:09:50
very authentic to yourself. >> Um I just think people know I think if you try to be something else or you try
01:09:57
to pre pretend you know stuff that you don't like people work that out pretty quick.
01:10:02
>> Oh yeah. People can smell [ __ ] a mile away. >> Totally. >> Yeah. Like, >> but are there any any books or resources
01:10:07
that you found particularly helpful that you could recommend to others? >> Yep. I think the first book I was Mark
01:10:12
made me read was High Output Management by Andy Grove. It's um great. It's an oldie but a goodie. Um I think 0ero to
01:10:21
one that was just a good startup book. >> Uh we love at Halter the book No Rules
01:10:26
Rules. It's a Netflix book. It's kind of similar to the old like Netflix culture
01:10:30
deck. has this awesome really thoughtful take on culture. It's a bit different to
01:10:33
most companies all around freedom and responsibility and trust and hiring awesome people and then just letting
01:10:39
them run like and how special to just come to work every day and work with world class people. Um that book's
01:10:46
probably shaped how I think about leadership and management the most. We haven't copied all of it. We pull parts
01:10:50
of it that are good for halter and >> um >> it's up there. Um yeah, I think you can learn something
01:10:57
from everyone. I think every book you read, you can take like something away, but they're probably the main ones.
01:11:01
Frank Slutman writes a good book called Amp It Up. >> Uh it's a little bit more suited for
01:11:06
once you've got like bigger teams in a bigger company. Um it's pretty good. >> How do you have time to read? Are you an
01:11:13
audio guy? >> I am an audio book guy. Yeah. When I'm driving or on a plane or >> I was going to say because there'd
01:11:20
always be things that you can do. You'd have to prioritize things like exercise and you know consuming books and
01:11:25
content. you you have to like clearly just at some point investing in myself is good for halter right like if I can
01:11:33
be a better leader or this is actually a shift you shift from this mindset from like pulling an allnighter and those
01:11:40
additional 12 hours being the right thing for halter to realizing that if you do that but then
01:11:47
at the all company meeting what we call all hands if at the all hands you do half as good a job because you're tired
01:11:54
cuz you didn't sleep. Well, then maybe you just undid all the good work you did because now everybody else doesn't have
01:11:59
the right context and they're not as motivated or so. Yeah, you you invest in trying to become a better leader is
01:12:05
probably one of the higher leverages, >> the highest leverage things you can do.
01:12:08
So, >> yeah. >> So, yeah, you got to protect your brain like you know you as um as romantic as
01:12:15
the idea is of doing an all nighter like ultimately it's going to catch up with you.
01:12:19
>> Yes. And still like there are sometimes we do all nighters now >> still. still, but they're very
01:12:24
>> like it's quite intentional, you know. We're not doing them just for any old thing that's on fire like
01:12:30
>> under what circumstances would that happen now at 10 years old and with a value of two or three million billion or
01:12:36
whatever it is. >> Well, there's the same level of ambition, right? So, or a higher level
01:12:39
of ambition. So, we have a this probably isn't going to sound good on a podcast,
01:12:44
but we have this operating principle called embrace discomfort. And it's this idea that it's never going to get
01:12:50
easier. Like for a while there people would think like oh this is hard work but it's just hard work because you know
01:12:56
we don't have any revenue or we don't have a product and one day once we build the product it'll be easy.
01:13:02
>> That's obviously not very ambitious right because so what we're going to build the product and then it'll sit
01:13:08
around and >> sit on our hands >> plateau out. >> Yeah totally like that's not what we
01:13:12
want to do. And so the the idea is that we're it's not going to get easier. you're just going to go faster, which is
01:13:19
I think a Greg Lemon quote. Or if you see a marathoner at K35 in a marathon, they obviously
01:13:26
don't look it's it's not like if if it's easy, they just run faster. So the point
01:13:32
is this point of embrace discomfort is um as we solve problems and things get easier, we get more ambitious and do
01:13:41
more. So we launched the US market two years ago. It's, you know, it's chaos in the
01:13:48
beginning, lots of stuff not working. It's like, you might be doing all nighters, whatever it is to try and get
01:13:55
that thing to work. The moment it starts working, sweet, let's go to South America, you know, like what's the next
01:14:00
front? And so that's I actually think the the progress of of Halter and the company can be defined in many ways by
01:14:08
our ability to be uncomfortable. >> I also think it's where you grow the most. Why did you um sort of um pause just
01:14:14
before and say that would sound bad on a podcast. >> I don't know. I just think if if I could
01:14:18
see like >> I don't know. I could see someone being someone hearing that we have a value
01:14:24
could embrace discomfort and think I don't want to work there. >> I know. But I I think like life's become
01:14:31
really really comfortable and resilience is a buzz word now. Um you you you sometimes you need I love that you use
01:14:37
the marathon running analogy cuz I think you need to like force some discomfort in your Oh yeah, turn the air on. It's
01:14:42
getting hot in here. >> Um you need to introduce some discomfort into your life cuz it's um otherwise
01:14:48
it's just like there's no discomfort at all and it's instant gratification and then when tough times come and they do
01:14:53
for everyone cuz it's >> it's part of the trade-off for having a life, you're not going to be equipped to
01:14:57
deal with it. >> Yeah. This is why I think farming is I didn't know this at the time but an
01:15:01
awesome breeding ground for running a startup because it's constant adversity and you can't it's animals right or you
01:15:07
don't get to weather you don't get to control everything and so >> this sometimes it can be so cruel you
01:15:14
know you could be at Christmas with your grandparents and the cows break out and
01:15:18
it's like so I've got to go you know like it just doesn't wait for anybody and so
01:15:22
>> you and then whilst that's happening someone's sick and like it so I think you do learn this this level of
01:15:28
adversity for sure. >> You you mentioned America before you um and just breaking into the American
01:15:34
market. >> I read I either read this or saw this from you somewhere talking about the
01:15:38
difference um early on in Hala between um say like a wet dairy farmer from your from to say a Manatu dairy farmer.
01:15:46
>> Um so with that in mind so you conquer new well don't conquer New Zealand but
01:15:50
you you get halt around New Zealand then how different is that the um cultural barrier like breaking into America?
01:15:56
>> Yeah, very different. I think farming systems are different or they even call
01:15:59
them ranchers over there, you know, for at least our the customer segment we have. Uh the culture is different, the
01:16:05
the product's different, the team's different. Yeah, I think you you just go in eyes open. You go in knowing you're
01:16:11
going to learn a lot. Don't pretend that you know everything because you don't. Um and
01:16:19
yeah, it's just it's almost having the same mindset we had when we first started rolling out Farms in the White.
01:16:24
It's like cool, we're kind of back at day dot, day one. Let's let's go. Let's work out like how we're going to build
01:16:30
this into a product that works really well for this region. Now, every new region you do, more stuff does overlap
01:16:38
because you you're able to make the product slightly more like well-rounded. So, a lot of things do just work from
01:16:44
the start. Like the hardware is the same in every market, as an example. But, >> uh yeah.
01:16:49
>> Who do you go to for honest feedback and are you good at receiving criticism? Um,
01:16:53
I think so. >> It's still not always easy, but yeah, I I think feedback is a gift. Um, it's at
01:17:01
least what ingrained in my brain. And so and so, >> but who who do you go to? Who do I go to
01:17:07
as CEO? like who can who can if you were to ask my friends I'd probably say the person that gives me the most critical
01:17:13
feedback is my wife Hannah who just is uninterested in you know in letting me get any form of like ego or big head or
01:17:22
anything like that. So uh the I'd say the executive is pretty good at this. The board is very good at it. Peter Beck
01:17:27
is amazing. Um let me tell you a story. We announced our like series A funding round. These are exciting moments. Um, I
01:17:36
think it was at field days. We weren't planning on announcing there, but like breakfast or someone like stuck a camera
01:17:42
in front of our face and and we were like, "Perfect opportunity. Let's go for it." We do the interview. I'm like, "Oh
01:17:49
yeah, I think that went pretty well." I like share the link with the board saying, "Hey, we've kind of announced
01:17:53
the round slightly early. Here's the link." Um, and Peter Beck, I think, emails me back, replies, and goes, "You
01:17:59
look like a hyperactive seven-year-old." And I was like, "Oh [ __ ] Thanks, Pete.
01:18:08
So, >> what are you? Oh, come on. What were you just expressing some joy or >> I don't know.
01:18:17
Yeah, maybe got the balance of, you know, excitement to seriousness wrong. Um, >> so yeah, no board. Um, we we try really
01:18:27
hard to have a a culture of feedback, especially when you don't have a lot of policies in process. feedback becomes
01:18:35
such a critical lever. We don't there's many periods of hold to where I wish we were better at it and and we have to try
01:18:41
quite hard to like get people to be more comfortable with it. But um it's at least aspirational and for a lot of
01:18:47
parts it's true. But >> how long is it going to be part of your life? >> Is this your life life mission? I I had
01:18:56
um Anna Moberry on the podcast and she I she she was she was involved in Zuru um
01:19:02
then she tapped out of that >> and um set up a recruitment company called Zeal. >> Yes.
01:19:06
>> And I asked her about that. I said after Zuru why don't you just you know kick
01:19:09
back, go on a couple of boards, become a director or whatever >> and she described Zuru as a mountain and
01:19:14
she said there's more mountains that she wants to climb while she's got time. >> Is this is this your one and only
01:19:19
mountain or do you think there'll be more mountains? >> The truth is I don't know. Um I love my
01:19:24
job. I it's super rewarding. Anytime I'm not enjoying it, back to the extreme ownership, I'm like, well, that's only
01:19:31
my own fault. You know, if I'm doing too much finance or I whatever it is, well,
01:19:36
I have control over that. You know, I can go hire more people in that space or I can control how I spend my time. So, I
01:19:42
think I take this idea that um if I'm not liking what I'm doing, it's only my own fault and it's probably not going to
01:19:49
get better if I go somewhere else. So, uh, thankfully with that, I love what I do. It's rewarding. I love the team. I
01:19:57
love the mission. I think it's worthy. Um, if that changes for any reason, if for some reason
01:20:02
>> it's, you know, it's a slog and I don't, >> you know, any of those conditions
01:20:08
change, then yeah, I'd h I'd probably happily go climb another mountain. But, um, I don't think I'd sit on a beach,
01:20:14
that's for sure. But I the more Halter's the more time I spend at Halter, the more I like it. And
01:20:21
>> yeah, the more I can see myself being there for a long time. >> Yeah. When when was the last time you
01:20:25
did sit on a beach? >> Um, >> are you hopeless at it? >> Yeah. Beach is like a It's not relaxing
01:20:33
for me. It's It's like almost It's like thinking time, you know, like you just sit there ruminating on Sorry, the cow
01:20:40
pun like I was going to say chewing um thinking on all these all the things. I think I'm an active
01:20:48
relaxer. Like I Hannah and I learned to scuba dive a few years ago and that was you're it's like meditative. You're so
01:20:56
for you're forced to be present. I don't fly helicopters but I've heard the same
01:21:00
about flying. Um running I find relaxing. >> Um >> you can think when you run though I
01:21:08
>> you can think when you run but if you're listening to a book or something you can
01:21:10
kind of get a bit lost in it. >> Yeah. >> Um hanging out with friends >> eating good food. Love eating good food.
01:21:16
>> Quite you a kite surfer. >> Quite surfer. Yeah, I wondered about that because um yeah, like he he races
01:21:22
cars and that's one of those things where you can't think about rockets or whatever else. You've got to be in the
01:21:28
moment and I suppose uh to a smaller degree it's the same with kite surfing. >> Yep.
01:21:32
>> Yes. >> You got to be present. >> Yeah. I have actually haven't quite surfed in a little while. But I agree.
01:21:37
It's things that force you to be uh force you to think about the moment my mind's empty, boom, health. you know,
01:21:45
the eight problems that we have and and if we did this and and that and um but if I'm being forced to think about
01:21:52
something else that's keeps me stimulated, then that's relaxing. >> How how has your um ego not run away on
01:21:59
you? I I I read an article online yesterday like from I think it was from like 2017, so it was really early on in
01:22:04
the halter days uh written by Madison Ready um who now does her own sort of content called Markets with Madison. um
01:22:10
that was um like singing your praises back then and at that point like you you hadn't actually done anything and
01:22:15
there's been like you've been sort of the the golden boy or the new face of entrepreneurship and startup culture in
01:22:20
New Zealand. How how have you managed to not get high on your own supply or have
01:22:24
there moments where you have been? There's probably been moments I have been um I think back to the you're like
01:22:29
who who are your friends like >> who none of my friends give a [ __ ] about it you know they would they still expect
01:22:37
if I'm late to a dinner or something they you know they don't let me get away with that so I just think it's who your
01:22:42
mates are and what the currency is and >> um part of it I guess is your motivations like if I had started halter
01:22:48
to try and get Rachel make a lot of money well then inevitably as that came true you you probably would it'd be hard
01:22:56
to control, but that wasn't like wasn't why I started Halter. So, >> yeah, I think all of that just um kind
01:23:03
of becomes secondary in a way. >> Have you are are you skeptical or um weary of like new people that come into
01:23:10
your life now that you've got like a a name and a reputation and some money behind you?
01:23:16
No, >> I pro like >> maybe sometimes I should be, but that feels like a really sad way to live like
01:23:25
>> questioning every every motivation and and I just think that would mess with my
01:23:32
head. Like so like I just think I if I feel someone's being authentic and genuine and
01:23:41
pure, like I love that. I'm attracted to that. I think >> that feels like such a a madam farm
01:23:47
thing. I trust someone until they give you a reason not to. >> Yeah. Yep. >> Yeah.
01:23:51
>> Yep. >> Where where do you pitch a halter in say 5 10 years from now? >> Uh so um
01:24:01
agriculture is obviously is a global industry. So about half the world's habitable land mass is agriculture. So I
01:24:07
think for us to have maximum impact we need to we need to keep expanding globally. We're we're currently we're
01:24:14
about a million cows uh 3 and a half thousand farmers across New Zealand, Australia and the US.
01:24:20
Great markets to start in a small fraction of the global a market. So we need to get to South America. We need to
01:24:26
get to Europe. We need to get to South Africa. Like there's many countries we need to get to. And I think you can have
01:24:32
all the impact you want on one farm. You know, imagine just being on my parents farm, but it's it's always going to be
01:24:38
limited, right? So I think that's one big dimension or that we measure progress on. And then the other one is
01:24:46
continuing to innovate and push every individual farm forward. Uh ship more features and more products that help
01:24:52
those farmers solve problems, make them like farming more, make the farms and the land more productive, make it better
01:24:57
for the animals and the environment. So and I think that dimension is exploding at the moment with AI, with the progress
01:25:04
in in tech. um the more customers we have, the more data we get, the more we're able to improve these products. So
01:25:11
I think you add those two two things together and our like mission or what motivates us is running
01:25:18
a globally in a more productive and sustainable way. Like if we can do that, that'll have a huge impact on the world
01:25:23
and that'll be our little our little dent in in the world, you know? Um so >> [ __ ] you're thinking real big, eh?
01:25:31
Yeah, I think that's that's maybe because I've spent a bit of time around Peter Beck.
01:25:37
>> That's really powerful stuff. >> And I think at some point you you like if I said if I said that 5 years ago, I
01:25:45
wouldn't have been able to say with a straight face, you know, you'd be like, "Really? You're only on six farms." Um,
01:25:50
but as as you prove to yourself you can do hard things like before we went to the US, you hear so
01:25:59
many businesses that struggle to break it into the US market for whatever reasons. And so as you work
01:26:07
through that challenge and you realize, okay, this is actually solvable with the
01:26:10
right people and whatnot, then you go, okay, well, let's go to South America. We're not in South America. It seems
01:26:16
very scary. It probably is like seems like a hard place to do business. Um what I what I mean by scary. Uh but
01:26:24
we'll have to solve it. It's a huge egg market. So >> yeah, that's the that's the vision and
01:26:29
the mission. We've got lots of stuff to do to get there. >> Um >> do do you think in New Zealand um a lot
01:26:37
of us just aren't um don't have the ability to think big enough? >> I think we have less
01:26:44
role models and examples. M. So it seems crazier. Yeah. Like the there's been I would hazard a guess maybe like a
01:26:56
dozen companies that have spun out of Rocket Lab because they've seen they've they've seen Pete every day do what they
01:27:03
have done and so then they believe okay well I could have a crack at that. >> Um these there's been companies that
01:27:09
have spun out of halter. So I do think as like in America it's everywhere like there is just so many everybody has a
01:27:16
cousin or that was early at some company and and made a lot of money on stock and
01:27:20
then they started their own thing. Um so I do think more examples and more stories and people seeing it is um is
01:27:30
really important and I think the industry is even in the time we've been doing halter has changed massively.
01:27:34
Yeah. >> Like the amount of investors that are here the amount of startups the amount
01:27:37
of people that want to be part of startups it's really cool. It's It's growing at such a rate. So,
01:27:42
>> has your degree come in handy? Has it has it been? Yep. >> Yep. I think you just as an engineer,
01:27:48
you learn how you they kind of teach you how to think, >> I guess. So, >> yeah. >> But the the engineering stuff that your
01:27:55
team's working on now, that'd be way above your education level, though. >> What? No.
01:28:01
>> I mean, I don't know anything. I don't know anything about anything. >> No, you're right. You're right. Like,
01:28:06
>> so I suppose in the early days, like if your engineer said, "Oh, this can't be
01:28:08
done. this is impossible. You could be like, well, no, I think there's a way. But now it's like, okay.
01:28:14
>> Yeah, you you we have a another operating principle called dynamic range. And I do
01:28:20
think you need to if you're constantly at 10,000 ft, it's really hard to act to to push or challenge or to know
01:28:30
how to help. And so being able to if something's really critical, being able to dig in all the way down right to the
01:28:38
detail where you know the reason hardware is taking ages or the new version is taking ages is because the
01:28:43
timeline slipped is because the tests were taking longer because there's only one of the machine and the technician
01:28:50
didn't know that we could go buy 10 of the machines because they're expensive machines. uh or you know time's also exp
01:28:56
like being able to do that process and then say let's let's go get five of these printers or whatever it is
01:29:03
>> and they're like oh can we do that and then all of a sudden you've unlocked this you know a big like timeline slip
01:29:10
or block so um yeah I think that that's like very engineering right first principles and and digging in um yeah I
01:29:19
still do a little bit of engineering I mostly do product now so the the blend between what farmers ask for what's
01:29:25
technically feasible and then how to build it. That's what we call like product. Um that's probably the part of
01:29:31
the business I'm still the closest to. Um >> yeah, you'd need to wear so many caps
01:29:35
now. >> Yeah, you have to take a few off as you go. But yeah, >> you people give you more of them.
01:29:44
>> Um when you picture um Craig Pick in five or 10 years from now, what do you hope your life looks like? Um
01:29:50
>> halter aside, this is just you. >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I in five or 10 years I hope to have a
01:29:58
family. >> I think it's probably the biggest change. Uh I hope >> all with little collars on so we don't
01:30:05
go so you have an unfenced house. >> Uh classic. >> Um yeah, a little tribe running around
01:30:10
would be pretty cool. Um which would you know we're working on. Um, I think I hope to
01:30:18
be able to eat good food with good people, >> solve hard problems, work hard. >> Uh, I think a lot in some ways I hope
01:30:28
that lots of stuff doesn't like lots of stuff doesn't change. Um, yeah, is probably the key thing. I Oh,
01:30:40
actually I hope my shin splints get better. Is that a running injury or a >> running injury?
01:30:46
>> Yeah. What do you do for fitness? You run a bit. >> Yeah, running is probably the main one.
01:30:49
Um, >> easiest e like in terms of time. >> I see you run around here every now and
01:30:53
then. >> Yeah. Yeah. What's I say to people it's the cheapest and most affordable sport
01:30:57
there is and you can do it right right from the door. >> I was never a runner. Like I my whole
01:31:01
childhood wanted liked the idea of being a runner. Never could make it really stick. And
01:31:07
then maybe through the pressure of work or something. Again, friends I was living with. We had some we live with um
01:31:16
we have a house not far from here, but uh we had we invited friends to live with us just for the fun of it. We don't
01:31:21
have kids. Why not? You know, it'd be cool. And one of them was like a big runner and so we would end up running a
01:31:27
lot together and then you get fitter and then you realize that when you're fit it's fun. And so yeah, over time like
01:31:32
learned to become a runner, I guess, and became like part of the identity. >> Yeah. Also for someone like you that's
01:31:36
incredibly busy and time poor like uh you you can get a half an hour run and that's that's um a substantial amount of
01:31:42
exercise and you can get what you need out of it. >> Yeah. And as I'm traveling I can do it
01:31:45
anywhere you know I don't have to take a bike with me or something like I can and
01:31:49
it's a good way to see a new city. >> Turn up somewhere go for a run for an hour.
01:31:52
>> Oh 100%. To shake off some jet lag. Yeah. >> Has your definition of success changed
01:31:56
in the past 10 years? Oh yeah, probably >> probably. I think the bar goes up. >> If you described to me halter today at
01:32:12
the start of halter, I would have said like, wo, done, you know, perfect. Like that is Yeah, that is like everything
01:32:21
you What else is there to do, you know? Um, now that we're sitting here today, it doesn't feel like that at all. It
01:32:28
feels like there's >> a lot to do. Um, so I think yes, the bar goes up, you get more ambitious. Uh,
01:32:37
it just depends what you mean by success, right? Like is success, what is success? Is it impact? Is it
01:32:44
team doing stuff they didn't think they could do? Is like it's probably not financial because that's not that like
01:32:51
ultimately not that rewarding. >> Um, is it happiness? I don't know. Like not to get too, you know, too
01:32:58
philosophical. No, no, I know what you mean. But yeah, I suppose um success is personal contentment because everyone's
01:33:03
definition of success will be different, right? >> Yeah, that's probably a good way to put
01:33:06
it. >> Um, has success made life simpler or more complicated? >> Um, my life is more complicated today than
01:33:15
it ever has been because there's just more going on. >> Um, >> yeah, it's probably made it more
01:33:23
complicated. >> I think I think I'm like I love what I do. Like I'm uh I feel very lucky. You know, there's
01:33:31
some days you wake up and I can't believe this is my job. Like >> how awesome. You go spend a week on the
01:33:37
road with customers and they just thank you so much and they're so grateful and like I'm like, "God, we're lucky we
01:33:46
picked farmers." Like that is it's just so yeah, these I feel extremely lucky doing what I do. Um, but life is is
01:33:57
complicated. Like there is you wake up every morning and there's like I don't know new fires and emails in your inbox
01:34:04
and someone wants to quit and something's gone wrong and um and >> are you are you sheltered from a lot of
01:34:11
that stuff now or are you still right in the weeds? >> Um, no. I'm more sh like I'm sure if you
01:34:16
ask the exec team there'd be plenty of fires in in their inboxes that don't ever make it up to me. Yeah. But, uh,
01:34:26
relatively speaking, there's still more fires for everybody. Um, >> yeah. >> Do you sleep all right?
01:34:32
>> Uh, yes. >> I sleep pretty well. >> What time are you normally in bed? >> Uh, Hannah likes to be in bed by 10:00
01:34:39
p.m. every night. And there's many days where I am running in the door at 9:59 straight, you know, straight in bed.
01:34:47
>> Oh, so that's your bedtime, too? >> Yes. Yeah, that's kind of the >> Right. >> Which I think is good. I actually think
01:34:52
it's been good for me. Now >> she she it sounds like she needs to put some boundaries on you otherwise.
01:34:57
>> Yes. Yeah, for sure. >> Otherwise, you'll be you'll be a halter cow without a collar just roaming around
01:35:02
the whole farm >> and it's not that often it's not good. It's not net productive, you know, like
01:35:06
>> 100%. >> Working till 12 just means I wake up later. So, but if I like >> Yeah. So, no, I sleep all right. I think
01:35:14
it gets harder as you get older. I used to claim with pride that my number one skill in life was sleeping. I could
01:35:20
sleep anywhere. I could sleep no matter how stressed I was. I could sleep in, you know, under a table, in the car,
01:35:27
whatever it is. But I think that was a young man's game. Like >> I'm still obviously quite young, but now
01:35:34
I find it I have an eight sleep. Amazing. Life changing. Um, and so I'm getting a bit more precious. Like
01:35:42
sometimes I stay in a hotel bed with a big pillow. I'm like, this is actually >> Oh, yeah. The blackout blinds as well,
01:35:46
the blackout curtains. >> They're so good. You wake up, it's like 11:00 a.m. You're like, "Where's the Um,
01:35:51
I noticed you came here today with your passport in hand. Are you going pretty much straight to the airport after
01:35:56
this?" >> I am. Yeah, I tend to It's kind of always in my pocket. >> Jeez, you're squeezing everything you
01:36:01
can out of every day, aren't you? I appreciate the time today. >> Ah, happy to tell the whole story and
01:36:06
hopefully if it's helpful to even just one person who wants to start a business and or you know that's I do think
01:36:13
storytelling is powerful. I think it's >> we do it internally for our culture and
01:36:18
And yeah, I think that I I reckon most people when they meet me are like, "Ah, he's just a normal guy."
01:36:29
Like >> you're really unassuming. Like you we were we were joking the office before
01:36:33
you arrived about what vehicle you'd pull up in. Like whether it be a Hilux or whatever. I think you just walked in,
01:36:38
right? >> Yes. >> You just walked in and jet jeans, t-shirt, cap on. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Your air ear air earpods, your
01:36:44
little wallet, and your Yeah. Very unassuming. No. No. Um, no press secretary or anything like that.
01:36:51
>> Imagine. Yeah. >> Imagine. >> When I had Miles Hurl in here for for a podcast who the former CEO of Fonta um
01:36:59
he came in with um like as head of communications or whatever. >> He had a few pages like about the
01:37:04
podcast and the history of the podcast had been briefed. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> But you're not at the briefing. You
01:37:08
could be at the briefing level. >> Yeah. Sometimes. Um, I think it like if I was
01:37:14
uh if I'm like if it was like a live interview interview on Bloomberg or something, I think I get, you know,
01:37:19
someone will give me a bit of a briefing. I think the briefing I was told for this is like it's casual. He
01:37:23
just likes to chat. You'll be sweet. I was like, "All right." >> Yeah. Actually, to be fair, yeah, your
01:37:27
team did ask um if if there were questions they could have in advance. I'm like, "Look, it's not really like
01:37:31
that. It's just >> sort of free flowing conversation." I said, "I'll do a lot of research and
01:37:35
I'll make do my best to make sure Craig has a good time." >> I actually don't like questions in
01:37:39
advance either. Like, I think when you're given questions in advance, you feel this pressure to like do you
01:37:44
prepare? But then I'm here like a robot or but if you don't prepare then is that
01:37:49
bad? >> I don't know. It's >> it's it's it's a 50/50 thing. Like you might um be on the flight tonight go
01:37:55
[ __ ] I I said this, I should have said this or whatever. >> And that's fine. That's just part of it.
01:38:00
Like you know we it won't be perfect but unless it's real. Um the >> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think especially
01:38:09
long form way more forgiving like if we had 8 minutes or you know to hit certain
01:38:14
key points so that's like a slightly different ball game but >> yeah that's when you get the text from
01:38:19
Sir Peter Beg saying you're like an excited sevenyear-old. >> Yeah. >> Um what are your best and worst habits?
01:38:28
>> Actually first of all what do you what do you think they are and then what would Hannah say they are?
01:38:31
>> Yeah that's a good question. Um my best habits would be I am relatively I'm never surprised.
01:38:41
Um someone can come to me and tell me like the worst thing ever. I'm like okay you know like
01:38:46
>> I >> I think that's important to have people feel like they can come to you and whatever is going on. So I think not
01:38:59
surprised. I think I genu I generally um assume positive intent like I look for like the best the
01:39:10
best version of the events or story or to if I'm going to debate against it or >> you know be like that sounds weird but
01:39:17
maybe there's something else going on I I didn't know about. Um I think I'm resilient. I think I work hard.
01:39:24
Um yep. My worst habits I think I sometimes I can overanalyze things so I can like get hyper theoretical like on a
01:39:37
whiteboard all through and then you realize like actually why don't we just do the best thing for the customer you
01:39:42
know or like >> is that the engineer in you? >> Yeah it is. It is like part of me loves
01:39:46
it. Um uh I comm I commit to too much stuff like I put I frequently put too much
01:39:53
stuff on the plate. drop a couple of balls and then think, "God damn it, why did I do that?" You know? Um I struggle
01:39:59
to say no. Uh there'll be lots of times someone's like, "Oh," I'm like, "Yeah, do that."
01:40:05
>> Well, I'm thankful for that. Otherwise, maybe you wouldn't be here today. >> Walk off thinking, "Fuck, I don't know
01:40:10
when I'm going to do that." So, >> I think you would have got better at that. Especially after
01:40:14
>> I've got better, but you the rate that you need to get better and then the rate
01:40:18
that you get better is different. you know, like >> um like it took me a long time to feel
01:40:24
comfortable replying to an email just saying like, "Sorry, I can't do that." >> Without justifying it, without
01:40:31
>> without saying, "Oh, we're really busy." Or maybe in a couple months like just to
01:40:38
>> sorry, like we just can't do that at the moment. >> That's such a Kiwi thing, a Yeah. No, I
01:40:42
can't do it because then often you'll make up an excuse, a lie about why you can't do it. Yeah, totally. Well, you
01:40:49
can just say no. It's perfectly fine. >> Yeah. >> It's funny you said before how um you
01:40:53
know you about the optimism optimism and glass half full. Every single entrepreneur I've had on this podcast is
01:40:59
exactly the same thing. >> That's one thing they all have in common, I think. >> Yeah.
01:41:03
>> And drink too much coffee is probably a bad habit. >> You do. >> Too much caffeine.
01:41:07
>> I love it though. >> Yeah. >> That's hard to beat a good cup of coffee. >> That's not a bad advice, is it? You I
01:41:12
think you said before you don't drink anymore. >> Yeah. Um Yeah, I think >> occasionally or never?
01:41:19
>> No, never. >> Since when? >> I don't know, four or five years ago. >> Yeah. Is
01:41:24
>> why? Just too much to do. >> Um yeah, two I think obviously health. Um I think my
01:41:32
job um these like for halter there'd be maybe three or four reasons to go out every
01:41:42
week then your friends. So you you end up drinking almost every night >> and I think also also there was part of
01:41:47
me that was like if I if my job gets too stressful I don't want alcohol to be like the crutch etc. So I just think my
01:41:55
life is better I'm a better person you know not drinking. So >> no one no one's ever quit drinking but I
01:42:02
I I still drink but I am mindful of how much I drink but no one's ever ever quit
01:42:05
drinking and you know said their life got worse. >> Yes. Yeah. >> Yeah. And I suppose the um the the the
01:42:11
level that you're working at and the amount of decisions you've got to make, you need a clear head.
01:42:15
>> Um what's your biggest fear? >> I think letting the team down, >> letting our customers down,
01:42:29
>> letting my family down probably. I think these like to do this job. Wow. are constantly
01:42:37
you're constantly raising the stakes and and taking risks and like you know you might go hunt someone out of a good job
01:42:45
overseas move their family to New Zealand you know you feel this like sense of pressure to be like well [ __ ] I better
01:42:52
better be worth it for them you know so I think that's letting your resters down
01:42:56
um >> yeah I think that's the the fear >> does it feel like you got the weight of
01:43:02
the world on your shoulders sometimes Um I try not to I yeah I try not to think about it too much because it would
01:43:10
be crippling but um not yeah >> it's not too too you you I think with time you learn
01:43:19
these habits right like you if you're anxious and then you you don't get much sleep and then you eat badly and you get
01:43:27
in this loop of like >> of just you're not in a good spot and then you're like okay I need to go for a
01:43:32
runm M >> I go to the gym, whatever it is. And you go do that and then you feel amazing
01:43:36
after you're like, "Okay, I'm fine." Like it was just I didn't seem to look after myself.
01:43:40
>> It's a reset. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. Hey, by the way, I just noticed your wristwatch. So the the the time now
01:43:45
in New Zealand is 2:54 p.m. Your Casio wristwatch says >> it says 8. Well, it's 900 p.m.
01:43:51
>> Where's that? Is that in >> That's right. >> Yeah. >> Why is that? Why don't you adjust your
01:43:55
watch when you're back in NZ? Is that >> My phone's on NZ time and my watch is on
01:44:00
Colorado time. And if I'm in Colorado, I sometimes flip it. Um, >> how how long does does that take to
01:44:07
become like acceptable practice or your new normal? >> The as in how >> is it? Yeah. Like working on two
01:44:13
different uh clocks. >> Uh, I think because we have an office like we've got a team in Colorado and
01:44:18
obviously spending a bit of time there. Um, and like I spent just while we set up the US, I've been spending some time
01:44:24
there. Um, I always try and have like the whole exec team and the majority of halter is in New Zealand and in Oakland.
01:44:30
So, I am always thinking about if I'm going to call someone, you know, what time is it in New Zealand? Um, and so
01:44:37
yeah, I kind of juggle them both. I would I don't know if there's a setting on your phone if you can have like two
01:44:42
two times at the top, but um >> yeah, the trusty Casio is >> that's good. >> Mate, you're working with some smart
01:44:51
people. Tell them to figure your phone out. >> Get a couple of clocks on. Um, what does
01:44:55
a good day look like for you now? Uh, a good day. >> Is it Is it >> a productive day? I think
01:45:02
>> Yeah. Is it? Oh, >> it's either like a day with customers, a day where your team wins, people do
01:45:08
stuff they didn't think they could. Um, yeah. Or just a really productive day. Um, I love to build things. I guess
01:45:18
that's the engineer in me. >> It can kind of be anything. Like I'm >> If I have friends like come help me
01:45:23
build a deck, I'm like perfect, you know, awesome. That would be it sounds like fun. So I think it's a sense of
01:45:30
achievement in those >> regards. Solving a hard problem. >> Yeah. >> If um Hannah and say your parents were
01:45:39
in the next room talking about you behind your back >> and they had to come up with three words
01:45:42
to describe you, what would you like those three words to be? >> Oh, what would I like them to be?
01:45:47
>> Well, what what do you what do you think they would be? >> Uh okay. What I think they would be
01:45:51
would be hardworking. >> We'll accept that as one. >> Yep. Yep. Sorry, that was one
01:46:04
>> with a hyphen. Uh >> you like grit >> and authentic, >> I think, would be the three. What would
01:46:15
I like them to be? >> I don't know. Yeah, that's a um >> I think they're good words, though,
01:46:23
aren't they? Yeah, I think I like I'm >> happy with them. >> Yeah, I'm happy with them. This is what
01:46:26
they are. >> Um I think actually I think I would like to be my wife Hannah is so good at being
01:46:33
a good friend. Like she is like not just to me but to her friends. That's like it's a thing that she
01:46:41
for some reason her brain's wired that way or she tries hard. Don't know what it is but she's a lot of her friends
01:46:46
would say that she's just a very good friend. For me, if I if you're not like in front of me, I just can like
01:46:52
completely forget that you exist. And so the I think you got to give yourself a a
01:47:00
pass on that. I think a lot of guys are like that, right? >> I I think so. I like when you when you
01:47:03
bump back into someone at Field Day yesterday and you bump into all these people you haven't seen in ages and it's
01:47:08
you just pick up where you left off. But part of me would like to be a better friend. Like I do think that's to the I
01:47:14
think I owe so much of my life to >> so many other people but in particular your close friend like my close friends
01:47:20
and so >> yeah it'd be I'd like to be a better friend >> if I >> oh that's cool >> could be could be anything
01:47:28
>> well it's always good to have things to work on. Yep. I got >> I think I got lots
01:47:32
>> I think there's probably like a lot of men that will listen to this podcast or
01:47:35
watch this podcast that that comment you just made like >> they'll be sitting there on Christmas
01:47:39
day and their kids will open presents and they'll have no idea what's what's underneath the wrapping.
01:47:43
>> I think that's fairly common like for guys to be a little bit I don't know unattentive I suppose when it comes to
01:47:48
being a good friend or >> Yeah, I think it's changing. But um dude that in the um someone told me this that
01:47:56
like 30 years ago it was rare for someone to say they wanted to be a good dad. I was like what really is that like
01:48:02
a >> a thing? Um like it just wasn't really a thing that dads wanted to be. It was
01:48:06
like a good dad. Like their job was different to that. It was >> Yeah. It was a provider or bread winner.
01:48:11
>> I'm like oh wow that's not even that long ago. Um obviously these days people
01:48:16
talk about being a good dad which is awesome. So >> yeah, that was a time where there was no
01:48:19
like a guy having paternity leave, it'd be like, "What? What? What? What for?" >> Yeah. Yeah.
01:48:25
>> You're not even pregnant. >> Yeah. Yeah. >> So >> yeah, I think it's changing for for the
01:48:32
better. >> That's cool. Hey, this has been fun. If if Sir Peter Beck happened to stumbled
01:48:36
across this this podcast and he watches it or listens to it and then sends you a
01:48:39
text, >> um what would you hope he says? >> Oh. >> Or what do you think he would say?
01:48:47
Uh he pro what would he say? It would be short. It would be like good podcast. It would be um what would I
01:48:58
hope he I hope he know I'm going to change your question. I hope he knows he's so
01:49:05
he's like he's clearly a guy that squeezes every inch chatter every day and I so a lot of our conversations
01:49:14
are like we will be cranking through work topics or trying to solve different problems. It's like we don't spend much
01:49:19
time stopping and reflecting. I've never walked down the beach with Peter Beck and just reflected. Um we had lunch the
01:49:26
other day and that was really cool. We were just we had a little bit of work stuff to talk about, but otherwise just
01:49:31
had a good yarn. Um, >> yeah, I hope he knows like the impact he's had on myself and Halter, but also
01:49:37
just the ecosystem in New Zealand. I think that's >> he's changed many, many more lives than
01:49:42
he probably realizes. Um, >> yeah. >> Are you proud of yourself? >> Oh, that's a good It's not It's not a
01:49:54
good question, but it's It is. Um, it's funny how people respond to that. Like a
01:49:58
lot a lot of New Zealanders and I suppose being a a farm kid from Mata Matter. Um, it feels like it's an
01:50:03
uncomfortable thing to admit if you are. >> Yeah. Do you reckon it's >> it's a Kiwi thing in a lot of ways? E.
01:50:12
>> My gut is no, but I don't know why I think that or like how to even think through that
01:50:17
>> cuz would it be a bad thing to be proud of yourself? >> Yeah, maybe. My brain thinks probably.
01:50:22
Am I proud of myself? In some ways, I feel well I just I feel like we are still so
01:50:33
early in the journey. >> So maybe I'd feel differently if you know if I was like 80 um and I'm
01:50:42
reflecting on my life and I can yeah maybe the answer would be different. So I think
01:50:50
yeah I think part maybe because I'm still on the journey we've still got so much to do. Yeah, I don't feel that. I
01:50:55
don't feel a sense of I'm extremely proud of the team >> and I'm extremely proud of Halter and
01:51:01
the impacts Halter's had and what we've accomplished and all that, but I don't know if that
01:51:07
translates to me thinking I'm proud of myself. >> And I also feel a deep sense of like
01:51:11
don't don't squander the opportunity like do not you've got we have everything we need to build a very
01:51:18
successful business. we have the investors, the capital, the team, the product, the market. Like, if we [ __ ] it
01:51:25
up, it's completely our fault. And so, >> I think this there's this like healthy
01:51:30
maybe it's a healthy paranoia on we have so much to do yet. Um, yeah, >> that makes sense. Not not resting on
01:51:42
your laurels. >> Yeah, I would like I do worry sometimes about being complacent for sure. How do
01:51:48
you keep a team hungry and not thinking that they've, you know, they're big, like too big for
01:51:54
their boots or >> Well, I love that answer. It's a great answer. Um, I would say I'm proud of you
01:52:00
like for if if nothing else, like creating as many jobs as what you've had for Kiwis like like work is so important
01:52:06
for, you know, for so many reasons like a person's self-esteem and a number of other things. And you've created how
01:52:12
many jobs? >> I guess 500. >> Yeah. >> Yeah. >> It's incredible. >> Thank you. >> That's awesome. Hey mate, this has been
01:52:18
great today. >> Thank you. >> I've I've listened to um I think just about every podcast you've done. This
01:52:23
has been um more revealing and more personal and than most of them. How's it been with you?
01:52:28
>> Yeah. >> Are you okay with it? >> Yeah, good. I think you've asked some good questions. Um I think I'm a I think
01:52:34
I'm a long form guy. Yeah. I haven't done I actually haven't done too many of these but too many long podcasts but I
01:52:39
do >> I do some for some reason I can struggle to like be really clipped and hit key
01:52:46
points and yeah >> and I I think actually credit to your clearly you've done your research you've
01:52:51
turned up with photos you know so so no I appreciate it and I do think the reason it's not my most like natural
01:52:59
thing to do but I do I try to say this to lots of people like I one of my biggest learnings with Peter
01:53:08
Beckle was watching what seemed to be like a very normal person achieve something realize he could achieve
01:53:14
something really impactful if he just worked hard cared a lot etc. And I think that's been so core to halter and and I
01:53:22
hope that's when people come up to me at halter and they want to start something
01:53:24
I'm like awesome I can go for it like there is nothing stopping you. There's nothing. You meet all these awesome
01:53:30
people overseas and in the US and sometimes we hold them up on a pedestal and they're they're just like me and
01:53:36
you, you know, they're no smarter. They're no like so I just think people realizing that you can just do stuff.
01:53:44
You are allowed like um it's not always easy and there's obviously a healthy amount of luck and whatnot, but you can
01:53:50
just give it a crack. It's allowed. Um it's fun. Uh and that's been like the story of Halter. So, if we can share
01:53:57
that, that's good. >> I think that's a good place to end it. That's a good p piece of advice. Um, I
01:54:02
think for every Kiwi kid or or adult, >> any age. Never too late to start. >> Craig Pigot, the big pig.
01:54:10
>> You got to get some business cards with that on. Hey, this has been great, mate.
01:54:13
Thank I know you're a busy man, so thank you so much for your time, eh? Really appreciate it. It's been awesome.
01:54:17
>> No, I appreciate you as well. Um, so thank you. Heat. Heat.