Building bridges

Looking back, the only constant in my career as an entrepreneur has been evolution. Entrepreneurship demands perpetual personal and professional evolution; we are forced into a state of constant adaptation and improvisation in order to survive. This evolution demands of us the humility to pivot, the ability to lead a team in the face of uncertainty, and the foolish curiosity to wander out into a storm when no one else will.

I started my first venture when I was 17, running concerts in Paris. With the funds from the concerts I started buying computers and launched A2X, a web agency. It was the beginning of the internet and we were the crazy people trying to convince everyone that they needed to build a website.

Aged 20, with a ponytail and a beard, I was absolutely convinced we would be successful – but then, no one called.

Vince Lombardi, the legendary American football coach, is noted for saying to his team “if you really want to win a game, you need to be on the field”. What I realised with A2X was that being an entrepreneur was about being on the field. No one was going to call me to build a website they didn’t know they needed, and we weren’t going to keep the lights on without any clients.

So, I got on the field. One phone call at a time we started the hard way, building the company into a success and eventually selling it to another agency. Since then I have always stayed on the field; as an entrepreneur, it is my home.

In those early days, “It’s complicated” would have been the best Facebook status to describe my own relationship with trying to make a difference in the world. Throughout grade school and then university, I had always felt torn between what I perceived as two separate spheres. I was becoming ever more involved in giving back to the community while at the same time I was discovering I had a true skill in business.

I had contemplated whether the right path was to go immediately to work in politics or a nonprofit, or instead to test my emerging passion and aptitude for business.

In the end, I choose the second path, thinking I would spend five years as entrepreneur to make money and meet the people I needed to amplify whatever difference I could make.

In reality, though, it didn’t take five years but 20. Fast forward two decades and I was a proud husband and father to three beautiful children. Now in the process of selling my fourth and fifth startups, I began to think of what would come next.

It became clear that now not only as an entrepreneur, but also as a father and a global citizen, I had to evolve again. Having spent the last 20 years in technology I decided for the first time to venture into a new field, moving from Silicon Valley to the world of social impact.

My sixth startup would be a nonprofit. The challenge was how to set off into a new field at the age of 35. What difference could I really make?

Back then I knew almost nothing about philanthropy, nonprofits, social enterprises, monitoring or any of the other wonderful things I would learn about the social sector in the years to come.

Yet, as an entrepreneur, I knew intuitively that the first step was just to get on the field. So I started knocking on doors and doing market research. One after the next I went to foundations and nonprofits saying: “Hi, I want to do some good but I need to understand what it will be”.

Not every meeting was a success, but I found amazing people who took me under their wings and, in turn, introduced me to more and more people.

This journey of discussions and research took place over a three-year period during which I was also exiting my two start-ups. As the closing of the sales edged closer, the pressure was building quickly to find a way to transition from life as a technology entrepreneur, to life as a social entrepreneur. The result was the Epic Foundation. 

At Epic Foundation, our mission is to bridge the gap between those looking to give more, and high-impact NGOs and social enterprises working to empower children and youth globally. We look to create opportunities for everyone to give and do more in support of the next generation, helping our children and youth to be ready to change our world for the better.

Our team achieves this by developing services, methodologies and technology applications that enable those looking to give more to feel confident that they can select trustworthy organisations to support – and to ensure they can truly monitor and experience the results the organisations they support are achieving.

I cover the entire operating cost of Epic Foundation, enabling 100 per cent of donations from other people and companies to go directly to organisations selected to join our portfolio.

Each year we go out looking for the world’s best organisations working to empower children and youth, and connect them to our global network of philanthropists and corporations looking to give in a more strategic and engaged way.

To identify the most impactful organisations, our team has built a new network across the world, of leading foundations, funders, and think-tanks. This enabled us to identify and receive applications from more than a thousand organisations across 85 countries in 2015.

From the favelas of Brazil, to the banlieues of Paris, to the bustle of New York and San Francisco, the slums of Mumbai, and the outskirts of Laos, we have searched to find the 20 most trustworthy, innovative, and impactful nonprofits and social enterprises.