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Bruce Talley is an American entrepreneur and frontier market strategist who has spent decades operating in opaque, rapidly changing environments from Russia’s Black Sea coast to Brazil and now Ukraine. He built the largest destination services company at the Sochi Olympics, navigated direct FSB scrutiny, and today is helping global investors access deeply discounted Ukrainian residential markets through the Ukraine Prime Property Fund. In this episode, Bruce shares hard earned lessons on operating in post Soviet systems, spotting opportunity in chaos, and why he believes Ukraine is one of the most compelling markets of the next decade.

In this episode we cover:

• (00:00:00) Bruce’s path from US capital markets to frontier markets
• (00:10:40) Life under the FSB and the moment he knew he had to leave Russia
• (00:22:48) Building Destination Sochi from zero to the largest Olympic services provider
• (00:26:52) Why he reoriented to Ukraine and the thesis behind the Ukraine Prime Property Fund
• (00:40:29) Kyiv as the next great European city and advice for young MBAs

Link to Ukraine Property Fund: www.ukraine-capital.com

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Victor Abou Rahal is a veteran digital transformation and tech leader in the GCC, with more than 25 years helping traditional industries go digital. He is now CEO of Narovate, a Saudi based startup focused on digital water solutions, after leading Boxit For Me through a successful exit and building the digital arm at ADNOC Distribution. In this conversation, Victor shares what he has learned about leadership, exits, and entrepreneurship across oil and gas, logistics, and now water in one of the fastest changing regions in the world.

In this episode we cover:

(00:01:59) How Victor went from computer science student and a night support at an Internet Service Provider to launching his first web development company baddak.com, inheriting 80 clients overnight, then moving to Dubai to lead regional digital transformation projects

(00:03:36) The Boxit4Me journey, using the people, process, platform framework to stabilise a COVID boosted logistics startup, clean up operations, and successfully prepare it for a strategic exit

(00:06:47) Why being a startup CEO felt like a second MBA, constantly switching hats between HR, operations, finance, legal, shareholders, and M&A, and what he now tells first time CEOs about the reality of the role

(00:11:10) How his leadership style evolved through INSEAD’s Global Executive MBA, two decades in the Boy Scouts, and hard lessons about empathy and communication in the tough leadership culture of parts of the Arab world

(00:16:38) The most common founder blind spots he sees when mentoring startups, from hiding in their comfort zone and over focusing on product to underestimating market fit, scalability, competition, mental health, and the choice between lifestyle business and scale up

(00:21:28) His advice for moving from corporate to entrepreneurship in the GCC, why investors prefer 2 or 3 complementary cofounders, how to test yourself as an intrapreneur first, and why resilience and health are non-negotiable

(00:29:16) Why he chose to lead Nerovate in Saudi, how Vision 2030 is reshaping the startup ecosystem, and his belief that sustainability and profitability can reinforce each other when you build the right digital water solutions for the region

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Kevin Carter is the founder of EMQQ Global and a leading voice in emerging markets investing. In his first appearance, he broke down the investment case for digital consumption in emerging markets. In this follow-up episode, Kevin returns fresh from a month-long trip to India, where he went beyond the usual business hubs to explore tier 2 and tier 3 cities, the infrastructure transformation, and why India might be the most compelling EM story of the next two decades.

In this episode we cover:

• (00:01:30) What Kevin saw firsthand in Uttar Pradesh and Ahmedabad that made him more bullish on India’s tier 2 and 3 cities
• (00:06:52) The rise of entrepreneurship in smaller cities and why the next unicorns may come from beyond IITs and IIMs
• (00:12:41) How India Stack digitized over a billion lives and added trillions in hidden infrastructure value
• (00:24:42) The explosion of quick commerce in India and why it may disrupt not only kirana stores but also Flipkart and Amazon
• (00:36:46) Why Mumbai’s infrastructure boom rivals what Kevin saw in China 20 years ago
• (00:41:59) Why you need to visit India to understand its transformation and how old stereotypes are holding back global perception

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