What3Word's 57 trillion 3m squares | Chris Sheldrick

In this episode of Nothing Ventured, host Aarish Shah sits down with Chris Sheldrick, co-founder and CEO of What3Words the global addressing system that assigns three unique words to every 3-metre square on Earth. Originally inspired by the challenges of organising live music events and directing crews to remote locations, What3Words has grown into a global platform used by businesses, delivery companies, emergency services, and major partners like Intel and Mercedes. Timestamps: 00:00 Introduction to Chris Sheldrick & What3Words 00:46 The problem with traditional addresses 02:23 Addressing challenges around the world 04:09 The origin story: from music events to What3Words 07:59 Preventing location mistakes with word combinations 10:19 Building network effects for global adoption 12:07 How AI fits into What3Words 14:34 Why postcodes don’t work for navigation 18:33 The maths behind 64 trillion locations 22:40 The psychology of adoption 25:18 How delivery companies are using What3Words 28:58 Solving addressing problems in developing countries 33:24 Is What3Words a utility? 34:42 The vision for global adoption 36:40 Chris’s contrarian view on hiring globally 41:22 What moves Chris emotionally: music 🎵 FindChris Sheldrick online at: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrissheldrick1/ Twitter:https://x.com/ChrisSheldrick What3Words: https://what3words.com This episode is sponsored by EmergeOne, fractional CFOs for venture backed tech startups from Seed to Series B. Get in touch at https://emergeone.co.uk/contact-us/ or join the CFO team at https://emergeone.co.uk/join-the-cfo-team/ Sign up for EmergeOne’s weekly newsletter, Off Balance at https://off-balance.beehiiv.com/subscribe Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See https://pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.