Annie Wechter Epilogue - Three more fast paced years in the life and career of our first ever guest. From Pipoca Swimwear in Florida to Bath University and Nyobolt in Cambridge via Uganda, Brazil and the UK's biggest IPO: Arrival.

This is Episode 150 of CAREER-VIEW MIRROR. We are celebrating this milestone with a very special guest, Annie Wechter.

Annie helped us to get the podcast started and was our guest for Episode 1.

When we last spoke to Annie, she was in lockdown mode, fresh out of a world tour and taking a career break from the EV world while launching a sustainable swimwear company. She didn't sit out of the game for long. Annie joined the exciting British start-up Arrival at the end of 2020 to launch their innovative electric delivery Vans and city Buses, powered by local microfactories. After an exciting ride at Arrival, which witnessed the highest-valued IPO in UK history, followed by many twists and turns, Annie left to join a Cambridge-based battery tech company called Nyobolt this year, leading their Investor Relations activities while also pursuing a Master's degree in International Development, Social Justice and Sustainability.

In our conversation we talk about Annie's experiences and learnings from 2.5 years at Arrival, she gives us an update on the 4 months she spent this past summer in Uganda and Brazil supporting her personal social projects, we talk about her appreciation and passion for renewable energies and green tech and how she has now joined Nyobolt and enrolled on a Masters programme at Bath University in the UK.

I am proud to call Annie a friend and privileged to be able to share this latest phase of her career and life journey. As always, I look forward to hearing what resonates with you.

Connect with Annie on LinkedIn: Annie Wechter

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Episode recorded on 16 November 2023.

Transcript

Annie Wechter: 0:00

I truly believe that, you know, we have the tools to make life better for humanity. And it's not going to look the same in every country, in Europe in the US and China might be electric vehicles. And it might be hydrogen powered things massive solar fields. But in the south parts of Africa, those solutions might look different. You might be using, you know, mobile phones to pay for solar energy. For your home, you might be using drone delivery for you know, life saving necessities like blood. But I do believe that you can use technology for good, and I would love to take my path in that direction.

Aquilae: 0:43

Welcome to CAREER-VIEW MIRROR, the automotive podcast that goes behind the scenes with key players in the industry looking back over their careers to share insights to help you with your own journey. Here's your host, Andy Follows

Andy Follows: 0:57

Hello, listeners, Andy here. Thank you for tuning in. We appreciate that you do. We're also very grateful for our guests who generously join me to create these episodes so that we can celebrate their careers, listen to their stories and learn from their experiences. This is episode 150 of Career-view Mirror. We're celebrating this milestone with a very special guest. She is someone who has impressed me from the day we first met almost 10 years ago. She played a role in encouraging me and supporting me to start this podcast and she was gracious enough and courageous enough to join me to create our very first episode, which we recorded over three years ago, in October 2020. If you haven't already guessed, she is Annie Wechter. Given the level of respect and affection that we have for Annie, and the pace at which she lives her life, we knew she would be the perfect guest for this celebration episode, and that she would have plenty of new life and career experiences to update us on since our first interview with her. We were not disappointed. When we last spoke to Annie she was in lockdown mode fresh out of a world tour and taking a career break from the EV world while launching a sustainable swimwear company. She didn't sit out of the game for long, Annie joined the exciting British startup Arrival at the end of 2020 to launch their innovative electric delivery vans and city buses powered by local micro factories. After an exciting ride at Arrival, which witnessed the highest valued IPO in UK history, followed by many twists and turns, Annie left to join a Cambridge based battery tech company called Nyobolt this year, leading their investor relations activities while also pursuing a master's degree in international development, social justice and sustainability. In our conversation, we talk about Annie's experiences and learnings from two and a half years at Arrival. She gives us an update on the four months she spent this past summer in Uganda and Brazil supporting her personal social projects, we talk about her appreciation and passion for renewable energies and green tech and how she's now joined Nyobolt and enrolled on a master's programme at Bath University in the UK. I'm proud to call Annie a friend and privileged to be able to share this latest phase of her career and life journey. As always, I look forward to hearing what resonates with you. If you're listening for the first time, Hello, I'm Andy Follows. I'm a trusted adviser to senior leaders in the automotive industry. I work alongside them and their teams to enable Fulfilling Performance. Contact me if you'd like to know more. Hello Annie and welcome back. Where are you coming to us from today?

Annie Wechter: 4:06

Good morning, Andy. I'm coming to you from Bath England.

Andy Follows: 4:11

What are you doing in Bath? Tell us what you're doing in Bath.

Annie Wechter: 4:14

I am doing a master's a long awaited Master's. I've been in the corporate world for about 11 years and always wanted to go back to school and study something that interested me. And I'm studying International Development with a social justice and sustainability focus.

Andy Follows: 4:34

And when we left you because you're our first guest to come back. You don't know this yet, but you're episode 150.

Annie Wechter: 4:42

Wow. Congratulations.

Andy Follows: 4:45

We wanted to have someone extra special for our 100 and 50th episode and who better

Annie Wechter: 4:51

I'm honoured

Andy Follows: 4:52

who better than you who helped to create the podcast in the first place and was gracious enough to be our very first guest, so there will be super to get you back and find out because we recorded that episode back in October 2020. So just over three years ago, the pace you live at that happened in the world of Annie

Annie Wechter: 5:15

Seems like ages ago.

Andy Follows: 5:16

Anyone who's listened to the first episode will know that you packed quite a bit in. So three years, there's going to be quite a bit to cover. And we thought how wonderful to have an epilogue and see what's happened since we last sat down to record the episode. Now where we left off, you were in Florida, and you were launching a sustainable swimwear brand called poker. Then very quickly after that, before the end of that year, you showed up on Arrival. So let's talk about Pipoca. Let's talk about Florida. Let's talk about how Arrival happened and start there if we can.

Annie Wechter: 5:52

Sure. So I think it would be so interesting sometimes when, you know, we had our first podcast interview that fall to hear today's interview as well, or today's conversation. And you know, we'd all like that crystal ball sometimes in our life to know how Where's where's this all gonna go? Where am I because, you know, smack dab in the middle of COVID I moved to Florida, I had been travelling around the world, and a COVID hit. I had some family in Florida. So I thought well, I'll wait till this passes over Florida. So that's why I was in Jacksonville living next door to my sister. And I thought well, a passion project of mine was always to start a sustainable swimwear brand. I did that out of my house using a small garment manufacturer in Los Angeles. And that was, you know, a really exciting creative project. For me, I wanted to try my hand at a launch my own startup. But I couldn't stay out of the Eevee world for long, it seems I had connected with some old friends with co workers from Tesla, who had joined this really exciting new British EV startup called Arrival. And I saw that there are at least three or four of my good friends who are working for this company. And I thought you know, I need to I need to learn some more about this. I'm not ready to leave the EV industry completely. So I interviewed, joined Arrival in November of 2020 and was leading the FinTech area. So strategy and partnerships and really building a financial services platform to sell our commercial vehicles through or to assist large corporate fleets. And the end up being a two and a half year journey that took me from Florida to London, once COVID restrictions had lifted, that brought us back together Andy through your company Aquilae brought additional great humans from Tesla over to a rival as well, folks that you know, we all really trusted each other we know we had worked in the trenches together, we could do the impossible. So surrounding ourselves with really smart and motivated people in this Evie startup world is really important. So arrival became became my journey for two and a half years. And I only recently left in June of this year. So the journey that arrival went on, for me was an extremely important one having left Tesla about a year prior. And the reason for that was that arrival was that was solving a problem or trying to solve a problem in the commercial transportation space, which I believe makes up about 30% or more of total emissions actually come from commercial vehicles and not from passenger vehicles. So for me, it was important transition going from you know, passenger EB focus to the commercial sector, where we can make a much bigger impact by turning you know, diesel and gasoline powered delivery vans, city buses to electric. And surrounding that mission arrival. And mostly through the founder, Dennis had this vision to also improve the lives of the communities where we worked and where we deployed our vehicles. So that was doing studies around Charlotte, where the US headquarters was looking at commute times for families for women, especially for communities that were in the lower income area of the city to understand what their transportation needs were, and designing, let's say commercial electric buses to serve their needs just as much as the wealthier population commuting in and out of the city would need. So I felt that joining a company was trying to solve a much bigger emissions problem that cared about the local communities and bringing clean energy clean transportation to their communities, and then bringing green and tech jobs to those areas through the rebel microfactory approach. So not to building a centralised, giga factory that served you know the entire world, but having smaller micro factories that would build about 10,000 units outside of of London, in Oxfordshire, or outside of Charlotte, for example, training up hiring local talent. And then of course, having those local supply chains local logistics routes to deliver those vehicles to their end customer. So I really loved the vision of arrival and the two and a half years that were really fantastic and really challenging.

Andy Follows: 10:44

Yeah, that's I can say very strong reasons for joining very clear social, environmental reasons for getting on that mission after your Tesla mission. And we said that you pretty much grew up professionally. In Tesla, that was your first gig, if you like, major gig, and what did you learn in your two and a half years in Arrival,

Annie Wechter: 11:06

I learned a lot about prioritisation and staying true to your mission, I learned that it's very easy when you have extremely smart and motivated people and great IP behind you to want to solve all the world's problems. And when you try to do everything, oftentimes, it's very difficult to be successful at even a few things. So I learned the importance of prioritisation, I learned the importance of focus and keeping your teams motivated on execution. And I also learned what it meant to have thick skin and get through some crises with humanity. We went through a number of redundancy programmes, you know, where we had to inform hundreds of employees at any given time that their jobs were at risk. And in the middle of some of them in the middle of a war started between Russia and Ukraine, we had a large population that had to move from their homes and relocate to Georgia to a totally different country. And even in the middle of that having to tell them that we may not have a job for you anymore. So I was managing a lot of ups announced a lot of really exciting times when we had successful trials, successful product launches, the most successful IPO in UK history actually valued at $13 billion. So we had a lot of highs. And then in the latter years, a lot of Yeah, crisis management and understanding what it really means to be a leader in the startup environment, because it doesn't always work out with, you know, the Tesla perfect, happy ending. And how do you react? And how do you grow in those situations when things aren't going smoothly? When things are going wrong? How can you try to either rebuild? And also when do you know that it's time to take your leave?

Andy Follows: 13:07

Yeah, no, it sounds like it's sometimes there's this concept that you, you get some experience somewhere. And then people hire you to come and do what you did, can bring your experience here and use it. And it sounds to me like yeah, I'm sure you were doing that. But also, you got an awful lot more experience out of those two and a half years, maybe more than you imagined?

Annie Wechter: 13:29

Yeah, it was a great learning experience for me because I jumped from the FinTech role into more of a chief of staff role in my second year, to work alongside the president to basically help prioritise a lot of the projects that the company was managing, and to help find points of collaboration between some of the leaders that may be you know, had different ideas of what should be prioritised helping to fight fires when there were fires. And then, of course, that rule led into largely managing the restructuring process for the company, then taking on an investor relations role. Because that role opened up in the middle of everything. And then I had the experience of managing investor relations and the Nasdaq relationship for a publicly traded company, which, you know, I'd never had experience doing before. So I pulled from the toolkit from working with global partnerships with you know, working with international teams and across many different focuses of the company and try to do my best I hope I did. I hope I did a good job, but it was a massive learning experience for me, I had to you know, I was put on the spot a number of different times to solve problems I had never had experienced solving before it was wearing, you know, four or five different hats at any one time and had a lot of very stressful nights but also a lot of days where I thought okay, people are looking to me To help them or have answers, or, you know, solve this problem, if I don't do it, or if I don't give it my best shot, it may not get done, I might be the best person to give it my best shot and do so with a very human approach. So that's what I felt towards the end of my time at arrival that my role was,

Andy Follows: 15:21

yeah, let's just because that's really interesting, because I was going to ask you, as your responsibility accelerated pretty quickly as it has done throughout your career. Really, it's gone up quite a lick in terms of you taking on extra responsibility. How did you handle the pressure of that, and it sounds like you had quite a positive self talk around, well, someone's got to do this. And maybe I'm the best person around to do it. And to do it with some humanity.

Annie Wechter: 15:50

It's definitely humbling. And I think many folks have been in this position right where you say, you fake it till you make it that type of approach, you kind of swallow your pride, swallow your your fear, you take a big courageous breath, and you say, okay, as long as I trust myself to act in the best interests of the company, and act in the best interests of my fellow coworkers, that's all I can do. That's all that anyone can ask of you in that situation. I definitely also leaned on friends and colleagues of mine in the industry. I know, I've asked you for advice. In the past, I've asked some of my professional IR contacts in the industry for advice when I took on that role. And I loved to I learned this from a director of of mine at Tesla, but I would ask the dumb questions, right, the seemingly dumb questions with, you know, the the full transparency that hey, I've not done, I have never done this before, this is what I think is the right approach. Can you tell me if I'm off track? Or can you and often times whether it was, you know, the NASDAQ or whether it was, you know, a legal firm or, or the CEO, they would say, Well, that's what I would do, or, you know, that's, that's about as good a guess as any, let's, let's try that. Because all the answers. No one expects to be in, you know, some of these situations where you're trying to save, save your company. And so we're all trying things for the first time, and some of them work. Some of them don't work, but no one has all the answers. And once you accept that, and accept that, yeah, maybe you're the best person to take on this challenge. Because when you trust your abilities, you trust that you have a solid network around you that's going to help you out and do so oftentimes for free and in the middle of their own busy, hectic lives. I'll answer the phone, when you call, you'll get through it, and the people around you, your co workers will be grateful that you took on you know, a role when maybe no one else was raising their hand to pick it up.

Andy Follows: 17:49

Oh, that was stunning. What a wonderful segment, what a wonderful insight into how you navigated your way through it and the thoughts, you're having the paradigms, you had the beliefs that and you know, people will help you if I do the right thing, I'm going to do the right thing by the people by the organisation. And I can get help and ask the dumb questions or the seemingly dumb questions, and then you discover everybody else is working out for the first time as well. And they don't actually mind. So when you started describing arrival at the beginning, I was thinking, okay, there's some similarities with Tesla here in terms of going on a mission, a very purpose driven organisation, you're doing it for all the right reasons. So there's some of the similarities, if you like, in terms of the purpose, what differences and if you prefer, if you were put in chat if you had a time machine, and instead of a crystal ball, we mentioned a crystal ball earlier, if you had a time machine and could go back to the beginning of your time at arrival, what would you do differently with the knowledge that you have? Now? Would it be around focus? And was there a level of focus at Tesla that there wasn't arrival? Or?

Annie Wechter: 18:57

Yeah, well, let me answer the first part of your question, which was, how was it different? Now, when I started at Tesla is very much in the commercial sphere, I had some access to engineers. But at arrival, I became much more intimate with the technology so that we were developing, and I think that's one of the main differentiators. So within a rival, there were teams developing, you know, not just engineers developing a new vehicle platform. But there were teams developing new hardware, so all of the major high voltage and some low voltage components for the vehicle. And that was really to answer a supply chain problem that when you're in the UK, and you're in line with some of the major suppliers behind JLR, it's hard to get access even to prototypes of some of the components that you need for your vehicles. So the founder Dennis, similar in that regards to Elon because, you know, we would hear what will destroy that ourselves. And that was the answer that a rival had to some of these technical challenges. So we developed a lot of the hardware in house, we then of course, developed the software as well, that would integrate all the components. So that the vehicles were very much connected, we had traceability. So all throughout the supply chain, we then of course, had a connected vehicle that would send health signals diagnostics, outside of the vehicle to the cloud that could be used to improve the vehicles to prevent any sort of more serious accident. And then, of course, over time to be able to sell some of those software services to customers. So that was hardware software. Then one of the major innovations that rival made was actually on the body panel. And there was, you know, in the industry, you hear a lot of aluminium or aluminium and steel bodies. But for commercial vehicles, you need a lightweight, but very durable vehicle body because you're carrying a heavy battery down below. So that's going to affect your payload, how many packages what's the winter packages you can carry, and also buses, delivery vans, I mean, they're on the roads 1012 hours a day, there's a lot of low speed crashes, I don't say crashes, but dings, bumps, right? You're banging doors, I have the fender bender, until you need a very durable and flexible body panel that doesn't need to be replaced every time there's a thing doesn't have to sit in a garage, you know, having repairs over a number of weeks, those vehicles need to be up and running as much as possible. So we had a whole specialised team in house developing composite body panels, polypropylene and glass fibre composite. And we had a lot of IP surrounding those body panels, we were producing them in house and forming them into I think it was up to 100 different panels of either the van or the bus to make the body so there was no metal stamping, we didn't have to instal purchase and instal all of the heavy machinery in the factory. So the factory was very much more about, you know, moulding, these composite body panels and then assembling a vehicle. We didn't have paint shops, we didn't have, like I said this heavy Stimpson and pressing machines. So that saved a lot on on capex that saved a lot on the size of the factory that you would have to develop. And I saved a lot on the pollution, there's a lot of pollution that comes from factories, I think it's actually the most polluting part of the automotive manufacturing process. So that was a really important differential as well. And then on top of that, we had a whole robotics team that was building really cool autonomous mobile robots to deliver parts around the factory, as well as a robotics and software team that was designing the nearly autonomous micro factory operations. So you'd have very few humans, once it was up and running. Very few humans involved in the assembly process you had off the shelf robots, and tech cells forming, you know, one stage of the vehicle assembly. And then you'd have the AMRs, basically zipping around the factory floor delivering parts to the different tech cells. So all of these technologies were being developed and deployed under the arrival brand name, which was really incredible. And I you know, I didn't see all of that innovation happening at Tesla, it was very much focused on, you know, battery engineers, automotive engineers. But there was focus at Tesla, there was intense focus, everyone knew and could repeat Elans master plan, all the way up into the model three, and then he delivered his part two of the master plan. And I think, at arrival, one of the pitfalls in the second part of your question, what would I do differently? If I was there since the beginning, it would be focused on on one vehicle, I thought all those technologies coming together was really amazing. But packaging them up into the delivery van first, for example, having the delivery van delivered to customers like UPS and others, proving that your technology works, working to get your costs down so that you can bring city buses, which have, let's say, a lower relative price points. You're usually working with municipalities and local governments, and then maybe bringing the car for ride hailing drivers. But we were trying to develop all of those unique underlying technologies as well as three different vehicle platforms on two different continents. It's easy to run away with all these exciting ideas. But when you're in a growth startup mode, and a public company, you have those pressures to deliver and to execute, and to start generating revenue. And I think that's that's the biggest takeaway that I took leaving a rival and we'll carry forward is, you know, focus on your core competencies, that you're technologies that are really unique. Everything else that maybe it's not your core competency? Where can you work with partners? Or where can you outsource that, and then focus on on delivering, executing at least, you know, one, one revenue generating product or programme or service, it's much easier to expand and add more complexity into your business, it's much more difficult to try to cut off the arms and cut off the legs and slim down because that affects people fix their livelihood, it cuts costs in areas that are maybe not so easy to cut costs. So that's my fresh learning that I've been taking with me into my next organisation.

Andy Follows: 25:47

Thank you, Annie. And I think that's relevant for listeners, for all of us. Even if we're not building electric commercial vehicles, I think there's a lot of transferable insight there around focus and great that you can see the learnings and take that into your next venture. And we'll talk about your next venture. Before we do. Should we have a little update on your social project? So we talked in the first episode, we talked about Uganda, you had a fabulous story of one of your early trips there with a friend, you've since been back. So tell us a bit about what's happening in Uganda. We also talked about what's happening in Brazil, as well. So I know you've got some interesting updates on that. Let me take a moment to tell you about our sponsor. This episode is brought to you by ASKE Consulting who are experts in Executive Search, Resourcing Solutions and Talent Management across all sectors of the automotive industry in the UK and Europe. I’ve known them for almost 20 years, and I can think of no more fitting sponsor for CAREER-VIEW MIRROR. They're the business we go to at Aquilae when we're looking for talent for our clients and for projects that we're working on. ASKE was founded by Andrew McMillan whose own automotive career includes board level positions with car brands and leasing companies. All ASKE consultants have extensive client-side experience which means they bring valuable insight and perspective for both their employer and candidate customers. My earliest experience of working with Andrew was in 2004 when he helped me hire Regional Managers for my leasing sales team at Alphabet. More recently, when Aquilae was helping a US client to establish a car subscription business, ASKE Consulting was alongside us helping us to develop our people strategy and identify and bring on board suitable talent. Clients we've referred to ASKE have had an equally positive experience. Andrew and the team at ASKE are genuinely interested in the long-term outcomes for you and the people they place with you. They even offer the reassurance of a 2-year performance guarantee which means they have‘skin in the game’ when working with you. If you're keen to secure the most talented and high potential people to accelerate your business and gain competitive advantage, do get in touch with them and let them know I sent you. You can email Andrew and the team at hello@askeconsulting.co.uk or check out their website for more details and more client feedback at www.askeconsulting.co.uk . ASKE is spelt A S K E You’ll find these contact details in the shownotes for this episode. Ok, let’s get back to our episode.

Annie Wechter: 28:27

So I left Arrival like I said in June, and I spent four months between Uganda and Brazil. So I wanted to get back on the ground to some of the projects that I work with in those two countries. So I started in Kampala in June. And I spent time with the youth group that I started working with four years ago just before COVID. So right before we had first spoken, I had been back one time before and what happened this year what what was really interesting with that group, when I first met them in 2019, there was about 20 street kids who weren't in school either had been abandoned or orphaned. And were living together in a in a shack it it had rats it leaked water, when it rained was just really terrible living conditions. And since that time, we had worked to put them in school, put them into a rented house. So we found the had enough beds for all the kids and then got them on a food budget so that they had, you know, two to three healthy meals a day. And then of course some other projects throughout the last four years such as getting them a van to drive the kids around certain medical, you know, situations would come up with they would need medical bills paid and whatnot. But it was very much a personal project because I had met these kids and their manager who was you know, in his early 20s. It was just a personal very familiar project. There's no NGO involved

Andy Follows: 29:58

Manager So are you saying manager, it's an interesting word,

Annie Wechter: 30:03

he calls him. So he calls himself, the manager manager, because well, he's the oldest, he's the coordinator for all the kids. But he also teaches them or he coaches them in football and in acrobatic dance. So they call him coach or manager, Moses, and he's worked with the local, you know, municipality, the police to register all the kids that that stay with them, you know, human trafficking is a big problem. And parts of Africa and Uganda is actually outlawed orphanages, really to protect children from being trafficked outside of the country. So it's very important that he is the manager has all of the kids that stay with him that go to school registered permission of any living, parent or relative. So while it's not a an official, you know, nonprofit or NGO, we've made sure that, you know, the group is very much in his has his oversight, and I also support and the approval of the local municipality. But that group has grown, I mean, from 2019 was 20. They're now 55. And most start with within the age range of 10 to 12 years old, but there are some as young as five, and the oldest are in their early 20s. But they help with the coaching and they help with, you know, the cooking and just taking care of all the kids, one of their sort of shining achievements is that they make these really cute dance videos on Tiktok, and Instagram, and whatnot. And they got the attention of some big Brazilian Popstar earlier this year, and blew up on social media. So I think now they have something like 3 million followers. And of course, with that comes a lot of good attention also on unwanted attention. So there were you know, many people wanting to promote them or wanted them to travel to their country and perform for them. But these are minor kids, they've never been an aeroplane, they don't even have passports. And then others wanted to donate out how can we donate to help these kids. So I was reluctant at first to, you know, have this project grow sort of out of my reach, and start accepting donations from foreigners. Because then there comes, of course, a big responsibility to report on how the funds are being used and make sure that you know, the funds are actually going towards what the kids needed. So we did in the ad, set up a GoFundMe page and raised a decent amount of money. But I felt that I needed to be back in Uganda to make sure that, you know, we maximise the use of that funds for really sustainable projects that the kids would always have, you know, to support them, for example, getting a house of their own getting a piece of land of their own to build, you know, proper Athletic Academy, and slowly build a house that would always be there, so no one can take away. So I decided when I was leaving a rival that I would go spend some time there and manage the funding of some of these projects. So I did that. We did succeed in buying about an acre and a half of land. We started to clear the land so that we could put a football pitch and start building a house there. I visited the kids school, we went on some really fun day trips to the waterpark. There's a waterpark in Kampala, to the zoo to the movies there first time to the movies. So I tried to do a mix of you know, organising projects with Moses, but also just doing fun things with the kids. That was really tough, though, as well. I mean, because like I said, not working with an NGO, it's, it's myself, it's Moses, and then it's about 55 kids who are looking to you to have all the answers and, and organise, you know, these important aspects of their life. So, while I was there, I was reaching out to a friend of mine that was on your show actually, Nav Sawnhey from The Washing Machine Project and sharing some of some of the stressors that I was having being on the ground in Uganda getting projects done, bypassing some of the, you know, corruption that's present in the government and trying to get, you know, meetings to happen on time, trying to ensure that funds were being used appropriately and not, you know, misused or stolen even. And he shared his experience about doing a master's in international development and humanitarianism at the University of Bath. And I started to think I was like, you know, I would really love to have the skills and the tools and the historic knowledge of international development and philanthropy to know how it could really have a lasting impact in the lives of these kids. And now the other commend terian type work I would do in the future, because I feel like I'm flying by the seat of my pants and I'm not doing this all that, well, things are getting done, but I don't feel like I really know what I'm doing. So, now I've had had recommended that check out the international development master's programme at Bath. And while I was in Uganda I applied, I applied for the fall semester that started in October, I got him probably thanks to a letter of recommendation that never wrote for me. But yeah, I've been studying here in Bath for about the last six weeks and just loving that programme.

Andy Follows: 35:29

Amazing, inspirational as ever. And a and I mean, what a contrast from being Chief of Staff, right? We're not really a contrast, just fascinating. All of the things that you are juggling there, to then being in Uganda, and you and Moses and 55 kids and working out as you go along and doing amazing work. And I also think it's fascinating how your kids dams post blew up in Brazil, where of course you also have spent time and some project there as well. Is there anything to say on Brazil?

Annie Wechter: 36:05

Yes, but so I left Uganda and I went to Brazil and because of this Popstar, his name is Lou Santana, in Brazil, his management team and then the largest TV network in Brazil TV global was reaching out to Moses and the kids. And there was a bit of a language gap between the English and the Portuguese. And so Moses would have those conversations to me like Getty Please, can you can you arrange this? Can you talk to them, they want an interview, or they want to, they want us to come to Brazil. So I began to work with the management team back in Brazil to see if we could get the besides and arrange a show for them in Brazil. So I got to use some of my Portuguese skills, which was quite fun. And when I went to Rio de Janeiro, in July, falling Uganda, I met with some of the producers of the TV show, we started working on on the visa process as well, which is quite extensive, especially when you're dealing with minors and so until now, because I'm not going to Brazil, but that relationship just basically opened up a massive, international, you know, fan base and support group for they're called the hyperscale, or the hyper skids in Uganda. So I've always given the Brazilian community and they have sent on a massive amount of thanks and praise for you know, giving these kids a brighter future. And it just happened that these are two places where I spend a lot of my my free time and have a soft spot in my heart for. So I thought that was you know, just the universe sort of smiling down in helping me connect some of the dots in my life.

Andy Follows: 37:45

I thought it was Yeah, incredibly serendipitous given because we talked about your time that you'd spent in Brazil in the first conversation. And so for your two projects, your two areas, your two parts of the world where you've been spending time to be able to be connected in this way seemed amazing. Also, you said during the first conversation, we were, you know, letting ourselves have some fun, I think about what you'd ultimately like to do. And you talked about building a community and you know, perhaps it will be, you know, small didn't have to be a whole new city, but it's a community and I had the sense that when you were describing, you know, the product lamb that you've been able to purchase or eaten up to help the kids purchase that's going in that direction, isn't it? You're it's manifesting after you put it out there.

Annie Wechter: 38:34

Yeah, it is. And I think that the combination with the work that I do in, let's say the green tech space, so EVs I'm not working in, in the battery industry. I also have a you know, a deep appreciation and passion for renewable energies and solar. Plus with a master's which is focused on international development with a very, very much a lens of social justice and community. How do you improve the lives of communities and people in developing nations, having one foot in each of those worlds I think is really important to match. Technology's primarily in what we call in historical sense, the global north with the needs and opportunities and primarily the global south to help some of these communities really leapfrog you know, existing infrastructure and pain points that they have today. I think I've often used the example of a company I really admire, which is zipline. Zipline is a drone delivery company, a Silicon Valley company, but they ran their first drone delivery programmes in Rwanda, and then Ghana, delivering emergency blood supply to local hospitals within a certain radius, using WhatsApp to order the blood, a small refrigerated you know, blood labs and then the drone delivery service. To deliver the emergency blood to those hospitals, where, you know, road conditions were poor poor, were the grid reliability. So the refrigeration at each of those local hospitals, I reliability was poor. And so either blood supply would would go bad, or they wouldn't have exactly the blood type that they needed. And so the centralised distribution centre that zipline developed was super quick, it was really cheap, because you didn't have to develop the roads and then get the trucks or the refrigerated vans to then deliver the blood, right, you leave out a lot of that classical development work by using new technology, and a much simpler solution. So looking forward to where I believe my journey is going, we'll always have one foot in the tech world because I I truly believe that, you know, we have the tools to make life better for humanity. And it's not going to look the same in every country, in Europe in the US and China might be electric vehicles. And it might be hydrogen powered things massive solar fields, but in the cell, the parts of Africa, those solutions might look different. You might be using, you know, mobile phone to pay for solar energy for your home, you might be using drone delivery for you know, life saving necessities like blood. But I do believe that you can use technology for good. And I would love to take my path in that direction. Rather than, you know, just delivering more and more EVs to the masses, I would love to take that experience, take some new tools and historic understanding through this master's and come out the other side with some proposals, some ideas about how to match these new green technologies with needs on the ground in some of these poor areas, and help them to jump decades or hundreds of years ahead of where they are today.

Andy Follows: 42:09

The image I have of you it's I'm imagining a picture of you. And it's cut right down, there's a line right down the middle on one side, there's you in the highest tech environment, the cutting edge with your chief of staff, your investor relations suit on but down the middle, there's this line. And then on the other side, there's you and your foot is actually on the soil, you talked about, you know, feet on the ground, your foot is very much on the ground, some dusty ground somewhere in Africa, and you've got whatever you were when you're in Africa being inspiring over there. And you're just so balanced in terms of yes, I'm going to be at the cutting edge. But you're also incredibly grounded. And you're not just doing tech for tech sake, you're doing tech because you recognise as you say that we could use this to help accelerate the development of these areas, decades or or hundreds of years ahead. So it sounds like you're very grounded, you're very balanced at it, does it feel like that? Do you feel you've got some power from that, and some stability, and you know where you're going.

Annie Wechter: 43:17

It's a very beautiful picture you've painted. Andy so thank you for that. But I think the the reality is always a bit more messy than that. On the tech side of things, the world is moving so fast, to even become an expert in your industry, you know, and I don't claim to be an expert in EVs or batteries by any means. But even to go, you know, deep into your your core area of technology, you'll never fully understand all of the applications that it can it can solve. It never seems like we can move fast enough to get our new technology into production and then into the hands of customers before it's changing again, and you have to adapt again. And then on the humanitarian side. There's a lot of criticisms on that side, too, from humanitarian and aid work to NGOs, to political alignment, even of the World Bank and the UN and our national governments. Neither half of that coin has easy solutions and are never so cleanly aligned. But I really love that idea that, you know, half my world could be in helping to, you know, spur the continuous development of these fantastic technologies, but do so in a way that brings up the communities that you're even extracting from right, that's a whole nother topic, but making sure that you're not just taking from or exploiting the communities that you need to develop these new green technologies, but that you're bringing them along the ride. You're empowering them to have the training to hold the jobs to have ownership of their land rights and their water rights and have a Say in in the environmental projects like reforestation, and a lot of the carbon offset projects that are being developed in South America and Africa as well. There's a lot of harm that happens on the ground, when you say, you know, when you put your feet on the ground, and you look around the green tech, you know, revolution, and the advancements that we're making in Europe, and the US and China have consequences in some of these poor countries as well. So we can't just be the the, you know, I applied to myself to I don't want to be that white Saviour, I don't want to look down on these poor nations and say, Oh, well, we'll teach you we'll bring all the technologies to you, because as I'm learning with a lot of humbleness, is we've created a lot of the problems, you know, we're creating the the emissions problems, we've created a lot of the environmental problems around the world, and now we're trying to fix them. And I believe it's possible, but we should include the communities on the ground that are being, you know, impacted the worst that are most vulnerable to climate change, include them in the solutions, let their voice you know, guide us what do they need? How do they want their land to be used? And how can we train them in the technologies that we might be developing and then put those technologies in their hands and give them autonomy to manage their their nations as well. But in partnership, we can learn a lot from one another, and act as one global community?

Andy Follows: 46:34

Yes. So it's not a simple yes, Andy I've got it all figured out. Now, I'm completely balanced. It's a bit more nuanced than that. It's a bit more complex, it's a bit more messy. However, it brought me back to your point earlier about, maybe I haven't got it figured it out yet. But maybe I'm still the best person to be doing this. Out of those available, maybe I'm the best. And I'm at least my in my hearts in the right place. And I'm going to take care of the people who should be taken care of on the way. So should we talk a little bit about what you're doing now then, and how you come to be working at Nyobolt.

Annie Wechter: 47:13

Sure. Well, like many aspects of my story goes back to a great co worker and relationship at Tesla. I know the CFO of Nyobolt reached out to me as I was departing Arrival, and invited me to come visit Nyobolt and take a look at what they're doing in the battery innovation space out of Cambridge. So one of the first things that attracted me to Nyobolt is that they have a woman founder, a scientist by the name of Professor Claire Grey, out of Cambridge, she discovered some really groundbreaking attributes in the anode, chemistry area of batteries, developments that enable really ultra fast charging capabilities and unlocked opportunities in some commercial industry. So there are EV applications for sure. But the company is really focused on commercial opportunities, where machines or robots or even commercial trucks, like mining trucks, for example, need really high uptime. And even with the fastest, you know, superchargers, or public chargers today, if you need to refill a battery from empty to full, you, you're still looking at 3040 minutes, whereas our battery chemistry allows for super fast like five minute recharges. So again, it's it's that thread through the commercial industries, those high uptime, that those machines, those vehicles that are running, you know, nearly, you know, 24 7365 and moving those more polluting machines and vehicles to an electric solution. So I'm really fascinated by that aspect of the company. I've also never worked on the battery side of the industry before it was always on the the Eevee or sort of the end use case and supplying the batteries from external sources. So I'm learning a whole new side of the business and technology which I love learning and so that's been really fascinating for me, and maybe I'm a glutton for punishment, but I really love this early stage girl the startup phase when you don't have the crystal ball but you have a team of really passionate and dedicated individuals who Yeah, who have big plans and a lot of energy to see our products out in the real world. So it's been a fun journey. It's only been I'm in month five now leading investor relations. So understand the technology so that I can tell the story appropriately to the public and to investors is my my role. But yeah, I've really been enjoying it. The team is Fantastic. And yeah, I've been grateful for the opportunity to stay in the industry. While you know, allowing me to study the team has been really understanding about me holding flexible hours while I finished my masters this year. So, yeah, it's been a good move.

Andy Follows: 50:16

Yeah. And how are you finding, working and studying at the same time,

Annie Wechter: 50:21

I'm used to always juggling a number of priorities, and I find that it helps me be very disciplined. In my time management, especially when I'm moving cities, I spend about a third of the weekend bath when I have lectures. And then I spend one or two days in Cambridge, to be in the office. And then I usually stop home in London for maybe a weekend, see some friends and kind of do some laundry, basically. So it's, it's busy, it's an interesting logistical challenge, but it keeps you know, it keeps me very disciplined with the school and the work. And because like I said, I find that the subject matter is very relevant to one another. One often informs the other. So I have a lot to say about, you know, the Green Revolution in my in my lectures, let's just put it that way.

Andy Follows: 51:21

Yeah, I'm sure you're able to bring a lot of experience and thought to, to those conversations and a lot of value to your cohort. Is there anything else we should touch on? So that's what you're doing? Now? Is it appropriate to talk about the direction you see yourself going in from here, as much as you're comfortable to share?

Annie Wechter: 51:43

Well, I'm postponing any new big life moves or changes for a year. I think that's a beautiful thing about being back in school, so I can't move anywhere for a year. And I need that rounding sometimes, as you you know me very well. So I'm not planning any new big life moves for for some time. But I do hope that, you know, when this master's has, has finished, I've written my dissertation that I can find ways whether it's, you know, through nybble, or another project, find ways to bring new sustainable technologies to the communities that are most vulnerable, and that could benefit the most from it. So whether it's batteries powering certain tools, or vehicles, and parts of Africa, or whether it's doing something on the renewable energy side, or maybe after the end of the Masters, maybe it will be something more in in policy work and influencing change. But I think you know, where my heart is, and where my skill sets are, I truly believe that working within the industry, working within tech companies, you can actually make a lot of positive change from within. Rather than being you know, on the outside as maybe a researcher or policymaker, or even, you know, in an NGO, you are, you have some ability, say some you have quite a lot of ability to influence change and change laws and change labour practices, for example. But I think we all can start by looking within ourselves and looking within our companies to see where we can make positive change. So I anticipate that I will stay within more of the the corporate setting, but with a more enhanced focus on sustainable development in emerging economies. That's really where my, my heart lies. And so I imagine if we have this, you know, another chat for episode 300. And another couple of years, maybe I'll be sitting, you know, and in that type of role,

Andy Follows: 53:56

yeah, let's look forward to that. But we're not let's not wish our lives that way. But I will definitely be following your journey, continue to follow your journey with delight and see how you're doing because we also talked about the second mountain, didn't we? We talked about the book. And I have a sense that you're just getting clearer and clearer, even though it's you haven't got it all figured out yet, as none of us do. You're at least gaining clarity and gaining momentum. And as you go up that second mountain. So thank you so much, Annie, for joining me. Again, I think it's exciting that we're here celebrating 150 episodes, that you were part of the very beginning of it. And I'm really grateful for that. And I look forward to staying connected.

Annie Wechter: 54:45

Thank you so much, Andy, always a pleasure to speak with you. And I'm really proud of you and this podcast. You've brought so many inspirational voices to your platform and we're all connecting with one another learning from one another. So Thank you. It's been a pleasure to be on.

Andy Follows: 55:06

You've been listening to CAREER-VIEW MIRROR with me, Andy Follows depending on your unique life experience of where you find yourself right now and your personal goals, you'll have your own takeaways from Annie's life and career update. Some elements that stood out for me were Annie's paradigms and approach to taking on significant new responsibilities that arrival and all the learnings she's taken away from her two and a half years there. And I'm always struck by the energy, humanity and humility she continues to bring into her work, her social projects, and her continuous pursuit of learning and self development. I'm proud to be able to share and his latest experiences and learnings with you. If you'd like to connect with an eight we'll put her LinkedIn contact details in the show notes to this episode. If you enjoy listening to my guest stories, please could you do me a favour and share an episode with someone you lead parents or mentor? Or perhaps a friend of yours who you think would also enjoy listening? Thank you to Annie for joining me for our conversation. Thank you to our sponsors. For this episode, ask consulting and Aquilae and thank you to the CAREER-VIEW MIRROR team without whom we wouldn't be able to share our guests life and career stories. And above all, thank you to you for listening