Company: Dent Reality
Stage: Seed
Headcount: 6
Warm intro from Zain Khawaja (#020)
Tell us your story
I'm the co-founder of Dent Reality, an AR mapping start-up that's building the digital layer for the physical world (see a 1 minute video here).
I grew up in London before studying Politics, Philosophy and Economics at Oxford University. I'd always been interested in start-ups, entrepreneurship and the prospect of building something from the ground up, likely against all the odds.
But I wanted to take my shot at the right time; when I'd gained the skills I'd need to be successful as a founder and when the right opportunity was in front of me.
After university, a lot of my friends went straight into banking and law but I took a slightly different path, joining the UK's biggest charity Cancer Research UK. I spent five incredible years there working with an astonishingly sharp team in strategy and operations. I learnt how to think through tough problems, how to influence decision makers, how to develop financially and commercially robust strategies in a number of different areas - all while driving projects bringing in hundreds of millions of pounds for a cause I believed in.
In 2019, the time felt right to make the jump into the start-up world. It had become increasingly clear from listening to the likes of Tim Cook and Mark Zuckerberg that building the next generation of Augmented Reality wearables was the biggest bet Big Tech was making. AR is set to be the third great wave of technology change. In the 2000s, the internet gave us access to the world's information; in the 2010s, smartphones enabled us to communicate with anyone, anywhere, instantly; and in the 2020s, AR will completely transform the way we interact with the physical world.
So I joined forces with Andrew, my co-founder who'd already achieved some phenomenal things in the space (such as building the largest open source library on Apple's ARKit), to form Dent Reality. We're building the world's first true "smart spaces" with our AR navigation, mapping and positioning technology.
Dent Reality's journey has started with grocery retail and we currently have a development partnership with Marks & Spencer, but this is just the beginning. In the not too distant future, providing a frictionless digital experience in a physical location will become as essential for every business as having a website is today.
Tell us a story that has really resonated with you
A podcast I listened to a few years ago about why humans make bad decisions, even when they know they're wrong, has always stuck with me.
Wilt Chamberlain was one of the greatest basketball players of all time, even scoring 100 points in a single game at one point, a record that's never been broken. He was dominant in almost every way but had one weakness: shooting free throws. This meant Wilt's opponents could foul him without worrying about him scoring from the resulting free throw, which to some extent neutralised Wilt's impact on the game.
Eventually, Wilt decided to try a different way of shooting free throws. Instead of shooting overhand (like the vast majority of basketball players), he switched to underhand free throws - also known as the “granny shot”.
The result? His conversion percentage radically increased. But despite the improvement, Wilt went back to his original technique and his conversion percentage dipped again. There was no rational reason for Wilt to switch back but his decision was driven by desire for social approval. He said as much in his autobiography: "I felt silly…. I know I was wrong … I just couldn’t do it."
It's a great reminder that reason isn't enough when it comes to human decision making, and people make choices based on what those around them think, even when they know it's wrong.
What can't you stop thinking about?
As a deep tech company, what's the right balance between exploratory R&D work that’s high risk, high reward vs incremental improvements to our technology and product?
If I could tell you just one thing...
My one piece of advice would be to think probabilistically.
Humans have evolved to think in black and white with heuristics that help us make rapid, confident judgements - i.e. something either will happen or it won't happen. This served us well when survival was the species' number one priority but isn't so great for the complicated world we inhabit now. Thinking probabilistically about different possible outcomes is one of the most helpful things you can do to make better decisions.
I got a headstart on this front from playing a lot of poker as I grew up. It drilled into me the importance of understanding key assumptions, how they impact the odds of different outcomes, and how to judge decisions based on the information that was available at the time, rather than purely on the end result.
If you could get a warm intro to anyone in the world, who would it be and why?
Two people who have done more than most to help the world think probabilistically.
Philip Tetlock - author of ‘Superforecasting’ and one of the leading academics in the science of prediction. His research famously showed that the average expert forecaster performs no better than a 'dart-throwing chimpanzee' and his book is packed with tips on how you can do better.
Nate Silver - election forecaster who's always interesting to listen to across politics, sport, and pretty much every topic.