The Fintech Founder Who’s Changing the Game for African SMEs – The Untold Story of Zazu

If you look at our banking, possibly in South Africa but also across the continent has evolved, there's been very little innovation. The apps look exactly the same since 20 years ago. Every now and then, I stood across someone who was not just building a business, but rewriting the rules of an entire industry. Jonner is one of those people. At a time when African S&E is often underserved, underbanked and often invisible to traditional financial systems, he's made a decision most wouldn't dare to, to build a new bank for the overlooked. In this conversation, Jonner shares the truth behind building Gaza. It protects that form designed to keep African entrepreneurs, the financial infrastructures they've been denied for decades. He opens up about failure, a mental toll of startup life. What no one tells you about raising capital and why simplicity, not complexity, is the future of banking under continent. This isn't a conversation about hype, it's about hardship, about vision, about how one founder is putting African S&E on the financial map, one transaction at a time. This is Jonner, and this is the ambition diaries. Welcome to the ambition diaries, and we spoke about what the goal in the purpose of the ambition diaries is. For those that don't know who you are and what you do, could you just explain to the audience what it is that you do? Yeah. No, no. Thanks, first of all, Tom, for taking me pleasure being here. My name is Jama. I'm originally from Belgium, and I spend the past almost decades in the European FinTech space. At the crossroad of banking, finance, and technology, where I had part in the early models or the pioneers of a lot of FinTech names that you may be familiar with, like some revolutes, like some filler bank, like some solaris bank, which are companies that were some of the first sort of first ones to digitalize the traditional models that we knew around banking and finance. After having been part of that wave of digital banking players, I wanted to take the knowledge and experience that I had developed in a matured market that Europe has become into a continent where I felt there was so much more to be built, and where the disruption when it comes to financial services had yet to fully take in place. And this is where I landed in South Africa, where we are building currently Zazu, which is a digital bank, specifically for businesses. So all the way from first-time entrepreneurs to freelancers to scaling businesses. So what has been around nine months now that we've been building Zazu? Well, okay. And so people go into entrepreneurship for three reasons only. So whether it is their past profession, their past pain, and their passion, what was it for you that caused you to go into entrepreneurship? Yeah, good point, good course actually. I think it's a mix of both. One, it's it's passion, right? For I would say passion for impact, right? I think when you work for corporate, I think there's a lot of good things working in corporate, and it feels very comfortable, but I think there's a lack of sometimes impacts on the organization. Within the organization, when you work for a thousand employees organization, you definitely have less impact than when you work for startup, and also in terms of some time to a certain point to the society around you, right? And I think what I liked about about Zazu specifically is that while we were solving for sort of convenience and efficiency in Europe, right? I felt that in Africa, in South Africa, you actually solving for, for, you know, actual problems, right? And helping in this case of Zazu, banking better, a lot of the business owners. So that's the first one. And I think also in terms of pain, I would say that, you know, we've, we've ourselves setting up our business here. We realize the pain it is to actually open up a business bank account here in South Africa, and many other jurisdictions in Africa, and the tons of paperwork, sort of the outdated and clunky and multi-step processes. So I think part of it is also having experienced that pain, initially in Europe a few years ago, but now in in South Africa, wanted to really solve it and, and, and make the whole process much more efficient, so that's us as business owners, but any other business owners can actually focus on, on building their business and running their business. Yeah. Okay. That makes a lot of sense. And why financial technology? I mean, you could have pulled anything. Why choose something as tar technical and regulated as banking? Well, I, my background was in, was in finance. I think, you know, I've been studied in the US. I had seen sort of the, and, and afterwards, Europe, I had seen the impact that financials, that feel tech, right, that the technology part of, entering financial services, I saw the impact that it could have. So I think that's something that really passionate me about, about the, the impact that tech can have in, in, in industry that has been sort of running the same for, for decades, right? I think that's the first piece of it. The second piece of it is, if you look at, you know, many industries, right, if you look at the way we, we, we, we, all the food online, the way we, we look for apartments for heavy and the, the way we, we, we, we, we move, right through Uber's, the way we communicate through WhatsApp and so on. Everything has been every areas of our, of our, of our life has been sort of disrupted by me, by companies that didn't exist maybe 20 years ago, right? The only two areas that have, that sort of were left behind when it comes to full disruption, was banking and healthcare, right? So I think if you look at the streets where there's a lot of, a lot of models that can be reshaped, that can be re-tank, re-topsery, financial services is, is, is a major one. And, and again, if you look at our banking, particularly in South Africa, but, but also across the continent, has evolved, there's been very, very little innovation, the, the apps look exactly the same since 20 years ago. So I think that's what I liked about, about technology applied to financial services. There's so much more that can be do, that can be done. Yeah. So would you say you basically the pioneer of the industry that you are in right now? I would say in, in, in, on the continents, I would say we were one of the sort of first models that's that applies to, to business banking. The, the model is not new, right? We've seen it. We were part of building some of the first models in Europe. If you, if you look up, the likes of Konto, Penta in Germany tied in the UK. And now afterwards, you had similar models in the US Mercury is becoming also a very well known in the start of worlds. And then you started having very similar models across different developed markets and slowly in developing markets. We felt that in, in Africa and part of the South Africa, there was no one that we, we saw certain, certain companies like Yoko, like, like Lula, right, tackling specific areas of, of business banking, including landing payment acceptance. If you look at peach payments, online e-commerce, but no one has came in with a sort of redefining the business bank account itself, not just payments, not just like what the everyday banking should look like. And nobody has sort of, we started to re-bundle a lot of these tools that have came in, right? If you think about it, the journey of a business owner in South Africa, they open their accounts, FNB or net bank or whatever. They still have to build a relationship with peach. They still have to, if they want to accept payments online, they still have to develop a relationship with Yoko. They want to accept payments physically. They still have to develop maybe a relationship with an international payment providers likewise to accept or send money to abroad, right? So the idea behind Zazoo is to start re-bundling all of these services into a single interface, right? So in that sense, I think we are one of the pioneers. Okay. So just tapping into failure has there been any pain points that you've experienced implementing Zazoo to start to Africa as a continent? And what sort of state are you taking towards solving those pain points? Yeah, no, but look, failure is, I remember a conversation with a friend of mine before starting this venture and he asked me, why would you want to step into entrepreneurship? Entrepreneurship is your constantly failing, he said. And I didn't factor that in until you actually give the journey. And I guess that's the beauty of it, if you will, is that every single day is different, but you constantly face failure, right? But you know, if you look at it from an optimistic sort of angle, this is where you actually have the chance to go over these failures, learn and directly as I talked about impacts earlier, have a direct impact to it versus being part of an organization. I think some of the failure, as I said, we fail every day to be honest, whenever it's, whether it's implementing a new product, testing a new features, whether it's sometimes losing an investor, it's part of the daily work of an entrepreneur. Some of the pain points, I would say initially, when we first came into the market, I think there was a big hurdle around around the fact that we were not locals, we were not South Africans, right? I do have some African origin, I'm half Tunisia, but I haven't lived and read the market, right? So that was something where we spent a lot of time on the ground. We actually quite right away hired local talents both on the technical side, but also on the, we surrounded ourselves with two ex-Senor bankers, one at the best and one at Apsa, which sort of gave us some legitimacy around the team and the experience. The second one is around fundraising, so very early on, we were lucky enough to have some solid investors on the ground. And twice, I think that's also, I think it's a typical journey of an entrepreneur as well, is twice we lost that lead investor. The very last minute, so the contract was signed, everything was ready to go, and not going to get into the details, but that obviously that hurts, right? Because you fund raising is only one part of the journey and it can unlock a lot of things. How to overcome these pain points and these failures, to be honest, you become, I think you become resilient at some point and you get moves to nose, you get used to some time to lose things, whether it's a customer, whether it's a partner. And I think, you know, it's like, I think you and I often talk about sports, but there was, there was a good interview from Novak Djokovic, right? I don't know if it's still number one now, after we're going to get lost, but he says the difference between the top players and the champions, those that become champions is that ability to recover after, after a point lost or after, after losing again, right? How quick are they able to recover mentally and be back for the next, and be ready for the next point? And I think that's the same for an entrepreneur. How quick are you able to, after a bad new, right? After losing an investor, after losing a client, are you able to recover and get back on the road? And one last thing is, we've sort of developed that mentality with my co-founder where when we, when something bad happens or comes our way, we say good, right? Good as in what's going to make us better with, you know, that make us make us as kind ticker and it makes us sort of aware of these sort of blind spot that we develop and learn to move over it. So that's, yeah, what's our way of overcoming? Just going back to you mentioning fund raising, where you applied for fund raising, I feel like everyone romanticizes raising money, what's the real story behind Zaz's first round of funding? Yeah, no, I don't know. Well, I think if you look at the, that's the worst thing I would recommend to do for any entrepreneurs is to, to, when you fund raising is to look at tech crunch or all LinkedIn because you keep seeing this fundraising all over the place and you start having that for more. But so it's definitely not romantic. It's probably the toughest thing I had to do, to be honest. You're constantly taking notes, right? I think there, there might be a few startups, you know, where they, maybe lucky enough, they raise quite quickly, but it's the reality behind the scene. It takes a lot of time away from building the product, going to market, you're taking constantly notes. And that's not just me saying it's a statistics, right? And you're facing a lot of investors that will challenge every assumptions behind your business, right? Your business models, your commercial, your thesis, why this market? So, so that's the reality. You gotta be, and, and it's affecting, at some point it almost affects, it has the potential to affect you on your personal side, right? Because you come home after taking ten notes, as much of a positive person that I am, at some point it affects you. So I think you gotta, you gotta, you gotta be ready, just like if you're going in a competition, you gotta accept that you're gonna take notes, that it's part of the journey, and remember that you just need one yes. Just one yes. Out of the 50, 100 notes you're gonna take, you just need one yes, and, and that in locks, and that, that, that yes can go very far. Yeah, I'm quite, I'm quite used to that as I was working real estate, and where you have to constantly make calls every single day and you get people that say, no, no, no, and some days it may be very demotivating to just carry on calling and calling and calling, and then one day you just start not to stop and you get that one yes, you know, it's all about the volume of work that you put in. Exactly. Exactly. I would say one differentiator though, because I was also in a sales jobs before, the difference is that in this case, when you're building your, your own company, it's your own baby, right? So, so I suppose to a traditional sales job where it's indeed it is stuff, you take notes, as I said, but you come home, it's, it's essentially it's another company, but when it's your baby, it affects your, you personally, because it's your, almost your gezonde, it's your, it's, it's your convention that that is being neglected. So, and I think that's what, what I shared with you as well, you know, in our last chat, I think, having that conviction, no matter what, no matter how people tell you, no matter how people around you will tell you because they care about you or because they, they, they, they, they want you to be on the safe side, are you sure about this, are you sure you want to keep holding to the commission is, is what made essentially the likes of, you know, if you look at Airbnb's, there's a, there's a, I think maybe you can share that with, with your audience, but there's a sets of email, rejection emails that they get at the, in the early, the early journeys. And I think that's, that's, there's a lot because that's, that's the traditional journey of a lot of entrepreneurs until they make it and break through. Wow. Okay. So, what are some of the misconceptions you had about investors before you actually sat across the table from them? Misconception? Yeah. I think, I think I had the misconceptions to be honest that, that investor was sort of the, not the gods, but they were supposed to be the one that knows that, that understand really the markets that, you know, and, and, and I sort of found us friendly as well. I think these were some of, of, of realities that were very different from, from, from, or, to us, they were different from my, the reality I experienced. Essentially, a lot of the investors that, that I met, you know, sometime they cover many, many different segments or industries, and they're not actually experts in, in this digital banking or payments and so on, right? So, I think that's the first thing, right? That's, sometime their, their expertise is not as deep as, you know? So, to be honest, it was easier for us, right? To give you an example, it was easier for us to convince, uh, angel investors or people in, in our ecosystem that has been, that has been 20, 30 years in payments, right? In Europe or in, in South Africa, uh, to, to, to, to, to, to invent and put in a ticket, then sometimes, you know, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, junior analysts that has never really, uh, worked in payments before, right? So, I think that's one. The second one is a lot of investors, uh, I think you have a few funds that's what, a few funds that I really like that were, operate, that were operators led, meaning that's a lot of these, uh, these investment funds were led by people that had built a company or had to start up themselves before, but quite often we were faced with junior analysts that just came out of school that have never built company themselves, right? And are sort of bringing, bringing theory to, to, to the table. I was like, oh, what's your go-to-market strategy? What's your ideal customer profile? What's your revenue model? Uh, which are important things, but you could feel behind the question. It's very theoretical. It's very sort of, uh, things that, that, uh, that you see on paper, but the reality behind, uh, uh, building a business is very different. It changes. It will change. Your business model may change. You may pivot, and I think operators understand that. Uh, and lastly, as I said, um, why, you know, in terms of, uh, founders' friendliness, not every phone is, is always the best interest of the founders, right? Um, it's, that's, that's something you, you can see in the terms in sometime in the, the, the communication style or, or, uh, dynamics, uh, some of them may ghost you, right? Uh, and then it's only when you start raising money and coming back on the, or, or, or, you know, being on the radar of, of, of, of the press and so on and, and, and, and, and, and, and the ecosystem, that's the tone sort of change. Uh, and I, and I found that a bit disappointing. Uh, so these were some of my, sort of misconception that I had going into the investor investor, uh, discussions. Yeah. How do you pitch African opportunities to investors who have never stayed foot in the country? Yeah. Good, good, good, good points. Um, to be honest, I don't, not that I don't, but it's, uh, I'll think it's, uh, you know, as, as I said, um, you know, one of the, one of the early, sort of mentors that I had in the journey told me, uh, you, you don't want to go against the winds, meaning that, as I said, pitch to an investor that doesn't know Africa, that doesn't know emerging markets in general, it's, it's, it's very difficult, right? And, and it's, and it's hardly the case that you get comments. I think, um, usually I tried to, to, to try to approach, um, funds that either had experience in, in emerging markets so that they understand the risk and the opportunities with it. Or, or, or, or funds that had either portfolio or some types of experience, uh, across the country, but should, should I pitch to someone that, that doesn't know about Africa? It's, it's pretty straightforward. It's, uh, it's, it's, it's one of the last frontier. I think that's, that's what a lot of people say. It's one of the last frontier of, of, of, of growth. I mean, there's a lot of opportunities now with AI and so on, but in terms of, as the continent, right, if you look at the demographics, if you look at, uh, the, you know, the rates at which people create new businesses, the rates are which people are moving online, selling online. Uh, I think, I don't remember the numbers, but maybe it's like almost two-third of the population would be, would be in Africa by, by 2030, something like that. You, you cannot deny the, the demographics, and you cannot deny the, the, the, the rate at which, you know, digitization is coming in. There's almost nowhere else in the world now, uh, that you find these, these, these, these sort of websites. Obviously, there's some risk with it, right? Uh, uh, uh, it's still available. But, uh, but I think people that have experienced that have, you know, uh, that have known or that, that have enjoyed the success of, say, India a few years ago, uh, uh, you know, uh, markets like Asia, Latin America, understands that, you know, being early on or seeing these rates is, uh, is something that, uh, that is very attractive for a lot of investors, as opposed to the moderate growth that you may find in more mature market like Europe or, uh, or let's say the US. Yeah. If you had to raise capital from the start again, how, what would you do differently? Well, yeah, good question as well. Um, I think I would, uh, I would be ready as, I would, I would try to make as much progress as possible on the product and try to get that somehow, I mean, it's easier said than done, but somehow in the, in the product, in the end of, of, of customers as early as possible, meaning even if it's a prototype, even if it's just mock up, but gets early, early senses of traction and validation from customers, because that's the first thing they ask. If you get revenue somehow or, or some types of, of monetization proof, right? Either it's a letter of, uh, letter of intent, whether it's, uh, uh, being able to demonstrate your survey, a willingness to pay, but any sort of validation on traction and, and willingness to pay, uh, I guess before coming in is the first one. Two, I think I would start, I think that's a good lesson. I would start with sort of the tier two and tier three investors, uh, as opposed to the, so I would do a list, right? I think that's what entrepreneurs do, they do a list of all the funds they can speak with. I would, you know, start with the the least relevant funds, just to practice, just to practice your speech, your page, just to practice the questions, because investors have also very good questions. And as I said, they will criticize, and they will look over every sort of angles they can, and you learn to, when you take notes, you know, okay, the question, you know, our go-to markets, the questions are ability to make revenue, the questions, why this country? And then you improve your pitch as you go, so that when you come, to the most relevant one, uh, you're, you're as ready as you can, as opposed to the other way around it, what you typically do, right? They look at the top five and they start, and then eventually they lose a bit that momentum. And three, um, you know, I, I often look at, we always joke with, with, with my co-founder, but it's, it's, it's, it's, it's somehow a bit, uh, quite close to, uh, to, to, to, to, to the relationship with investors with dating, right? There's a bit of, uh, I wouldn't say again, but there, there is a bit of, um, of, of a, of a dynamic between investors and that sort of formal, and so I would try to create that as much as possible. And once you've sort of practiced your pitch and, and ready to go, try to really go as much as you can on those top investors at the same time, so that they sense that sense of urgency to say, look, if you're not, like, if they tell you, look, we're coming back maybe in two or three weeks, no, actually, we already are in talk, like, make them feel that you're busy, that there's already traction from the investor's side, and then you need to, to move as fast as possible. As opposed to, you know, I think that's, it's not a mistake that we did, but initially when we, when we talked to investor, we were sort of, uh, always at the MRC. Okay, you come back in three weeks, sure, we'll be there. Let us know if you need anything else. Uh-uh, you need to really lead the, lead the dance, so to say. Yeah. As, uh, as a young entrepreneur, I know we spoke about why a combinator, um, would you say get the best way to get traction for your business or for your idea would be to enter communities and systems like why a combinator? Yeah, I think there's, there's different ways to look at the why combinators, right? There's, there's multiple ones now, uh, quite, quite a few ones. Uh, I think, uh, I think what, what's, it has become, I think, over time, a lot, a very big sort of trademark as opposed to adding value sometimes to the business, which is, you, you can say it, it always brings some visibility to have to be sponsored or to be accepted in why combinator for sure. Uh, but, uh, but I think, um, I think most importantly, then the trademark, I think is, is the ecosystem that it can bring, right? So, for example, I think a lot of ongoing processes go and right away you incubate it or you surround it by mentors that have done it before, uh, or people that are in the, in the same mindset, right? So, I think the most value you can extract from, from these things that I don't think they'll, they, you know, if you work 20 years, 30 years in, in payments in, in, in lending, in, in credit scoring, and so on, I don't think, you know, you'll find many people that can, whether they are wild combinator or Sequoia that can, that can know the business more than you. But however, you know, you'll surround it with people that can open doors, people that are in the same mentality, uh, I think is, is the most valuable from, from, from these accelerators, I would say, but is it a must? Is it required? Uh, I wouldn't say so. I think today online, you have a lot of courses, you have a lot of people sort of sharing the experience. Um, so it's, I think it's, it's a mix if you can get in, for sure, recommend it. Uh, but more important than that, you know, and I think I read this, uh, which I found very interesting and, uh, and, and, and, and very, uh, very intelligent is one of young entrepreneurs sort of move to, to, I think it was from South Africa. I moved to, to, uh, to, to San Francisco, to live in the same building as most of the white combinatorial people. Not, it wasn't part of the, the incubator himself, but just to be surrounded with people that are in the same mindset, and that essentially becomes your network, right? Exactly. Yeah. Wow. Okay. So what do, what do African SMEs need in your bank like Zazu? What's broken the traditional banking models? Yeah, well to start, I think, uh, as, as I said earlier, right? We had the feeling that, uh, if you look at the banks, right? I think Capitech was sort of one of the, the, the banks that I've came in and sort of innovated over the past few years, but it's still an old bank. It is 20 years now, right? It's, it's, it's, and I mean, if you think about the rate at which technology is evolving 20 years, 20 years, you didn't have the, the iPhone. If I'm not mistaken, I think maybe the last few years now, but the stage of the technology, right? So I think, uh, one, we, we, we, we, we, we, we need simply more more choices for, for business owners. They cannot be just four or five six banks that have been existing for the past, you know, multiple decade, more choice, uh, with more choice, more, more transparency on the pricing, right? Because really, that, you know, research, uh, around the, the true prices of business banking. So, so we, we build the baskets of transactions, and, you know, over months, and we said, you know, how much does an account at fnb at standard bank and net bank at capy tech, a business account costs per month, right? And you should see the, the reacts, every banks, I swear to cut standard bank jumped in, uh, there was, who else, I think fnb jumped in as well, sort of correcting our research. No, no, that's not correct. The point I'm making is that even we were, we, we did that exercise with the market research company. We spend some time linked and is sitting to really understand the fees, and yet we didn't get it right, apparently. Just to tell you how confusing the, the fees and opaque, the fees are for, for, for, for business owners, that doesn't want to spend is, uh, it's Sunday night or at the end of the month, trying to figure out how much you pay for business banking. We need more simplicity when it comes to, so more choice, more simply. And I think something more modern, right? If you, if you compare your experience on, on a daily basis with apps like Instagram, WhatsApp, Uber, it's instant, it's sleek. It's, you know, it's, it's, it's an enjoyable experience, right? It's simple. Um, and, uh, that's what Zazoo wants to, wants to bring. Even for everyday banking things, everything is online. You don't need to go to a branch. You don't need to call five time customer support to just issue a card or, or unlock a certain payment. Um, we make it intuitive, delightful and, uh, and to, to, to, to, to, enjoyable, right? Um, and then finally, as I said, right, the idea of, you know, of, of having everything centralized into a single, viewing to single-dash, comprehensive view of your, of your, of all the data that's typically you generate as a business, right? Think about it. Your inventory, your, uh, your transaction, your expense when you travel, your revenue, your cost. None of these banks are able to tell you today, uh, you know, project your cash flow, automate certain things, tell you, right? You know, if you keep going at that rate, you may have a cash flow in month X, you know, we command you the right products, the right loans, um, the right payment provider. So, so having some level of intelligence, leave it on AI. So I'm not even talking about AI, you know, none of these banks are able to, to integrate any of the AI tools because they're relying on the very old system. So in short, you need, exactly, in short, we need a more, a more simple and modern banking experience for these businesses. Yeah. Okay. So of course, you've been running a business in, in Africa. What then, what is one thing that people don't understand about running a company or business in Africa, especially from a financial perspective? Yeah. I think, uh, one, I think that there's often, there's often quite a, you know, some, uh, a priori is when it comes to, to, uh, expectations when it comes to running a business in Africa, right? Most people don't understand that the narrative is not what Africa is used to be, uh, you know, decades ago, right? If you look around, you, you, you're telling me yourself, you're, you're building a, you're building your platforms. Now, a lot of the entrepreneurs that I sit with at Innovation City on the co-working and so are building the next generation of, of tech, the building SaaS, the building HR tech, legal tech, FinTech. So you have a whole generation now of entrepreneurs that, um, there are, there are not going to, into entrepreneurship because of necessity, right? To support their family or, or following what their family business was, but really out of opportunity, right? And they want to create an generation of, of, of tech companies. So I think the narrative around Africa in general, uh, uh, as change, uh, you mentioned why combinators and why combinators is, is quite, I think they have enough this, uh, somewhere on the continent, but the quite, quite involved, you have tech stars, you have a lot of, uh, you have a lot of, uh, of, uh, innovation hubs. Now, even in the townships, you know, you have constantly, I'm going to, to meet up tomorrow, uh, the day after you have now, now, lots of entrepreneurial network that are coming in. So it's a new generation, I think, the narrative has changed when it comes to entrepreneurship in Africa. Uh, and in terms of, of, of managing finances, I think, uh, yeah, I think there's, uh, there's, there's much more that can be done. There's much more that can be done. If you look, if you compare, you know, uh, uh, if you compare, it compares to, to, to a lot of the developed markets and so on, that, you know, typically now, you have at least seven, eight digital banks for them. You have specific companies that helps their managing their, their, their cash flow, their invoicing, their bookkeeping, right? So the point is, I think there's much more, much more, uh, uh, solutions that can be developed at the local level, as opposed to relying on, on intellectual companies. Okay. Just tapping into, um, your mindset and vision, what does your daily routine look like now? And how the, how do you stay shop in an industry that is currently moving so fast? Yeah. Uh, I think, look, routine is number one, right? Uh, whether you're, uh, your top athletes or, uh, are you going through tough times or, or you're an entrepreneur, I think that's what's, you know, what's, what helps you stay grounded first, right? Because as I said, every day is different. You're, you're constantly failing. So those routines really help you stay grounded, um, and two, and most importantly, helps you stay somehow healthy, right? And we can say, well, you know, a lot of entrepreneurs, sort of have that old mindset of, of working as hard as possible and forgetting everything else. Look, if you, you, you cannot sustain a certain rhythm, if you're not, if you don't sleep so then hours, if you don't eat well, and if you don't take a minimal sense of, uh, uh, care of, of your body. Because essentially, if you want to wake later nights, it's not just your mind, your body at some point, uh, uh, is letting you down. So you need to, to, to keep these, these routines. My routines, typically I try to wake up, yeah, around, and the one who sounds like all the gurus that you see online, that's quite early, right? And, and start with a bit of sports. So I get activated, a good breakfast. And then try to ideally between, you know, seven to nine already, uh, get started. So that's, you know, once we, we, when it's nine, uh, I'm already hitting the ground running, right? I'm not behind emails or, or, uh, uh, because it's easy to, to also have meetings, right? Especially I'm, I'm looking after, uh, the growth side of the business. So I have a lot of discussions with partners, uh, with potential customers and so on. It's easy to, to get, uh, to get locked into meetings. Uh, and then what else? I tried to, I tried to do a post sometime around for 30, between 4.30 to six to, to, uh, to do some proper exercises, uh, at least to take some fresh air. Uh, uh, it's break that sort of cycle, so that I can work a few more hours at night, uh, and ideally be in bed by, uh, yeah, by 10, 10, 30. So that, uh, unfortunately, I used to work late, but as I said, we cannot sustain that rhythm for, uh, for a long period of time. Uh, yeah. And one, one last piece of, of advice when it comes to a habit, I try as much as I can some time to, before having breakfast or before even opening my phone is to take a walk outside, right? Obviously, now I'm kept down today's sunny, but they can get quite cold. But, uh, either doing a cold plunge or, or just a walk, not looking at your email or your, or your, or your phone, because that's the first thing. And then you'll know you constantly have your emails, uh, just to get your minds, sort of, uh, uh, dictating your, your, your journey. Just let it, let it think, let it go where it needs to go. Be creative as supposed to open your phone and right away, you know, being dictated by your emails or by, by the external environment. Okay. That's, that's pretty useful advice. What have you, what have you learned about yourself through building Zazu that you didn't know before starting this journey? Uh, I would say that I'm more, that I'm more, uh, more resilient than I thought to be honest. We also know that I, uh, now have gray hair. Uh, it's definitely, uh, accelerated the process. No, I think, um, I think, as I said, resilience, for sure, I, I, obviously, you have in a corporate world as well, corporate job as well. It's, you have tough times and so on, especially if you're ambitious, but, uh, but entrepreneurship is, is, is very, very hard journey. I encourage it because you learn so much. But so, so I would say big that, that I'm more resilient than I thought. Uh, and that, uh, that, that, uh, that I think the, the conviction that I had, uh, around your portfolio, around, around business banking and, and, and better sort of, uh, digital experiences is, is something that, um, that, that's, yeah, that there is deeply convinced, uh, inside of me, and that these convictions, regardless of the, the number of knows that I take of people that are trying to, to, uh, they try to convince me that it may not be the right path, uh, is, is, is much, is, is embedded deeply in me. Otherwise, I wouldn't still be here despite the hardships. Yeah. So finally, if a young African entrepreneur is listening right now to this episode and you speaking, um, and he has this crazy idea going on in his head, what would you tell him, um, about just not giving up and carrying on? Yeah, no, I look, I speak to a lot of, uh, a lot of friends, now I think it's definitely a trend here in Africa, and, uh, people that want to go into entrepreneurship. First of all, as I said, started early as possible, uh, because I think that's the typical sort of, when I'll start when or, you know, for example, my studies, nothing stops you from developing, putting a pitch deck together, having early discussion of investors, putting a prototype together, testing it. So start today, or yesterday, actually, and that's something I wished for myself that I started earlier. Uh, I would say, as I said, keep those convictions, uh, being open to feedback, being open to feedback, but, you know, hold your conviction here because, uh, because they won't be challenged. And it's in those, it's, it's especially in those difficult times that, uh, that, uh, you need to keep those convictions as a, as a guide, as a vision to, uh, to, to, to get you, uh, to get you going. And three, I would say, uh, don't be afraid of failure. Failure, you, um, race failure. That's, that, that is almost a requisite for, for the entrepreneurial journey. And it's, and it's something that, you know, it's a bit of a cultural way, actually, if you look at Europe, for example, the failure is not, it's not always encouraged, you know, it is, we're more on the, the, the risk-alver side, go for, go sturdy, go for, for, for a corporate, that's more stable. That's, that's the, the conversation my mom always has with me. Well, for example, in the US, and I think that's what the US is so successful, you know, in terms of entrepreneurship and startup, is that they have that failing culture. They encourage you to fail. You know, it's almost as the trademark, as, as a mark of, uh, of, uh, potential success in the future. So don't be afraid of failure. Uh, keep going. All the, all these, uh, these conviction deer, and, and, and, and they're gonna be like any athletes, you know, are at one point, they lose, they lose, they lose, they lose, but it's only when they keep going that they have this breakthrough. Wow, all right. Um, while German, um, we've come to the end of the episode, and I'll just like to say, thank you very much. It's been an honor having you on this episode. And definitely hope to have you on for many more episodes, even in person as well, um, when you ever do come to South Africa, are you in South Africa? Yeah, I am, I'm in Cape Town, as you, you may, you may see, yeah, you may see, so we can do it in person any time, but, okay, how long will you year for? I've been here for close to nine months now. Yeah, nine months. So, uh, yeah. There you go. Then we should definitely schedule an in-person podcast episode, and I'm sure the listeners that are gonna listen to this episode will find much value in it as well. And yeah, once again, thank you very much, and I really appreciate you hopping on. Thank you, Tom. Take care, you see. Bye-bye.