Loading…
Before pausing my PhD (because frankly I was incapable of working on it) (pause started in April 2026), I had already realised that academia (that is: research!) was not what I wanted to do with my life. Mum had planted the send of entrepreneurship in my head the summer before (sat on the terrace in Britany), and so I thought... why not!
I first applied to Pioneers (incubator in Paris), I got it and they asked me to move to Paris within the next week... I said no. At this point, I was not suspended yet, just exploring my options. I remember Dad saying "tu vas pas faire ca quand meme", and I guess yes fair enough. I then applied to EF and Antler. I got into Antler after two interviews, interviewed by David Houghton (who would end up being my coach) and Adam French (one of the partners), I accepted the offer early March, but I could not suspend my PhD before Varsity, which was mid-March, and the Antler program would start the week before! I did not get into EF. I remember Adam calling me when I was sat next to Heath in the Clarendon office, I was so happy when he said I got in.
And then started the 8-10 weeks of the Antler Residency (not program!!). I was living at Francois and Delphine's house, though I would not end up seeing them very often as I would usually leave just after they were gone (around 9am) and would come back late (around 1am). It was such an amazing experience, but what made it special was the people I met, not Antler itself. On an open day before the actual start of the Residency, I met Karim. Moroccan (i think??) legend, boxer, finance bro, sexy man. I knew I would get close to him.
On the first day I met Ines: French American legend. I told her about Audacieu and my dream to be able to work on anything that interests me from social media to art to recycling... and not be bounded by a job description. She said I was a dreamer, I liked her. I then met Charlie (who would end up teaming up briefly with Ines on clo0p), he criticised my promotion of Viewport on Product Hunt. I could tell he knew what he was talking about. The I met Cosimo the Auction Goblin for WoW guru, Luke the sustainability man, Murdo the ex-Scottish international hockey player, James who I would briefly team up with on RootRisk, Chloe who had ideas all over the place, Jesse and Julia the healthtech duo, Ziggy and Paul the drug discovery duo, and so many more awesome awesome AWESOME people. And let's not forget Lewis, an absolute ray of sunshine and now CEO of Plenex with Soon. Lewis "there he is!" Fail is someone that everyone would be lucky to know.
Opinion Soup on the ANTLER big screens!
Adriana and Darren, the two ANTLER people in charge of us, loved Opinion Soup, so that is how it started growing: after a sprint with Gersh, it was put on the big screen in the office so people could vote and keep track of the trends easily!