Making Billions: The Private Equity Podcast for Fund Managers, Alternative Asset Managers, and Venture Capital Investors

From Purpose to Profits in Gaming, VR, AI, and Tech

Ryan Miller Episode 148

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Hey, welcome to another episode of Making Billions, I'm your host, Ryan Miller and today I have my dear friend Nanea Reeves.

Nanea is the founder and CEO of TRIPP, an award winning global XR Wellness company that empowers people to take control of their mental and emotional well being. Nanea brings over 15 years of experience in digital distribution, video game technologies and mobile application development. So prior to founding TRIPP, Nanea was the president, CEO of textPlus, the COO of Machinima, and Chief Strategy Officer of Gaikai. Nanea was also the Senior Vice President and CEO of Global Online at EA games. Through her leadership at these previous companies, she's facilitated get this in $1.6 billion in exits.

So what does this mean? Well, it means that Nanea understands that you can fulfill your purpose without sacrificing your profit, and she's about to teach us how she did both.

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Ryan Miller  

My name is Ryan Miller, and for the past 15 years, I've helped hundreds of people to raise millions of dollars for their funds and for their startups. If you're serious about raising money, launching your business or taking your life to the next level, this show will give you the answers so that you too can enjoy your pursuit of Making Billions. Let's get into it. 


Ryan Miller  

Have you ever had an idea inside of you just wanting to come out, but everyone thought you were crazy, or maybe you've had a difficult time that really defined who you are, yet you still struggle at turning from victim to victor? Well, my next guest has taken some of the hardest times of her life and turned it into one of the hottest VR wellness companies in the world. Join us as we cover how to win in getting your idea to market while serving your purpose without sacrificing your profit. All this and more coming right now. Here we go. 


Ryan Miller  

Hey, welcome to another episode of Making Billions, I'm your host, Ryan Miller and today I have my dear friend Nanea Reeves. Nanea is the founder and CEO of TRIPP, an award winning global XR Wellness company that empowers people to take control of their mental and emotional well being. Nanea brings over 15 years of experience in digital distribution, video game technologies and mobile application development. So prior to founding TRIPP, Nanea was the president, CEO of textPlus, the COO of Machinima, and Chief Strategy Officer of Gaikai. Nanea was also the Senior Vice President and CEO of Global Online at EA games. Through her leadership at these previous companies, she's facilitated get this in $1.6 billion in exits. So what does this mean? Well, it means that Nanea understands that you can fulfill your purpose without sacrificing your profit, and she's about to teach us how she did both. So Nanea, welcome to the show.


Nanea Reeves  

Thank you, thank you so much for having me and thank you to all of the listeners of Making Billions, I think it's pretty much my favorite podcast name ever.


Ryan Miller  

Yes, thank you. Yeah and really the mission of the show is really just to reach broad and facilitate in the rise of the rest. And what I mean by that is, there's a lot of people, and we're going to talk about this, but there's people around the world that perhaps may be confused to think only success, whatever their definition is, is only for elite few and I don't think that's okay. And so we have this show where we're saying there's lots of people that made it, they started out and maybe a golden spoon, but usually it's not, and really just opening up and democratizing, decentralized, decentralizing a lot of the knowledge around the world and you have one of the coolest stories that I've ever heard. And so I'd love to just walk into how did you go from being a gamer girl to all kinds and developing this online meditation wellness. I mean, it's not just meditation, but helping people with their mental health and their wellness through VR technologies. I mean, you have done it all. You are certainly Wonder Woman, I'm just, I'm curious about that, maybe walk us through for beginners, just starting out on their entrepreneur journey, whether they're starting a fund, or they're starting a business where they're going to ask a fund for money. What advice can you give to people who are just starting out on how do you get some early points on the board? 


Nanea Reeves  

I think, as a founder, one of the biggest elements that I've found the most helpful is this certain amount of grit in not wanting to give up. And maybe, you know, when I look back at my life, and I had a pretty rough childhood, my mother was a drug addict, I now know I think she was trying to self medicate mental illness, I pretty much felt like I was on my own to figure out how to do a lot of hard things at a very young age, and I was excited about technology. From the beginning, I was that weird kid that would take apart the TV to figure out how it worked and then put it back together again, sometimes successfully, sometimes not, but always trying to figure out how things worked or how to do things. And that really has held me in good stead, you know, you think about how to be an innovator and have that mindset of not dismissing new ideas. And there, there was a Wharton study that I remember reading where during uncertain times, the tendency for people is to dismiss new and creative ideas and default to the practical ideas. And the irony is that during uncertain times, those are when you really need to embrace the big ideas, that's where the opportunities come from. And so it's really kind of learning how to go within and analyze, what am I curious about and what am I resisting or dismissing? And that is my whole journey as a founder and an entrepreneur, is to kind of lean into, hmm, what is that about? And to investigate and then try to understand what's interesting about that kernel of an idea. 


Nanea Reeves  

I think if I were giving advice to anyone though about pitching and how to get your ideas supported, I think sometimes we hold these norms that only rock stars or superstars are going to get supported. Or, you know, oftentimes I hear a lot of my girlfriends who are in the, in their career saying, well, only men get supported, women can't raise capital, etc. And I'm an example that that's not true. But what, when I look back at my own personal journey, I had the good fortune of being on a very early, successful mobile game company called Jam data, I was employee number four. And this was we started the company in 1999 and at that time, when we were pitching that company, we would hear people say, no one's ever going to want to play a game on their cell phone. And I, as a young person, very early in my career, thought, well, I don't know, I think I'd be kind of curious to see if you could play a game on the cell phone. I was playing Snake a lot on my Nokia phone, and, you know, so that was kind of that first encounter with no one's ever going to want to do that, and a lot of people dismissing what ultimately was a big idea. We were very successful in the early days of mobile content. We were one of the first mobile, I think we were the first mobile content IPO in 2004 and then we were acquired by Electronic Arts, and I ran tech at that company, and it was career changing for me, because by being part of that team that hit a home run, I was able to get my own ideas, ultimately supported because I had a track record. So I think my advice to a young person with that entrepreneurial spirit, that that really wants to lean in and and try to figure out how to do something that makes a real difference, one of the best things you can do to tee that up, to tee up the support of it is to find a team that is, you know, probably already identified product market fit. They have great investors, and just get in that company and get on that team, because your association with that team that might go public or have a big exit is going to do more for your own ideas five, six years later, or even two years later, etc, and that's been my experience.


Ryan Miller  

Brilliant. I'm glad you brought that up about pitching and raising capital, and, more importantly, about different mental frameworks that a lot of people have that either set them free or lock them up, and it's all self inflicted. There was a saying that was done is that we're all self made, but only the success will admit it and so that's a good idea.


Nanea Reeves  

I've also had a lot of early failures, and.


Ryan Miller  

Sure. Well, let's talk about that a little bit and more of like not to illustrate in romance, I think failure is overly romanticized, it's not fun, but how you handle it that can really lead you to the Promised Land, as I like to say. So in the early days, when you're pitching investors, and everyone goes through this, and some are saying yes, probably most are saying no, I'm not sure, but for the ones that say no, right, let's let's just assume most people listening to the show who are raising capital are gonna hear a no when, let's say a VC says no to you. How do you use that moment to get better? Do you ask them any follow up questions? What do you do? 


Nanea Reeves  

Oh, for sure, for sure. And if you just think about the logistics of it, and you don't take it personally, and you look at the math or the data, a partner at a firm is only going to do a handful of investments per year, so the likelihood of them saying yes is actually pretty low, so I look at it through that lens, and one it's an opportunity to harden my pitch and get feedback in real time from somebody who's seeing a lot of pitches. There's no one who is better suited to give me feedback than somebody who's hearing pitches all day long and seeing what's a good pitch, what's a bad pitch. Also, in my category, what are they seeing? You know, because they might have more visibility into where I'm leaning into because of the volume of of deals that they're looking at and companies that they're being presented with. So I usually go into it expecting that the likelihood of them saying no is small, and that just prepares me for that. It's an information gathering for me, it's a way to get feedback, bounce my ideas off somebody very well informed. And from there, I have found that when I do get a pass, I'm very clear about asking them what would have made you say, yes, you know what was missing, because that's actually the info I need. Now they might not be the best fit for my company, either and so in some ways, I look at rejection is the universe's protection too. Sometimes do you know you have to kind of trust that things will that you'll be supported? I definitely have those concepts that I hold it helps me stay optimistic in the face of a lot of opposition. But I've had investors even recently with trip, or in the past couple of years, there were, there's one investor who told me no three times, and when I asked that question, what would have made you what will make you say yes? And they told me, and then I had hit those things and came back. They ended up investing in our series A and so you just never know how it's going to play out. And I think also the fact that I was listening, I heard them and I adjusted, also as a strong communication, but not that you need to do everything an investor tells you to do, too, because in the early days of your company, that can actually get you into some trouble as well. You have to kind of trust your own North Star and your own vision, your own instincts. 


Ryan Miller  

Yeah, absolutely. Another time when we were talking and you were talking about the early days of Oculus, and you know, that's a common device used to access your products, but at the time, you noticed that a lot of the games on Oculus invoked one kind of emotion and you thought, well, maybe I can invoke a different one. Do you know what I'm talking about? Can you talk to that?


Nanea Reeves  

Yeah, sure. I had the very good fortune of working with a lot of the team that started Oculus. We were at a cloud gaming company called Gaikai, and Gaikai ended up being acquired by Sony PlayStation, and this was around 2008 ish that time period. But that team, there were six of them who went to go start Oculus instead of going to Sony, and many of us who made some money at Gaikai invested in Oculus. So that allowed me to get access to some very early demo experiences, and so I went with some friends and family members down to the Orange County Oculus office to try one of the early demos. And many of them were all pretty much designed to scare you, because it's pretty easy to scare you in VR you can feel like you're standing at the edge of a cliff and you're about to fall over, walking on a plank, or horror, you know, dinosaurs showing up, and aliens and 


Ryan Miller  

Zombies, they get me every time.


Nanea Reeves  

Lots of zombies.


Ryan Miller  

Scare the heck out of me. 


Nanea Reeves  

And on the way home from trying that first really solid demo on a prototype that they had done on a dev kit, I helped asking myself, if you could create fear that easily, and it was so visceral, what else could you make someone feel? And that really was the kernel for the idea for TRIPP. And I went down to that office with my late husband, Vic, and it was a few months after that day that he was diagnosed with liver cancer, and we were told he had eight months left to live, and it ended up being eight weeks. It was one of those experiences that just turns your life upside down. And you know, I went through this whole experience of his illness and his passing, and then, you know the grief that just you think you can navigate it being kind of a strong person, and I had to just concede that I needed more help, and I got professional help. I got my community rallied around me, and it was very difficult for me to ask for help and but as I was starting to think about how to rebuild my life going forward alone, I also could see that it was time for me to step up and bring my own ideas forth. I had been COO and President, as you had mentioned in the intro, I had been a strong number two for a long time, helping other, other people's ideas come forth in the world, and have contributed to them and and scaled them, etc. So I had a lot of confidence in my ability to execute, but I kept going inside, going, what's my idea, what do I want to bring forth? And I went back to that moment of, could you use technology in ways to make people feel better? And when I was a kid in peril, I would play a lot of video games. You know, I went to the arcade, and I was one of the few girls in there. And I think there was something about like feeling in control of the environment when you're playing a game, being able to adopt a different persona and be someone else, other than who you are, and have that kind of heroic feeling I had every game console, and there was something about it that I found very beneficial to my own mental health. But of course, it wasn't enough. Eventually, I was in a mental health crisis as a 15 year old, and I went to therapy after being in the hospital, and a therapist taught me how to meditate, and it was a superpower for me. So when I was thinking about, what's my idea? You know, loving technology, being very curious about VR and how it could stimulate these emotions, and also knowing that video games was something I loved and it helped me. And it was in that triangulation that the idea for TRIPP emerged.


Ryan Miller  

That's beautiful. You know, you and I you've you've mentioned something to me in other conversations we've had in the past, and I'd love to talk about it into any detail that you'd like, about your husband's passing, and I know you've been in the room a few times when people have passed away and or passed to the other side, or whatever we want to call it. My question for you is, how has being in that moment when someone takes their last breath and you're right there with them, literally looking them in the eyes, I remember the story you've told me, share with us what you're comfortable with about how has that helped to shape you as an entrepreneur, but also shape you on the mission that you're on with TRIPP right now? 


Nanea Reeves  

Yeah. Okay, so we'll talk about it in the context of my husband and that experience first, and he had a very deep meditation practice. He ran a nonprofit that focused on preserving the Tibetan Buddhist culture, and he built some schools there. We sponsored several women's college education who were nomads, and nomads in that area, the education of girls is not the highest priority, and definitely a lot of things have changed, but we felt, you know, he had done a lot of good things in his life, and when we got that cancer diagnosis, while we would have hoped to have been able to grow old together. That wasn't our journey, but I could see that my husband felt very good about what he had done in his life and with his life in that moment, and so we came together as a family. He had some very specific guidelines about the energy around him as he transitioned, and he was preparing himself to leave. And when that moment came, I was with him, his daughter, many of our friends were in our house, he passed in his meditation room. But there was this moment where, and I I've seen it with other people I've been with at that moment, that even if you're on the hospice care drugs or, you know, to help you transition end of life, especially if you have cancer pain, which is no joke, you know, medication is definitely needed, there's an awareness that's very present, where the person is very alert and he was, he was immediately alert, and I was looking at him, and I had that understanding that this was that moment, this was his last moment here, and we were looking at each other, and I had this panic start to overwhelm me, like, oh my God, he's leaving. And the fear, and because of my meditation practice, I was able to stop in that moment and consciously make the choice to show up with love and support for him so that he did not see someone he loved in despair in that last moment, and also he needed to know that I was going to be okay. And I was able to tell him that I was able to tell him that he was deeply loved, that we were going to be okay, that I was going to support his daughter and and family and and, you know, take care of all the things that he didn't need to worry about, and in that moment, and he could just go with love. 


Nanea Reeves  

And if I had caved into that feeling, which would have been appropriate, right, most people would be overwhelmed with the fear and the sadness once you realize someone you love is leaving, but I would have missed being really present with him, and really, I would say, out of our entire journey together, which was 23 years of being married, that was the most profound moment and the most connected moment of our relationship, even more than when we said our vows to each other, when he asked me to marry him, the first time he told me he loved me, that moment was what defined our entire relationship. And I'm so grateful that I was able to show up with that kind of trained mind to be able to insert that pause in that moment. And that pause is everything, right? It's a superpower and you can't just show up with it. It's not natural, right? We get into our thoughts where, you know, the reptilian part of our brain kicks into survival and grasping, right, and our ego gets all involved and but I learned a lot in that moment, and there was another thing I learned in that moment, that I could see my husband felt very much at peace with who he was and what he had done in the world that allowed him to leave with a very present state of mind. And when I was in that contemplative space after he was gone, and I was kind of emerging from the just the numbness of that grief will put you in, I had to be honest with myself that I don't know if I were experiencing my last moment at that point, that I would have felt the same about my own journey here, you know that I had actually made a difference in the world. And so when I was thinking about how to rebuild my life, and thinking about what was my idea I wanted to bring forth, I also knew that I wanted it to be something that would have real impact in the world, that it was time for me to really think about my own contribution.


Ryan Miller  

So would you say perceiving the, I guess, the finite nature of our existence, really, as well as maybe peering into what, what are we? What is this place? And you know, you never know when you're gonna go or never know when you're gonna show up. There's so much uncertainty, yet there's beauty in it, and there's sorrow in it, and there's everything in it, but in that moment. And thank you for being vulnerable with me here, but in that moment, it really sounded like because of your own journey of mental health and taking care of of yourself, that the temple that you were able to create to take a very challenging moment, and it passed, and it went the way it went. But it sounds like you keep me honest, that that that moment allowed a very difficult moment to ultimately have a soft landing as a very precious moment, and it was all because you took care of the temple, you took care of the soul, and now you're building a business to bring that to other people, would you say that's fair?


Nanea Reeves  

For sure. And I remember, um, you know, my husband was older than me, so he had his daughter, who's closer to my age. She has three grown children now, and when I built the first prototype of TRIPP, her son, Dashiell, when he came out of it, and he who was teary eyed, and he was 18 at the time, so you know, 18 year old boys don't tend to get emotional, but it came out. He said, I feel like grandpa lives in there. And it, you know, all of this, we're a composite of all of our journeys and relationships and experiences good and bad. I tend to have a more non dual point of view about it, because some things that I thought were horrible to endure have turned me into a warrior, you know, and I understand what it means to be a child impacted by addiction. I lost my sister to a fentanyl overdose and, you know, so it's, I think it was all preparing me as well, just life experiences to show up for this idea, even working in the video game industry, the exposure I had to technology and how to engage people and all of those skills now, applying it in the category of wellness, has made what we've built very unique. So you never know how it's all going to come together. And I really you know it's like when you're building software, you just want to get that MVP together and up and running and and start looking at the data, start looking at how people are using your application, analytics and data. It's like this beautiful conversation with the end user. They're telling you what, what they like, what they, what they're dismissing, and they're giving you information on how to course correct and iterate. And sometimes an idea can turn into something completely different than what your original concept was through that iterative journey of responding to what's happening right now. And I feel like my life is kind of like that too, right?


Ryan Miller  

Yeah, I love that, and getting that MVP out and following data. I love all that, and I think you and I both understand the power of launching fast, getting that MVP, getting it in the hands of your market. And it's really cool, because I know these are your words that you've taught me offline, but it's what's cool about it is you get to co-create with your market or your ideal customers, and you build this thing together through data. And it's a very cool way to really invest with people. 


Nanea Reeves  

I feel that way about AI as well. And you know, we launched our AI emotional support guide, and it's called Kokua, it's in the TRIPP app. And Kokua is a Hawaiian word for support. I'm Hawaiian, Chinese, Irish, while she tell you in a few things, Chop Suey, as they say in Hawaii. And, but it occurred to me because, it because we're focused on emotions, and I had shared our experience with you on how we collected data in advance of building our interface into different AI services asking people how they feel, and now I'm watching Kokua learn how to support people through supporting them. So I feel like our users are also creating that co-creating this, this really amazing, compassionate digital solution. It's a very unique experience, and for me, it's fascinating because, you know, I've worked on AI powered experiences and data, you know, algorithm based experiences, but when you're working with deep learning, where it evolves over time, this is a whole new arena, I think, for people who work in tech, and we've been so excited as a team to lean into it with this mission of, how do we use AI technology, these game like environments, to target and stimulate more beneficial experiences for people?


Ryan Miller  

And that's what life is, is a bunch of collecting of experiences, isn't it? Now, speaking of that, have you ever had a time where, let's say, people tell you it can't be done? I'm sure a lot of entrepreneurs have this story, but maybe talk about, if that is happened, maybe talk about a little bit of, how do you overcome it when people are telling you it can't be done? Or, you know, Oculus has fear based games, and you create a joy based game and or, you know, really touch on the part where maybe for those people who are listening to us right now, maybe you're waiting for your parents to tell you it's a good idea. Maybe you're waiting for your friends or your loved ones to tell you it's going to work. I used to be that guy when I was a young kid, and I would always be the wantrepreneur, waiting for everyone around me to tell me that was the best thing and it's gonna work. And guess what? Who cares? The important thing is something Nanea taught me, and I'd love for you to talk about, what did you do in the times when people around you are telling you it can't be done. How did you overcome that? 


Nanea Reeves  

Going back to that Wharton study I had mentioned, you know about dismissing creative ideas, especially when there's uncertainty around it. If you understand that most people are hardwired to resist change, and I like to kind of look at, are we putting the no in innovation? How do we take the no out of it and just look at something with that curiosity of, hmm, that's an interesting idea. Let's see where that takes us, and also to be willing to throw it out. But it's just the idea to investigate and and then see where it leads you. You know, we talked about when I actually first started working in, in tech was in the very early days of the web and coding websites. And, you know, I would hear people say, I would never, ever give my credit card to the World Wide Web and and I would think, well, but you give your credit card to somebody in a store, like, how is that more secure, right? And so it's looking at the whole picture, right? Why would anybody want to play a game on their phone? All people want to do is talk on their phone, right? We've heard that, why would anyone want to watch someone else play a video game at Machinima? We had 100 million monthly active users on YouTube watching other people play video games, you know? 


Nanea Reeves  

So it's, it's really interesting when you start to look at the conversation in your mind and that is also a power of meditation, is that you learn to zoom out and look at your thought stream, look at the true nature of your mind. When you do that, you have this awareness of how negative the conversation is. You know, it often times is in between our ears, it's like driving through a bad neighborhood. You know, this person's an idiot, or, why am I so dumb? How could I say that we're either attacking everyone around us in our heads or attacking ourselves? And so the first shift is really to start changing the inner dialog, to shift to hmm, that's interesting, or curiosity. I wonder, or what might that lead to? And then also, there are so many accidental discoveries, when you look at like penicillin and other major discoveries, that it really just came from an accident. And then people leaning into some things, I think you and I talked about, you know, Botox was originally designed for correcting a wandering eye or lazy eye, but when they started testing it, they could see, oh, it also smoothed all the wrinkles out on the face, well, big, much, bigger market wrinkles, right? And there's so many examples of that, I think post it was an adhesive that failed, and it became a very successful product for 3M so over and over, you can see that just getting something, just take that kernel of an idea and try it, and then just stop and look and observe and see what happens, where it takes you.


Ryan Miller  

That's brilliant. You know, just to echo is in the early days of the internet. No, I remember those days, and you're right, I remember everyone was a little gun, tried to share their credit card online, until PayPal did it. And then nobody thought,everyone thought, what do I need? A video camera and video games and all this stuff on my phone. Nobody's gonna do that until, until Apple did it and guess what? People, and I'm sure you've heard, who wants to meditate on a VR video game headset? Nobody wants to do that until TRIPP did it.


Nanea Reeves  

I could even hear my late husband's voice in my head going, you can't meditate like that because he had such a deep traditional practice,


Ryan Miller  

Traditional practice.


Nanea Reeves  

Right? So it very much became informed by our meditation practice, which was more traditional, but it also became part of my own idea. So it's really like just being willing to lean into something new takes a lot of courage, and I find that developing that confidence really comes from trying the hard things. Some people will wait for the confidence to show up before they take the action. And the trick is really that once you do the scary thing, you realize, oh, I didn't die, and the confidence builds from there.


Ryan Miller  

Yeah, that's brilliant. You know, as we, as we round third base, I'm curious, you've had such an amazing experience and incredible background, and just, you're just a great human being and I've really appreciated this.


Nanea Reeves  

I definitely have my, my things, for sure. 


Ryan Miller  

That's part of being a human being, yeah. But you know what? I'm curious if you have maybe just one. I know you're a busy lady, so but I am curious if you have maybe one or two pieces of advice that can really help our listeners gain a competitive advantage if they haven't got it already. How could you summarize some of the things that you've done? Cut right through the noise, get to the signal. What are one or two pieces of advice you can provide for our listeners?


Nanea Reeves  

I think the best advice I got very early on was from a former boss of mine, Mitch Lasky, who is partner at Benchmark Capital. I worked for him for many years, and I was young, and he said, look, people are going to dismiss you when you walk in the room just because of the way you look. There weren't a lot of people running technology who look like me. And you said, so everything coming out of your mouth needs to be number, number, number. And I became very data driven, and I was kind of oriented that way anyway, but by showing up with data and tests and evidence to support my ideas. My ideas got supported, and it took a lot of the anxiety around a new idea or an approach to say, hey, look, here's the journey, here's the test we ran, here's what we think it could do. This is what it would cost to do an MVP, if it doesn't work, we've only lost x, but if it does work, it could be a really amazing contribution to what we're doing. And that really helped, I believe, get my ideas supported in despite kind of not being the norm, and it help people feel more comfortable with, you know, there's a lot of fear around execution risk, right? You think about, like, when you're pitching a venture firm, your idea they're gonna, the only thing they're thinking about as they're going through your pitch is, how big can this get, and when? Because they're thinking about, when are they going to get their money back right? And depending on where you're at, they might also be thinking of where would I sit in the preference stack, right of the payout.


Nanea Reeves  

 And then once you get them excited about that, you know through the you can get them past those hurdles and communicate very clearly how big this could get. And the timing on that is they're going to look at you and go and is this the person capable of delivering this? Is this the team capable of delivering this? And this is why a lot of entrepreneurs may not get the support that they need, because are they presenting themselves in a way that gives them, that gives the people on the other side of the table the confidence that, yes, this person can execute. And this, lot of my friends will say, Oh, it's a boys club, it's actually not, it's a winner circle. 


Ryan Miller  

Oh, bravo.


Nanea Reeves  

And this, if you look at like the way VCs fund frequently repeat entrepreneurs, it's because a known entity reduces a lot of that execution risk for their investments. So that's what I would say to any founder out there, is, how do you build the story of yourself that will ensure that you can blow through that fear that they're going to have around, is this person capable of delivering and I feel like I've done a good job with that by just working my way up and being part of a lot of successful teams. I've had good instincts, even on my angel investing, and have leaned into a few good, good investments, and so I have a lot of confidence in my own instincts. Now, that wasn't always the case, though, and I think through that process of course, correcting, iterating, you know, trying things out, looking at the data and, and adjusting to it and responding to it the you know, it's so much more calming to to know that, okay, I know that I've been right more than I've been wrong so that's something. There's a lot of things I'm not great at, but I can hire those gaps and, yeah, it's, I'm pretty easy on myself nowadays.


Ryan Miller  

Yeah, that's incredible. And you know, you and I, we've, we've spoken offline, and you've mentioned, I've told you about my reputation, relationships and results, my ethos on those three and you have your own version, it's very similar, but with a twist and I absolutely love it. And I'm wondering if we could talk a little bit about it. You mentioned, yeah, reputation relationships, but also resilience and responsibility. Maybe talk about how those have shaped you now, and how has that guided you in doing business? 


Nanea Reeves  

Well, we talked, we spoke a little bit about that early journey really creating grit, because it's being an entrepreneur is never easy, and most of us are going to fail on in our journey to get to product market fit. But I really do believe, like, if you're willing to throw out ideas and take information and keep iterating, that you can make a lot of things work, you may not start out the same way. And Slack was a game company, and the tool they built for cross team interaction was ultimately what Slack became and they realized like this was actually a more valuable product than the game that they were building. And so you just never know where the ideas are going to percolate. So that resilience really is, is important, that grit. You know, when we started TRIPP, it was at the beginning of the pandemic, and there no one was doing any new investments, and I had two term sheets pulled, and I had no idea how we were going to keep going, and I was in a really existential crisis at that time our team was only seven people, but I felt this huge sense of responsibility to them. I knew I would be okay, but many of them had families. They're, you know, not well resourced at that point in their careers to be able to weather unemployment for any length of time. And Hawaiians have this word called kuleana. It's like the spiritual sense of obligation and responsibility. And as I was kind of like head in the hands, trying to pitch for my life on Zoom, and feeling very discouraged getting one no after another, and we received an email from a veteran, and this was right after we launched on the Oculus quest. We were the first subscription product, the first wellness app on a gaming platform. I just needed more users, and the team let me launch TRIPP on there, and this veteran emailed us and said, my buddies and I, and many of them are suffering from PTSD, and some are even suicidal. We've been getting together and using your app, and it's helping us tremendously. 


Nanea Reeves  

And I got that email, and I just went, you know what Reeves, this is an idea worth fighting for, and you are going to, you are going to push through this despair, you're going to push through this resistance, and you are going to show up and fight for this idea. And that's where I think I found who I was as a CEO in that moment, and even now, with the fundraising environment, I have three young men on my team who are going to be new fathers. And, you know, I just want, I gotta get this done. There's no, you know, I have a kuleana, I have a responsibility to my team that many who feel this is the best place they've ever worked, they love showing up for our product and our community of users, and I couldn't ask for more. You know, I think having that mission in life is everything, and I believe it can be a big business. I think that young people are, you know, I'm very moved by how strongly they feel about their mental health. It's something that other generations we were told to just suck it up and ignore and to great consequences. And so the timing is right for solutions like ours, and I think that we can move this out of philanthropic impact, investment or opportunities, and really take this concept of technology for good and hit a home run with it. And I'm here for that.


Ryan Miller  

That's brilliant. You know, I'd love to if, if you're okay with it, I know you've done a demo in the past before. Would you be open to maybe giving our listeners just a peek on what it's like to experience your product? 


Nanea Reeves  

Sure. I'll set it up really quickly and we can close with that. Yeah. Okay, so this is the TRIPP catalog, and I am actually going to go into our AI called Kokua, and


TRIPP DEMO  

Welcome to TRIPP. Hello. Let's take a moment to reflect together. How are you feeling right now? 


Nanea Reeves  

I am feeling very excited to speak with my friend Ryan. He has an awesome podcast called Making Billions, and I'm wondering if you have a reflection for his audience on how to maintain an innovative mindset. 


TRIPP DEMO  

What a great intention to share. Let's create some space to cultivate an innovative mindset for Ryan's audience. Embrace the excitement of new possibilities as you prepare to connect with Ryan and his audience. Begin by taking a deep breath, allowing your mind to open like a blank canvas ready to be filled with fresh ideas. Imagine each breath as a gentle breeze clearing away any lingering doubts or limitations, visualize yourself standing at the edge of a vast ocean of creativity, where each wave brings forth new insights and perspectives, allow your curiosity to guide you exploring uncharted territories with an open heart and mind. Remember that innovation often arises from the willingness to see things differently, to question the status quo and to embrace the unknown. 


Nanea Reeves  

Thank you for that. Can you give us a joke that'll make us laugh that's focused on entrepreneurs?


TRIPP DEMO  

Why did the entrepreneur bring a ladder to the meeting? Because they wanted to take their business to the next level. 


Nanea Reeves  

Thank you for that. I'm going to show Ryan the rest of the app.


TRIPP DEMO  

Thank you for sharing this moment. Enjoy exploring the app with Ryan


Nanea Reeves  

So that gives you an idea of the AI, sorry, I've got this weird little Oh, I got a gift, but I'm going to place it later. Gifts go in this area called sanctum, but in here, you can look at all the different. Experiences we have for calm, focus, even some to help you sleep, which I use a lot. We have AI breath detection technology that visualizes your breath like bubbles underwater, or you can move rocks around with your breath in the space. We even have some more experimental stuff that are kind of psychedelic and a beautiful experience that's an homage to Ram Dass, the spiritual leader. Then we have a lot of nature environments. I can show you a little bit about what they might look like. Let me go into this one, and you can always download our mobile app. It's free for now, we're available on IOS and Android, and we have a simpler version of our AI on there, but in January, you'll see a major expansion. So this is the mood data. We ask you how you're feeling, I'm actually feeling a seven right now. I'm feeling inspired and happy, and all of that...


TRIPP DEMO  

Welcome to TRIPP


Nanea Reeves  

helps us build out our AI. So this is the first stage of this experience. It's called Flower Power, and you can see it's pretty lovely. I want to show you the light that comes up and you can get this feeling of seeing your breath actually visualized that will come up soon. 


TRIPP DEMO  

Today's reflection will help you to stay optimistic during stressful times. 


Nanea Reeves  

It's a good one for today. Sorry, I need a battery in my controller so you can see that message coming up like to make it go away.


TRIPP DEMO  

Breathe with me.


Nanea Reeves  

Anyway, if you have an Oculus quest, I would recommend checking out TRIPP, and you can get more info on tripp.com.


Ryan Miller  

That was absolutely stunning. The sounds, the visuals, you've really outdone yourself. I can see why you've been speaking around the world and everybody's trying to get a piece of your time, and all of this was in your head. 


Nanea Reeves  

Yes. And you know, what's really lovely about it, Ryan, is that our audience is 59% male, young male, and for wellness application, that's very unusual. And I feel very motivated by that mission.


Ryan Miller  

You're right. You're absolutely right. So as we wrap things up, just to summarize everything that we spoke about with starting a business, and everything that we want to do is really just understand that maybe sometimes something inside of your story, and it could even be something that, at the moment, maybe felt like it was the worst thing that ever happened, you could actually end up being the best thing that ever happened to you, if you understand how to use it to your advantage, that's number one. Number two, the thing that I love this isn't a boys club, it's the winner's circle. You remember these things and you too will be well on your way in your pursuit of Making Billions.


Ryan Miller  

Wow, what a show, I hope you enjoyed this episode as much as I did. Now, if you haven't done so already, be sure to leave a comment and review on new ideas and guests you want me to bring on for future episodes. Plus, why don't you head over to YouTube and see extra takes while you get to know our guests even better. And make sure to come back for our next episode, where we dive even deeper into the people, the process and the perspectives of both investors and founders. Until then, my friends, stay hungry, focus on your goals and keep grinding towards your dream of Making Billions.



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