Latest / Healthier: Building Health & Fitness Businesses / How to raise money from angel investors in 2026 | Nicola Telford, Tabu Ventures | Healthier Ep 11

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How to raise money from angel investors in 2026 | Nicola Telford, Tabu Ventures | Healthier Ep 11 · Healthier: Building Health & Fitness Businesses

• Will Read: You're about to hear from the investor that runs towards the spaces that most investors shy away from. Sex, addiction, death, and women's health are just some of the things that Taboo Ventures takes very, very seriously when others are too scared to look. Nicola has built Taboo Ventures into the leading angel community and syndicate, backing transformational businesses hidden by stigma and shame. We talk about how founders can succeed. In 2026. Being a founder in general requires delusion beyond belief. But then being a founder in a space that is like, you know, you come up against these walls is completely mad. So one of the things that we see which allows founders to like keep going, basically, in a space that's so difficult to move forward in, is that they have some kind of personal connection to what they're building. How they can show themselves in the best light when speaking to investors. And you know, like For some investors, that is the profile they want, right? Like they want to see people that are like, I am gonna just prove my daddy wrong and I am gonna make loads of money. It's an amazing episode, not just for investors and not just for those raising, but for anyone building in twenty twenty six. This is Nicola Telford from Taboo Ventures on Healthier. Enjoy. Hello and welcome back to Healthier. We are the place for you if you're building, investing, or if you are helping. as elite talent in the worlds of health, fitness, well-being, and other things around those worlds, then we are the place for you to be. I'm extremely excited for today's conversation with Nicola. Nicola looks after Taboo Ventures, started Taboo Ventures, which is an amazing new project. And I will let you introduce yourself, Nicola, around what Taboo is and and who you are, and then we'll kick into some really interesting lessons that I think you'll be able to shed some really interesting stuff for the audience. Thanks, Will. Thanks for having me. Yeah, so I started Taboo Ventures and it's already been on like a totally crazy journey to get where it is now. How what we are now is an angel investor community and syndicate. And we have a brilliant group of angel investors who essentially invest in taboo, what we call taboo categories. If you like, if you verbatim take our like mission statement, we talk about transformational businesses that are hidden by stigma and shame. So it's not necessarily out and out vice, which is what a lot of people like think think of us when they they come to us. They think we we would go to do like invest in negative things. That is not what we're here to do. What we exist to do is yeah, uncover and fund these businesses that are having a positive impact in the world or transforming something which has a huge health overlap, which is probably why we're here. Yeah, absolutely. But they're they're hidden it to to the market or to investors by by stigma or shame or discomfort or people finding things uncomfortable to talk about? To that. Like are there some categories? Are there some an example of a business that you think really like sums this up? Yeah. So our core categories are sexual health and wellbeing, addiction, recovery, death and end of life and grief, and women's health. And there's there's different reasons why each of them sits in our in our world. There's There's obvious ones like sexual health and well-being where censorship is at play. There's, you know, there's obvious discomfort that people experience when they're having conversations about these topics. And then there's more systemic issues around like women's health investing and research that is showing that the people are thinking of women's health issues as niche. I'm sure you've heard that before. And so therefore they're like systemically, you know, struggling with funding and those kind of things. But it doesn't mean that the businesses are not investable or, you know, are having a huge positive impact. And then with death and addiction areas, the it's not necessarily as uncomfortable for people to consider as a business opportunity necessarily, but there is a lot of discomfort personally for people to discuss when they have addiction issues or indeed we're finding it very difficult as humans to talk about how we die and how that how we relate to that. So there's a there's it sort of comes in, but this is how we've our thesis has developed over time with our members and how we're seeing, you know, the the taboo spaces unfold. So really, really, really cool. And and I think that importantly, I've never heard you talk about people having that misconception. They're like, yeah, this is just all about like kind of anything goes with us. Like the I the way I've always seen it from talking to you and being a part in the early days is like you you're doing really, really positive things. I think you you talk about it as overlooked. Sometimes it feels like it's overlooked. Sometimes it's also just I'm sorry, or uncomfortable. And then sometimes it's just people placing so safe, right? It's it's just like there's a lot of kind of why bother doing anything that looks slightly out of the ordinary compared to if we can just do like another AI workflow tool, then maybe just stick with that. Yeah, I mean I I mean I guess a lot of people think that in like good investments are boring investments. They're like, or well, you have two categories. You have the boring investments that are like, okay, well, this is obviously gonna do relatively well because, you know, there's an obvious enterprise SaaS need for this or whatever. And then you've got the like the hype cycle of, you know, San Francisco VCs and all that. And then in I think in angel investing especially, which is where we position ourselves because we feel like these categories are ripe for angel investors, they they have like firstly more intuition is involved in in investment decisions. And also what you're personally interested in is more at play. So so if people aren't even seeing these deals because syndicates and general deal flow tracks aren't showing them because the syndicate lead is finding them uncomfortable, then We're not getting exposure to things that actually we might find really interesting and also think, yeah, actually, I don't know, sexual well being is really important to me. And I would like to be investing my money, time, energy into improving people's sexual well being, for example. So it's quite a interesting space to be moving around in, actually. Yeah. I I've I've read about you talking about how like I think the phrase was like, culture accepts these things before capital does. And so that would suggest that you're like, Sometimes you are months, quarters, years out front, but it's not that you expect those things to never be accepted. It's like, everyone's gonna cotton on sooner or later. Like this stuff is getting more and more accepted. Like the the the the average investor will be more up for this at a later date. But we're getting in early. Is that how you see things? If that is how you see things. Are you seeing early signs of like that happening? Like capital starting to catch up in in some of these places? Yeah. So Well, firstly, it we've just released a report which actually has it has graphs and everything about this whole this cycle. I mean it's it's it's based on the Gardner hype cycle, which essentially is like you get you get this sort of spike of hype and then it and then there's a trough and then it and then it sort of flattens out. And that's generally most in like sectors will see that kind of that kind of like curve, I guess. And what we are seeing in in taboo categories is like the same thing, but there's a there's a different kind of thing happening in the trough of fund afterwards, which is causing like a considerable shift in in cultural acceptance rather than just capital acceptance. Like if if you don't have to have a cultural acceptance piece, then it doesn't matter. But if you take something like mental health, for example, 15 years ago, 20 years ago, it was like Awkward for everyone to talk about their mental health. We didn't discuss it. And then there was this wave of people starting to talk about how they were feeling and and all these sorts of things. Then there was this wave of businesses coming through in this hype cycle where we saw, you know, all the these huge companies just like blow up overnight because it was it was now culturally accepted to talk about your mental health. Then there's this clear out where like all the crap goes away because they just don't win because actually, you know, they were never gonna win in the first place. And then there's this flattening out curve where what we see now is like, you know, mental health and well being, you know, tools, apps, businesses, B2B businesses, eBay, all those sorts things. They exist and they're mainstream and it's not considered like a crazy investment decision to be investing in a business that has a mental health angle. And we're seeing this in our in our categories already. And actually I did I did a post last week talking about how why the YC have just backed a business in the addiction space. And like as a I mean, for me, I'm like, yay, you know, like this is exactly what I'm talking about. It's like the perfect early signal that someone, you know, a a major like investor is backing. a business that is specifically focused on addiction when and granted addiction may be a space that is probably the the easiest of of the ones that we're looking at, but it's it's really great to see that that that we're getting like major institutional funds looking at these kinds of businesses where previously addiction would have been like, it's not our problem. It's like, you know, hobos on the street kind of problem. Whereas actually, you know, you're seeing over one point two billion people in the world experiencing addiction issues. So they're just starting people are starting to cotton on to these things. I think the same is true with sexual wellness. I think there's a there's a big sort of cultural wave at the moment where we're starting to talk about this much more. I am obviously in an echo chamber, so I have to go and like ex speak to other people that aren't in my echo chamber to check that this is actually happening. But More and more people are talking about sexual liberation, pleasure, well being, sexual safety, s like and and that will eventually will like people will cotton on that this is a thing that is happening with a huge dam, like two total. I think you're starting to see some s in in in that space as well. I think also having some success stories where investors feel like, I've only had done that or when they were having like a comparable to look at. Like I'm sure there's a bunch of Asian universities who wish they did like a field, for example. From the outside they've managed to build a impressive scale, like they're they've become culturally relevant, they've they're like on the tube vibe. Yeah. And and that that seems like it would be like unthinkable. Or you've got like a Melbourne doing like kind of interesting stuff as well. And I guess th y you kind of need these people up front, the tall poppies going out and And making it happen so that you see the more interest coming through. Yeah, and we need to make them more visible. And I think the other thing that this is like coming to mind now, I think because we have such such insane ac access to like viral information now, that these topics, if someone does take a topic and, you know, and does something well with it, like in business or in in just like cultured media in general, then these things can like, you know, pop up literally overnight where we're suddenly talking about like yeah I don't know how how how we're having sex with one another for I don't know like there's so many questions that these things but what I mean is because of the way we interact with our with these questions now and it's it's so much more accepted to be able to talk about sexual I'm just I keep using that example but sexual well being now is the time when businesses are like actually formulating in ways that are like we're getting genuine market kind of like feedback, which I think is really important because previously if we're like market feedback was difficult to get because the market was also uncomfortable about so you'd have businesses that were just going against deaf ears for their own market, even if there's an a genuine need for it. Hey, we'll hear from the future. If you've enjoyed this episode or you're enjoying it so far, then you will love our note. The note is a weekly email that we send out, which includes our learnings and playbooks from the people we're speaking to. Includes any invites to future events as we're building healthier, the place for founders in health, fitness and well being. And it includes any new episodes. So go to healthierco.com and sign up and we'll see you there. You're still so much of your job is still education and still kind of beating a drum. If you were investing in keep picking on AI middleware workflows, you don't have to say like why why that why that's important or like how to get comfortable with investing in this stuff or like How do we map this opaque investor community? You just you can you can yeah, spend your time scouting and so so from the founders that are starting to break through and and you're meeting a bunch of founders, is there any common traits or common ways that they are talking, executing, positioning themselves to be able to succeed, both from like a demand capture side and a funding side of things? Anything you're noticing? Yeah. So one of the main things that I think as a as a sort of trend that I'm seeing in in especially the deals that are most interesting to our community is that there's some kind of deep tech element to it. So some kind of like deep research element, whether that's in a material, for example, so we've seen a deal that's live right now taking commitments, are both developments of new biomaterials. And their use cases are in in sexual well being and sexual health. So and that's I think there's there's there's two parts that are interesting to people. One is that there's sort of you know, deep I IP and like there's some some something new that's being created. And two is that they are also playing the like consumer get to market kind of game where they're showing really, really strong traction. And so The deep but the deep tech thing is really interesting to me because then we're also seeing, you know, some really long like pharma play kind of businesses that are doing drug discovery and stuff like that, which again, super, super technical. So we've also had to really learn how to like review these deals because I cut I come from like a B2B SAS background. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And then and also when we're when we're inviting, you know members into our communities to contribute and be a part of it, they they are often also new to these spaces. So we've had to build this like expert network around us of of scientists and and people like that to to take on this this deep research element. And I think there's also we we get a lot of like, I would say like consumer content and app kind of stuff, which I think generally speaking, we've kind of passed it a little bit with that kind of stuff. I think that's the same for a lot of the spaces, consumer apps are very, very difficult to get to market and actually achieve anything and then they can just, you know, disappear overnight. So and like, you know, stickiness and all that sort of stuff is very difficult. I was we were talking about the best founders in the space and like how do they how do they take the fact that it's difficult to get investors on side, maybe it's difficult to get markets on side, or maybe they're i somewhere where markets are starting to turn a little bit. And how do they how do they kind of go about succeeding? But that was a great answer. Yeah, okay. So I guess things like trends I'm noticing with founders that we're like progressing with the most is I think I think and I wrote this in our report something like being a being a founder in general is like requires delusion beyond belief. But then being a founder in a space that is like show you know, you come up against these walls is is you know, completely mad. So one of the things that we see which allows founders to like keep going basically in a in a space that's so difficult to move forward in is that they have some kind of personal connection to to what they're building. So we just recently did an investment into a company that's building a new biomaterial to replace condoms. And it will be essentially applied like a lubricant, but it would be able to block and shield against sexually transmitted infections. And which is like, you know, When you think about it. And that came out of the founder having an a cervical cancer scare from HPV. But so there I think when you have this like deep connection to the problem, it it that translates into like I'm gonna go on this like mega journey and I'm gonna overcome all the things like she's facing censorship because she's talking about vulva health. She's facing, you know, funding issues because she's in the sexual well-being space. You know, she's got all of the barriers. So having that personal connection to it helps her like keep going, basically. Unless you're really weird. Like you cannot have that kind of personal connection with something outside of a health or a like impact space, I think. Yeah. But you just don't see that in in those other spaces. Yeah, that you see when people are really personally connected to the outcome of a of a like a I'm gonna keep going with it AI workflow company. It's some other driver behind it. And I think you the people c you can get yourself personally connected to it, but it's gonna be something around status, outcome, money, chip on shoulder, proving like I'll prove you all wrong. Like dad dad didn't believe in me, vibe, as opposed to like I need I need this to exist in the world. And and you know, like for some investors, that is the profile they want, right? Like they want to see people that are like I am gonna just prove my daddy wrong and I am gonna make loads of money. That's great. But I think in in in my world at least, or in in the angel investors that I work with and and want to work with, there is a desire to use their capital and their experience and their contributions to create something that is going to make people's lives healthier and better. Yeah. And make a return. And like and those two things can coexist. Yeah, I think it was I think it was Harry Stubbings that said on LinkedIn that he screens founders for childhood trauma and that if if they've got some then they score some points in his excitement, which it's an interesting world we're that we're now living in. Yeah, yeah. And it it's an interesting point actually because like I like just a personal anecdote. Like I my last company, I closed it and we raised some money, it didn't work out, fine. Like a company twenty early twenties twenties. And then And then I went on this like, you know, personal journey. And I did a lot of like personal healing work. And then it was really interesting to experience when I then wanted to like start working again properly. I was like, what motivates me now? Because like originally I was like, I don't know, I've got these abandonment issues and like all of this stuff. And that was motivating me. And now I'm like, I have you have to completely update your motivation system, basically. Let's talk about that. But obviously been in a similar position, leaving a company that I was with for twelve years recently and looking to looking to go again. Yeah. I'm trying to work out well w what is it, what what motivates me, where do I want to be? What and I think the biggest thing for me has been to then tr try and start going towards something rather than away something away from something. And so to think about well, what should what what would the ideal week what would the ideal Tuesday afternoon look like in ten years' time? And then if that's the case, well, what have I got to be up to? now to kind of make that happen or and if if if it's something around people and variety and impact and and spending time with family then like okay cool so then the the the the the vessel almost needs to look like this. And then and I think it forces you to be a little bit more honest with potentially like other people that you're getting involved. And that doesn't mean that ambition comes down. That doesn't mean that kind of work levels come down. But it's like okay we are The ambition's really high. The ambition's high in service of this thing that we want the the vessel, the the company to look like, as opposed to the ambition is high in terms of like what Stubbings needs us to do. Or like like like do you know what mean? Yeah, 100%. I think the other thing that I'm thinking about as you're saying that is my yeah, my work ethic hasn't changed, but my my like cutting out the crap. has changed a lot. I'm not like up on Saturday night in the middle of the night thinking about a like random idea. I'm like, I've got the system. I'm building the system. I'm pulling levers. I'm like, I'm building in a totally different way, which actually means that this company's done better than the last one. Not an and I think we can, you know, sometimes the the whole like, I'm gonna be led by my childhood trauma stuff also leads us down paths that are just completely like You just burn out. Like because you're doing a gazillion things rather than doing like I know what I wanna do, I've thought about it, I've like sat with it, and now I'm gonna like experiment in this space, but I'm not gonna compromise on X, Y, and Z, like lifestyle, sleep and exercise, for example. I am not gonna compromise on them, even if even if I'm being trying to prove something to my dad now. Like that's there's a motorbike rally happening outside my house, but I think for me it's so much easier when you're not going towards something to pick up all these random shoulds as well and to pick up all of this like, shit, we we need to be doing this thing on marketing and like, my god, the competitor's doing that, now I need to react to it and to to be much more reactive, which actually gives you a a a worse result than if you kind of take a breath, know where you're going and work really hard in pursuit of that thing. we've gone all over the place and I didn't I didn't ask you to prepare for that, so apologies. But that was that was super interesting. We talked about investment, we talked about your last company. What have you learned about when to take investment on, how to think about the investors that you take on? That will sound crazy to some people who are trying to start a business and have got a deck and have been pounding the pavements for six months with a trying to raise SEIS and thinking like, What are you talking about? Choosing which investors to take on? Like you you've done you just if anyone will give us some money, we take it. But like yeah, is there anything that you can say to people who are thinking about funding the business with other people's money that might be useful. yeah, so a big a big shift that happened for me was thinking like reminding myself or learning that money comes at like at a cost. There's not just like it's not free money. there is never free money. People have expectations attached to them. And so I think this whole idea of like I just need to raise money is really unhelpful. Actually, I think in general, this is probably not like it's a bit like anti what we're doing, but like when we're celebrating funding announcements more than we're celebrating like actual traction moments, we're in a bit of a problem area, I think. And and I have this conversation I would have this conversation with anyone outside of our sectors as well, when I think you really need to consider whether fundraising is actually like it takes so much time, so much energy, door slammed in your face over and over again. And In so many businesses, you should maybe go and spend that time getting your door slammed, like get the door slammed in your face by customers instead of by investors. And I mean, this isn't new. This is like, but just as a reminder to anyone that's thinking about it, I think that framing actually, I've never heard that framing before, and I love that. Like if you're if you're gonna go out and get told no because I want X, I would I would much rather get told no, no because I want X, because you can then go, Maybe we should be doing a bit more X, like with customers. Whereas if you do that with investors, I know that's the advice. I know the advice is to like stack rank who you actually want and start at the bottom and then when they give you feedback, you change the deck. But like y you can iterate to a certain amount, but you don't want to build business that is just aimed at like how can we make something investable. Yeah. You also want to build something which you which gives you your goals. It's like w yeah, exactly, because all the feedback you're getting is iterating a deck that sits in dog sec or whatever. And like go and iterate your business and like actually make it work for the people that are there. And I think I think people, you know, all the usual stuff. People raise way too early. They think that money is like the golden ticket for everything. It's not. People like you can take bad money as well. I've done that before. and I got myself in situations where, you know, some this like a particular investor would be you know, calling me at all hours of the day, basically like shouting at me and being c extremely unpleasant. And because it was like one of my first sort of phrase in fundraising, I didn't realise that that was just like I thought that was just like and now I'm like, my God, I cannot believe that I allowed that to like continue. So yeah, there's there's all the ranking and stacking of like who you actually want. Then there's got to be some kind of like fit check and like personality check. And like that doesn't have to be like a no if it's not like a perfect fit, but like a an expectation kind of setting within the relationship. It's like any relationship, you know, like what are our expectations here? How do you want to work together? Blah blah blah. You know, all of those that kind of stuff needs to come in. And and actually not to be like too woo-woo about it, but I guess like go away and just like f feel into like whether that relationship feels like a good like Is there red flags that you're choosing to ignore because there's a big check on the table? Or like, have they are they gonna come around in a couple of weeks and say, actually, like I want X, Y, and Z, or like they're gonna be, you know, mean or or whatever? Are they actually in your corner and are they actually gonna go and like, you know, support you and contribute in the way that you want? Just practically speak just practically speaking, for that person who's at the beginning of the SEIS race, or maybe they've been like out there with their deck for a while. Is there a is there a like a level, a ticket size at which this stuff starts to matter more? Or is it around like the term? So for example, should I as a person with a super exciting startup in the death space and taboo interested, am I supposed to be like feeling into every single one of the angels that you might bring? Or is it more like getting to know Nicola? Or is it and then so that might be syndicate specific, but like also if I'm picking up a few smaller checks from like I don't know, like super fans of my beta test. Do I need to be worrying about those guys? Is it just the the the leads that I need to be worrying about? Good question. I think it it entirely depends on how people operate. Like for us, we we don't like shield our members, but we try and do a lot of work for them, with them, so that like, you know, it's not like a complete fucking mess to be honest. So we might have, you know, 10 investors who are like curious about something, but the the founder doesn't want to take a call with every single one of those investors. So I essentially become the like the the fit check. And ultimately, depending on within that group, let's say all of them want to invest, but some of them will want to be capital only and others will want to be like actively contributing. But the way that would work is kind of through taboo as a as a as a middle middle ground. So the I would have a relationship with the founder and like for example with this investment we've just done, we now have like a monthly cadence. I support them. I then go back to our community to see how they can support. And and then it's just sort of like we become a a one-stop shop for for supporting them. Other syndicates don't work like that. And that's, you know, sort of worth checking how they how they operate. But I think generally speaking, if you're doing individual angel checks, like go and get a s like relationship kind of get on the like thinking about whether you could work with that individual. And then if I think on a syndicate perspective, it's generally the syndicate lead that you would be building the relationship with, and then possibly some other people, but they would be like they could be shielded. Like if one of my investors started behaving like my previous investor did, the founder would come to me and say, like, you know, Joe Bloggs is being a dick. What should I do about it? And then I would Tell Joe blogs off. So I think that that because that's just not how we operate. We don't want to that is we want to support founders, not like w there's no you know. So I would probably take the brunt of that. How experienced is the average taboo ventures ancient investor? A mixture. A real, real mixture. And so does does part of your role sometimes become kind of teaching people the one one for ancient investing and and and sh like kind of helping them to understand what it's all about? And if so, is there a two minute version of that that you can give our listeners. Well, so interesting interestingly, we I've thought about this a lot because because we have such specific sector sort of focus and we have so much education around those things, we're more focused on education around the categories than we are about angel investing itself. So there's other syndicates that we actually work with who are more about like democratizing angel investment. So it's like if you're a less experienced angel and you want to do like you want to learn more about how you know a SPV works or something, we would I would link away to to partners for that because we're focused on the sector education rather than the angel education. Plus there are like some specific requirements to be part of an angel syndicate like ours, which are around being sophisticated enough to make your own decisions around angel investing. And that's a like financial regulations kind of thing. So so every one of our members has to self-certify that they are in a position and understand how how this stuff works. And if they don't, then there's a like six months course that's been created by the UK BAA or by others to like do that. So it's a mixture. But Okay, so the the but maybe then the question is the difference between between being an angel investor and being like a good ancient investor. Like if there was like three things to be a good Ancient at best what might they be? I mean, I I'm I'm new to this game a couple of years in and I'm what comes across to me is like just be helpful as possible. Pretty much never feel like you're nagging for anything, because that's just not your not your role. That's that's over to the to the lead. Is there is there any any anything else that you might I think yeah, being h helpful as possible, I think that includes like being really And proactive with your contact book as well. Like if you're seeing in an update from the founder, like, you know, we're trying to go into this space and we're trying to speak to people like that, like actively being like, my god, I know some people in that space. Here's a couple of my contacts, would it be useful? That kind of stuff I think is like game changer stuff for founders. And you never know whether you're an angel investor or not, you never know who's in your network that could be useful to someone that you have access to that they don't. So and it could just be like your mate. That just happens to work in a certain space. So I think helpful contacts. I think, yeah, like really the updates thing sh there should be expectations around that. So you're not having to nag for things. If someone said I'm gonna send you a monthly update, they should send you a monthly update. And then that should be your experience of it. I also think like if you have specific like domain expertise, like offering that. Again, it it it moves again from like being reactive to proactive and just being like, I want to support and and otherwise, yeah, then then sit back and wait for for updates and then say say hello. and I think also just championing them wherever you are, like because you just don't know what rooms can be can be helpful for people. So yeah, being a champion. Amazing. So you see a lot of problem areas, you see what angels want to invest in, you see startups coming through. Yeah. Why combinator every so often does their request for startups? Mm-hmm. Like we we're interested in startups that are thinking about things in this way or solving this particular problem or focused on this particular like way of doing things. What would Nikola's or taboo's request for startups include? Like are there spaces that you feel like there are interesting problems to solve specifically that are aren't being solved yet? Yeah. So okay. So where so interestingly, since we started, everyone's become mm like created taboo being synonymous with sexual health and wellbeing. That's probably because that's just it's just that's just the way it's happened. Maybe positioning thing or whatever. But it means and and also women's health, I would say. They those two we're like we're good on. There's like a lot of stuff coming through there. Our two categories that we would love to see more in is addiction, recovery, and death. And I think the death one is specifically interesting because there is a lot of like deadmin businesses out there starting up, which is great. They're they're they're mostly a sort of, you know, either a B2B to C or a B to C kind of like make your life easier when you die kind of stuff. But I think there's a lot of other things around death that we're not working on. Like even just I mean, there's some people in our group who are specifically interested in like how how we die, basically. And and how we choose our end of life. interesting ways that we can dispose of our bodies or all of these sorts of things. I would love to see more stuff in in that part of our lives and in the preparation for death as well, because I think we're we're terrible at that as humans. And I don't see I don't see them being solved properly right now. I think I'd be curious to see. So anyway, it would be a call out on addiction recovery and and death spaces and see what what people's ideas are in those areas. Amazing. Really, really interesting. On on the addiction thing, you specifically focused on s like kind of substance addiction or or is there interesting things happening in other addiction? So I have a I have like a personal connection with like alcohol abuse. That was one of the connections to why this is in our in our thesis. But I'm seeing interesting things across gambling addiction, porn addiction, yeah, substance abuse, all sorts of different things. And actually interestingly, I was I was digging into the the company that YC backed and the way their segment they so they actually have one core engine for their business, but then the way they they are getting to market is through multiple different like front doors is how I really describe them. Is like so they have Christian sobriety, Muslim sobriety, they have gambling specific addiction. They've categorized it in ways, but the core element of it is like addiction is addiction and Things are are playing out in in different ways or they have different needs based on faith or on some kind of defining category. So super interesting like insight, I guess, around whether addiction businesses are all actually just working on all of it, but a they might just have specific go to market kind of Yeah, that's really interesting. Yeah. I think one of the one of interesting things with addiction that I've seen recently is well, there's two things. So there's like People reducing screen time and that's that is a seemingly very trivial thing, right? So if you compare that to a cr crippling alcohol addiction, then it's you would assume it's far more trivial. But there there's a lot of people going after that. But actually there there are some people for whom like the compulsion with which they use devices is is is kind of at least lowering their quality of life. And they and there's a shame element and there's a and there's like a I just can't No no no matter what I do, I can't st I can't stop this. And I think there's probably something interesting there, which is addiction adjacent without being real addiction. And then the second one is in there are some parts of Twitter where they it's it's kind of people talking about how they just like vibe coded an app and and then it went nuts. So like those kind of like star mark thingy with starter story and there's a bunch of other kind of media outlets on that. And something I've noticed is a bunch of them have been telling stories around essentially like no fab apps. So like people that have built these apps to help usually young men not watch porn and not do stuff that you do when you were born. And these things have got like crazy revenue stories, if you believe them. Usually there is some inflation in there, but also like it still tells a story that there's a bunch of people telling telling these stories. And so that that suggests that Facebook ads kiddies like kind of making all this money, then s the serious stuff might be around the corner as well. Yeah, well and if you take back our like our curve again, then we might be in this kind of like hype element where they're getting big, big, big trends and then the crap will get, you know, wiped out because they won't sustain. But then the ones that are actually working for people and people continue to pay, et cetera, et cetera, then because a lot of these things can be and actually addiction is specifically a very interesting category for this because the nature of addiction is like you have to find the right time for someone And then be in the right mentality to actually like want to do something about the thing that they're doing. Because if they're in the midst of their addiction and have no awareness that they are experiencing it or, you know, or they're so ashamed that they don't know how to do anything about it, actually, you know, these businesses won't work unless there's a there's a some kind of avenue for them to go down to like accept that they have a problem or whatever language you want to use that they need to solve. So so it's interesting actually that maybe in this case, especially if they're targeting young men, that they are probably speaking to their peers, which probably helps them connect with them much better than if they were if like, you know, a well-meaning motherly archetype came along and said like, let's help the boys from reducing their porn or whatever, then or their their smoking weed, I don't know, whatever it is. Th the there'll be a mismatch of like language to between the audience. So it might be that that's why they're they're taking off because people are not people in the mainstream are not able to reach those those people in a way that like their I don't know, yeah, their peers can. Yeah, absolutely. This has been super interesting. So if if if if you are listening and you are working on a business that Nicola should know about, they sh then they need to go and find you and and and chat to you. Anything else that want to want to leave people with? I mean, the focuses are around finding investors to join our group. We like have a mixture of very eclectic people, but also one of the key things that I'm trying to do is engage people that have not had any experience in these spaces and are interested to learn, want to contribute, want to like get stuck into something new and interesting. And and then yeah, of course. Deal flow and investors. That's basically what you're talking Let's talk about investors actually. Let's let's let's spend let's spend th thirty six seconds on that. Like what is the ideal ancient investor to be to be to be looking at too? And then what do you offer them? I think there's a there's a couple of groups. One is like angel investors that also have their foot in one of these worlds in some way, whether that's they're like they become a certified sexologist or their death dooler or something, they've got some kind of interest in this space already. That's one category. And I would say that's our like early adopter sort of group. Then there's this like more mainstream investor, angel investor, who normally looks at like sector agnostic syndicates or deal flow from LinkedIn, all that sort of stuff, but is never seeing any they're they're seeing the same things that everyone else is seeing and is interested in dipping their toe into categories that they maybe don't know, but they want the support of the group around them to learn and understand and see where they could contribute, whether it's through more like generalist advice, business advice, et cetera. But and then we have health health investors. We have such a strong we have such a strong overlap with with health categories that we have relationships with health tech and health VCs as a sort of ongoing co investment opportunities and things. And so people anyone that's interested in health is like a great fit for us. Amazing. This has been awesome. Thank you so much. Thank you. Thanks for having me. And catch you again soon. Thank you.