A bit about us
We are Mike, Tim, and Matt. We have come together from all corners of the world to create Rightfounder
Our team
Mike Stevens
Ideas
In 2001 Mike joined the startup team of innocent drinks; first being in charge of their supply chain then heading up to Scandinavia to launch the business into the Nordics. 🦌
The startup experience at innocent gave him the chops to found his own business, confectionery brand Peppersmith in 2009. He set it up with a great cofounder, (👋Dan). Through their ups and downs, it was here he learned the value of investing in his cofounder relationship.
Mike was CEO at Peppersmith, seeing it through idea, launch, scale and eventually sale. 🤸♂️
At Rightfounder he looks after the business side of things, making sure this idea is useful.
Talk to Mike about business, space, technology, music and the environment here:
email: mike@rightfounder.com
LinkedIn: mikejstevens
Twitter: @openmikestevens
Matt Wright
Product
Matt started building internet apps in the 90s, saw the dotcom bubble burst, then moved into investment banking tech. He was part of some dubious coding leading to part of the global financial crises. He loves engineering, dealing with data, and enthusiastic about solving technology problems.
Matt cofounded a natural language processing and machine learning business in 2013. They had a few years of near success before eventually 💥. They also had and downs, and it was rocky at times, but he learned a lot about founding a business and the relationships required to keep it going.
Matt's role at Rightfounder is to build the product and look after the technology. 🤓
Talk to Matt about climbing, surfing, django, choosing boring technology and making exciting Lasagne:
LinkedIn: mrmattwright
Twitter: @MrMattWright
Tim Stoller
Data and People
Tim's first job was selling radio advertising during the day and DJing at night for Kiss FM 🎧. He moved to the BBC to work in audience research, production, and marketing.
After stints in commercial roles at innocent drinks, Lindt, and Hovis, he followed his passion for helping smaller companies to grow.
He grew several young businesses, including The Happiness Index. Tim has worked extensively on using people data to understand human relationships. He cares about helping people see the impact of relationships with business partners, consumers and customers.
Tim looks after the data, works out what it means, and explains it to the world.
Talk to Tim about culture, customers, brand, 90s house music, sourdough, and touch rugby:
email: tim@rightfounder.com
LinkedIn: timstoller
Twitter: @stollaris
The Rightfounder timeline
From a thought experiment about cofounders to where we are now...
2001
Mike joins innocent drinks. It’s start-up fun on a West London trading estate. It was all the smoothies you can drink and lessons in building businesses you can eat.
2006
Tim joins innocent drinks, meets Mike and they bond over smoothies and party turntables.
2009
Mike leaves innocent to cofound natural confectionery company, Peppersmith
2012
Mike asks Tim to join Peppersmith, the time is not right. Never say never.
2013
Matt is living in Chamonix and starts going out with Mike’s wife’s (Lou) best friend.
2015
Matt and Sarah head back to London. Matt and Mike recognise they are both startup geeks. Lots to talk about as Matt cofounds stitched.io a Machine Learning Organisation Solutions business.
2016
Tim finally leaves the corporate world to first invest in then join the startup team at The Happiness Index.
2018
Matt agrees to leave Stitched.io. It is time to get off that train.
2018
Mike agrees to sell Peppersmith.
2019
Mike is thinking about what next and shares his idea of cofounder personality testing with Matt. Matt astutely identifies that personality is only one of the dimensions which influence the compatibility of cofounders. Back to the drawing board.
2020
In February Matt and Sarah and two young children (they have been busy) head to New Zealand for a holiday and to see Matt’s Family (Matt is a Kiwi).
COVID-19 changes their plans and their family holiday becomes a one-way trip.
2020
Mike has fully exited Peppersmith and has a long list of new businesses ideas. The cofounder compatibility tool is on the list and he asks Tim what he thinks of it.
By this time Tim has 4 years of experience
in assessing the interrelationships and performance in teams. He recognises the value of the idea.
Now the time has come to work together
2020
Tim and Mike are thinking about how to build the tool but have got stuck. Matt may be in NZ but he is a fan of the idea and can code. A few video calls later the team is complete.
2021
We begin.
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