How has COVID impacted the impact investing space? 

It’s been very positive. One of the arguments that people make against Impact Investing is the proof of return vs non-impact investment. What we’ve seen consistently since the start of the Pandemic is that impact funds have outperformed general funds, and that’s across the board. You no longer have to convince people through morals alone, instead you can convince people based on the financial return too. When people are presented with the returns in addition to the impact layer, it’s very difficult to say no.‍

What are some common misconceptions people have about Tickr?‍

The first is that we are only for beginners, which isn’t true. We have a lot of people who, like me, have worked in investment management as professional investors, and are using Tickr for the bulk of their money. On the flip-side, you don't have to have hundreds of thousands of pounds, pay a financial advisor, or have much investment literacy to begin with. We’ve designed Tickr in such a way where you can start your investment journey and learn as you go, so it's more of an investment platform and impact investment platform for a broad audience than just beginners. ‍

How do you see the role of impact investing  changing over the next decade?

It's hard to think about how I see the role of it changing as opposed to the scale of it changing. The role is there, it's just not fully scaled yet. If you look right at the beginning of the chain where companies first receive investment, at the early venture capital stage, it’s those organisations and individuals who are responsible for the companies of tomorrow. People who invest in big list businesses only invest in them when they're a late-stage company, companies whose DNA, for the most part, have already been defined, and there are very few late stage companies that can change their DNA. What can and will have a measurable effect, is the businesses that are getting funded today, those who have impact ingrained in their DNA, which we are seeing much more of in the UK, Europe, North America and beyond in terms of venture capital companies looking for clear purpose-driven, impact-driven founders, products and services. I believe that this will result in a shift in capitalism over time. The majority of businesses being founded now have impact in their DNA so the big businesses of tomorrow will have impact in their DNA. In 10-20 years time, what would be a large business with a powerful brand, will look completely different to how a powerful brand looks today. They’ll have to have impact at their core and consumers will demand it, even more than now.‍

What was your biggest lesson that came out of last year? ‍

What Matt (co-founder) and I have realised is whenever we have a hunch about something, 99% of the time it’s right, so we should act at that point as opposed to mulling it over with other people and delaying it by a week or a month. We’re starting to really hone in and trust our internal instincts. If we have a little niggle about something, then chances are it’s going to be right, and if we both have the niggle it's definitely right. Now when we feel it, we act upon it and that has helped us make quicker decisions. A caveat to that would be five years ago, I shouldn't have, and wouldn't have, trusted my instinct because I hadn’t yet gained the experience. ‍

What is Tickrs mission? ‍

Ticks mission is to become the impact platform for millions of people in the world. We started as an impact investing vehicle, but our future is not limited to that. We want to broaden our product suite so that customers can come to us and have an impact in whatever way they want through their finances.