Moonshots with Peter Diamandis - EP#42 What It’s Really Like to Live in Space w/ Anousheh Ansari

Episode Date: May 4, 2023

In this episode, Peter and Anousheh discuss her journey to space, advice for women entrepreneurs, and Anousheh’s path to leadership at XPRIZE.  You will learn about: 17:32 | How Do You Go From Telecommunications To Flying Into Space? 57:21 | Advice for Women Leaders: Break the Mold 1:24:11 |Why Are The World's Billionaires So Scared To Innovate? Anousheh Ansari is the CEO of the XPRIZE Foundation. Ansari, along with her family, sponsored the organization’s first competition, the Ansari XPRIZE, a $10 million competition that ignited a new era for commercial spaceflight. She captured headlines around the world when she embarked upon an 11-day space expedition, accomplishing her childhood dream of becoming the first female private space explorer, first astronaut of Iranian descent, first Muslim woman in space, and fourth private explorer to visit space. > Learn about XPRIZE.  _____________ I only endorse products and services I personally use. To see what they are,  please support this podcast by checking out our sponsor:  Use my code MOONSHOTS for 25% off your first month's supply of Seed's DS-01® Daily Synbiotic: seed.com/moonshots If you want to try House of Macadamia products for yourself, you can get 20% off your first order by using the code PETER20 at checkout.  Just go to houseofmacadamias.com/peter and enter the code PETER20 at checkout. As my listener, you'll be getting a complimentary Extra Virgin Macadamia Oil with your order. _____________ I send weekly emails with the latest insights and trends on today’s and tomorrow’s exponential technologies. Stay ahead of the curve, and sign up now:  Tech Blog _____________ Connect With Peter: Twitter Instagram Youtube Moonshots and Mindsets Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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that they're not alone. Help CAMH build a future where no one is left behind. So, who will you rise for? Register today at sunrisechallenge.ca. That's sunrisechallenge.ca. I knew the passion I had for space and I was willing to give my life to go to space and take the risk. And I knew there were millions of people like me who would do the same.

And as long as we understood the risk and still we were willing to take that chance and build something and risk our lives to go to space, I think it was all right to make that choice. Exploration and expanding humans' footprint in the universe is important. And I truly believe that. I'm super excited to have a dear friend, a colleague, an extraordinary CEO, entrepreneur Anusha Ansari. and a colleague and extraordinary CEO entrepreneur, Anousheh Ansari. Anousheh made headlines around the world in 2006 when she participated in an 11-day space expedition and became the first female private space explorer, first astronaut from Iranian descent, first Muslim woman in space, and the fourth private space explorer. She was the benefactor of the $10 million Ansari XPRIZE

for spaceflight and is currently the CEO of the XPRIZE Foundation, where she continues to lead our mission of creating incentive competitions to solve the world's grandest challenges. Before joining XPRIZE, Anusha served as the CEO of an IoT company called Protea, and she was previously the CEO of Telecom Technologies. She serves on the World Economic Forum of Global Futures and has received multiple awards and honors that would take me an hour just to list. In 2010, she published her memoirs, My Dream of Stars, to share her life story and inspire young women around the world. An extraordinary friend and a co-venture to the stars and solving the world's grand challenges. Anusha, it's a pleasure to have you here.

Peter, it's great to be here with you. Thank you. Yeah, of course. So question for you. It's September 18th, 2006. You're at the Baikonur Cosmodrome. It's about 8 a.m. You're 150 feet in the air, and you're sitting atop a 40-year-old piece of Soviet technology on top of 670,000 pounds of explosives. Next to you are Mikhail Turin of Russia, your commander, and then Mike L.A., a mutual friend of ours, a U. a US astronaut, and you're about to fly to the space station. What is going through your mind? It was a very interesting moment that I remember very clearly because we were sitting there,

we finished all our checklist and we were just listening to music, classical music in our headsets, something just like this. And I was thinking to myself, is this really happening? Am I really going to space? And then, you know, this sense of gratitude, because I was just thinking like a flashback of my life, of all the dots that had to connect all the people who I met including you that put me on the path that got me to be in that seat on top of that rocket it was I mean it was something that I could have never planned and uh and just thinking about how many things had to come together to make that happen. And I felt privileged and a sense of gratitude was the most strongest feeling I had at that moment.

So three, two, one, the engines ignite and Soyuz is lifting out of the Baikonur Cosmodrome. What did it feel like? I mean, I mean, how would you describe that moment? Everything happens, at least in my head, happened faster than I thought. So lots of shaking and I'm strapped into my seat and just watching all the lights go green and red and green and red and making sure that they're going in the right sequence. So at that moment, I was very focused on making sure that there are no problems and everything's happening the way it's supposed to happen and then um you you're going very fast you feel the g-forces increasing on on your chest and all of a sudden you, the first stage is over and then everything stops.

It's like you're going fast and you stop and it's like a moment of silence. And then the second stage kicks in and you feel the kick and then you're going up again. But before that, also, we were in the dark because there was a nose cone over the capsule. the capsule and just before the second stage that just when we launched a few minutes after launch when the nose cone goes off it's a big explosion and then there's light coming in which was really special but then you know you go to the second stage and I think it takes about maybe 12 to 13 minutes to be in microgravity. And then the first thing I saw, someone had dropped a pencil that we didn't know on the floor of the capsule. So I saw this, you know, pencil sort of rise up and start floating in front of me, which made me giggle and start laughing. And then, you know, other things that you, we were strapped.

So I couldn't feel the, that I was moving up, but still, you feel that your weightlessness and, and it was so, so, so special. And I felt like a kid. I was just giggling. I was going to ask you, were you in those moments of the launch sitting there between the bike, sitting there between the launch in Baikonur and getting to 17,500 miles an hour 12 minutes later, were you a kid or an engineer or scientist? What were you in those moments? I was a kid. I was totally a kid.

Did you feel ready? Did you feel like, okay, I'm ready for this? I did. I had trained almost nine months in Star City and done a lot of sims and studied everything. And so I felt ready. We had done so many simulation that I wasn't worried about what would happen next. And frankly, you know, that morning, I felt such a feeling of calm and peacefulness because I felt that even if I die, I'm dying doing something that I wanted to do all my life. So how many people get to do that? And so I wasn't worried about the dangers of things going wrong. I was just focused on the experience that I will have. And that's why I was a kid because I wanted

to experience it fully with all of my heart. And I did. And it was fantastic. So I'm going to take you back. You're in Tehran. Yes, as a child? Yes. What were your first memories of space? When did you, and you and I share a very similar background in our childhood passions. You know, I remember mine, and I'm curious, do you remember yours? Do you remember when you sort of first said, I want to go to the stars? For me, it was gradual, but constant. And that was this fascination with the night skies and the stars for me it was gradual but uh but constant and that was this fascination with the

night skies and the stars so i would uh you know summer nights we would sleep outside on the balcony because we didn't have air conditioning and um and i would love those nights because i could sleep and just and they would put these malaria nets over the bed and I refused to have one because I wanted to look at the night skies and and just when I looked up at the stars it was like this whole new world this universe opened up to me and I could you know create stories and worlds and places to go things to do do, aliens to meet. And it was fascinating to me. And I, this constant question in my head, that's what's up there? What's out there? How can I go there and figure it out? So it was that question that drew me to want to become an astronaut,

wanting to go to space and sort of discovering what's out there. And when did you first have the idea that that might be an option versus just, you know, sort of sitting on the ground and appreciating it? Did anybody that you knew have that kind of a dream or a goal? I mean, is it possible for a young girl from Iran to have that kind of a dream? Well, I loved sci-fi and I read a lot of sci-fi stories, especially Jules Verne was one of the authors that I read as a child. And so all those fascinating voyages that I would go on. So in my head, maybe it was my ignorance. I was like, yeah, of course I can go to space. And then I used to watch Star Trek and I'm like, there will be a Starship Enterprise

and I can go to space with Starship Enterprise. So I didn't understand the complexity and the problems associated with it. didn't understand the complexity and the problems associated with it. So it sort of, you know, made it simple in my head that I, yeah, of course I can go to space. That's not a problem. It's only when I became an adult and I came to US, I understood all the difficulties associated with it and that it's not, it wasn't possible unless I figured out a way to join NASA or one of the government space agencies. Everybody, I want to take a quick break from our episode. Tell you about a health product that I love and that I use every day. In fact, I use it twice a day.

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Trust me, your gut will thank you. All right, let's get back to our episode. Let's take it from, uh, from there. What brought you to the States? And, uh, I want to take people through your entrepreneurial journey, you know, as, as women and entrepreneurs, uh, men and women, look at what you've done. It's been extraordinary. Companies you've built and the journeys and fulfillments you've gone on. But talk about your family's transition from Iran to the U.S. and going to school and becoming an engineer, if you don't mind. So I left Iran when I was about 16 years old. I was just about to start grade 12. And we left,

and we had this rare opportunity where finally, my mom's request to get a green card came true. And they had accepted our application after 12 years. So this is after the revolution. You know, this is during the Iran-Iraq war, which went on for eight years. But I was there for the first five years of that. And so there was this opportunity. And I was excited but scared at the same time. I was a teenager. I had never left Iran before that trip.

And so we left with a lot of anxiety and anticipation and arrived here. And I was studying math and sciences in Iran and ended up, well, first I wanted to become an astrophysicist and I got accepted to University of Virginia. And my mom convinced me that that's not a really great career choice because all I could do is become a professor and that I didn't even speak English. I would be a good professor if I couldn't communicate well and I should think of something else. And I was, at my core, I'm always a problem solver. I love solving puzzles.

I'm curious. So engineering became my second choice, which was in retrospect, really a good choice because it helped me get to my dream and going to space. So I became an electrical engineer, computer science. This is in late 1980s, early 1990s. So it was an area that was growing, changing, lots of job opportunities. And so I became an engineer and started working for a telecommunication company, MCI, a company that doesn't exist anymore. Microwave Communications, Inc.

Yes. And it's interesting because that, you know, that opportunity to work for them, it was, and learning about their history, because their history is interesting. They disrupted telecom. about their history because their history is interesting. They disrupted telecom. They disrupted the whole, you know, conglomeration of the big mob bells and changed the face of, you know, telecommunication by doing that and the breakup of the bell companies. So that story was fascinating to me and really interested me

in how a small company can really disrupt big conglomerates so that maybe had something to do with my entrepreneurial desires later on so were you when you were being uh educated in iran and in your family uh what did your mom and dad do my father father was head of sales for the only wine producing company in Iran. This is before the revolution. He lost his job after the revolution. So he was in sales. And my mom worked as an administrator for in a university and also worked two jobs to make ends meet um and her second job was in a laboratory where they did blood tests and other things so i remember i would go in because it was

an evening shift she had so i would go sit next to her and see her putting blood in different things and putting it in the centrifuge and so that fascinated me also it's like all these equipment around me that i didn't know what they were for. And was there a mindset in your childhood that you could do anything? Was that something that you sort of left alone to entertain myself and do things on my own. And I had a very big imagination in my head so I could entertain myself with imagining things and making things up all the time.

So I sort of didn't understand the limitations. In our household, there was no issue with being a girl and, you know, people telling me I couldn't do something because I was a girl. And I was left alone, so I thought I could do anything I wanted. I was, you know, practically being able to do anything I wanted in the house, so why not outside? I would get in trouble, not too much. But mostly I remember I asked a lot of questions, and that drove my mom crazy.

And they would just pass me along to someone else, like, go ask your grandfather. So I always had a curious mind. And so I think that sort of drove me to want to try different things and think that I can do anything. It wasn't until I became an adult and understood. And then after the revolution, frankly, and all the limitations that were put in place against women and especially women in science, like the fact that were put in place, you know, against women and especially women in science, like the fact that I wanted to study physics and math became an issue. And it's like your chances of getting into university will be very slim and the chances of you finding a job

in the field would be very slim. So it wasn't until later that I realized being a woman is putting me in a disadvantage, especially in Iran. And perhaps now in the new world, it's an advantage, especially as a female entrepreneur. Let's fast forward. You meet your husband, Hamid, his brother, Amir, and the three of you become sort of an entrepreneurial team. When did the first idea that you would start a company together come in? Because you built three companies with some tremendous success. I can't claim that we had a brilliant idea and all of a sudden it's like, let's go build it. It started slowly. And it started when we were very young. We were working for MCI and they

changed their headquarters from Washington, D.C. This was Hamid, your husband was? Yeah, Hamid and myself. Yeah. So that's where we met actually. My brother-in-law and I, Amir, we went to university together and I was a year ahead. so when I looked for internship the last year I was in school he introduced me to the company my husband Hamid worked which was MCI and I started as an intern and then ended up getting hired there and working together but the company moved headquarters to Texas we didn't want to go to Texas. Ironically, we ended up there. I know. But we left and we started our own consulting business first.

We thought we'd try small and learn about what are some of the big companies are thinking about and trying to build. So we came from the advanced planning group of MCI. So we were always looking at what's next that we need to build for the company. So we felt that will be a good area for consulting. And frankly, it ended up being a good choice because we got sort of a view into what future the companies want to build. And then our first big entrepreneurial endeavor was to start building those products those software products for them and and creating them designing them and then building them for them so this is where telecom technologies comes in correct and and we we did this under the telecom

technology umbrella and we got to a point we saw an opportunity to leapfrog that and instead of asking the companies what they want to try to see what are the gaps what they need instead of what they want and and that's when we started our first products and building ended up building the first soft switch which is a technology that enables voice over ip and this is is before Skype and any of the voice over IP software that we see right now or applications. So it was way ahead of its time, but something that the companies, the telecom companies were looking at in order to reduce costs of long distance. And Internet was just starting to grow. So that's what we built and that was the right choice because it ended up being a successful product and exit. Yeah.

Yeah. So I have to ask you the question, was there ever a twinkling in your eye during that time where you're building telecom technologies and you're playing in the telecom market like if i can make it big here this can be what i can use capital wise to get to space was that playing in the back of your mind well i can tell you exactly how it came about so i was one morning i was getting ready to go to work and on cnn they were showing dennis tito and uh and dennis tito uh was the first this is 2001 yes before that it was 1990 i think oh well eight or nine uh when we first contracted yeah before he went yeah before he went this is a company that uh i had started with eric anderson uh and Eric Anderson and Richard Garriott, and we had negotiated a deal with the Russians that we could sell seats to go to the space station.

And Dennis was our first customer. Back then, I didn't know you. I didn't know XPRIZE. I didn't know you. None of this. But I watched Dennis Tito because there was this controversy that um you know we shouldn't let any commercial passengers to go to the space station united state was against it uh then it's true space adventure had a contract with the russians to go so there was all this

controversy playing and the only thing i took i didn't care about the controversy i'm like wow there is a way to buy a ticket to go to space. I just need money now because I didn't have the money, of course. So it became actually a motivation to grow the company, grow it faster and exit. Until then, I was just, it was work and I was building a company. But that's when actually I thought about exit because now I had the solution to go to space and I wanted to do it. exit because now I had the solution to go to space and I wanted to do it. So interesting. So you're serving as CEO of telecom technologies.

Yes. I think Amir, your brother-in-law is CTO and Hamid's head of marketing. Hamid can sell anything to anybody. He's extraordinary in that regard. And Amir as well, three of you. And the time from which you said, let's build a software IP switch, a soft switch, to the time the company exits, roughly how long?

I think three and a half years, four years. I mean, the idea came about four years and it helped. It took four years to build it and actually productize it and have sales on it because, yeah, about four years. or somewhat over a billion dollars. Yeah. And that's where our story comes together. Now, it wasn't just a sale of the company. It was an asset sale of the company, right? They didn't pick up the employees. They just bought the contracts and the software, I think. They did actually acquire the entire company, Actually, they acquired the entire company.

But one thing that we negotiated was they didn't put restriction on the shares that all the employees and we all got, except for some of our shares. But most of the employees were able to basically sell their shares and exit. So it was like an SSL because, you know, they could realize a cash value for the shares immediately and they didn't have to wait. Just to tell those listening where we intersect, I am at this point, it's 2001. I am desperate. I had announced the X Prize under the Arch in St. Louis in May of 1996, five years earlier. And I pitched 150 executives, CEOs, billionaires, philanthropists around the world to say, please put up the $10 million. You don't have to actually pay it until someone flies to space. And by then, of course, it'll be worth it.

And everyone's no, no, no, no, no. And I remember where I was in my apartment on 3rd Street in Santa Monica, picking up a copy of Fortune, Wealthiest 40 Women Under 40. And you were featured in that. And I was just flipping through the pages. And I remember reading a sentence in there that one of your dreams was to fly on a suborbital flight into space. And I must have read that sentence three times because I was like, no, no, no, it cannot be true. Wait, wait, suborbital and flying to space? And who is this woman?

And then I tracked you down. Do you remember the first communication from me at all? Yes. So my assistant at that time, we were in Hawaii where we took some time off because we had had a proper vacation for God knows how many years by then. Um, but, um, so we're in Hawaii, we had taken three months off to, to go and relax. And my assistant called me because at that time after the announcement, a lot of people were calling, everyone had an idea, an investment, you know, so she was screening

all the calls. And then she called me and said, there's a person who's calling, they're very persistent, and they want to talk to you about going to space. And then she told me about you reaching out. And I'm like, I immediately, I perked up. I was like, yes, let's decide on a meeting immediately. I want to know more. So I think you were the first meeting we had when we got back to the States, to Dallas, actually. And you came in with Byron. Yes, I brought an astronaut with me.

So I had absolute credibility. Which sold me from just walking in with an astronaut and his pictures in astronaut suits. I was sold. Yeah, it was. I remember Byron and I flew down. You were in Plano, Texas. And we came in. Hamid, Amir, Hamid's older brother was there, and we're presenting and pitching to you.

And we're like, I can't tell you how many hopes and prayers I was riding on this meeting because it was like, this has got to be her. This has got to be the person. And you didn't tell us yes right away. Do you remember that? You waited a few days. I did. I mean, I was sold.

I was totally sold. I was trying to contain my excitement. But we do everything as a family, so we couldn't cuddle in front of you. So we said, we'll get back to you. And then we had a conversation later on. And I think I was the most enthusiastic. And, you know, everyone else, well, you really think this is great? I'm like, yes, we need to do this.

This is it. And Amir was very supportive, too, because Amir shares this dream of going to space with me. So between the two of us, we twisted arms and we got the okay. Yeah, it was our offer was, listen, if you fund this $10 million purse, because we had been successful in bits and pieces. I used to go out and try and raise with Greg Maranac and Bob Weiss, you know, $25,000 at a time. That was a huge success for us. And we were able to fund the operations of the prize, but, you know, getting the purse was insanely difficult. And we pitched you and I think it was two days later, I got a call from Hamid who

did all the talking. I would not have been able to negotiate. Well, he was the best negotiator. And we called it the Ansari X prize. Originally, you know, before we were going to call it the Ansari prize, but the X stuck around, uh, because it'd taken us so long. And of course that allowed us to turn X prize intoZE into a platform versus a one-off prize. You know, fast forward, you start getting involved.

We start visiting the teams out there. What are your memories of first going out going out to scaled composites and meeting bert rutan i love those visits because it made it real for me and i could see people are actually building spaceships it was incredible um and i remember meeting bert and and uh he's a very unique individual and that's for sure yes and he was uh showing us the sketch of some of the plans he had. And it looked nothing like rocket ships. It was a plane. And it was very different design, very different approach. And I was thinking to myself, well, would this actually make it up there? And I'd relied a lot on you and Greg, and you had visited and worked with a lot of the teams,

and you felt that he probably was one of the top-running teams in the competition, and he was, I think, better funded than most other teams as well, through Paul Allen, of course. And so I was excited to see his design and and he was he didn't warm up to me at the beginning so I felt a little bit ignored but but but it was fine I I was there to learn and it was a they're not like a kid in a candy store I was just taking in all the information he was willing to share with us,

which he was very protective back then as well, rightfully so. He didn't want his IP to by any chance be compromised and wanted to make sure that it protected its design. But he was very confident that he's going to win this prize. He's like, I'm going to win this prize. And it was a great compliment when he unveiled Spaceship One and he said that the rules had stood the test of time. And so you and I went up there together first on September the 29th

for the first flight. Michael michael melville's flying this flight and um do you remember the aerobatics that that that vehicle had on that flight yes oh my god my heart stopped i mean i first i didn't know what was going on i would i was watching on the big Jumbotron, you know, this corkscrew flight pattern. Yeah, so Mike had pulled the vehicle up so straight into a flight regime it hadn't flown before, and it started to corkscrew. It started to roll on the long axis and i i don't remember how many rolls it did uh i think it was like 27 rolls before before he got into space and used the reaction control system to uh to stabilize it and i was listening on the ground control

talking to him too and and uh it they wanted him to abort and then he didn't. He's like, no, I can make it. And I'm like, my heart is stopping. He's like, it's okay. You can try again later. You know, one of the things I didn't feel, and I wonder if you did, you know, when I was going out to raise the $10 million prize,

one of the objections, there were three objections always. Can anyone really pull it off? Why isn't NASA doing this? And is someone going to die trying? And there was a sense of feeling of, are we incentivizing people to risk their lives and potentially die in the process? Did that ever hit you that you're putting up the money might cause a team to build a technology that, you know, we couldn't turn away, but it wasn't safe and they would kill themselves?

Of course, I understood the risks and felt the weight of it on me. But it wasn't something that would stop me because I knew the passion I had for space, and I was as willing to give my life to go to space and take the risk. And I knew there were millions of people like me who would do the same. And as long as we understood the risk, and still we were willing to take that chance and build something and risk our lives to go to space, I think it was all right to make that choice. If we play it safe, we will never advance in anything. So I think it was an important step.

And I don't know if you remember, the Challenger accident happened before this flight. And that was actually another wave of, you know, negative sort of sentiment around our competition. And that, you know, even NASA has accidents like this. What makes you guys, you know, small teams to think that you can go to space and you will definitely kill people? And I wrote an op-ed on this as well. And I talked to a few astronauts to see how they felt about this. And they all said that it's actually dishonoring the memory of those astronauts who gave their lives because they're in this knowing that exploration and expanding humans' footprint

in the universe is important. And they're willing to give their lives and and using their death as an excuse not to do it is actually dishonoring their memory and and i truly believe that i i do as well i mean you know uh risk is is the game that we that we enable to live you know humanity at a higher higher level you know i remember uh something that most people don't know is we set the rules for the Ansari XPRIZE. You had to build a three-person spaceship. We figured as a pilot and two paying passengers, and you had to fly it to 100 kilometers altitude, land safely, and within two weeks, make the trip again. You could replace up to 10% of the dry mass. And it had to be, you know, 90% or more privately funded.

So in Spaceship One, where Mike Melville was sitting up front of the controls, there were two empty seats in the back. Yes. I wanted one of those seats. I remember the day of the flight, I was telling Bert, you know, I'm happy to replace one of those bags if you want now then you can't do that yeah we we gave the option to the teams that instead of risking three lives uh you know it was interesting it was important to have a human in the pilot seat would not have been the same would it had we had an you know autopilot flying the vehicle

uh then uh then mike Millville on that flight. And in the back two seats, we had all kinds of memorabilia. I remember what I flew on there. Do you remember? Did you fly some things? I didn't. I don't remember. We'll have to go back in our time machine and get you an opportunity.

Yeah, I know. Didn't. I don't remember. We'll have to go back in our time machine. Yeah, I know. I flew a copy of The Spirit of St. Louis, the book that Greg Marinak had given me that inspired the Ansari X Prize. I flew Atlas Shrugged. I'm a huge Ayn Rand fan. And then I flew The Man Who Sold the Moon by Robert Heinlein, which had inspired so much for me. which had inspired so much for me. And then we flew certificates that we used for fundraising with the XPRIZE

and bags of pennies that we gave out to people and so forth. They had to come up with, I don't know, something like 400 pounds of ballast back there. So he flies on September 29th and then the rules were you had to fly again within two weeks. So what does Bert do next? Well, he definitely didn't want to wait two weeks. He wanted to make a memory of the second flight. So I think it was October 4th. Yes. Which is another date in history, right? It's the

anniversary of Sputnik. Yes. October 4th of 1957, where the Soviets beat the Americans to orbit a satellite in space. Yeah, so he notified us that that's when his second flight will be. And we were scrambling to make sure we get ready to cover it and be there and bring everyone else there. So it was an exciting two flights, both of them. It was an exciting two flights, both of them. I remember getting up very early and surprised by the line of cars in the darkness of the early morning, Mojave. All these cars and headlights. I'm like, oh my God, all these people are coming to watch the launch.

This is important to a lot of people. Yeah, we had, God, probably, I don't know, 30 or 40 large satellite trucks and 10,000 plus, but it was like a giant party in the middle of the desert. And it was, it was insane. And what was crazy was, you know, Mike Melville had flown that corkscrew flight five days earlier. And what Bert and the team, this was the genius of the group he had, was they figured if they just flied a more shallow flight profile, it would be stable. So they didn't have to modify the vehicle at all. So I don't know if you remember our Charles Lindbergh who won the Ansari X Prize, an extraordinary pilot, Navy pilot. Remember who that was? Yes. Brian Binney. Yeah. Brian. And flew a picture perfect flight. And I remember Brian told us that the morning, you know, these guys are getting up at 3.30, 4 o'clock in the morning for their flight. And he had barely

gotten any sleep the night before. And his mother-in-law steps up to him to give him a hug. And she's got a large, uh, big gulp soda in her hand and she's coming to wrap her hands around him. And he's thinking in the back of his mind, what is she going to do with that giant big gulp soda? Where's she going to put it? And she puts it down his flight suit. So he does the flight to space with all of this sort of sticky on his back.

And he does the calculations of like, you know, extra six ounces of weight, how much less altitude is that going to be? Anyway, crazy, crazy. And that was an amazing, amazing day in history for us. But it was just the beginning of your space adventures, Mademoiselle. Yes. space adventures mademoiselle yes yes so uh so let's take you back to the connection for the for the cosmodrome um uh how did you get into cosmonaut training okay my entire life revolves around x prize so um we were celebrating the first anniversary of winning of the competition the ansori x prize and we had the big party and invited who's who of space agencies and Buzz Aldrin was there.

And also of course, all the X Prize family. And we had also invited Eric Anderson and he brought the next person who was supposed to go to space. It was a Japanese businessman. And they were there. And Eric told me that, you know, that he doesn't have a backup. And, you know, I know how interested you are in space. Do you want to be a backup and just learn about the Russian space program and Hyde Works?

And because this was something on my list of, I wanted to do, I didn't know how long. What year is this roughly? This is 2005. So, and for backup, you mean go to, uh, go to Russia and train, uh, in star city. Correct. And, um, so I, my original plan was to go to space with Spaceship One. And then I knew that I have to wait until they get it commercialized and all that. So I didn't know how long that would take. And this opportunity came. And the only question I asked Gary is like, will I be in the same room as the other astronauts? Will I be training next to them?

And he said, yeah, you'll be part of the whole crew. You'll be a backup crew. So that was the only question I asked. And then I packed my bags and then I was off to Russia to train for nine months and be in the cold weather. I want you to describe the luxurious accommodations that is the Star City training facility. So how would you describe it visually? I don't think it has changed much since Gagarin flew to space. In 1961, yes.

Yes. And you and Hamid came with me for my qualification because they had to make sure I can enter the program. So you both came with me to Star City. And I remember there was this capsule the uh old soy's capsule in the big hall that we entered and uh you and i were sat inside and hamid poked his head in and it's like you're really going to fly this thing i'm like yes it was so old everything push button and and and old screen then the operating

system was das so it was pretty old i remember every i mean everything was cement and uh and asphalt and the stairs were crumbling on the way up uh it was a, it was definitely, it was a, it was a one star. Yeah. Trip going back in time. Yeah. Yeah, for sure. For sure. And so you're, you're going through training and, and you're expecting that you're going to be in, you know, on the ground watching as the launch vehicle takes off for 11 days on Space Station. But that dream of standing on the ground and watching it was dashed, wasn't it? Definitely. Fortunately. And it happened very quickly. And it happened very quickly.

So before that, if you remember, there was a launch for the crew before us. And I got the opportunity to go watch the launch. And if I had any doubt in my mind that I wanted to go to space, my God, watching the Soyuz launch just made it that much stronger in my heart. I'm like, I'm going to do it. I started negotiating. It's like, so when is the first spot that I can sign up to go? And while I was thinking about that, finished the training, and the entire time I was training, I decided that I'm going to train as if I'm going to space

because I wanted to. You're giving it your all. I was giving it my all. And I even designed my patch, which was very presumptuous of me. But eventually I'm going to go to space. So I started designing my patch and everything. And then the training ended.

I remember very clearly the training ended. It was the last day. We finished our last sim. And Hamid was coming to help me pack to you know get ready to go home and then the astronauts were going to quarantine to Baikonur and on my way to the airport they I got a call from Eric and it's like I know Eric's the CEO of space adventures yes yeah and it calls me like do's the CEO of Space Adventures at this time. Yeah.

And Eric calls me, he's like, do you want to go to space? And I'm like, Eric, this is not funny. I'm so depressed. Yeah,

exactly. I'm so depressed right now. I was very depressed. The last day, the best time I had in my life and it's coming to an end. And he's like, no, I'm serious.

The person who was supposed to go had a medical condition and they had just disqualified him and that they said that anusha has passed all the trainings she scored very high and she's probably even more ready to go and uh and it's just a matter of if you want to go and i screamed screamed so loud, I think. How long, how many days before flight is this? So this was three weeks. Three weeks before. So you're ready to go back to Plano, Texas.

And instead, you turn the car around and head back there. Yes. And my first call after, of course, Hamid was there and i as soon as i saw him he's like guess what it's like you're going to space i'm like yes i'm going to space so so i got really um you know i didn't know what to do i had only three weeks so i couldn't prepare anything and my first call was to you peter it's like peter i'm going to space. What can I do? What should I do? What experiments should I do? And I remember you told me is just write about your experience, write a blog. And I'm like, I don't know how to write blogs. I just write whatever comes to your

mind. And I said, okay, and you had to actually pull some strings and get permission for me to actually publish that blog for XPRIZE, through XPRIZE. It was an extraordinary. And so how many days on the space station were you? So you launch, how long to get to the space station? How long are you there? Coming back down?

Give people a flight profile. Those folks may not know, but it's like how quick you can hail your taxi and get to the space station and back. So back then, it would take two days to get to the space station so you spend two days inside the capsule which is uh not the best part of the trip because the capsule is pretty small i was with other two crewmates and uh you know inside the capsule you're sitting and your knees are to your chest and it's very tight and and then you can get out of your seat, you're sitting and your knees are to your chest and it's very tight. And then you can get out of your seat once you're in orbit. But there's just a little bit more room for two people standing close together.

And that's the space you have for two days together. And that's also the time when your body's going through a lot of changes. So I had motion sickness. I had tremendous headache. I had like tremendous headache. My back hurt. You know, the body's adjusting. So it was, that was the hardest part of the trip I would say. And then after two days you get to the space station

and compared to the capsule it's like a luxurious, you know, castle with all the different modules. And I was really happy to get there and stayed nine days on the space station and returned to Earth with a different crew who had just completed their six months. Your favorite moment, like the favorite thing, like what do you, when you close your eyes and you remember being there, what is it you remember? There are two very special moments that I remember. Of course, the first one is when I saw Earth for the first time from, and I was still in

the capsule. It was after we got to orbit and they had just told us that we can open our seatbelts. And I sort of slowly flew up and I had the, you know, porthole next to me. So I flew up a little bit to the porthole and I looked out and it was daylight and I could see earth. And it was such an emotional moment for me. And I just, it was so beautiful. And it was like there was this energy and this warmth coming from Earth. And I was in the capsule, so it wasn't like I was actually feeling it. But it was there.

I could feel it. And I started, you know, laughing and at the same time crying. It was bizarre. And my teardrops started accumulating under my eyes and then one of them started floating and I saw my teardrop floating and then that made me laugh again. So it was just back and forth,

you know, a really big, strong mix of emotions. And then after I got enough of watching our planet and then started getting dark as we turned, I decided I'm going to fly. I can do Superman now. And I pushed my feet down so hard that I flew so fast I hit my head to the top of the other module. And then I was somersaulting. All the things they told you not to do at the beginning of being in space. I was doing, I was just, I was a kid.

I was a kid in a candy store. I was just experiencing all these sensations and feelings and sights. And of course, I got very sick after that. Did you, did all the motion sickness eventually go away? Yes, I had to get a shot. It got so bad, I had to have a shot. And that makes you drowsy. So one regret I have is the first two days inside the capsule,

I was very drowsy because of the medication. But by the time we got to the space station, I was adjusted. I was, you know, adjusted. I was ready. I was excited. So my body went through all its changes before getting to the space station, which was the best part. I could just enjoy the experience out there. Yeah.

No, that's awesome. You come back down and we begin our journey together on the XPRIZE. So you've been a trustee of the XPRIZE since your family stepped up to underwrite the first Unsorry XPRIZE and been an extraordinary co-conspirator, I'll say, in this journey. And we were lucky enough to pull you in as CEO,

how many years ago now? About three years ago, three and a half years ago. Okay. Like I tell you, you know, it's the first three years of your next 300. I'll offer you all the longevity services on the planet, as long as we keep you as our CEO. Anusha, I want to, I want to talk a little bit about mindset, which I tend to focus on in this podcast, because I think it's, what I like to say is that what enables the most successful people on the planet is their mindset. It isn't the money they have. It isn't the technology they have. It's the way they process information and see the world. So let's kick off with a conversation around a passion and purpose-driven mindset, because I think you're someone who very much exudes passion and purpose.

What's your advice to people when they're saying, I'm not sure what I want to do, I'm not sure what my purpose is? Do you have any advice for folks to help them find their passion and their purpose? Yeah, I think it's good if people leave some room for exploration and experiences. That's the only way you can find your passion. So as I said, I have a very curious mind, so I love trying new things. And sometimes I like it, sometimes I don't like it. I think that's very essential to being able to find your purpose and your passion. And a lot of people are looking so hard that even if it's there, they miss it because they think it's formulaic and there's like, they need to take a test to find out what their passion is. And it's not like that because

passion comes from an experience that leaves an emotional sort of footprint on you. And then you, you, you know, you, you want to have it again and you want to have it in a bigger way or something that maybe it's an idea that you watch something. And I, again, I love sci-fi stuff. So I always got ideas from just watching what the future could be and then trying to make it happen. So I think curiosity and allowing yourself to experience different things and having an open mind to these new experiences is a big part of finding your passion. an open mind to these new experiences is a big part of finding your passion. And, you know, risk taking is core to all of it. Because if you want to play it safe, you will never try something new. And if you never try something new, how would you know if it's something you like or

you're passionate about? So those are, I think, very important factors. I love that. And it goes back to another mindset I focus on, which is a curiosity mindset, right? Which I think you exhibit in spades. Is there, you know, do you think you were born with a curiosity mindset or is that something you develop over time? I think we all are born with curiosity mindset, but some start putting limits on it and sort of killing it. As kids, we're always curious. Every child is curious because they're just learning. And you can either develop it and let it grow or you can sort of start and and kill it. And a lot of our systems, sometimes parents, sometimes society,

plays a big role in really killing that sense of imagination and curiosity in young people. And that's one thing that if I have a chance to give advice is don't let that die in you, because that's the best gift we have as human beings is this imaginative mind that the curiosity that we have allowing us to imagine things and then building it later. It starts with that whole concept and it's very unique to human beings. I don't know any other species that we've studied enough that has this type of capability. I love that. And that was part of your patch. What was your mission? What'd your mission patch say? Imagine, be the change, inspire. So I had these three things on top of my patch. So the first

part was imagination because without imagination, you don't go anywhere. You have to first see it, imagine it, and then do it. So the second part is the action part, be the change. So if you want something, don't wait for other people to do it for you. You have to do it. You have to make it happen. You have to create it. So it's part of the famous Gandhi quote of be the change you want to see in the world. So you have to manifest that yourself. And then the last part is when you do the first two parts, inspire others to do the same. Because this world will be a much better place and more fun place to live in if everyone followed those steps. Everybody, let me take a quick break from our episode to talk about something important for your diet.

Now, as you know, I'm a huge longevity and health champion. Part of my focus is on exercise, sleep, and diet. And when it comes to diet I'm super careful on what I eat. But throughout the day when I need energy I'm looking for a snack and one of my favorite options is macadamia nuts. And there are four reasons I want to share them with you. First macadamia nuts are high in monounsaturated fats which are the good fats for your heart. It lowers LDL and raises your good cholesterol. Second, they taste great and they're rich in fiber, which helps with digestion and gut health.

Third, macadamia nuts contain antioxidants and flavonoids, which protect your cells from damage and inflammation. And finally, macadamia nuts have a low glycemic index, which means they don't spike your blood sugar. They truly are the king of nuts. I get mine from House of Macadamia, which offers the best macadamia nuts in the world. They're sourced sustainably from South Africa. They offer a huge range of delicious, nutritious products, including roasted and dipped macadamia nuts, macadamia nut bars, macadamia oils, which are actually better than olive oil for cooking. If you want to try House of Macadamia products for yourself, you can get 20% off your first order by using the code Peter20 at checkout. Just go to houseofmacadamias.com backslash peter20 and enter

the code peter20 at checkout. That's houseofmacadamias.com slash peter20. And then again, use the code peter20 to get that 20% off. Trust me, you'll love them as much as I do. Now back to our episode. One of the things that I love is the fact that the XPRIZE has a significant number of women in leadership positions. And I've often said, it's time to give women, men have screwed up enough, let's hand it over. What's your advice to women out there who are, uh, you know, interested in, in non-traditional what has been historically non-traditional female careers and, or want to be entrepreneurs and leaders? Um, you know, what do you say to all of them?

So I think, um, uh, this whole concept, the podcast about mindset, and I think mindset plays a huge role, whether you're male or female, but in women, I think, uh, a lot of times we limit, uh, our limiting belief system is what limits us. We are scared to try big things. And part of it, I think has to do with the fact, and again, I grew up in a different culture, but girls are always told to be perfect by their parents, especially their moms, usually. It's like, you have to look perfect, dress perfect, your hair has to be perfect, everything has to be perfect.

And when you're trying to be perfect, you don't try things that you may fail at. I remember my grandmother used to discourage me from playing in games where I had to run and I could fall down. It's like, you're going to have a scar on your skin. And if you want to ever be in a beauty pageant, you can be in a beauty pageant. I'm like, who wants to be in a beauty pageant? I want to run. I want to climb.

I want to go up the tree. So I think those types of things as a child puts a sort of this limiting belief system that there are certain things a perfect girl cannot do. And I think we need to get rid of that and, you know, try everything and not be afraid of failing. So anyone who wants to try something worthwhile, they need to prepare themselves for failure. And to me, I even don't like the word failure because to me, anything you want to do that's new, you're going to make mistakes and things won't work the way you thought. So to me, they're lessons, they're not failures. And you just need to understand what went wrong so next

time you don't make the same mistake or make adjustments to do it better. So I think those things are very important in women who want to be in leadership position. I also, especially I want a lot of women in the STEM and tech oriented businesses because I think our society will be run by technology. And the fact that the voices of women leaders are missing at the design tables, at the discussion tables, the world is being built in a way that it won't be women-friendly. So I think it's important for women to be at the discussion table,

at the design table, at the leadership role to do that. And the last thing I would say is, and this is true for me, when I did things, I didn't think about being a female engineer or a female CEO or a female this or female that. I was me. I was a human being. I was doing things the way I believe should be done, the way I would if I switch places. My leadership has always been that if I were the employee, what would I want to see? And I would try to do that. Or when I worked for someone else, what things worked

and what things bothered me? So I never went to business school. I don't have an MBA. So everything I did was from intuition and just doing the things I liked in other leaders and not doing the things I didn't like in other leaders. So it's something that I recommend for women. And when you look for mentors, I don't think you just need to limit yourself to female mentors. I think female mentors can understand some of the challenges that women leaders face, but you can always learn lessons from anyone. And I would actually like that diversity of experiences when you're trying to tackle a problem that's facing you.

I love that. I love that. Let's talk moonshots. That's our business in XPRIZE. And, you know, is this, is the idea of going big and or going, something that was inherent in your mind as an, as an entrepreneur, did you gravitate to this idea of going after the world's biggest problems? I mean, I think, I don't think that's for everybody, right? I think some people just like to stick in their knitting and, and do the 10% incremental work and other people are like, unless I'm changing the world, I'm not interested. You know, is that, Do you agree with that? Or what's your experience here?

I agree. And so here's the way I look at it. Being an entrepreneur, starting something new is very risky. It requires a lot of sacrifice. It's hard. I think sometimes people make it sound like it's always fun and games and parties. And you get to be your own boss so you can sleep as late as you want is the farthest from the truth. It's hard.

It's you're all you have to be all in if you want to succeed. You have to be dedicated, passionate and and you need to be ready for a lot of failures and adjusting and getting up, you know, and taking the next step. So if you're doing all of that, it's not worth it for a 10% increment. If you want to do that, go work for a company. That's what they do. Large companies, well, they do incremental change. If you want to be entrepreneur, you need to take big leaps and make sure that your time and energy and the sacrifice you make from your personal life, which you have to make, is worth it. So that would be what I would do. And that's why a lot of things, projects or products that we built was way ahead of its time. So we were changing something.

was way ahead of its time. So we were changing something. To stick on the focus on women leaders and entrepreneurs, I have to imagine it's difficult to have a trade against family, a trade against kids, a trade against how you spend your time. What do you tell young women in their 20s and 30ies who are, you know, going all in on this. Well, that's exactly the sacrifices that you have to make. You have to have a passion strong enough that you feel like it's worth it. Because as I said, you're giving up a lot to be able to do what you do. So you need to be sure that this is something you really want to do deep down in your heart. And unfortunately, it is a sacrifice right now, but it doesn't have to be, Peter. I think in the future, as business leaders look at things other than just quarterly profits,

and even that, I don't think it's an issue. and just quarterly profits. And even that, I don't think it's an issue. Just being open to creating and accommodating people of different background and different needs to be part of a team, whether it's a leadership team or a design team, that diversity and inclusion will give you a much stronger, better product, service, or company at the end of the day. So I think it's worth making some accommodations to create that environment that invites everyone, invites women, invites people of different race and background.

And I think business leaders will get to a point that they will understand that and they will embrace that. And this whole notion of putting people in boxes eventually will go away. That would be my ideal world where we don't have to put people in any box, a woman or a man or an African-American or a gay. I don't know why we create so many labels. We're just humans. I mean, I, I love the way you run, you run the organization. Did, did you have any mentors or anybody, you know, role models that you looked up to Anusha that really shaped your,

your life here? Not people that I've worked with as a kid. My idol was Albert Einstein. I read about how he came up with the theory of relativity. And to me, that was mind boggling. How could someone sit in a, you know, small office, patent office, and imagine how the universe functions and imagine it so differently than what was believed to be the way the world works. And the fact that you can have such strong imagination and be able to just see things like that in your mind and then try to prove it to me was that's what I wanted to do. I want to go beyond what's in front of my eyes to be able to see and imagine things and then go prove them

or go build them. And that was my fascination and why I so strongly believe in this magical gift we have, which is the gift of imagination. But in terms of a mentor, as I said, the way I sort of tried to shape my leadership style is around what I liked from other leaders around me and what I disliked and build on that. Very human-centric type of approach, not textbook approach. Let's turn to XPRIZE. We've launched $300 million in prizes. Uh, uh, you really have done an extraordinary job in, in building the structure for growth going forward. Um, uh, give everybody a quick overview of, of like, what does the X prize do at its fundamental? If they haven't heard about the X prize, how would you describe it?

So, um, I, I describe it to actually why I was drawn to it. So XPRIZE launches massive competitions to really focus the world's attention on a problem that has been left unsolved and it's important to humanity. And then incentivizes the best minds from all over the globe to focus on solving it. from all over the globe to focus on solving it. And the way we incentivize them to really break down with very clear objectives how you would solve this. So demonstrate these three things. Go 200 kilometers, do it twice within two weeks, the way you described it. So very clear objectives that people can wrap their mind around,

okay, I need to build this, that, this, A, B, and C. And this way they are excited and they come together and form teams to build what we want because we only award the winners once they built and demonstrate that they've accomplished what we asked them to accomplish. So it's very different than some of the awards and prizes that awarded our ideas or past work. This is very future forward looking. And at the core, the thing that really draws me to XPRIZE is the fact that our mission is to build a hopeful, abundant future for everyone. And the world needs that. And that's what we try to do with accelerating innovation and breakthroughs and solving the world's problem.

We are driving the world toward this vision of an abundant and hopeful future for everyone. Do you think that XPRIZE sets big enough challenges? How do you think about this? Cause I, I, I'm always, you know, saying, is that going to happen anyway? Or is this going to be a big enough prize? And, you know, should we be going more into, into, you know, the area of crazy, so to speak, you know, where do we balance between an incremental prize and a prize that's so crazy that it will never get won? I mean, these are the things, you know,

I think about, and you have to run an organization, you know, I just have the, I have the luxury of being chairman and throwing ideas over the transom to you. So it's a really good question and a question that we ask ourselves, as you know, you ask yourself and as a team leadership team, we ask ourselves too. And in the past, we've been very opportunistic to find that intersection of an idea that there's enough interest from a sponsor to actually help us launch it because we can come up with a lot of crazy ideas and people will tell us you're crazy and we won't be able to get it off the ground. So we have to have a different approach, which we're working on, which is the next phase of XPRIZE. But today, the way I

think when I look at the world, there's so many immediate problems that we can't just focus on crazies without understanding that people have shorter term needs. And again, short term for XPRIZE is not next year or the year after. It's like five-year horizon, five to 10-year horizon is short term for us. And our long term is always looking at, you know, 20, 25 years, 30 years into the future. So I think we need to balance both. And we need to have a good mix of very challenging prizes where we probably won't have to set a time limit that you have to win by this time.

And that will basically allow teams to work on their own over a long period of time and eventually get there. And then there are some immediate issues around climate, energy, biodiversity, health, that requires still big risks and big steps, and no one else is doing. And XPRIZE can accelerate those breakthroughs. And I think that's also very important for us to do. So I think we need to have a good mix of both. So any favorites that, you know, of your XPRIZE children, like, you know, and I'm curious if you've like any of the XPRIZEs that we've launched that you've said, man, that just isn't going to happen or Or anyone's like, wow, that's amazing. Yeah, I love all of our X-Prizes, but I'm a techie.

I'm a geek. So I definitely love our Avatar competition, and it's a favorite of mine. So tell people what you have to do to win this Avatar, this all Nippon Airways ANA Avatar X-Prize. The part that I love is that the actual prize initially was like they were thinking of, is it possible to build a transportation like the one you see on Star Trek? Yeah, quantum teleportation. Quantum teleportation.

Yeah, that's what I really wanted to, but we had to see what can be done in the span of 10 to 15 years. And so it ended up being an avatar competition where you're not, you know, dematerializing yourself, but you are transferring your senses, your actions, all of your emotions through an avatar to a remote location. And it would feel as if you're there and taking those steps and actions and feeling like you're there, actually. So it was bringing a lot of different technologies together and integrating them and advancing them in a way that will give that sense of

being in a different location without physically dislocating yourself. So it's haptics, AR, VR, AI, robotics, vision systems, all of it coming together and building an avatar. And then you will have a suit that you wear and put on your goggles and the suit and the gloves or whatever and then you would feel like wherever your avatar is you would feel it's there and you would be able to pick things up and and sense things and move around like you were physically there nice uh you and i were in I were in Israel for the attempted landing of the

Israeli Google Lunar X Prize team. So this was an interesting one, right? We had challenged, gotten Google to put up $30 million for the first team who could land on the moon, send back photos, videos, rove, and send back more photos and videos. And the competition ran out of time. Yeah. That was one of our audacious competitions, to ask a team to actually build a system and launch it and land on the moon. That was a tall order. But many teams attempted.

I mean, I was really encouraged by the number of teams from different countries who actually built hardware and they were trying to negotiate catching a ride on someone's rocket to get to the moon. But we were in Israel and one of our teams, Space IL, who continued their work even past the expiration of the competition, announced that they're going to make an attempt. And the part I loved that when they launched, they actually had the little card that they were going to use to show that they've launched and how close they get to the moon. And they had the X Prize on it because the team, I remember the team members were young kids when we had the Anstari X Prize, and they were inspired and their interest in space was picked because of that prize. And then they became a team competing in our Google Lunar X Prize. So we had, you know, shaped their lives. And they sent us a photograph of a selfie taken by the spacecraft in its trans-lunar injection.

And so the moon is behind the spacecraft and the photo shows the XPRIZE logo in the foreground with the moon. That was amazing. I loved that. That was amazing. That was amazing. And just being there and hearing their stories and the excitement they had created in their community, the kids that were looking at them like they were heroes because we always call our teams our heroes, but now they were the heroes of the nation.

They were a small team of young entrepreneurs landing a lunar lander, and they almost made it there. They were like this close. They did land, it's just with a high velocity impact. Yeah, we're in Israel at mission control. And it's just crowded. You and I are in mission control along with, you know, we had the president of the country was there. And the head of their space program was there.

And they're in orbit around the moon which was a big accomplishment itself getting into lunar orbit and uh they hit the the engines to break and they're coming down and uh nothing hardware it's a software glitch damn software and um they unfortunately uh didn't do a soft landing. So close. And I think they're funded to go again. They're funded to go again. And the best part was many of the teams who didn't even go that far, they all have received contracts from different space agencies because they all had a lot of innovation.

So that's what we do at XPRIZE. Even our failures are big successes, because we advance technology, we create innovative approaches to things that have not changed for, you know, decades. So that's the beauty of XPRIZE competitions. Hey, everybody, this is Peter, a quick break from the episode. I'm a firm believer that science and technology and how entrepreneurs can change the world is the only real news out there worth consuming. I don't watch the crisis news network I call CNN or Fox and hear every devastating piece

of news on the planet. I spend my time training my neural net, the way I see the world, by looking at the incredible breakthroughs in science and technology, how entrepreneurs are solving the world's grand challenges, what the breakthroughs are in longevity, how exponential technologies are transforming our world. So twice a week, I put out a blog. One blog is looking at the future of longevity, age reversal, biotech, increasing your health span. The other blog looks at exponential technologies, AI, 3D printing, synthetic biology, AR, VR, blockchain. These technologies are transforming what you as an entrepreneur can do. If this is

the kind of news you want to learn about and shape your neural nets with, go to dmandus.com backslash blog and learn more. Now back to the episode. How would you define a moonshot mindset, Anusha? You know, if you were to say that some of the most successful people, entrepreneurs on the planet have a moonshot mindset, what is that? What does it take to have a moonshot mindset? whether it's money, resources, engineering, technology, nothing. If the world was perfect and I could snap my finger and create something, what would that thing look like? And once you have that vision, then you can step back and figure out how to get there and how to build it.

Because a lot of people start with something that's there and how they can improve it. And you will never end up in a moonshot if you're starting by trying to improve something. But if you look at a problem or something that's, you know, just you want to build and start with the end in mind and envision it without any limitation, I think it will ultimately end up in a moonshot thinking. It's a practice. I think I love sometimes when you get there through conversation, because if you get just two or three crazy people around and you start throwing ideas there, and then someone say, what if this, and what if that?

So another thing about moonshot is I don't think you sit there in a room by yourself and create your moonshot. You come up with an idea. In order to make it into moonshot, you need to bounce it by a few crazy people around you. Yeah, I agree with you. It's in conversation. I would say sometimes it could be in conversation with the author of a book, right? So reading a book and hearing ideas and having that rattle in your brain. Right. So reading a book and hearing ideas and having that rattle in your brain.

So for me, the original Ansari XPRIZE came out of a reading of the spirit of St. Louis that Greg Marinak gave me and then calling a few people like Byron Lichtenberg and Jim Burke and Greg and then asking them what they thought of the idea. And when they told me it was a crazy idea, I said, good. It's like, you know, and I think that's an interesting point, right? Because, uh, if you go with your moonshot idea and you bounce it off of people and they tell you it's a crazy idea, it'll never work. Uh, how do you deal with that? I think you're asking the wrong person because I was always told, anything I wanted to do, I was told, nice, but you can't do that.

I said, I want to go to space and nobody believed me. So I don't pay attention, whether it's moonshots or other things. I live my life without caring what other people think. It just has to sit right and be right with me inside my heart, something I want to do. And then, you know, I say, well, even if it's crazy, I'll try it. And I will never have regrets, because I know I tried it, and then I failed at it. But if I never try it, one, I don't know if I will make it. And two, I will always wonder,

what if I did it? Let me ask you, you know, why, why would you say moonshots matter? You know, do, are we taking enough, are entrepreneurs taking enough moonshots? Are countries, are philanthropists taking enough moonshots? And why do they matter? I don't think we are taking enough moonshots. And it matters because that's how we make fundamental change in society. And if we learn one thing with the pandemic is change happens, nobody's safe. You can't live in safety, whether you like it or not. So to me, when you take the chance, when you do something, at least you control or not control, but you at least predict the change a little bit. And you, you know, you decided to take the chance. So you have, you feel at least some agency in the change that's happening

to your life because you chose to go in that direction, take that path. So big changes in society happens through moonshots. I think nothing that has really transformed societies in a positive way was done with just incremental thinking. So moonshot definitely matters. And I think it's a shame I don't see people with means taking moonshots. It's usually people who don't have much to lose, so they take bigger chances. And to me, it's good and it's always you need to have that. But if you mix that with people who have lots of capital to invest in something where a 1% of that capital can really help drive moonshots. It's a shame that they can't take even that decision. You're hitting on a pet peeve. I mean, there's so many individuals who've got

50 or $100 billion and were like, what are you going to do with that money? Have you not figured out you can't take it with you? And if you leave it to your kids, you're going to destroy their lives. So what are you going to do with it? And, uh, you know, it, I'm, it really does drive me nuts. There's a few people, uh, you know, Elon's been taking big bets despite let's put Twitter aside for the moment. Um, and you know, Mark Benioff has done an incredible job. Eric Schmidt's done, but there's a lot of just money sitting on the sidelines just accumulating. Why do you think that is? Why are, you know, world billionaires really being quite conservative and quiet? Is there like something happened when you get, you know, three commas?

I think it's the scarcity mindset that,, you talk about, because they're always thinking that I may lose it. So if you're thinking that I may lose it, that you're continuously trying to protect it, then nothing is enough because you could lose it. And guess what? Things happen in the world that you may lose it anyway. So why don't you spend at least a fraction of it? So if you're a few billionaires listening to this conversation,

take just one of your billion and launch $10 million X prizes. And I guarantee you, we will do really a lot of great work with the capital you put forward. And we do. I mean, we have 26 years of experience to show how we bring 10 to 30 times the money invested in a prize in terms of investment in ideas and innovation in that field. So to me, if you want to have an impact in the world, if you want to leave a legacy, what better leverage for your philanthropic dollar than 10 to 30 times. And it's fun. It's definitely fun. I mean, you had fun as the benefactrix of the Ansari XPRIZE, yes? I loved every moment of it. I loved the board meetings.

I loved the visioneering session. I absolutely loved the visioneering events. And it was not a chore to go to any of these meetings. It was like I couldn't wait until the next one next year. My theory about why billionaires don't fund this, you don't have to be a billionaire. If you're sent a millionaire and you want to put up a $10 million prize, that's aligned with our vision. Happy to have the conversation. But I think there are two things I think about. One is that they, and I've told this to Steve Forbes and Kip Forbes and the Forbes family, I think that

the Forbes list gamifies wealth retention. And so I don't want to drop from number 13 to number 43 by giving away a few billion dollars. And we need a countervailing force here. We need the equivalent of the Forbes contribution list that has them raise up the ranking there. That's one reason. The reason I think is that when you get to that point of wealth, you like directing where the money goes.

I think you like saying, no, let's use that design for a rocket ship and I'm going to invest in this individual versus letting you know the crowd compete against each other any other reasons why even that i mean for me was the that last point it was the opposite because i was an entrepreneur and i always looked at putting money in building things that I directed. But then I also was fully aware that I would go hire a team, tell them the designs, what we wanted to build and, you know, wait three or four years or longer. And usually it would cost more and I would not end up with

what I wanted exactly. But, you know, the big appeal of the competition to me was that I will put my design out there of what we want the people, the teams to build. And I don't pay anything until they actually build it and show that it works. I mean, as an entrepreneur, what better way to innovate, you know, to build something you want to build is ask everyone, crowdsource it to the entire world and ask them to build it for you without paying them. And then someone else pays them to build it for you and you only pay up to the winning team, to the best design. That to me, like it's a no brainer. And if you want to have an impact in the world, you know, just creating that many different

innovation and companies out there, that's the best legacy you can leave. I tell you, I went to space so people know I'm an astronaut, so usually that's an attraction. But when I go speak at universities, the students who come up to me, many of them were maybe in high school or even younger during Ansari X Prize. And they were inspired by that idea. And they ended up going to aerospace engineering or taking, you know, a field of interest in space because before that, they never heard of space in any exciting way. They never thought that there will be a path for them. And all of a sudden, we created the opportunity. And they're like, oh, I can be part of this whole new marketplace,

a whole new set of jobs that are opening up. And I don't need to just think about working for NASA, which would be a limited opportunity. So it really has driven a lot of people in a field that they wouldn't go study in. And they're excited and they come to me and thank me for sponsoring it. And I get that more than, oh, you're an astronaut. So what better legacy? I want to thank you too, Anusha. I mean, I would have been up the proverbial creek without a paddle had you guys not stepped up. I mean, I remember before we announced you as a sponsor,

I would have teams calling me up all through the week saying, do you have the money yet? I'm building our spaceships. Do you have the 10 million? No, I don't. But trust me, I'll find that someone out there has to be intelligent enough to do this. So was it worth it? Was it worth putting up the money for the prize? Oh my god, every penny and more. I'm so happy we were the lucky ones to be the sponsors of this prize. I look out there now, and this whole industry that has been built around space, I truly believe, and I know there has been even scientific papers written that trace it back to that pivotal moment of the competition and making this paradigm shift in people's mind, changing mindset, that it is possible. That, yes, entrepreneurs can build spaceships and go to space. spaceship and go to space. And I think that was the pivotal moment, just like, you know,

your inspiration, the spirit of St. Louis, there was that pivotal moment for aviation. XPRIZE was a pivotal moment for this whole new age of space and commercial space exploration. I mean, people are having conferences, space investment conferences. Nobody would invest a penny when we launched the competition in space. The old adage was the best way to become a millionaire in space was to start as a billionaire. It was so true. It was like, the only way you can go raise money from somebody is if they had not invested in space before because they would have lost it all. So at the end of this podcast, I ask every guest a question, which is the following. And I'm going to ask you, cause I think it's beautifully self self-referential.

If, uh, if I could snap my fingers and, uh, and fund and launch any X prize you want, what would be a grand challenge, a problem that, uh, that you would want solved? Do you have an, do you have a passion or a favorite XPRIZE out there? I have several. It's such a hard question. Well, I will accept more than one entry. Okay. So one is definitely space related and it's a very futuristic. It's one of those crazy ones. Okay. I love it. Space is big and I want to travel fast and go far. So I want a different type of engine. I want a warp engine or something close to it that allows us to travel much

faster and go further. That's why you want faster than light speed or do you want, uh, I'm happy with the fraction of light speed. You're open to sub light, but something else, like where do you want to get by when? Like do you want a couple of day travel to Mars? Do you want to go?

Yeah, yeah. That would be a good speed for you? That would be good speed for me. Okay. And then sorry, drive. A weekend on Mars would be great. But other than that, the other two things, and one, I don't know if there's an XPRIZE in it, but it's, it's something I love to do. One that I, I know there's an XPRIZE.

I want to find a solution for abundance, sustainable, clean, almost free energy. Because I think if we have access to that, so many problems and everything can be solved. So that's one. And my last one. Let's double click on that one. Okay. So almost free, abundant, sustainable, clean energy.

But we're talking about going beyond solar and wind, yes? Yes. So in other words, it's easy and it sort of can go anywhere. So this sounds like conversations you and I have had with a few individuals out there in the cold fusion zero point energy. Is that an area of passion? Yeah, if it's cold fusion, it can be done. Yes. If not, is there another way?

But I think, you know, whether it's food, water, you know, circular economy, anything. Energy tips everything, right? So if you have abundant energy, you have abundant clean water, you can desalinate anything, pull water out of the atmosphere, and then half the disease burden of planet Earth is due to unclean drinking water. So energy tips, water, and medicine, health, and so forth. Everything. The last thing is I have a deep passion for empowering young young people

and i want to find a way a really strong way to give young people a voice especially in the geopolitical situation that we live in because i think their voice will bring sanity and balance in the world versus leaving it to power hungry politicians that live all over the globe now. I love that. And I agree there's a level of purity and hope that comes with those voices. What age group, if you were going to empower them, what age group would you focus in on? I would focus on probably 15, 16 to 25. You know, I've often thought, I've had conversations when I youngest people into space would literally put them on a pedestal to speak to the passions of making the world a better place. So, you know, it's how do you elevate them, but how do their voices get heard around the world? Because they're so smart and they have access to so much information.

They're much more capable than when I was their age and they can do so much, but they're not taken seriously. They're not invited and involved in a lot of decision-making because we think they're kids and they're much more on than we believe they are. And we need to empower them and give them an opportunity to make their voices heard and acted on, not just hear their voices, because we can also put them, you know, behind podiums and they can talk and then we walk away and do whatever we were doing before, but really empowering them in having a voice that will be actioned. You know, we talk about in XPRIZE, our global visioneering mechanism of sourcing from the

experts out there, which XPRIZE we should go out after. I wonder if we should have a category of it where we ask 15 to 25-year-olds what they think we should be going after, independently of the traditional experts, which sounds like a four-letter word to me sometimes. Absolutely. We're bringing a lot of interns into our conversations and hope to build a strong youth program and continue to build it up. But I remember at Visionary, when our benefactors would bring their young kids, they loved it. They had a blast. Yeah.

Well, Anusha Ansari, Dr. Anusha Ansari, we have a few honorary degrees that have come your way. Allow me to say from my heart of hearts, thank you for being in my life. Thank you for stepping up and underwriting the Ansari XPRIZE. Equally important, thank you for coming back to the mothership and leading us and being my partner in creating change in the world, to go back to your patch design. Thank you, Peter. You have been a great influence in my life. You have a very strong gravitational field and you've changed the trajectory of my life for good. And I appreciate that. Thank you so much. Thank you, Anusha. Have a beautiful day. Thank you so much. Thank you, Nisha. Have a beautiful day. Thank you too.