Nikolas Ioannou has already achieved a level of professional success people decades older can only aspire to.
He shared some of the story of this success in a fireside chat with Yiannis Eftychiou, Co-founder & Partner, 33East, during a fireside chat entitled, ‘A Cypriot Founder’s Journey to Global Fintech.’
The fireside chat explored how the half- Cypriot, half-Norwegian, US-born and based entrepreneur built an international fintech success story in the United States—from identifying a market opportunity and scaling across borders to navigating growth and a major acquisition by American Express (AMEX).
As Ioannou noted, he is a first-generation American who grew up in Seattle and is now based in New York.
Having developed a love of engineering at a young age, he left high school for the University of Washington at 15 before dropping out to focus on his business.
Hyper’s acquisition by AMEX constituted his second exit success as a founder, all by the age of 23.
Ioannou shared that his passion for creation was sparked at an event similar to the INSPIRE entrepreneurial festival, “When I was very young, I had the privilege of going to a confernece like this, hosted by Apple, and something unlocked in my mind, that I can do things, do things. I think it was Steve Jobs who said, ‘Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you.’”
The sentiment resonated with Ioannou.
He also identifies with a quote often attributed to Mark Twain: "They did not know it was impossible, so they did it."
A benefit of having little experience meant that he did not go in being aware of how difficult the endeavour of creating a new product would be. Another benefit is that he did not know how things ‘should’ be done and so found more effective ways to do it.
“When building a company, a lot of people are attached to a particular solution, particular technology. The thing is to be attached to the problem. The problem may never change unless it gets solved,” he suggested.
This meant that his team’s approach to solving the problem that led to the creation of Hyper worked the second time around, with a fresh approach.
Underlining that he was not a prodigy, joking that his parents were well aware of many of his projects that ended up nowhere, Ioannou highlighted, “Failure is not the end point. You choose where your story ends. The only failure is giving up.”
He went on to note, “I have succeeded twice in my life. I have failed a thousand times.”
As Ioannou stressed, the difference between a person who is successful and one who is not is the ability to get up after a failure, adding, “Nearly every one who is successful failed more times than they were successful.”
He also underlined the importance of reaching out, revealing that he remembered finding 100 people he wanted to speak to, sending out 1,000 emails, getting 10 responses, and three people who he went on to meet.
Ioannou also mentioned the importance of finding a way to keep going when times were tough and that it was something different for everyone, “You need to have something that keeps you going, to push through sacrifices; it is unique for every person. It could be your love for the people you work with and that you want them to be successful. It could be that you really care about the product, that it means something to you.”
The expert also shared his view on AI, underlining that it was impossible to predict what would be happening 20 years from now.
Noting that he himself was now using to create code he had spent years learning, he called on people to allow AI to become part of their skill set.
AI also looks likely to be part of Ioannou’s professional future. “Right now I am at American Express, which acquired the company in May. I am m very interested in AI, especially through a safety lens,” he said
For Ioannou, this includes working on ways to introduce guardrails so that AI use does not have dangerous consequences. “There is a race to introduce new capabilities but so little focus on this,” he said, adding that this was why it was something he wanted to focus on next.
Also read: US-based Nikolas Ioannou on Hyper’s acquisition by Amex, the future of AI and his Cypriot roots
Also read: American Express acquires start-up with Cypriot co-founder, Hypercard
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