August 26, 2025 • 41 mins
Kaave Pour (ex‑SPACE10/IKEA) breaks down the home as retail’s #1 touchpoint: from layered home systems to utilities as technology (heat pumps, batteries, air/water quality), the Matter standard, robots, renting vs. owning, and how energy economics reshapes behaviour.
You’ll learn: The home stack:structure → furnishings → utilities → interfaces/data → services Why utilities are the next big tech platform for healthier, cheaper living How layers are blurring (IKEA energy, Airbnb building homes, etc.) Kitchen as battleground: in‑home touchpoints for grocery & CPG Europe lens: cost‑first renewables, off‑grid myths, renting, community Leadership: mission‑led recruiting; winding down SPACE10 without losing momentum CTA: If you lead retail, ecommerce or CX,
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Chapters below ↓
00:00 Intro & why Kaave returns
01:08 Inside IKEA/SPACE10: building an innovation culture
02:35 Pilots, new ventures & ‘home’ as the red thread
03:18 Ending SPACE10 & what’s next
05:16 Kaave’s 3 filters: impact, people, money
08:14 Why he’s fixated on the home
08:37 Hiring for mission: how to attract top talent
12:08 Closing SPACE10: lessons from the transition
14:40 The home’s expanding role in work, fulfilment & wellbeing
16:40 The home stack: structure → utilities → services → data
18:13 Layers blur: Airbnb, IKEA Energy & new players
19:49 The home becomes retail’s #1 touchpoint
24:29 Utilities as the next big tech (heat, water, air)
27:29 Energy shift: costs beat ideology
29:05 Unbundling food: cloud kitchens vs groceries
31:42 The next 5 years: renting, community, tech adoption
33:20 Matter, spatial/wearable computing & home robots
37:24 UBI: promise, risks & policy
40:30 Resilient jobs in utilities
41:16 Thanks & close
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Hello and welcome to the Retail Podcast.
Now for those who were here in the early days and as we were
just talking to Kobe almost fiveyears ago, I originally
interviewed Kobe. Actually, to be fair, it goes a
little bit further than than that.
I saw him I think twice on stage, once, I can't remember at
the Next Web in Amsterdam and once before that where he sat
(00:25):
opposite me, obviously virtually.
But it was incredible. And I thought this is someone
that every so often it will be an amazing opportunity and
pleasure to just pop in and and get what's at the top of your
mind because for so long. And maybe if you tell us a
little bit about the work they used to do with IKEA, I know
that's like bygone day, so we don't need to dwell on that.
(00:46):
But for so long, you had your finger on the pulse of
innovation as an agency looking to the future and helping one of
the largest companies in the world remain fresh and
interesting, which was no no mean feat.
So Kobe, what what do you sort of tell us?
Where were you? And then we'll just bring it up
today and then we'll just get into it.
(01:08):
Sounds good. And thanks for having me, Alex.
Yeah. So basically I spent almost a
decade obsessing with the home together with one of the largest
home furnishing companies in theworld, IKEA, if people don't
know it, as a small furniture company from Sweden.
And yeah, you could say that we definitely started working with
them at a time where I think many leaders, many CEO's, many
(01:32):
people in particular in the C-Suite were looking around and
saying why is the world around our company moving faster than
the world inside of our company and what do we need to do to
gear up. And at that point, the word
innovation obviously had had made its rounds, but it wasn't
something that had really materialised in a lot of
organisations, at least not in amore structured way.
(01:55):
And IKEA was definitely one of those companies.
So our role throughout those 10 years were on one side to spark
a strong innovation culture within this large company of
quarter of a million people. But it, but also to position
IKEA as a more curious company towards the world and say, hey,
we are actually open for new ideas, for meeting new people.
(02:16):
And where I think a lot of companies they, they tend to
become so successful, they closethemselves around themselves
and, and that can be super dangerous to live in that
bubble. And then the third, third part
of of our journey was to obviously do innovation in terms
of developing new pilots, helping them launch new
ventures. A lot of it was focused on
(02:37):
technology and the intersection of technology and, and the
environment, but they were also focused on new retail models and
new markets, new types of customers and, and I think it
was a very exciting, quiet, chaotic journey.
But our red thread was the home.Where is the home today?
Where is it going? And, and as you know, I'm
obsessed with the home, so it was quite a good fit for us for
(03:00):
10 years. But everything has an end.
And in our case, we actually decided proactively to to end
after that decade of work for various reasons.
I won't bore you with today, butit's been one of the most
liberating and most exciting decisions I've taken, even
though it was a really difficultone.
But when something ends, new things begin, and hopefully
(03:22):
that's what I'm here to talk about to today.
There's so many just that on itself in terms of, but anyone
who's read the innovators dilemma knows that large
companies can't do innovation. They can't go fast, they can't
go, they can't keep reinventing themselves.
And that's why it made so, so much sense to to have an agency
or an innovation area to do it. But I, but I can remember some
(03:45):
of the projects that you worked.And I think this is the
important thing to stress. You did anything from vehicles
to technology in the house speakers to bees to that by
biology to the whole. I mean as we people.
Were the just one layer and I think that's the most important
thing or the most the important thing that I find interesting
(04:07):
about talking to you that it wasdelayer and I remember we even
spoke about the future of the home.
Our retailers are always thinking, well, what's the
future of the home? You know, the home pantry.
How do we does does every grocerhave a a small delivery robot
now in everyone's and there was just so many different layers
that you look at and and then the other thing that you did is
(04:29):
that you kept challenging people's perspectives.
So you would say, for example, here's an autonomous car, it
could be a milk flow or it couldbe a super fast, I don't know,
self autonomous vehicle, same technology, but different ones,
community based ones, I guess profit base.
But you kept challenging people to say, is this it?
(04:50):
Is this it? So now you're a little bit
older, you're a dad, you've moved on, you've had many, many
businesses of your founder in lots of different areas.
How do you decide? Or when you look at the future,
what's driving your decisions? What what has made you, what
steered you spiritually or physically to go in the
(05:11):
direction that you're going to go in?
That's a good question. I think obviously after space
and I had a lot of time to reflect on that, like what?
What's next? And after so much of your life
being tied up in one identity, Idid come up with like these
three criterias that I would look through when starting new
(05:31):
businesses from from a few yearsago and now.
And one of them were, you know, a value driven criteria that I
think, you know, you have almosta responsibility in this day and
age to work on something that matter.
You can do so many things, but there is also so many people in
my opinion, who spends a lot of that time on things that maybe
(05:52):
are not that important. And if you have the privilege to
actually choose, I think you have, you have also
responsibility to choose something that that really
matters for, for more than just yourself.
So whether you're dedicated to local community or to the
environment, that's to improvingthe sign or to helping others in
in a more indirect sense. But I think, you know, we don't
(06:14):
need more AI wrappers of generative images, you know,
like, and, and this whole, you know, I think maybe not to, to
completely point fingers, but there's definitely been a
culture that has been driven by Silicon Valley, which is like,
let's just make a bunch of startups and see what fails and
doesn't really matter. And then we sell them.
We'll make a lot of money and wedo it again.
(06:35):
But if you go a bit deeper into it is like, but who are you
actually doing this for? And I think for me, working on
something important also gives me a lot of energy.
The energy I tend to do better work.
So it's like some sort of self fulfilling prophecy to succeed
if you also choose important domains.
The second one is that I want towork with people who give me
energy rather than take energy from me.
(06:56):
And I think everyone knows that feeling of being in the room and
someone is so annoying because they drain you.
And I think not everyone has that opportunity to choose who
they work with. And, but since I'm an
entrepreneur, I, I do have a lotof downsides of being an
entrepreneur, but also have someupsides.
And one of them is obviously that you can in the beginning
(07:17):
choose who you work. And I really focused on trying
to work with people who give me energy because, you know, I
don't want the energy to come tome only after work.
I want to also have that energy at work.
And then third, third is quite acynical I also want to do work
where there's money. I want to be paid what I think
(07:37):
I'm worth. I want to pursue things that
gives me financial freedom to not take too many other points
of view into consideration and become more and more independent
in what I try to pursue over time.
So, so these are kind of like the three things I I look at
when I go into a new business. And then on the domain side
(07:58):
where many people are more practitioners within one craft,
you know, you can be a graphic designer or business analyst or
an energy, especially for me, I'm, I'm more of a generalist,
but I do have a fixation of one domain that I want to work with,
which is the home, but the new own.
So whatever business I go in, ithas to tie into the whole and
(08:19):
seller capacity because that is where I sit with a lot of
expertise that is I think betterthan what I would be able to
achieve or accomplish if I work with it, with sports, for
example. I got you.
So before we get into the home, I'm just going to stay with you
as if you like a leader, an entrepreneur, you've got to make
financial sense and I, you know,can completely understand that
(08:40):
you don't want to be near vampires constantly sucking your
energy. And then the first one was
interesting. You, you know, it has to be keep
evolving and changing. I'm just curious for the for the
OR young leaders, because I do have a lot of young CE OS or
founders who watch this. What's been your experience in
recruiting the right talent to come?
(09:02):
Because it feels like every timeyou sort of land and then you,
you need an army behind you. What's your thoughts on that in
terms of how, how do you get people to buy in, especially
when I've got to be honest, you were very radical in those days,
right, in terms of your thinking.
So you needed people with a certain mindset.
How do you attract? But I think that goes into that
first criteria around working onsomething important, the
(09:25):
machine. Yeah.
Like you need a mission that people get excited about.
In particular with younger generations.
They don't just want to work forwork's sake.
In particular the ones that are really good, you know, so either
they want to work with their ownor they want to work for someone
who's doing something important.And I mean, that's phase 10.
We were what, 40 people in house?
(09:45):
Maybe 150 full time freelance in, in peak periods, but we had
more than 3000 job applications a year and certain years and we
didn't, they were unsolicited, right?
Like they just came, you know, when they were not just from,
from universities, they were also from a NASA and from Apple
and from Amazon and, and all of them they, they basically said
(10:06):
the same, you know, they were tired of working in a bigger
company where they feel there was too many compromises on
their values. They may also feel they were a
bit too much or maybe they were located in a place where they
didn't feel their family was, was thriving.
So choosing as a leader where you you set up shop not just for
(10:26):
your business, but also for yourworkforce to thrive outside work
is extremely important. You see, many older companies
suffer from that because they stick to being in their old
school city that they were founded in.
And it's really hard to attract international talent that needs
to bring in their husband and wife with them or their kids
(10:47):
that needs to move school. And you know, that whole life
outside work is underestimated in in 10 recruitment, I think.
And the second is so obviously that if you have something
exciting to work on and you're good at communicating that you
will see that people are far easier to be persuaded.
And then besides that, I think many leaders and CE OS, they are
(11:08):
simply not spending enough time on it.
I mean, for me, I saw that as one of my biggest
responsibilities were to to findtalent and headhunt leaders and
sway them and invite them to allkinds of things to say, hey,
because we couldn't match their salaries, but we could match
some other factors. So I think yeah, making sure you
work on something that is submission driven, make sure
(11:30):
you're your system works for notjust your Co worker, but for
their extended family in to someextent.
And then yeah, obviously be be diligent in trying to really
bring these people in. Don't expect some hire that you
have done to be able to hire thebest people in the world.
You should. You should do that yourself for
a long time. OK, final question on the on the
(11:52):
past before we go to the queue, I remember reading quite an
emotional post from you on LinkedIn when you closed Space
10. Well, now reflecting back,
what's the one thing that reallysurprised you during that
transition period of your life? What was it that got you?
I get, I guess what surprised you.
Maybe it's in two parts. What got you through that period
(12:13):
as well? Was it the motivation for
something new? Was that the driving element or
was? I think obviously since this was
not a key one day coming saying you're out of business, we had a
lot of time to plan it, which isquite rare in these situations.
So I think I had time to digest this whole shift and more
(12:35):
naturally over a longer time andto plan it in, in a process
where I felt the team was informed and included in it and
we had a great way of ending it.We even launched a whole new
website with all our final work and open sourced a lot of
things, so it felt like it was acomplete rap rather than
something where half of the things we wanted to do, we
(12:55):
didn't have a chance to really say yes.
So that journey was definitely helpful.
And then in all honesty, I thinksome of the other people in
space, then they had a harder time figuring out who they were,
where they wanted to go next, what they should do.
Not that they were not super smart people with bunch of
opportunities because they were more used to working within a
(13:18):
company of existing structure. Me as an entrepreneur, that part
of Space 10 were the anxious part of Space 10, the part where
there was too much structure, too much predictability.
So I get energy from building something new.
OK, so for me, it was almost like being let loose in a candy
store as a kid. You know, like suddenly I could
(13:39):
just do everything again. I had nobody below me, nobody
above me, which was a rare situation for me after 10 years
being being in a leader role in Space 10.
So it was actually quite easy inmany ways.
Obviously you also realise that you need to work hard again to
open those doors. I didn't have the mail, I didn't
(14:00):
have it, so, you know, I didn't have a scene that could just do
anything. I I came up with of ideas.
So that part of been harder to suddenly start to bootstrap
everything again and every little detail and.
So, but your energy comes from from from listening you right?
That's where you draw your excitement and, and and energy
from. OK, coming on to, to your
(14:22):
favourite subject, the home. Obviously the home it's been
referred to in so many differentterms, like the home of the
future being, I don't know, the the workplace of the future, the
fulfilment place of the future, that the spiritual like men, the
mental aspects and the psychology of it.
It's sort of gone beyond has them sorry, Maslow's hierarchy
(14:43):
of needs of just giving you shelter in this new world.
How do you say that? I mean, that's about that.
What's your what's your take on this new world that we're moving
into? I.
Mean there's a lot of layers in the home.
I think first and foremost, I see the home as the most
important place in the world. And I think reflecting on that,
(15:05):
people don't always ascribe thatmuch to the home.
But if you really reflect on it,the home is such an essential
space for us as a civilization. And then in relation to, for
example, the phone, where peoplesay we spend a lot of time on
our phone and always spend a lotmore time at home.
And then besides that, the home is not just one Lifebone with a
(15:27):
bezel less screen that everyone has in the same design.
The home is so diverse, which for me is a fascinating element.
Like the home is not this monotone thing where everyone
lives in the same and that creates such a diamondism in the
way you look at the home. It has some core functions and
it has some emotional elements to it as well, like the feeling
(15:49):
of home. Certain places you can be, you
don't see that as home. Other places are not even
physical and you would see that as home.
But I think, you know, at the end, home is is super important
and super diverse and people spend most of their time in some
capacity in relation to their home.
And yet home right now is probably one of the biggest
barriers when it comes to a lot of the things we as humanity
(16:12):
needs to to address the climate crisis, the mental and health
well-being crisis. You know, even, you know, the
urban challenges of of build, being in cities, how we adopt to
technology, family. There's a lot of things where
the home is an enabler, but alsoa barrier today.
So as a designer of that is an amazing space to work within.
(16:35):
What's your approach? To this, are you transforming
the home or are you? Yeah, tell me.
Obviously you said the environmental, the mental side.
Where's your focus in this area?Yeah.
So as I see the home, there's kind of like 2 lenses, 1 lens is
the layers within the home and the other one is the system of
many homes as a totality. So if we start with the first
(16:57):
one that most people when they, let's say would draw a home,
they would probably draw a square with a triangle on top.
And that's like the very old wayof looking at it.
But, but that's the base you could say is the the physical
build structure of a home. Then you know, the layer below,
above that is maybe the home furnishing layer.
You have the appliances layer, you have the utility layers like
(17:19):
energy, water, waste. Then you have the interface and
technology and the data layers that are coming more and more
in. And then you have the service
layers like the air BNP. So the cleaning or the
improvement and all those services that sits on top.
And you could say in the old days there were all kinds of
companies in the different layers, but they were quite
(17:40):
confined in those layers. So, you know, a company who made
furniture would very rarely alsobuild a home and they would very
rarely also be the energy provider to that home.
And energy providers would very rarely also build a home or
design sofas and tables. But I think what has happened
recently is that some of these layers are breaking because of
(18:01):
new platforms and new where players in the market is is
trying to challenge it. You know, you have Airbnb who's
trying to challenge it from fromthe service layer down also now
building certain homes themselves.
You have IKEA who also is movingup in the energy layer and you
have construction that companieswho also now leasing out their
own homes and even furnishing them as finished products
(18:23):
before. So, you know, you could say that
these shifts super interesting. And for me, the focus here is on
what can you do within these layers that can enable a more
healthy and sustainable life at home.
And that's that's the intersection I find extremely
exciting. And yeah, on the flip side,
obviously a home in isolation isnot really an adequate way of
(18:46):
looking at homes because homes they ocean often in systems of
neighbourhoods. There can be large
neighbourhoods, can also be verysmall rural community or
villages. But obviously the systems of how
we enable homes to thrive are also really important.
How do you get your energy? How do you get your food?
How do you get your kids back into school?
(19:06):
How do you we live a parcels in a world of e-commerce and who
takes the trash away from you? And these systems are also very
different. Like for example, in Mexico, a
lot of places you know, water iscoming to you on trucks, you
know, that fills up your water tanks.
Other places it comes to pipes. Some places they have the solar
on the roof. Other places it's the sipilized
(19:28):
heating that is the dominant course.
But but you see a lot of innovation right now and so many
of these layers and why I think it's fascinating conversation
for us to have in the retail podcast, so to speak, is that I
do believe that the home will likely become the biggest and
most important customer touch point for any industry right
(19:49):
now. They're selling to customers and
not to businesses at large. I can't almost think of a
company who will not be forced to think about the home as more
than the in destination of some product they are developing at
some point. Whether it's the bathroom items
that fits in in your bathroom orthe clothing you buy.
That is in your wardrobe or the way you sleep, or the food you
(20:10):
make, the films you watch, the work to do on your computer,
like so many of the things we inbusiness do will end in the
home, but it will also now startin the home.
And you've talked a lot about the phone being the starting
point for a lot of these customer journeys.
But actually if you assume a little bit out, just like 1/2 a
metre out, you will actually seethat the person on the phone is
(20:34):
at home. They won't get home while they
do a lot of these things. And but yet any company I've
advised and work with, they don't look at the home in that
sense as part of their customer journey in particular, not when
we talk retail, they talk small formats and pick up an order
points and big stores and onlineand yeah.
End point, right? It's just an end point rather
(20:54):
than what? Yeah, I I agree with you.
I mean, for a long time, especially to grocers, I've said
the battlefield is the kitchen and how are you going to own a
portion of that kitchen in the future, right?
What is that element that is going to be your element that
restocks automatically? So, you know, it's not just
Amazon, but it's a grocer or a local grocer that is in a
(21:19):
sustainable world, delivering produce to the home.
How do you? I think the challenge obviously
we need to sort of keep narrowing it down because we're
talking about such a global in what homes are, as in, you know,
for example, in Europe we have lots of dense cities as there
are lots of dense cities around the world, but we don't have
(21:40):
that much, especially in the UK,there's not that much space for
new homes, right? So then we can't build new.
I say you can't. New communities are tougher to
build and so new spaces become more more challenging.
Whereas in a country where potentially there's more
development opportunities, they can build these new future
(22:01):
community driven homes. Where's your focus on this?
Like are you looking at a European lens?
Are you looking at a global lens?
How are you looking at this? I mean, me personally, I'm
definitely focused on Europe as a region and as a market right
now in what I do for various reasons.
But I think just a comment on the home.
(22:23):
I think with IKEA you, we, we did a lot of research across
many markets, you know, from India to Mexico, the US, Europe
as a whole, but also East Asia. And what what you find out is a
lot of the functional needs at home supports people with are
the same and are universal across a lot of the things up
(22:44):
more on size and on aesthetics and on who provides those things
to you. But in most people, they need a
place to cook, to sleep and to do some sort of relation in
between. Scandinavia for sure is leading
with the whole thing around the interior and the creation and
really put a lot of effort into it where maybe certain countries
(23:07):
in South Europe and even in the UK studies show that people's
interest in home furnishing and interior is is found over.
Yeah, I think overall the home as a function is I think pretty
global and universal and. Interesting.
So a lot of people criticise me for saying that.
One about when you look at spaces within the home, so for
example, if you're lucky becausethen we can't talk about all of
(23:30):
this then without thinking aboutsocietal, you know, potentially
people at one end of the scale may have less space, people at
the other end of the scale will have more.
I feel that's a generic week. We'll say that as a sort of
global rule, right? And one end you've got less of
the other end you've got more. But then how spaces are
(23:50):
utilised. One of the beautiful things I've
seen through design is how a living room can transform to
become a dining room. So even if you have more space,
it's actually more technology driven or design driven to make
that small space transform into multiple layers.
So again, how, how are you looking at that?
(24:11):
Are you, are you saying are you just looking at the spaces
individually? Are you looking at them?
Are the layers within those spaces?
How? How are you looking at it?
Yeah, I mean, my my obsession and what I'm working on quite
actively right now is at the intersection of home and
technology. So like where will technology
move into the home and how will technology change your life at
(24:34):
home? My particular focus is on
utilities because I think they are so boring and outdated in
many ways, yet it's so importantwhere you could say many others
right now are working on VR glasses and smart TV's and all
kinds of IO orchestration that never really works.
But like the the way you heat your home, cool your home, the
(24:57):
way you clean your air, the way you get fresh water from your
tap, even your toilet and your shower and your, you know, E
core utilities and appliances. I think those are one of the
most important and interesting areas when it comes to
technology and even AI, because this is where it can enable
people to live healthier, but you can also help them reduce
(25:19):
the, the, the their monthly billand actually really provide
something of value. And the experience today within
that phase is insane versus whatyou, for example, see today in
other domains of technology where we are getting really high
expectations of how things should work and how things are
done. So me that that is something I
find quite fascinating. And I mean, the home obviously
(25:41):
also moves quite slow because it's such a static structure and
so different. And some people would argue,
yeah, but it's anything ever happening with the home.
Isn't it just the same, like it was 100 years ago?
And if you zoom out historically, you know, the
first homes we as humans had were, you know, almost like
shelters, You know, nature homes, They were not bound to be
(26:04):
one place. And they didn't really do much
more than giving you a place to sleep and maybe a little bit of
adjusted temperature. And then with agriculture, it
was the first time where the home suddenly had a little bit
more of a contextual anchor. So we build homes around the
agricultural initiative or things we did.
And then, you know, over time, you know, ancient civilization
(26:24):
suddenly came and suddenly homesalso were cultural phenomena.
You know, the industrial home came and the highway and the
car. And suddenly that changed a lot.
Now I would say we ended up in home area where a lot of the
holes are primarily built aroundcities.
Yeah. And I think why it's so
interesting is that the way homes function and where they
are placed, they've they basically inform everything else
(26:45):
in society, including retail andbusiness.
So the urban home area now obviously has dramatically
shifted the company's retail models.
So for example, like here suddenly saw that all their
customers were living in cities as well and and you know, all
their stores were outside the city so.
All in the. What are we doing?
And I think a lot of businesses indeed, as they often forget the
(27:08):
home's effect on it and they describe all the change to the
full and to the Internet. But it's not necessarily those
parameters alone that has changed businesses.
Actually a lot of them is also just how and where we live.
It's just not as cool to talk about than the cyber truck
driving itself from a. Where?
So when you look at the future, how are you seeing energy?
(27:29):
What's what's the looking glass for you then?
I mean, I think you can have your pragmatic glasses on or
your idea holistic glasses on with this question.
I think overall the question on renewable energy now has shifted
from being like an ideology to being a cost saving measure for
a lot of people in the household.
So now it's not a question of whether you're doing the right
(27:51):
thing anymore for the climate. It's just you are cheaper, like
you will lower your monthly bills if you add solar and a
battery and if you replace your gas boiler with a heat pump, you
know, even more reduction in your money.
And that is what will sway people, I think at the end to
take these decisions because as you said earlier, like most
people don't even have the luxury to think about
(28:11):
sustainability when it comes to their work supply.
If they need to look at affordability before anything
else. And I think that will drive it.
And then the other part is that the entry barriers so much
lower. If you're selling batteries and
solar, you need to build a National Grid delivering energy
to a completely different system.
(28:32):
You don't need any oil refinery stations.
You don't need any infrastructure built with with
your nations policy approvals. And so you know, suddenly a lot
of smaller companies, they can actually enter the market and
say we can also provide your energy and it will be cheaper
for you. It'll be easier and we can do it
(28:52):
outside the normal system. And I think that will be a
little bit the effect that we have seen the Internet they're
doing to media or Amazon guns who big platforms just like
they, they unbundled old businesses and then at some
point new businesses will emergethat will bundle that again in a
different way. But we are currently right now
in the unbundling space of boogie and homes.
(29:14):
And then at some point you wouldlike to see certain players try
to then funnel those players again into something like
resource Shopify now bundling a lot of the players that's
emerged as new, new startups. And that is for me a fascinating
space That will also happen witha lot of other domains in retail
industries that are dependent onthe home.
(29:35):
Food is another good example of it, I think, where everybody
thought groceries would be delivered to your home.
And that's been the perception. And now we're seeing that it's
actually more or less being replaced with ready made food is
being delivered to your home anddone in cloud kitchens across
across the country for better and worse.
But it's just, it's a completelydifferent system where suddenly
(29:58):
like all kinds of people can build 345 businesses, sit in one
vow kitchen, seal that to to thehousehold.
And, and while that is being done, you have the big grocers
talk about whether they should deliver groceries to you at home
or not. And, and while they decide
whether they should do that or not, ten years too late, you
know, a whole different consumertrend has emerged, which is that
(30:19):
we are eating food differently and preparing less and eating
more fast and and ready ready meals, you know, which is
obviously having its own consequences.
And I. Think it's like the war in
Ukraine has told us all governments around the world or
specifically in Europe, how energy diversification is such
(30:40):
an important part. Yeah.
And, and this whole mentality ofliving off grid and, and whether
or not people can actually do itand whether or not the
government wants you to live offgrid, I think that's probably
will end up in a rabbit hole either way if we, if we go that
way, because I, I, yeah, I, I don't know if they do.
I I I partly feels that that doesn't serve how society works.
(31:01):
We don't want more people to go off grid.
We don't want more people to grow their own food.
We don't want more people to be self sustained in their land or
with their water or their energy.
We want more interdependency, I think, I think that's where
we're going. So, OK, so in terms of when you
when you look at I, I think I'vegot a vision of, of what the the
(31:24):
future looks like for you. But can you sort of, and I'm not
going to hold you to this, but maybe maybe in five years we'll
come back and say 25 you said this.
What, what, what, what do you see as the big transformational
blocks over the next, say five years, right?
What are those? You've said it's energy, but,
(31:45):
but what do you mean by that? Do you mean I I don't know.
Yeah. Tell me what what your thoughts
are. I think they're like a few key
pillars in the home that has been untouched for quite a
while. And then there's been other
pillars that are rapidly changing as we speak, you know.
So I think finishing entertainment and activities
(32:05):
both moving out and inside the home, you know, that will happen
for sure and continue more or less as it is now will probably
be different activities that aremoving in and out of the home at
some point and different styles that you want to decorate with,
but would be more or less the same.
I also think that the price willbe more or less the same
challenge that like housing is getting more expensive and more
and more people will unfortunately move towards
(32:27):
leasing rather than owning homes, which will be a big trend
that I think will accelerate even further over the next five
years. And then I think, you know,
there will be a question that ismore on the human side, like how
many do we live with at home? You know, do we live alone or do
we live multiple people will be something that I think will be
quite different from in not justcountry to country, region to
(32:50):
region, but even within the country, from community to
community. So it's like diverging and
converging in the same time, youknow, some people will live more
and more alone, while other people will start to look for
community more and more and moreand move out of the city
potentially to find that that desire.
And then, and then I think for me, the most important part will
(33:12):
likely be the technology moving into the home where there's been
a lot of talk about IoT for whatever 30 years now, you know,
almost as long as we've talked about the Internet.
But sometimes with these technologies that moves in these
curves and cycles is a question of timing, technological timing,
industry timing, societal timing.
(33:33):
And I do believe that the timingof technology in homes are
starting to align from a technical point of view.
The Meta technology, which is like the equivalent of Wi-Fi,
Bluetooth for IoT has been introduced, which means that
it's a lot easier to orchestratethings at home now than what it
used to. You also do a lot of tech
companies who are maybe at the end of an S curve when it comes
(33:56):
to iPhones and smartphones and are starting to really look more
aggressively to their next businesses for the next couple
of decades. And there will likely not be an
iPhone 36. You know, like at some point
there it was a new business to move into.
And there are not that many businesses that are as important
and as big and as universal as the whole.
(34:16):
So you will likely have spatial computing as one domain people
will move into, and then you have wearable computing as not
the main. These tech companies will move
into the world, but computing isalready happening with glasses
and parts and watches and, and whatnot.
And then on the other side, I think the, the spatial computing
aspect, not just the AR parts, but also the, the data, the IoT,
(34:39):
the utilities, that will likely be the part we'll see more and
more coming in over the next five years.
And it's all driven obviously bythe progression of of machine
learning and AI, but it's also driven by financial incentives.
I think for a lot of these companies who today have seen
the peak of growth with one verydefining technology, we're now
(35:03):
trying to hide the next ones. If you ask a lot of people in
these conference, you will hear that a lot of the money right
now is being allocated to to projects within these fields
and. Well, yeah, I think having a
robot in everyone's house, right, that's apparently the
robots can do it at the moment. They, the, the the technology is
there. But well, I don't know.
There, there, there seems to be some friction entry points that
(35:25):
they just need to get over before we end up having servant
roads in all homes. Yeah.
And also is that what like we have talked about VR glasses and
everyone really tries to push those, but people just don't
want to wear them, you know, like they just though.
And I think the question is going to be a little bit the
same with the robots. Like no matter how cheap and how
(35:45):
efficient it will get, like there will be a long adoption
rate for people to invite and robot into your house.
It will likely happen for certain groups, maybe early
adopters who love sick. I think also an ageing
population where the amount of care we as society can provide
will likely be forced to replacewith robots and other types of
(36:06):
technology. Yeah, but do you think the home
will be a very big platform, a battleground, sorry for
technology. And new players will also emerge
in that battle and an existing players will be defeated.
Like we saw Knocker moving down,ever moved up?
Like who are the players who will move up and down in this
game? So what?
Yeah, exciting times ahead, but definitely also a very different
(36:28):
game than the game of smartphones because this is not
just something you have in your pocket.
It's far more complex. Yeah, I mean, you've got Sam
Ullman and Johnny I've with their products coming out next
year, whoever knows what that will be.
I'm curious. This is my final question.
I don't know what your thoughts are on this, whether or not this
is too pessimistic, but in a world where there's a tonne of
(36:51):
people on UVI Universal Basic Income because lots of jobs are
going to go to AI, have have yougot, has your thinking got to
that point or do you think that's just people
scaremongering? That's probably, I don't know,
10-15 years away before we're inthat sort of world where there
aren't jobs for people and so therefore the home is that
(37:13):
critical space. But yeah, again, curious on your
thoughts. I mean, I think there's, there's
like two sides of, of Ubi, in particular Ubi in relation to,
to artificial intelligence. I think the, the, the, the
people who believe in, in that direction often saying, you
know, we can work less, we can spend more time with our
families. A lot of studies, including a
(37:36):
study in Finland shows that people on Ubi actually don't end
up working less. They end up doing the same.
And I'm not just being, being checked out as such.
So, so, you know, some of them may be scepticism or concerns
are not, not there. And, and that there's some sort
of like welfare net below everyone.
Obviously, as a Scandinavian human here who used to have
(37:57):
strong welfare system, I definitely see a lot of benefits
in catching everyone even if they can't get a job with some
sort of minimum financial support and welfare.
But on the other hand, I also think that, you know, if
everyone is suddenly in, you know, dependent on the state for
giving money and it's another big responsibility for the
states with them, treat that with respects and not use that
(38:21):
to sway the population into certain behaviours.
And I think that's probably my biggest fear right now.
If you would look at at certain countries across the world, they
are getting a bit more authoritarian in their way of
looking at, you know, policy anddecision making and you know,
scores for how you well you're doing and insurance score or
(38:42):
this social school in China. It's like it's quite a lot
broader. And what happens if you don't do
what you are, you know, what youshould do?
Do they didn't just cut you up your Ubi and then you're off.
And can they say that if you do this, if you are believing in
this religion or if you do thesebehaviours, you get more Ubi
than those and suddenly becomes a quieter token system where
(39:04):
obviously people being dependenton a way more mixed market of
income has a lot more mode against these things because
it's, it's other dynamics and it's more market driven.
So I think certain countries could do it with success and I
think others would probably end up in a by the Stopian scenario
if they rolled it out. Sure.
(39:25):
But to answer if I think it's necessary, I definitely believe
if we look at a longer time horizon that the amount of jobs
that we right now have versus the amount of jobs that we
likely have with these new technologies.
I'm probably not an optimist like some of these AI founders
who say that this will generate thousands of new jobs, hundreds
(39:47):
of thousands, if not millions ofnew jobs.
Because if you look at the top 10 most probably public jobs or
occupied jobs, and we're like a lot of those, you know, they're.
Gone. They're going.
Yeah, they go. And so, so in that sense, yeah,
I'm, I'm a bit worried for sure in, in that in combination with
the fact that we had less kids and we live longer.
(40:07):
So there's a lot of more pressure on there.
We haven't actually spoken aboutthat which is the ageing
population, but it feels like. Yeah, Yeah.
So it's a Penguin cocktail. I think right now that we we are
in certain jobs can't be replaced anytime soon either.
So I also think, you know, I would love if more people were
excited about utilities than AI because utilities, you can't
(40:29):
just be placed with AI anytime soon.
You know, there's quite a lot ofhumanly well needed for for that
tool to work for a long time at least.
Yeah, and it feels like it's actually for the for the planet
in the, in the sense of how we get those utilities into the
home and how it works the, the multiple layers.
That's what a healthy society needs, right.
(40:49):
So irrespective of everything, unless we're all going to move
into tents, which I very much doubt we we meet that there's a
big problems that we need to solve.
So Kobe, thank you so much for giving up the time to speak to
us. I am look forward to obviously
stalking you on LinkedIn to see where where you where you will
(41:09):
appear over the next few months.And it's been a really
fascinating conversation. Thank you so much.
Thank you. Thanks.
Hello and welcome to the Retail Podcast.
Now for those who were here in the early days and as we were
just talking to Kobe almost fiveyears ago, I originally
interviewed Kobe. Actually, to be fair, it goes a
little bit further than than that.
I saw him I think twice on stage, once, I can't remember at
the Next Web in Amsterdam and once before that where he sat
(00:25):
opposite me, obviously virtually.
But it was incredible. And I thought this is someone
that every so often it will be an amazing opportunity and
pleasure to just pop in and and get what's at the top of your
mind because for so long. And maybe if you tell us a
little bit about the work they used to do with IKEA, I know
that's like bygone day, so we don't need to dwell on that.
(00:46):
But for so long, you had your finger on the pulse of
innovation as an agency looking to the future and helping one of
the largest companies in the world remain fresh and
interesting, which was no no mean feat.
So Kobe, what what do you sort of tell us?
Where were you? And then we'll just bring it up
today and then we'll just get into it.
(01:08):
Sounds good. And thanks for having me, Alex.
Yeah. So basically I spent almost a
decade obsessing with the home together with one of the largest
home furnishing companies in theworld, IKEA, if people don't
know it, as a small furniture company from Sweden.
And yeah, you could say that we definitely started working with
them at a time where I think many leaders, many CEO's, many
(01:32):
people in particular in the C-Suite were looking around and
saying why is the world around our company moving faster than
the world inside of our company and what do we need to do to
gear up. And at that point, the word
innovation obviously had had made its rounds, but it wasn't
something that had really materialised in a lot of
organisations, at least not in amore structured way.
(01:55):
And IKEA was definitely one of those companies.
So our role throughout those 10 years were on one side to spark
a strong innovation culture within this large company of
quarter of a million people. But it, but also to position
IKEA as a more curious company towards the world and say, hey,
we are actually open for new ideas, for meeting new people.
(02:16):
And where I think a lot of companies they, they tend to
become so successful, they closethemselves around themselves
and, and that can be super dangerous to live in that
bubble. And then the third, third part
of of our journey was to obviously do innovation in terms
of developing new pilots, helping them launch new
ventures. A lot of it was focused on
(02:37):
technology and the intersection of technology and, and the
environment, but they were also focused on new retail models and
new markets, new types of customers and, and I think it
was a very exciting, quiet, chaotic journey.
But our red thread was the home.Where is the home today?
Where is it going? And, and as you know, I'm
obsessed with the home, so it was quite a good fit for us for
(03:00):
10 years. But everything has an end.
And in our case, we actually decided proactively to to end
after that decade of work for various reasons.
I won't bore you with today, butit's been one of the most
liberating and most exciting decisions I've taken, even
though it was a really difficultone.
But when something ends, new things begin, and hopefully
(03:22):
that's what I'm here to talk about to today.
There's so many just that on itself in terms of, but anyone
who's read the innovators dilemma knows that large
companies can't do innovation. They can't go fast, they can't
go, they can't keep reinventing themselves.
And that's why it made so, so much sense to to have an agency
or an innovation area to do it. But I, but I can remember some
(03:45):
of the projects that you worked.And I think this is the
important thing to stress. You did anything from vehicles
to technology in the house speakers to bees to that by
biology to the whole. I mean as we people.
Were the just one layer and I think that's the most important
thing or the most the important thing that I find interesting
(04:07):
about talking to you that it wasdelayer and I remember we even
spoke about the future of the home.
Our retailers are always thinking, well, what's the
future of the home? You know, the home pantry.
How do we does does every grocerhave a a small delivery robot
now in everyone's and there was just so many different layers
that you look at and and then the other thing that you did is
(04:29):
that you kept challenging people's perspectives.
So you would say, for example, here's an autonomous car, it
could be a milk flow or it couldbe a super fast, I don't know,
self autonomous vehicle, same technology, but different ones,
community based ones, I guess profit base.
But you kept challenging people to say, is this it?
(04:50):
Is this it? So now you're a little bit
older, you're a dad, you've moved on, you've had many, many
businesses of your founder in lots of different areas.
How do you decide? Or when you look at the future,
what's driving your decisions? What what has made you, what
steered you spiritually or physically to go in the
(05:11):
direction that you're going to go in?
That's a good question. I think obviously after space
and I had a lot of time to reflect on that, like what?
What's next? And after so much of your life
being tied up in one identity, Idid come up with like these
three criterias that I would look through when starting new
(05:31):
businesses from from a few yearsago and now.
And one of them were, you know, a value driven criteria that I
think, you know, you have almosta responsibility in this day and
age to work on something that matter.
You can do so many things, but there is also so many people in
my opinion, who spends a lot of that time on things that maybe
(05:52):
are not that important. And if you have the privilege to
actually choose, I think you have, you have also
responsibility to choose something that that really
matters for, for more than just yourself.
So whether you're dedicated to local community or to the
environment, that's to improvingthe sign or to helping others in
in a more indirect sense. But I think, you know, we don't
(06:14):
need more AI wrappers of generative images, you know,
like, and, and this whole, you know, I think maybe not to, to
completely point fingers, but there's definitely been a
culture that has been driven by Silicon Valley, which is like,
let's just make a bunch of startups and see what fails and
doesn't really matter. And then we sell them.
We'll make a lot of money and wedo it again.
(06:35):
But if you go a bit deeper into it is like, but who are you
actually doing this for? And I think for me, working on
something important also gives me a lot of energy.
The energy I tend to do better work.
So it's like some sort of self fulfilling prophecy to succeed
if you also choose important domains.
The second one is that I want towork with people who give me
energy rather than take energy from me.
(06:56):
And I think everyone knows that feeling of being in the room and
someone is so annoying because they drain you.
And I think not everyone has that opportunity to choose who
they work with. And, but since I'm an
entrepreneur, I, I do have a lotof downsides of being an
entrepreneur, but also have someupsides.
And one of them is obviously that you can in the beginning
(07:17):
choose who you work. And I really focused on trying
to work with people who give me energy because, you know, I
don't want the energy to come tome only after work.
I want to also have that energy at work.
And then third, third is quite acynical I also want to do work
where there's money. I want to be paid what I think
(07:37):
I'm worth. I want to pursue things that
gives me financial freedom to not take too many other points
of view into consideration and become more and more independent
in what I try to pursue over time.
So, so these are kind of like the three things I I look at
when I go into a new business. And then on the domain side
(07:58):
where many people are more practitioners within one craft,
you know, you can be a graphic designer or business analyst or
an energy, especially for me, I'm, I'm more of a generalist,
but I do have a fixation of one domain that I want to work with,
which is the home, but the new own.
So whatever business I go in, ithas to tie into the whole and
(08:19):
seller capacity because that is where I sit with a lot of
expertise that is I think betterthan what I would be able to
achieve or accomplish if I work with it, with sports, for
example. I got you.
So before we get into the home, I'm just going to stay with you
as if you like a leader, an entrepreneur, you've got to make
financial sense and I, you know,can completely understand that
(08:40):
you don't want to be near vampires constantly sucking your
energy. And then the first one was
interesting. You, you know, it has to be keep
evolving and changing. I'm just curious for the for the
OR young leaders, because I do have a lot of young CE OS or
founders who watch this. What's been your experience in
recruiting the right talent to come?
(09:02):
Because it feels like every timeyou sort of land and then you,
you need an army behind you. What's your thoughts on that in
terms of how, how do you get people to buy in, especially
when I've got to be honest, you were very radical in those days,
right, in terms of your thinking.
So you needed people with a certain mindset.
How do you attract? But I think that goes into that
first criteria around working onsomething important, the
(09:25):
machine. Yeah.
Like you need a mission that people get excited about.
In particular with younger generations.
They don't just want to work forwork's sake.
In particular the ones that are really good, you know, so either
they want to work with their ownor they want to work for someone
who's doing something important.And I mean, that's phase 10.
We were what, 40 people in house?
(09:45):
Maybe 150 full time freelance in, in peak periods, but we had
more than 3000 job applications a year and certain years and we
didn't, they were unsolicited, right?
Like they just came, you know, when they were not just from,
from universities, they were also from a NASA and from Apple
and from Amazon and, and all of them they, they basically said
(10:06):
the same, you know, they were tired of working in a bigger
company where they feel there was too many compromises on
their values. They may also feel they were a
bit too much or maybe they were located in a place where they
didn't feel their family was, was thriving.
So choosing as a leader where you you set up shop not just for
(10:26):
your business, but also for yourworkforce to thrive outside work
is extremely important. You see, many older companies
suffer from that because they stick to being in their old
school city that they were founded in.
And it's really hard to attract international talent that needs
to bring in their husband and wife with them or their kids
(10:47):
that needs to move school. And you know, that whole life
outside work is underestimated in in 10 recruitment, I think.
And the second is so obviously that if you have something
exciting to work on and you're good at communicating that you
will see that people are far easier to be persuaded.
And then besides that, I think many leaders and CE OS, they are
(11:08):
simply not spending enough time on it.
I mean, for me, I saw that as one of my biggest
responsibilities were to to findtalent and headhunt leaders and
sway them and invite them to allkinds of things to say, hey,
because we couldn't match their salaries, but we could match
some other factors. So I think yeah, making sure you
work on something that is submission driven, make sure
(11:30):
you're your system works for notjust your Co worker, but for
their extended family in to someextent.
And then yeah, obviously be be diligent in trying to really
bring these people in. Don't expect some hire that you
have done to be able to hire thebest people in the world.
You should. You should do that yourself for
a long time. OK, final question on the on the
(11:52):
past before we go to the queue, I remember reading quite an
emotional post from you on LinkedIn when you closed Space
10. Well, now reflecting back,
what's the one thing that reallysurprised you during that
transition period of your life? What was it that got you?
I get, I guess what surprised you.
Maybe it's in two parts. What got you through that period
(12:13):
as well? Was it the motivation for
something new? Was that the driving element or
was? I think obviously since this was
not a key one day coming saying you're out of business, we had a
lot of time to plan it, which isquite rare in these situations.
So I think I had time to digest this whole shift and more
(12:35):
naturally over a longer time andto plan it in, in a process
where I felt the team was informed and included in it and
we had a great way of ending it.We even launched a whole new
website with all our final work and open sourced a lot of
things, so it felt like it was acomplete rap rather than
something where half of the things we wanted to do, we
(12:55):
didn't have a chance to really say yes.
So that journey was definitely helpful.
And then in all honesty, I thinksome of the other people in
space, then they had a harder time figuring out who they were,
where they wanted to go next, what they should do.
Not that they were not super smart people with bunch of
opportunities because they were more used to working within a
(13:18):
company of existing structure. Me as an entrepreneur, that part
of Space 10 were the anxious part of Space 10, the part where
there was too much structure, too much predictability.
So I get energy from building something new.
OK, so for me, it was almost like being let loose in a candy
store as a kid. You know, like suddenly I could
(13:39):
just do everything again. I had nobody below me, nobody
above me, which was a rare situation for me after 10 years
being being in a leader role in Space 10.
So it was actually quite easy inmany ways.
Obviously you also realise that you need to work hard again to
open those doors. I didn't have the mail, I didn't
(14:00):
have it, so, you know, I didn't have a scene that could just do
anything. I I came up with of ideas.
So that part of been harder to suddenly start to bootstrap
everything again and every little detail and.
So, but your energy comes from from from listening you right?
That's where you draw your excitement and, and and energy
from. OK, coming on to, to your
(14:22):
favourite subject, the home. Obviously the home it's been
referred to in so many differentterms, like the home of the
future being, I don't know, the the workplace of the future, the
fulfilment place of the future, that the spiritual like men, the
mental aspects and the psychology of it.
It's sort of gone beyond has them sorry, Maslow's hierarchy
(14:43):
of needs of just giving you shelter in this new world.
How do you say that? I mean, that's about that.
What's your what's your take on this new world that we're moving
into? I.
Mean there's a lot of layers in the home.
I think first and foremost, I see the home as the most
important place in the world. And I think reflecting on that,
(15:05):
people don't always ascribe thatmuch to the home.
But if you really reflect on it,the home is such an essential
space for us as a civilization. And then in relation to, for
example, the phone, where peoplesay we spend a lot of time on
our phone and always spend a lotmore time at home.
And then besides that, the home is not just one Lifebone with a
(15:27):
bezel less screen that everyone has in the same design.
The home is so diverse, which for me is a fascinating element.
Like the home is not this monotone thing where everyone
lives in the same and that creates such a diamondism in the
way you look at the home. It has some core functions and
it has some emotional elements to it as well, like the feeling
(15:49):
of home. Certain places you can be, you
don't see that as home. Other places are not even
physical and you would see that as home.
But I think, you know, at the end, home is is super important
and super diverse and people spend most of their time in some
capacity in relation to their home.
And yet home right now is probably one of the biggest
barriers when it comes to a lot of the things we as humanity
(16:12):
needs to to address the climate crisis, the mental and health
well-being crisis. You know, even, you know, the
urban challenges of of build, being in cities, how we adopt to
technology, family. There's a lot of things where
the home is an enabler, but alsoa barrier today.
So as a designer of that is an amazing space to work within.
(16:35):
What's your approach? To this, are you transforming
the home or are you? Yeah, tell me.
Obviously you said the environmental, the mental side.
Where's your focus in this area?Yeah.
So as I see the home, there's kind of like 2 lenses, 1 lens is
the layers within the home and the other one is the system of
many homes as a totality. So if we start with the first
(16:57):
one that most people when they, let's say would draw a home,
they would probably draw a square with a triangle on top.
And that's like the very old wayof looking at it.
But, but that's the base you could say is the the physical
build structure of a home. Then you know, the layer below,
above that is maybe the home furnishing layer.
You have the appliances layer, you have the utility layers like
(17:19):
energy, water, waste. Then you have the interface and
technology and the data layers that are coming more and more
in. And then you have the service
layers like the air BNP. So the cleaning or the
improvement and all those services that sits on top.
And you could say in the old days there were all kinds of
companies in the different layers, but they were quite
(17:40):
confined in those layers. So, you know, a company who made
furniture would very rarely alsobuild a home and they would very
rarely also be the energy provider to that home.
And energy providers would very rarely also build a home or
design sofas and tables. But I think what has happened
recently is that some of these layers are breaking because of
(18:01):
new platforms and new where players in the market is is
trying to challenge it. You know, you have Airbnb who's
trying to challenge it from fromthe service layer down also now
building certain homes themselves.
You have IKEA who also is movingup in the energy layer and you
have construction that companieswho also now leasing out their
own homes and even furnishing them as finished products
(18:23):
before. So, you know, you could say that
these shifts super interesting. And for me, the focus here is on
what can you do within these layers that can enable a more
healthy and sustainable life at home.
And that's that's the intersection I find extremely
exciting. And yeah, on the flip side,
obviously a home in isolation isnot really an adequate way of
(18:46):
looking at homes because homes they ocean often in systems of
neighbourhoods. There can be large
neighbourhoods, can also be verysmall rural community or
villages. But obviously the systems of how
we enable homes to thrive are also really important.
How do you get your energy? How do you get your food?
How do you get your kids back into school?
(19:06):
How do you we live a parcels in a world of e-commerce and who
takes the trash away from you? And these systems are also very
different. Like for example, in Mexico, a
lot of places you know, water iscoming to you on trucks, you
know, that fills up your water tanks.
Other places it comes to pipes. Some places they have the solar
on the roof. Other places it's the sipilized
(19:28):
heating that is the dominant course.
But but you see a lot of innovation right now and so many
of these layers and why I think it's fascinating conversation
for us to have in the retail podcast, so to speak, is that I
do believe that the home will likely become the biggest and
most important customer touch point for any industry right
(19:49):
now. They're selling to customers and
not to businesses at large. I can't almost think of a
company who will not be forced to think about the home as more
than the in destination of some product they are developing at
some point. Whether it's the bathroom items
that fits in in your bathroom orthe clothing you buy.
That is in your wardrobe or the way you sleep, or the food you
(20:10):
make, the films you watch, the work to do on your computer,
like so many of the things we inbusiness do will end in the
home, but it will also now startin the home.
And you've talked a lot about the phone being the starting
point for a lot of these customer journeys.
But actually if you assume a little bit out, just like 1/2 a
metre out, you will actually seethat the person on the phone is
(20:34):
at home. They won't get home while they
do a lot of these things. And but yet any company I've
advised and work with, they don't look at the home in that
sense as part of their customer journey in particular, not when
we talk retail, they talk small formats and pick up an order
points and big stores and onlineand yeah.
End point, right? It's just an end point rather
(20:54):
than what? Yeah, I I agree with you.
I mean, for a long time, especially to grocers, I've said
the battlefield is the kitchen and how are you going to own a
portion of that kitchen in the future, right?
What is that element that is going to be your element that
restocks automatically? So, you know, it's not just
Amazon, but it's a grocer or a local grocer that is in a
(21:19):
sustainable world, delivering produce to the home.
How do you? I think the challenge obviously
we need to sort of keep narrowing it down because we're
talking about such a global in what homes are, as in, you know,
for example, in Europe we have lots of dense cities as there
are lots of dense cities around the world, but we don't have
(21:40):
that much, especially in the UK,there's not that much space for
new homes, right? So then we can't build new.
I say you can't. New communities are tougher to
build and so new spaces become more more challenging.
Whereas in a country where potentially there's more
development opportunities, they can build these new future
(22:01):
community driven homes. Where's your focus on this?
Like are you looking at a European lens?
Are you looking at a global lens?
How are you looking at this? I mean, me personally, I'm
definitely focused on Europe as a region and as a market right
now in what I do for various reasons.
But I think just a comment on the home.
(22:23):
I think with IKEA you, we, we did a lot of research across
many markets, you know, from India to Mexico, the US, Europe
as a whole, but also East Asia. And what what you find out is a
lot of the functional needs at home supports people with are
the same and are universal across a lot of the things up
(22:44):
more on size and on aesthetics and on who provides those things
to you. But in most people, they need a
place to cook, to sleep and to do some sort of relation in
between. Scandinavia for sure is leading
with the whole thing around the interior and the creation and
really put a lot of effort into it where maybe certain countries
(23:07):
in South Europe and even in the UK studies show that people's
interest in home furnishing and interior is is found over.
Yeah, I think overall the home as a function is I think pretty
global and universal and. Interesting.
So a lot of people criticise me for saying that.
One about when you look at spaces within the home, so for
example, if you're lucky becausethen we can't talk about all of
(23:30):
this then without thinking aboutsocietal, you know, potentially
people at one end of the scale may have less space, people at
the other end of the scale will have more.
I feel that's a generic week. We'll say that as a sort of
global rule, right? And one end you've got less of
the other end you've got more. But then how spaces are
(23:50):
utilised. One of the beautiful things I've
seen through design is how a living room can transform to
become a dining room. So even if you have more space,
it's actually more technology driven or design driven to make
that small space transform into multiple layers.
So again, how, how are you looking at that?
(24:11):
Are you, are you saying are you just looking at the spaces
individually? Are you looking at them?
Are the layers within those spaces?
How? How are you looking at it?
Yeah, I mean, my my obsession and what I'm working on quite
actively right now is at the intersection of home and
technology. So like where will technology
move into the home and how will technology change your life at
(24:34):
home? My particular focus is on
utilities because I think they are so boring and outdated in
many ways, yet it's so importantwhere you could say many others
right now are working on VR glasses and smart TV's and all
kinds of IO orchestration that never really works.
But like the the way you heat your home, cool your home, the
(24:57):
way you clean your air, the way you get fresh water from your
tap, even your toilet and your shower and your, you know, E
core utilities and appliances. I think those are one of the
most important and interesting areas when it comes to
technology and even AI, because this is where it can enable
people to live healthier, but you can also help them reduce
(25:19):
the, the, the their monthly billand actually really provide
something of value. And the experience today within
that phase is insane versus whatyou, for example, see today in
other domains of technology where we are getting really high
expectations of how things should work and how things are
done. So me that that is something I
find quite fascinating. And I mean, the home obviously
(25:41):
also moves quite slow because it's such a static structure and
so different. And some people would argue,
yeah, but it's anything ever happening with the home.
Isn't it just the same, like it was 100 years ago?
And if you zoom out historically, you know, the
first homes we as humans had were, you know, almost like
shelters, You know, nature homes, They were not bound to be
(26:04):
one place. And they didn't really do much
more than giving you a place to sleep and maybe a little bit of
adjusted temperature. And then with agriculture, it
was the first time where the home suddenly had a little bit
more of a contextual anchor. So we build homes around the
agricultural initiative or things we did.
And then, you know, over time, you know, ancient civilization
(26:24):
suddenly came and suddenly homesalso were cultural phenomena.
You know, the industrial home came and the highway and the
car. And suddenly that changed a lot.
Now I would say we ended up in home area where a lot of the
holes are primarily built aroundcities.
Yeah. And I think why it's so
interesting is that the way homes function and where they
are placed, they've they basically inform everything else
(26:45):
in society, including retail andbusiness.
So the urban home area now obviously has dramatically
shifted the company's retail models.
So for example, like here suddenly saw that all their
customers were living in cities as well and and you know, all
their stores were outside the city so.
All in the. What are we doing?
And I think a lot of businesses indeed, as they often forget the
(27:08):
home's effect on it and they describe all the change to the
full and to the Internet. But it's not necessarily those
parameters alone that has changed businesses.
Actually a lot of them is also just how and where we live.
It's just not as cool to talk about than the cyber truck
driving itself from a. Where?
So when you look at the future, how are you seeing energy?
(27:29):
What's what's the looking glass for you then?
I mean, I think you can have your pragmatic glasses on or
your idea holistic glasses on with this question.
I think overall the question on renewable energy now has shifted
from being like an ideology to being a cost saving measure for
a lot of people in the household.
So now it's not a question of whether you're doing the right
(27:51):
thing anymore for the climate. It's just you are cheaper, like
you will lower your monthly bills if you add solar and a
battery and if you replace your gas boiler with a heat pump, you
know, even more reduction in your money.
And that is what will sway people, I think at the end to
take these decisions because as you said earlier, like most
people don't even have the luxury to think about
(28:11):
sustainability when it comes to their work supply.
If they need to look at affordability before anything
else. And I think that will drive it.
And then the other part is that the entry barriers so much
lower. If you're selling batteries and
solar, you need to build a National Grid delivering energy
to a completely different system.
(28:32):
You don't need any oil refinery stations.
You don't need any infrastructure built with with
your nations policy approvals. And so you know, suddenly a lot
of smaller companies, they can actually enter the market and
say we can also provide your energy and it will be cheaper
for you. It'll be easier and we can do it
(28:52):
outside the normal system. And I think that will be a
little bit the effect that we have seen the Internet they're
doing to media or Amazon guns who big platforms just like
they, they unbundled old businesses and then at some
point new businesses will emergethat will bundle that again in a
different way. But we are currently right now
in the unbundling space of boogie and homes.
(29:14):
And then at some point you wouldlike to see certain players try
to then funnel those players again into something like
resource Shopify now bundling a lot of the players that's
emerged as new, new startups. And that is for me a fascinating
space That will also happen witha lot of other domains in retail
industries that are dependent onthe home.
(29:35):
Food is another good example of it, I think, where everybody
thought groceries would be delivered to your home.
And that's been the perception. And now we're seeing that it's
actually more or less being replaced with ready made food is
being delivered to your home anddone in cloud kitchens across
across the country for better and worse.
But it's just, it's a completelydifferent system where suddenly
(29:58):
like all kinds of people can build 345 businesses, sit in one
vow kitchen, seal that to to thehousehold.
And, and while that is being done, you have the big grocers
talk about whether they should deliver groceries to you at home
or not. And, and while they decide
whether they should do that or not, ten years too late, you
know, a whole different consumertrend has emerged, which is that
(30:19):
we are eating food differently and preparing less and eating
more fast and and ready ready meals, you know, which is
obviously having its own consequences.
And I. Think it's like the war in
Ukraine has told us all governments around the world or
specifically in Europe, how energy diversification is such
(30:40):
an important part. Yeah.
And, and this whole mentality ofliving off grid and, and whether
or not people can actually do itand whether or not the
government wants you to live offgrid, I think that's probably
will end up in a rabbit hole either way if we, if we go that
way, because I, I, yeah, I, I don't know if they do.
I I I partly feels that that doesn't serve how society works.
(31:01):
We don't want more people to go off grid.
We don't want more people to grow their own food.
We don't want more people to be self sustained in their land or
with their water or their energy.
We want more interdependency, I think, I think that's where
we're going. So, OK, so in terms of when you
when you look at I, I think I'vegot a vision of, of what the the
(31:24):
future looks like for you. But can you sort of, and I'm not
going to hold you to this, but maybe maybe in five years we'll
come back and say 25 you said this.
What, what, what, what do you see as the big transformational
blocks over the next, say five years, right?
What are those? You've said it's energy, but,
(31:45):
but what do you mean by that? Do you mean I I don't know.
Yeah. Tell me what what your thoughts
are. I think they're like a few key
pillars in the home that has been untouched for quite a
while. And then there's been other
pillars that are rapidly changing as we speak, you know.
So I think finishing entertainment and activities
(32:05):
both moving out and inside the home, you know, that will happen
for sure and continue more or less as it is now will probably
be different activities that aremoving in and out of the home at
some point and different styles that you want to decorate with,
but would be more or less the same.
I also think that the price willbe more or less the same
challenge that like housing is getting more expensive and more
and more people will unfortunately move towards
(32:27):
leasing rather than owning homes, which will be a big trend
that I think will accelerate even further over the next five
years. And then I think, you know,
there will be a question that ismore on the human side, like how
many do we live with at home? You know, do we live alone or do
we live multiple people will be something that I think will be
quite different from in not justcountry to country, region to
(32:50):
region, but even within the country, from community to
community. So it's like diverging and
converging in the same time, youknow, some people will live more
and more alone, while other people will start to look for
community more and more and moreand move out of the city
potentially to find that that desire.
And then, and then I think for me, the most important part will
(33:12):
likely be the technology moving into the home where there's been
a lot of talk about IoT for whatever 30 years now, you know,
almost as long as we've talked about the Internet.
But sometimes with these technologies that moves in these
curves and cycles is a question of timing, technological timing,
industry timing, societal timing.
(33:33):
And I do believe that the timingof technology in homes are
starting to align from a technical point of view.
The Meta technology, which is like the equivalent of Wi-Fi,
Bluetooth for IoT has been introduced, which means that
it's a lot easier to orchestratethings at home now than what it
used to. You also do a lot of tech
companies who are maybe at the end of an S curve when it comes
(33:56):
to iPhones and smartphones and are starting to really look more
aggressively to their next businesses for the next couple
of decades. And there will likely not be an
iPhone 36. You know, like at some point
there it was a new business to move into.
And there are not that many businesses that are as important
and as big and as universal as the whole.
(34:16):
So you will likely have spatial computing as one domain people
will move into, and then you have wearable computing as not
the main. These tech companies will move
into the world, but computing isalready happening with glasses
and parts and watches and, and whatnot.
And then on the other side, I think the, the spatial computing
aspect, not just the AR parts, but also the, the data, the IoT,
(34:39):
the utilities, that will likely be the part we'll see more and
more coming in over the next five years.
And it's all driven obviously bythe progression of of machine
learning and AI, but it's also driven by financial incentives.
I think for a lot of these companies who today have seen
the peak of growth with one verydefining technology, we're now
(35:03):
trying to hide the next ones. If you ask a lot of people in
these conference, you will hear that a lot of the money right
now is being allocated to to projects within these fields
and. Well, yeah, I think having a
robot in everyone's house, right, that's apparently the
robots can do it at the moment. They, the, the the technology is
there. But well, I don't know.
There, there, there seems to be some friction entry points that
(35:25):
they just need to get over before we end up having servant
roads in all homes. Yeah.
And also is that what like we have talked about VR glasses and
everyone really tries to push those, but people just don't
want to wear them, you know, like they just though.
And I think the question is going to be a little bit the
same with the robots. Like no matter how cheap and how
(35:45):
efficient it will get, like there will be a long adoption
rate for people to invite and robot into your house.
It will likely happen for certain groups, maybe early
adopters who love sick. I think also an ageing
population where the amount of care we as society can provide
will likely be forced to replacewith robots and other types of
(36:06):
technology. Yeah, but do you think the home
will be a very big platform, a battleground, sorry for
technology. And new players will also emerge
in that battle and an existing players will be defeated.
Like we saw Knocker moving down,ever moved up?
Like who are the players who will move up and down in this
game? So what?
Yeah, exciting times ahead, but definitely also a very different
(36:28):
game than the game of smartphones because this is not
just something you have in your pocket.
It's far more complex. Yeah, I mean, you've got Sam
Ullman and Johnny I've with their products coming out next
year, whoever knows what that will be.
I'm curious. This is my final question.
I don't know what your thoughts are on this, whether or not this
is too pessimistic, but in a world where there's a tonne of
(36:51):
people on UVI Universal Basic Income because lots of jobs are
going to go to AI, have have yougot, has your thinking got to
that point or do you think that's just people
scaremongering? That's probably, I don't know,
10-15 years away before we're inthat sort of world where there
aren't jobs for people and so therefore the home is that
(37:13):
critical space. But yeah, again, curious on your
thoughts. I mean, I think there's, there's
like two sides of, of Ubi, in particular Ubi in relation to,
to artificial intelligence. I think the, the, the, the
people who believe in, in that direction often saying, you
know, we can work less, we can spend more time with our
families. A lot of studies, including a
(37:36):
study in Finland shows that people on Ubi actually don't end
up working less. They end up doing the same.
And I'm not just being, being checked out as such.
So, so, you know, some of them may be scepticism or concerns
are not, not there. And, and that there's some sort
of like welfare net below everyone.
Obviously, as a Scandinavian human here who used to have
(37:57):
strong welfare system, I definitely see a lot of benefits
in catching everyone even if they can't get a job with some
sort of minimum financial support and welfare.
But on the other hand, I also think that, you know, if
everyone is suddenly in, you know, dependent on the state for
giving money and it's another big responsibility for the
states with them, treat that with respects and not use that
(38:21):
to sway the population into certain behaviours.
And I think that's probably my biggest fear right now.
If you would look at at certain countries across the world, they
are getting a bit more authoritarian in their way of
looking at, you know, policy anddecision making and you know,
scores for how you well you're doing and insurance score or
(38:42):
this social school in China. It's like it's quite a lot
broader. And what happens if you don't do
what you are, you know, what youshould do?
Do they didn't just cut you up your Ubi and then you're off.
And can they say that if you do this, if you are believing in
this religion or if you do thesebehaviours, you get more Ubi
than those and suddenly becomes a quieter token system where
(39:04):
obviously people being dependenton a way more mixed market of
income has a lot more mode against these things because
it's, it's other dynamics and it's more market driven.
So I think certain countries could do it with success and I
think others would probably end up in a by the Stopian scenario
if they rolled it out. Sure.
(39:25):
But to answer if I think it's necessary, I definitely believe
if we look at a longer time horizon that the amount of jobs
that we right now have versus the amount of jobs that we
likely have with these new technologies.
I'm probably not an optimist like some of these AI founders
who say that this will generate thousands of new jobs, hundreds
(39:47):
of thousands, if not millions ofnew jobs.
Because if you look at the top 10 most probably public jobs or
occupied jobs, and we're like a lot of those, you know, they're.
Gone. They're going.
Yeah, they go. And so, so in that sense, yeah,
I'm, I'm a bit worried for sure in, in that in combination with
the fact that we had less kids and we live longer.
(40:07):
So there's a lot of more pressure on there.
We haven't actually spoken aboutthat which is the ageing
population, but it feels like. Yeah, Yeah.
So it's a Penguin cocktail. I think right now that we we are
in certain jobs can't be replaced anytime soon either.
So I also think, you know, I would love if more people were
excited about utilities than AI because utilities, you can't
(40:29):
just be placed with AI anytime soon.
You know, there's quite a lot ofhumanly well needed for for that
tool to work for a long time at least.
Yeah, and it feels like it's actually for the for the planet
in the, in the sense of how we get those utilities into the
home and how it works the, the multiple layers.
That's what a healthy society needs, right.
(40:49):
So irrespective of everything, unless we're all going to move
into tents, which I very much doubt we we meet that there's a
big problems that we need to solve.
So Kobe, thank you so much for giving up the time to speak to
us. I am look forward to obviously
stalking you on LinkedIn to see where where you where you will
(41:09):
appear over the next few months.And it's been a really
fascinating conversation. Thank you so much.
Thank you. Thanks.
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