Technology for Good Podcast: Anousheh Ansari, CEO, XPrize Foundation
The world of information and communication technologies (ICTs) can sometimes feel like the human body, with all its different parts. Some work autonomously, others need help to stay virus free, and for most it takes a real expert to understand how they work. One thing we do know is that we rely heavily on them and really feel it when they stop working.
The ITU Technology for Good podcast series looks at technological challenges and opportunities through the eyes of some incredible and inspirational women in tech, in the run up to and during the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference, also known as PP-22.
Anousheh Ansari, CEO of the XPRIZE Foundation, discourages women from trying to change themselves, because success depends on “being who you are.” Interspersed with wisdom, Anousheh shares her story of becoming a tech CEO as well as the first female private space explorer. She reminds us of the power of what makes us human: passion and curiosity.
Since I was very young, probably six, seven years old, I was fascinated with the night skies. I would look at these beautiful, shiny objects in the darkness of the night sky and wonder what they are, why they’re bright, you know, how I can go get closer to them. I wanted to go to space to touch them, to understand them. And this question, as I grew a little bit older, the question of, you know, why are we here? What am I doing here? What is this, how this world came to be and the role of humanity and the place we are in time in the grand scheme of things. So these questions are, and my curiosity to find the answers to these questions, what drew me to math science and got me set up on my path to actually being where I am an engineer, a business woman, and an astronaut.”
Anousheh Ansari, CEO, XPrize Foundation
For 5 episodes of Technology for Good, we are focusing on technological challenges and opportunities through the eyes of some incredible and inspirational women in tech, in the run up to and during the ITU Plenipotentiary Conference, or PP-22. This major event will gather policymakers from ITU’s 193 member states to take decisions that will shape the future of technology, making it greener, more gender and youth inclusive and more accessible to everyone on our planet.
This podcast is the nineteenth episode of Technology for Good – an ITU podcast series that focuses on how technology is helping to shape the world around us.
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Available on Soundcloud, Spotify, Apple Podcasts and more.
Presented and Directed by: Maximillian Jacobson-Gonzalez
Co-presented by: Adeleh Mojtahed
Produced and Edited by: Gianluca Allaria
Production Assistants: Tiziana Ballester, Martina Camellini
TRANSCRIPT
Technology for Good – Women in Tech – Anousheh Ansari, CEO, XPrize Foundation
Interviewers:
Maximillian Jacobson-Gonzalez, Senior Communications Officer, ITU
Adeleh Mojtahed, Consultant, ITU
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
Welcome to ITU flagship podcast series technology for good I’m Max Jacobson Gonzalez, and I’m senior communications officer at ITU. For the last 11 or so years, I’ve been interviewing a plethora of interesting people in the worlds of technology, technological innovation, government, academia. From fledgling entrepreneurs to Presidents and Prime Ministers from chiefs of industry giants, to young people taking their first steps towards scientific or engineering careers, and even Hollywood film stars, but to balance things out a bit for the next five episodes of Technology for Good, which we’ve decided to devote to Women in Tech, I’m going to be joined by a female co-presenter for every episode and today I have the pleasure of introducing you to Adeleh Mojtahed. Adeleh, why don’t you tell our listeners a bit about yourself?
Adeleh Mojtahed:
Thank you, Max, I am Adeleh. I’m a digital specialist, foresight strategists, and a multidisciplinary artist. And I have been moderating a few panel discussions related to immersive technologies. I’m passionate and dedicated in helping and educating others. Particularly those from marginalized communities, considering the inequalities and help to bring them to the center of the new solutions in digital transformation. My work at ITU primarily focuses on using data to optimize digital projects, building new strategies and enlightening UN organizations on how to make digital products and web more accessible for people with low broadband and people with disability, also how to reduce digital carbon footprint to help with climate change.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
Thanks Adeleh. Now, just in case that there are listeners out there who don’t know what ITU stands for, it is an acronym for …
Adeleh Mojtahed:
International Telecommunication Union: it is one of the oldest specialized agencies of the United Nations. ITU’s aim and challenge is connecting people all over the world, through information and communication technologies (ICTs) bringing all the decision makers together from 193 member states, to discuss, study and make decisions on the technology, standards, development, and infrastructure that affects all of us, like in the next Plenipotentiary Conference in Bucharest, Romania.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
Exactly, which is running from September 26th to October 14th, 2022, where representatives from all over the world will gather to shape the future of technology, making it greener, more gender and youth inclusive and more accessible to everyone on our planet. Computers, smartphones, broadband, standards, spectrum, satellites, AI…
Adeleh Mojtahed:
Whoever people are, whatever their background, geographical location, economic situation, gender…
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
And talking about gender…
Adeleh Mojtahed:
That’s why ITU wants to hear from women in tech related jobs, who have often got there with the odds stacked against them, so people can be inspired, in particular the next generation, so as to not only inherit the future but also shape it.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
Absolutely, not only inherit the future but shape it too. In this episode, we’re going to be speaking with someone who believes that the sky isn’t the limit. A great welcome to Anousheh Ansari, CEO of the XPRIZE Foundation. Anousheh is an Iranian born American businesswoman who captured the 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. Anousheh serves on the World Economic Forum’s Global Future Council, She is a UNESCO Goodwill Ambassador and serves on the board of Jabil and Peace First, as well as several other not-for-profit organizations focused on science, technology, engineering and mathematics education, and youth empowerment. Anousheh, thank you very much, indeed, for joining us.
Anousheh Ansari:
It’s a pleasure to be with both of you.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
Now, your roll call of achievements is incredible, we will go into some of these shortly but first of all, I am sure all our listeners will be keen to hear about your space expedition and I’d like to know, also, how it continues to inspire you.
Anousheh Ansari:
Well, since I was very young, probably six, seven years old, I was fascinated with the night skies. I would look at these beautiful, shiny objects in the darkness of the night sky and wonder what they are, why they’re bright, you know, how I can go get closer to them. I wanted to go to space to touch them, to understand them. And this question, as I grew a little bit older, the question of, you know, why are we here? What am I doing here? What is this, how this world came to be and the role of humanity and the place we are in time in the grand scheme of things. So these questions are, and my curiosity to find the answers to these questions, what drew me to math science and got me set up on my path to actually being where I am an engineer, a business woman, and an astronaut.
Adeleh Mojtahed:
You always had this big dream. You were aiming high, very high, in fact, and you got there. This is extremely inspiring. More often we see people wonder through much of their lives without discovering their passion, or they go from one job to another unfulfilled and they regret. What helps you to understand what you wanted and what your dream was?
Anousheh Ansari:
I think just naturally I’m a curious person and curiosity and imagination are some unique aspects of human beings, I think. I don’t know how the animal kingdom works, but I think we have this unique ability to get interested and ask questions. And the pursuit of those questions is what really drives you to find your passion. That’s how I found my passion. So, anyone who allows themselves to question everything around them, get curious about it, wanting to find out how it works, how they can be part of it, they will eventually stumble on something that really grabs their attention and sits in a special place in their heart and, and draws them to want to know more, do more, get more involved and that’s how you find your passion. You won’t find it by sitting and thinking about what’s my passion? It is by being out there and trying in different experiences to travel, to talk to people, to read about different things. And, and then you will find it. I can assure you if you are curious and you go out there and try to expose yourself to different ideas, you will find something that really sits well with you.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
Now, Anousheh, you are the CEO of the XPRIZE Foundation, the world’s leader in designing and operating incentive competitions to solve humanity’s biggest challenges. How does the Foundation’s work encourage young people and women to embrace the technological world?
Anousheh Ansari:
Fundamentally XPrize and I believe that innovation, ideas can come from anywhere in the world from anyone, any age, any gender, any background. It comes from non-experts. We’ve seen it over and over some of the teams that who form a team and participate in our competitions actually are not experts in the field and because they’re not experts, they approach things differently. And personally, I’m passionate about getting young people involved and especially women involved in our competitions because they have to have a voice in how our world is shaped in the future. I want them to be core architects of the future with us and be able to help design and shape the future. Technology will be a big part of our future. More and more as we’ve seen in the past couple of decades. Our lives have evolved to use a lot of technologies in our everyday life and work. I think in the future that even will evolve to be more integrated into our lives in ways that we won’t even see or understand that technology is involved in the background with artificial intelligence and machine learning. So, having voices of diverse communities, especially young people and women involved in designing this will ensure that we will have a more equitable and brighter future. And this is core to the work of XPRIZE. We ensure that we reach out to every corner of the world when we launch a competition. We want to ensure that the teams are diverse. We incentivize the teams and direct them to make sure that there’s diversity inside the teams. And we design our prizes to consider, different parts of the community and be equitable in that manner. And fortunately, we have really good representation in the teams, and we see a lot of young people involved. Most of our teams are formed from university students. We even had junior high school students who won one of our bonus prizes. So we are very proud of the diversity we have inside the organization and in the teams who compete for our competition.
Adeleh Mojtahed:
You co-founded The Billion Dollar Fund for Women in 2018, with a goal of investing one billion U.S. Dollars in women-founded companies by 2020. That goal was met in under nine months and the Fund has morphed into Beyond The Billion, further investing in businesses driven by women. Is the gender gap decreasing when it comes to investment?
Anousheh Ansari:
Unfortunately, not. The Billion Dollar goal was to reach out to existing venture capital list and investors. And get them to pledge a billion dollar to invest in women founded companies. And we got that done, as you said in record time, and now they’re actually making good and, and they have been making those pledges. When we talk to investors, they talk about not having access and not finding those women entrepreneurs or women entrepreneurs don’t know how to get access to the investors find out where they can go and where those pockets are. So, we are working on making those connections and making sure those pledges are for real. But it’s always very difficult. I think the gap exists is a little bit better now, but you know, even though there are multiple reports, many reports, published that shows how women founded companies are, have a higher chances of rate of success, that, they perform better, they’re profitable, faster…still when it comes to making decisions, whether it’s an unbiased or bias, unconscious bias or, a conscious bias, there is, for whatever reason, there is lack of proper investment levels into women own companies. And that comes in form of either lower valuation, lower amount or no follow ups. And, I hope that changes because, as a report show, and as I personally have experienced women, founded companies are very successful and having a female CEO, you actually find a more responsible person at the helm. So I hope things change and change rapidly.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
Anousheh, you mentioned in the past that one of your passions apart from space, is to get young girls to believe in themselves and go after their dreams. Is that why you started the Ansari Foundation where you are committed to ensuring the freedom of women around the world and supporting female entrepreneurs? And I’d also like to ask you, do you think that challenges between male and female entrepreneurs differ?
Anousheh Ansari:
So, I fundamentally believe that we need to have equal opportunity for everyone. Men women, you know, people have different gender and backgrounds. And I come from a part of the world where, young girls are told there are certain things that are not suitable for women to do, like go to space or become engineers. So, I want to use my life and my life story and what I’ve done as an example for women around the that it is possible, and you can succeed, and they should not listen to what anyone tells them. Even here in United States, I’ve talked to young girls where their counsellors at their schools told them, don’t go too math, don’t go to science, it’s going to be difficult, as if you know, we can’t handle difficulty. So it’s essential for young girls to believe in themselves and not listen to people who, for whatever reason, want to hold them back. And I think women, you know, basically create these barriers and the biggest barrier is their own limit that they put on themselves, what they think they can do or they should do, or they cannot do. And we need to remove all those barriers. So, I do a lot of talks with young students, elementary school students to college students, to women who are already trying to get into the business world and try to help them think through what they want and then just put their blinders on, in terms of focusing on their passion and desires and not listen to all the naysayers around them. And yes, I do believe that the difficulties that women entrepreneur face is, harder, much higher in terms of what a male entrepreneur in the same business focuses, whether it’s seeking investment, whether it’s recruiting, whether just, you know, leadership style. I’ve learned over the years as CEO of multiple tech companies and now at XPRIZE that it takes a while for even the employees to understand how I want to interact with them, the collaborative nature of the way I lead, you know, I’m a softspoken person. Maybe they’re used to a man in my position who is, uh, very forceful or very loud in the way they express themselves. And, and my personality is different, but the effectiveness of what I do sometimes is a lot higher. So, I think it’s important for, you know, women entrepreneur not to try to change themselves because I also fundamentally believe you can only be successful if yourself, so you need to be who you are and succeed with that as a strength. And again, not be discouraged by people around you who try to hold you back and eventually you succeed, but then you have to, as a woman in business, you have to go to a lot more hurdle than a man would in the same position.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
I’m sure you do. Some very good advice there. We got time for one last question. Over to you.
Adeleh Mojtahed:
Thank you, Max. Anousheh in your memoir “My dream of stars”, which I have read, and I highly recommend to our audience to read it, the book has been an inspiration for young women around the world, especially those who are struggling to overcome economic and culture barriers. If you remember when I first met you a few years ago, I came to you and I said, “you are my role model” and I was so excited to meet you. So, as a role model, what advice would you give to women who also share your dream of becoming an astronaut?
Anousheh Ansari:
First of all, I would love to see more women in space. I was one of, I think, around 530 people have ever flown to space and only 10% of those individuals are women. So definitely want to balance that equation a little bit more. And I think in the past, a lot of people who in early days of space entered the astronaut core, came from a military background, they were test pilots or they were part of the military. And I’ve seen a shift now because a lot of our missions to space are exploratory missions, to allow us to build the permanent base on the moon with Artemis, and, and other projects around the globe with different countries to go back to the moon and settle on the moon. I think we need more scientists and people have different background to be able to really create a permanent presence on the moon and beyond. So, I think women have more chances now as research scientists, as psychologists, as doctors, as, artists hopefully in the future to participate and become an astronaut and experience this incredible experience I had. So, I’m hopeful that just because they feel like I don’t have the background they don’t give up. I think in the near future, any field of science will be wanted to have a really good group of astronauts to go to space. The seats will still be limited, so it’s just that much more important for women to be very rigorous in, understanding what are the needs to applying for every opportunity, whether it’s through government agencies or the private sector. Now, we also have the private sector with many opportunities to participate and go to space and you have to start just being in the space industry and the community, so you can find those opportunities of actually flying to space. So, just joining any of the private sector communities or the government space agencies, even as researchers at junior level and then working your way up. So, I feel more confident that there’re opportunities where the interests of women in science and the space industry are coming together and hopefully women will take advantage of those opportunities-
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
That’s excellent. Anousheh, it’s been an absolute pleasure hearing about, all your experiences and adventures and plans for the future. Before we go, a final word from you to our listeners?
Anousheh Ansari:
The only thing I say, I actually served as a US delegate to ITU. So, I’m very familiar with ITU and it’s an organization that looks at standardization in technology. And I think, as I mentioned earlier, technology will be a big part of our future and it’s going to change how we do everything. It’s going to be integrated into our lives. And I would love to see more diversity when these solutions, these systems, these products are being designed. So I want a diverse voice around that design table. I want diverse conversations when ideas are popping up. So, I think just my best advice is anyone who’s listening if you are considering what career you want to build, where you want to go, especially if you’re a woman or from any of the minority communities, please, please, please consider an area in science and technology and math and find your way to sit at those design tables, because we need you. We need better design products and systems to have a more equitable future.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
Well, thank you. Once again, Anousheh, we’ve just been talking with Anousheh Ansari female space traveller, champion, and extremely, strong supporter of young people and women in the fields of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics.
Adeleh Mojtahed:
If you have enjoyed listening to this podcast, why not send us your feedback on Instagram at @ITUofficial?
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
And if you have any comments or suggestions, anything or anyone that has inspired you, and that you would like us to feature, do write to us at podcasts@itu.int…and… you can also visit our website at www.itu.int. And…If you’ve enjoyed listening to this programme, which I’m sure you must have, please don’t forget to subscribe to ITU podcasts. You can find us on Soundcloud, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and more, as we try to dig ever deeper into how technology can truly serve the greater good for all the residents of our planet.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
I am Max Jacobson Gonzalez.
Adeleh Mojtahed:
And I am Adeleh Mojtahed.
Max Jacobson Gonzalez:
And You have been listening to Technology for Good, an ITU digital production.