Nick Thompson is CEO at Bettering Our Worlds (BOW), a robotics software start-up based in Sheffield.
Put simply, BOW’s platform is universal for any robot model or make, democratising use cases for industries previously underserved by robotics.
BOW, originally spun-out from the University of Sheffield in 2020, recently closed a £4 million seed funding round which will be used to build on the firm’s strong commercial traction to date, expand the team and accelerate product development.
The business is also currently working with the XPLOR innovation centre in Wakefield’s Production Park to advance robotics projects in film, TV and live event productions.
Here, Nick Thompson shares a recent week in his very busy life…
Monday
Up at 6.30am. Go for a run – 5K around my local woods. Monday is ‘meeting day’. I’ll work from home today.
9.45 – daily ‘scrum’ with my exec team – CTO (Daniel Camilleri), COO (Eleanor Tang-Smith), CFO (Stephan Hollingshead) and Chief Science Officer (Stuart Wilson). Get an update on what happened leading up to the end of Friday, and high level plan for the week.
There’s a lot to discuss today. We closed our £4M investment round last week, and it’s crazy. We have to hire a dozen people this year, launch our product in the next couple of months, and start selling it ASAP. That means part of our hiring strategy is a sales and marketing team. We really have no time to lose.
10.30am to lunch is ‘catch up’. Emails, a bit of pipeline nurture, overseeing, approving and signing off financial, operational and commercial decisions.
12.30pm. Some piano practice (I am a classical pianist of 35+ years)
1pm. Catch up & 1:1s with my direct reports, Eleanor, Daniel, as well as our Chair (Liz Upton, co-founder of Raspberry Pi), and our Board Advisor (David Lander) – agree plan for the week and catch up on longer term goals. Also a regular PR company catch up.
6.30pm. Cook dinner with wife.
7pm. Netflix/hobbies/exercise/do a bit of programming for fun.
Tuesday
After catching up on emails, a few calls and usual daily scrum meetings, I headed to Heathrow airport from my home in Surrey at 10am. My flight is at 12.30pm to Berlin. I was invited to the British Embassy to meet the Ambassador to Germany, Andrew Mitchell who wanted to see my robot ‘dog’ in action and to showcase our trade relations via the government Department of Business and Trade. I had the robot dog with me, a very heavy bit of kit, and at that point in time, it was broken.
During another trip to Germany the previous week, I had travelled to five different cities meeting companies to try and develop partnerships for BOW. While I was there, I had arranged to pick up our robot, which had been in for repair. It had developed a fault when I was showing off its embedded AI capabilities in Malibu a few weeks previously (another trade show we exhibited at), when I probably overdid the ‘backflip’ trick, and one of the legs had bent out of shape. Our guy in Germany was pleased to hand over the newly refurbished robot and I explained how excited I was to show to our German counterparts what the robot was capable of. But it was not quite fixed. There was still one part that needed replacing, and no battery.
‘But Kai’, I said, exasperated. ‘I need the robot working next week without fail, how are we going to get all this delivered and fixed for then?’ He said ‘It’s OK, Nick. We’ll deliver the battery and spare part to your hotel in Berlin, and you can fix it there, it’s not that hard!’
So I knew that when I got to the hotel I had 30 minutes before having to head off for the Embassy. It was a race against time. Package had been delivered, tick. In the room, firstly battery went on charge, tick.
I whipped off the back of the robot; luckily I had the tools with me, I thought ahead, tick. Then various springs had to be replaced along with some plastic clips. I pulled a spring around and it pinged across the room. Damn. My hands were covered in the lubricating grease inside the mechanism. It was fiddly, but I got it fixed and screwed back together within 15 mins, tick. Battery charged, now I can test it. Open the controller to test the robot. Doesn’t work. Wrong controller software installed. Does anything ever go to plan? Luckily I know a bit about Android, so I was able to hack into the controller and install a beta version of the controller that had the functionality I needed. Now 15 minutes late. Robot packed up, over to the Embassy. It was a great event, and the Ferrero Rocher’s were flowing.
Wednesday
6.30am – 5km run around Berlin. I am trying to keep my running going after a lifestyle change in 2021. Back then I was CEO of One Beyond, a large, international, private-equity-backed software development company that I founded back in the 00’s and sold to a PE group in 2020. But it was getting stressful, and I was neglecting my health.
So in 2021, I quit booze and meat, and started vigorously exercising. I lost nearly six stone and started running marathons. Running keeps me sane, and I use the time on long runs to indulge in business podcasts during which I educate myself in the latest trends and innovations, continually fine-tuning my strategic vision and leadership approach. I finally left One Beyond in 2023 after 26 years; it really was time for a change. Then I found BOW, and the rest was history.
10am. After a healthy hotel breakfast I’m back at Berlin airport on my way back home, but I’ll be heading straight off to Sheffield to meet the team at our HQ later. At the airport, and even on the plane (thank you Satellite internet!), I’ll keep on top of my to-do list, emails and messages so I don’t fall behind.
2.30pm. Back at Heathrow airport, and on the train to Sheffield via Central London, with heavy suitcases and robots in tow. At least there’s a positive in all this lugging – it’s keeping me fit.
7.30pm. Meet the team for dinner, catch up, and plans for the rest of the week.
Thursday
6.30am. 6km run around Sheffield. I have a few routes that I’m getting to know well. Sheffield is a beautiful city. Getting into the higher elevation, if the sun is shining the views are amazing.
9.45. Daily scrum, in person.
10am. Playing with Daniel’s first version of Universal Controller, our app that replaces any proprietary robot controller, but giving the user much more flexibility and expansion opportunities. It works well but it’s still a prototype; either way, I am impressed.
11am. Testing out the latest build of our SDK. I’m happy to put a bit of time into testing the product and getting to use my coding skills, especially when I am in-person with the engineering team around me. I feel like when I test anything I can break it within seconds.
I know I’m quite annoying – my boss back in the ‘90s used to throw things at me if I wrote a bug, and it taught me (the hard way) to put quality first, and to vocalise it. I don’t necessarily condone his management style now, but I always say to my technical employees that bugs are ‘bad’. When I’m in charge there will be very little give when it comes to software quality! We’ll very quickly have no customers or partners if our systems are sub-standard. This attitude served me well in One Beyond and I don’t see any reason to change this now.
2pm. Set up the office for a photo shoot and video. We have to film some footage of me talking and get some photos for the press release about our investment round, with robots in the background. I quickly put together a script and read it out whilst recording it on my laptop. When I play it back my eyes are darting around everywhere so I use an AI tool to correct it. Five minutes later, it’s ready to go! I have no qualms about using technology to get a job done quickly and efficiently. Before I know it, the video is on Sky News…
4pm. Meetings with investors, preparing them for what we’re doing at the board meeting next week.
5pm. Meeting with Liz (Chair), Stephan (CFO) and Eleanor (COO) to finalise the board pack before distributing this evening.
7pm. Dinner on my own at the hotel, and an early night. I always like to read at night. I don’t do business books at night – it just makes my head spin. Instead, I read fiction or stories of strife and resilience, tales of people overcoming adversity, which helps put my own challenges into perspective and lets my mind unwind before sleep.
Friday
10am. Meeting with one of our robot suppliers. We have several weekly scheduled meetings where we strategise with our partners, planning trade shows and product launches. We always have a good conversation with this particular partner who is often showing us the latest tech that’s yet to hit the market, things that don’t seem real or possible, but are going to take the world by storm.
2pm. Back on the train to London, then to home. On the way I connect to the train’s wifi and get work done. I have some brochures to finish off today, and some job specs to write up. Looking forward to getting back to my wife, extended family and lovely house for some R&R, before the weekend disappears in a flash.
