Cristina Aleixendri Munoz, Co-Founder @ Bound4Blue

Hi, Cristina, welcome to the podcast. If you could just start off by telling us a bit about what you do.

So I'm one of the co-founders of Bound for Blue, and Bound for Blue is a Spanish startup which was born to reduce the fuel consumption and emissions of shipping by using, or let's say it the other way, by going back to the basics and using sails again to propel ships.

Nice.

And I guess if you want to just quickly run us through maybe your story thus far and what led you to Banta Blue.

I think that one of the first questions is what led me to study an engineering career. I wasn't good at maths, neither at physics, so I wanted to be a teacher, then later a doctor because I was good at biology and chemistry. But then one of my professors realized— well, in fact, the the professor that was in charge of mathematics, realized that I loved to solve problems. That was like what I really liked. And she helped me throughout the way to choose a career related to engineering. Then I chose aeronautics. I did not know anything about airplanes, neither space shuttles, anything. I mean, I didn't know how an airplane was flying. It was magic to me the first day I arrived and I started learning new things. And how I ended up in shipping, I think it's because of this thing that I have internally. I think that all engineers have it, which is that we love to solve problems and we believe that it doesn't matter the background you have. If you have an idea to solve that problem and to make things easier for the people, good for humanity, for the world, then you have to just step in and give a solution.

What have been the main difference in terms of working as an engineer for a firm and actually being your own boss, like being the founder? How have you found that? What have been the pros and cons of that experience?

So as an engineer, I think they train you very well to make CFD calculations, like structural aerodynamics and so on, but they don't train you how to start and launch a business, neither how to grow it. I think that's the hardest part. So you can have an idea and people tend to believe that's the hardest part of all. I think that it all starts with a problem. You see a problem in the market, And then you find an idea behind and a product or a service to solve that problem. And then you have to think about, okay, now this has to be a business and I have to make money out of it and I have to grow it and how I will do this, how I will acquire the talent, how I will retain that people. For instance, in our case, at an operational level, am I going to close agreements with the partners and suppliers? Where? Around the world or just here in Europe located? All these things and then investment. So how am I going to fund all this growth? So R&D activities, for instance, in our case, has taken a lot of years, as you can imagine. It's a product service, it's a product attached also to a service as hardware plus software. Plus in the end, that's a lot of investment in R&D. So that's patents behind that you have to fund, that people going to CFD and wind tunnel test and so on and so forth. They don't train you to do this. So somehow I had to learn it by doing. So I started the business. I am very fortunate to have started the business with the best two co-founders I have, that everyone would desire to have in the world. So they've had past experience launching startups. In fact, they are also aerospace engineers and they were part of the founding team of an aerospace startup. They launched stratospheric balloons to space. So they were since the very beginning, like, looking for funding and also developing their product and commercialization and so on. So they sort of gave me that learning and I was able to apply it and then do also like some courses on startup management.

Yeah, definitely. I was wondering in terms of— so you started with two other people and then you have to decide what your individual role within the company is going to be, and you're Chief Operations Officer, right?

Yes. So at the beginning I was like the team, we were David, José Miguel and I, and then maybe one or two people more. So at the beginning I was more required on the technical aspects within the company, also because of my background. So the business side, I mean, I couldn't sell anything because I had nothing to sell. So I could talk with the market and that's needed to develop your product, but you couldn't go and sign agreements with suppliers, like for maintenance activities, for production. I mean, it's not the States, but neither for investors. So it didn't take all my time to be speaking with investors to raise the first funding round. So I was more devoted on the technical side. But while the company kept growing throughout the years, the team kept growing also on the technical side, and they were much more better engineers than me. And I believe that this is something that all founders have to do. So find their way of helping the company. And in my case, it wasn't on the engineering side. So I started to focus more on more business-related aspects, closing agreements with those partnerships, managing the investors within the company, more on the marketing side also and commercialization, and more focusing on that business development. So that was like a transition that I had to do within the company. But for instance, David, in the end, was the one of the, from the three of us, it was the who took care of all the technical aspects and today is the Chief Technical Officer within the company. So we couldn't be all of us, the three of us on the technical activities. And you have to make a decision and really see yourself where you're best at.

Yeah, I guess, I mean, as someone who maybe transitioned from something technical and then into all these other aspects that you are now responsible for, I know you said learning by doing was obviously a huge, aspect of this, but were there any other channels through which you sort of found the skills and maybe the confidence to do these completely new skills like marketing, for example?

I think it was more on if you don't have the knowledge within the company or within your teammates, I mean, you can always externalize part of it. And because it wasn't a key aspect within the company, I mean, all the technical development has to be developed within the company. That's what makes you special. But how to market your solution, you can always find someone to help you throughout the way. So we found partners that could give us that support. So that was one of the ways that we did it and we do it today, whenever we need help on those things. But also, for instance, like more related courses. So I started doing some courses in startup management. I went to Cambridge. So I did Ignite course. I also went to the Singularity University with the moonshot thinking for entrepreneurs. And then later, for instance, 2020 was a moment where the company, although there was the COVID impact, the company was growing huge and we needed to grow the team. And I felt that I wasn't prepared for that growth or to lead that growth. So I decided to embark on an Executive MBA while I was doing my daily job. So that was on Friday afternoon and Saturday morning. You can imagine the workload that I had during 2 years nearly. So, so that was a way also, so there you could also find the courses on marketing, but also on HR, financing, and that helped me a lot also.

So in terms of maybe the structure of your MBA and your other educational endeavors, um, post maybe your bachelor's and engineering qualifications, um, you say you've got access to these courses and things like that. Have you found that genuinely they are contributing to your growth? And by you educating yourself, it's a huge investment from yourself and from from the business in terms of your time, are you finding that it is having a tangible impact on the—

Yeah, definitely. I mean, they don't tell you how to go throughout that path that you have in front of you as an entrepreneur. That, I mean, if they told you that, and everyone would be doing that. That's what makes entrepreneurs special. So they find the right path to reach the right point. But obviously they make you think about areas where you're not maybe touching because you're lacking that knowledge. So how my decisions or how HR fits within the strategy of a company, operational strategy, financing strategy, like more on a high level and how everything should work together and move. Because if one of those is not working the same way, it can break everything. So this is really helping me like open my mind, see other business models, see how those could be applied to my business and see areas where maybe I'm not putting so much of my attention. So I should focus on there and make it grow and realize these things. So of course, I mean, they aren't perfect, but they help you a lot.

Yeah, it seems you're a very naturally motivated person. But there have been times in your career where, either during your education or in your actual career, where you've been juggling a lot of things, doing a job on the side or doing education on the side of your work. How do you prevent burning out from too much work? What are some habits to keep you sort of motivated and healthy?

So there was a moment, I should say that it wasn't that— I wouldn't say it's a burnout, but rather that I felt that I couldn't add a lot of value or that I was taking the wrong decisions all the time. And I think that had to do with self-esteem. And that was something that I had to work aside. It wasn't because I wasn't capable. I was realizing I wasn't capable and I was hurting myself so much because of taking bad decisions. And I didn't realize that sometimes as an entrepreneur, you have to take not only one, but a lot of decisions. So you as an entrepreneur, and that's what I realized later, that took me like 1, 2 months, I would say. But anyways, you realize you want to reach this point and you will take a lot of decisions and maybe the first decision will not take you straight to that point and it will just move you a little bit and you realize that you're not really on the right direction and you have to take another decision and it's not a linear path. So rather you will be taking a lot of mini decisions that will bring you to this point. The important part is not that you're taking bad decisions and doing this, which was what I was doing, but rather that you're closer to the point and that you are aware that these decisions were not as good as you thought about, and then you have to go back. So in my case, some people would have said, okay, that's, I mean, that's straightforward. You should have realized that. But in my case, because I was lacking maybe that self-esteem and I thought it was because of me and all that pressure I was putting on me, just me, myself, nobody else, I was unable to keep taking decisions. So I step a little bit aside and I did more regular work. I didn't involve to take decisions and I spoke with my two colleagues, José Miguel and David, and I told them, hey guys, please, I don't want to take decisions throughout some weeks, like I need you to support me. Which I suppose this brings me to the point of starting a company with or without teammates, which I obviously, and as you can imagine right now, I would suggest to do it with somebody else also. Because sometimes this can happen throughout the way. I mean, you will find that your energy will not be as high. And then your other partner, then the magic is that when you are down with your energy, they will be up with their energy. So you're somehow doing the work together. So this is also something that brings me to being sincere with you and also with your partner and with the team and with the client. So right now I'm not in the position to take decisions. But of course I realized that, that was at the beginning of the company. So it wasn't a huge impact. And it took not that much for me to realize, like 1 to 2 months maybe. So it wasn't a huge impact. But then of course, I took much more into account how I was feeling and not letting me reach that point of like burning. And so right now what I do is raise my hand whenever I see that something is not going okay with me. Like, Hey, I feel that this should go this way or that one. I think we're not going the right way, rather than seeing everything not going how it should be. I also like, I think that lowers the bar a little bit. Like I tell my colleagues, do you feel the pressure? I'm starting to feel the pressure, right? And that is helpful because you realize you're not alone and that the rest are also feeling pressure too. So I mean, it also helps you to decrease the level of that pressure. So, I mean, you make fun of it, you tend to just lower it. Of course, like exercising, in my case, I love hiking. I have two dogs, so they help me a lot. So it was like, I need to see my dogs. So it really depends. I think there's not a magic answer to this. I think it's realizing and knowing yourself. So working a lot on yourself, maybe a coach, maybe you, or having a colleague that helps you throughout the way, improving how you are. Personally.

Yeah, I guess that's something that all of us can take into our future careers, especially I think your advice about not maybe dwelling on the bad decisions and realizing that they bring you closer to your end goal in the future anyway. But I guess in terms of maybe if we move on then to another one of your passions, which is empowering women in business. Of course, you're a very successful woman in business thus far and having aided many mentoring schemes and the like, but what are some challenges and experiences you have faced, as I say, a woman in business at the moment, And what about this sector in particular that you're working in, i.e., the shipping sustainability sector?

So as you can imagine, shipping is somehow dominated by male people, old people, or at least right now, I would say that some years till today, we've seen a lot of change, but it was not normal to see people coming from outside the industry like we were, like José Miguel, David, and I, aerospace engineers, young people, like, and even myself being a woman. So today, like, only 2% of all seafarers are women, and around, I think that it's 20% of the workforce in the northern part of Europe, for instance, in shipping is formed by women. So in the end, it's rare. So, I mean, you're there because you deserve it. So that's something I would say to whatever girl or woman that is willing to take a position in shipping, that we need all talent, and that means that we need more women to include in the shipping industry, and they can add a lot of value with whatever type of background they have. It's not just about engineering. We need a lot of lawyers, we need a lot of economists, and I mean, it's not only on the technical side. So I would encourage everyone to join. That's somehow the reason why I started like participating in more initiatives. And I think that more at a younger age, I would say, like encouraging also women to go to engineering roles. Younger. So when I was young, I didn't want to become an engineer because I had no reference. I mean, I looked around me, first I didn't know engineers, no engineer, but then no woman at all. And if I thought about an engineer, I thought about mechanics. I mean, just full of grease and that really didn't represent me. So I want to be not a representation, that's too much, but for them to show that I'm a normal person, that what I do, what they can do within this type of careers and this knowledge that they can acquire and that they really can change the world for the better so that they can find on the engineering careers that they can do a good thing in the world and leave a mark and an impact. So that's one of the things I do, but I also help other women to launch their own projects. So I participate in other programs while they're a little bit not that young, so close to university careers maybe. And so because I found it difficult even having the two teammates and counterparts that had this experience, past experience starting business, I found it difficult, and I found it difficult every day. So, so in the end, I helped them also throughout the way. So every learning I acquired throughout all these years, I want to share it and help them so they can do it faster and better.

I want to take you back to your time in education a bit. So you started off in, in Spain, that's where you got your degree as an engineer, and since then you've you've done education abroad in England with Cambridge, you said, and you did one in California, is that correct?

Mm-hmm.

Yeah, and I was wondering, as someone who is not from the country, maybe not immersed in the culture, you know, UCL where we go, we have a lot of international students, and I was wondering if you have any advice for them in terms of adjusting to the new surroundings and just the new work culture and just everything. How have you found it?

Yes, so, um, for instance, one of the best experiences somebody could go would be like an MBA, like so many different backgrounds. Really, these, and I think about it, and that's one of the reasons I love shipping, it's because of the diversity that you can find. So shipping is global, and that means you have to deal with a lot of people throughout the world. It's the sector that never sleeps, I would say. So that makes it very special. So I'm somehow used to it and I love it, and that's why an experience such as an MBA really opens your mind. So you have to be open to other ideas. So that means you have to work a lot on empathy, of course, because certain people will tell their opinions in different ways, but also be open that you are not having the whole picture of what's happening in the world. So that's the way I was looking at the classes of the Executive MBA. So this is the full picture, and maybe I'm seeing the mountains and you're seeing the ocean. But that doesn't mean that the ocean is not existing. It's just that I have to turn around and see the ocean. So what I saw is that my colleagues were helping me see those areas from my camera that I was not getting. So this open mind, like the open mind, then have this empathy, I would say, and patience.

So one of your educational experiences was Ignite with Cambridge, and you also said you completed another entrepreneurial-based course as well. In terms of the value they gave to you, Obviously we spoke about your MBA before, but in terms of maybe the different backgrounds and such, and like that fusion that you, that you mentioned, how important is that to you in your development?

Yeah, so I think that Ignite, for instance, was a very like starting point. I mean, Ignite is for companies that have just recently launched or about to launch. So they help you like take into consideration all aspects of your business. And there you, You of course are submerged and you work together with other entrepreneurs or wanna-be entrepreneurs. I mean that they still have not funded the company, but they are about to fund it and they're coming from different industries. So the good side is that we are all going to encounter the same problems, I would say. And also the good side is that they are building their businesses in radically different industries. So when you speak with them, like for instance, one was in pharma, so you realize how difficult it is for instance, for the regulatory side. And then you try to think about how difficult or easy it will be on your side and what aspects you should take into consideration. That was, for instance, one moment I realized that maybe I was not considering that well the regulatory side. So I was more optimistic, but I should consider it in another way and how regulations could affect my business. So they were helping me because they were very highly affected by regulation. So that was a thing. Then I moved a little bit and I did this course on California in the Singularity University. Was thinking about, okay, I'm a company, I have my project. And at that time, one of the ideas we had was applying our sails not just for reducing fuel consumption and emissions of ships, but rather as a production plant to generate hydrogen in a renewable, renewable way and at a lower cost than current methods of production of hydrogen, like with natural gas. So that was our moonshot, and they helped me realize that this is not impossible, but rather possible, but that I had to really split it up in different phases. So then just in the starting phase, but that this is my vision and that how to have this vision and really move you so the strategy will follow to really grow the company and to go ahead of this huge vision you have behind. So that was very good because I had the base from Ignite, then I I had the possibility to grow that opportunity, like my mindset I had from the company and how it was going to move. Plus also it was very immersive. I mean, like we also got the opportunity to go to Hewlett-Packard, for instance, also to Google, other companies, to other PCs. And I could realize the opportunities I also had. So at that moment, nobody was speaking about artificial intelligence. Now everything with this ChatGPT or whatever, Everyone is speaking about artificial intelligence. And at that point when I did the course, they were like, okay, you should think about how to apply artificial intelligence within your company, your product or your service. If not, I mean, you have problem, like then it's not a good technology or whatever. So I could realize the possibilities in my product that were not limited to what I was thinking about. So that was very helpful. And then the Executive MBA was setting the baseline. To the growth. So I had built the business, brought it to first prototypes installed and seed trials. Now I have to grow. What should I do to be like a big incumbent company?

You said, um, when you co-founded the company, you didn't really know anything about business and you had to learn on the job. But is there anything you wish you were told while you were at university studying as an engineer to sort of prepare you for that entrepreneurship journey and maybe help find out that you do have sort of entrepreneur within you, you know, any programs you can do at university or just things you should be looking at, you know, things you should be keeping up with?

So I think all of us are entrepreneurs ourselves. The only thing is that maybe you are not an entrepreneur to build your own company, but you have to find a way within a company to be an entrepreneur, like intra-entrepreneur. And that there are a lot of ways of being an entrepreneur. You can also acquire a company. Like a search fund and also like start from there. You don't have to even build your own company from scratch. So that would be one of the ways. But of course, like going back to basics, realizing you can start something and do something. And it's not just going there, working, doing CFP analysis and that's all, go home. And you're just one more piece of a whole full of blocks of pieces. And I mean, it's encouraging, I think, those students and making them believe that With the tools they have, they can build much more. It's not just, they're not just engineers, they are much more than what they have studied. And of course, more on the course side, maybe how to find this financing, because you go there and it's like, what should I do? Should I go to the street and ask for money? I mean, that's ridiculous, but if you think about it and you just finished your career, then where should I go? So what type of investors do I have? What are they going to ask for? Should I have some sort sort of shareholders agreement, they don't tell you this. Who is the first person you should have in the company? How important is the lawyer, for instance, since the very beginning? Like those types of things that you have to either like know by yourself or, I mean, learn it by doing or maybe participating in like some sort of incubation acceleration program. But I think this should be included within the like I mean, class.

Definitely, and obviously you've got that unique insight. Another huge theme in your life, which is obviously Bound4Blue and the work you do, is related to sustainability and climate change. Obviously, it's such a huge problem that we're having at the moment. And so how did you narrow it down to this is the way I'm going to devote, you know, the next few years of my life at least to tackling this problem?

So sustainability, I think for me is key, and it's one of the decisions that made me start Bound4Blue. Of course, this was a profitable business when we did the numbers. Technically speaking, we were going to develop a good product. But in the end, what's the mission? So the mission is not just gaining money. The mission is doing good for all of us. I mean, reducing the emissions, reducing the emissions means better impact for all of us. Like at the personal level, I mean, less deaths because of lung cancers and so on. And also, I mean, good for the planet. So that was the main, like, ignite to really start Mountain4Blue. So I think that one of the ideas you have to have in your mind is that you're not going to solve the whole climate change problem yourself. This is too ambitious to do it by yourself with no money, just starting from scratch. And so I realized that Shipping has a huge opportunity to make a good impact in the world. So shipping, for those who really don't know it, is transporting 90% of world trade. So it's the backbone of the global economy. It's key for all of us. And because it's transporting that huge amount of volume of cargo, in the end, it's polluting a lot. So till today, and I mean, this is the starting point, there hasn't been an been any breakthrough in the industry. I mean, they were somehow risk-averse, somehow conservative to the adoption of technology, and thus they have been doing business since the very beginning. Like, I mean, not pretty much improvement on the technical side. So for all those engineers looking to really make a huge impact, I mean, we're not speaking about incremental development, we're speaking about double-digit, like fuel efficiency savings. So I would encourage them to join an industry that has these so amazing opportunities of improvement at the technical level and that you can really generate an impact. Of course, we cannot solve the whole problem, not either in shipping. I mean, we will provide around 20-30% of the fuel savings. Then you have to add up like digitalization solutions, for instance. You have to add up improvement on the design of the ship to reduce the resistance and so on, and then you have to use alternative fuels. But throughout this multi-solution for chips, then you can reach really the 100% sustainability that is needed within the industry. So that was the decision to embark. But of course, I think that anyone really or looking to climate change solutions or to embark in a startup related to this type of products, just realize it will not solve everything. So just focus on one thing and, and that's enough.

Yeah, that's amazing. And honestly, I think ESG should be for any degree that anyone's doing university, it should be at the forefront of our minds, you know, considering how we can impact it in the future. And I think what you're doing is amazing for it. Do you want to talk about— you and your company appear so successful since you started in 2014 from the outside looking in. You yourself, you were selected in 2017 as Europe's top 50 most promising entrepreneurs. You received the Forbes 30 Under 30 Award in 2019, and in 2020 you won the FED-EPE Innovation and Female Entrepreneurship Award. So clearly very successful since graduating, but I think what's most important is your own definition of success and how you see success from your own perspective. I was wondering, how would you define success now?

For me, it's being calm with the decisions I take. So I mean, um, if If today I was going to die, I need to feel calm that I'm doing the right things today. And I mean, in the end, that I feel happy with the life I'm having. It's not about having more money. It's not about anything material. It's something like more internal. So for instance, it's not building a business and building it very quickly and being famous and like, I mean, and selling the company. If that has to do, for instance, with not being good, ethical, I would say, like taking wrong decisions that are harming people or the planet, then, then that's not the way to go. So for me, it's like feeling this calm with the decisions I take, feeling in peace.

No, I think that's amazing advice. Has that changed since getting into your industry? Have you always thought that way, or is this something you've learned recently?

I think that when I was very young, for me, the definition of success was being the best. So I was trying to improve. So always I was comparing with the rest. When I grew up, I realized I had to compare with me. So being better than I was yesterday, a better person, a better professional in the end. So it really changes. And I think as you grow up and as you mature and you know yourself much better, I would say.

Just as we're sort of wrapping up the episode, and I want to thank you for everything you've said so far, and it's been amazing. Honestly, you're a huge inspiration to ourselves, I'm sure a lot of students. What is one message that you want to leave with students, maybe your own self as a student, something you wish you were told going into your career, like one overall piece of advice?

To try earlier new things. I mean, you don't have to wait. At least in Spain, they tell you, okay, on third year you can start approaching companies. I think you can start approaching them since day one. If you're an engineer and they don't hire you in the first year, then start building your own things. Like, there's not a limit. I mean, you're not an engineer, but that's something. You don't need a paper to say that you are an engineer. An engineer is an engineer without a paper. And then later on, when you grow up, you realize that. Like, you know people that have not studied anything at all related to these careers, but they're better engineers than you. So an engineer is by heart. So if you see a problem, then start solving it. Do a podcast, for instance, like you're doing. Like, I mean, there's a lot of ways. I met a student at Naval Engineering and he did a podcast and he wanted to meet with engineers and know a little bit about the professions also here, like in Spain. That's a possibility that brings you like a step closer to where you want to go. And if you don't like that, then leave it and just try new things.

Thank you very much, Cristina. I mean, that's amazing advice, as Peter said, throughout the episode. And I guess that's a really good last thing, um, in terms of trying new things and not being afraid to keep it moving, um, especially when you're young. Once more, Cristina, thank you very much. It's been an absolute pleasure speaking to you today. We wish you all the best in future.

Thank you. And if everyone is interested in a career in shipping, they can contact me directly also on LinkedIn, and I'm always open to, like, help people if We'll make sure to link that in the bio as well.

Um, but thank you very much, and yeah, we'll see you all later.