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What happens when two bold entrepreneurs uproot their lives and move to a city they’ve never been to before? They find community, opportunity, and a spark that ignites their biggest idea yet. In this episode of Remote With, Justin Harlan dives into the journeys of Misha and Andy - from their first connection with Tulsa’s vibrant startup scene to the creation of NovAI, a new solution for school safety. Listen in to hear how a random pairing at the Tulsa Idea Challenge and a warm welcome from the city’s innovation hubs is helping turn a big dream into a reality.

 

Transcript

Justin Harlan: Hi, I'm Justin Harlan, Managing Director of Tulsa Remote, and today we are here with another episode of Remote With, joined by Misha Shah and Andy Sajnani. Looking forward to speaking with both of you about what brought you to Tulsa, the amazing entrepreneurial backgrounds that you both have, as well as your participation in the Tulsa Idea Challenge and everything that came after that. So let's dig in. Thank you both for being here with us.

Misha Shah: Thank you for having us.

Andy Sajnani: We're excited to talk to you today.

Justin Harlan: You all have been such staples of the Tulsa Remote community over the last few years. I'm really excited to dig into your stories and uncover a little bit about how Tulsa has supported you all as entrepreneurs. I'm really excited about this conversation. So, thanks for the time.

Misha Shah: Same here.

Justin Harlan: Talk to me about life before Tulsa. Where were the two of you? What were you up to? Yeah, let's just start there.

Andy Sajnani: Misha and I started a company called Think Latitude in Chicago. We were originally mentors at an incubator called 1871. Misha was doing more of the operational business side of things. She was on the sales side, and I was more on the technical side. We realized that people had a lot of great ideas, but they just weren't coming to fruition. There was always something blocking them. You could have the best idea, but you don't get traction because you don't know how to market it. Or you could have a great marketing plan, but you have an idea that's not developed enough to actually get funding. So we decided to combine our forces with a third partner. We started this company and we were growing in the incubator. Then we grew out of the incubator and started to expand to cities across the United States. Before Tulsa, Misha was in Nashville and I was in Austin. And then we made our way to Tulsa.

Misha Shah: We wanted to really ask people, go out there and do research. The big thing that everyone would answer is we have great ideas, but we don't know where to start. So that was really where Think Latitude was born. It was a great synergy as well, because a lot of people have entrepreneurial spirits, but they just don't have the courage to take that next step.

Justin Harlan: Yeah. For you all, being so rooted in the entrepreneurial community, where does that stem from for each of you as individuals? Where did you get that spirit yourselves?

Misha Shah: My parents. Growing up, I'm from Lawrenceburg, Tennessee, a really small town south of Nashville. My parents owned a business. They owned a tanning salon and a hotel. Ever since I was little, I think that I've always been around customers and always selling. I was always selling tanning lotions or packages. So I think that's where it was born. I moved to Chicago. I was in corporate for a while. Then whenever I was at 1871 in Chicago, there were so many entrepreneurs coming together. I think that re-sparked my energy.

Justin Harlan: Yeah. Andy, I remember talking with you as you were considering the move through Tulsa Remote early on. I'd love to hear from the cities that you all were living in, as you went through the application process with Tulsa Remote and learned about Tulsa, what stood out to you about the city, and what ultimately made it a place that each of you wanted to live?

Andy Sajnani: I never visited Tulsa before I spoke with you.

Justin Harlan: Oh, one of the brave people that just flies blind. All right, I love it.

Andy Sajnani: I want to give you a lot more credit, Justin, because it was really the relationships that made me want to consider Tulsa. It took me about 14 months from the day we talked until the day I actually moved here. But having made those relationships so easily and it was just so organic when I looked at how Tulsa was doing business, it made me want to double down on Tulsa. I remember you had introduced me to Connor from Tulsa Innovation Labs and Rosa from Atento. Just from there, every time I spoke with someone, they would introduce me to two more people and two more people. Then I met individuals from Build in Tulsa, ACT, and other organizations from TIL. I realized, wow, you guys really care about embracing entrepreneurship in this city, and it's accessible, and it makes sense for people. Until you actually come to Tulsa, you don't realize that.

Justin Harlan: Yeah, well, I definitely want to dig in more to that. I want you to know, I don't take it lightly that what started with a conversation between the two of us ultimately led to you taking a chance on uprooting your life and moving to a new place. That is one of the coolest parts of this job, being able to pull out the beauty of this place and the beauty of connections. And then ultimately, people like yourselves taking a chance and saying yes.

Andy Sajnani: Yeah, I saw how much you cared about Tulsa, Justin. Really, I thought you were a Tulsan. If I didn't know any better, I would think you were born here.

Justin Harlan: Well, I've lived here 20 years. At which point do you become a Tulsan?

Andy Sajnani: Well, yeah. What is that? What is the mark?

Justin Harlan: Me? It's one year.

Misha Shah: That's a good answer.

Justin Harlan: Yes. So, Misha, I'd love to hear from you. Where were you living and what kind of stood out to you about Tulsa? Did you also come blindly or? Yeah. What was in that decision-making process?

Misha Shah: It was really about understanding. I do a lot of research. So when Andy brought it to me, I was like, oh, I don't know much about Tulsa either. But we had just been on the tail spin of the pandemic. I think that for me, there was a lot of isolation during the pandemic. I really believe in community. I feel like people help each other a lot. From an entrepreneurial background, no matter who I talk to, it always stems to entrepreneurship. So every conversation that I have, if we can help, if we can introduce people. I think when Andy mentioned that you were so accessible and you were introducing us to so many people, I was like, I'd like to pay that forward as well. So it was an excitement. And now that I'm part of the community, I feel like I'm a Tulsan at this point.

Justin Harlan: You are, according to my definition.

Misha Shah: According to your definition. So I'm very happy and I'm excited that the program is expanding as well. So that's really cool.

Andy Sajnani: Misha was really brave too, because when a CEO and a COO from a company headquartered in Chicago moved to another city, a lot of questions are asked, right? And a lot of eyebrows are raised, but I'm so glad that you decided to move as well.

Misha Shah: Thank you. And I'm glad of the opportunity. I've actually encouraged other people to apply. So it hasn't ended here. I think that it's not for everyone, but if you have an entrepreneurial spirit and if you're looking to take a leap of faith, this is a great place to start. So a lot of people are starting new chapters in their life. I've met a lot of people in different age ranges, people from diverse backgrounds. So it's a really welcoming community. It reminds me of Nashville, which is at my heart. So I feel like it's a sister city.

Justin Harlan: Well, that's great. So, diving into your Tulsa Remote experience for a little bit of background, we launched a couple years ago our first iteration of the Tulsa Idea Challenge, which we can talk about some of the findings there, but we partnered with Harvard and Builders and Backers and did a 48-hour crash course based on how to build up an idea. As a part of that experience, participants were paired with a totally random stranger who you had no idea who they were when you walked in. I'll talk more about what we were trying to find there after we're done talking about your experience. But just tell us a little bit about why you signed up for that, because you've always kind of been on the other side of entrepreneurialism. So I'm interested to hear from you, what spoke to you or stood out to you about the Tulsa Idea Challenge? And why did you choose to sign up?

Misha Shah: That's a great question. I think about it all the time. I'm normally in the passenger seat of entrepreneurship. I listen to other people's ideas and develop those frameworks for them. So I was like, I want to be in the driver's seat. I love to be in a classroom setting. I love meeting new people. I love brainstorming. So it was the culmination of all those things that got me really excited. Being partnered with an amazing partner named Nikki Murray. She was really cool, really enthusiastic. So when we met, it was like an immediate connection, which is kind of weird to say, but it was very magical. But I came with an idea in my mind. It wasn't completely solidified, but to me, women's safety is super important. So my idea was if you're in big cities, having a drone and a mobile app following you along when you're going to your car. So that was my original concept.

Justin Harlan: Okay, interesting.

Misha Shah: So I told her that that was my idea, but I'd love to hear your ideas and let's collaborate. And she was like, I am in love with that idea. Can we take it a step further and provide it for schools? And that was the magical idea that really kind of solidified NovAI.

Justin Harlan: For context, the Tulsa Idea Challenge had about $50,000 in prize money. You all then took that idea or the combination of the two ideas and made something beautiful out of it. So why don't you tell us a bit about where you landed and ultimately what happened as it relates to the prizes and all of that?

Misha Shah: Sure. So we were just brainstorming and she was telling me about some of the pitfalls and challenges that she faces as someone in the education system. And then I was telling her in terms of really putting everything together, why don't we look and research what solutions are out there? As I was researching, we only had 48 hours, so we didn't have a lot of time. But I started noticing that there wasn't anything pinpointed with school safety. And that's where the drone idea came up. We would have a drone to monitor the system. We would have a command center to help students, teachers, faculty, and police staff to come together within a mobile app. And then lastly, AI detection security. So the culmination of that really was the idea of NovAI. Now, after we won the grand prize, which was so exciting, that's when I was like we need some technical expertise and none other than Andy over here. And that's where we actually brought him into our accelerator.

Justin Harlan: I love it. So just as some context there. So on the back end or the behind the scenes of the Tulsa Idea Challenge, what we were kind of testing or wanting to see alongside Harvard was, is there any difference in the pairings? So you got paired up with a random person, Nikki. She has been in Tulsa for a long time, her whole life.

Misha Shah: 34 years.

Justin Harlan: 34 years. Long time. And so we had a subset of folks who have been in Tulsa for a long time.

Misha Shah: Sure.

Justin Harlan: Then we also had a subset of people like yourselves who are new to Tulsa. And so our theory was, is there any difference when you pair up two long-time Tulsans than there is when you pair up a new Tulsan with a long-time Tulsan? And what we found is absolutely there is. You all won the prize as a mixed group, $25,000 grand prize. And what we saw is that on the whole, as we took surveys throughout the experience of the 48 hours and just kind of saw the success of ideas come to life, it really takes both. It takes the lived experiences and diversity of thought of those that are coming into a new place paired with the local knowledge and need for what we actually need here in the community and the connections to resources and people, which we're actually seeing play out a lot in real time with NovAI. So I would love to talk a bit about where you all have gone because I think what you all accomplished in winning the grand prize and then the ways in which the program has come to life or the business has come to life is really representative of what we expected when we set out to kind of do this research through the Tulsa Idea Challenge. So you brought Andy on. And then what have you been up to? I know you've talked with Heartland Forward and there's been a number of other pitches that you've done. So talk to us about where it is today.

Andy Sajnani: So just building upon something you mentioned, Justin, before I get to that, I think some of the most successful cities you'll see when it comes to how they've grown, like D.C., Chicago, New York, L.A., you're going to see that they're all a melting pot. They have a lot of diversity, diversity of thought. They have a lot of groups of people who think in different ways and they all come together and that's when you're going to see the best ideas. And that's why these are considered entrepreneurial hubs, right? And that's where I'm seeing Tulsa start to make that shift and having programs like this, bringing new people into the city is helping shape that future of Tulsa.

Justin Harlan: Right. Yeah. And I mean, it's like a very out of date way of thinking that we were good where we are. We have the people we need. We're going to make the most of this today, which this isn't to downplay that. I mean, if you're a longtime Tulsan, you are 100 percent valuable in this equation. But it's also bringing folks in that have those new ideas. And it is a welcoming place for new people because you both have specific roles. And I think that's the beauty of what we found is it's not that one is greater than the other.

Andy Sajnani: No, I spent about 80 percent of my time interacting with locals outside of the Tulsa Remote bubble. And the first year it was Tulsa Remote made it easier for me to enable me to get there, right? So we have the member engagement specialist. You can talk with anybody to get a connection here or there. And that's really what helped me understand what Tulsans need, right? And then you could figure out how to address Tulsa as a city versus just saying what we need or what I need, right? Or what needs to satisfy me to be here long-term. So I think that's the difference. But to get back to your question, yeah. So after the Idea Challenge, Idea Accelerator, my background is in engineering, various aspects of it. So from working in the UAV lab to understanding AI technology. Misha couldn't stop ranting and raving about the idea challenge. She had called me, told me she won it. I literally got in the car, drove out to the party. I was like, I'm going to have to celebrate this with you. She's one of my best friends. I was like, I can't say no to that. But I was really excited. But I wanted to understand where Nikki and Misha were coming from and what they hoped to accomplish. Because there's no instruction manual for entrepreneurship. You can't just say because you won the idea challenge, you're going to get from point A to point B, and there's only one way to do this. So we talked about all of the opportunities and the ideas. Originally, I just wanted to be an advisor.

Andy Sajnani: But the more we talked about it, we even did a small podcast too as well. I started to realize that they have a lot of ideas, but they need to get these resources together. And there's some areas where being in the heartland is very advantageous for this. You know that they do a lot of drone research here. AI is huge here. They're doing quite a bit with cybersecurity. So I thought about all of these things. I said, well, why don't we pull this resource, this resource, this resource? Because we have to go through some structured accelerators. So the first thing they did, well, actually, I think collectively they decided, well, why don't you kind of take the lead on this and we'll give you as much advice as you need from our backgrounds. And I thought, well, I want to involve you as much as possible. So I want us all three to be one major group, like one collaborative group.

Misha Shah: So Andy became kind of the main and Nikki and I are advisors.

Justin Harlan: Yeah, okay.

Misha Shah: We're still involved.

Andy Sajnani: We had taken this through a 90-day idea accelerator powered by Heartland Forward called Builders and Backers. We mentioned that earlier. You get about 90 days to test your assumptions, figure out what you need, and they give you resources of up to $5,000 in non-dilutive pebble funds to help you test that idea. So we started with a basic drone, not something that we would actually use in a school. We wanted to get footage of different schools in the area, figure out what are the dead zones, what are the spots that they need. But I was not very well versed with schools because I didn't know that every school is so different. Some of them didn't even have cameras. Some of them didn't even have Wi-Fi that was up to date.

Misha Shah: Some of the cameras we found out are there just as displays. They don't even work. So it really showed us the disparity between different schools in the state of Oklahoma as well.

Andy Sajnani: So that helped us explore where we need to be in order to get this into a pilot phase. And then after that, I was invited to the Heartland Forward Conference, Heartland Summit, and that was in Bentonville, Arkansas. And I had an opportunity to pitch NovAI to a series of different investors who came out there.

Misha Shah: To some of the most prestigious... He's being humble. 

Justin Harlan: Wasn't Matthew McConaughey there? 

Misha Shah: Matthew McConaughey was there. We met several billionaire investors. So these are people that wanted to really understand our idea and we got a lot of traction there too.

Justin Harlan: Did you tell Matthew McConaughey about Tulsa Remote? Just wondering, just out of curiosity.

Andy Sajnani: You know what? Unfortunately, I didn't catch up with him. He was in and out so quickly.

Andy Sajnani: The craziest part is I lived in Austin, I never met him, and he goes to a lot of the FC games at the Q2 stadium. I never met him there, and I met him in Bentonville, Arkansas. At least I saw him there; I didn't actually get a chance to meet him.

Justin Harlan: He's connected with, like, part of his passion project is also solving for school shootings.

Andy Sajnani: The Greenlight Foundation. So that was very synergistic because there's a lot of schools that get grant opportunities, but they don't have grant writers. And they get someone like a PE teacher to write a grant who doesn't really understand, they don't understand the intricacies of these grants and they will automatically get denied. So what they were trying to figure out is how can we get them assistance to write these grants? And in Oklahoma, the state of Oklahoma, they were budgeting $25,000 per school for school safety. So our goal was to try to make them aware that they have access to these grants and we can help them and Greenlight would enable it. So we're working on that partnership to get them to help us write those grants for each school because that's a lengthy process. I know you were in the education system. So you must know all about this, Justin.

Justin Harlan: Yeah, well, it's funny because the partner that Misha had, Nikki, is a dean at a school that I actually helped start as a founding board member about 10 years ago.

Misha Shah: So it's all just a whole circle.

Justin Harlan: Well, tell me where NovAI is right now and then what are your plans, I guess, for the future and what stage are you in? And then I'd love to talk about just why Tulsa was ripe for entrepreneurship.

Andy Sajnani: Absolutely. So we had built the mobile app this year. We were part of another accelerator that we were accepted into. To follow up from the Builders and Backers one called Stepping Stones. And we were given $25,000 in non-dilutive funds to take our idea to the next level. So the goal is to raise $1 million for that calendar year and then get you to the next stage. And they still provide mentorship and ongoing support after that. So we're going to end that. We just had our last session, but officially it ends on December 31st.

Justin Harlan: Awesome.

Andy Sajnani: So we are hoping to close on our next round of funding. And we do have the foundational stage complete. So we can take data sources from any school, no matter what kind of alert system they use, we could plug it into the mobile app and show them how these real-time alerts work. So we've gathered feedback from over 2,000 students, parents, and faculty in support of getting NovAI into their school. So we have a pilot list of schools, a dozen schools, most of them in the Heartland area and some outside the Heartland area. But we do want to pilot this in the Tulsa community as well as the Arkansas community and really help them understand that this can work to get you the real-time alerts.

After that, we have contracts and partnerships we're trying to form with different universities to get licenses to the AI-based weapons detection software, which can monitor in real-time whether somebody is a threat when they're approaching a school or not and how far they are. And once we get that set up, our last phase is to get a commercial-based drone onto a school that can monitor the perimeters, as well as a small drone that could fly into a school and actually tell you where a threat is because what happened in Uvalde should never ever happen again. I've been reading play-by-play what happened and why it took so long for them to react and that's what sparks me to wake up every day. Justin, you have kids. I know at the top of your list is always like, are my kids going to be okay in school? Right?

Misha Shah: Will they be home? Will they be able to come home? I think that was really powerful during our Heartland Forward pitch because it really spoke, it woke everyone up to be like, "Hey, listen, how many school shootings is enough to get..."

Andy Sajnani: We can't be desensitized to this. That's a problem. School shooting should not be an epidemic. We need to control the situation. And that's where I get passionate. So that's where I'm raising my voice.

Justin Harlan: I couldn't agree more. And I wish it wasn't a problem that you were having to solve, but I'm glad that you are. And you're taking a super innovative approach to it. And it's really cool to think that that kind of stemmed from this random event that we put on and decided to do. And I'm curious, just if folks are listening and want to hear more, do you all have a website or a place that they could contact you? Give us that information, then let's transition.

Andy Sajnani: Yeah, absolutely. Our website is flyNovAI.com, info@NovAI.com. And then our personal website, which we do post stuff about NovAI, because we donated resources for one year, development resources to NovAI to help solve this issue and build the mobile apps, even if we were outside of our funding zone, www.thinklatitude.pro. You can read more about it in the news section. We post updates of NovAI there as well.

Justin Harlan: That's awesome. Great. So let's talk about entrepreneurship because you all are fascinating in the sense that you have this vast background in entrepreneurship from the mentorship side and kind of coaching and development, the entrepreneurial hubs that you've been a part of yourselves, starting Think Latitude and actually being like on the investor side. And then you also have this lived experience of like building out product yourself and thinking through all of that and now fundraising. So I'm just interested to hear your take as people who have lived at least a few places in what you've said today, why is Tulsa ripe for entrepreneurs? What have you felt here that's different from Chicago or Nashville or Austin? And if there's folks on the other side of this podcast that are listening, just maybe have an idea, why is Tulsa a place that they should consider if they are willing to relocate? What is it about this place that has made the access that you've had easy and come to life in the way that you've taken advantage of it?

Misha Shah: Well, I think that the biggest thing is a sense of community. And I think that in larger cities like Chicago, I know Austin as well, you sometimes feel a little bit confused as to where to go. You know, you may feel like you need a big idea in order to get in front of Capital Factory or 1871. I feel like whenever we are in the midst of tons and tons of entrepreneurs, people are just talking about business. And I think that could stem from some pitfalls or challenges that they may be facing. Maybe it's a resource allocation conversation, but everyone is really helpful and warm. And I think that it's always better to share knowledge instead of keeping it to yourself. And I have noticed that so many people are just so warm and open to having those conversations and it makes you... It's contagious, right? Like sharing information and resources, I feel is so contagious so it makes me want to pay it forward and that was one of the big reasons why I love Tulsa. And I have to say one of the biggest things was Tulsa Idea Challenge that really got me more excited about making my move to Tulsa.

Justin Harlan: It sounds like what you've experienced is through the connections and resources and all that it's not a competitive spirit of where like, if you win, then I lose. But it's rather trying to kind of lift each other up and pursue what you know is possible.

Misha Shah: For the most part, like any conversations that we've had, I feel like everyone is uplifting and supporting. Also having Slack access, people are coming into Tulsa. So if you are considering Tulsa, definitely get involved in those conversations because a lot of people are voyeurs and they love to be involved in a city before they even make the move. So there's some interesting conversations in the Slack channel.

Justin Harlan: Yeah. And Andy, I know that we talked, as you mentioned, a couple of years back before your 14 months before you even moved. And we talked about what you could or should expect when you moved here. How's that played out for you in real-time?

Andy Sajnani: I was skeptical. That's why it took me a while to actually move out here, because I was well connected in Austin at that time to Capital Factory. In 2012, actually, I was tagged to help build 1871. So short story, I was actually thinking of just doing entrepreneurship as a side gig until I could get to med school.

But then, you know, after I realized I was able to work with some amazing people like Ron Manuel, Governor JB Pritzker, and really build this innovation hub in the city of Chicago. Chicago was never a place you wanted to start your business because it was all about corporate jobs there. But then I started realizing that entrepreneurship was just such a great way to experience different projects every day and work with a diverse group of people who are passionate about what they do. Extremely passionate. I never saw that passion in corporate. Well, I saw it once in a while, but not very often, right?

So when it came to Tulsa, for me, it was really all about seeing that community, the nurturing of that community, and being able to realize that if you're in the early ideation stage, going to a big city could be a detriment. You may not be able to get that funding. The programming that we put in place, it's great at 1871, so I'm not going to knock it. I still work there today. But a lot of that funding is meant for people who are further along in their ideas. You don't have like a Builders and Backers. You have so many mentorship programs with Build in Tulsa and other programs that you could tap into right here. And you don't even, and they could get you ready to get that funding, right? Instead of having to do that. And now the biggest challenge is if you really want sustained entrepreneurship in the city of Tulsa, how can we get those growth-stage companies to stay in Tulsa and create jobs in Tulsa? Because I think that's going to really help out the city overall in the long run.

Justin Harlan: Yeah, I agree. We were very heavily focused on the front end of that entrepreneurial journey, which is exciting. And I think it opens doors for folks like yourselves. But I do think that as we continue to evolve within that entrepreneurial ecosystem, I think the latter stage focus and also diversity of funders, that will be huge, which will then support businesses like the one that you all are building now to bring employees in or build brick and mortar or whatever else.

Andy Sajnani: We have prestigious universities right in the city, right in the Tulsa region. And we want to make sure that people who graduate have a job opportunity here that's comparable and paying at the same market level as other jobs in larger cities.

Misha Shah: And Andy and I have been brainstorming as well, like how can we actually bridge the gap between Tulsa and Chicago or Tulsa and Nashville and Austin and Miami, places where we have resources and being able to kind of funnel that together because the ideas that are coming out of Tulsa, they may not have access to them and vice versa. So just being able to even foster that kind of connectivity is something that we'd be willing to help.

Andy Sajnani: And I know you guys are doing your part because Gradient, we're going to have a huge innovation hub right in the city of Tulsa.

Misha Shah: Which is exciting.

Justin Harlan: Well, I really appreciate both of you, both for the ways that you've taken a chance on the program, immersed yourself in that program, whether it's through the lens of giving back or paying it forward. The ways in which you've taken chances on programming that we've done at the Tulsa Idea Challenge. I mean, it's just cool to hear all the different things that you've done that we intend for members or participants to experience. But you really both are such an awesome example of both contributing to the community that brought you in, but also leaving your mark on a place through your own personal development and professional journey. And I know that this is just the start for you all. Thrilled to see both how you develop personally, but also as a business. And I really hope you continue to call Tulsa home both for yourselves, but also as you build out your business.

Misha Shah: Thank you very much.

Andy Sajnani: I want to thank you, Justin, but you took a chance on us. Tulsa took a chance on us. I look at it that way, right? We were just two people who moved out to the city and they gave us a lot of opportunity to be involved through various parts of the entrepreneurship ecosystem and beyond.

Justin Harlan: Yeah. Well, it's a two-way street, so we'll both take credit for it. Thanks for being here with us today. I look forward to what's ahead for you both.

Andy Sajnani: Thank you very much. Appreciate it.