"Stay hungry and go your own way", advised Felix Paul Wagner, Managing Partner of Next Mobility Lab

HackerNoon Reporter: Please tell us briefly about your background.

I have a background in IT, Business Administration and in startup-building. I’ve lived some time in Australia where I started my first startup in the solar industry.

What's your startup called? And in a sentence or two, what does it do?

Our Startup is called Next Mobility Labs. We are a company builder / startup studio investing in and supporting sustainable, digital mobility startups.

What is the origin story?

Armin (Co-Founder) and I met within the digital agency mediaman which he founded 25 years ago. We both made some experiences in founding and building up startups in our career. 2 years ago we decided to follow our passion and start the journey of the Next Mobility Labs.

What do you love about your team, and why are you the ones to solve this problem?

Well I would say we are not the typical startup that solves a single problem, we rather encourage and support smart and ambitious people to solve various problems within the mobility sector. I love our team because we share the same values which is the most important thing in my opinion.

If you weren’t building your startup, what would you be doing?

Building another Startup ;)

At the moment, how do you measure success? What are your core metrics?

If our startups are able to attract potential clients and receive funding from investors we are on the right track and consider our startups successful

What’s most exciting about your traction to date?

We were able to attract top-notch people from the industry to join us as advisors / partners. e.g. Dr. Peter Mertens (former CTO Audi) or Thomas Andrae, a well known german serial founder and investor.

What technologies are you currently most excited about, and most worried about? And why?

I’m both excited and worried about AI. On one hand it opens huge potentials but on the other hand I think it is very important that we as humans define a common rule set how we will use AI.

What drew you to get published on HackerNoon? What do you like most about our platform?

I like the idea of the startup of the year award and got notified by your people that we got selected.

What advice would you give to the 21-year-old version of yourself?

Stay hungry and go your own way. Don’t always rely on what others say.

What is something surprising you've learned this year that your contemporaries would benefit from knowing?

Networking is almost everything. You can have great solutions but you need a well established network to bring the power of your solution with speed on the street.