C3 AI's Billionaire CEO on How AI Will Change Our Lives | At Barron's
Summary
TLDRIn an insightful interview, Tom Siebel, CEO of C3.ai, discusses the evolution of his enterprise AI software company from its inception in 2009. He highlights its role in optimizing complex industries like energy and finance with 90 AI applications. Siebel emphasizes the transformative impact of AI on various sectors and shares his bullish market outlook. He candidly addresses C3.ai's stock performance, the company's strategic focus on market share over short-term profitability, and shares personal anecdotes, including a dramatic encounter with an elephant during a safari.
Takeaways
- 🚀 C3.ai is an enterprise application software company that focuses on AI applications, with a history that dates back to 15 years ago before major cloud providers and GPUs were widely used.
- 💡 The company was founded with the vision that the future would involve elastic cloud computing, big data, the Internet of Things, and predictive analytics, which led to the development of a comprehensive software stack.
- 📈 C3.ai has developed 90 enterprise AI applications addressing various industries such as utilities, energy, oil and gas, defense, and financial services, giving them a significant market advantage.
- 🔭 The company's early focus was on the energy sector, optimizing the power grid's value chain and enabling safer, cleaner, and more reliable energy delivery with lower environmental impact.
- 🌍 An example of C3.ai's application is Shell, which uses the software across its entire value chain, from predictive maintenance to refinery operations, resulting in a significant economic benefit.
- 📊 The stock performance of C3.ai has experienced fluctuations, initially surging post-IPO due to market hype, then cooling off as the company transitioned its pricing model, and now showing signs of growth as the market recognizes the value of enterprise AI.
- 🌟 Tom Siebel, CEO of C3.ai, emphasizes that the AI application software market is a multi-trillion-dollar opportunity, and C3.ai aims to establish a clear market leadership position in enterprise AI.
- 🛠 AI is transforming every aspect of life and business, from communication and job performance to medicine, product design, manufacturing, and knowledge work, as highlighted by Tom Siebel.
- 🤖 Tom Siebel praises Microsoft's use of AI, particularly in its productivity tools, for enhancing user experience without requiring them to have data science expertise.
- 🏆 Siebel discusses the importance of assembling bright teams to help governments and corporations use information technology to improve services and products, which he finds fulfilling.
- 🦣 A personal anecdote shared by Tom Siebel is his encounter with an aggressive elephant during a safari in Tanzania, which resulted in severe injuries and multiple surgeries, demonstrating his resilience.
Q & A
What is the primary function of C3 AI?
-C3 AI is an enterprise application software company that provides a software stack enabling companies to design, develop, provision, and operate massive scale enterprise AI applications across various industries.
How did C3 AI start and what was its initial focus?
-C3 AI began 15 years ago with a vision for the future involving elastic cloud computing, big data, the Internet of Things, and predictive analytics. Initially, it focused on applying predictive analytics to the power grid value chain, optimizing energy delivery and carbon footprint management.
How many enterprise AI applications has C3 AI developed and what are some examples of their use?
-C3 AI has developed 90 enterprise AI applications that address various value chains, including utilities, energy, oil and gas, defense intelligence, consumer packaged goods, and financial services.
What is an example of a company using C3 AI's software and how does it benefit from it?
-Shell, a nearly $400 billion business, uses C3 AI across its entire value chain for predictive maintenance, hydrocarbon loss accounting, production optimization, and refinery operations, resulting in $2 billion a year in recurring economic benefits.
How has the perception of enterprise AI changed since November 2022, according to Tom Siebel?
-After November 2022, the world recognized the importance of enterprise AI, leading to a hype cycle. Tom Siebel believes this interest is not ephemeral but legitimate, as the market potential is significant.
What was the initial stock performance of C3 AI after going public, and what changes affected its growth rate?
-C3 AI's stock opened at $101 after pricing at $42 and quickly rose to around $190. However, after changing the pricing model from subscription-based to consumption-based, the growth rate declined significantly before recovering and accelerating again.
Why does Tom Siebel believe that the current AI application software market is not a flash in the pan?
-Tom Siebel sees the AI application software market as a multi-trillion-dollar opportunity, with C3 AI having a significant first-mover advantage, which he believes will lead to the establishment of a clear market leadership position.
How does Tom Siebel view the impact of AI on various aspects of life and business?
-Siebel believes AI will change everything, from communication and job performance to medicine, product design, manufacturing, and entertainment. It will enhance and accelerate all aspects of life and work.
What is Tom Siebel's perspective on the influence of companies like Microsoft and Open AI in the AI market?
-Siebel appreciates Microsoft's use of AI in its products but does not believe that any single company, including Open AI, will dominate the market. He suggests that the real winners may emerge from lesser-known companies.
What is Tom Siebel's opinion on the current state of Silicon Valley and its relationship with Wall Street?
-Siebel sees Silicon Valley as being busy with a hype around AI, where many companies are rebranding with AI stickers. He criticizes analysts for not conducting thorough research and for swinging between trends of prioritizing market share and profitability.
What personal motivation drives Tom Siebel to continue leading C3 AI, and what is his philanthropic focus?
-Siebel is driven by the enjoyment of building companies and working with talented professionals on difficult problems. His philanthropy focuses on education, scholarships, research, public health, and homelessness.
Can you summarize Tom Siebel's encounter with an elephant during a safari in Africa?
-During a walking safari, Siebel and his guide were charged by an elephant. The guide missed a shot, and the elephant attacked Siebel, severely injuring him. After multiple surgeries and a long recovery, Siebel was able to walk again and continue his active lifestyle.
Outlines
🤖 Introduction to C3 AI and Enterprise AI Applications
The video opens with Andy Serwer welcoming viewers to the show and introducing Tom Siebel, CEO of C3 AI, a company specializing in enterprise application software. Siebel explains that C3 AI was founded 15 years ago with a vision for the future involving cloud computing, big data, IoT, and predictive analytics. The company has since developed a software stack that supports the design and operation of large-scale enterprise AI applications, which are now being used in various industries such as utilities, energy, defense, and financial services. C3 AI has 90 such applications in the market, which is significantly more than any other company. The conversation also touches on the recent surge in interest in enterprise AI and Siebel's belief in its lasting importance.
📉 C3 AI's Market Performance and AI's Impact on Business
Siebel discusses the stock performance of C3 AI, which saw an initial surge after going public but later experienced a downturn due to a shift in the company's pricing model. He emphasizes the long-term growth potential of the enterprise AI market, which he believes will be one of the largest in history. Siebel also talks about the transformative impact of AI on various aspects of business and life, including communication, job performance, research, and the legal and medical fields. He highlights the importance of generative AI and its ability to enhance productivity and effectiveness across different sectors.
🚀 Tom Siebel's Vision for C3 AI and Reflections on Silicon Valley
In this segment, Siebel shares his outlook for C3 AI, emphasizing the company's first-mover advantage and the massive market opportunity in enterprise AI applications. He also reflects on his experiences in Silicon Valley, including his time at Oracle and his views on the current state of the tech industry. Siebel critiques the short-sightedness of market analysts and the cyclical nature of tech bubbles, suggesting that true innovation often comes from unexpected sources rather than established tech giants.
💼 The Role of Market Share and Profitability in Tech Companies
Siebel delves into the strategies of tech companies, particularly focusing on the importance of market share over short-term profitability. He cites examples of Amazon and Salesforce, which took years to become profitable but ultimately created significant value for shareholders. Siebel argues that the current market's obsession with immediate profitability is misguided and that investment in market share is crucial for long-term success. He also discusses C3 AI's financial health and its commitment to investing in growth rather than short-term profits.
🏆 Tom Siebel's Passion for Innovation and Philanthropy
The conversation turns to Siebel's personal motivations and achievements. He expresses his passion for building leading companies and the joy of working with talented professionals to solve complex problems and innovate in the enterprise AI market. Siebel also talks about his philanthropic efforts, focusing on education, research, public health, and homelessness, as well as his commitment to the University of Illinois and the integration of data science with engineering.
🐘 A Harrowing Safari Experience and Resilience
In the final paragraph, Siebel recounts a traumatic event from a safari in Africa, where he was attacked by an elephant. He describes the incident in vivid detail, from the initial sighting of the elephant herd to the moment of the attack and its aftermath. Siebel shares the long and painful journey of recovery, including numerous surgeries and his determination to walk again, which he eventually achieved. The story underscores his resilience and determination in the face of adversity.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Enterprise AI
💡Cloud Computing
💡Big Data
💡Predictive Analytics
💡Internet of Things (IoT)
💡Silicon Valley
💡AI Hype Cycle
💡TurnKey Solutions
💡Market Capitalization
💡Generative AI
💡Philanthropy
Highlights
Tom Siebel, CEO of C3.ai, discusses the company's focus on enterprise application software for AI, emphasizing its origins and evolution in the tech industry.
C3.ai's software stack development began in 2009, anticipating the convergence of cloud computing, big data, IoT, and predictive analytics.
The company has developed 90 enterprise AI applications addressing various industries such as utilities, energy, defense, and financial services.
C3.ai's early start in the AI space has positioned it with a first-mover advantage in the enterprise AI market.
Tom Siebel shares insights on how AI is transforming various sectors, including energy optimization and predictive maintenance for Shell.
AI's impact on the future of work, with generative AI changing job roles across different industries.
Siebel's view on the current hype cycle around enterprise AI and its legitimacy in shaping future markets.
C3.ai's business model shift from subscription-based to consumption-based affected its growth rates and stock performance.
The potential of the AI application software market, which Siebel believes will be the largest in enterprise software history.
Tom Siebel's reflections on his time at Oracle and the importance of assembling bright teams to innovate in the tech industry.
Siebel's perspective on the current state of Silicon Valley, the hype around AI, and the challenges of the bubble cycle in tech startups.
His critique of public market analysts and their focus on short-term profitability over long-term market share growth.
C3.ai's financial health, with substantial cash reserves, and Siebel's commitment to investing in market share over short-term profits.
Tom Siebel's personal motivation for continuing to lead in the tech industry, emphasizing the joy of building and innovating.
Details of Siebel's philanthropic efforts, focusing on education, research, public health, and homelessness.
A dramatic account of Tom Siebel's encounter with an elephant during a safari in Africa, highlighting his resilience and recovery.
Siebel's advocacy for keeping data science closely intertwined with engineering disciplines in academia.
Transcripts
[Music]
hello everyone and welcome to at baren
I'm Andy serwer and Welcome to our guest
Tom seble CEO of C3 aai and a veteran
leader in Silicon Valley Tom great to
see you thank you Andy nice to be here
so tell us about C3 aai What
specifically does it do uh C3 AI is an
Enterprise application software company
and we began 15 years ago before AWS
before the Google Cloud before aour and
before the before the uh GPU building a
software stack that would enable
companies we believed that the future
would be about elastic cloud computing
big data Internet of things and
Predictive Analytics so in January of
2009 we began work building a software
stack that is is thousands of person
years of software engineering and a
couple of billion dollars worth of work
uh that provides all the services
necessary and sufficient to design
develop provision
operate massive scale Enterprise AI
applications and then we use that stack
to build 90 now Enterprise AI
applications that address the value
chains of utilities energy oil and gas
defense intelligence consumer package
Goods Financial Services what have you
so we have
90 uh Enterprise AI applications in the
market today right so now it is you know
fast forward a little bit you know
decade and a half and you know after say
November of
2022 all of a sudden the world woke up
and decided the Enterprise AI was
something important and uh that is now
going through a little bit of a hype
cycle that being said I don't think this
is ephemeral I think it's legit and we
are now find ourselves with 90 TurnKey
Enterprise AI applications which I think
is something like 89 more than anybody
else in the world and the company you
you found in in 2009 didn't start off
per se about AI although you did end up
getting the ticker AI which was a great
move it evolved a little bit over time
did it not it did the stack that we
built was the same and we were applying
these basically Predictive Analytics to
the value chain of the power grid so it
was really focused on energy okay and
optimizing allowing people to measure
their carbon footprint me measure and
monetize their their uh uh energy
footprint and if we look at the grid the
power grid is not arguably in fact the
largest most complex machine ever built
and this is about the time that we
started the company the global utility
companies were going through a upgrade
in the infrastructure to make the entire
grid of remotely machine addressable
they spent like two or three trillion
dollars on that globally and so this was
the first value chain that we optimized
using AI to allow um grid operators to
deliver safer cleaner more reliable uh
energy at lower environmental impact
into the hands of um more satisfied
consumers and so can you give an example
Tom of how a customer would use your
company software sure uh shell for
example shell is about a almost a $400
billion do business that uses C3 AI
across its entire value chain whether
this is deep water let's say predictive
maintenance for offshore oil rigs uh
Predictive Analytics to identify uh
hydrocarbon loss accounting and
pipelines going across Africa uh well
placement analytics production
optimization in Wells um uh using AI to
optimize uh Refinery operations and
process optimization integration of
Renewables um uh these are uh theft
energy theft right now uh at Shell
Shell's probably is one of the largest
AI application deployments on Earth uh
and the economic benefit that they acrew
from the use of our products is $2
billion a year in recurring economic
benefit Bank of America uses it for
customer churn uh Caril uses it for
supply chain and demand chain
optimization associated with hundred
billion dollars worth of protein uh and
if we get that wrong North Africa
starves um we use were used very
frequently in defense and intelligence
applications uh space contested
Logistics uh Intel these are these are
the types of applications so this is Big
Iron Big Stuff Big Oil big utilities big
steel big
Aerospace big Enterprise Computing
problems got it now the stock started
off with a bang and then it's cooled off
a little bit over the past couple years
why is that what's going on in the
marketplace there well when we went out
the market this was kind of before the
AI boom uh we went public as I recall
December 20120 we priced the stock at 42
which we thought was a for fair price I
think it opened that day at 101 and
immediately ran up like in the course of
the next two days to like 190 or
something it was crazy it didn't make
any sense at all uh you know sometimes
markets behave in non-rational ways and
so I have no explanation for that and
you know thank goodness that bubble did
burst very quickly and so the stock
settled down to reality um and then when
we repriced our we we changed our
pricing model as a public company from a
subscription-based model to a
consumption-based model that brought our
growth rates down mathematical certainty
was going to bring our growth rates down
that and our growth rates were I think
north of 40 50 60% compound annual
growth rate a year well it came down
almost well it came down to to negative
okay growth rate and then zero and now
and and so we had to go through a period
of of that transition and as we did the
stock came down with the growth rate and
now the stock seems to be rising as the
growth rate has accelerated in the past
few quarters from I think 0% to 4% to 7%
to 16% and it's it's now been
accelerating what's the case for buying
the stock going forward for investors AI
application software Market this is not
a FAL this is a couple trillion dollar
opportunity so this will be the largest
market that we've seen in the history of
Enterprise application software C3 AI
has significant First Market Advantage
first mover advantage in the space I
mean come on I was talking about
Enterprise AI you know a decade before
anybody anybody else in the world and so
we have a significant first mover
Advantage uh we're looking at in we're
looking at a couple trillion dollar
addressable Market Opportunity by any
analyst uh projections uh at the bottom
of that we have silicon okay above
silicon we have infrastructure above
that we have learning models and in the
long run the largest share of that stack
is going to be Enterprise applications
and that's where we play so the game
that we're playing like we did in a
previous like at Oracle and previous
life when I was CEO of seil systems is
to see if we can establish and maintain
a clear Market leadership position in
Enterprise Ai and if we do that this
will be one of the important companies
in information technology that would be
the bull market case fair enough how do
you see AI changing our lives Tom maybe
from an Enterprise standpoint business
and then from personal holy moly Andy it
changes everything I mean it changes
everything about the way we communicate
about the way we do our jobs the way
that journalists will do their jobs the
way that you would do research you know
particularly with the Advent of of of
generative AI I mean this is this is
staging uh it changed the way that
lawyers would do their jobs uh we're
working with two law firms now with
generative AI that fundamentally changes
okay the nature of work it makes these
people much more effective at what they
do it make changes the way that we will
do medicine with Precision medicine
genome specific medic medical protocols
what have you uh distance medicine it
changes the way we design products
manufacture products there's no aspect
of Our Lives okay in entertainment in in
manufacturing okay in um in uh uh
knowledge workers that like that will
not be influenced and accelerated and
enhanced by the use of AI should we go
faster slow you know there's sort of two
camps there well there's just one speed
and this is at the speed of Science and
this is going fast I this is not this is
not going to be stopped okay this is
this is happening right and do you think
that say company like Microsoft and open
AI together do they hold too much sway
over the marketplace or is there enough
diffused um progress going on with AI
gener first let me comment I think the
Microsoft use of AI and what they're
doing with copile is nothing short of um
genius I mean these guys are very
talented people and I think the way that
they've enhanced their products with
edge with word with with office in terms
of incorporating AI into those products
so you know there was this thought not
too many years ago that AI meant that we
had to completely retain our Workforce
and every cab driver in New York City
needed to become a uh a data scientist
well this is a bunch of bunk okay and
the way that AI will be incorporated is
the way that Microsoft is incorporating
AI you don't even know it's there okay
and it's making suggestions for you it's
correct your spelling it's correcting
your references you know it's generating
Pros for you it co-pilot is writing code
assisting you writing code if you're a
programmer So you you're using the tools
that you used before and you don't even
know the AI is there helping you and so
you don't need to know anything about
data science to use these tools and do
open Ai and Microsoft have too much
influence I don't think so I mean In
fairness is open AI uh done some
significant things they have but is open
AI going to win this thing there's no
reason to believe that holy moly this is
first half of the first inning first
person's on its way to bat this is a big
market and there's some belief that one
of Microsoft or Google or Facebook or
Amazon is going to win this AI battle I
don't know why we should believe that
you know in previous generations
information technology and you've seen a
few just like I have the obvious winner
never wins and so I suspect the real
winner in these language models comes
out of Paris or the rocks or it's some
company we haven't even heard of yet and
I mean remember last Thanksgiving I mean
goodness gra open AI could be out of
business this Thursday and I mean it it
could disappear and it really wouldn't
make much difference to the world you do
have a lot of experience in these
markets you mentioned your time at
Oracle and seel systems a big company
that you founded that was later bought
by Oracle came you went came back what
are you most proud of in terms of your
work at Oracle and its seil
systems I think that we there's no
question at Oracle and there's no
question at seel is that we assembled
really bright teams to help governments
to help uh uh government agencies okay
and to help corporations use information
technology to provide higher quality uh
services and products to more satisfied
customers and I'm I'm confident we
succeeded at that at Oracle I'm
confident we succeeded that at cow and I
know we're succeeding that at C3 and
that's what I'm most proud of I want to
ask you a little bit more about Silicon
Valley Tom because you've spent so much
time there for instance do you still
follow what Oracle does are you still in
touch with Larry Ellison I have no idea
what Oracle does I actually not sure
what business they're in today and I
haven't spoken with Larry in a while I
think Larry is a you know Larry is
clearly A Gifted guy and a giant in the
information technology industry I know
oracle is a very big company I'm not
quite sure what they do moved on all
right so what's your take on Silicon
Valley right now and the mood in terms
of its relationship with say Wall Street
and the rest of the
economy well you know silicon Val is
pretty busy again and it's all now it's
we have this big you know every company
has become an AI company every company
that has a technology stack many of
these technology Stacks go back to 1995
2000 2005 and they all put AI on the
cover of their box they got a new
sticker and they became AI so that seems
to be the big hype we're seeing you know
hundreds and hundreds of the companies
getting getting um financed at
staggering Market valuations by the
Andreas and hor and seas of the world
and you know just like the do you know
we will see hundreds of thousands of
these kids get financed and you know
when the Music Stops we'll see thousands
of these companies go out of business so
we're now we're in kind of one of these
bubble Cycles so it's kind of fun to
watch but are analysts looking for these
companies to have profitability or not
there's sort of always a a come and go
there isn't there I think in you know
right now if we if we look at the public
company Market okay so these uh you know
I'm not sure these salside analysts are
quite as uh do the research that they
used to do now they kind of they spend
their whole world inside their Excel
spreadsheet model they don't visit
customers they don't visit companies
they don't visit competitors they don't
really you know get a feel for what's
going on and you know there's a move
U after I would say after uh 2021
2022 where we've swung from G you can't
spend money fast enough uh and the only
thing important is to gain market share
and don't worry about profitability to
today you know the they're they're in a
mood where every company has to be you
know profitable this quarter next
quarter no matter what and it's really
kind of silly that these people swing so
hard with these trends that are you know
that that are Emeral that will go away I
mean when we look at the software
business the name of the game is market
share and when we look at these rapidly
growing markets like the relational
database market like the Enterprise
application software market like the CRM
Market um when we uh see these markets
expand many many companies will get
financed and scores of them will go
public and one of those companies will
become the market leader in the space
and they usually get about 50% share and
then when the market turns somebody will
invest and takes and in investing means
you're not making a profit and those
people that invest become the market
leaders and when the market turns they
tend to be the companies that endure and
create great shareholder value let's
take a look at Amazon I mean Amazon took
29 years to sustain a profit 29 years
okay how'd that work out for investors
when you when Jeff basos took all that
heat over the years of not running a
profitable business 20 for 29 years
how'd that work out for investors day
got what $2 trillion market cap rough
rough numbers let's talk about Mark
Benny off I mean Mark has done a fine
job I believe he's buil built you know
the world's leading Enterprise
application software company it took
them 25 years to become a sustain they
become sustainably profit profitable
until 2023 25 years and so he just
ignored the analyst and he did what was
right and how much value has he created
for his shareholders I think about you
know $250 billion for his shareholder so
he's done done a fine job and so at C3 I
mean we're focused at Market leadership
and we are invest I can I could make
this company profitable this week okay I
mean it's not that hard to make a
company profitable come on you just
figure out how much revenue up coming
and you spend less than that okay and
we're we're we're a structurally
profitable company and by that I mean
our you know our our our gross margins
are substantially greater than our cost
of sales so we we're a structurally
profitable company and I could throw
this into profitability in a second
would that be in the best interest of
shareholders no way noow I we know I
raised a billion dollars in in the
public market in when December of 2020 I
think and we raised that money
to invest in the market invest in brand
invest in brand Equity invest in
technology leadership today I think we
have three4 of a billion dollars rough
numbers last time I did a public
announcement I think we had roughly uh
34 of a billion dollars of cash in the
bank and so we're we're very healthy and
I'm investing in market share and will
this be a cash positive company
absolutely will it be a profitable
company Absolut abolutely is it the
right thing to do at this quarter
absolutely not let me ask you some
questions about you first of all you
seem so passionate about this Tom but
you don't have to be doing this why are
you still at this
game Andy This Is My Idea have a good
time in other words we're I you know I
love to build you know leading companies
I love to attract to to I go to work
every day with a thousand professionals
as you know were're a little bit unusual
we're you know we have a you know we all
work together in the office um and these
are people with you know exceptionally
well trained I think you know 65% of our
people have advanced degrees 10% have
phds and we're working shoulder toosh
shoulder on just enormously difficult
problems we're inventing new things
we're inventing new markets and we're
playing a meaningful role in inventing
the entprise AI market like we played a
meaningful role in in inventing the CRM
Market in all fairness I might have
invented that and with Larry at Oracle
we did invent the relational database
market so this is fun stuff and and so
this is this for better this is my idea
of a good time and this is why I do it
and so we're we're having fun we're
building great product we're making
customers successful I'm working with
talented people and I believe we're
building one of the world's great
companies on the personal side of things
you are a very philanthropic person so I
want to ask you what drives you there
what the focus of your philanthropy is
and then also I want to ask you about
what happened to you in Africa when you
got attacked by an elephant well that
was a bad day uh I like everybody like
you and like all of our friends you know
to the extent that we can we want to
give back to the community and I've been
very fortunate in my career and so I've
had the opportunity to get back to the
community and uh we invest a lot in
education you know a lot of scholarships
a lot of scholarships for under
privileged people um uh a lot in in
research a lot in uh Public Health um uh
we do a lot a lot of work in
homelessness um and I've done some I'm
very interested you kind know recently
I've been doing some work with the
University of Illinois uh focusing on
what I see as the future of data science
okay and making sure that there's been a
trend recently uh that we've seen at
Berkeley and MIT and others to split off
data science from engineering into
separate disciplines I believe that's a
mistake and so we're we're we're doing
some work with the University of
Illinois and some other universities to
help keep these things closely
intertwined but University of Illinois
where you went you're Alma moer with
Mark andrees Mark was was a little bit
after me but yes I have three degrees
from the University of Illinois I've
been I'm I'm I'm a product of the Public
School System a land grant institution
in the state where I grew up yeah and I
was fortunate to get a uh uh a number of
degrees there one in history one in
business and History of Science actually
and uh one in uh a graduate degree in
computer science inter relational
database Theory um and ever since I've
left there I've been very active at the
University of Illinois in helping them
uh realized their mission as a public
land grant uh uh state University that I
think is just a superlative organization
I'm proud to be associated with it and
and finally can you tell us about what
happened that day in Africa August 1st
2009 uh my wife and daughters had been
you know had been encouraged me for me
for some years to take them on a safari
to Africa so in August of 2009 we went
on a safari to Africa and we were in
Tanzania and uh in Late July and uh
after about 3 days my wife and daughters
were kind of bored of riding around in a
Land Rover the way that you will looking
at Oceans of wilderbeast and and and
Cape buffalo and what have you and so
they were taking a break and one of the
one of the activities that they featured
at this um at this Camp which was you
know pretty big concession I think it
was about a half million acres in the
serenti in Tanzania was walking safaris
so I asked our guide uh
if we could go on a walking Safari in
the morning and he said absolutely Mr
seil meet me for coffee at 6:30 and so
we but this is a you know this is kind
of a Four Seasons level campsite and I
meet him for coffee and he explains to
me that you know Mr Cel very care you
know he's going to be carrying a double
barrel 470 rifle um the 470 is a charge
about the size of a roll of Dimes and I
was armed with an icon camera and we
were going to go for a walk and he said
Mr people it's very important if we get
charged by an animal okay that you don't
run because if you get if you run we're
going to get hurt so long story short we
go out about Daybreak and we skirt
around a herd of Cape Buffalo which is
pretty pretty interesting thing to skirt
around and uh about five minutes later
we come up upon a herd of 15 elephant
about 200 meters away and they were half
adults and half juveniles and there was
a stand of trees there the serengetti is
just a kind of a big desert there's not
much relief there's no Hill there's not
many trees but there were some trees and
they were ripping branches off of these
trees the way that they will and so we
stood there it's an out day Daybreak and
we watched and then the wind must have
shifted or something so all of a sudden
this one matriarch elephant goes back on
her hunches her ears go back her Trunks
goes up and she Bellows and it's just
deafening how loud she Bellows and then
she got a you know she got us in her
crosshairs and she starts this well this
elephant this is five tons of elephant
coming at us at 30 miles an hour well at
30 miles an hour you cover 200 meters
pretty quickly and so it's the elephant
the guide
me 100 met this thing is still booking
coming at us 70 M 60 meters 50 m guide
doesn't shoot 40 m 30 m 20 M guide
doesn't shoot this is starting to get a
little concerning at 10 meters the guide
shoots and misses the elepant comes up
wraps his truck her track around the guy
just tosses him so he flies about 10
meters away and she comes up stops 18
Ines from my face it's very surreal
because you really don't have a place to
put an elephant and there's an ele to
this moment I can I can smell it I can
see the hair follicle the eyeball the
Tusk everything went 18 inches away was
and meanwhile Tom hasn't run you know
and and you know we're still holding our
okay what do you want to you know how do
you want to handle this what do you want
to do now and then she proceeds to knock
me to the ground kind of roll me punch
me Gore me I took a Tusk through my left
leg uh she stepped on my right leg my
right foot came off I'm taking hits Andy
like you can't believe and I'm getting
rolled it's very surreal it just hurt so
bad and I remember you know I to this
day I have a thought know please God
make this stop and I really didn't care
how it stopped mean I couldn't do it
anymore look up elephant's
gone long story short they surrounded me
with they know they called The Lodge
surrounded me with trucks I lay there
bleeding with my foot off my leg flade
open for three and a half hours uh
airlifted in a back of a SES of tail
dragger to Nairobi uh airlifted from
Nairobi had surgery in Nairobi airlifted
from nirobi to San Jose California
20-hour flight and they had 10 hours of
morphine and so last 10 hours were
pretty long and I spent the next 5 years
um and had 19 reconstructive surgeries I
walked 5 years later there were were two
surgeons that wanted to amputate my
right leg and I explained to them that
we really didn't have any F further to
talk about and this meeting interview
was over and uh so I went on down the
road and the bottom line This is my leg
and I did walk five years later and
since then I've set you know I've done a
lot of extreme sports kiting you know I
do a lot of kiting extreme sailing I've
won world's record sailing and uh and uh
I'm still here in the alpha is
Tom seel he is a fighter CEO of C3 AI
thank you so much for joining us thank
you Andy this is at Barons I'm Andy
serwer we'll catch you next time
[Music]
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