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Luke Anear is the Founder and CEO of Mitti, the global technology
company formerly known as SafetyCulture. Founded in 2004, Mitti
has grown into a US$1.6 billion company with 850+ employees,
helping tens of thousands of organisations improve how work gets
done. Today, it is expanding across AI, computer vision and
insurance, building on more than 3.5 billion workplace images and
an insurance business that has already written US$115 million+ in
premiums.
After more than 20 years building the company, Luke stepped away
from the CEO role completely exhausted. Eighteen months later,
he’s back in the chair, has made more changes in five months than
he says he did in the previous decade, and is rebuilding the
business for the AI era.
In this candid conversation, Luke shares how dropping out of
school and cycling through 18 jobs and businesses shaped him,
including living in his car before making $42,000 in a single
night, and why he regrets selling 28% of SafetyCulture for just
$2 million. Vidit and Luke unpack the chaos of scaling from 25 to
300+ employees, why stepping away became “one of the best things
that ever happened” to him, what he’s doing differently in his
second stint as CEO, and his ambition to build Mitti into a $10
billion revenue business.
They also explore why AI is pushing software from horizontal to
vertical, Mitti’s expansion beyond traditional SaaS, the
surprising lesson Luke learned on a job site in Nepal, and the
more personal side of a founder who flies helicopters, makes
films and once took his children out of school to travel the
world making documentaries together.
Please enjoy exploring your curiosity.
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TIMESTAMPS
00:00 Why SafetyCulture became Mitti
02:10 Introduction
07:00 Xero
10:15 Living in his car to making $42K
overnight
20:30 How SafetyCulture really started
25:30 Selling 28% for $2 million
31:30 Stepping away and returning as CEO
36:00 The mistakes of scaling too fast
44:15 Why AI is making software more
vertical
46:30 What Nepal taught Luke about global
expansion
54:00 From SaaS to insurance
1:03:00 “I was cooked”: burnout and becoming a
different CEO
1:15:00 Documentaries, his kids and flying
helicopters
1:23:00 Rapid fire
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