0:00

You probably know

0:00

your parents you've seen or your

0:02

parents friends, where one of

0:02

them is going through a very

0:05

different kind of health cycle

0:05

at retirement than the other

0:10

one. And it creates issues with

0:10

housing, it creates issues with

0:15

planning in terms of financial

0:15

planning, travel, because a lot

0:19

of people want to do a lot of

0:19

traveling at that time. And then

0:22

one partner is in this different

0:22

thing. And, and it's really is

0:26

fascinating, because you can see

0:26

these things, you can see them

0:28

you can project them out from now.

0:39

Do you have trouble conceptualizing what your finances look like over

0:40

your lifetime? For many people

0:44

and acid accumulation and

0:44

decumulation graph might just be

0:48

too abstract. And for most

0:48

people, money is a tool that

0:52

helps us tell us what is

0:52

possible in our lives. And our

0:55

lives are certainly about more

0:55

than just money. On today's

0:59

show, I'm going to be speaking

0:59

with the founder of a new

1:01

service that tries to visualize

1:01

your whole life, and not just

1:05

your life, but your kids lives.

1:05

And your parents lives too, all

1:09

in one place. But we think about

1:09

planning differently, or with

1:13

more conviction. If we can see

1:13

what year we might be expected

1:17

to have kids. Or if we're going

1:17

to retire while we still have a

1:21

mortgage and those kids are

1:21

still in school. What might our

1:25

help feeling? Well, this new

1:25

startup is trying to help

1:28

visualize those considerations,

1:28

and more.

1:40

This is mostly money. And I'm

1:40

your host Preet Banerjee, and on

1:43

the show today I'll be speaking

1:43

with Michael Meyer, he's the

1:46

founder of a company called

1:46

oplex, which is a cloud based

1:50

life planning app. It visualizes

1:50

not only your financial

1:55

milestones in life, but also

1:55

your health, major life events

1:59

and your personal goals. using

1:59

artificial intelligence, it will

2:04

help you visually map out and

2:04

predict things like when you

2:07

will have kids, when your kids

2:07

will have kids, when you when

2:12

your kids will graduate, if

2:12

they'll be in post secondary

2:14

school while you still have a

2:14

mortgage. And we're hoping to

2:17

retire and more Michael, welcome

2:17

to the show. Hello, thanks

2:21

for having me.

2:22

Very interesting

2:22

piece of software. And this was

2:26

brought to my attention by my

2:26

friend Bruce salary, because I

2:28

think you were a guest on his

2:28

Sirius XM Satellite Radio Show.

2:34

And he said you need to talk to

2:34

Michael Meyer, about this app

2:37

that he's brought out. And so

2:37

when Bruce asks, I listen. So

2:41

it's a pleasure to have you

2:41

here, and is wondering if we can

2:43

get right down to brass tacks

2:43

Give me the elevator pitch on

2:48

what oplex is? Well, I

2:50

think you actually did a great job in the intro. So thank you, thank you

2:51

so much. That That really is is

2:55

what we do, we take your basic

2:55

demographic data of yourself and

3:00

your family members. And we

3:00

create what is a stack timeline.

3:04

And on that timeline, we we

3:04

project all of the kind of data

3:08

points that we have general

3:08

population data, and we kind of

3:12

create a view of the future for

3:12

you, then we allow you to, to

3:18

fill in the blanks as it were,

3:18

and add in your own goals or

3:23

things that you'd like to

3:23

achieve. And then we start to

3:25

overlay on top of that some of

3:25

your financial information,

3:29

health data, and what we start

3:29

to quickly see is we get these

3:34

interesting intersections, now

3:34

when these overlaps happen, you

3:39

kind of can come away with some,

3:39

some, some learning and some,

3:43

some some ideas of what's going

3:43

to happen, what's coming down

3:46

the pipe for you. And and it

3:46

kind of gives you both a way to

3:49

visualize it and kind of take

3:49

control of the future. And it

3:52

really makes planning, you know,

3:52

it takes it out of a, you know,

3:55

a sheet and a simple, you know,

3:55

growth chart, which is, you

3:59

know, we've all seen those and

3:59

it's kind of how do we

4:02

personalize data, that's a big

4:02

part of it, you know, how do we

4:05

kind of make this a little bit

4:05

more relevant to ourselves, and

4:08

also our family members.

4:08

Because, you know, as people, we

4:13

are able to have a, you know,

4:13

we're kind of, we've evolved to,

4:16

to, to, to be in the here and

4:16

now and to survive, and, you

4:20

know, these immediate needs,

4:20

make sure those are taken care

4:22

of. And as, as we get forward

4:22

into the future, we have some

4:27

trouble even visualizing our own

4:27

future. But when you ask us to,

4:31

okay, let's overlay your partner

4:31

and overlay your, your kids and

4:34

even your parents, you know,

4:34

plotting my parents health in

4:37

there is is helpful. It really

4:37

it becomes something that's very

4:41

hard for us to do without some

4:41

assistance. And so I think

4:46

that's what we try to do and

4:46

it's and really a computer that

4:50

it's, you know, technology is

4:50

good for some things and not

4:53

it's technology is really great

4:53

at taking a ton of data and

4:56

making it user friendly. And I

4:56

think that's what we're really

5:00

trying to achieve and then at

5:00

the end users is somebody who

5:03

can now walk away without and

5:03

kind of say okay here's what it

5:06

looks like and here's what i can

5:06

do about it if i want to

5:09

you were kind of to give me a demo a couple of weeks ago and it's sort of hard

5:11

in in an audio format to really

5:14

describe the visualization of

5:14

the data and i think that is

5:18

kind of where it'll make a lot

5:18

more sense some of the things

5:21

that we talk about because it is

5:21

if i recall correctly it was a

5:25

couple of weeks ago it's kind of

5:25

like a giant timeline and

5:29

overlaid on this timeline there

5:29

are different phases of life not

5:34

only your own life other members

5:34

of your family as well will be

5:38

put onto this time it's not just

5:38

one line as a couple of lines

5:42

but and you can very quickly see

5:42

the overlaps in different

5:46

people's different phases of

5:46

life and it's just a different

5:50

way to sort of have this

5:50

holistic big picture view of

5:55

kind of like your family and not

5:55

just an individual but to your

5:59

point right you have the

5:59

accumulation phase you retire

6:02

and then you've got the d

6:02

cumulation phase and as they say

6:06

you know you you accumulate till

6:06

you get to zero you write your

6:09

last check it bounces and then

6:09

you die right it's very easy

6:13

if you do it right yes

6:14

depending on your goal right there's some people say i don't want to leave

6:16

anything to anyone right other

6:19

people want to leave a legacy

6:19

but but that's essentially what

6:22

it looks like and this is quite

6:22

different so okay let's let's go

6:27

through some some basics now is

6:27

it is this live now

6:31

yes it is

6:31

absolutely you go in and you the

6:35

onboarding process is

6:35

essentially what asks you the

6:38

questions in terms of your you

6:38

know the year you are born the

6:42

sex and the country you come

6:42

from and it does that for

6:46

yourself and your partner and

6:46

your children and your parents

6:49

you know you can add them in and

6:49

the reason those things matter

6:53

is because you know just even

6:53

within canada males and females

6:58

have different life expectancies

6:58

and different healthy life

7:00

expectancies and we use that

7:00

then we stack those those

7:06

timelines together to create

7:06

what you see when you when you

7:09

when you get into the app and

7:09

then similar to you know it's

7:15

often been described as kind of

7:15

editing software so when you see

7:18

visual editing software for

7:18

songs or for for video editing

7:24

software so you see these kind

7:24

of these lines at the bottom and

7:29

you can kind of then add to them

7:29

so you can simply add notes you

7:32

can add milestones and you can

7:32

start creating things like you

7:36

know education goals family

7:36

planning goals fitness goals and

7:41

then layer that data over over

7:41

this so so i think i think you

7:45

made an interesting point earlier where you're talking about the traditional line of

7:47

you know here's my retirement

7:50

savings going up and then it

7:50

comes down we do that so that's

7:55

projected but it's actually

7:55

overlaid over your family so you

7:58

can see okay at this timeline

7:58

when i reached my peak what's

8:03

happening with with my partner

8:03

what's happening with my kids

8:06

what's happened to my parents at

8:06

that point and for me that was

8:09

really interesting you know i'll

8:09

my partner's a little bit

8:12

younger than myself but also

8:12

women aged differently than men

8:17

so so we right away when i did

8:17

this for myself and this is just

8:21

using general publish i immediately thought you know what i'm going to i'm going to

8:23

to have my healthy lifespan i'm

8:29

going to hit that before her

8:29

retirement age and this has

8:33

really made me think okay we've

8:33

got to have a conversation about

8:36

this and then i think i think

8:36

you know you probably know your

8:38

parents you've seen or your

8:38

parents friends where one of

8:41

them is going through a very

8:41

different kind of health cycle

8:46

at retirement than the other one

8:46

and it creates issues with

8:51

housing it creates issues with

8:51

planning in terms of financial

8:55

planning travel because a lot of

8:55

people want to do a lot of

8:58

traveling at that time and then

8:58

one partner is in this different

9:01

thing and and it's really is

9:01

fascinating because you can see

9:05

these things you can see them

9:05

you can project them out from

9:07

now you know it's really is and

9:07

those those overlays i think are

9:12

what's revealing beyond just

9:12

okay if you you know you save

9:17

this much per month and then you

9:17

withdraw this much per month you

9:22

don't have a frame of reference

9:22

for that and i think what we do

9:25

is we try to give you that and

9:25

so it's a much richer plan a

9:29

much richer view that you can take away

9:32

what i want to

9:32

sort of like draw a comparison

9:35

to and get your perspective on

9:35

this is to traditional sort of

9:39

financial planning projections

9:39

and software so we've heard this

9:42

phrase that you know time is

9:42

money and i would say that

9:46

financial planning software is

9:46

money centric but your planning

9:50

perspective seems to be more

9:50

time centric in a way in other

9:55

words like while money is a

9:55

factor that impacts life

9:59

enjoyment or misery, you know,

9:59

when we retire, what retirement

10:04

looks like based on how much it

10:04

will cost and so on. It's all

10:07

very sort of money centric in

10:07

the way that traditional

10:11

planning software takes a look

10:11

at it. But looking at it through

10:14

a lens of time centricity and

10:14

having everything sorted based

10:18

on time, you are essentially

10:18

saying, Listen, time is an asset

10:22

that needs to be sort of

10:22

allocated over a lifetime. And

10:26

qualitatively, just spending 20

10:26

years in retirement isn't really

10:30

deep enough, you need to think

10:30

about, what does that time look

10:34

like in retirement? Is it going

10:34

to be? Am I going to be healthy,

10:37

but my partner is not or vice

10:37

versa? So and I think I saw this

10:41

on the website, you say that,

10:41

you know, time is our single

10:44

biggest asset? So is it fair to

10:44

say that this is not necessarily

10:49

something that should

10:49

necessarily replace, you know, a

10:52

traditional financial plan, but

10:52

it is maybe a more palatable

10:56

perspective for people to take a

10:56

look at all those factors that,

11:02

you know, I think a really good

11:02

financial planner takes into

11:04

account like your health, and

11:04

what do you want to do? And what

11:06

are your goals? What is your

11:06

perspective on how this compares

11:11

to traditional financial

11:11

planning software?

11:55

Well, well, I

11:55

think I, first of all, I do

11:58

agree that that is on this site,

11:58

and that is my kind of core

12:01

philosophy, in terms of that

12:01

time is your most valuable

12:03

asset. And I would say that, you

12:03

know, if you look at,

12:07

fortunately, the people who have

12:07

a house and have a retirement

12:12

savings account, generally are

12:12

the people who have enough money

12:16

to get through this and do what

12:16

they want, and you spoke about

12:19

it, it's more, it becomes more

12:19

an issue of what your goals are.

12:21

Because for the majority of

12:21

those people they have enough,

12:25

you know, we're essentially

12:25

preaching to the choir, they

12:28

have enough money to to to, to

12:28

achieve these things. And it's

12:32

just termination, do you want to

12:32

spend it all? Or do you want to

12:34

give some of it away. So I think

12:34

if you think of this kind of

12:38

fire movement, which is really

12:38

the, you know, I think almost if

12:43

you if you take out retire

12:43

earlier with you could be a

12:46

better name, it's financial

12:46

independence. And that really

12:49

means to me, and it has been my

12:49

philosophy through my life is

12:52

control of my time. So if I have

12:52

enough money to really be able

12:58

to control that, that time and

12:58

do the things that I want to do,

13:01

I don't, I don't, it's not that

13:01

I don't want to work, but it's

13:04

just, I want to be able to have

13:04

control over my time. I think

13:09

that's where we see that, that

13:09

prioritization of time. And I

13:14

think it's going to change for

13:14

many people, you know, the idea

13:16

of working from home, many of

13:16

these things are just going away

13:19

from just a simple accumulation

13:19

of a number two, having control

13:24

over your time. And the idea of

13:24

of retirement coming earlier, is

13:28

something that I think we'll

13:28

we'll kind of keep working with.

13:31

And yes, I believe that, you

13:31

know, traditional, and I'm not,

13:37

I don't want to be disparaging

13:37

towards a traditional financial

13:39

plan, its focus, because it is

13:39

singular, focused on a person,

13:43

and it has to be to some extent,

13:43

on that individual to be

13:47

effective. And I think I think

13:47

we can coexist with that,

13:51

because I think, you know,

13:51

within this software, we're able

13:56

to accumulate different, you

13:56

know, you can plug in your, your

14:00

mortgage, if it's at a different

14:00

institution, you can you can,

14:03

you can kind of bring in your

14:03

different financial information.

14:06

But I think you're able to, to

14:06

take a larger view of it than

14:14

something that's just

14:14

individual, what's at this,

14:17

what's at this institution, that

14:17

that is generally limited to a

14:21

way that that, as you said, is

14:21

entirely financial. But I think

14:26

I think there is, you know, we

14:26

know, there are different levels

14:30

of that planning, you can go

14:30

somewhere and you can get a more

14:33

sophisticated plan, you can pay

14:33

for a an advice, only life plan,

14:38

which I think is is a is a

14:38

valuable, something going to go

14:44

and do. So I think we can

14:44

coexist with with with these

14:47

these different types of

14:47

financial planning. And I think

14:50

I think it's something that is

14:50

portable. And what I like about

14:55

it is that it's dynamic, it can

14:55

kind of keep being updated with

14:58

with different information. You

14:58

know, when we have some of your

15:03

health information here, let's

15:03

say that's something that

15:05

financial institutions don't

15:05

want to essentially keep. And,

15:09

and I see it as more of a, you

15:09

know, a way to funnel and kind

15:12

of keep these different pools of

15:12

information and get them in a

15:17

way that that creates a

15:17

forecast, forecast becomes

15:20

better with more data. And so I

15:20

think that the more places that

15:23

we can take data from that are

15:23

you that's your data that you

15:26

can control, we can create a

15:26

richer forecast for you. And

15:30

part of the other part of our

15:30

goal is to not take any data

15:35

from you that we can't use to

15:35

generate a valuable forecast. So

15:39

if I say to you, you know, Do

15:39

this quiz or or enter this

15:43

information. It's only so that

15:43

we can give you a projection.

15:46

It's not just simply to collect

15:46

the information. And I think

15:49

you're not going

15:49

to ask my my doctor's office for

15:52

my blood work, or you

15:54

know, no. And I

15:54

mean, in terms in terms of in

15:58

terms of the quiz, one of the

15:58

things that we generate, as we

16:01

go through and we do a health

16:01

quiz, you're able to calculate

16:04

your biological age, you're able

16:04

to calculate your, your actual,

16:08

we start with general population

16:08

data, and then we get down to

16:10

individual data, which is your,

16:10

what is actually your life

16:14

expectancy. And then we

16:14

Furthermore, we go into

16:16

something called the Sphinx

16:16

score, which gives you your

16:19

survivable sort of probability

16:19

of survival into the future. So

16:24

it's taking an actuarial table

16:24

and saying, you know, based on

16:27

your answers to the to the

16:27

health quiz, as we scroll

16:30

through, and as we look through

16:30

into your future, this is

16:33

actually what it what it's what

16:33

it looks like, for you. So so we

16:38

can get very specific, but we

16:38

don't ask you questions unless

16:41

we can give you a forecast from

16:41

them. Right?

16:43

Yeah. So let's,

16:43

let's talk about so now we're

16:46

opening up Pandora's box a

16:46

little bit when it comes to the

16:48

question of data. And so, you

16:48

know, I was joking about, you

16:53

know, contacting my doctor's

16:53

office to get certain data, but

16:55

you're not pulling health

16:55

records from anywhere you're

17:00

ascertaining health information

17:00

through basically surveys that

17:04

people can't even put answers,

17:04

yes,

17:06

in the same way that you would do a life insurance quiz to go through and

17:08

kind of get an idea of what's

17:13

my, you know, how healthy Am I

17:13

it's really focused on your BMI,

17:16

your habits, your dietary

17:16

habits, your health habits, and

17:21

then we can get a projection for

17:21

you of what your what your

17:25

health looks like. And and for

17:25

some people, that's valuable. If

17:29

you don't want that you can just

17:29

use the general population data.

17:33

So it's still it still shows

17:33

you, you know, what I was saying

17:37

before with me and myself and my

17:37

partner, wow, just, I'm retiring

17:42

it x age, because as a woman

17:42

she's going to be has a longer

17:47

life expectancy, a longer sorry,

17:47

healthy life expectancy, and

17:51

she's younger than me, it really

17:51

kind of throws this this last

17:54

decade off, you know. So it's up

17:54

to you, I think it's still

17:58

valuable in a general population

17:58

sense. But if you want to get

18:02

kind of deeper into it, you can.

18:02

Same thing with the financial

18:05

information as much financial

18:05

information as you want to put

18:07

in there, you get a better

18:07

projection from

18:18

the conversation

18:18

with Michael Meyer from mobile x

18:21

continues in just a minute. But

18:21

first, a few thank yous to

18:24

listeners who left comments on

18:24

Apple podcasts, Maxie from the

18:28

Maritimes, who was a longtime

18:28

listener, and I am the real

18:32

Jenny, thank you both for taking

18:32

the time to leave a comment and

18:35

reading, taking just 30 seconds

18:35

out of your day. And leaving a

18:39

rating and or a review on Apple

18:39

podcasts is much appreciated.

18:43

And thank you, as always, to

18:43

everyone who has already left

18:46

ratings and reviews, I do read

18:46

them all. ever even more content

18:51

on my main YouTube channel, I

18:51

just put up a deep dive into all

18:54

those buy now pay later apps

18:54

you're starting to see on e

18:57

commerce websites, apps like

18:57

klarna, afterpay, quadpay,

19:02

paybright, and others are pre

19:02

the option of splitting your

19:06

purchases into four equal

19:06

installments with no interest.

19:10

But they do come with a cost

19:10

over and above getting you to

19:13

spend more than you otherwise

19:13

would. And if you want to learn

19:17

more, you can check out that

19:17

video on my YouTube channel. And

19:20

now back to the conversation

19:20

with Michael Meyer from mobile

19:23

x.com. You talked about different

19:34

measures of age, you talked

19:38

about a biological age and life

19:38

expectancy. And then there's the

19:42

concept of your chronological

19:42

age, which is how will you

19:44

actually are and that differs

19:44

from your biological age. So can

19:49

you can you tell me how those

19:49

would differ and give me an

19:52

example? Sure.

19:54

Well, so you

19:54

know, if you were born 20 say 20

19:59

years not gonna have 30 years

19:59

ago, you're 30 in chronological

20:03

age. Now if you go through and

20:03

you you you answer these

20:06

questions, in terms of what is

20:06

your your BMI when I say your

20:11

BMI, that's your your height and

20:11

your weight, the relationship to

20:14

that. What you eat, how how

20:14

healthy your diet is, how much

20:21

exercise you do kind of low,

20:21

medium, high intensity exercise

20:24

a week, to smoke, you know, the

20:24

factors that are and the factors

20:33

that mattered in terms of life

20:33

insurance, we ask those

20:36

questions, and let's say those

20:36

are the things that matter. And

20:40

the other interesting part about

20:40

this is those are the things

20:43

that you can actually control

20:43

many of them. So it's something

20:47

that you could kind of come back

20:47

to in a little while and see,

20:50

you know, how am I doing with

20:50

this? Am I getting the output

20:53

that I want? Can I can I do

20:53

something to change that? Well,

20:56

this is interesting, because you mentioned that some of the goals

20:58

that you can put into your, your

21:01

life plan, like what do you call

21:01

the progress of the life plan or

21:05

your timeline

21:05

timeline. So,

21:08

one of the goals you mentioned that you could factor into your timeline is

21:10

health goal. So, so give me an

21:15

example. So let's say that I

21:15

fill this, this survey out, and

21:19

it says, alright, well, your

21:19

chronological age is 43, your

21:22

biological age is 50. Because

21:22

you drink your smoke, you're a

21:26

couch potato, whatever, then can

21:26

I go on and say, all right,

21:29

well, I've got a health goal to

21:29

you know, get my BMI down to x

21:33

or whatever. And then I go back,

21:33

and I say, All right here,

21:37

here's my updated information.

21:37

Now is my biological age, you

21:41

know, creeping down towards my

21:41

chronological age and hopefully

21:43

getting younger, is that

21:43

something that that people

21:46

would, is that a use case for

21:46

this? Absolutely.

21:48

I mean, so what

21:48

we would do, I would suggest

21:51

that you do is, is go through

21:51

it, you know, in another six

21:54

months and say, you know, you

21:54

can see as you go through this

21:57

quiz, and to be honest, this,

21:57

this was one of the, you know,

22:02

we're jumping out of it. But this was one of the things that happened to me why I decided to

22:04

do this. I went and got life

22:07

insurance when my when my son

22:07

was born, and then when he

22:10

turned 10, I had to renew it.

22:10

Okay, so I had to go through

22:13

this whole thing again, I had to

22:13

go through a quiz. And then, you

22:16

know, they do the quiz. And then

22:16

they verify it. So they come out

22:19

and they take your blood work

22:19

actually measured my height, and

22:22

then they get you on a scale. So

22:22

you know, you can you can write

22:25

that whatever you want on a piece of paper, but they'll come and verify it. So I when I did

22:27

that, something went off in my

22:33

head, while I think you know, my

22:33

wife is actually an actuary as

22:36

well. So I have an idea of

22:36

what's what the calculation I

22:40

know, I picked, you

22:42

know why she

22:42

picked? You mentioned the age

22:45

gap. She's an actuary. Smart.

22:51

She Yeah. So, so

22:51

so i think i think i want to

22:55

say, you know, what, I they're

22:55

essentially pricing me and I

22:59

want to understand that right? I

22:59

want to understand I want that

23:01

information. And I think I think

23:01

that goes for many things.

23:04

There's many ways our data is

23:04

collected projections are done

23:08

on us by companies. And we don't

23:08

necessarily get the benefit of

23:12

that projection. Right? So I'd

23:12

like to turn that around. I like

23:15

to say, Okay, I'm interested in

23:15

forecasting, I studied commerce,

23:19

I, you know, I studied to be an

23:19

analyst, I really am interested

23:23

in the future What, what, what

23:23

the data tells us what, what can

23:26

we project from that? And so

23:26

that's why I thought, okay, they

23:30

know now a whole bunch of things

23:30

about my future, because I've

23:32

gone through this quite

23:32

extensive quiz. And they did do

23:34

blood work if you know,

23:34

insurance, right. So so you know

23:37

that we're not going to that

23:37

stage or that level of it. But

23:41

we can tell you a whole bunch of

23:41

things about your future, just

23:43

from these algorithms. Right.

23:43

And to me, that's, I want to

23:47

know that, you know, I think

23:47

it's I think it's useful. And

23:51

it's helpful to me, you know, in

23:51

terms of understanding what are

23:55

my constraints, again, time, we

23:55

talked about timeslot? It's a

23:58

constraint. But it's a valuable

23:58

constraint. Because if I didn't

24:02

understand this, I would, I

24:02

would kind of assume you, you

24:07

touched on appreciate earlier,

24:07

this just linear projection of

24:10

the next 20 years. Well, the

24:10

next 20 years, every year is not

24:13

as valuable, they're not equally

24:13

valuable, you know, to me,

24:16

right, some of them are going to

24:16

be much better. And so

24:20

understanding that and

24:20

prioritizing those effectively,

24:23

I think is really important and

24:23

is a useful exercise. Right?

24:27

I want to ask

24:27

you about sort of the business

24:30

model for people who are

24:30

listening to thinking Alright, I

24:33

want to take a look at this and

24:33

kick the tires a little bit. So

24:36

first off, this is a b2c

24:36

offering. So this is not

24:40

necessarily directed at planners

24:40

to use this with clients,

24:43

although they could I imagine.

24:43

But this is primarily a b2c

24:47

offering. And what is the cost?

24:47

So if someone wants to go to the

24:53

website and say, Alright, I'm

24:53

sold, I want to see what my

24:55

timeline looks like, with all

24:55

these different dimensions,

24:58

what's the cost,

25:00

it is free to

25:00

use. So we are we have launched

25:03

and, and it is free, free to

25:03

use. I think, in the in the

25:08

future, there will be a maybe

25:08

some recommendations that we

25:12

could make in terms of financial

25:12

products or health products or

25:16

things like that. But we are

25:16

it's a free planning tool that

25:20

allows you to kind of get this

25:20

projection. And then basically,

25:27

I like, you know, it's one thing

25:27

to take this and see what this

25:30

future looks like, but then to

25:30

help people to actually act

25:33

towards a better future. And

25:33

that I think would be the be the

25:37

next stage of what we can do.

25:37

How can we make this actually

25:40

something better for you and

25:40

that's what i think we will do

25:45

and i think there are financial

25:45

products that we could we could

25:49

bring in and partner partner

25:49

with in different different

25:54

areas but that's not what we're

25:54

not what we're doing at this at

25:58

this point so

25:59

so i know a lot

25:59

of people when they when they

26:02

hear that a product or an

26:02

offering is free they say all

26:06

right well that means that i'm

26:06

the product now when it comes to

26:09

launching a business sure

26:09

certainly one of the models is

26:12

you know to get scale first you

26:12

make it free to run at a loss

26:16

until you get to critical mass

26:16

and then you monetize later

26:19

because you need a certain

26:19

number of people using the

26:22

platform or you need time to

26:22

develop alright now that we've

26:25

established that a lot of people

26:25

are using this this is now more

26:28

valuable to these partner

26:28

agreements so if you were to

26:31

link up with you know an

26:31

insurance provider or a robo

26:33

advisor for the investing

26:33

component or whatever that is

26:37

another way for for your

26:37

business to make money so so

26:41

you're saying that the cost is

26:41

free to the consumer and down

26:48

the road you will look to

26:48

monetize to generate revenue

26:53

through the promotion of

26:53

products that i guess are going

26:56

to be more tailored right out of

26:56

the bag to the individual

26:58

because he knows so much about them

27:00

right and i think

27:00

you know i understand this

27:03

financial and obviously we're

27:03

here to talk about financing

27:07

even even the word life plan is

27:07

a very kind of has a very

27:10

financial connotation to people

27:10

within the industry obviously it

27:13

means something but what we

27:13

found is that our users to have

27:18

different interests and there's

27:18

the there's the user that's

27:22

interested in kind of family

27:22

history so genealogy dna now

27:26

what is my so we've done a lot

27:26

of research about our family

27:29

past what is our family future

27:29

look like you know they may not

27:32

care about their mortgage or

27:32

their retirement savings they

27:36

just are interested in what is

27:36

the family the future look like

27:39

so i think that's an area that

27:39

we have we have longevity

27:43

longevity is just such an

27:43

interesting topic you know you

27:46

touched on it what can i do to

27:46

change it so i would really like

27:50

to see that prioritize is

27:50

something that that we go down

27:53

and we develop you know we can't

27:53

go and develop every you know

27:57

every every feature from from

27:57

day one but we see when people

28:02

are interested in something we

28:02

can kind of go down that path

28:05

and i think longevity is going

28:05

to be something that people want

28:07

to know the good news i would

28:07

tell you is that from everything

28:11

that we've done and we've seen

28:11

it's it is largely within your

28:14

control it's not as much of a

28:14

genetic issue that people kind

28:18

of assume okay am i you know i

28:18

have some bad genes i inherited

28:21

this in our family xyz you

28:21

really through your diet and

28:25

your exercise are able to do so

28:25

much and you really have control

28:30

of that stress sleep now i know

28:30

these are not easy things to

28:35

control easy easier said than

28:35

done but it is within your

28:38

control so that is good news and

28:38

then the last part that we have

28:43

which i think is is also just an

28:43

interesting group is people who

28:49

are just are interested in goals

28:49

life planning you know life

28:52

coaching without necessarily the

28:52

financial part of it just how do

28:56

i achieve the things that i want

28:56

to achieve so here we're talking

29:01

about financial planning and

29:01

that's a that's a component of

29:04

this but it is it is i would say

29:04

not the internet it's not the

29:08

whole picture of what we're

29:08

talking about here and what

29:10

people go into and use the

29:10

software for so i think we'll

29:14

see how that how that over the

29:14

next how it plays out in terms

29:19

of what the users are most keen

29:19

on i think the other thing that

29:22

we do have going for us is that

29:22

when you come in you invite your

29:25

partner and if you think of a

29:25

social network you know you know

29:30

facebook something like that you

29:30

interact with many people in

29:34

this you have a it's more like a

29:34

support network so you interact

29:38

with your family maybe maybe you

29:38

interact with an advisor in some

29:43

capacity but you you and your

29:43

partner can add to your timeline

29:49

together so it's something that

29:49

you can work on independently

29:52

but you still have your own

29:52

dashboard that is private in the

29:56

same way that you know on other

29:56

social networks i can interact

30:00

with somebody in this timeline i

30:00

can drop notes i can create

30:04

goals i can create events for

30:04

our family and i can see you

30:09

know we can look into what our

30:09

child's education savings looks

30:13

like our projection savings look

30:13

like that but i can also still

30:16

keep some data my own in my own

30:16

dashboard so that i think is is

30:21

interesting and we'll see how

30:21

that plays out as well

30:24

now let's say i

30:24

was younger let's say i was 20

30:28

years old and i come across the

30:28

website i start to you know

30:31

build out my my life plan is it

30:31

going to because i noticed it

30:35

says it uses artificial

30:35

intelligence is it going to tell

30:38

me hey listen you're going to have a child Rather than eight years or statistically, you

30:40

know, based on your cohorts your

30:44

age, where you live, I'm going

30:44

to tell you, you know who your

30:48

partner is going to be what your

30:48

kids name is, like how it is, if

30:51

you're if you're

30:51

a female, yes, I mean, we have,

30:53

we have mean, mean age of

30:53

childbirth, for every country in

30:58

the world. So that when you when

30:58

you say, you know, this is what

31:02

we can do about grandchildren,

31:02

we can give you projections on

31:04

when you're going to have a

31:04

grandchild. It's really, it's

31:07

kind of neat. And, and, you

31:07

know, just also from your, from

31:10

your grant from your parents to

31:10

see those overlays quite

31:13

interesting, right? Like, what

31:13

what am I What am I? What are

31:17

what is my mom going to see?

31:17

What are my in laws going to

31:20

see, of the graduations, the

31:20

high school graduations, the

31:24

University graduation, the first

31:24

grandchild? You know, it's,

31:28

it's, it's powerful information,

31:28

I think, you know, it's out

31:35

there. There's a whole bunch of

31:35

interesting things going on with

31:38

that right now, if we can just

31:38

kind of jump into that if you're

31:41

comfortable jumping into that,

31:41

you know, if you look in the

31:44

States right now, that's

31:44

dropped, life expectancy has

31:47

dropped a year, in the last. So

31:47

the opioid crisis had had kind

31:54

of shaved off some, some, you

31:54

know, months of the, you know,

31:58

the average lifespan in the US.

31:58

since World War Two, it has not

32:02

dropped a year, like it just

32:02

did. So it just has gone down

32:06

one year, in Canada, Quebec has

32:06

been the hardest. And I think

32:09

Quebec is between four and six

32:09

months. This last COVID has

32:14

shaved off our expected life

32:14

expectancies. So yes, we will be

32:18

able to give you an updated

32:18

version of what is happening as

32:22

it changes. So you know, your

32:22

health, and then the population

32:26

data set, you know, what's

32:26

happening, right? As that gets

32:29

richer, as more points get in

32:29

there, you'll be able to make a

32:34

more accurate, that is a model

32:34

that is forecasting, you know,

32:37

one on one, the more data points

32:37

you have, the more information

32:40

you have, the richer it becomes.

32:40

And I think like I said, for me,

32:45

I see that as a as a way to to

32:45

make the hearing now more

32:49

important, and to help people

32:49

prioritizing and do things in a

32:53

way that allows them to actually

32:53

achieve their goals, you know,

32:57

so I think there's, that's a real benefit.

32:59

I think one of

32:59

the things that you just talked

33:02

about was one of the things that

33:02

stood out for me when I was

33:06

going through the demo with you.

33:06

And that was the overlapping of

33:11

things like, knowing how will

33:11

you be when you're when your

33:16

kids graduate? And I mean,

33:16

that's something you could you

33:18

sort of, like, jot down and

33:18

figure out, but to see it mapped

33:21

out, especially when you have

33:21

multiple generations of family,

33:25

and you see the interaction. So

33:25

for example, you know, your your

33:29

parents being able to see their

33:29

grandkids, go to school or

33:33

graduate or something like that,

33:33

seeing that visually, that was

33:36

pretty cool. So let's, let's

33:36

tell people where to go. So we

33:39

talked about the site, but we

33:39

didn't talk about the spelling.

33:42

So at the end of every, at the

33:42

end of every podcast, every

33:45

guest gets a bit of a commercial

33:45

now, this entire podcast has

33:48

just been about your product.

33:48

But why don't you tell people

33:51

where they can go if they want

33:51

to sort of kick the tires and

33:54

see if they want to fill in their data?

33:56

Great, thanks.

33:56

Okay, so so the site is called

33:59

opal x, and that is spelled ob o

33:59

l x.com. The name is actually a

34:07

plan opalesque, which was the

34:07

outside the Egyptian monuments,

34:14

it was actually outside the

34:14

pyramids, where the pharaohs

34:16

were buried. And those look like

34:16

little rays of sunshine from a

34:21

child's drawing. So we use that

34:21

those those obelisks were moved

34:26

eventually. And they were used

34:26

as milestones. So we use the

34:29

kind of double meaning that we

34:29

want to light up the milestones

34:32

of your life, and illuminate

34:32

your future. But again, it's ob

34:37

o l x.com. And you can go and

34:37

check it out. And let me know

34:42

what you think I'd love to hear it.

34:44

And in the last

34:44

point is it's not Canada

34:47

specific is it this can be used

34:47

by anyone, because it's not

34:50

specific to any one country in

34:50

terms of people's life plans.

34:54

100%.

34:55

So we are we have

34:55

users from around the world. And

35:00

the other thing is that, you

35:00

know, even as Canadians even if

35:03

you are Canadian, you may have a

35:03

partner who's not from Canada or

35:06

your father in law or mother in

35:06

law that's not from Canada. So

35:10

you want their historic data in

35:10

there. And that's why we that's

35:14

why we use that term. That's

35:14

cool, you know, a global

35:19

perspective. It's always

35:19

helpful. Very good.

35:22

All right.

35:22

Michael, thank you so much for

35:25

coming on the show and

35:25

explaining globalex to the

35:27

listeners looks like some

35:27

interesting software, certainly

35:31

something interesting to sort of

35:31

kick around. If you are

35:34

interested in learning more

35:34

about creating your own life

35:37

plan your timeline, you can go

35:37

to alexa.com michael thank you

35:41

for being a guest

35:43

thank you so much for having me it was a real pleasure

36:07

if you want more

36:07

personal finance content or you

36:10

have questions for me or topic

36:10

suggestions for the podcast you

36:14

can follow me on twitter or

36:14

instagram same handle in both

36:17

cases at Preet Banerjee also

36:17

have two youtube channels you

36:22

can subscribe to my main channel

36:22

which covers personal finance

36:26

and investing topics that are

36:26

global in scope and a canadian

36:29

specific channel as well that's

36:29

it for this episode thanks for

36:33

listening