Sunny Ray sits down with Ari A., who alongside his wife Tatum runs Tatum Goodman and Associates, an investment bank focused on strategic partnerships, board building, and access to high level networks for founders. Ari shares his path from working retail floors to owning and turning around his own business, and explains why passion, lateral thinking, and understanding the customer separate winning startups from the rest. He recounts painful lessons from two earlier ventures, including a community buying club called We Buy As One, that looked great on paper but failed because he never validated demand before building. He also discusses Vid Live, an AI powered visual troubleshooting concept, his training as a licensed NLP practitioner under Dr. Bandler, and portfolio companies applying AI to preventative medicine, nutrition, cancer detection, and robotics. Ari reflects on growing up in Johannesburg during apartheid and how that shaped his worldview. He closes with a bold prediction about individuals armed with AI, robotics, and crypto outperforming mid sized companies within a decade.
An investment banker explains why passion, validation, and AI fluency separate real startups from good ideas that never launch.
Can you tell us a bit about Tatum Goodman and Associates, the company you're building?
My wife Tatum is CEO. She's from South Africa, studied art at UCLA, then got a law degree and moved into IP and business contract law in Israel. Clients kept asking for help turning ideas into reality, so she built relationships with family funds worldwide and became chairlady of the US Trade Commission twice. I joined later, bringing experience from retail and commercial property, learning to read people and respect their time.
In a sentence or two, what does Tatum Goodman actually do?
We're an investment bank involved in strategic partnerships. We help leverage a company's brand into something more well known, find the right board to represent them, and create introductions that would otherwise take years to build organically, whether that's access to consultants, government contacts, or major partners like Google or Meta.
What was it like growing up in Johannesburg as a young boy?
I was on the privileged side of apartheid, good schools, good education, but a very sheltered, censored, conservative life. We had domestic help, so you saw the world differently than in a normal Western household. South Africa was actually advanced in some ways, first with electronic banking and ATMs. I only really became aware of apartheid's realities once I got to university.
You started a company called Vid Live or Vid Solutions. How did AI come into that?
It started because I had a problem in my shower and didn't know how to fix it or even ask the right question. The idea was you point your camera at a problem and AI tells you what it is and your options, call a plumber, turn off the mains, buy a part. It's for people who don't know enough to ask the right question, helping them save money and time.
You're a licensed NLP practitioner. How does neurolinguistic programming connect to your work?
I went to Tony Robbins, walked on fire, and got curious, so I went to the source, Dr. Bandler, one of NLP's co-founders. In short, people process information as visual, auditory, or kinesthetic. If you communicate in the wrong mode, like showing flowers to someone who needs to hear I love you, you won't connect, whether in relationships or business.
You've helped companies using AI in preventative medicine. Can you tell me more?
AI is combining natural nutrients to fix specific problems, like dry eye, by identifying the right molecules and putting them in something like yogurt. They're now working on diabetes, weight loss, and depression. I'm also involved with a company using AI to test medicine against a person's blood in three to four days instead of six weeks to see if it helps them.
You mentioned robotics companies in your portfolio as well.
I'm working with people who enjoy space and advanced technology, and it's surprising how many of these companies are still running on Excel spreadsheets. If AI tools can cut your time to twenty percent of what it was, that's the J-curve moment. If you're not using AI to become more productive, you won't keep up with where the world is heading.
Help me land the plane, what does Tatum Goodman look like five years from now, and what's the big bet?
My bet is on independence. Imagine someone who owns cryptocurrency and has a fleet of robots producing for him using AI to maximize productivity, that person will be more effective than a mid-size company today. Technology and knowledge are pushing everything toward individual independence, and that's the direction we're building Tatum Goodman around.
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