29th Annual Milken Institute Global Conference Special: Day Two

21:51Carol Massar:Okay. So I guess, I don't know, how do you then look at things longer term? Because I think what most folks are also thinking off of this war, that things are going to be changed forever in terms of people thinking about, we talked about this yesterday, about countries' access to strategic commodities, whether it's oil, whether it's really ensuring that their supply chains are solid, that they can't be disrupted. And that means a lot of domestic production. That means probably higher costs around the world. It feels like it's a very different global economy going forward. So I think that's... Should we prepare for that?

22:24I think we will prepare for that. And in fact, some of it has already happened. Yeah. So this is similar to two other events. One is the 1970s, which led us to build a strategic reserve, created the IEA, the International Energy Agency. Structures of the energy market were different moving forward after the 1970s. they were very different before, changed forever. COVID changed how we think about supply chains. We suddenly got shocked by the supply chains, which is why we started stockpiling. We started thinking about making sure that we didn't live on, you know, one supplier, et cetera. And now what's going to happen is the Strait of Ramirez is under Iranian control forever, basically for the foreseeable future, regardless of nobody in the market should look at what the deal says eventually and believe it on Straits.

23:11Iran will control the Straits. Everybody in Washington will believe it. Nobody in the Gulf, no one in the Gulf will believe. They know the Iranians are not going to control this. What does that mean? It means you got to change, Carol, what you said. You got to build out infrastructure that does two things. One, bypasses the Strait of Hormuz. It's possible to do. It's not even that expensive. A few billion dollars. But a few billion dollars in what we're talking about doesn't cost very much. The redundancy is important. Second, build out more storage facilities in destination countries. So we already have some storage in places like Singapore, but build them out in Tokyo, in Delhi, China already has, not just of oil, but of jet fuel.

23:55Airports should probably hold a little bit more jet fuel capacity.

23:59Carol Massar:Just ask Cliff Tunza, canceling flights for the summer. Exactly. Not just them. I think everybody, if you're an American listening to this and you think you're going on vacation this summer, plan for a very, very expensive one. Driving is going to be very expensive. And so will RVs. RVs will be even more expensive because diesel is through the roof and jet fuel is hard. Can I ask you why this is happening right now? If it was President Biden and you were advising him, you know, were you guys pushing to do something to this effect in Iran? They have been a threat for how many decades, right? Look, we used to joke whenever people come and say, oh, my God, we're.

24:38Carol Massar:We've had people come on and say, listen, this was long overdue. It was time to do something. We knew this was a country that hated America. Yes. By the way, they're not alone. If we're going to war against every country that hates America, then there's a list that we may have to go to war for a few more months, a few more years. North Korea is not funny, actually. North Korea is doing a lot on nuclear. They hate America. We're not going to war there. Iran is a place where, first of all, we had a deal with Iran to not go to a nuclear weapon called the JCPOA in 2015. President Trump got out of that in 2019, probably should have stayed in, because the deal we're talking about now that we will get is going to be very similar to that.

25:18There'll be some cosmetic changes, it'll be very similar. We didn't have to do this war. I understood some of the rationale of the June War several months ago. They were cheating on the nuclear side. If they're not going to go back into a deal, a limited strike. And the Iranians didn't strike back and the proxies didn't strike back. They didn't close the straits. It was limited in scope. It was limited in time. And so I understood that this war was a moment of opportunity. There were a lot of protests that were rising up and President Trump said, help's on the way. And all of a sudden got painted into the corner and then started coming up with reasons why we're in this war.

25:59Nobody really knows why we're in this war. No American really knows why we're in this war.

26:03Carol Massar:I don't even think, yeah. But it doesn't matter from the administration. But they change. You mentioned storage, though. I want to ask you about what's about to happen in Iran when it comes to their own oil storage. Because there's nowhere to put the oil at this point. They're loading tankers almost. They're putting oil supposedly on trains to China. The president says the whole underground infrastructure is going to blow up, which I'm not sure is true. But if they have to start shutting wells, that's going to be a pretty major moment and something that could happen in days or weeks. Do you? Well, first of all, it was supposed to happen already several days ago.

26:36So that's not. So it didn't happen. Here's the thing. Because I dealt with there is real economies of oil where you look at the Baker Hughes manual. What do you do in this situation? And there's wartime and stress time. They're very different. I was spent I spent a lot of time in southern Iraq trying to help them refix. Yes. and so on. And if you went down there, no manual told you to do it. They should have been shutting. There is a way, Iran is a very good engineering country. They have remarkable engineering talent. They've been in the oil business 100 years. They know what they're doing. When we did them, I was in charge of the sanctions 15 years ago, so 2012.

27:13And we took them down to like 900 ,000 barrels of exports. And instead of doing all of what President Trump suggests, you know, things blowing up and just shutting everything down. There are ways for them to do wartime economizing, right? So you shut down one field, do some maintenance on it, then you bring it back, you shut down the next one, you can do a rotation. You can set fields on fire, which is by design, which doesn't put any pressure on the pipes below ground. I don't expect to see any explosions. They are hurting economically. They are devastating economic pain in Iran.

27:49Carol Massar:And yet, here we are still at war with them. This is, I mean, they can handle the pain. I'm just saying they can handle the pain. And their view is how long can you handle the pain? And I'll tell you this. We're going towards a cliff on oil and oil products by the end of this month. Physical shortages. We have physical shortage already, but it just in countries we don't care about. So then they will write because they're poor. But then it'll go to middle income countries like Vietnam and Thailand. Then it goes to Japan and Korea. and then it comes here. And here's the thing. You want to fly out of the United States?

28:24You can say, we have oil. We have jet fuel. Okay, can't take it with you. Wow. When you fly out, you got to be able to refill somewhere else.

28:32Carol Massar:It's already making its way through manufacturing supply chains. Like you are feeling it. And ask the airlines when it comes to jet fuel. AI spends a lot of money. Hundreds of billions of dollars. Which is not dependent on consumers. They need power. But they're not dependent on consumers. What happens when consumers say, I can't spend this. I have no money. Almost, thank you. It's great to have you on Bloomberg. I hope Milken treats you well. Full optimism, please. Amongst Carol Masser, I'm Joe Matthew. This is Balance of Power, live from L.A., only on Bloomberg. You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast.

29:00Catch us live weekdays at noon and 5 p.m. Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business App. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube. Here at Milken on the geopolitics of supply, which, of course, is something that we talk about just about every day here. But interesting to hear from voices around the world. Those were business owners and executives operating in the Middle East, operating in Asia. And they each have a slightly different angle on this, although it's a common thread throughout this conference.

29:30Carol Massar:I feel like the supply chain grab is on. And some people in some countries are certainly better positioned than others. Supply chain grab. We should have called the panel back. I like that. All right. I'll work on it. Hey, we're going to do a little bit of a switch to something that's actually top of mind because we have PayPal out today planning job cuts. The new CEO is really pursuing kind of a massive turnaround strategy at this company. They're going to make Venmo a standalone unit. But we think about these payment companies, Joe, that I don't know about you, but I'm using mine all the time.

29:56Carol Massar:A hundred percent. Kind of this concept of digital money. We want to see what Denise Leonhardt has to say. She's the chief of Zelle. I use Zelle a lot. Thank you. She's here at Milken. You're very welcome. Tell us about this because this is a consortium of banks that are involved in it, and it's kind of direct to bank to bank transfer. Tell us about your world, what you're seeing in terms of activity on the platform and what it kind of tells you about our economy. Yeah, so we are owned by a consortium of seven of the largest banks, but we actually have a network of 2 ,400 financial institutions.

30:26So that's everything from the largest bank in the United States to those small community banks and credit unions. And those are really important to us. And we have 160 million accounts on the platform. That includes consumers as well as small businesses. And in December, we actually had 100 million of those accounts were actually active. So during that holiday season, 100 million customers in the United States were actually using the Zelle.

30:48Carol Massar:Which is pretty typical? Yeah, it's actually pretty typical. And we continue to see this increase in terms of digital payments. So we had$1.2 trillion moved on the platform last year. So that's larger than the GDP of Switzerland, to put that into context. And we're continuing to grow at 20 % year over year. So we just continue to see more and more people move away from cash, move away from check and go to these digital payments. You just had, I believe, your second consecutive trillion dollar year. Exactly. Where do you find growth from here? I know that you're working on potentially having an opportunity for people to pay their mortgages, to pay their rent, recurring payments like this that might make your life a little bit easier.

31:31Is that the next opportunity for Zelle? It is. So when we talk about the value proposition of Zelle, it's exactly how you described it. It's moving from one account to another account and being able to do that quickly and safely and securely. So what we want to do is actually just open up more use cases for people to be able to use Zelle. So that includes small businesses. It includes we have currently a pilot with BillPay with our friends at Truist. We also have a pilot for donor advised funds in order to get into the charity space with Bank of America. So we're continuing to pilot these and hoping to expand them and expand our roadmap.

32:04You just want more and more people on the platform. More and more people and also thinking about us more and more often.

32:08Carol Massar:Denise, where's the growth? You know, you talk about bill pay, you talk about donor advised, you talk about small business. Where's the growth? Yeah, I think that there is growth in all of it, actually. So it's just that recurrence and using us continually to make all those different payments to people or to small businesses that you know and trust. Can you tell us in terms of data? I mean, everybody's got lots of data, anything that's digital. So what can you tell us about the types of payments? And it doesn't give you any indication about the health of this economy. It feels pretty good. We talk about the market going up, but we know the market isn't necessarily what is going on in the broader economy.

32:39So on the platform itself, we continually see this increase of overall payments. So, again, 20 percent year over year. But what we're also seeing is this boom in terms of small businesses. So 30 percent of our volume is small businesses, and that's actually our fastest growing segment. So part of the reason why small businesses love Zelle is because they get their money almost immediately. and then they can be able to pay their workers. They can be able to go out and buy supplies instantaneously. So it's that quickness of payments that people love. Is your sort of long-term vision or your dream a cashless society?

33:13Well, when's the last time you went to an ATM? I'm just kidding. I don't know about you. I'm already living in it.

33:17Carol Massar:Hey, Joe, they got rid of the penny. They did. They don't make them anymore. I keep finding them in my pockets, though. I have to remind my daughter. There is actually money under all this. I actually feel silly sometimes. I don't remember the last time I carried cash, but there are a lot of people that do. And I guess, I mean, is that the goal where cash is useless? I mean, the goal for us is to get more and more digital payments. It's more safe. It's more secure. And it's also more convenient. What is it? Does the structure stay just as, you know, multiple bank ownership? Is it something that this is a company that could essentially go out on its own?

33:48Carol Massar:I think that makes sense. It will stay in the current ownership structure. it's actually fun to be part of this ownership structure because you get the best payment minds in a room often and really thinking about the innovation as the entire ecosystem moving forward yeah it's kind of fascinating uh to see that um thanks so much for stopping by thank you for having another snapshot of what goes on here at milken denise uh lean hart she's chief of zell joining joe and me stay with us on balance of power we'll have much more coming up after this Amazon Pharmacy presents Painful Thoughts Of course I see my co-worker in light at the pharmacy Can he tell I'm picking up prescription hemorrhoid cream?

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36:56Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our flagship New York station. Just say Alexa, play Bloomberg 1130.

37:08Carol Massar:We are back here at Bloomberg Institute. Bloomberg, The Milken Institute. Boy, did I just tell them that I just renamed it? Well, we could maybe work on that for next year. We could do it. Milken Institute Global Conference. Carol Massa, Joe Matthew here in Beverly Hills. One thing we talk about a lot, and we've spent some time talking about the energy space over the course of this program, almost Hoxstein painted a pretty bleak picture. We also talked a lot about data centers. And these two stories come together in a way that has reinvigorated the conversation about nuclear in a way that nobody could have really predicted.

37:39We talk about it with experts in the industry, the need for more power. We talk about it with lawmakers who are trying to find a policy path. And our next guest can speak to all of this. Maria Korsnick is the president, chief executive officer of the Nuclear Energy Institute, the trade group for the nuclear industry. It's wonderful to see you. I'm sure you've been awfully busy at milk. And this is a conversation a lot of people are trying to get close to, whether it's the small modular reactors that could end up landing around data centers, whether it's actually taking old decommissioned nuke plants out of the mothballs and putting it back online.

38:14When do we start actually building and seeing approvals when these projects are proposed? Well, we're doing that already. Right. So you have the TerraPower had their construction permit approved out in Wyoming. They're beginning construction. They're building actually in Canada, the GE Vernova first SMR for that's about 300 megawatts. And then down in Tennessee, the Kairos power test reactor is under construction as well. So we have actually transitioned from just some great ideas to actual construction.

38:49Carol Massar:When does nuclear become something really significant in the United States? In a country where we know there's a lot of neighborhoods, a lot of areas that just don't want to have any kind of nuclear facility in their area. Well, we're 20 percent of the electricity sector today. So I would say nuclear is already making a difference. and honestly we're not hearing the pushback that you're mentioning for local communities anymore. One of the latest polls showed greater than a 60 percent favorability rating for nuclear and climbing. I think part of that is what you mentioned. It's the data center conversation.

39:22Data centers are looking for really reliable energy. They'd like it to be clean. Nuclear is here to help. And so you're going to be seeing, first of all, extending the lives of plants we have started out 40 we got it to 60 have over about 25 plants approved for an 80 year life okay so what you have is going to last longer what you have can make more power so three quarters of the fleet are going to do power up rates that's going to bring five ish to six gigawatts of new power to the grid and that can be short term are the the near-term solutions small modular reactors or should people get used to seeing large plants like we used to at just a different scale in the old days?

40:05Yes, all of the above. Okay. Check your data center. Do you want an SMR on your property? Yeah, it might. So there's a couple of different things. If you're a data center, you need that power. Constant, constant, constant, right? They don't want to have that disruption. Off the grid, potentially as well. Could be off the grid. But because of the high reliability that you want, you might want to have a couple of small packages rather than one large package. If you're a really big data center, you might want several large packages. So I think it depends on your solution, but it's literally all of the above.

40:35From the large gigawatt size to the medium size to the even really small, we call them micro reactors, so think less than a megawatt even. And so you're going to be able to look at nuclear as a solution set

40:46Carol Massar:in ways that you just never thought before. You mentioned the SMRs, though. Do we really have a viable design and it's happening? Because I feel like we've been talking about it. So how long though before those are actually in use and production? So one's in construction in Wyoming, one's in construction in Canada. You just heard X Energy within the last two weeks do their IPO, raised over a billion dollars. That's an SMR. But when are they up and running? What are you hearing? So early 2030s I think for that design. But the GE design I think is talking about being online in 2030 and same for the Terra Power design.

41:22Carol Massar:Do you think when you guys ask Americans if they're comfortable with it, I mean, is it because they're is it against the backdrop of higher electricity prices? Because I think Americans are feeling so squeezed. And is that where they say, OK, if that's what's going to make it less expensive for me, I'm in. You know, it's a combination of things. If you want energy security, nuclear has that. Do you want it clean? Nuclear has that. Do you want it reliable? Nuclear has that. I mean, the value proposition broadly for nuclear. And it's not just here in the United States. It's around the globe. What do you need from Washington?

41:51What do you need from policymakers to continue the growth? It's still hard to go first. So one of the things that we're asking for from a legislation perspective is what's called the ARC Act, which is something that's going to help the government lean in on a little bit of those first-of-a-kind risks just to help those get ameliorated so you can move right in. The other thing is we got some energy credits, the tax credits, and they're wonderful. They're a couple of tweaks. would like to opt out of normalization to let you get that tax credit faster and some transferability. And both of those are in legislation that's on the Hill now.

42:24Carol Massar:All right. Interesting stuff. We didn't talk about nuclear waste, which is always an issue, too. Next time. I'm going to leave it there. Maria, though, thank you so much, because I do feel like when we talk energy, you're right. Everybody's saying we need it all in order to power. Maria Korsnick, Nuclear Energy Institute CEO, joining us right here at Milken. You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch us live weekdays at noon and 5 p.m. Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube.

43:00Thanks for being with us on what we'll call a special edition of Balance of Power here at the Milken Global Conference. It's special. It's special, indeed. Well, Carol Masters with us has got to be. I'm Joe Matthew. you as you just heard live at Milken. And it's been an interesting conversation today that we want to continue here by going to the top of the mountain with the face of American business.

43:20Carol Massar:I have to feel exactly. And I feel like all the conversations we've had lead up to this, whether we talked about energy, higher costs, inflation, supply chains, geopolitics, politics in Washington. Suzanne Clark is with us. She's president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. A great voice when it comes to what's going on in the business community. What is top of mind? Because the laundry list of things that is coming at American businesses right now is a lot. Well, thank you so much. Thank you for having me. I was saying a minute ago that we were just with the L.A. Chamber yesterday. And it's such an opportunity to get out and talk to local businesses, big and small, about what's happening in their community.

43:56And what we see is businesses really trying to deal with all of this uncertainty. What should they be doing about finding workers? What should they be doing about their supply chains? What will happen with the economy? What does AI mean? So all the things that you've been tackling all morning, business leaders are live trying to figure out themselves. What conversations are you having when it comes to affordability? I know you were on a panel today with Neera Tanden. It was on the broadcast a little bit earlier. Both of you, I'm sure, coming from different perspectives. When you're trying to keep American business in mind, knowing price pressures from the gas pump to the grocery store are very real.

44:32You reached for the word uncertainty first. How do you speak with your members about this, the challenges they're facing and about to face? Well, you know, let me say first that Neera and I had violent agreement about the need for permitting reform, right? That we really need to build things faster. All of it, right? It's housing, it's electricity, it's utility costs. It's, you know, so what could we do as a country to build things faster, more efficiently, and cheaper? So that comes up with affordability. The U.S. Chamber, we really believe a lot of the root of the affordability problem is a supply constraint, right?

45:04We don't have enough housing. We don't have enough access to health care. We have labor shortages in key sectors. We don't have a resilient supply chain. So the question is, if we want long-term economic growth, 3 % growth that lifts up families and communities in the country and helps pay off debt, if we want all of that, we've got to take some of these structural issues really seriously.

45:23Carol Massar:Like which one? If we could tackle one right now in this given moment, what would it be that you think the American businesses could really get behind and say, this is a game changer? I really think it would be permitting reform. Think about the fact that it takes five to seven years to get a permit. In that time, you'll have a change of administrations most likely. Right. So if you have one administration that prefers one type of energy and you have a different administration that prefers a different type of energy, how do you decide where to invest and what to build? And yet at the same time, as you've reported, we need all of the above.

45:50Suzanne, how do we get there, though?

45:51Carol Massar:Because I think about, you know, the American business community, they have a great line often to the White House and to lawmakers. So how do they say, hey, folks, it's not just about four years, four years, four years. It's about a 10-year plan. China does it. It's a whole different country, and I know that. But how do we do that so that we really commit longer term to build some of these things that need that perspective? It's such a good point, Carol, because we certainly do not want a government-planned economy, right? None of us are for that. But you're right that we do need government to set the conditions so that we can grow so business can solve these problems at scale that society really needs answers to.

46:24And I think maybe we have to do two things a little differently. One is talk to more people at the local level, local businesses, local chambers, and get them to drive community support for politicians who are willing to do some hard things. And two, I think businesses are going to have to get more involved earlier in the process, in the primary process, and really thinking about candidates who don't want to just admire the problems and say expedient things, but are willing to do hard work and take hard votes. You know, I think about you sitting in your headquarters right across from Lafayette Square, looking out the window at that White House.

46:55You've been there a lot longer than this administration. And to your point, you're going to be there for administrations in the future. But this Trump administration has embraced crypto in a way that we have not seen in a White House before. And, of course, the timing has a lot to do with this, with this suddenly kind of going mainstream. And there's a clarity act that Republicans and some Democrats are hoping to see past this this year. In fact, it could be sooner than later. Are we managing the rules of the road when it comes to crypto in a way that the chamber can support this approach? I really like the question.

47:29And I really even more like the preamble, right, which is we just had our 114th birthday. How about that? I know. I don't look a day over 112. You look amazing. Thank you. I really feel the weight of the fact that, you know, who was the guy in my office in the Depression or in World War II? And how did they think about emerging technologies, emerging financial instruments? How did they think about the impact on working families and communities and American security and competitiveness? And how do we do the long-term right things while being empathetic to the real short-term pain? So I think your preamble was just so important.

48:07We actually do need institutions with historical memory and reach. And I think it's really important. Sound like an institutionalist. But the chamber not taking a position on crypto? Look, I think what we want to do is be supportive of new technologies at the same time that we don't lose sight of what really works in this country and the traditional capital markets and traditional financial services. We want to be careful.

48:31Carol Massar:I mean, banks have been watching this so closely. That's right. And they've gone from pushing back completely, not interested, to embracing slowly, but I think moving carefully. But there is this concern. We talk about disruption and innovation, that how could something like the digital world or cryptocurrencies replace so much of what the banks do? So is there a lot of pushback that you guys are getting from the banks? At what point is that innovation good and is that disruption dangerous? And it's what you're always balancing with a new technology. And so I applaud these industries and these companies that are educating Congress and getting to a point where we can do something that makes sense and makes sense for business.

49:07It's, of course, not just crypto. When we think of emerging technologies, there's another industrial revolution happening right now. Have you heard of it? Take the words from Jensen Wong. That's what he calls it. How concerned is the chamber about, to your point, there are wonderful things that AI is bringing to us, but there could also be a negative disruption when it comes to the job market. Is that a worry of yours? Do you want to hear something cool? You know the fastest, the people having the fastest uptake of AI? Yeah. Small business. Okay. It's the first technology in the United States that small business embraced first, which is really a leveling out, right?

49:39A great equalizer. Last year, the United States had 5.6 million new business starts. That's optimism for you. And some of that is that they can do more with AI, which is really fascinating. So the answer to your question is, of course, everyone can see there's a disruption coming. We don't have revolutions without some kind of disruption. So how do we help people through that? because we're long-term optimistic about job growth, about health impact, about the innovation, about what it does for our country. We want to compete with our adversaries, right? So I think this is a really important topic, and we're going to have to do re-skilling and education, but the short-term disruption, I think, is going to lead to a nice hockey stick.

50:15You know, we need a little bit of optimism.

50:17Carol Massar:I feel like there's a lot of serious stuff we've talked about today. A hockey stick. Let's take it. Yes. A hockey stick. Thank you for the optimism. Suzanne, what a pleasure. Thank you so much. Thanks so much for having me. Suzanne Clark, President and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. You're listening to the Bloomberg Balance of Power podcast. Catch us live weekdays at noon and 5 p.m. Eastern on Apple CarPlay and Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app. Listen on demand wherever you get your podcasts or watch us live on YouTube. We are going to go to space here to talk about another emerging technology, but it's also one that has been rather mainstream.

50:51And it's not just SpaceX. It's not just Jeff Bezos. there's a massive collection of companies that fulfill what we call the modern space industry. And one of them is Northwood Space, where Bridget Mendler is CEO and co-founder and joins us right now, live from the Milken Global Conference. It's wonderful to see you and welcome. You actually control the ground infrastructure that helps to make satellites work. As I mentioned, it's not always the most obvious type of approach that your company has found something unique. when you're talking to business leaders here at Milken, what markets are opening for you?

51:26What does this mainstreaming of space mean for your company? Yeah, well, thank you both very much for having me. It's fun to have the occasion to talk about space at a forum such as this. And what we do is that networking infrastructure between Earth and space. So enabling all of the space missions that we are seeing commercialized, whether it's things like direct-to-sell applications, really expanding the telecom sector, or different national security priorities or, you know, enthusiasm around compute and growing compute solutions from orbit, really bringing a lot of the industries that have typically been terrestrial into a more expansive architecture that goes beyond.

52:07Carol Massar:But I've got to ask you, because, again, somebody like an Elon Musk and a lot of stuff that he is doing, whether it's Starlink, tell us how you differentiate what you guys are doing from a lot of the big players so we understand exactly what this business is. Yeah. And so what we're excited to solve with our company is the networking infrastructure for the industry writ large. We tend to draw comparisons to like an AWS platform where you think about not everybody was able to have their own IT department and local data storage solutions. And so AWS opened up that solution for many more companies to grow and blossom.

52:42Think about the whole SaaS ecosystem that we've been able to see grow and expand as a result of that. And so for the space networking solution, the kind of nuts and bolts of that networking, it's not really a differentiated solution for a lot of space companies, but it consumes a lot of their time, a lot of operational overhead, complexity, and cost. And so for us, if we can do that at scale, provided as a generalized solution for the industry, then that opens up a lot of different businesses to really grow their prospects. I just have to acknowledge what everybody's thinking watching this right now.

53:13Yes, this is the same Disney Channel. You're a Disney Channel actress. You're an award-winning singer-songwriter. Bridget, you have a bunch of fans around you. I'm just going to tell you. You'll have a bunch of fans around you.

53:23Carol Massar:You're a different generation from showing me. Yes, this is the same Bridget. How do you go from that world to investing your life in a space company? You know, I... You could be doing anything right now. You know, I think the space industry is full of people who are just extremely passionate, curious, and I feel really grateful to have discovered that community. And I also feel grateful that the world is kind of opening up its excitement around the mainstream aspects of this industry. Think about Artemis this year. Think about SpaceX IPO. Is there a halo effect from Artemis on all of your businesses?

53:57I think what it points to is that these missions are becoming possible in a way that is more mainstream. And that's really the core of our business. The core of our business is how can we take all these ambitious missions and get them further faster by providing the infrastructure that is kind of common and serves to be a strong foundation.

54:16Carol Massar:Actually, the Bloomberg team back home, they know my dad was involved in the initial space race. So we kind of grew up with this. And it's really fascinating to see it move so much into the private sector and kind of away from the government. Having said that, I'm curious about who's working with you, who are your customers, who's funding you. Like, what's the longer term plan here? You've got a big round of funding. Yes, we've raised around$140 million to date. And our customer base is very intentionally broad. We want to serve the whole space industry. And so that includes government customers, customers that require ground connectivity for solutions ranging from launch to GPS satellites that power a ton of diverse applications for us, really, to sensing applications.

54:58And then you have real commercial industry. So we're in communications with multiple public communications companies in space. that are trying to resolve their networking infrastructure.

55:07Carol Massar:Where are you in terms of development and deployment? And just got about 30 seconds here. Yeah, it's a really big year for Northwood. Last year it was about developing our very first site, our very first operational units. This year it's about scale. So we currently have sites in multiple continents, both in Australia and the United States. We're planning to be on eight different countries this year and producing nearly 100 antenna units. So it's going to be a very busy year. Where are you going to space? You know, that's what's next, right? That's what this is all about. One of our producers, James, I think wants to go to space too.

55:40Carol Massar:I'm just going to tell you. We'll put them together. He's over there. Producer James is actually with us at Milligan. I'm glad you pointed that out. Bridget, it's wonderful to meet you and great to see you. Thank you for all of your insights. Thank you very much. Northwood Space is the company. This is Balance of Power. She's Carol Masser and I'm Joe Matthew. you.

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