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Matt Black

Matt Black

Entrepreneur, investor and author. Forty years of starting things.

The story

I grew up in the Australian outback, in mining towns and part-Aboriginal communities. I didn't wear shoes until I left home at fourteen. At seventeen I started a courier business. At nineteen I sold it to the national competitor it had just beaten to a major contract.

Since then: twelve ventures across three continents. One of Australia's first private telecoms re-billing companies, built from nothing and lost when its network partner collapsed. The dot-com years in San Francisco. More than twenty years in London, backing more than 300 startups and advising the people who run them.

The rise taught me how to build. The fall taught me judgement. Both are in everything I do now.

I still start things.

The business side: investments, boards and advisory →

Speaking

Talks, firesides and founder workshops on how decisions get made when certainty never arrives. Rooms include Google Campus, Microsoft, Imperial College London, Virgin, Travers Smith, Chelsea FC, WeWork, Hult, Greenwich, Pecha Kucha and Westminster.

Media: Sky News · The Chrissy B Show · Focus on WHY podcast · expert contributor, Disrupts Magazine.

Three talks people ask for

  • The fall — What losing a company taught me about judgement, and why it's the lesson most founders learn too late.
  • What becomes scarce — When intelligence is abundant, what is still worth being good at?
  • Own your digital self — Why your context and your data should belong to you, not the platforms.

Invite Matt to speak

Writing & research

Three books so far: The Imagination Economy, Mobilism and The Little Black Book for Entrepreneurs, with Answer Rich, Question Poor launching shortly and How to Change the World (and other handy tips) due in Q4 2026. Alongside them, independent research, published openly, including the tests that fail. Current work covers verification and governed autonomy, where authority sits between people and machines, and how founders act before feasibility arrives.

If you're working in the same territory, as a researcher, co-author or institution, I'm open to collaborating.

Start a conversation

The Imagination Economy cover

The Imagination Economy

Matt Black — entrepreneur, independent researcher and author.

How To Act Powerfully When Certainty Disappears

A field guide for building and deciding when AI, abundance, and speed change what counts as a good move — and certainty never fully arrives.

Status: live

Buy on Amazon UK →View book →
Mobilism cover

Mobilism

Matt Black — entrepreneur, independent researcher and author.

The Hidden Architecture of Action Under Uncertainty

Movement under changing conditions — how to act when the map shifts faster than your plan.

Status: live

Buy on Amazon UK →View book →
Answer Rich, Question Poor cover

Answer Rich, Question Poor

Matt Black — entrepreneur, independent researcher and author.

A Field Guide to thriving in an Answer-Rich World

What happens when answers become abundant and the quality of questions becomes the real advantage — written for young people finding their footing in an answer-rich world.

Status: Launching shortly

Join the early list →
The Little Black Book for Entrepreneurs cover

The Little Black Book for Entrepreneurs

Matt Black — entrepreneur, independent researcher and author.

2015, 2nd edition 2019

Published 2015, 2nd edition 2019.

Status: Available

View book →
How to Change the World cover

How to Change the World

Matt Black, entrepreneur, independent researcher and author.

(and other handy tips)

A pocket guide for the stuck moments in ordinary life: when to try something small, when to commit, and how to tell which one you're facing.

Status: Release Q4 2026

Join the early list →

Giving

Most of what I've given has had the same aim: helping people earn their own living, on their own terms.

  • Pilbara Arts. From seventeen to twenty, unpaid, part-time work helping Aboriginal artists commercialise their work.
  • Scouting, twice. Full-time roles with the Boy Scouts of America in San Francisco (2007) and the Scout Association in London (2010–2012). I donated the salary from both back to the charity.
  • Women's enterprise in Malawi. Profits from The Little Black Book for Entrepreneurs, and a lump sum from the sale of the IP rights to the Women in Business show, funded an NGO in Malawi working under the NGO Gender Coordination Network on women's economic empowerment: business and financial training, microloans, grants and village savings-and-loan groups. It reported helping around 8,000 women towards financial independence, through community support, entrepreneurial training, microloans and grants, so they could support themselves and their children. When it closed after COVID, the funding moved to smaller charities built on the same idea: self-employment as a route to independence.
  • Mentoring. Seven years mentoring founders at Eligent Club, and earlier as a volunteer business mentor.

Get in touch

Speaking, collaboration, or something else? Tell me which, and one line on what you have in mind.

Used only to reply to this enquiry. Privacy.

Occasional essays

On decisions, investing, and what changes as intelligence becomes abundant. No spam.

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About Matt Black