Entrepreneur, philanthropist, and now author Shane Muller talks about his career, philosophy, and using his platform to effect positive change in society.
Shane Mueller is an influential entrepreneur, mentor, and philanthropist known for his involvement in over 300 companies worldwide. Founder of Paladin AI Ventures, InspED, SafeWatch, and The Destiny Foundation, his work spans from technology innovation to community-focused initiatives.
Preferring to put the spotlight on his operations, teams, clients and projects rather than himself, Shane’s approach to business has a strong focus on driving the growth and potential of others.
We recently spoke with Shane to explore the roots of his entrepreneurial philosophy, uncover the motivations behind his incredible career, and explore how entrepreneurship can be leveraged for broader social impact and lasting change.
Hi Shane, what inspired you to go into technology and entrepreneurship?
My entrepreneurial journey began at the age of 10 when my sister got a computer as a gift and I immediately embraced it. I got the opportunity to write a payroll program for a company with 370 security guards. I wrote the entire program even though I had never touched a computer or programmed before. That was my first adventure into entrepreneurship, collaboration and experimentation.
After building the program, I moved on to doing simple data entry every month, which paid me a respectable monthly salary. While it wasn’t really the money that motivated me, it did push me down the technology path and gave me the freedom to experiment a bit more.
What do you think drives you?
I think there are two aspects that are important to me: the entrepreneurial side and the impact side, and that’s probably the best way to sum me up.
There are many businesses and ventures that are interesting or visionary to me. Some are just starting out, others have been running for over 25 years. Entrepreneurship is my craft and my way to make an impact.
My upbringing also had a big impact on me. I was born and raised in Sri Lanka, where my family was relatively well-off, but my neighbours were not. Australia is different; it’s segregated by class for the most part.
In Sri Lanka, wealthy people can live next to people sleeping on the street. This experience reinforced my belief that if someone is blessed with wealth, they have a responsibility to empower others. This is a major driving force behind my work.
Can you tell us a bit more about your professional life and how you got through the tech industry to where you are today?
When I came to Australia as a teenager, I experienced severe culture shock. I struggled with school and academics, dropping out in grade 10. From there, I had a number of jobs in tech, including one where I averaged 100 hours a week for several months, but I didn’t mind because it’s in my DNA to get things done.
In 1999 I started building a cloud computing business, OBT, 9 years before it really took off in Australia. It was a huge investment, with high labour costs, and statistically it was never going to last – at the time around 90% of these types of businesses closed down every year over a 5 year forecast period.
After years of success and costly lessons learned, OBT has expanded to Singapore and the US, and celebrated its 20th anniversary in 2019 as one of the most accomplished cloud computing businesses in the Asia Pacific region. It wasn’t easy.
Also, The Big Smoke
As we entered our 19th year with OBT, many of the industry’s problems became apparent. Looking back at all the losses and unmet goals, we realized we had an opportunity to close the gaps and turn them into strengths. This led us to launch our technology transformation consulting business, ArchITect Consulting.
Instead of running our own data centers, we were consulting the big players in town, the marquee companies, helping them transform quickly. These were some of the top brands in telecommunications, banking, and aviation.
What prompted you to transition from your previous business to founding Paladin AI Ventures?
When you do something for 20 years, something changes over time.
Whether you like it or not, your identity is rooted in your job, your title, your business. There was nothing wrong with my business, and the last thing I wanted was to run away from it. But I wanted to separate my identity from it. I chose to take the time to get to the core of who I am, the core of my abilities and skills.
I asked myself: What have I done in the last 20 years?
Well, I created around 50 products and services and I realised that my passion is to innovate new products and services and pave new paths.
So in 2021, I founded Paladin AI Ventures, a hybrid of incubator and pre-venture capital, or more precisely pre-seed, essentially a machine that generates business ideas that solve problems and have an impact in the community.
This helps when you have a glimpse of something in your mind but don’t have a name or concept. I wanted to help others with the entrepreneurial aspect of taking their ideas and executing them. Paladin AI Ventures aims to take ideas from a glimpse into an MVP or prototype.
What inspired the original concept for SafeWatch, and how has its mission expanded to address global mental health challenges?
One of the first businesses to come out of Paladin AI Ventures was a mental wellness app. I was personally intrigued by this concept after seeing research that shows that self-harm and choosing to end one’s life is a silent cancer. We don’t always know what’s going on inside a person’s mind. That was ultimately what drove me.
With mental health taking a major hit around the world amid the pandemic, I was unaware that the statistics for 2019 were so low compared to what would happen over the next three years. In 2020, I started researching mental health more and it became my focus.
As a result, we decided to create a platform and support app so that people don’t have to say, “I didn’t know that person, that friend, that family member was suffering.”
In 2021 I assembled a team covering the who, why and what. The vision and values were shaped until the concept reached an MVP. The concept eventually became SafeWatch and we transferred all the values and IP to a separate company dedicated to it.
Since 2023, Paladin AI Ventures has been working on a new innovative service called Secure My Digital that makes the risk of ransomware virtually unnecessary.
What are the core principles that guide Destiny Foundation, and how do they reflect its ultimate purpose?
I have been blessed to have been constantly asking “why” from an early stage in life. This constant questioning of ultimate purpose was the driving force behind The Destiny Foundation, which was founded in 2001.
This is my ultimate goal and the outward expression of all my entrepreneurial accomplishments. Businesses come and go, but the work of Destiny Foundation is a lifelong passion and pursuit.
Some of our ventures, like SafeWatch, are impact businesses, but the concept of a foundation is that we have the motivation to make a profit and can answer why and how, and where that profit goes. The Destiny Foundation is centered around four impact principles:
- Reinvigorate family values: Emphasize the family unit as an essential component of societal development.
- Support children: Positively impact children’s futures by supporting NGOs that support children’s development from the womb to the workforce.
- Supporting single mothers: We provide coaching, training and mentoring programs to support single mothers who may face significant disadvantage.
- Development and Recovery for Abuse Survivors: We create recovery programs for individuals who have endured any form of abuse, aiming to address and heal generational trauma and help them restore their lives.
Through the Destiny Foundation, we hope to impact millions of people.
You recently wrote a book. Can you tell us a bit more about it and what do you hope readers take away from it?
The title of this book is “Your Unique Strengths: Living Your MasterpiecePublished under the InspED brand, created as a fusion of inspiration and education.
The aim of EdTech businesses is to facilitate the continuous learning and growth of people who “don’t fit the normal box” in a positive way.
We found that if you don’t fit into the majority of learners, you will be labeled, diagnosed, and marginalized. We mustn’t forget that these people have incredible skills, so we need to find ways to address these issues and include those who are typically labeled and marginalized. Research and history show that much of the great change in the world has been brought about by “out-of-the-box” people.
Also, The Big Smoke
In this book, I share insights into my own experiences and lessons learned, discussing topics such as long-term goals, the power of silence, and the individuality of wisdom, many of which have played a key role in shaping my various adventures.
Throughout the book, I have focused on writing for six different readership groups: families and parents, children, single mothers, people who have experienced abuse, entrepreneurs, and people who suffer from mental illness.
By speaking specifically to different personas, I hope to inspire and enlighten readers as they navigate their own unique journeys.
Readers can find out more about “Your Unique Edge: Living Your Masterpiece” on the InspED website.
