Keep Pushing Yourself to New Limits: Interview with Vadim Fedotov, Co-Founder and CEO of Bioniq

I recently went one-on-one with Vadim Fedotov, co-founder and CEO of Bioniq.

Adam: Thanks again for taking the time to share your advice. First things first, though, I am sure readers would love to learn more about you. How did you get here? What experiences, failures, setbacks, or challenges have been most instrumental to your growth?

Vadim: Basketball became my passion when I was a kid. I played basketball professionally for the German national team and for the Buffalo Bulls university team from 2005 to 2009. My father, a former tennis player, instilled in me a love for sports and served as an example of dedication and striving for success.

Basketball taught me a lot: teamwork and determination to win, facing stress, and building resilience. In sports, there are many high-pressure situations. For instance, when you play at someone else's arena, you have to handle the crowd trying to disrupt your focus, even resorting to yelling offensive things about you and your personal life. There's no censorship in sports stadiums, and you need to know how to manage that without letting it impact your performance.

After going through four ACL tears, I came to terms with the realization that it was time to give up on a professional sports career. So, I studied international business and marketing and then got into supply chain management. Eventually, I joined Groupon, the world's fastest-growing company. At 26, I became the youngest regional CEO in 48 countries.

Life had unexpected twists for me. I never imagined that my love for sports and wellness would merge with my goal of helping people through personalized health solutions. 

Adam: How did you come up with your business idea? What advice do you have for others on how to come up with great ideas?

Vadim: In my early thirties, I noticed a decline in my mental and physical performance. Despite undergoing thorough check-ups that revealed no abnormalities, I sensed something was amiss. I began searching for ways to optimize my physical, mental, and cognitive abilities.

However, I realized that there were almost no personalized solutions for people like myself on the market. So I founded Bioniq, a health management platform offering bespoke nutritional supplements on subscription. Its foundation lies in numerous clinical trials and research conducted in Switzerland.

So the basic advice would be to live in the future, stay updated on new inventions. Think about products for yourself and for the next generation. Look for and create solutions to address your own needs or the needs of those surrounding you; identify their pain points. Study potential demand and engage with people facing similar problems. 

Only when you've realized there's truly a gap in the market and your product adds value, start diligently developing and refining your solution.

Another important thing is to learn to be proficient in multiple different areas. Medicine and sales, marketing and wellbeing. There are plenty of unique opportunities at their intersections.

Adam: How did you know your business idea was worth pursuing? What advice do you have on how to best test a business idea?

Vadim: As I mentioned before, I realized that I would gladly use my own product. Next, I surveyed my close circle – friends, partners, colleagues – and found that there was interest in the product. I extensively researched the media landscape and confirmed the necessity of this product.

Then, with the help of my partners and external experts, I understood that there were technological means capable of bringing my idea to life and making it economically viable. I studied similar services from different markets and tried many things myself.

And of course, I always knew how to find people with relevant expertise and motivate them to work with me. Thus, my journey is a combination of completely different means, which ultimately worked and brought me to where I am now.

Adam: What are the key steps you have taken to grow your business? What advice do you have for others on how to take their businesses to the next level?

Vadim: It's important to focus not only on clients but also on potential partners. There are always businesses that have already achieved a lot and are ready to share their experience for mutual synergy. Important partnerships, like the ones we've established with European laboratories, and now with major medical centers (London, UAE), and even departments (such as The Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi ), can provide incredible leaps forward. It's not just about sales; it's about connections, recommendations, a certain circle of influence, and growth opportunities for all members of my team. It's important for employees to have the opportunity to grow and see how other businesses operate and understand their aspirations.

Adam: What are your best sales and marketing tips?

Vadim: Aim for utmost consumer-centricity. Employ a comprehensive approach to fulfill consumer needs, going beyond what your initial product offers. What’s more, a thorough knowledge of your consumer enables precise targeting of key messages and brand positioning.

Precisely define your product and brand identity while involving appropriate influencers. This significantly enhances customer attraction and sales growth. Genuine advocacy and reflecting shared values is crucial; influencers should authentically endorse your brand, not just partner with you for financial gain. Select influencers whose values align with yours and who genuinely appreciate your product.

Adam: In your experience, what are the defining qualities of an effective leader? How can leaders and aspiring leaders take their leadership skills to the next level?

Vadim: Much of what I bring to my entrepreneurial journey comes from my sports career. In basketball, teamwork is one of the key factors in achieving victory. How you interact, complement each other and can literally understand each other without words is truly important.

How can aspiring leaders take their leadership skills to the next level? Engage in team sports; it's not a joke! This will help you become more disciplined and learn to understand others. Also, read good books, listen to experts, and never stop learning from other people.

Adam: What is your best advice on building, leading, and managing teams?

Vadim: My best advice is to stop building companies and start building teams. Companies often call their workers "teams" to foster camaraderie, but there's rarely much meaning behind it. Companies are groups of people typically united under loose, superficial criteria like working in the same department or office building. A team is a group of people with shared goals, complementary skills and an understanding of how and why they will achieve their goals. Within a team, each member understands the importance of their contribution and takes responsibility for the outcome.

To build a good team, you have to clearly communicate your goals. Sports teams never set foot on the field without a plan. A leader sets clear goals, communicates them well and everyone works together to achieve them. To foster a genuine team atmosphere, regularly conduct strategic sessions as a format for teamwork.

Then, compose your team of members with complementary skill sets. Just like you wouldn’t want an NBA team of guys great at three-pointers and nothing else, you don’t want a team of people who have all the same strengths and weaknesses. So it’s crucial to keep adding employees who can further shore up weaknesses and create a strong foundation for your company.

And lastly, foster collaboration. A lack of collaboration means you cannot develop the team dynamic you need to succeed. Employees should feel equally comfortable exchanging insights with both peers and management. 

Adam: What are your three best tips applicable to entrepreneurs, executives, and civic leaders?

Vadim: Stay dedicated to your discipline and do not let your mood overrule you. It's about showing up every day, putting in the work, and staying committed to your vision even when faced with challenges. Any athlete has to go through 10,000 hours of routine movements to fully perfect them, so everybody understands that nothing in sports happens overnight. It takes a lot of repetition and hard work to be put into something before we become good at it.

Build your team and foster collaboration. Entrepreneurship is a team sport. There’s nothing you can do by yourself that you couldn’t do better in a stronger team setting.

Have faith in yourself and visualize your success. As an example, I worked with sports psychologists who helped me imagine myself in a challenging situation, like the end of a game. The idea is to try to create muscle memory through visualization, closing your eyes, being present in the moment, hearing the sounds of success, feeling how you release the ball, how it goes through the net, and the crowd's reaction. Because you've already imagined it so many times before, when you encounter the situation, your mind and body take over. So, I believe that through training, both physically and mentally, you can prepare yourself to be much more stable in high-stress situations.

So, to my mind, these three things – confidence, discipline, and teamwork – are critical aspects in any endeavor.

Adam: What is the single best piece of advice you have ever received?

Vadim: Always challenge yourself and dream bigger. In my life, my father played the pivotal role of being that challenger. From the age of 8, we played basketball against each other almost every day, and I could never beat my dad until I was 15. So when I finally won, we never played basketball after that.

My father is a successful entrepreneur, running a family business. So, when I graduated from university, he said, "Listen, if after five years from university you haven't established a career that you find significant, consider joining the family business." I took this as a challenge, and within three years, at the age of 26, I became the regional head of Groupon. When I called him to share the news, he asked, "Okay, how much are you making?" I mentioned my salary and his response was "Yeah, I make that in a week."

So, if you don't have someone with a character like my father's around you, become that person yourself. Keep pushing yourself to new limits and never stop.


Adam Mendler is an entrepreneur, writer, speaker, educator, and nationally recognized authority on leadership. Adam is the creator and host of the business and leadership podcast Thirty Minute Mentors, where he goes one-on-one with America's most successful people - Fortune 500 CEOs, founders of household name companies, Hall of Fame and Olympic gold medal-winning athletes, political and military leaders - for intimate half-hour conversations each week. A top leadership speaker, Adam draws upon his insights building and leading businesses and interviewing hundreds of America's top leaders as a top keynote speaker to businesses, universities, and non-profit organizations. Adam has written extensively on leadership and related topics, having authored over 70 articles published in major media outlets including Forbes, Inc. and HuffPost, and has conducted more than 500 one on one interviews with America’s top leaders through his collective media projects. Adam teaches graduate-level courses on leadership at UCLA and is an advisor to numerous companies and leaders. A Los Angeles native, Adam is a lifelong Angels fan and an avid backgammon player.

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