Gurhan Kiziloz is restless. The thirty-five-year-old entrepreneur behind Lanistar, a London-based challenger bank, has amassed a fortune nearing $700 million. His rise, however, hasn’t followed the typical narrative of careful planning and calculated risks. Instead, it’s marked by sharp pivots, quick decisions, and repeated setbacks, failures he openly acknowledges.
We recently met with him to discuss risk, ambition, and the obsessive drive that propels him forward.
Embracing Failure as a Strategy
I asked about his well-documented setbacks, and if one stood out in particular. Kiziloz shook his head, dismissing the question as too narrow. “There isn’t one, there are maybe sixty or more,” he replied. “I’ve gone broke repeatedly. I wouldn’t say I enjoy it exactly, but there’s something addictive about building everything back up again.” He paused briefly, then added, “Going broke is just part of the cycle. Fear doesn’t come into it.”
Looking back, does he regret anything? “Just one thing: starting too late,” he said. “If I could advise my younger self, I’d tell him to stop partying. It was wasted time. I should’ve gotten into online businesses, particularly gaming, much earlier.” He offered this not with nostalgia, but the blunt practicality of someone who sees time as his most limited resource.
Instinct Over Analysis
Kiziloz’s approach to business is instinctual, almost impulsive. He openly admits to relying heavily on intuition rather than detailed planning. “Details slow me down. That’s what my team is for,” he explained. His leadership style reflects this urgency, militaristic in intensity, punctuated by short bursts of warmth. He summarized it neatly: “I lead with love. A little military. Hyperactive. And a sprinkle of love.”
His openness extends to his diagnosis of ADHD, something he views less as a hindrance and more as an engine. “My ADHD is a superpower,” he said matter-of-factly. “It pushes me forward. I can’t linger on anything for too long, which means I’m always onto the next goal.” His team, he conceded, sometimes struggles to keep up with his rapid shifts in direction, but they’ve learned to filter and execute, allowing him to maintain momentum without getting bogged down.
When the topic shifted to his entrance into gaming through Megaposta, Kiziloz described it as a series of early failures before eventual success. In 2024 alone, Megaposta generated $400 million in revenue. “I struggled for five years. Most people would have stopped by then, but that struggle didn’t count for me,” he explained. Brazil was his launching pad, chosen not through meticulous market research but sheer affinity.
“I love everything about Brazil, the culture, the energy, the people. It was instinct, nothing else.” Yet his ultimate ambition extends beyond Brazil or even gaming itself. “There is no single market I want to dominate, just the world. Brazil is only the beginning.”
This expansive ambition also shapes his philanthropic outlook, though he frames charity explicitly in terms of wealth. “I currently support food distribution and water well projects in Gambia. But they’re not delivered in scale,” he said. “Real change requires serious financial resources. Once I reach the wealth I envision, then comes the impact.”
Success as Endless Momentum
There is virtually no line between his personal and professional lives. “I don’t do anything else. My day starts with motivational videos on YouTube, I’m a YouTube baby, and the rest is all work.” When asked about relaxation or downtime, he mentioned only the occasional shisha. Burnout, he insisted, isn’t a concern. “If you genuinely love the pace, burnout doesn’t happen. I keep moving forward; slowing down doesn’t appeal to me.”
Yet relentless ambition has its downsides. Kiziloz admitted to occasional feelings of isolation, especially when sharing his goals with friends. “People look at you differently. Sometimes they think you’re crazy,” he said. “Ambition can isolate you, but I’ve learned to embrace it. Isolation sharpens my focus.”
I wondered aloud whether external opinions ever mattered to him. “Never,” he replied quickly. “I don’t care what others think, only what I think. Advice rarely resonates with me because I trust myself more. If I fail, it’s my fault; if I succeed, it’s my achievement. External voices are just noise.”
As our conversation wrapped, I asked him to define success in simple terms. “Top ten billionaires globally,” he responded without hesitation. “That’s the goal. It might sound grandiose, but I don’t know how to think smaller.”
Then, almost as an afterthought, he added, “People act as if success is a burden, something complicated and heavy. But the truth is, success is fun. That’s what nobody admits, chasing success, building things, even failing and starting again, it’s genuinely enjoyable.”
For Kiziloz, then, success isn’t merely a destination; it’s perpetual motion, always forward, rarely looking back.