Quick answer
In February 2024, the Singapore Christian news site Salt&Light profiled Prof. Aleks Farseev, co-founder and CEO of the AI marketing company SOMIN and later the founder of Faith Driven Singapore. The article traces his faith to an answered prayer at eight years old, when a wild duck ended up in his mother's hands 30 seconds after he prayed on a failed hunt. It follows that faith through a frightening trip to Russia during conscription and a war that forced his company to restart in Southeast Asia. Its thesis is simple: "Every time I have doubts about God, I remember this incident."
What happened with the ducks?
As a boy, Aleks spent summers at his grandmother's village in Russia. He played the accordion, and the grown-ups brought him along on duck hunts "to provide musical entertainment". One day the men came back empty-handed. Aleks, "all of eight years old", offered to pray. "My mother had taught me to pray for my needs," he told Salt&Light.
The men laughed. Then, "not more than 30 seconds after young Aleks finished his prayer, his mother appeared with a duck in hand." She said she had been walking through the village when the duck flew into her hand.
I am a mathematician. I know the odds. Never before and never after have I seen wild ducks run into a person's hand in the middle of a village.
For a founder who later built a company on statistics and machine learning, the story is less about ducks than about where the evidence points. Aleks grew up in a Christian home, baptised as an infant into the Russian Orthodox Church. The article notes that "70-odd years of Communism… was no match for the more than 1,000 years of Russian Orthodoxy."
Who is Aleks Farseev?
Aleks came to Singapore in 2013 to do a PhD in computer science at the National University of Singapore, and he stayed. He founded SOMIN (SoMin.ai), which Salt&Light describes as "AI that mines data from social media to predict behaviour and then uses that information to create targeted digital ads". He is also a research professor, a former Forbes Technology Council columnist, a professional accordionist and a father of three. He jokes: "People think I am angry all the time but it's just my face."
The Screwtape Letters and a flight into fear
The article's most gripping section comes from around 2023. A research-grant issue forced Aleks to fly back to Russia, where men were being conscripted, to secure funds that paid SOMIN's staff. "All my relatives in Russia told me not to come."
On a stopover in London he attended a Russian Orthodox service and, in the church bookshop, unexpectedly found C.S. Lewis's The Screwtape Letters. He then went to Holy Trinity Brompton, where the vicar told him: "God already told you what to do. You already know. You don't need to ask anymore."
On the flight, "one of the strongest fears in my life", he read the passage in which the senior devil tells the junior one never to let the man realise that all the bad things cannot happen to him at once. The two-week trip passed without incident and the grant was secured. "I am not a very sensitive person," Aleks said. "So God talks to me in a straightforward fashion."
Building through a war
When war broke out, many of SOMIN's employees and much of its business were in Russia. The company was "haemorrhaging as much as over $150,000 a month", sustaining staff and giving them time to find other jobs, and it had to start again in a new market, Southeast Asia. Aleks sees providence even in the timing: "He let us fund raise just before the war broke out. So we had enough cash to go through those two years."
I never asked God why this happened. Just listen to what He wants you to do.
That redirection led SOMIN into DMV Redemptive Labs, the accelerator of Digital Mission Ventures for "early-stage tech founders looking to use their business for Kingdom impact". Later, it led to a conversation with Henry Kaestner and to the founding of Faith Driven Singapore.
Faith in the business model
The profile ends on ethics. SOMIN is "very selective" about industries such as gambling. It "often compromise[s] margins to help businesses who really want to change for better", and sometimes tells a client: "You don't need our services, use the money to invest in infrastructure to improve." Aleks wants SOMIN "to redeem the advertising world", an industry where he says turnover is the second-highest of any sector. That conviction later became his idea of redemptive marketing.
On AI, he is calm: "AI is just Math with powerful computers." And: "Everything can be used by God in a good way, just as it can be used by the devil in a bad way."
Lessons for founders
- Keep a memorial stone. Aleks goes back to one undeniable answer to prayer whenever doubt returns.
- Peace doesn't depend on the deal. When a $500,000 contract was cancelled at the last moment, he described "a great sense of peace", "one more chance for me to be reminded that God is in control".
- Pray the uncomfortable prayer. He quotes a pastor: "God, don't give me what I don't need even if I want it or ask for it. I think this part is very important for start-ups."
- Trouble is training. "In this world, it is impossible to be without tribulations. But that is the only thing that sharpens us for assignments in the future."
Frequently asked questions
What is the "prayer for ducks" story?
At eight years old, on a failed duck hunt in his grandmother's Russian village, Aleks Farseev prayed for a duck. About 30 seconds later his mother appeared holding one that had flown into her hand. He says he remembers it every time he doubts God.
Who is Aleks Farseev?
Aleks Farseev is a Russian-born, Singapore-based AI entrepreneur and professor. He is the founder and CEO of SOMIN, founder of Faith Driven Singapore, and an APAC / Southeast Asia Ambassador for Faith Driven Entrepreneur.
Where was the Salt&Light article published?
On saltandlight.sg on 20 February 2024, under the title "How a child-like prayer for ducks laid the faith foundation for an AI start-up", by Christine Leow.