Amazon + OpenAI, Sarah Guo, Doug O'Laughlin, David Senra

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>> Good to see everyone. Welcome back to the show. Uh, we have a great show for

the show. Uh, we have a great show for everyone today. We have Sarah Guo

everyone today. We have Sarah Guo joining us in the TBPN Ultradome. We

also have Doug Laughlin from Semi analysis hopping on to uh hopefully break down the Amazon OpenAI deal. That

is big news. Uh, I was talking about this with some friends about, you know, SpaceX is potentially going out gonna hoover up 30 billion of capital.

>> They're going >> they're going out at 1.5 trillion.

They're talking to bankers now. They're

going to hoover up all the capital.

>> They're hoovering.

>> The public market's going to be tapped out, right? Well, Sam Alman would like a

out, right? Well, Sam Alman would like a word with Andy Jasse and he says, "I need 10 billion." And Andy says, "Sure, as long as you buy a bunch of tranium chips." That's basically the story. We

chips." That's basically the story. We

will get into that. We'll dig

>> Yeah. Isn't is isn't it like mostly or all credits?

>> We will see. We will see. Um but first I wanted to dig into a little bit more. We

we we touched on >> Wait, don't forget we also have Logan from Google coming on to talk about uh Gemini Flash, the new model they released today. We also have David Senra

released today. We also have David Senra joining at the end of the show just to hang out.

>> What is the What are the odds that David Senro will be in a more elaborate Santa Claus costume than me?

zero. I hate to I hate to say it. We'll

give him this hat. He can have he can have this hat.

>> Um anyway, uh so uh the the closing out the story with uh the Ford F-150. Of

course, this broke earlier this week. Uh

the CEO Ford uh did a did a a round of press interviews talking about the news, which is that Ford, the historic automaker, is killing the F-150

Lightning, their electric truck. sales

fell 72% year-over-year. Of course, they that is a 72% decrease specifically in last month, which is post EV tax credit

going away. Um, and the whole project

going away. Um, and the whole project was a money pit. So, they took a 19.5 billion dollar charge. Uh, and now they're shifting strategies. So, the I mean, the first question that I was sort of toying with that we've been debating

is, uh, did truck buyers ever really want to go electric? Was that even was that ever a good idea? Um because it

always seemed like who's the last person that's going to buy an electric car, the truck buyer, right?

>> So, one thing that I was thinking about is I feel like the Cyber Truck probably got truck buyers to like traditional truck buyers to go electric, but it wasn't because it was electric. It was

because it looked electric.

>> Like it looked different. It looked

wild.

>> I completely agree with this. And so,

yeah, there's this weird thing where like the F-150 silhouette is iconic, but you sort of >> forgot I had forgot I had my my elf ears on.

>> Um, but uh yeah, I mean there's just like I mean ballpark how many how many ads how many billions of dollars have been spent on ads that associate trucks with like

>> being a being a cool dude, >> guy, dude, you know, driving through the mud. And a big part of that is the

mud. And a big part of that is the engine note. And a big part of that is

engine note. And a big part of that is the actual exhaust coming out of the back like roll.

>> All that all that advertising worked on me.

>> Like I I grew up in a in a Toyota family. We only had Toyotas growing up.

family. We only had Toyotas growing up.

>> We at one point we at one point had two Priuses right?

>> And uh but as soon as I was an adult and I could afford it, I bought a Ford Raptor. It was black on black on black

Raptor. It was black on black on black on black. It was lifted.

on black. It was lifted.

I just wanted the truck that I was that was advertised to me as a kid. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah.

>> Uh and then of course I realized quickly like it's very difficult to to to park it. It was so loud in the cabin

it. It was so loud in the cabin >> that it didn't make sense for a lot of reasons, but it but I but I I'd wanted that truck since I was a kid.

>> Yeah. Yeah. And a $750 tax credit probably wouldn't be enough to pull you off the the Raptor if that's what you've been programmed from a young age. 7500

>> $7,500 uh uh EV tax credit. Um, that's

probably not enough to pull you away from, okay, I've been watching Super Bowl every year. And every year at the Super Bowl, I see truck ads with big,

loud engines, and they've been marketing this to me for decades. And yes, EVs, it's very logical. There's a lot of cool benefits. I mean, the Ford F-150

benefits. I mean, the Ford F-150 Lightning had crazy stuff. You'd open up the front, it just had four household power outlets. So, you just have like a

power outlets. So, you just have like a full You could have a full like tailgate. There was a 220 volt. You

tailgate. There was a 220 volt. You

could power a washing machine on it. You

could just like pull up with a washing machine and just do your laundry, I guess. Um, also big part of big big

guess. Um, also big part of big big problem with trucks, I'm sure you experienced this, is that uh you don't have anywhere to store anything if you because if you put it in the back, it

could just get taken. You have to lock it down if you put something in the back. So if you have like

back. So if you have like >> I think I think I think most people that are buying trucks for yeah a daily are getting a a cover over the bed. But

>> yeah, locking cover potentially, but then you're in this like weird half and half. Uh instead the F-150 Lightning,

half. Uh instead the F-150 Lightning, there was a front trunk that was actually very large and you could and it had outlets in there too and there were a bunch of features. Uh and they really went crazy with the features. Um but uh

like ultimately it wasn't really it wasn't really enough and there was some interesting there's some interesting data that Ford was sharing that they were framing as positive when the F-150

Lightning launched but I think in retrospect might have actually been sort of a canary in the coal mine. Totally.

>> So the first stat was that of the people that reserved the F-150 Lightning 50% had never owned a truck before. So

they're new to trucks. And then 75% of the reservation holders had never owned a Ford before. And so Ford was celebrating this. It's like we did it.

celebrating this. It's like we did it.

New hero products. It's going to bring new people into the Ford ecosystem. It's

going to be bring new people into the truck ecosystem. We are expanding the

truck ecosystem. We are expanding the market. And in hindsight, what it feels

market. And in hindsight, what it feels like is the truck buyers didn't want it.

The board buyers didn't want it. And

they're the two biggest markets. And so,

yes, there were a class of people that were like, "Oh, I would always I've always an electric truck. That sounds

really interesting. I love the idea of a 220 volt. I'm a I'm a unique purchaser."

220 volt. I'm a I'm a unique purchaser."

And they're like, "This is a niche product." And they go hard for the niche

product." And they go hard for the niche product. They show up immediately and

product. They show up immediately and they'll do it no matter what.

>> And you wrote in the newsletter, the first electric truck was the Riven.

Yeah.

>> And that had only launched a few months, >> six months earlier. So, the Riven came out in September of 2021. That's the

R1T. Ford shipped in April of 2022.

That's actually very impressive to me. I

was very impressed with how fast uh Ford was able to respond to the idea of electric trucks happening because electric cars have been around for a really long time.

>> Yeah.

>> But there was always this like is it ever going to happen with trucks and then all of a sudden it was like it's happening this year and you need big company. You need to respond within six

company. You need to respond within six months. Like big companies are typically

months. Like big companies are typically not that good at responding. Usually

it's like oh we'll let the startup we'll let this Rivian company show up. They'll

we'll let them ship. see how they do and then we'll move. They like a lot of big companies like being second movers. This

feels like they were like, "No, we're we're moving in the first wave." They

did successfully. A lot of that's because they built off of the F-150 platform. They were able to reuse a lot

platform. They were able to reuse a lot of equipment there and the and the and the supply chain. Um but ultimately they didn't ship a product that delivered at

the level of the R1T. So Doug Gurro, friend of the show, former guest, gave the R1T a 73, which is a very, very good score. It actually earned Doug's car of

score. It actually earned Doug's car of the year or vehicle of the year. The

next year, Rivian runs it back again, wins car of the year again with the R1S with uh the the SUV. And so Rivian has two back-to-back

uh car of the year with Douggee. But the

R1T gets a 73. So that's the benchmark for where you should be if you're competing with them. And Rivian doesn't break out sales, which is super annoying. I I really want to understand

annoying. I I really want to understand this, but my guess is that n over 90% of their sales are the SUV.

>> I agree. Yeah, that sounds reasonable.

>> And that is that is generally just because of the popularity of SUVs among the cohort of people that are going to buy an EV.

>> Exactly.

>> And it and the car just looks fantastic.

I think that's under underrated. Like

people critiqued the headlights early on. You didn't really like the

on. You didn't really like the headlights, but the car, the silhouette is just amazing. It feels like a >> 21st century, very very modern, very kind of modern take on a Range Rover,

right? And it has the same capacity.

right? And it has the same capacity.

>> Yep. Yep. And so, um, the So, the the the R1T got a 73 Doug score. The

Lightning only got a 65. So, on day one, even with all the features, even with all the heritage, even with good pricing and time to market and all this stuff, still couldn't actually be a step

forward. And it uh I think it tied the

forward. And it uh I think it tied the Raptor um but lost on the on some of the some of the weekend categories obviously because Doug likes to drive these cars

um for fun on the weekend. Um but uh uh you know people wound up you know obviously buying some of them. I've seen

some of them around. But my question was uh how much does the iconic silhouette help or hurt the lightning? because you

would imagine that there's so much there's so much value in the F-150 silhouette that you would you would that would be a huge advantage that you're driving something that looks like the

classic canonical truck. But at the same time, if you see those Rivian headlights, you know that that person's driving electric truck and that's maybe more of a signal, more of a more more

badge value there. It is just crazy reflecting on how, you know, the way you're talking about this the Rivian silhouette looking good. Um, I was thinking the Rivian name. Do you like

the Rivian name?

>> I think it's I think it's fine.

>> It's weird. It It sticks out to me. It

was also weird when I'm neutral on it.

>> It It was weird when it first stuck out.

It It sounded like something that came from like a like a brainstorming session at a pharmaceutical company, you know, because it's like this weird it like like what does the name actually mean? I

guess it means river and Indian kind of port manto but >> so the reason so uh itself is a blend of syllables from the river symbolizing adventure and connection to nature.

>> Sure.

>> Like I I always looked at uh Rivian as as something like the >> the whole foods of cars, right? Like the

the REI of cars, right? It's like

>> people go to REI like the average person going into REI is not necessarily like buying gear for the most rugged adventure. Yep. like they might be

adventure. Yep. like they might be buying gear for their backyard or like going on a hike that weekend. And again,

like >> I feel like the Rivian cars again, I mean, we had the CEO on, but like have that range where it's like it really is just like a good daily.

>> Yeah.

>> But they've built it. It's super

powerful. It's very capable. Mhm. Um

well, if you were to daily a Rivian R1S, let's say, um Oh, by the way, just to close out the Ford F-150 thing, um Ford's plan is to pivot. I will tell you

what they're going to pivot to after I tell you about Linear, uh the soft the system for modern software development.

Linear streamlines work across the entire development cycle from road map to release. Um, so they're going to be

to release. Um, so they're going to be pivoting to hybrid uh hybrid trucks and hybrid designs. But what's interesting

hybrid designs. But what's interesting is that it's one of those uh it's this extra long range hybrid where you have an electric powertrain that is charged

by a gas motor and so you can get like 700 miles of range. I saw someone demo one of these in China and it felt like one of those like crazy like okay is it

just a gimmick like the jumping car or is this a really interesting like value prop because you could fill up once you have all the towing power like you have the energy when you need it but then

also you uh you you don't have any of the ranging range anxiety of the electric car ownership which is still a little bit real.

>> Magnus is a little triggered. Rivian is

terrible. Stop talking about it ever bought.

>> What was bad about it? Tell us the details. give us the details. I've only

details. give us the details. I've only

heard good stuff. Um, I don't know.

Interesting. We'll have to dig it. We'll

have to dig into it. Um, anyway, let me tell you about Gemini 3 Pro, Google's most intelligent model yet. There's an

update today. State-of-the-art

reasoning, next level vibe coding, and deep multimodal understanding. So, uh,

uh, here here's a here's a question.

Here's something that people don't like about Rivians. Um, it's they don't have

about Rivians. Um, it's they don't have CarPlay. Is that a deal breaker for you?

CarPlay. Is that a deal breaker for you?

Do you like Apple CarPlay? I think it's solid. The thing that I find annoying is

solid. The thing that I find annoying is car like the fact that there's no >> the cars that I've owned are all defaulting back to the the actual operating system.

>> Oh, really? Wait, what do you mean they're defaulting?

>> So, in I have two Mercedes. They have

like the regular Mercedes operating system and then like Apple CarPlay is layered on top, >> but I still find myself like >> turning on the car sometimes and it's

the stock system. I'm like,

>> so I just wish there was a single operating system. I wish

operating system. I wish >> I mean, so Apple's trying to do this because I've noticed, >> but the manufacturers are like, well, we sell the Android and we don't want you to control us forever. Yep.

>> Through some type of like new blue bubble scenario.

>> Totally. So, uh, I've noticed this weird thing where there are there are set of buttons that I can use to interact with CarPlay. So, like changing the song is

CarPlay. So, like changing the song is is a button that's mapped to my steering wheel in this Cadillac. Uh, and as I as I if I push the button, it will go to

CarPlay and say, "Play the next track on Spotify." Great experience. But if I

Spotify." Great experience. But if I have if I if I'm turning the volume dial, the volume exists at the at the

car operating system level and that overrides CarPlay. And so then the all

overrides CarPlay. And so then the all of the all of the all of the buttons in the car are in like, okay, we're we're

now we're now elevating to the to the volume knob UI. And so if you push a button, you you're not clicking on the actual screen anymore. You're clicking

on the volume overlay. And it's very weird. There there is

weird. There there is >> Think about how it be insane if you're on a a Mac and it was like running two operating systems at the same time. The

difference of being in a car is like you're in a moving vehicle >> that's thousands of pounds >> and so it's >> it's really I do think we'll look back

at this kind of era being like okay well what were we doing right >> yes so let me tell you about cognition the team behind the AI software engineer Devon crush your backlog with your personal AI engineering team um but so

Apple's trying to solve this their way Apple's saying hey let us take over everything including >> you can let the fox let the fox into the hen We can be trusted. We're a good fox.

>> Yes. And so and so they're they they will do we'll we'll handle the volume.

We'll handle the the speedometer and we will do all of that in in in Apple CarPlay plus or something and it'll take the whole screen. Uh and that seems great. That seems like a solution to a

great. That seems like a solution to a lot of the problems that we've identified. Uh Rivian's gone the other

identified. Uh Rivian's gone the other way. Said no Apple CarPlay. Uh he was on

way. Said no Apple CarPlay. Uh he was on Ben Thompson's show on stratey and uh Ben asked him about this. So Ben said uh uh why is there no CarPlay in Rivians?

R.J. says the the CEO of of Rivian says it's a good question. We get asked a lot. We're very convicted at this point.

lot. We're very convicted at this point.

We believe that the aggregation of applications and the experience and importantly now with AI acting as a web that's integrating all these different applications into a singular experience

where you can talk to the car and ask for things and and where it has knowledge of the state of the health of the vehicle, the state of the charge, distance, outside temperature, everything becomes much more seamless in

time if the vehicle is its own singular ecosystem versus having a window within the vehicle that's into another ecosystem. Ben says and that's the issue

ecosystem. Ben says and that's the issue just the implementation effort on your side or that c is that the issue or is it implementation on your side or is it

that customers are actually shortcircuiting themselves? Um RJ says

shortcircuiting themselves? Um RJ says we could turn on CarPlay really quickly but then you end up with >> I think I know why he's doing this. He

wants the consumer to be able to say >> Riven get me the fastest production car lap record at Laguna Psychoa >> and it just does it.

>> And it just does it. It just does it self-driving, right? Um, so he he

self-driving, right? Um, so he he basically doubles down and he says, you know, in the age of AI, you'll be able to say, Rivian, tell me what's on my schedule for later today, and it will go

talk to Google calendar, pull that information, and maybe you get stuck in an Apple ecosystem a little bit more. It

still feels like a lot of duplicate work where um over the long term Android Auto and CarPlay will be compounding and

adding more features and they should outrun the individual car uh car companies. Uh Ben actually asks uh is

companies. Uh Ben actually asks uh is this a bit where Tesla covered for you because they don't have CarPlay either, but now there's a rumor that they might add it and it might make it a little bit

more difficult. Is it confirmed that

more difficult. Is it confirmed that Tesla is going to add CarPlay? I I

didn't know that that was confirmed, but >> they as of uh November 13, Tesla from Bloomberg, Tesla plans to feature CarPlay >> within a window inside its broader interface.

>> Yeah. Which is normal. So CarPlay is coming to Tesla. Will CarPlay come to Rivian TBD?

>> The question is, will the fart sound effect come to CarPlay?

>> Yes. Yes, for sure. that that 100% going to happen. Um anyway, if you want to

to happen. Um anyway, if you want to make a more serious soundboard, go to Fall, the generative media platform for developers, develop and fine-tune

models, serverless GPUs, and on demand clusters. Um anyway, uh I think I think

clusters. Um anyway, uh I think I think Rivian will eventually get on CarPlay. I

think it's got to happen because um I just think of the car as like the car is not fully a device. The car is a speaker.

>> It's not your life.

>> It's not my life. Exactly. It's not my life. And so if I'm if I'm going on a

life. And so if I'm if I'm going on a run and I'm and I and I and I'm listening to music on headphones and then I get back from the run and I go in the car, I'd like a seamless handoff.

And then I go in my house. I'd like

another seamless handoff. I I don't want my house to be like, "Oh no, like we're building house OS and like we don't interface with Apple. We don't play nicely with Google." I actually as a

consumer I do sort of benefit from a monopoly and at least picking an ecosystem and staying into it. I mean

I'm I'm seriously considering um going just I know that the I think the audio quality isn't that good on the Apple Air speakers are I can't even I don't even know what they're HomePods the HomePods

but I'm thinking about just dropping those everywhere because at least it will be integrated whereas Sonos has just been falling behind falling behind falling behind. And imagine if you're in

falling behind. And imagine if you're in a situation where like the Sonos situation plays out to Rivian like it would be really really unfortunate where you could be like well at least it still has CarPlay. Like people will go buy

has CarPlay. Like people will go buy retro cars or or old cars and then uh go retrofit them with uh CarPlay and and then it's like

okay yeah like it has analog knobs and stuff. It's old car but at least it runs

stuff. It's old car but at least it runs CarPlay. So, I know that if if I switch

CarPlay. So, I know that if if I switch from Spotify to YouTube to Apple Podcast to anywhere else where you can leave us five stars, um you should uh it will still continue to play. It will still

continue and it'll play seamlessly because that technology will just continue to get better uh regardless of what happens. Anyway, um let's move on

what happens. Anyway, um let's move on to other news. But first, let me tell you about Adio, the AI native CRM. Adio

builds, scales, and grows your company to the next level. Um, so the big scoop from Katie Roof. She says, uh, Amazon is

in talks to invest over $10 billion in open AI. And so let's read through some

open AI. And so let's read through some of this, get the scoops. Um, the

>> according to three people familiar with the discussions, yeah, the valuation be higher than 500 billion. The Amazon

investment would help OpenAI afford some of the commitments it has made some to rent servers from cloud providers, including from AWS. Yeah, this is like it's like there's somewhat there's some

circularity, but it's not entirely >> fully beating the circular allegations on this one. OpenAI last month announced it would spend 38 billion renting servers from AWS over the next seven

years, making AWS one of at least five >> cloud providers OpenAI use uses to develop AI.

>> The deal also could help Amazon find a new customer for its tranium AI chips, which compete with the Nvidia chips. Uh,

>> this is kind of like a rebate, you know?

It's like they they said, "Hey, we're we're going to buy 40 and they said here, take 10 back >> and we'll take a piece.

>> Take take 10 back." I mean, this is the this is the semi- analysis likeis.

>> Yeah. So, the bigger honestly, the more notable news here is that Amazon and OpenAI have discussed commerce partnership opportunities.

>> That's very interesting.

>> OpenAI wants to turn Chass into a shopping hub and has discussed earning fees for referring customers to retailers. It isn't clear whether Amazon

retailers. It isn't clear whether Amazon opening I deal would involve any arrangement related to such features in chatbt or AI powered shopping features that Amazon is developing. So I just look at this in the same way as like the

Disney deal which is like hey we're going to invest but we're going to give you access to this thing. And I would expect that >> I mean you can imagine OpenAI has been working on getting referrals to from

from uh basically getting a revenue stream from referring products out to Amazon for a really long time, right?

They've done the Etsy deal. They they're

doing uh deals with Shopify. They have

not done eBay notably and they have not done Amazon notably. Yeah. And I think there's been some >> there's just been some general hesitance to let again let the fox into the hen house, right? Because you can think

house, right? Because you can think about it like the Google search experience is like or sorry searching for products on Amazon. Yeah.

>> Is extremely profitable for Amazon, right? If if consumers start just going

right? If if consumers start just going to catch >> y >> to find products on Amazon. Yep.

>> That like Amazon needs to be really careful around that because yes, they can get a referral fee.

>> Yeah.

>> Or they'll they're they're getting a customer but then they Amazon or sorry opening wants to them to pay them for that customer and that's a customer that didn't just go look at a bunch of ads,

right? And I do not like searching for

right? And I do not like searching for products on Amazon because the experience is I'm just trying to find I always use the example like paper

towels right?

>> It's so frustrating to search on there because I just want to buy like I'll spend 20 to $30 on this thing and then it's like three pages of like $6

versions of the product that I know are going to be terrible and a bunch of ads for those things, right? And so being able to go into Chat GBT and just say like, "Hey, I want to buy

this item from a manufacturer or a brand that has been in business for more than 30 years, like pre- e-commerce."

>> Yeah.

>> I want a brand that has just been making this thing well for a really long time.

>> And so I I would be defaulting to the LLM and skipping Amazon entirely.

>> Yeah. You want to fight You want to fight to be the aggregator. you want to like I I I guarantee that although Amazon shows up on Google search results like they want people to open the app

and search in the app and be the main starting point for their commerce their entire commerce journey and we've seen this with Shopify as well. Shopify

obviously would love for the for the commerce journey to not start on Facebook or Meta properties. Instead

start in the shop app. They're working

towards that. Um the same thing uh is true of Amazon and uh I every aggregator is acutely aware of aggregation theory and acutely aware that they should not let someone aggregate on top of that.

>> Apparently projecting 60 billion of advertising revenue.

>> Yeah.

>> Which is growing way faster than the core retail business. They've sort of like the core retail business is probably growing at the rate of overall e-commerce penetration, >> whereas this is just like extremely high

margin, fast growing, and they want to protect that >> and probably bigger than what they could make off of a referral fee on top deeper in the stack if they're deeper down.

Like they they if they control more of that purchase, they can probably take a higher take rate essentially. Yeah. Uh

because I imagine their margins on top of all of that is is very high. Well,

the other side of the Amazon OpenAI deal is uh that the deal could also help Amazon find a new customer for its tranium AI server chips which compete

with NVIDIA AI chips that OpenAI primarily uses today. As part of the deal being discussed, OpenAI plans to use Tranium chips. Two of the people

said the cloud deal Amazon announced with OpenAI last month only made mention of service powered by Nvidia. So uh if the interesting thing here is is is what will they be doing with those tranium

chips? Will they have a specific model

chips? Will they have a specific model that runs on tranium? Will they will they set up some sort of abstraction layer that they can run any of their models on any hardware or any ASIC

basically like like will you see or will it be like okay we still have GPT 40 workloads let's recompile 40 for for

tranium and let it just chill there and tranium is our is our pool for for 40 or you know what tranium is going to be our

workhorse for image gen or videogen and let's do our image gen optimized for that particular stack. We when we talked to um when we talked about trrenium

initially during the during the latest launch um the Wall Street Journal highlighted real time video as an interesting place where trrenium could

potentially outperform. They weren't

potentially outperform. They weren't making the case, at least to the journal, that tranium is what you want if you're going to do the biggest and

most massive training run. That was sort of the narrative that uh the TPU was pitching with the latest anthropic round uh like runs. Um but they did highlight,

you know, uh real time video generation.

And so I'm what I'm what I'm interested in is that is is train does trrenium get abstracted to a point where it's sort of

like model agnostic or or is openai like the the chatpt the app has a whole host of models because these models are now mixtures of models and there's model

routers and there's different products video audio uh image you know deep research is one of those going to be on trrenium or will trrenium be a like a

liquid pool of compute that uh cuts across the entire stack. Do you have any uh you know instinct on this or >> Yeah, I mean I I think the abstraction thing is pretty hard, right? Because you

always hear about TPUs and how um the TPU team and like the Gemini team are so closely integrated, right? Like every

all the model architecture is like interlin with the with the GPU architecture TPU.

>> So I I think it's hard to actually abstract all the way up, but it is interesting. I mean, Anthropic has been

interesting. I mean, Anthropic has been like multi- platform platform for a while now. So, I'm I'm curious how how

while now. So, I'm I'm curious how how they think about this stuff.

>> Yeah. Good question for Doug.

>> Yeah, maybe Doug will will be able to get us up to speed.

>> Something that's interesting, if I search on Gemini >> for a product on Amazon, find me the best blank on Amazon. It takes me it says top recommendations on Amazon. And

then I click the link and it takes me to a Google search >> for that product >> that is a sponsored result on Amazon. So

then then I click.

>> So Amazon is paying >> Amazon is paying Google to appear in search results.

>> Adwords. Okay.

>> In Adwords.

>> Yeah.

>> And then Gemini is routing basically to Adwords to get the clickth through there. So there's no direct integration

there. So there's no direct integration at all.

>> Yes.

>> Huh. Yeah. Well, uh I mean that that is like the the odd Google has so many odd advantages. It's crazy like the the the

advantages. It's crazy like the the the the the fact that the Google bot just sees so much more of the internet feels

extremely important and yet I just don't know how if it will be enough if it will be enough to win in consumer in some meaningful way. What does it mean? Does

meaningful way. What does it mean? Does

it mean 50% of the value of consumer?

Does it mean that they can win, come from behind, defeat OpenAI, Chad GBT?

Like it feels so important and yet uh it it it also feels extremely hard to actually pass that message through.

Maybe they need like a whole ad campaign around it or something. But um and and also I haven't even did Did Matthew Prince over at uh Cloudflare ever publish those results? He was saying he

was asking people like how much of the internet do you think Google sees relative to OpenAI's web scraper? or

like their bot because no one has blocked no one's blocking the Google bot. Like you have to be insane to be

bot. Like you have to be insane to be like I don't want my company showing up on on uh on Google that like you would just never do that. Um but if you do then you also show up in Gemini like

that like you like what you just showed.

>> Now there are plenty of blogs and plenty of people out there who are saying I don't want to show up in chat GPT because uh my content is valuable. I'm

monetizing in a particular way. Uh,

we're not talking about products.

Products on the other side. They're on

profound.

Get your brand mentioned in chat. You

reach millions to consumers. We use AI to discover new products and brands. Um,

no, but seriously, like like if you're if you're a brand and you're you want to be mentioned everywhere, but if you're like a newsletter writer or you write reviews about best Amazon products, you

might not want those reviews just to get sucked into Chatd and anonymized, right?

So, you might turn that off. But no

one's turning off Google. So, Google

should have an advantage there. The

product should be better, but it all matters on like how much does the consumer feel the betterness of it because even you can see it even with the image releases. It's like we're into

one's 99% of the way there, the other one's 99.1% of the way there. There's a

benchmark that says this one's better, but people aren't really shifting.

>> This one is really good at doing ornaments.

>> Which one?

>> Like that was >> that seems that that's the first value prop I've heard where I would switch immediately. Well, that that was that

immediately. Well, that that was that was like something they were pushing yet. That was something opening eye was

yet. That was something opening eye was pushing yesterday was basically like you can turn yourself into an ornament trying to kick off a new >> meme super cycle. Uh Near Ne near is not

loving this line. The the Amazon investment would help OpenAI afford commitments including from AWS.

>> That's very funny.

>> Um >> well, >> liquidity is showing the gang standing around.

All right, Jeff, you're up next to invest in open AI.

>> LFAO.

>> Yeah, literally almost all of them.

>> Well, to be clear, I don't think Elon is. I don't think Sundar is. I don't

is. I don't think Sundar is. I don't

think Zuck is.

>> And I don't know, >> you know, Tim Cook's partner with Gemini, so this meme is actually slop.

I'm sorry, Liquidity. I love you, but it it was funny, but then as I dug in deeper, I mean, 10K likes. Um, but it is not is not it's not accurate. It's not

accurate. Um, let me tell you about Vanta to automate compliance and security AI that powers everything from evidence collection to continuous continuous monitoring to security

reviews and vendor risk. Um, uh, Amazon $10 billion investment in OpenAI in the form of AWS credits. You got Sachin Nadella point >> I couldn't find where

>> 2% for Amazon maybe less if it's at if it's at above a $500 billion valuation.

So Andy Josie is getting one and a half% of Open AI. Satcha is sitting there with over 20. He's pretty happy. Pretty happy

over 20. He's pretty happy. Pretty happy

looking at the screen. Uh this is a Oh, and this is a Gemini meme. Very funny.

Uh well, uh Jared Kushner is pulling out of the Paramount bid hours after his father-in-law took aim at the Ellison Clan apparently.

>> Yeah. To be clear, I don't know where Nick pulled uh the credits line. I

haven't seen that.

>> Which credits line? Sorry. uh Nick that this post before.

>> Oh yeah.

>> Amazon $10 billion investment in OpenAI in the form of AWS credits.

>> Oh yeah confirmed anywhere.

>> Yeah. Yeah. It's actually not in the form of AWS credits. It it it's it's just cash and then but but it's just it feels like credits because they do have

obligations with spend all of it.

>> Well, no, it's like it all goes into a bank account. So but but it fits it fits

bank account. So but but it fits it fits the narrative to be like it's in the form of AWS credits. This is a good that is a good correction. Thank you, Jordy.

Um anyway, uh the the the latest news in the Paramount bid for Warner Brothers, the story that just keeps on giving, um

is from uh Semaphore here. Let's see

what this says. Uh in the news in backtoback salvos Tuesday, the president and his former and his family distanced themselves from Paramount's hostile bid

for Warner Brothers discovery. I think

we know what's going on there. It's

about Fogghorn Legghorn. It's about

Tweety Bird. Is that it? Porky Pig. It's

Porky Pig. Um, it's a rebuke to owner David Ellison's attempt to leverage relationships with the White House to close the 108 billion takeover effort.

President Trump Tuesday afternoon said he had been treated far worse by the Ellisonowned CBS since the family closed a deal for CBS parent Paramount.

>> Which is so interesting because I've seen a bunch of there's been uh people have been riled up about Barry Weiss running CBS.

the the reason that you maybe would say that she's doing a an effective job as a manager of that asset is because people are talking about CBS content in a way that I have not seen

>> in ever, right? Do you ever remember like maybe couple times a year you'd see something and uh she's she's clipping CBS content. It's like she's doing

CBS content. It's like she's doing >> it feels like it's working.

>> I I >> Yeah, if they're if they're >> We were joking about this. I mean, no no shade to the people that were running CBS before, but like what what content was on that network?

>> Yeah, we just don't know what they were doing before.

>> We it like it it's like it didn't exist and now it exists and you can like it or you hate it depending on your political persuasion, but you can't deny that this is like >> it's a thing.

>> The Ellison's were like, "Hey, we can get a truth engine and we can help we can help like we can can basically shoot."

shoot." >> Yeah. Yeah, I mean I I mean there

>> Yeah. Yeah, I mean I I mean there there's definitely like the brand is still great. Like CBS feels like a solid

still great. Like CBS feels like a solid news source. So So I I agree with but

news source. So So I I agree with but the distribution was so far behind that people weren't talking about what was going on there. And

>> the reason the reason one way to think about the value of CBS >> is what would it cost and how long would it take to recreate a brand like CBS?

>> Probably cost it would take you decades.

>> I don't think you can buy it. Like I I I actually don't think I think you could I think you could be Sam Alman and Marshall a $50 billion fundraising round >> to snap your fingers

>> and it would still take 50 years to get there. And that's the thing is that it's

there. And that's the thing is that it's not it's not like if you if you get 50 billion what do you have to do? You have

to go buy the legacy IP because there's only you can't just you can't just c you can't snap your fingers and create a brand overnight. Like it just takes

brand overnight. Like it just takes time.

So, uh, Warner Brothers sent a letter to shareholders this morning >> basically saying that, >> uh, they're riding they they want to the board of directors still wants to go

with Netflix. They believe it's superior

with Netflix. They believe it's superior in a number of different ways.

>> Uh, one thing that stood out to me is that, uh, Paramount has consistently, they said Paramount has consistently led WBD shareholders that its proposed transaction has a full backs stop from

the Ellison family. It does not and never has. Uh Paramount's most recent

never has. Uh Paramount's most recent proposal includes a $40 billion equity commitment for which there is no Ellison family commitment of any kind. Instead,

they propose that you rely on an unknown and opaque revocable trust for the certainty of the crucial deal funding despite having been told repeatedly by WBD how important a full and unconditional financing commitment from

the Ellison family was. And despite

their own ample resources as well as multiple assurances from Paramount Sky Dance during our strategic review process that such a commitment was forthcoming, the Allison family has

chosen not to not to backs stop the Paramount Sky Dance offer and a revocable trust is no replacement for a secured commitment by a controlling stockholder. Uh the assets and

stockholder. Uh the assets and liabilities of the trust are not to publicly disclose and are subject to change. So they basically like have this

change. So they basically like have this entity being like, "Yeah, we're guaranteeing it, but >> it's not actually them saying like, you know, they could move assets out of that trust and >> you know."

>> Yeah. Yeah. Got it. So

>> anyways, >> so I offer not as strong potentially as Netflix. You know, Netflix is good for

Netflix. You know, Netflix is good for it. It's huge company. They've already

it. It's huge company. They've already

signed a deal with a massive termination clause and they've I believe they've raised debt for this. Like they're

they're ready to rock. So, uh, bird in the hand is worth, uh, not too in the bush.

>> Yeah. The other thing is, uh, Paramount has not offered to reimburse the breakup, the termination fee. It's a

$2.8 billion fee. There's also

financing, uh, costs that they're going to have to take that Warner Brothers would have to take on if they don't, you know, complete the debt exchange. So,

>> yeah, at the end of the day, what do the >> what do the Ellison's do at this point, right? They've been they've been doing

right? They've been they've been doing deals, right? they they're they've got

deals, right? they they're they've got CBS now. They've got uh the UFC. They're

CBS now. They've got uh the UFC. They're

trying to build this streaming platform.

And uh I again going back to some of the conversations that we've had like this entire the entire strategy to date has been predicated on getting this Warner

Brothers asset.

>> Yeah. Yeah. And it seems like it might not happen, but uh game's not over. I I

I I anticipate >> announce the $1 trillion backlog.

>> Figma, think bigger, build faster. Figma

helps design and development teams build great products together. Um, also Obby Schiffman got back to us. He answered

the question. Is he leveraged up? Is he

levering up to buy billboards? He says,

"Every out ofome agent I've ever talked to has offered 50% reductions in price when doing a large-scale campaign. Most

of the inventory is actually pretty cheap if you don't focus on the most premium assets. So what ha where haven't

premium assets. So what ha where haven't you seen a friend.com billboard? The the

101. You haven't seen it, you know, in the iconic places. He hasn't done the Times Square buyout. He's in the subway, right? like like when when we saw them,

right? like like when when we saw them, you always make fun of this one. There's

one that's like up against a wall. I saw

one just at a random bus in my hometown.

It's like there's just there's just like random places, but there's so many of them.

>> Some of the alpha and out of home in LA is there's so much traffic that you're kind of moving slowly by some areas >> and you'll just see random stuff. And

so, yeah, I was kind of fighting on you fighting you on this like was this truly one of the greatest campaigns of the year? And hearing his extra context,

year? And hearing his extra context, it's it's incredible. He might have unlocked some entirely new strategy of just like the go big massive billboard campaign. And I wouldn't be I wouldn't

campaign. And I wouldn't be I wouldn't be surprised if we don't if we if we I I wouldn't be surprised if next year is the year of the copy paste this strategy for, you know, a company that has a

million dollars to spend on a big campaign. Let's do an interesting

campaign. Let's do an interesting billboard campaign.

>> Maybe they have a million dollars in revenue, too. Maybe.

revenue, too. Maybe.

>> Yes. Ideally. Ideally, yes. I mean he he clearly like it was you know he's he's like risk on exploring testing new things like learning um but uh but just

the core the core ARB of like a big billboard campaign paying off I think you got to credit him you got to check in with uh with Avi Shiffman.

>> Did you see his other post? He said SF is over. Still a beautiful place to

is over. Still a beautiful place to live.

>> Hype around LLMs has subsided. It's not

an interesting place to be anymore. Why

go to a hackathon? It's not like GPT4 just came out. There's nothing too interesting to discuss at a party anymore. All the big companies are too

anymore. All the big companies are too mature now. Most of what is new is just

mature now. Most of what is new is just why see slop startups? If you're still in preede exploring stage, it's mostly too late. The directions have been

too late. The directions have been positioned in. It's just a performative

positioned in. It's just a performative scene left. There are always a cycle to

scene left. There are always a cycle to these things and this is fine. I've

joined I've enjoyed 2022 to 2025. I

hereby declare New York the new bastion of what matters in the near future.

could not disagree more with every single pretty much every single word in here. Um it is uh uh I think this is

here. Um it is uh uh I think this is this is uh I think AI has shown you know brilliance in in some ways even though

many uh don't but uh this this was I put this up as one of the worst takes of the year.

It's just like it's literally like saying like back in in 2000 like it's like saying in the early days of the internet or in the early days of the iPhone like hey like yeah it's over.

Just don't build anything.

>> Okay. Obby underrated reason to stay in San Francisco. First Finn.ai the

San Francisco. First Finn.ai the company's headquartered up there. It's

the number one AI agent for customer service. And I know you love AI agents

service. And I know you love AI agents aviate the most complex customer service queries on every channel. Um, also, uh, you should get in, if you're bored with

the hackathon, you're bored with the YC demo day, get into shark diving. Go dive

in the bay. Put on the the seven mil wets suit. Swim out to Alcatraz,

wets suit. Swim out to Alcatraz, take on a shark head, and uh, emerge victorious. I think that will really uh,

victorious. I think that will really uh, give you the sort of the glory. You'll

be excited again. You will have survived a shark attack. that will energize you in a way that uh GPT 5.2 might not be energizing you >> totally >> fighting head-on with a great white

shark in the San Francisco Bay. That's

something you can only do in the Bay Area.

Who's making friend.com for sharks, right? Like a wearable pendant that a

right? Like a wearable pendant that a shark could use to, you know, better navigate. Maybe they're lonely out in

navigate. Maybe they're lonely out in the high seas, right? It's cold, it's dark, >> maybe, you know, in between hunts, right? They're just kind of hanging out,

right? They're just kind of hanging out, right? Maybe. Yeah, just having a having

right? Maybe. Yeah, just having a having a digital companion. Why reserve digital companions for >> why reserve those just for humans, right? Like all life, all life matter.

right? Like all life, all life matter.

Think bigger. The other thing I was thinking, why I was saying this yesterday, why has no one uh made like a tele medicine for anabolic steroids for your pets, right?

>> Somebody has, right? Wasn't isn't that a real thing? Uh you I think Tyler was

real thing? Uh you I think Tyler was saying loyal. I was saying loyal, but

saying loyal. I was saying loyal, but >> really count though. That's a

>> I want to see a golden retriever as a mass monster.

>> I think that's just a Rottweiler. Like I

think you just get that.

>> No, but nobody nobody >> a jacked.

>> Well, so I mean you can make your uh like cattle really jacked, right? That's

like what SAMs are. So you should just you couldn't you just give it to your dogs?

>> You know way too much about performance-enhancing drugs. Uh anyway,

performance-enhancing drugs. Uh anyway, um >> yeah, just saying the word SARMS is like just just say that you've been deep in bodybuilding form. Styler,

bodybuilding form. Styler, >> just say you're a day one all more plates, more dates.

>> Well, speaking of >> reream.com, one live stream, 30 plus destinations. If you want to multiream,

destinations. If you want to multiream, go to reream.com. Uh before our first live inerson guest gets to the TVP and Ultra Dump, we got to open a Christmas present. But if you have breaking news,

present. But if you have breaking news, break it down. I wanted to talk about this Christmas present.

>> Okay. Okay. We got a Christmas present from friend of the show, Sawill Bloom.

Let's open it up. It's under the Christmas tree.

Also, I got a belt on today. I'm looking

much more Santa.

>> Belted up.

>> Okay, so this is from Sawill Bloom himself. Look at this. Look at this nice

himself. Look at this. Look at this nice >> new brand alert.

>> I love this. So he said, "I got sick of putting things on my skin that I'd never put on my body. So I spent 18 months creating the perfect solution. The

perfect solution, Wild Roman. I can

smell it. Everyone says the TBP Ultrum smells bad now. Smells great. This This

actually smells fantastic. So uh Wild Roman is 100% natural skincare for men.

Made with grass-fed tallow, coldressed oils, and wild botanicals. You can order today at wildroman.com. Just want to give him a shout out and then so so this is good stuff. I've been using this for

about like two weeks.

>> Wow. I think it's working so far.

>> Two weeks on Wild Roman and you look like that.

>> Yeah. I mean I think it's been you know it's helped with like beard growth and just general skin clarity.

>> You look fantastic.

>> Yeah. You're you're glowing. You're

really glowing. Glowing from the inside out.

>> It must be the grass-fed tallow and the coldressed oils. Or maybe it's the wild

coldressed oils. Or maybe it's the wild botanicals. But it's clearly

botanicals. But it's clearly >> I just want to say never stop. really

truly never stop using this product.

Yeah. Because I do not want you to go back. I don't want you to go back. Never

back. I don't want you to go back. Never

churn. I think you're a customer for life.

>> Ne never never turn. Never turn from this. Uh anyway, what uh back to uh the

this. Uh anyway, what uh back to uh the the the show. What do you think it takes to win in this category? Saw Hills

obviously a an influencer, an author. Uh

he has a massive newsletter. He has 1.1 million followers on on X um and has an audience, but something we've been keep we keep coming back to is like an audience might not be enough to truly

win in a category. What are

>> I think he's got to go hard on target like this feel this feels like a good brand to introduce like tallow. Yes. To

the target audience, right? This feels

uh >> uh again like going going for the set bunch of products out the gates. This

this screams endcap to me.

>> Uh I I was talking to a friend and they have a brand that uh uh does over a hundred million a year only in Target.

Yeah.

>> They don't sell anywhere else.

>> Yeah.

>> Um and so it's just such a such a massive channel.

>> And so I think Sahel can probably leverage his brand to just go really hard into Target early. Mh. Uh, but I'm sure but I'm sure he can he can at least get some initial traction. Um, DTOC.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The DTOC thing is great just because it gets the business up and running. Kind of like, you know, iron out any of the kinks, get the supply chain going, you know, learn the obvious customer service questions.

>> Yeah. The main the main thing that people miss with like personalityled kind of like influencer brands like this is that >> no matter how big your audience is, you can be Kim Kardashian

>> and in order to build a truly big business, you get this initial boost from your audience, >> but uh but but the the nature of like any audience is that the longer that you

just advertise against it, you can saturate it.

Tim K can post like >> five times in the first week, but then eventually you have to go find new net new people >> uh that aren't necessarily Yeah.

>> Uh getting exposure.

>> Well, it's a fascinating uh it's a fascinating question. Anyway, um

fascinating question. Anyway, um liquidity is uh is having some fun with data bricks. Uh he says you're laughing.

data bricks. Uh he says you're laughing.

Startups are raising series L's instead of going public and you're laughing. Um

yeah, it is it is crazy. I was thinking about the the product that that data bicks is offering like the financial product that data bicks is offering like uh funny the deal director who's in the

who's in often in the chat here says replied to this and said don't be salty VCs need to get paid too >> that's it agree there is something to the fact of like of like if you have a growth fund with billions and billions

of dollars under management and you need to park a couple hundred mil in a safe place that's going to grow the C it's not some like data bricks is not like a

oh started a year ago AI company that might you know be gone if or or there's going to be some like you know different competitive pressure like it's a real company it's really going um the series the data brick series L looks pretty

good um >> oh no Trey in the chat says wait according to Reuters trying to reverse engineered ASML's EUV machine with the help of former ASML engineers and it's undergoing testing

>> that's crazy well >> well they've never done this before >> that's another good question for Doug.

We can we can get into that. Um uh I don't know. It it does feel like there's

don't know. It it does feel like there's a there's a bit of a boom in lithography machines right now. We we had one founder on the show talking about it. Uh

and it feels like that was for a long time thought of as unassalable. You

could not build a business that was that deep in the chip supply chain. It was

just too difficult. And now people are at least trying. I don't know. Maybe

they're maybe they're seeing love.

>> This is what I this is what I've always said on the like China Yeah. Nvidia or

just the China AI debate. It's like no matter how many chips you give China, they will never say, "Oh yeah, we actually want to be dependent on >> foreign >> Yeah.

>> like suppliers for this technology that's so critical to the future. We'd

love to just remain dependent." It's

like, no, they'll take the chips and they'll continue to >> uh innovate and and copy and invest to uh get to the to uh parody. I can't

believe we got a crossover between good skin care and data bricks, but is he here on the timeline? Uh FOD says the real reason Brian is trying to live forever is because he was an early investor in data bricks and is waiting

for the liquidity event. Of course,

there's probably plenty of times to to tender your shares if you want to. But

>> I got to say Brian is looking fantastic in this new image. He looks

>> 2025 is the best he's looked.

>> This is a great version the 2023.

The trough of disillusionment of disillusionment. Everyone's like, "He

disillusionment. Everyone's like, "He looks like he's dying. This can't be good."

good." >> Look at him now.

>> I think the lighting is also doing a little bit of work there, but >> yeah, but just the general skin tone.

>> He just feels more balanced, you know?

That's good. Um, well, we mentioned uh we mentioned Netflix before. Obviously,

they're trying to go for Warner Brothers, but they're going for Bar Stool Sports as well. Before we take you into this story, let me tell you about Julius AI, the AI data analyst that works for you. Join millions who use

Julius to connect their data, ask questions, and get insights in seconds.

>> Let's actually pull up the Portoi video.

>> Pull up the Portoi video. So Dave

Portoi, the founder of Bartool, says, "Breaking. I am proud to announce in our

"Breaking. I am proud to announce in our continuing 20 plus year evolution. We

are now partnering with Netflix for exclusive video podcasts." Uh, and the way he frames this in the video is remarkable. So, let's play it.

remarkable. So, let's play it.

>> Emergency press conference time. If you

haven't heard the news, I'm proud to announce that Barcel has partnered with Netflix for three of our top podcast.

Exclusive video only on Netflix starting next year. I'm talking you want to watch

next year. I'm talking you want to watch a video of part of my take Netflix. You

want to watch video of Spit and Chicklets Netflix. I actually spit

Chicklets Netflix. I actually spit there. That's just my brain. You want to

there. That's just my brain. You want to watch a video of Ryan Rillo show?

Netflix. Netflix. Netflix. Lots of

video. Audio stay the same. Video where?

Netflix. Netflix. We're proud to partner one of the best in breed companies.

That's what we do at Barcel. Evolve,

rotate evolve >> video next year, PMT chicklets, Ryan Rolo Netflix Netflix Netflix.

>> Yeah.

>> 13 in a 47 second video. 13 mentions of founders. Anyway, that's what

founders. Anyway, that's what >> out there.

>> Founders technology founders. Next time

you think, "Oh, I need to film this."

Yeah, it's amazing. I need to film this crazy c. I need a I need a studio shot

crazy c. I need a I need a studio shot of me sitting down on a couch looking all put together. Dave is sitting there with with a with a bunch of windows

behind it that are reflect reflecting one shoted this video and it's way more engaging than than him just being, you know, trying to be all professional.

But I I mean to be fair like in order to do that 20 years 20 years of experience like most people cannot just oneshot that on day one of their career on on camera. It is hard. Anyway, turbo

camera. It is hard. Anyway, turbo

puffer. Turbo puffer. Turbo puffer. If

you want serless vector and full text search, turbo puffer. If you want something built from first principles and object storage, turbo puffer. If you

want something fast, turbo puffer, turbo puffer. 10x cheaper, turbo puffer.

puffer. 10x cheaper, turbo puffer.

Extremely scalable, turbo puffer. Um,

it's a it really does work. It just

worms its way into your brain. Anyway,

the other big get for uh I guess the modern tech companies is uh the Oscars are moving to YouTube, which is a box.

>> Okay. So, explain the Oscars.

>> Okay. So, it's like, you know, how we did the award shows for, you know, random obscure achievements, journalist, yes. Uh, absolute hitter of the year.

yes. Uh, absolute hitter of the year.

Uh, it's like that. uh but for movies of course uh the Oscars for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and they said they reached a deal with YouTube for exclusive rights to show

this to to uh to the show starting in 2029. So, I mean, really feels like

2029. So, I mean, really feels like forever, but I'm sure it'll be upon us in no time, but uh probably the right time, but um does feel particular, it

hits particularly hard because it's uh it's like the whole show is about the theater. It's about the movie industry.

theater. It's about the movie industry.

Yeah. And the movie industry is saying like, "Yep, like YouTube beat us. It's

over. It's over.

>> We're so back." But also, >> it's over. Anyway, let me tell you about numeral compliance handled numeral worries about sales tax and VAT compliance so you can focus on growth.

>> Um, >> okay, let's pull up this video of of Vlad and then we'll bring in our first >> What is he holding? Is he holding an auction paddle or >> Earlier I showed one of the many weather contracts we offer on the platform.

>> Here's another one.

>> Some people have already started to realize that using prediction markets can be cheaper than conventional fire, flood, and hurricane insurance. You can

just place a trade on your on your phone without having to deal with a traditional broker. Earlier I showed

traditional broker. Earlier I showed >> many give your take. I have a take.

Let's break it down.

>> So on one hand, uh, >> give the funny take first. The funny

take is instead of buying insurance, you just >> Well, yes. Yeah. So the funny thing here is like instead of, you know, insurance is like a pretty cool product. It it

gives you a lot of peace of mind. You

pay for it once, you know, a year. just

pull pulls it out.

>> Kind of automatic. You got a policy, whatever. You don't have to think about

whatever. You don't have to think about it. In this scenario, it would be like,

it. In this scenario, it would be like, okay, you're heading into the next month and you're like, "All right, like I'm pulling up the weather charts. Like, I'm

I'm trading I'm trading on I'm I'm trading effectively, you know, >> will my house burn down?

>> Will my house burn down from a fire?"

The other problem here is like if you're betting on a fire happening in a certain area and depending on the odds and if there's a lot of volume on it, it could very well incentivize somebody to start a fire.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, it does >> in your in your neighborhood. So, I I think obviously I think prediction markets are are very cool in a lot of ways, but uh the the uh the CEOs that

have been integrating prediction markets have been coming out and giving some pretty wild examples of of their value when I think that the value is that

consumers want they want these products experiences. Yeah, I think that there is

experiences. Yeah, I think that there is a world where uh you do wind up building a like an actual financial product on top of all of this that feels a lot more normal instead of like the DIY version.

Uh but obviously it's very funny.

Anyway, we have our next guest, Sarah.

Welcome to the show and thank you for dressing up. Good to see you. Welcome.

dressing up. Good to see you. Welcome.

>> Uh you look fantastic. Feeling feeling

the Christmas spirit.

>> Move this out of the way.

the big smack.

>> What's up, guys?

>> How you doing?

>> I'm feeling good. I'm feeling the spirit.

>> I have to take my ear off so I can get the >> Yeah, it's a mess. Um,

>> those look very natural on you.

>> Yes, I know. They really do. I I I said earlier before the show started, John's more Santa coated. I'm more elf coated.

I don't know. It's just

>> Anyways, you're looking like a lot more a lot more polished.

>> I like the nails. They're like frosted nails.

>> There you go. We don't have skinare, but we've got nail art.

>> Okay, cool. Amazing.

>> Um, how did you process the storytelling uh the the storytelling cycle, news cycle yesterday? We asked pretty much

cycle yesterday? We asked pretty much everyone about storytelling. Uh, do do you did you did you I mean, I'm sure you saw the viral announcement that there's a lot of companies that are hiring people, storytellers. Is this just a

people, storytellers. Is this just a rebranding? Is this a valuable thing? If

rebranding? Is this a valuable thing? If

a if a founder came to you and said, uh, uh, my my second hire is going to be a storyteller, what would you say?

>> I'd say that's your job.

>> Okay. Yeah, actually.

>> Well, so then the question becomes, can like is it is it a skill set that you're kind of born with? You maybe start at an 80% and you can get to 100%. But if you

start at like a 10% capability wise, like you should probably just focus on other things, right? You're maybe never going to be great at that. I I was classifying it as like it feels like there's like Joe Rogan CEOs, which are

CEOs that could go on a three-hour podcast and deliver an amazing performance. some of which would be

performance. some of which would be about the business, a lot of which would just be about, you know, random stuff.

Um, but it feels like have you seen founders in your portfolio go from just okay to like truly excellent?

>> Uh, I think so. I'm an extreme growth mentality person, right? I'm like if you are smart and you are a high work ethic, like most skills are accessible to you.

>> Not everybody can, you know, be TBPN, right? But you can go from like a D to a

right? But you can go from like a D to a B+ and that does a lot for your company.

But I don't think you can outsource it.

>> And so if you take this like storytelling idea and you just kind of disagregate it a little bit, you have you have like channels that have changed right?

>> This matters and like traditional media, you know, it's it's having a time of it.

It's struggling, right? Um and so if you think about the job like does anybody want to like start off as a junior PR consultant today?

>> It's a hard job, right? Um, I'm not saying there's not room for that, but the traditional like lowgrade version of that that was I'm going to call a bunch of journalists. I'm going to repeat the

of journalists. I'm going to repeat the pitch from the company. I have no point of view. I don't really have

of view. I don't really have storytelling or taste and I'm a I'm a C.

Like, I think there's not a lot of room for that, right? Because if you think about it from the reporter's perspective, even if you think about where the attention actually is, you could be like a midsize AI influencer

>> and have as much like uh followership as a large media publication that's relevant today, right? And so I think >> and weirdly like the hardest job on our team is Nick who's somewhere around here

and that is actually just like getting inundated with pitches from from various PR teams, companies, agencies, etc. and he has like functionally he has to say

no to 95% of them just because we don't have there's not there's no time in the show to do as many as many as are coming in. So

in. So >> yeah, I think there are a lot of people now where um they like why do they call it storyteller instead of like content person or PR or whatever >> or just advertising specialist

>> or advertising specialists like uh the meta has changed, right? It's saying

like we need people with taste. um we're

chasing the moment. There's a lot of noise and we have to like create some signal even if we want the traditional channels.

>> Um and so some of it is skill set, some of it is the story about like what the job is.

>> Um but I I do think a lot of it is is hard to outsource and you can get better. We run a grant program um which

better. We run a grant program um which is like an uncapped note for 10 companies twice a year called embed and the highest rated session for the program is a storytelling session.

Interesting.

>> Right. So you come and you pitch your company and it like it goes from like a D minus to an A+ in terms of where people start.

>> But like people get a lot better in the span of a week before they do demo day.

And so I definitely >> it is rel it is relatively like structured, right? It's it's not like if

structured, right? It's it's not like if you're making a film, it's not like hey I need to reinvent the hero's journey.

Like the structure works and I think there's the same type of approach you can apply to storytelling about your company. I I would have this I would get

company. I I would have this I would get sent a deck and I'm like your idea is cool and you're great. your deck is terrible. And I would just send a Figma

terrible. And I would just send a Figma file that is like here's the deck template. Here's like an example for

template. Here's like an example for each like six examples for each slide.

Just like completely redo it and then it and then it's automatically like a few times better.

>> But you have amazing intuition for this now. Did you start great at it?

now. Did you start great at it?

>> No, I made six years old. No, no, no, no. Yeah, it's definitely uh Yeah. I

no. Yeah, it's definitely uh Yeah. I

don't I I think I started I've I've I've been sort of n naturally I've studied advertising since I was a kid. not directly but just like

kid. not directly but just like understanding like why do I want this product so much more than this product right and that started with like skateboarding and snowboarding stuff

right and so I like fully understood okay this this brand it's like their event athlete strategy the design this collaboration that they did how you know but uh but again like it was very very

refined to get to that ultimate structure that I have in Figma that I can just be like this is the structure that that has worked for me >> and it's worked for a bunch of other companies It's like tried and true. This

structure even just my personal one which I haven't shared broadly has like directly contributed to raising like hundreds of millions of dollars, right?

Um just across the years. So um I don't know. I think you can systematize it.

know. I think you can systematize it.

>> Yeah, there's art and there's alpha in it, but it's certainly something you can practice.

>> Totally.

>> Um and I think people have discovered that like you need to be good at this now. Yeah, I think that's

now. Yeah, I think that's >> Do you think people >> Well, the other the other thing I've I've noticed with like company storytelling is like >> if it is truly >> and people take you more seriously if you do it in an elf costume.

>> Yeah. Of course. Of course. Uh no, but the the thing that I've always found is like if it's really difficult to get the story out in a cohesive way, then your whole strategy is just >> effed. Like it's just bad, right? And if

>> effed. Like it's just bad, right? And if

it comes out very naturally, it means that like >> there's alignment, the strategy makes sense. But if you're like if if making

sense. But if you're like if if making the deck takes, you know, 50 hours, it's like you probably just don't have that great of a story in the first place.

Like the actual facts of the situation are not that great.

>> Yeah, this is so true for me. So the

version of it is at some point I actually thought I wanted to be a writer. Like thank God I'm not. Um I

writer. Like thank God I'm not. Um I

find writing incredibly painful, but I still have to write every week for my work as an investor. Right.

>> Like memos, LP updates.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Mostly memos. And and like the problem is writing is thinking, right? storytelling thinking, right? How

right? storytelling thinking, right? How

do I actually communicate the strategy of the business and do I believe in it?

>> And the difference between like >> I'm procrastinating, I'm avoiding writing this memo for six days in a row because I got to talk to my partners about it is I actually understand the strategy of the company or I don't.

Yeah.

>> And sometimes it's because like I just don't know enough, right? we make our first defense investment and I'm like, well, I I need to call like 45 people to understand what I don't understand about this yet in terms of the procurement process or whatever else. Like,

>> how important is electronic warfare?

Like, how quickly is this cycle going to go? Um, but uh

go? Um, but uh >> but some part isn't knowledge, it's just like does it make sense at all? Yeah.

>> And I have learned to trust that signal of like, well, if I'm not missing information and it's still like not super cohesive, it's not cuz I'm an idiot because I have to go tell this

story to recruits. and to the media um and to the next investor. And if it's hard, they're not going to get it either, right? And so I think there's

either, right? And so I think there's substance in that.

>> Yeah. I think I think part of the at least backlash or virality around the idea of >> still so funny >> to me.

>> We almost did Santa. We almost did Santa for for uh for Evan from Snap on on Monday. And

Monday. And >> for it, I not the first time. It's the

first time you're meeting someone. Like

can you really go full Santa mode? Um

but uh yeah I mean part of the reason there was like some backlash is I think people are worried about startups leaning into like over rotating to all style no substance all storytelling no

plot like you have to forget that like without some plot points you can't tell a story around it if you haven't built anything you haven't raised you know you didn't raise a funding round like a lot of the stories get get told around we

built this thing we satisfied this customer we hired these people >> you also need you also need tension you need you need some like adversity Right.

So, we'll have founders come on and we're like, "Aren't is this not >> like the most hyper competitive category?"

category?" >> And they'll be like, "No, it's not." And

then like not give like the followup as to why it is. And it's like it's okay if it's competitive if you're going to win.

>> Uh and you might be the one to win, but you it's better to just admit like it's competitive and like here's what here's what the market is like missing.

>> Uh sometimes people don't want to share whatever their alpha is, but >> yeah. So, I um I've like learned a

>> yeah. So, I um I've like learned a little bit more about I'm just going to go ahead and say marketing, advertising, storytelling, but like that category of things that has existed for a little while over time, but I'm still like >> I taught marketing at Wharton, but I'm

I'm like at my core.

>> Wow. She didn't just study no studied storytelling. I studied a little bit. Um

storytelling. I studied a little bit. Um

but uh but like I'm a product absolutist to your point of I actually had just this like pretty full contact debate with a founder in our portfolio very

recently about um how much of uh like the success of a company is its ability to raise money, get to momentum, look like it's winning to customers, look

like it's winning to hires and go faster than others. Yeah. And I'm like, well,

than others. Yeah. And I'm like, well, you know, there's some it it depends on the space, right? And uh if you're in

take an example like like late 2010 SAS, >> the degree of freedom you have for like what you're going to go build in any given category. Not to denigrate the

given category. Not to denigrate the product work. It's just like you can

product work. It's just like you can only do so much without fundamental technology change if you have certain integration points and certain workflows. Totally. And you can have

workflows. Totally. And you can have amazing execution there. But I'm like, you know what? you probably want to do invest in people who understand the workflow, have amazing execution, and are total animals about like storytelling and momentum and all of

that, right? Um, and that doesn't mean

that, right? Um, and that doesn't mean there's no substance. It's just like >> Well, there there's like there's not as much creativity.

>> That doesn't sound like 2010 advice, though. That sounds like advice today.

though. That sounds like advice today.

>> No, no, no. Okay. So, today I would argue actually like >> is it different?

>> Yes. Okay. Um, so

>> there's more white I mean 20 late 2010 SAS there was no there it was struggling to find whites space. I think like if you if you look at >> the things you build were not that different.

>> Well, yeah. The 2021 era, you saw this like it was crypto and fintech, sure there was a lot of SAS, but like even with fintech, >> there wasn't there w there was some new

infrastructure with fintech that made it easier, but yet that you were still competing with companies that started five, six years ago. And so that was that was just really rough. And so I think the difference today is like we

have super powerful LLMs, we have machines that can think. And so maybe there's like a little bit more like kind of random white space and categories that you can >> uh find and and go digging in.

>> I I was talking to um an investor friend yesterday about this and he like we were discussing whether or not um you just want to invest in the smartest people you could within some constraints of like they can convince other people to

come to their cause and and such. And

I'm like I actually think this is a much better strategy now than it was in the late 2010s 2020 period. Yeah. because

you're like >> well the r the variance on what you can build is really wide right and that's both information and like ability creativity people are trying to you know

they're trying to build very different products even in software and it depends on like what you think you can do with models >> or robots or hardware whatever it is right and I think it's just like broader and if if you can do more different

things with product it matters more so substance matters more than ever >> yeah storytelling too >> if you believe in the midwit meme then you should invest in the smartest founders, but also the dumbest founders because who knows, they might lock into

the same thing. No, I don't think >> I think I think that I think I think that works. I think that works in CPG

that works. I think that works in CPG actually. I think it works in CPG. I've

actually. I think it works in CPG. I've

seen some people on on both sides do very very well and in the middle it's like innovating on four to four to five different dimen dimensions. It's like

way too complicated uh and and tends to uh >> anyway uh tell me what is a Neolab?

Okay. So, there's this category of company that has been um you know a handful of these things have been funded this year that are quite controversial in the investing community which is essentially like >> we're going to raise a solid amount of

money let's say you know $50 hundred million plus and uh we are going to invest in largecale AI research and training upfront.

>> Yeah.

>> Um >> so not a rapper company >> uh not a rapper company though we can come back to that. Um, and I think this is like one of the reasons it's so interesting is because you had this

dominant narrative for a lot of the last couple years of just like how could you compete with Google and OpenAI.

>> Yeah.

>> And maybe people threw anthropic in there.

>> Yeah. Yeah. And then that was the first and it's notable because you have you have if you're if you're >> trying to build like a new LLM or maybe have some new ideas around that type of product and people are already saying like

>> oh open AI can't compete with Google because Google has all this cash flow and even though they have like almost a billion weekly activives like they're burning so much money and then and then you get a new company a neolab that's like oh yeah we're also going to compete

and we don't have any users and we have a fraction of the money and so that's why I think it's been like almost a narrative violation if you're going to like or or at least like contrarian to say like no we actually are going to bet

even more into this >> point of clarification uh thinking machines SSI anthropic are those neolabs or are the neolabs post those labs

>> I think the definition would be post those labs but that was the first generation of this because they also fought that narrative um like and opening I did before them totally right

um and so I think this is like this big open question in venture investing like it it opens a can of worms of like >> well how much money do you need to go do venture investing at conviction I got to

say like 14 times like we would argue not that much necessarily if you're very early but um >> no it changes the economics completely to like growth fund you need to be able to build a position because it used to

be you could take a flyer for two you know get get 10 company for a couple million bucks and if that's just not going to happen on day one it's just the economics just don't works, right?

>> Yeah.

>> So, so is that changing your fund or have you figured out a way? How are you thinking?

>> It's it's not for us. Um and you know, we have supported some new research lab efforts, but um I I think that's also a tactical thing of how early you are. Um

and um but but I think the the broader thing that is really interesting is this narrative violation or question of uh is scale the only thing that matters? And

um and like if you're going to spend the GDP of a medium-sized country on training, can anybody keep up with you?

Um or >> even even if so, Greg had a video that came out yesterday or this morning where uh at OpenAI and he was just saying uh we've tried everything but scale and

scale is the thing that works, right?

And so again, it's it's very contrarian to be like, well, no, we actually can come up with you're basically if you're raising $100 million to compete >> Yeah. with these other labs. You're

>> Yeah. with these other labs. You're

saying like we don't need scale just because you're never going to be able to compete on scale when these anthropic and open AI are running away in the capital markets.

>> You know, the I think one of the more nuanced arguments about these things has been uh let's say a bunch of people can go raise hundreds of millions to billions of dollars to you know hundred

billion dollar plus which is a wild claim to begin with. Um, even so, like where you spend that money matters, not just size, right? Um, and so like one of the things that's happened with open-

source is that there are uh large pre-trained models, some Chinese, some European, now hopefully more and more American ones, um, that people work with and are really powerful. Like the big

joke that Silicon Valley runs on Qu >> and they're like distilling them. um

they're distilling them and and they're also I think if you're a research lab you tend to be post-training or just trying entirely different architectures and and like so people are the argument I think goes something along the lines

of you know more is better eventually right like I do need the GDP of Japan >> in compute but on day one um Ilia Sutsker basically said this like in the

age of research we need some amount of money to just validate our ideas >> but it's not a trillion dollars >> yeah I I And his interview I took away.

He's like kind of like we're going to do couple million here, couple million here, couple million here. Maybe

>> it's a little bigger than that. But

>> yeah. Okay. Okay. But but the idea is like he's not just like we're oneshotting we're going to try to oneshot this with 60% of the dollars that we've raised. It's much more again experimental research driven.

>> Yeah. And and then I think the second part of the argument of like you know we're we're doing actually new things versus fighting symmetric warfare with Ant or OpenAI which is like seem

seemingly a bad idea in Google you know money machine >> um is that uh if you have these pre-trained models like we can just focus if you have the GDP of Japan and you have the GDP of Germany and you know

I have some other equivalent country California right >> let's give it up for California >> let's go California we love you >> total failure of governance, an accident of history, but it's the best place in the world.

>> We're still cooking.

>> Still cooking. Still cooking. Um, thank

you, uh, semiconductors. Um but uh but if everybody has some huge amount of money and I put it all toward post-training or self-improvement or

diffusion or SMS or some other bet and you're like serving inference and also doing pre-training and whatever else.

Yeah. Then like my effort on the thing that matters might be bigger than your effort even if you have more money overall. That's the story.

overall. That's the story.

>> Let me pitch you on a fund thesis and I want you to push back on it potentially or agree with it. Um, so I I have a >> Wait, tell me now and then let me do it.

Tell >> the world. I don't know. Uh, you know, let's say I have like, you know, a billion dollar fund. I'm going to put a hund00 million in 10 of these NEO labs.

One, you know, $100 million each.

They're all going to go and try different ideas. And my thinking is, you

different ideas. And my thinking is, you know, 10% chance one of them goes really, really big. Um, but but I but I'm also underwriting these on talent acquisitions. Yeah. And I say that, hey,

acquisitions. Yeah. And I say that, hey, for, you know, I'm not going to lose money on basically any of these, even though I'm paying crazy prices at seed for just a couple people with barely an

idea. Um, I'm going to get a lot of

idea. Um, I'm going to get a lot of money out because the because the big hyperscalers are going to continue to acquire. Yeah. Are you telling me I

acquire. Yeah. Are you telling me I think that party's over or do you think no, there's going to be an endless stream of billion-dollar acquisitions coming out of the hyperscalers?

>> Yeah. It's like shoot for the moon. Even

if you miss, you'll land in in Satcha's arms. Yes. Is that true?

Yes. Is that true?

>> Um I do think that is part of the calculus that's happening here where the distribution of outcomes is like >> how you know without naming names but

how many people want to hire Ilia or Mir Maratti or Barrett or any of these folks that have started new labs like a lot of people that could have >> um that think that winning an AI race is

very valuable to them.

>> Yeah. So, so, so you think that the the hyperscalers definitely aren't uh like exhausted of these like lab tuckins, lab tuckins lab.

>> Well, and I think my point of view is like as long as you have a bunch of people spending something in the range of a hundred billion dollars a year and they believe that by spending a billion dollars to acquire a team that they can

make that >> money go further, there's a good chance that they will. It's always been >> if there's if there's a again if there's like a pullback and new information then you start to run the calculus of like

>> well we're actually cutting spend and we've figured out what we need to figure out and just adding five new smart people to the team is not going to give us that much of an edge in this market.

Mhm.

>> Yeah. I think this is exactly right where um one of the craziest reframings of this to me made by somebody at a large lab with a a lot of money to spend

is like just imagine Jordy as a researcher and like his GPU budget for experimentation is $100 million personally. Yeah.

>> Right.

>> Um >> and I have to give that to him all the time. Right. So he works four years $400

time. Right. So he works four years $400 million.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Otherwise, you start looking around. You say

looking around. You say >> else.

>> Well, and and the question is like, well, then how much am I willing to pay for Jordy or the talent that is >> 1% better, 10% more likely to like make the thing work? Actually, a lot of

money, right? Because it like the way

money, right? Because it like the way the um I'm not saying that you should start your growth fund with this risk calculus. It takes a, you know, certain

calculus. It takes a, you know, certain um >> uh strength of gut, right? Um, but

it's it's not irrational to be like these players have already committed to spend x billion dollars of compute over the next years and they will look at the people as leverage on that compute.

>> Totally.

>> And so like I don't I mean lots of things can happen in the macro and people can change their minds and some of these like contracts are um on performance, right? Like they're not

performance, right? Like they're not like fully solid but the way it looks now I'd be like I think people are going to keep spending money here. So, you're

probably safe with your fund.

>> Amazing. No financial advice.

>> If the fund pans out, I'm going big on Christmas. What should I give to all of

Christmas. What should I give to all of the founders in my portfolio who have made me so much money? What how do you think about gifting? Is there a top gift recommendation for this Christmas

season? Is there anything that you can

season? Is there anything that you can share about top gifts?

>> Yes.

>> Uh is there anything you can think about?

>> Look at Yeah. Look at the Christmas theme on this, too. We got Santa Claus.

You know, this is a gift to advertising.

I learned recently that Coke made the uh modern >> We fact checked this. It's not

>> They solidified it. No, they solidified it. They solidified it. They like they

it. They solidified it. They like they basically like the whole stick.

>> They didn't create the meta, but they they owned it.

>> They owned it. They story told around it.

>> Yeah, >> they story told around it over substance.

>> So, so gift guide or maybe like a book recommendation that you could put under the tree if you I I always like giving books. Uh what what do you have? What do

books. Uh what what do you have? What do

you think?

>> No, I'm a I'm a big uh books person. Um,

I want people to give me time and books and nobody seems to be able to give me time. So, um,

time. So, um, >> that's deep.

>> Whoa, that's crazy.

>> Yeah, my my husband hates this. He's

like, "What do you want for Christmas?

Do you want like uh stuff? Do you want jewelry?" I'm

uh stuff? Do you want jewelry?" I'm

like, "No, I want time." And he's like, "You a terrible answer.

>> Maybe you should get you a luxury watch on getbasel.com, our sponsor. What's

better? The only way you can get time is if you get a watch on getbazzle.com." Of

course. What are you what are you uh how are you processing >> the ad >> how are you processing the current moment and like what are you what are you looking out for in the next 12 months?

>> Okay.

>> It feels like it's hard to think that we could go things could get crazier.

>> I disagree.

>> Can I give one book recommendation and then we'll like talk about 26? Um okay

only one. Um no I'm going to give you three. So I think uh I think Dan Wang's

three. So I think uh I think Dan Wang's book Breakneck on China and the US was really good. It's worth reading. It's

really good. It's worth reading. It's

like a little stylized but I think like really substantive actually just good storytelling I suppose. Um there's a book on immua like I think a lot of people are suddenly like interested in biotech.

>> Okay.

>> I'm not saying that's bad. I think

biotech is amazing and it will get a lot more impactful and like more efficient and but uh the book is called um I think it's called for blood and money >> but it's about uh

>> great title. Yeah. I'm interested.

>> Yeah. No, it's it's sexy. I think

>> it doesn't sound like a textbook.

>> Yeah. as hot as and interesting as a book can be about a non-technical founder of like a breakout leukemia drug, like this is worth reading.

>> Okay. Very cool. Very cool.

>> Um and then um if anybody Okay, I mean this is a lot of tech nerds in this audience. So if anybody hasn't read

audience. So if anybody hasn't read Masters of Doom.

>> Okay.

>> Um this this is a story of like the like the >> Carmarmac, right?

>> Best era of the video game industry.

Carmarmac worth reading.

>> All right. These are great.

>> Um >> Masters of Doom is great.

>> Okay. Actually, I have one more niche one. There's also the Prince of Persia

one. There's also the Prince of Persia book by Stripe Press. That's a good one in that Masters of Doom.

>> No, I haven't read it. No, I'm excited.

>> That's sort of like similar similar theme.

>> Okay, I'm going to screw up this title because it's >> Speaking of storytelling, I mean the the story of a individual video game is particularly great because it's a tech company, but it's always hard to tell the story of a full tech company that just keeps going and going and going.

And the video game companies, they do, but you can also tell just the story of that one game.

>> Yeah. Like multi-year project.

>> Exactly. No one's like, "Oh, yeah, we needed to talk about like, you know, the story of Figma in 2018 specifically."

Like it's like this whole it's such a broader arc.

>> Yeah.

>> Anyway, other book recommendations or we go in 26 predictions.

>> Okay. Maybe last niche one.

>> Yeah.

>> But we could do the rest of the episode this way. Um the uh there's a book I I'm

this way. Um the uh there's a book I I'm really interested in like what environments make for good ideas, >> right? And like consistently good ideas

>> right? And like consistently good ideas because >> part of like extreme growth mentality is you think environment matters. like ah

>> how do we like help people create the environment where they're doing their best work?

>> Um there is a book called Apprentice to Genius.

>> Um and it's about uh a series of researchers at NIH and John's Hopkins that had like just huge contributions to biology, chemistry, science for a while,

like way more than you should have in just a small lab over like decades.

Yeah.

>> And um >> was it the funue of the building or something? What about the environment?

something? What about the environment?

Were it obviously like the academic environment?

>> Yeah, I think it's a I think >> even a couple key people that were kind of like around during that period.

>> It is definitely about um a couple key people, but the question is like how come their students also are like Nobel Prize winners, right? Because it's hard to imbue the next person with like magical creativity.

>> Let's go win a Nobel Prize. Here's the

playbook.

>> Yeah, but like three times in a row, man. Um and so I think

man. Um and so I think >> just look at this deck. Study this deck.

Yeah.

>> Study this Figma file for an hour and you'll be >> It's actually an online course now.

>> Yeah.

>> Nobel Prize for $1,000 >> for a grand >> with with uh cloner payments attached.

So, >> how did I get this Lambo? I won a Nobel Prize and then they sold a course on how to win a Nobel Prize.

>> The course is $9.99.

>> Yeah. Yeah.

>> Yeah. How are you what are you looking forward to this next year? What are you What are you kind of wary of?

Um, I think all the other investors should like go away and leave AI alone.

>> Okay.

>> Yeah. And then it's over everyone. It's

over.

Sorry. The demand.

>> Look at the Oracle stock price. That's

That's what's happening here.

>> Clean.

>> No. If I can't move the markets that way. Uh, no. I uh

way. Uh, no. I uh

>> Okay. Here. I I have really high conviction that like, >> you know, 26 is going to be a year of a bunch of new applications of AI. And

that doesn't mean that there won't be like market panic or um some bumps. Of

course, people like claim it's winter, but uh I think there's now so much proof that the models are powerful in a bunch of different domains.

>> Um and it starts with ones that maybe are not like so obviously commercial. Um

you know, reneech aside, people are like, what can you do with math? Right?

I feel like, oh, here's my prediction for 26 that you can like come back to me on is um uh I think somebody out there is going to make a lot of money, like hundreds of millions of dollars on AI trading,

>> like it's not happening at that scale yet, but people are certainly going to try and I I see no reason that would >> But but but do you think that would happen on Wall Street? Will there just be like a pod that is like training

models or is that like a startup in Silicon Valley because they're very different cultures?

>> I I would love to see it be a startup.

It would be fun if it was our team, but I think it's gonna be who knows.

>> I think people are already trying it in lots of different environments.

>> I have talked to some I've talked to some high frequency traders who are just like, "Yeah, I worked at I worked at Meta and like Meta's better at machine learning than we are." I don't know if that's like

we are." I don't know if that's like holds across the entire industry, but I do think that like the the the adtech industry might be better even though the high frequency trading industry is like a little sexier and a little bit like more discreet.

>> Yeah. One reason you might see a startup do it is just because the labs have been and just like the west coast has been recruiting from some of these >> trading firms on the east coast >> and so they already have the experience

and then they like hey we made something that's pretty smart maybe maybe >> and we're seeing like I I think NASDAQ announced like 24-hour trading and there is a lot of volatility >> just in general. So

>> yeah, >> last question for me. Do you uh we we've been wrestling with this debate over whether uh some of these AI tools become like video games. We talked to the founder of Sunno and it's like and

Midjourney is similar where there's a lot of people that are using Midjourney as a proumer tool. There's other people that are using Midjourney just as like a game like they have an idea for a funny image they make it and then they're

satisfied when they get that image that they created. I think there's a lot of

they created. I think there's a lot of people that are creating songs on Sununo and then just enjoying them themselves and they're not actually sharing them anywhere. Yeah. Uh do you think that

anywhere. Yeah. Uh do you think that like the how do you how are you think about the nature of like Gen AI interfacing with like proumer maybe new consumer flows this like gamification?

Is any of that resonating from you or any of the portfolio companies?

>> Yeah. Okay. So one thing I have as I think it's inspiring as an idea is that um most people are much more creative than they get to express in daily life

right if you are uh a creative of any type like people have more ideas and points of view than they have tools and skills to go execute >> and so if AI allows people in images and

music and video I don't know if it's a good thing in writing with slot but or or code even right like if you can make things at a much higher level.

>> Yeah.

>> Then you're like you're going to enjoy making things and making more things, right? Like I you know what's the like

right? Like I you know what's the like saying inside every adult is an artist like because who doesn't draw?

>> I feel like some people just don't know what the process >> like people that get viewed as like creative people are often people that just take two very different ideas and

put them into one idea or take something that's working and make it different.

And I think once people I've seen people in their head kind of like unlock that concept and then they realize like oh I can be creative because like here's a product that I like. What if I made it healthy >> here, you know?

>> But did they make Santa or did they clear what if we made a soda and then marketed it with by creating Santa Claus?

>> And we're back to storytelling.

>> I guess uh one question uh maybe fun prediction. How much do you how many

prediction. How much do you how many dollars do you think will be spent on ads within LLMs? Mhm.

>> Next year, >> do you think next year?

>> I think it's a little early.

>> Little early.

>> That's that's my feeling. Like I could see it ramping in the back half of the year and like actually because I think the ads are going to be extremely in effective. People are saying like, "Oh,

effective. People are saying like, "Oh, a lot of these queries are not that high intent. It's just research."

intent. It's just research."

>> But I think that a lot more of them I I think a meaningful amount are product research and once you're driving these sort of like high intent clicks, >> I think it will scale pretty quickly.

But I think it will take I think it will I think this will be like a second half of the year 2026 story as it starts to scale. But we've had founders on the

scale. But we've had founders on the show that have said like when somebody lands on my site from Chad GBT they can convert at 7% and my average conversion

rate is like 3%. So it's like >> I think people don't quite um I think when it happens it's going to happen really fast. And the question is just

really fast. And the question is just like how quickly can the companies with a bunch of traffic build any kind of product because the inventory is going to be so good. And I think it's useful

to look at um open evidence as a like precursor here. So it has been reported

precursor here. So it has been reported that the company went from like 2 to 150 million of ad run rate already.

>> Oh yeah it's fully ad supported. This is

LLM for doctor ad business in AI today.

>> Right. I forgot about that.

>> And like what happened? They made a product that was free that was so useful to doctors because you're literally answering the question of like, well, I don't know what's happening in this area of like personalized medicine for this

domain of oncology for this type of patient, right? I'm from Wisconsin, so

patient, right? I'm from Wisconsin, so we'll use Wisconsin as an example. Like,

>> uh, I am a doctor in rural Wisconsin that's never seen this type of leukemia, right? Um, so I'm going to ask Open

right? Um, so I'm going to ask Open Evidence for help. Guess what? Like,

that's a really high intent >> Yeah. query to go serve ads against

>> Yeah. query to go serve ads against here's a treatment. Yeah. Um and and so I think when you compare that to the ad inventory that exists in the world which is just like um look at a bunch of

random stuff. My average query is two

random stuff. My average query is two words or whatever like I I think that >> and there's some there's some amount of there's there's a level of trust that I think someone will have with open evidence that they maybe don't have with Google search.

>> Totally. Yeah. They understand what the sources are. Yeah.

sources are. Yeah.

>> It's it's you know research trials etc. It's generated data from other doctors.

So I think um I think that if you can make the right products here it's going to be very big. The my only question is like how how quickly they make those ad products.

>> Last last question are you long or short forward deployed engineer like the model?

>> Um I think it is a uh symptom of how quickly AI is happening. And so like if the long is people are gonna pay for a

lot of FTE next year, huge bull, right?

Um >> so maybe more like 2027, 2028.

>> 2028 I think like in the long run like you should deliver that as a product and people are going to, >> right? I don't I I don't think um uh I

>> right? I don't I I don't think um uh I think FD happens when people don't have a transition happens too quickly or they don't have the talent or the ability organizationally to do like change

management the corporate term but it's real right it's really hard to like >> completely transform uh an asset manager or a big public company and so like

that's what you're paying for in 26 and 27 and maybe 28 but I think eventually it's going to be product.

>> Yep. Well, thank you so much for coming and fantastic. Merry Christmas.

and fantastic. Merry Christmas.

>> Merry Christmas.

>> Hit the gong. Hit the gong for conviction.

>> For conviction, all the progress you've made. And we will bring in Doug Olaflin.

made. And we will bring in Doug Olaflin.

>> The president of semi analysis is coming on TVPN. Uh while we bring him in from

on TVPN. Uh while we bring him in from the reream waiting room, let me tell you about graphite.dev code review for the age of AI. Graphite helps teams on GitHub ship higher quality software

faster. And we've been keeping Doug

faster. And we've been keeping Doug waiting, but let's bring him in to the TBPN Ultradome. Doug, how are you doing?

TBPN Ultradome. Doug, how are you doing?

Whoa, look at that.

>> Outer fantastic.

>> Galactic Doug, >> I'm so glad was delivered. It looks fantastic on

was delivered. It looks fantastic on you.

>> It it dude, it's great. I've been

telling we're going to make some analysis like we're going to try to do this merch. It's so good.

this merch. It's so good.

>> I got it yesterday. I actually didn't realize I was on today. I just wore it today for work. I'm like, I'm not I'm not joking. And then I was like, "Oh my

not joking. And then I was like, "Oh my god, my schedule, my calendar. I'm doing

this." I was like, "Dude, this is perfect."

perfect." >> Yeah. I mean, we were we were talking uh

>> Yeah. I mean, we were we were talking uh and and Tyler was like, "Oh, did you book Doug specifically because you knew that Amazon was going to do this deal with OpenAI. He's the perfect person to

with OpenAI. He's the perfect person to talk to."

talk to." >> We booked Doug. We love Doug. I said,

"No, they did the deal because they knew Doug was going on TBPN on Wednesday, December 17th. They were like, "We got

December 17th. They were like, "We got to give him something to talk about.

Let's do a deal." And so Sam and Andy, they got together and they were like, "This is good content for TBPN and semi- analysis." Anyway, uh take us through

analysis." Anyway, uh take us through your reaction to the deal. And if you could actually just start with like setting the table on where are we on the

Traium narrative? Is it good? Is it bad?

Traium narrative? Is it good? Is it bad?

Is it like what do we know? What how is it changing? What's the updated thinking

it changing? What's the updated thinking around just Amazon's chip efforts?

>> So, I think it's pretty good. Uh we

wrote an article about Trrenium 3. We

think it's going to be a lot better than Trrenium 2, mostly because there's a lot of interaction and help with uh from the the labs themselves. And let's not forget um Oh my god, it's beautiful.

Let's not forget uh one of my favorite parts of this whole story is everyone's like, "Okay, we wrote about the TPU article and people hated it because we said, "Oh, it's a it's a Reuben clickbait." Where did all the TPU

clickbait." Where did all the TPU engineers go? A lot of them went to

engineers go? A lot of them went to Tranium. So,

Tranium. So, >> this is too this brain rot's too Nvidia focused. I botched it.

focused. I botched it.

>> We wanted to give you some brain rot. We

wanted to put the brain rot directly in the show because we've been we've been enjoying the brain rot edits and we thought what if we did it live but my prompting was maybe below below standard

but I like the is it a cake or not.

>> That's pretty good. I honestly forgot about the is it a cake.

>> Anyway, sorry. Uh just resetting on on training. You wrote the article.

training. You wrote the article.

Obviously there was like a bunch of back and forth but uh but but how are you thinking about it currently?

So look, I think uh we actually in in the semi analysis uh premium, you know, product that I managed, we definitely we kind of made a a call that we thought there would be some kind of announcement

open eye um at reinvent mostly because and like first principles here's what it is. Uh data center execution is starting

is. Uh data center execution is starting to become a real issue. Oracle's

delayed, fairwater's delayed, corores and core is delayed. And you know who is not delayed? Um Amazon. Amazon has like

not delayed? Um Amazon. Amazon has like their execution is flawless when it comes to data center and power and they're I think they're going to put like 56 gigawatts online next year. It's

a big number like a huge number. Wow.

>> Um >> and so OpenAI is always trying to secure more compute at at every single point in time and who has the most power available to them and has a project uh

that they you know obviously are very interested in getting more customers for. I think OpenAI's power constraint

for. I think OpenAI's power constraint is going to like that's one of the reasons why the deal and then also you know OpenAI is always down for fresh money at this point in time. They're

like uh they're hitting up Disney, they're hitting up Soft Bank, everyone who has money, >> they're trying to get money investment from. So that's kind of like a you know

from. So that's kind of like a you know a win-win for them.

>> Okay. So the question that I was kicking around was there's a there's there's this $10 billion investment into OpenAI

from Amazon. Simultaneously OpenAI has

from Amazon. Simultaneously OpenAI has around 38 37 billion of commitments with AWS over a series of years. And my my

question is like how how do we see how do you think about the way the way OpenAI will be working with uh with AWS

and uh and Tranium chips broadly? Is it

something where they can basically make all of their models multi-platform and run them and kind of create one fluid compute uh resource, a pool of compute

that that can fluidly shift across tranium and GPU from Nvidia or are they going to sort of take the Tranium chips and have a specific model like maybe

they'll do their video generation over there or their image generation or they have old 40 workloads that are sticking around longer than they expected. Let's

replplatform that model to Tranium and have it run really cheaply on Tranium or something like that. Like is it a per per use uh partnership or is it something that cuts across the entire

org? Do you have any visibility into

org? Do you have any visibility into that?

>> Did we lose audio?

>> I'm not hearing I'm not hearing Doug.

>> Lost him.

>> Uh oh. How about now? How about now?

>> We're good. Okay, we're back. or so back um uh I I don't think we have perfect visibility first and foremost but you can look at someone who's already doing that which is anthropic uses TPUs they

they use GPUs and they use trainium and so there's a certain level that you can abstract it at and I think TPUs for example is trying to do it on torch TPU

right so at PyTorch and I I think um having the multiple compute like elastic pools of compute is good for negotiating power and that's probably in OpenAI's interest but It's like a pain in the ass

to get this to work. So, there's like a two two brains. Um, one, if you're really focused, you just buy more of one and be the best at it. Um, two, uh, at the same time, you get to pay less gross margins if you can kind of diversify

your suppliers instead of just one. Um,

it's possible. Anthropic has shown you that they people can do it. They already

have. And that's probably what we Yeah.

So, that's kind of my brain. I I think it really comes down to the power constraint dude.

>> Mhm.

>> That's what Amazon has that no one else has. And that's like that's the art of

has. And that's like that's the art of the deal if that makes sense. And also

>> is that is that a refer is that uh like does that tell me that Amazon was more excited about the AI buildout a year or two ago? They didn't pause when Sachi

two ago? They didn't pause when Sachi Nadella went through that pause. Or is

it just Amazon's been building sort of linearly growing growing growing for a decade two decades and so this is just more of the same what we should have predicted from Amazon. Do you have do

you have an idea of like is this them catching up? Is this them just

catching up? Is this them just maintaining their level of excitement?

>> Well, I mean, if you look at Oracle's like backlog enhancement, they were basically saying we're going to build AWS in like a couple years. Meanwhile,

AWS has, you know, multi-deade head start and it's like, yeah, we're also >> that like imagine they're thinking like we're going to we're going to build that capacity too and

>> you're welcome to like, you know, have your deal with Oracle, but uh it makes sense that Amazon can kind of like beat them to the to the punch.

>> Yeah, I think that that's uh I think what Jordy said is probably more down the more realistic what's happened. So

like last year we had the pause from Microsoft um obviously it's a big deal but even before the pause u Microsoft at the infrastructure level was never as

sophisticated from Azure versus AWS. AWS

um is the OG all-in-house did everything themselves and has like a very reactive and like battle tested infrastructure and like hey they're the largest logistics company in the United States.

They're one of the largest logistic companies in the entire world. before

all this AI stuff, they had the biggest amount of compute and the biggest uh you know the biggest infrastructure shell and all like the whole pipeline and platform and all of this. And I think that that's the like pretty much they

finally got everything turned in the right direction with a focus on more AI and then you're seeing the the results of that about a year and a half later like right but you're you're while Microsoft pulled back they pushed ahead

and then now all of their long-term investments are going to start to bear fruit meaningfully in 26 and 27. So

that's the I think that that's the simplistic way to think about it. Um

when I work when I talk to and I work with people who have worked with let's say and this is like from the before times you know before GPUs uh the difference between AWS and Azure is like

you know junior varsity varsity like they're a totally different league and I think that that's uh that's that and and you don't bet against AWS's infra uh infrastructure like execution there.

We've seen almost like like Oracle is a perfect example dude. It's been delay after delay after delay. Like these

timelines are starting to be pushed out and >> and we think that that's going to become like you know more than just like trying to find power. It's just like converting that power into a powered shell seems to have a real execution risk and I think

Amazon is more money good from that perspective.

>> How did you process the AWS uh like direct pipe to GCP news? It seems like they're maybe trying to get into more like cross data center training. I know

Google uh has some experience there is AWS. Is that is that something that the

AWS. Is that is that something that the the big labs are demanding at this point? Like because they're also

point? Like because they're also multicloud like are there any special um offerings other than or is it really just like hey we just have capacity and no one else does and that's enough.

>> I mean I think I think the labs probably demand it. Um, and historically the the

demand it. Um, and historically the the biggest rake that everyone got paid or like had to pay in these in the multi cloud world was egress and ingress. Um,

I don't like this is like I don't know you remember maybe 2019 everyone was like oh these freaking egress fees are like too high and that's kind of um I think >> that's like kind of how what they did is they forced all the data to stay inside

their data centers and they charged you like crazy to open the door. I think um I think that's just kind of breaking because they're they're seeing that like the customers absolute size is so large

and they need so much demand that you have to pay. You know, how do you win these customers? Well, you need to build

these customers? Well, you need to build a pipeline, a door to your your data center, especially if your data center isn't where they started at and they're, you know, their data lives in Azure and

not in AWS. Uh right, you want to have a door to uh AWS because up until now it was everything lived in AWS. So, I think that's kind of the story there. Um yeah,

I think I definitely think the multi- data center uh multi-data center training and inference probably like to a certain extent is like maybe not inference but like that's part of the story too. I also think um maybe even

story too. I also think um maybe even rolling back to the previous question in terms of like there was a paper or article where maybe it was like a conversation that Enthropic had where there are different models that have

different TCOs and different values at um on different hardware. So like

certain types of hardware I think is much more profitable on certain types of memory bound and or like flops bound and so I do think having all those different

options is going to have um a better co cost per use per model per hardware and so that's I think that that's going to be a like strategically valuable thing going forward in terms of like lowering the cost AI.

>> Do you ac uh expect to see any announcements on the commerce side between open AI and Amazon? Uh we were talking earlier uh it feels like this could be a scenario where like Disney

invested in OpenAI and in exchange uh as part of that Disney is giving them a one-year exclusive on all that IP which is like an insane I think underrated

advantage with Amazon. You can imagine chatbt openai has been working since inception to like be able to monetize uh some of the product uh like some of the

purchasing that they are driving across the internet and could be but at the same time Amazon is a $60 billion like ad business and they want to protect that and that's based on people landing on Amazon and searching for products

there.

My impulse is no. No way, man. That's

like the, you know, that's like the unassalable. That's the unassalable. So,

unassalable. That's the unassalable. So,

yeah. It's the golden goose. Why would

you let Why would you let the fox into the into the house? Like, just no way.

No way.

>> Yeah. So, so the weaker weaker companies have the Etsies of the world have said like, "Yeah, we we'll do it because we >> they more to win."

>> Yeah.

>> Your background makes it look like you're in space. Are you developing a thesis around data centers in space or is that coming? I know you probably

don't want to leak too much alpha on this particular show, but how are you thinking about it? What's the timeline?

Is there going to be a space denator data center model for sale anytime soon?

>> So, you're talking I'm from the space data center team, research team at SM analysis right now on the ISS. Yeah. Um,

and and and I'm >> Santa Tracker online.

>> Santa Tracker online. Um, and uh I'm going to be honest with you, I'm a space data center hater. I'm a huge space data I'm a I'm a giant hater. I'm sorry. I

know. I know Gavin talked about it.

Gavin's really intelligent and like a very wellspoken smart individual in the space. But like guys, it is hard to

space. But like guys, it is hard to train a model on Earth today.

>> It's hard enough to train a model.

>> It's hard. It's hard to build a box and put some chips in it and plug it in and on Earth.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. It's It's Dude, we're telling me that we have power delays on Earth.

>> Yes.

>> What is going to happen? Like we you know, >> it is hard to square those things. Um

and so and so and so hater hater >> I mean the push back there would obviously be like there's a lot of energy in space solar energy but but

again it it uh I just felt like there was like a very organized uh effectively narrative pump >> tied to this uh >> I I mean do you want to know why? Come

on. I can tell you the answer. I could

tell you the answer. It's cuz space uh SpaceX is racing. Yeah,

>> you got to remember what bagger what bag is being pumped at any given time. And

the fact that you heard the SpaceX round come out maybe a few weeks later is not um it's that like >> it wasn't it was within the same week.

It was the same week that the $800 billion round like details came out. I

could see them raising more now because they've announced the like target 1 a.5

trillion. So like that that just creates space for like the preIPO round which could land at easily a trillion or north of a trillion now that all these people

realize like hey it's going to go out I'm going to have like a a shorter liquidity timeline. Uh and so yeah, I

liquidity timeline. Uh and so yeah, I would expect, you know, more >> I I think that's part of it, but also uh you know, if we're talking about data centers in space, there's only one service provider, right? The whole So

like, you know, one of the reasons why I'm like a hater of data centers in space is like, hey, um like, you know, a 3,200 lb or whatever a one ton GB200 on

Earth costs a lot of money. Uh 10x the cost to get it into space, right? Um but

if a space data center was to ever happen, right? uh there's only one

happen, right? uh there's only one company that has really lowered the cost of moving something from on Earth into space. And so if that was to even be

space. And so if that was to even be part of the TAM, uh all of that TAM would belong to SpaceX. So that's my that's that's that's my belief at least is that like when when these like large

narratives come around a very large funding round, there's no it it isn't a coincidence. Maybe that's what they were

coincidence. Maybe that's what they were talking about in the SpaceX round and that's where you're starting to hear all this stuff. Hey, this is something in

this stuff. Hey, this is something in their long-term planning. And then, you know, investors who are very excited about it talk about it. That's very

plausible.

>> And if if there are data centers in space, I promise you SpaceX will be doing it. Let's put it that way.

doing it. Let's put it that way.

>> However you feel about it, I promise you SpaceX will be doing it. So,

>> it's sort of the same thing as like the Mars narrative, which is still years and years away and and you know, maybe decades away. Uh, but you still have

decades away. Uh, but you still have this like call option on it because if we get to Mars, it's probably gonna be on space.

>> Something I've been thinking about is I mean it seems like I mean so far Paramount's uh Sky Dance effort to acquire Warner Brothers seems to be falling apart a little bit. Warner uh

Warner Brothers board doesn't want to do it. Uh they're happy with Netflix. It

it. Uh they're happy with Netflix. It

seems like Netflix very clearly is like good for the deal and there's less certainty on the on the Paramount side or at least that's how Warner Brothers board is positioning it. And I have to

imagine that there's a handful of people that are looking at that money that was like softcircled by the Gulf and they're like I want I want those tens of billions of dollars. So like if you're

SpaceX or you're open AI >> and you're like seeing an opportunity of like, hey, this this kind of money was softcircled for a deal that might not be going through.

>> Everybody should be going after that.

>> Yeah, you should be raising. Always be

closing bro.

>> Always be.

>> Yeah. Always be closing.

>> I wanted to ask you about storytelling, but in a very specific context.

Obviously, everybody on the timeline was talking about storytelling this week. if

you should hire a storyteller. Uh, but I wanted to ask you about Meta, specifically their storytelling because they came out this year with this story around personal super intelligence. And

then there was some reporting recently, I forget by who that was saying like some of the execs apparently were just like, hey, we should just work on ads basically, like let's just make the

core business better. And I feel like I I personally as a as a user in the meta ecosystem, I have no idea what like personal super intelligence like really

means, right? Is it is it a better ver

means, right? Is it is it a better ver like are you trying to deliver a better version of chat GBT and get into the search business as a as a meta shareholder? I'm like I don't know. I

shareholder? I'm like I don't know. I

also don't I also don't totally know what it means. And so my question is like do you do you think that Meta needs to kind of dial that in or or do we just

let them cook and and we can form an opinion once they uh once they ship?

>> Look, so okay, I I think forming an opinion when they ship is like the most reasonable way to live your life instead of speculating. But I'm going to put my

of speculating. But I'm going to put my my Zuck hat on. Okay, Zuck hat on. Um

let's think about how I would do this.

Um, three billion people use our products every single day and it's an important part for of your day-to-day thing. I would argue uh the chat GPT

thing. I would argue uh the chat GPT universe is actually like don't even include us uh include the United States actually we are high RPO users who like

pay for like max or pro or whatever and like can can advertise know how to use these things. Um the adoption in the

these things. Um the adoption in the United States is pretty high. The long

tale of meta users is like pretty astounding. um you know in in some

astounding. um you know in in some places in Southeast Asia like hey Meta or like WhatsApp which is owned by Meta is like the primary mean for people to do business on right for people to talk

to other businesses. Hey um all of a sudden like I'm sure have you ever done like a random like tour in like Southeast Asia or like Japan or like wherever the hell you going um and you like you know you sign up for it and

they they send all these things there's clearly like a whole business flow behind it. Um, WhatsApp actually does

behind it. Um, WhatsApp actually does have a ginormous, you know, billion user moat that I think can like kind of, you know, kind of become the super app.

That's like if I >> Yeah, that that but the other thing they have to be feeling pretty confident with the experience with threads where they have effectively ported their user base

to an entirely new app like it's I I believe they could at some point once they're confident in the product experience get the Meta AI app to half a billion users in the way that they I

don't think threads is at that yet but it's at hundreds of millions of of active users and that that distribution advantage does give them the potential

to like come from behind, especially in some of these uh uh sort of more international markets.

>> I mean, have you guys ever seen the like the really sloppy um I I think they're apploving app advertisements actually for the games. It's like the guy and he's shooting a gun and you press one.

It's like the the pure brain rot video game ad that like gets you to click through. Um, Meta Meta has the ability,

through. Um, Meta Meta has the ability, in my opinion, to serve that kind of crap in your feed that is so gamified it makes you press a button. Um, when I am when I am doom scrolling on reals or

something like that, occasionally there will be a thread where they have like such a jabated ridiculous title where I'm like, I just have to see that. And

of course, it ends like the word before the hook that you want to know the answer. And so, you click it and then

answer. And so, you click it and then you go through and then like that's how you can like juice arpoo. So, yeah,

you're I think you're right. No one else has quite the on-ramp, I think, in terms of engaging active users ASAP if they wanted to.

>> But I think you have to have like, you know, you have to have the Galaxy brain addictive perfect use case done first.

Cuz I think they have the on-ramp and they can spend enough GPUs to tell you here's how you convert a random user to try our experience for 30 seconds. And

we could probably mechanically show it to enough people to get, you know, to to easily boot up 10, 20, 30 million people to to try the app very quickly. But the

real execution I think it's going to be on them is to get those 10, 20, 30 million people to become addicted users who share it with other people and make that, you know, personalized super intelligence part of your day-to-day.

Um maybe >> remember to the WhatsApp point, they did boot chatvt out of like the WhatsApp ecosystem like not too long ago, remember? which had like a ton of users.

remember? which had like a ton of users.

I think it was I I it was at least >> How did they boot this out?

>> This was like I think a couple months ago.

>> That's actually a really interesting >> I might have to follow up on that idea actually. That's pretty It's pretty

actually. That's pretty It's pretty interesting. It might kind of uh

interesting. It might kind of uh >> That tells you that tells you Yeah. I

mean it tells you like how how they'll integrate their own models.

>> Yeah.

>> Uh anyways, we're we're way over. I wish

we had more time. But let's do it again.

>> Thank you for being a part of this this year. Some of our most enjoyable

year. Some of our most enjoyable conversations.

>> Thank you so much for everything you've done to help.

>> Dude, thank you guys. I love I love TPB.

Like seriously, I love TPBN. Like

straight up. Uh we're we're on the moon, I guess, or we're in outer space. Uh you

guys are in LA. I would love to do I got to do in person sometime. I'm like never out. No, I would love to. It'd be great.

out. No, I would love to. It'd be great.

It'd be great.

>> Merry Christmas. Have a great holiday season and we'll see you in 2026.

>> You're the man. Yeah. Goodbye.

>> Cheers.

>> Public.com investing for those who take it seriously. They got multiasset

it seriously. They got multiasset investing >> and they're trusted by millions. Our

next guest is Doug Burnau from Radiant.

He's right across town over in Elsa Gundo. He's one of the one of the

Gundo. He's one of the one of the original Elsa Gundo uh hard tech companies. Um I have been a huge fan of

companies. Um I have been a huge fan of >> Look at that bow trust.

>> Look at this building.

We're looking for a building.

>> I didn't know that. I didn't know that terminology until this year. And now I only want to spend time if I'm not at home. I want to be in bow trust

home. I want to be in bow trust buildings. They're just they're iconic.

buildings. They're just they're iconic.

>> You can come on by. I think it's a double bow trust cuz they got the two.

No way.

>> They got double bow trust.

>> There's a name for that. That might be a name for that.

>> Anyway, we're not here to talk about architecture. We're here to talk about

architecture. We're here to talk about nuclear reactors. So uh please kick us

nuclear reactors. So uh please kick us off with a uh get us up to speed on what's happened in the last year. How

are you describing the shape of the business? Where's the progress? Uh what

business? Where's the progress? Uh what

are you building and how do you frame it for everyone?

>> Thanks John. Uh great to be here. Uh we

are actively building our first nuclear reactor which would be the first new design uh going critical at Idaho National Laboratory since 1977. So

before any of us were born.

>> Uh so it's extremely exciting. Uh I

think last time we had talked you know a year ago we were still working on the design. Now all components are ordered

design. Now all components are ordered there are parts here there are technicians assembling it. Yep.

>> Uh we're on qualified supplier list and you know just this morning we >> said you said the first.

>> That's right.

>> Is there some competition to really be the first? A lot of people want to say

the first? A lot of people want to say they're the first.

>> Absolutely. There's always competition and I welcome all the competition. Let's

all build a huge amount of reactors. uh

and all right make uh American nuclear energy uh reach as many people as it can.

>> So the design's still the same 1 megawatt roughly the size of a shipping container. Have you thought about uh who

container. Have you thought about uh who the buyer is? I know we've talked in the past about uh you throw it on a military base or you throw it on a an oil and gas

exploration zone stranded area where where diesel might be really expensive.

Are you still thinking about those types of customers or have the AI folks come calling?

>> Uh we're absolutely thinking about those types of customers, but really uh nuclear energy is for prosperity, driving prosperity. That means letting

driving prosperity. That means letting humans put power wherever they want to put it. Uh it just so happens if you

put it. Uh it just so happens if you make a compact reactor, you can put years of megawatt scale power wherever you want.

>> Um we have made progress with uh you know, we have a data center customer Equinex who has uh >> put down an order for 20 units. Soing AI

is definitely driving that.

>> Congratulations. That's a huge move.

>> That's a lot. I mean,

>> yeah.

>> And then more more progress with the military customer as well. You know, we have a contract now with the Air Force through Defense Innovation Unit uh for several units there uh as well.

>> UAV UAV.

>> So, it's it's really we're working on the same stuff. The you know, the design has not needed to change. We submitted a regulatory document over 500 pages to the Department of Energy. one shot it with.

>> It's not a good not a good thing to do.

You definitely can use AI to learn fast uh but not to do fast.

>> Yeah, that makes sense. Um so take us through the news today. Uh massive new funding round uh what exactly happened and and then I want to talk about uh some of the some of the uses of that

funding.

>> Yep. Uh yeah, so we have raised over $300 million in new funding uh through Boosts uh and Draper Associates.

>> Massive.

>> Awesome. Uh yeah, I mean that's a huge that's a huge number. Um are is that because um you're expecting to order lots of parts at this point because you're actually fulfilling orders? Is

this hiring more R&D scientists? Um how

much of this goes into R&D? How much of this goes into opex, capex? Like how are you thinking about the uses of the funds?

>> Y all D no R.

>> Okay. All no R.

>> It's we're building. We're building

right now. Um

>> that's right. But it does accelerate our ability to go and build and uh >> uh get some more trained operators to run uh at IDO National Lab. We'll be

running 24/7 uh with the reactor uph up and functioning. Uh but a lot of those

and functioning. Uh but a lot of those funding will go towards actually our facility that we announced in Tennessee uh you know over 80 acre site where we're putting down new construction on

uh Department of Energy land and that's fueling facility what will become the mass production of reactors uh coming out of that facility.

>> Yeah.

>> Wow. Um what uh so so the next uh INL uh milestone do you have a specific date locked in?

Are you working against a particular timeline and has any of this shifted since there's been sort of a flurry of efforts uh to speed up the development

of nuclear specifically? Um has has anything been able to be be pulled forward? I know that there's a lot of

forward? I know that there's a lot of there's a lot of excitement around uh nuclear just over the past year. Uh has

anything changed uh from your uh initial plan?

Uh I think that things are accelerated across the board. So uh we got access to fuel in May.

>> Uh we know that's been transported now.

It's at the fabricator. Fuel's being

made for the reactor. That's very new.

Probably the most important thing to know that will hit schedule.

>> Sure.

>> Um that but nothing's really changed in the you know in long run. You know we had a goal of going critical with a reactor full scale.

>> Uh one that's designed, built by and then operated by Radiant along with the National Lab. Uh and that'll happen

National Lab. Uh and that'll happen before summer. Uh which is pretty

before summer. Uh which is pretty exciting. So it's very very soon that's

exciting. So it's very very soon that's coming up. Uh your greater question, you

coming up. Uh your greater question, you know, there there's a a whole bunch of executive orders and there's a lot of uh impetus from uh the current administration to make things move and make them go quickly.

>> Uh and the national labs and the NRC are both uh looking at their processes and going, well, we've got new reactors coming and so let's plan for it.

>> Yeah. Uh and so there are new processes that have already been released >> as part of that effort. So it is not uh an open call to action, but we're seeing a lot of real action.

>> That's great.

>> Uh switching topics, I wanted to uh we had the tragic news yesterday that uh the MIT professor uh passed. I know he

uh was uh studying and and uh focusing on fusion. Can you talk about maybe the

on fusion. Can you talk about maybe the significance of of his work and and uh kind of the more industry reaction

because a lot of people on on uh the timeline were just kind of reacting to that and and obviously it's incredibly tragic um and uh just cons you know

concerned around um the work that that he was doing.

>> Yeah, I am actually not a fusion expert.

So I think that the probably that story is best told by someone else.

>> Uh of course energy is critical. Uh and

we're all building off of those marvels of the past and the technology that's developed even just the ideas.

>> Uh and those people who are willing to you know take their make their life and their life's work about something so important uh as you know clean um safe

energy and access that energy for all of humanity.

>> Yeah. What uh I applaud that >> you uh one of your unique uh sort of like experiences been at SpaceX watching

uh development of early rockets and then the the transition from making one that works to making uh you know dozens and eventually hundreds that work uh of

these like you know massive machines.

How are you thinking about setting the company up for success in the transition to the point where you're turnurning out dozens of reactors? Um are does it can

you already feel that Radiant is a different company because you're thinking about scale down the road?

>> Yeah, that's absolutely the case. Um

so uh uh pretty much everything with nuclear does not have a thing you can go and just carbon copy and say we're going to make uh somehow make reactors a thousand times smaller but yet follow like all the rules and use all the same suppliers who are used to making those

types parts and things.

>> Um and I think at my core is that SpaceX kind of derived first principles approach. Um and you know it's ab

approach. Um and you know it's ab absolutely the case if uh and we usually point folks to talk to national labs or other entities who are not us to talk about us >> uh and go you know what's what's

different about those guys and we really uh we feel strongly that you must really own every aspect of the design down to including the printed circuit boards and the software that goes on them.

>> Uh and that is not at all dissimilar to right that's a thing SpaceX also did. So

it wasn't just hey make rocket engines only make that. There's also it's really required that you think through integration and go put everything you can get from the modern world into something so that you end up with

something that's not outdated um or slowed down by lack of of integrating that new technology.

>> How big is the team at this point? And

and are you going to need to set up a second facility at some point because it feels like you know SpaceX started in Elsagundo eventually sort of outgrew that and now has an entire city. Uh, is

there going to be a uh like a a radiant base city somewhere in Texas or something at some point?

>> Yeah, so Tennessee is our factory site.

Construction will start really soon on that. I think we will have a functioning

that. I think we will have a functioning building uh able to able to handle fueling reactors before the end of next year.

>> Yeah, >> which is a wild timeline. Only supported

by the NRC being able to move fast today, which is very exciting.

>> Um, but we already actually have two buildings in Elsagundo. We just got our second building last month.

>> Congrats. That's amazing.

>> So, we have ES1, ES2.

>> Yeah, very cool.

>> Uh chat, uh Gabe in the chat said the Koreans are making major moves in nuclear, he thinks. Are there any countries that are kind of like re rebooting their their nuclear energy

efforts of America right now? That's

interesting.

>> As uh or yeah, inspiration or people that have been inspired by your efforts and and other companies in the space.

Yeah. So, nuclear spans this wide range of power levels. So, very true. Korea's

uh they're building a whole fleet of reactors that are I think uh 1,400 even up to 1,600 megawws.

>> So, some of the biggest that there are >> uh and they're able to do it on really short timelines, you know, 5 to six years to construct a giant facility like that.

>> Um which is grid power. Um but it's it's so different from what we're doing. Uh

and I I don't know uh if it seems like America might be ahead and might be first in the area we're in which is these 1 megawatt right systems the real tiny import and portable stuff. Um but

there are uh because the US is so innovative there are startups that are working on this as well and some established US nuclear companies. Um but

there's handfuls of them. Uh though you know there are even more federal dollars being pointed at this problem. Mhm.

>> Uh so the the army actually have a really big program called Janice that's been announced that we're really excited about.

>> Yeah.

>> Uh so that could provide even uh faster motion to the tip of the spear, right?

And and go make it so that nuclear can go in a box and can go anywhere you want, which isn't isn't the case. Yeah.

>> For those big reactors in other countries. H how much of what's

countries. H how much of what's happening in the admin is just a different level of energy, a different perception versus like there's oh that

one law changed, that one rule changed.

And because it felt like we we've talked about this in the past, um there wasn't necessarily just like one line in the legal code that was holding you back. it

was more like this gloric system of you know like a large organization a lot of people trying to do their best but just not really pushing things forward. Uh so

is it more of like a cultural shift or has there been particular um regulatory changes that have been helpful?

>> Yeah, it's a great question. I think

it's always a it's kind of a combination of things but I would say that you know we have department of energy, we have the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Uh

these organizations have been around a very long time. There are people who have been there.

>> Oh, did we lose audio and video?

>> We lost both.

>> We lost both.

>> You're back.

>> You're back.

>> Oh, sorry about that. Re

>> Oh, >> reanswering. Um,

>> reanswering. Um, >> so the um NRC right in the Department of Energy, there are people there who've been there for decades and it's it's not like there's a real cultural shift, but there's a there's a culture within them

that just needed to be unleashed.

>> Sure. And so a lot of folks, it's the same people.

>> Yeah.

>> Um but they're just answering a different call.

>> Yeah.

>> Right. And they're they're excited by and they're they're deploying fuel. You

know, there's a reinvestment in enrichment assets >> in this country as well, which since 2013 there there had been nothing.

>> So I think we're we're just really out of a dry spell and >> Yep.

>> That's fantastic. Well, uh a lot of belief. Thank you so much for coming on

belief. Thank you so much for coming on the show on such a busy day and congratulations on the massive series D.

It's 1.8 billion valuation. You're

officially a unicorn. Uh

congratulations.

>> Unicorn mode. Congrats to the whole team. I'm sure you guys are not going to

team. I'm sure you guys are not going to have very relaxed end of the year.

>> I can't imagine you resting on your laurels. That's what that's what we do

laurels. That's what that's what we do over here.

>> We got uh we got timelines timelines.

>> We'll handle the laurel resting.

>> That's right. The build plan includes weekends and holidays.

>> Okay, that's great. uh locked in. Well,

thank you so much for coming on the show. Have a great uh have a great

show. Have a great uh have a great holiday season.

>> Cheers.

>> Cheers.

>> Uh Privy Privy makes it easy to build on crypto rails, securely spin up white label wallets, sign transactions, and integrate onchain infrastructure all

through one simple API. And our next guest is already in the reream waiting room. We have Jacob Efron from Redpoint.

room. We have Jacob Efron from Redpoint.

>> There he is.

>> There he is.

>> Hey, how you doing guys? Great to be on.

Great to finally have you on. Got it in before the end of the year. Welcome to

the show.

>> It's an an honor to be here and a very very happy holidays to you guys.

>> Thank you. Thank you. Uh what's going on in your world? Maybe maybe uh first time on the show. Quick quick introduction uh for the folks watching.

>> Yeah. Uh I'm Jacob. Uh I'm a managing director over at Redpoint. We're a $6 billion fund and I co-run our our early growth fund. Uh which sounds like an

growth fund. Uh which sounds like an oxymoron, but basically means uh series B and C. Uh so that's where I spend all my time uh and do a lot of our AI investing across a bunch of companies.

>> What's what's your favorite?

>> Uh you you know you can't answer that question.

>> I think you can answer it. I think I think it's uh I have a friend who does A's and B's uh and like he has like a very very clear a very clear clear

preference around like one of I'm I'm not going to I'm not going to I'm not going to you know share his alpha but like he has a lot of reasons about liking one versus the other and I think

I think they track but I'm curious how you think of that B to B TOC range if there's like a what >> I will say the first the first investment I ever worked on at Redpoint point was uh was show sponsor Ramp uh

which is sitting nicely up there in the uh in the top right. And so I feel like that that set the bar pretty high uh for uh for team velocity.

>> Was that the Was that the B or the C that you guys >> That was the B. Yeah,

>> that was the B. Yeah. Yeah. No, I I uh I remember those days you guys were had a lot of conviction and it uh it certainly panned out. Um what uh yeah, what like

panned out. Um what uh yeah, what like how are you kind of reflecting on this year?

Yeah, it's been uh it's it's been been quite the year, right? I think we've uh you know on the application side, I feel like there's been a tremendous amount of stuff that's really started to work. I

feel like you know obviously coding being the uh the killer use case, but there's been a ton in customer support, healthcare, legal. Um and I think the

healthcare, legal. Um and I think the big question going into next year is uh what's what's the next set of dominoes to fall on the application side? um you

know are we in a time period where models have uh are are relatively plateauing and it's going to be this set of uh of applications for a bit or uh are we going to see some improvements and then get a whole next wave of of

application areas uh unlocked. Um at the same time there's been a ton of interesting stuff on the model side uh you know outside of of core LLMs. Obviously you guys have talked at length about some of the cool stuff happening

in the image and video world but even in robotics biology material sciences it's been fascinating to see. Uh and then next year I'm really fired up about infrastructure actually. I think with

infrastructure actually. I think with the with the models slowing down a bit uh I actually think it's a great opportunity. There's finally a stable

opportunity. There's finally a stable set of things to to build infrastructure for. And so uh I think it'll be really

for. And so uh I think it'll be really really interesting 26.

>> Do you think that there's any chance that we'll get a new consumer AI company out of a company that didn't start as a consumer AI company? I'm just fascinated by this this

>> like OpenAI part two. Oh, I mean I mean that is one of my hottest takes is is that may maybe maybe the OpenAI nonprofit spawns another forprofit because perhaps there's something just

innately uh you know like like just there's no better place to just do unstructured research and start a company than a massively funded nonprofit. It happened

once in history, maybe it happens again.

Um but but I mean to be clear, I was talking more about like there's there's these like pseudo midjourney. There's

this interesting uh there's this interesting wave of companies where they have a model and they turn it loose and it seems like people are kind of playing with it themselves and and everyone

reads on immediately as oh job displacement that's a proumer tool that's an enterprise product and maybe that's right maybe there is a big enterprise opportunity or big proumer opportunity or B2B opportunity but I'm

I'm more interested in in these new patterns of consumer behavior right now and and and trying to find areas where um where where consumers just might land. But I I don't know if you've even

land. But I I don't know if you've even looked at any of that or >> Yeah. No, we've looked at all these and

>> Yeah. No, we've looked at all these and I think um there's obviously a ton of of interesting new consumer behavior around you know uh remixing these models, playing around with them. I think uh especially I mean we we we play around

with that uh with that tool all the time. Um and so I do think that there uh

time. Um and so I do think that there uh you know I think that the key will be and you're starting to see this with uh OpenAI and Disney and even Sunno which uh had an arrangement with Universal recently. It's like bringing IP onto

recently. It's like bringing IP onto these platforms, I think, will just be fascinating, right? Because what's the

fascinating, right? Because what's the It's fun to remix something that is, you know, maybe a friend or somewhat abstract. It's a lot more fun to remix

abstract. It's a lot more fun to remix something that involves uh, you know, Taylor Swift or uh, you know, Darth Vader or some form of IP.

>> How do you look at that category evolving? because I was debating uh

evolving? because I was debating uh somebody Monday night who has managed some of the biggest global superstars and we were talking about music creation

as a category and consumer AI and this kind of proumer category and I was taking the side that like I like you have to assume that every lab or not every lab but a lot of the big players

get into you can imagine Gemini letting you make uh music OpenAI every I think a lot of people will get into this because it's just like a it's a great hook and it's something consumers clearly want. I

was much more on the side of like I think music is like nuanced enough and like there's a lot of depth to it and I think it deserves a standalone app and I think that there's a lot of people that will just pay for the Sunno experience

for a long time even if they have some of these other subscriptions. Meanwhile,

like clearly like you don't need like the average person is not going to necessarily have like an image gen app and then also like their normal LLM. So

I'm curious you guys you guys are obviously quite uh biased here given your position in Sunno but like how you see that structure evolving.

>> Uh we're not investors in Sunno just a fan but uh really sorry >> I'm from Boston and so anytime there's like an epic Boston based company I get very excited and so being from there uh

is uh is is awesome. But I think that uh to your question you know I I I agree with you like it it probably doesn't live within uh a larger consumer app. I

think if anything what you're going to see is there's a whole set of experiences to be built around how artists interact with their fans through these platforms. And I think that when someone captures a lot of the volume of

folks that are interested in this, that's where the artist will go. It's

not like an artist is going to go to 10 different, you know, to Gemini to Claude to Chatbt where music's embedded and like, you know, have back and forth with fans that are, you know, remixing their songs and interacting with it. I think

that the, you know, uh, the IP holders here will go to the consumer, uh, landing page that aggregates as many people as possible and so I actually think it makes a ton of sense as a as a space for a standalone category because

it's not really just about the quality of the model, right?

>> Yeah, >> totally. Uh, sorry.

>> totally. Uh, sorry.

>> I wanted to chat was asking about pricing and I was curious too how you guys are how you guys handle some of these companies that are being formed have are getting off the ground

basically with like series A pricing out the gates. How do you guys handle that

the gates. How do you guys handle that at Redpoint when you have an early stage team and then you're doing early growth and you're like where do these even fall in? No,

in? No, >> you incorporate the company and you say I don't want to talk to the Redpoint seed investors. I want to do a growth

seed investors. I want to do a growth round on day one. I want to talk to Jacob. That would happen from day one.

Jacob. That would happen from day one.

They call I don't have an idea, but I need a growth round right now. Put a

hundred million in my account.

>> Yeah. I mean, this is where, you know, I think it's just one of the really fun parts of working at a a small firm, right? There's, you know, there's eight

right? There's, you know, there's eight of us that are that just work super closely together uh on all this stuff.

And, you know, a company can be a seed one day and five days later be a series B. Uh and so we, you know, I think it

B. Uh and so we, you know, I think it involves us just working super closely together. But it's, you know, it's it's

together. But it's, you know, it's it's an interesting time, right? It's both uh a crazy valuation environment and also uh these markets that folks are going after is just absolutely massive. And so

I think you have to hold both of those uh both of those truths simultaneously.

>> Okay. Uh on the valuations broadly, um just in the last half of this year, we've seen uh Oracle sell off post big excitement around the backlog and the

RPO. We've seen Coree sell off. We've

RPO. We've seen Coree sell off. We've

seen uh Rich Sutton and uh Andre Karpathy and Ilasgiver on the Doresh Patel podcast uh talking about how maybe the models are slowing down. Uh is any of that

>> though I love that Andre's take was taken as bearish. He was like I think this stuff will automate all enterprise work but it will take a decade and everyone's like oh it's over. Like if it takes a decade I don't

>> Well, there's the question is that is that is that how is how is the venture community? How is how how are all of

community? How is how how are all of those different data points? Some of

them bullish, some of them bearish, potentially many of them up for interpretation, how are they being interpreted in series A, B, C prices?

>> Yeah. I mean, I think what's what's very clear is there's both going to be, you know, massive uh massive new companies created in this wave. And I think even with just the capabilities of models, even if even if you believe that models

aren't going to get that much better without some algorithmic breakthrough and you believe that we're overbuilding on the data center side, it doesn't change the fact that this current generation of models uh works really well in a bunch of different application

areas. And so I do think that like on on

areas. And so I do think that like on on the app side there's going to be massive businesses built. They'll require a

businesses built. They'll require a bunch of infrastructure behind them. Uh

I think the you know you were talking earlier with Sarah about some of the Neolabs. I think that's like the most

Neolabs. I think that's like the most interesting question of you know what what is the form of model progress going to be in the next five t years and is that something that occurs within the labs or or outside of them but I don't

think that uh anyone's questioning whether really large companies will be curated today >> yeah um what about the overall venture comm uh the venture e like the the

amount of dollars flowing into venture funds right now I'm sure you have a view and you have a couple data points there's this chart that looks incredibly bearish It looks like it's completely

over for venture capital and yet that doesn't match with anything I was feeling because there's huge rounds happening. I mean, I guess it doesn't

happening. I mean, I guess it doesn't count as venture capital, but open AAI is raising 10 billion from Amazon. Like

there's big deals getting done, but for some reason there's a chart that shows venture dollars going down. How did you process Did you see that chart? Did you

process that the same way I did? Uh walk

me through your interpretation of that.

What's going on?

>> Yeah, I think you're spot on on the vibes. it didn't it didn't totally match

vibes. it didn't it didn't totally match uh what it feels like the game on the field is. I do think there's probably,

field is. I do think there's probably, you know, it's definitely harder for uh emerging managers or first-time funds and so it doesn't surprise me that the overall count of funds was was down a bit. But like, you know, a lot of that

bit. But like, you know, a lot of that data can be skewed by some pretty outlier large funds that were raised in kind of 20 21 as well as the fact that those funds in 21 were deployed in like, you know, 6 12 months or something,

right? And so I think actually maybe

right? And so I think actually maybe we're back to slightly more normal fund deployment bases.

>> Yeah. And then do you think there's also uh a shift over the last few years uh to more SPV usage amongst fund managers so

that maybe the maybe the dollar value that's flowing through is high or is growing right now this year certainly is >> look at look at rate we just had Doug on from Radiant the two funds that led yeah

are not >> to my knowledge >> multi-billion dollar funds and yet he raised $300 million that had to come from >> assuming that came almost entirely from SPVS.

>> Sure. So yeah, are are you seeing an

>> Sure. So yeah, are are you seeing an uptick broadly? How does your firm have

uptick broadly? How does your firm have a view on SPVS?

>> Yeah, I mean I think there definitely uh you know seems to be both SPV activity as well as uh you know Nvidia like you know large uh the hyperscalers a lot more investment coming in from from all

sorts of other places. I I think for us you know we we keep our fund size focused. We're, you know, we want to be,

focused. We're, you know, we want to be, uh, you know, direct investors and and long-term partners for the companies we work with. But I do think, uh, you know,

work with. But I do think, uh, you know, I do think that's probably part of the story here, too.

>> Yeah. Do you think there's any are funds losing like uh losing rounds to hyperscalers? Like, oh, yeah, I put in a

hyperscalers? Like, oh, yeah, I put in a term sheet and they went with Nvidia instead of me.

I think usually these rounds are are kind of a combination of uh you know traditional uh venture firms and and some of the other folks but obviously people have different incentives in those arrangements and so uh you know it

can change uh change the pricing sometimes.

>> Yeah. Yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

Uh >> what are you uh what are you expecting out of uh robotics broadly next year or maybe the next two years?

>> Did you guys see the news from from physical intelligence today? It's

actually pretty nuts. What? Yeah. Um

>> I didn't I didn't see it. Sorry, break

it down for the audience.

>> Yeah. So, for those that didn't see, uh, and I am not a robotics AI researcher to be clear, but I'll do my best to play one. Um,

one. Um, >> you guys are investors in physical intelligence, so expert.

>> Let's ring the gun.

>> Exactly. Exactly.

>> I love that.

So what they basically what they basically showed uh is uh there's been this question for a long time of can you use you know egocentric human video data to improve robotics models cuz god we

have a lot of of human video uh what we don't have a lot of is uh teleoperated data and other data that's more difficult to gather for robotics and so what they were able to show is that

basically they they built these models already uh on you know they had this model pi.5 that they built using a bunch

model pi.5 that they built using a bunch of teleoper operated data and once the model got to a certain ability they then threw a bunch of egocentric human video data at it and it actually made the model way better and this was what's

called an emergent capability. This

capability didn't happen when the model was way worse. And what's exciting about it is it kind of parallels actually a lot of what's happening in in reinforcement learning right now. In,

you know, after Alph Go, there was this huge push to to do reinforcement learning for everything. And it didn't really work because the base models weren't powerful enough. But then fast forward, we did this massive pre-training. We got these much more

pre-training. We got these much more powerful base models. And then

reinforcement learning started working really well. And so it seems like as

really well. And so it seems like as we're starting to scale some of these robotics models, uh we're starting to see some pretty cool effects, uh of the ability to apply, uh video data, which we have a lot more of.

>> Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. It's awesome. Um

>> yeah, those guys every any uh any predictions around just like I feel like for people you see stuff coming out of labs, it's really

exciting, but for people to really start to like actually believe that robotics are going to transform our entire world, right? You have to like get Zipline

right? You have to like get Zipline delivered to your house and have that like >> moment, right? You have to be you have to be in a Whimo. Uh

>> yeah, everyone seems to be waiting for like the touring test of robotics is like do my dishes and and it's like it's unclear that that's going to be the first really big business in robotics.

Like it could be something else that comes out, but we already have the robot in the house. It's a vacuum cleaner. Um,

you know, a variety of companies have duked it out there, but like we we have some robotics that deliver some value, but we want something that's like the full humanoid will probably accept the dishwasher robot in the interim with like one arm.

>> I'll I'll definitely accept the dishwasher robot. Like, I'm here for

dishwasher robot. Like, I'm here for that. The laundry robot like dishwasher.

that. The laundry robot like dishwasher.

Uh, sounds sounds >> dishwasher robot. I'll sell you a dishwasher. It's an AI dishwasher. 20

dishwasher. It's an AI dishwasher. 20

grand. You want it?

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> For for under my Christmas tree, I I'll take it. Uh but no, I I do think that uh

take it. Uh but no, I I do think that uh you know, basically as these models get better, we'll start to see some pretty interesting uh probably to start in like you know, some of the enterprise use cases where you control the environments

a bit more uh and it's less uh on the home side. But I think there's going to

home side. But I think there's going to be a ton of really interesting stuff people build on top of the models. To be

clear, there still needs to be improvement uh in in the underlying models until we get there. But I think it's so clear everyone from the government to the largest uh companies in our economy are are are quite focused on robotics right now and and rightly

so. Have you looked up have you looked

so. Have you looked up have you looked at other AI hardware stuff? It there's

this weird uh phenomenon happening where there's a lot of AI hardware companies that go viral, get tons of press, and then it doesn't seem like there's massive sales in the short term at

least. Uh and then we wound up finding

least. Uh and then we wound up finding some company that was just doing basically AI device for note-taking. It

just records and gives you the notes.

It's a very simple like you know you very I can explain you you already know exactly what I'm talking about in terms of the product value prop and they're making like a hund00 million in sales maybe 250 or something already. Have you

looked at that? Have you thought about how uh like the future like AI hardware plays out or is it scary because uh the big device companies like Apple might want to just go after that and just eat

that at some point.

>> Well, I think all all big markets uh the big companies will want to go after, right? And so nothing nothing uh I think

right? And so nothing nothing uh I think that's the price of it being really interesting. Uh we're we're investors in

interesting. Uh we're we're investors in a company called Sesame that is going after you know uh both kind of better voice models but also like you know the the AI glasses world and I think that uh

it's interesting to see so many people coales on that as like the form factor for uh for a bunch of you know of these products going forward. And so I think that like that is hugely exciting and I

would be really surprised in the next few years if there wasn't uh much more prolific usage of hardware that has a bunch of these AI capabilities built into it.

>> Yeah. No, no, it's exciting stuff. Um

Jordan, anything else?

>> The amount of glasses that are going to be available in a few years is is wild.

Probably going to Whereas Sesame, Snap, >> I mean, >> Apple, >> that's less than you walk into a sunglass hut, there's 25 brands. Why not

25 brands of electronic products?

>> Yeah. No, no. I I I just think it's exciting. It's going to be very cool.

exciting. It's going to be very cool.

>> It's going to be pretty sweet.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah.

>> Yeah. We we got the demo uh Monday of the new uh new the snap >> spectacles >> uh specs that are coming out next year that are dev only right now and uh we were running around everywhere here

having having a lot of fun.

>> I mean the are you guys going to rock them on the show next year?

>> The augmented reality is rock they're very chunky. They're they're big like

very chunky. They're they're big like and and I I I've actually thought about this like like >> no the developer version is not what they're releasing this next year but um

uh I like wearing augmented reality glasses. I mean I guess I could have a

glasses. I mean I guess I could have a screen. It's like I could kind of use it

screen. It's like I could kind of use it as like a teleprompter like I I sometimes I will uh like text with the team on my laptop here. Um oh is the next guest you know on time or do I need

to hang out in this interview longer?

Not to break the fourth wall here, but um and I could imagine I could imagine glasses. I hope you're not right now.

glasses. I hope you're not right now.

>> I'm not. But uh but Logan from Google is actually a few minutes late, so we can hang out here and chat. Um but uh and then maybe it would be fun to have a camera on there that you could feed into the show. So you could be like, "Let's

the show. So you could be like, "Let's go to the John cam." Because sometimes we go to the the gong cam and imagine if you could watch me hit the gong in first person as Santa Claus. Like that sounds

like entertainment. Um, of course I'm a

like entertainment. Um, of course I'm a sort of a niche use caser use uh for sort of a niche a niche user, but uh I don't know. I just came up with two

don't know. I just came up with two pretty cool use cases. I I I think it's going to be a fun future.

>> Yeah. I think the fun part about this stuff I mean it reminds me of the models. It's like you put it out in the

models. It's like you put it out in the world and you can't begin to imagine the way that people are going to use it, right? And I think that once you have a

right? And I think that once you have a product that uh meets the aesthetic bar of something you'd actually wear, people are going to use it in all sorts of ways that I'm sure anyone making these things couldn't possibly predict. In the same way that I love whenever the model

companies release a model, it's like they have some idea, but they're always day one shocked at like all these, you know, uh things that that work about it or ways people use it. They had no idea.

>> Yeah. Um last question. Uh with uh with all the competition in the foundation model space, um it does seem like there's a lot of startups that you've probably invested in that are spending a

lot of money with the foundation labs.

Have you seen that manifest in gross profits? There was a data point from

profits? There was a data point from notion in the Wall Street Journal that their gross profits went from like 95 to 85% or something. It was like very slight gross margin compression. Um

certainly not cause for concern, but have you do do you feel like you have a view on what the impact of of you know high usage LLM inference might be for

growth stage software companies uh on gross margins?

Yeah, I mean I think for uh the the thing that makes it challenging to uh to know where it all shakes out is just the price of these models changes so much every you know two three months. It just

keeps going down. And so you know if we stay on this like treadmill of capability improvement then maybe you're always paying for uh for the most cutting edge thing. But I do think that uh for any thing that one of our

companies was doing 6 months ago it's gotten 10 times cheaper. Now they may be doing a whole new set of things as well but take any set of capabilities. I

think the gross margin for that set of capabilities uh will end up being you know being pretty good uh just given the competition that exists in the foundation model space and just the insane rate at which this stuff keeps getting cheaper and we're going to see

the same stuff happen in video uh in other spaces and I think that'll be incredibly exciting too for for folks building on top.

>> That's good to hear. Well, thank you so much for coming on the show.

>> Thanks for having me day. Yeah, we're gonna have a great

day. Yeah, we're gonna have a great time. Uh well uh have a great rest of

time. Uh well uh have a great rest of your day and we will talk to you soon.

Yeah, great great hanging jacket.

>> Sounds good.

>> Good talk so cheers.

>> Bye.

>> Um, let me tell you about eight.com.

Exceptional sleep without exception.

Fall asleep faster, sleep deeper, wake up energized.

>> I had kind of a brutal night.

>> Do you have a rough night? That's too

bad. I'm sorry. Well, maybe you'll need to >> 63 4 hours.

>> Maybe you'll need to book a wander in the meantime.

>> Book a wander. Inspiring views, hotel grooming, hotel grade amenities, dream beds, top tier cleaning, and 24/7 concier service.

>> I forgot to ask Jacob what he felt is an appropriate tip. Founders end of year

appropriate tip. Founders end of year holiday tip.

>> We didn't ask Sarah either. Uh, I got an 89, so let's go.

>> Wow. I have some breaking news.

>> Breaking news.

>> Uh, Jared Isaacman confirmed.

>> Let's go online.

um >> friendly brain together.

>> I'm I'm I'm very excited. You know,

whether the data centers go to space or not, there's obviously a lot of interesting and important things to be done in space and um very very excited to have >> he's that guy >> leadership in the position in the

hopefully doing some cool stuff.

>> You know who else is that guy?

>> Logan Kilpatrick from Google. Of course,

>> he's in the re room waiting room and now he's in the TV and Ultradom. Welcome to

the show, Logan. How are you doing?

>> He's that guy, pal. Hey guys, happy holidays.

>> Happy holiday. I love the background.

>> The UAV online is incredible.

>> Well, we have we have Christmas themed ones now. So, there's Get Play the

ones now. So, there's Get Play the drummer boy one.

>> Hostile drummer boy on your six.

>> Hostile drummer boy on your six. That's

a good one. The team had fun with that.

Anyway, uh thank you so much for joining. Uh please, uh everyone knows

joining. Uh please, uh everyone knows who you are around here, but take us through the news today. Uh Gemini 3 Flash. What are the highlights? how how

Flash. What are the highlights? how how

are you uh positioning the communication around um that particular launch?

>> Yeah. No, it's a great question and thank you again for for having me on. Um

Mi3 Flash is the most capable model I think along a bunch of dimensions that we've shipped before and um it's also just this model that is going to bring intelligence to everyone which is the

exciting thing. So I feel like

exciting thing. So I feel like I love it. I feel like that is we need to do this for Gemini launches is we should get I'm going to get a gong for the office and when we launch >> we'll we'll help you out. We've we know

all the suppliers and uh we we get bulk pricing you know we help you guys out etched etched gong for the office when we launch would be perfect. No, but I think the model is incredible and I

think it builds on the momentum from 3 Pro which is really exciting. But and

it's actually the crazy thing is it's actually better than 3 Pro at some dimensions.

>> I was looking at this I'm looking at the model card. It it outperforms on ArcGI 2

model card. It it outperforms on ArcGI 2 which is like my personal favorite benchmark. We love the team over at

benchmark. We love the team over at ArcGI and somehow the flash model outperforms the Pro model. Uh it like I would I would be very interested what the thesis on that is it like uh Gemini

3 Pro was overthinking it. Is that

what's going on?

>> We also did we also did our own Ben Shrimp Bench. Uh

Shrimp Bench. Uh >> oh yeah shrimp bench went very well.

>> We had it it came up with uh >> you're supposed to think of you're supposed to think of jokes that have the same format as you're telling me a shrimp fried this rice. So shrimp

>> for ginger snap it said you're telling me a ginger snap this cookie.

>> It's pretty good. Pretty good. It's it

it's funny. We're we're loving it.

>> Not all the some of the models absolutely fall that are that are that are quite smart. So, it's it's a good it's a good uh benchmark, sir.

>> Yeah. Really quick though, like the reason Flash is so much better like there's a very pointed answer on this and actually not that it's so much better.

>> It's better in certain places.

>> Some places it's a little bit better.

And this is because the model is a little bit smaller. So the like iterate like we're able to do a little bit more iteration and it has like a slightly updated um like post-training recipe

versus the pro model and this is just because of the timing. So like we finished pro and finished some of the training like probably a little bit more than a month ago. So like just within the last month have like made a bunch of innovation on the research side. It

makes it into the smaller model just because of like the timing and the release process. Um

release process. Um >> but so you'll you'll see some of that.

So there's no like special you know silver bullet behind the scenes of making this possible. It's just like literally time and with enough time we can keep making uh even better and better models which is exciting.

>> Yeah. How are you thinking about the like I I feel like the Gemini team is very uh very good about offering uh different models at the along the paro frontier.

um not not overfixating on a particular benchmark but delivering a high quality product at each incremental price or the best product for a given price. Um do

you do you envision um the the the like the left and right bound expanding further? Is there like like a nano

further? Is there like like a nano coming something even cheaper, even smaller, even more compressed? How do

you think about um offering a product from the same sort of API uh you know structure but at you know an even cheaper price? Is that something that's

cheaper price? Is that something that's coming?

>> Yeah. Yeah. So we're working hard on this. So the flash or the sort of three

this. So the flash or the sort of three model family historically or 2.5 model family historically has been pro flash light which is the smallest model and then I think I don't know if we still

call it nano or not but nano is our ondevice model which is like the the smallest model. So, we will hopefully

smallest model. So, we will hopefully have a flashlight model early next year.

Um, it it takes time to sort of trickle the innovation through and um it's the holidays are busy. So,

>> I was joking with with uh with with Jordy because Nano Banana the the code name sort of leaked into like the public consciousness just because it was exciting as great model and so people

figured it out. Nano banana. Uh but but it implies the existence of just a normal banana or banana pro or a mega banana or giga banana. And so we want

the giga banana. We want the full image.

Uh the the the even bigger model, the biggest the biggest possible model. But

of course, >> banana pro is your gigab banana. We

actually thought about calling it Giga Giga Banana. Giga Banana.

Giga Banana. Giga Banana.

>> It wasn't as catchy as Nano Banana. So

>> Nano Banana already has its own brand.

So you kind of got to just run with that. Like you got the bird in the hand.

that. Like you got the bird in the hand.

Just run with it. Uh maybe getting a little bit more specific, how how have conversations been going with with startups that are leveraging kind of the suite of models like what where's

where's where are people most excited in terms of actually implementing them?

Yeah, I think the cool thing and this is um hasn't been unique to this launch, but I think the cool thing is that for 2.5 Pro customers who are paying I think

it's like between a$125 and 250 per million input tokens and then like 10 to 12 per million output tokens. It this

model is actually almost across the board completely three flashes better than 2.5 pro. So like if you're a startup and you're like 2.5 Pro was the model that which for meant like literally tens to hundreds of thousands

of customers in production right now, this is the case for them. Um yeah,

>> they're able to sort of migrate over to this new model and like out of the box costsaving their product just gets faster. And I was talking to someone

faster. And I was talking to someone earlier today and like the fact that two years ago this like narrative of being a model wrapper was like a sort of like bad idea. And then now I think about

bad idea. And then now I think about this for our team actually like we have APIs for developers to build with but we're also building a vibe coding product in AI studio and like the vibe coding product we ran the like silent

test behind the scenes and it was like just with three flash actually because of how much faster it was and it was like reasonably the same quality as 3 pro. Retention went up, the number of

pro. Retention went up, the number of things people were building went up, engagement went up and it was like free.

We didn't have to do anything. We

literally just changed the model in the drop down. It's actually cheaper for us

drop down. It's actually cheaper for us to run that. And like as a product builder, I don't think there's been a time in like human history of building startups where like you just get to show

up one morning, somebody made your product 40% better and saved you 50%.

Like the >> the analogy is like >> usually if you make something 40% better, you're like get ready to pay 50% more, you know?

>> Exactly. Exactly. So it's it's crazy. I

I think it's like that that continues to get me just like in the fiber of my being so excited about what startups are able to go after and um yeah it's it's a great moment. So hopefully hopefully

great moment. So hopefully hopefully folks get a chance to adopt. And then I think the next thing that I'm excited about is like taking these these two models, Flash and Pro now become like the default models to build on top of

for our other like custom variants. And

like the the image generation is one example of this, but also we have text to speech models and live audio models and a bunch of other stuff in the works, computer use models, and they all sort of rebase onto this new thing and then

again by default just like get better out of the box, which is really really cool. So I think you'll see the not just

cool. So I think you'll see the not just you know coding and all these other agentic capabilities multimodal that we've showed with this specific three flashbased model but you'll see this across pretty much every other dimension

as all of those more bespoke checkpoints rebase to these new three flash and three pro variants.

>> What's going on with the agent builder that uh that that you guys did you roll it out last week? I'm losing I'm losing track of time but uh uh

>> Google. Yeah. Yeah. I know it's I know

>> Google. Yeah. Yeah. I know it's I know it's outside of your kind of like uh key territory, but uh I would I would love to kind of hear why what's exciting about it to you.

>> Yeah. I think and and so what I mean truthfully and I'll I'll give you my very candid take, which is I've been I was trying the version of that product for probably and I tweeted this out probably like three months before it

came out. And the part that was most the

came out. And the part that was most the reason I loved it so much is because inside of Google like you know we can't just use random startup products like there's like a very rigorous process in

order of like what software are we actually using as Google employees and so this like homegrown solution for me to be able to like have an agent builder and like connect all my stuff up and build workflows and all these things um

like really is the AI product that I get to use on a daily basis. So like I it is exceptionally important that it's worldclass and that it like pushes the frontier and that it's actually good

because I I don't get the sort of free market of options. I can't just go and choose between any one of a 100 AI startups who are providing something similar to this. Um and for what it's

worth I I get those in my personal life which is awesome but I don't get those in my work life. Feel like it's like sort of hit the mark of where I wanted it to be. Like I really do get genuine

product utility. Um, and as somebody who

product utility. Um, and as somebody who my email is out on the internet, you can email me elk kilpatrickgoogle.com.

Um, I get many, many emails. Um, it is helpful to like have a system. I still

respond to all them manually humanly, but it is nice to have some sort of like filtering mechanisms and then sort of separate my external stuff from my internal stuff and um, it's been and also hook up to the rest of my Google

information. It's awesome. Um, so I'm a

information. It's awesome. Um, so I'm a huge fan and it's also just chapter one of this like AI native workspace story and I think you'll see this across other Google product services. I don't know if

you all have had Robbie Stein on who leads AI product for search.

>> Um, >> oh yeah.

>> Yeah, we did. I think we did. That's

right.

>> Robbie's a man. I I love Robbie. He he

we talked probably six months ago about he he was telling me this story and it was a story at the time of like how search was becoming this frontier AI product and I um sort of had to extend

disbelief a little bit and I think now you sort of see this with AI like AI mode is crushing it like it really is like a just as competitive frontier AI product as a lot of the other ones that are out in the market and it's like at

search scale which is crazy. So, um,

they're doing a great job and I think Workspace is going to go through that same arc where it's like they're going to become a Frontier AI product, uh, which is great for the, you know, billion plus users who are using Workspace.

>> Anything any shipping again this year or you going to give everyone a break? Let

people uh >> let the other labs rest >> offline starting next Monday. So, we've

got we've got a couple more things in the pipeline the rest of this week, which I'm excited about, and then people really will be offline. it is the the blissful last part of the year where people actually take time off and relax

and then uh the road map for January is going to be ridiculous. So, um

>> you should try and get a massive companywide secret Santa going just like thousands.

>> One more quick pitch for both of you.

I've been pushing for the blimp. So,

don't worry. I'm having a conversation.

>> We've been pushing for the blimp.

>> It's time to blimp. It's time to blimp.

>> Yeah.

>> Maybe going to be a blimp coming. It's

in here.

>> I'm not gonna Google DNA. I I feel >> not gonna say who's involved, but we've got got some people involved.

>> I love this.

>> See what happens.

>> We would be We'd be >> 2026 TVPN live from the air.

>> Christmas gift for us.

>> Yeah, >> that'd be incredible.

>> Uh what a what a year. You and the team should be incredibly proud and uh we've loved every conversation. So, thank you for being a part of this >> and uh yeah, I'm glad we'll be off when

you guys are off so we can all uh I expect what some someone out there to be like we're launching something on Christmas Eve >> because everybody's but uh >> imagine >> uh anyways

>> but we'll cover it when we're back in January.

>> Awesome.

>> But thank you so much for taking the time to come on the show.

>> Have a great rest of >> Cheers.

>> Happy holidays.

Good to buy one last. If you if you don't if you don't have access to a blimp and you want to run a billboard ad, you go to adquick.com. Out of home measure out of home advertising made

easy and measurable. Plan, buy, and >> we need some David Senra by David Senra billboards.

>> Yeah. When's the billboard?

>> We need the $1 million ad buy.

>> We have David Senra in the studio in the TVPN Ultra Dome. We're going to bring him down. We'll talk to him about

him down. We'll talk to him about podcasting. Maybe we'll touch on

podcasting. Maybe we'll touch on podcasting. Maybe we'll touch on media.

podcasting. Maybe we'll touch on media.

No, you know what I want to talk to you about first? Uh we've beat this story to

about first? Uh we've beat this story to death, but a few days ago, uh this uh Wall Street Journal article went viral on how all tech companies are trying to

hire storytellers, and I want your unfiltered thoughts on on storytellers and and uh entrepreneurship and whether storytellers can be bought or or they

merely exist. um a lot I I I think the

merely exist. um a lot I I I think the read just to set the table was that so basically there are a number of jobs that have popped up in Silicon Valley $250,000

um for someone whose job title is just storyteller and that feels very broad because is that a copywriter is that someone who buys ads what what are they doing?

>> Do you think it's important for a founder to be good at telling stories?

>> Yeah, of course.

>> I'm just kid I'm just kidding.

Well, take us through a lot.

>> Well, and and so my my take was like the best storytellers are just not for hire because they're running companies, right?

>> I mean, who do you think is the best storyteller or salesman alive today?

>> Probably Elon.

>> Yeah. And before him, >> basically >> Steve Jobs.

>> There you go. Yeah, it's very important.

Steve Jobs.

>> There's a great uh quote um from Don Valentine, the founder of Sequoia, who talked about this >> and I actually put it in my ads for one of my partners >> and he's like, "The art of storytelling is critically important." Most

entrepreneurs that come to us can't tell a story >> and that learning to tell a story is really important because money flows as a function of the stories.

>> Uh so yeah, I don't know. I I didn't read the article. I don't read any of that [ __ ] Um >> but I do but I do um listen to you guys and I heard you go over it

>> and I think uh like Vanta was one of them trying to hire. Yeah.

>> Yeah. So like

>> I I think Yeah. They were one of my big partners. like they pay a lot more than

partners. like they pay a lot more than $250,000 and I think I'm just like the person that needs to tell that story and I think that's the Yeah, I think like obviously Christina is really good from

founder level. Um but even if you don't

founder level. Um but even if you don't have like the very few people have the Elon or the the the the Steve Jobs skill set and so I think like we've talked about this over and over again and like you just partner with the people that are able to tell that story.

>> Yes.

>> Like let me give an example. Um Mr.

Beast texted me like two days ago. He's

like look up my Spotify rap and number one was the was founders podcast. Yeah,

>> I want to talk with the new show, not founders, but so we'll get to that in a minute.

>> But um he we're in a group chat. It's

me, him, and all the founders of RAMP.

>> And his whole thing was that like he didn't know what RAMP was. He he text this to Kareem and Eric and he's like now we've switched over my company to RAMP because like I feel like I know every single thing that's going on

inside ramp because I get a minute or two minute update every week from David.

And if you listen to my ramp ads, it's not like this is, you know, it's just corporate cards. It's like

corporate cards. It's like >> the same every time. how you're digging into different pieces of >> it's not that it's not the same every time because I think actually repetition is persuasive. So, I have three or four

is persuasive. So, I have three or four versions and I repeat them over and over again, but Ramp and I, as you guys know, have a multi-year partnership.

>> So, but his point was just like, oh, >> fair.

>> It's more than a partnership.

>> So, his you should see the shirt I have underneath this hoodie.

>> It's ramp. Um, so the the point that he was telling them, it's like he now knows how Eric, the CEO, thinks, he knows how Kareem, the co-founder and CTO CTO, thinks. He knows their hiring practices.

thinks. He knows their hiring practices.

My ads are just stories about RAMP, not and if you pay attention to them, then you're like, "Oh, like I want to work with a company that takes this that seriously, that does 300 different updates to their product on a yearly

basis that's nearly impossible to get hired as an engineer that is trying to lead from the very front, an AI."

>> Um, and you know, these are very effective storytellers to the point those ads converted the biggest creator on in the world to use your product. So,

I think that's what companies should be doing. Paying somebody 250 grand maybe,

doing. Paying somebody 250 grand maybe, I don't know. How how structural do you think uh storytelling should be? Because

I I really like systems thinking. I like

I like I like systems and processes. So

when I think about telling a story, I actually do think about a three-act structure. I think about who's the

structure. I think about who's the protagonist, what's the antagonist, like I can map it out on a piece of paper.

>> I know this is from your YouTube days.

>> Yes. Exactly. No, I literally think about I studied I studied the books on it and I studied and I created like structure around it. There are other people that are much less structural,

but when you when you are trying to like when I tell the story of a founder on a YouTube video essay, I would literally

map their journey to a beginning, middle, and end act one and act two and act three. What happens at the end of

act three. What happens at the end of act one? You're crossing into the

act one? You're crossing into the unknown. What happens to

unknown. What happens to >> you're you're describing the oldest story there is. Of course, the hero's journey.

>> Yes. the hero's journey, try and map it to the to the hero's journey. Uh do you think about that when you are constructing an interview for David

Senra, your new show? Are you trying to start with let's do the early life and then at h at oneird or or you know 20 minutes into the interview I'm going to try and get you into tell me about the

crossing into the unknown. Okay. Then

how are you structuring the episodes if not following a huge >> I am just like the way I think about my work is very simple and I think it's really important because there's this great line from Munger where he's like you know the rarest of all things is to keep things simple and remember what you

set out to do right the value in what I do is that I'm going to be doing very similar things now I was doing it 10 years ago doing it 10 years from now that is the value it's in the compounding nature of it >> um so the way I try to keep remember to

keep things simple >> is founders is the books that I'm intensely interested in reading >> and the new show is who am I intensely interested in speaking to >> and talking to?

>> Yeah, there have been multi-billionaire public company CEOs that asked to be on the show and I started doing research about them. I was like, I don't want to

about them. I was like, I don't want to spend any time with this guy. Like, I'm

just not interested in talking to him at all. And me and Rob, my partner, my

all. And me and Rob, my partner, my partners are Andrew Humeman, and Rob Moore on the new show >> and you know, Rob kind of pushes back sometimes and it's just like, I just don't want to talk to him. What do you want me to tell you?

>> And you know, he's like, this is actually good that you would say no to somebody like that. Um I don't think of things in in like obviously the hero's journey if you listen to founders like that is essentially that is what I'm

doing over and over again. Um I think that comes naturally to me but I don't think of things in structure. I'm just

very almost everything for me is like I I'm intensely interested in what I'm working on. I consume I try to consume

working on. I consume I try to consume more information about that subject subject matter than anybody else in the world and then I just go straight off intuition.

>> I just wonder if I think one thing that's interesting about that intuition will develop a structure. I don't know.

I I think that makes sense.

>> I don't know. You listen to the podcast.

I mean, do you see a structure there?

>> Uh I Well, you're how many episodes in?

>> Six.

>> Six. Like I I would assume that in a decade um I will be able to somewhat predict a structure and you won't you won't need to ever sit down and map out

I'm going to ask this question before this question. It'll just come to you

this question. It'll just come to you naturally. But that intuition will

naturally. But that intuition will happen and it will make sense. But you

will know the rules and also know when to break them. So it won't like there are stories that are told in four acts.

There are stories that are told in five acts. There there are stories that don't

acts. There there are stories that don't map perfectly onto the hero's journey because it's actually a love story or it's actually, you know, some other structure of story.

>> I think storytelling is downstream from interest. So I heard um Jordy say

interest. So I heard um Jordy say something that I think is dead right.

It's like you you guys are using the term storyteller when it's really like you're talking about like copyriter, right? And what I would do is I'd go

right? And what I would do is I'd go back and study this guy named Claude Hopkins. Can one of the guys check? I

Hopkins. Can one of the guys check? I

think it's episode 170 of founders >> and he wrote this book called scientific advertising and I found him because I read not only you know >> it is 170 a life in advertising.

>> When did I do that? How how how long ago was that?

>> March March 8 uh 2021. Okay. So 2021. So

this is my point. It's just like intensely interested in what you're doing and then um >> and then just try to collect as much information as possible. Essentially

they I found this guy named David Oggovy.

>> Then he would write about every single person that you're interested in will tell you who influenced who influenced them. And this guy wrote uh this is

them. And this guy wrote uh this is Claude Hopkins probably the greatest copyrighter to ever to live.

>> And he wrote this book called scientific advertising that if I'm pretty sure if you buy his autobiography on Kindle you get my life in advertising and then the end you get scientific advertising uh for free. But I think every single

for free. But I think every single person on the planet should read scientific advertising because Claude Hopkins worked for this guy named Albert Lasker. Albert Lasker built he made more

Lasker. Albert Lasker built he made more money as an advertising agency founder than anybody else in history.

>> And all he did essentially cut away all the fat. He didn't have an art

the fat. He didn't have an art department. Didn't have a research

department. Didn't have a research department. He had two of the best

department. He had two of the best copyriters and their words made the cash register ring. and inside. I'm saying

register ring. and inside. I'm saying

it's like it's such an elite skill set like using using only your words you can you can get the you can bend the world >> but you have this is it's the amount of you have to one be intensely interested

in the subject and two you have to be willing to do an insane amount of work and in >> well that was why that was why sorry to interrupt you but when when the point brought up ear the point you brought up earlier >> like if I'm trying to hire a storyteller

I want to hire the best writer I don't want somebody that wants to be the chief storyteller of a business I want them to be obsessed with writing and actually understand how important it is. I don't

want them to like >> best communicator, not writer. Just so

happens at that time writing was the form of communication. So let me let me just finish the story real quick.

>> Albert he wrote scientific advertising.

Albert Lasker reads it. He's like this is our trade secrets. This is why I'm so rich. Like it's going in the safe. He

rich. Like it's going in the safe. He

literally locked the manuscript in a safe for 20 years. Then when he retired he let Claude Hopkins publish it and wind up selling eight or 10 or 12 million copies.

>> Wow. And so, but when you go into there, like Claude Hopkins, uh, let me give you an example, and this is something I think I do really good on the podcast ads, is like talking about the story behind how the product is made.

>> And so, there was this big beer at the time. It's like Schlitz beer or

time. It's like Schlitz beer or something like that. It was like fifth market share. Yeah.

market share. Yeah.

>> And so, they hire Claude Hopkins. He

goes and visits him. He visits their distillery. He interviews all the top

distillery. He interviews all the top founders, the founders of the company, the executives. He spends an insane

the executives. He spends an insane amount of time with it. And then he goes, "Hey, you have this like remarkable brewing process that is like fascinating with all these machines and this technology and like I drank your beer, but I didn't know what was going

on. Why don't you tell that story?" And

on. Why don't you tell that story?" And

their whole point was, "But our process isn't different from any other beer company." He's like, "Yeah, but no other

company." He's like, "Yeah, but no other beer company is telling the story." And

all he did was tell in text of like a,000, 2,000, 3,000 words >> the story behind how the product is made. this when you when you hear a

made. this when you when you hear a founders episode or the new show like the James Dyson episode just came out.

It was one of the best days of my entire life to be able to spend several hours with him. The amount of [ __ ] people

with him. The amount of [ __ ] people Am I going to get you in trouble on the stream cursing?

>> No, no, it's fine. It's fine. There's

one there's one listener >> who >> that that takes issue with it.

>> Yeah.

>> Tell me. He doesn't like the swearing.

>> Okay. Well, I apologize.

>> David has a potty mouth, but it's it's you. It's you. I appreciate it.

you. It's you. I appreciate it.

>> So, the That's funny. the um I now I lost. Oh, the amount of people that sent

lost. Oh, the amount of people that sent me messages after that podcast or other podcasts have been uh made on him that now because I understand who the person is and what went into building the product like I went and bought his haird

dryer or his vacuum cleaner works for everything.

>> Um yes, it's interesting. We every that that the style of advertisement which was like you had a page of a magazine and you had a basically an opportunity

to put a a picture and then a block of text. it kind of like comes back in fa

text. it kind of like comes back in fa it's constantly like coming back in fashion and I think the reason for it even though it's not like the most native format for the internet is it's because when companies sit down and

they're like how do we sell our product in a short paragraph often times companies never do that right the modern ad you the modern way that you communicate is like you have a big website somebody has to scroll all

over the website to really be sold on something or you have an ad that's like targeting different things or different value props but when you just sit down and write one paragraph of exactly why somebody should care about your product

and why they should purchase it. It's

just extremely effective.

>> Ramp's doing this with Harry Dry. Have

you ever paid attention to Harry Dry's Twitter feed? Do you know who that is?

Twitter feed? Do you know who that is?

>> No.

>> Fantastic copyriter out of Europe. I

think he's might be in England and he's worked with Eric hand in hand and they've done a couple, you know, and and it's posted if I'm not mistaken on like Eric's Twitter feed. He's like that is still a very effective ad unit.

>> Yeah.

>> Um so to answer your question, I don't know. Like yes, telling your story is a

know. Like yes, telling your story is a good idea. like the founder should do as

good idea. like the founder should do as much as possible. Then the founder should be really teaching how they think about their business. I always like Jim Synagogle, the founder of Costco, has this great uh this great quote where he's like if you're not spending 90% of

your time teaching, you're not doing your job. And his whole point is like

your job. And his whole point is like the direction's coming from you. You

talk about this is what we're doing.

This is why we're doing this is how we do it. And you repeat repeat over and

do it. And you repeat repeat over and over again. And you know, people like,

over again. And you know, people like, oh yeah, but Jim Synagogle, you know, he's running Costco. It's not a tech company. Well, go read go watch uh the

company. Well, go read go watch uh the episode I did How Elon Works. And in

that I just break down I super way everything that that has nothing to do with how other than how Elon works. And

this four-step algorithm he got to the point where he's like he says in the book I repeated it so much that the executives are sitting in the meeting would mouth the next word that's coming out of my mouth.

>> Repeat repeat.

>> Um >> Dave Portoy did this today. He had this announcement video and and uh it looks like very >> unprofessional in the way that it's shot. It's clearly shot in an iPhone.

shot. It's clearly shot in an iPhone.

and he's standing in front of glass and he's just kind of like rambling but he's just going Netflix he said it like 15 times cuz they were announcing a deal uh bunch of bar stool podcasts are going on

Netflix uh and he's just like Netflix and like you just immediately like it doesn't look >> you want to listen to pardon my you want to watch pardon my take Netflix you want to watch spitting chicklets Netflix you just keep saying Netflix it is very

>> very on on repetition something that I've appreciated about our relationship is I feel like when we all get together it's almost the same conversation every single time. Uh, and you would think you

single time. Uh, and you would think you would get bored of it, but because we're extremely obsessed and focused, it's like it's actually helpful in that like we're remembering like why we do this,

why why why we make the decisions that we make and almost just kind of like constantly reminding ourselves and I think that's very helpful of like not uh we talked about how we're thinking about somebody asked us what our

>> is this Emily Sunberg.

>> Yeah, she she asked >> Can you read that exact quote? I thought

it was really good.

>> Oh, we were supposed to It's in the show notes, I think, today or yesterday. But,

uh um >> I'll pull it up. Our 2026 resolution is to lock in. We had a great 2025 and it opened up a lot of amazing and fun opportunities. But the most contrarian

opportunities. But the most contrarian thing we think we can do the next year is simply double down on the core show itself. That means having to say no to

itself. That means having to say no to anything that doesn't improve the show directly. No fun, no products, no world

directly. No fun, no products, no world tour, just 3 hours of talking about tech and business at 11:00 a.m. every

weekday. The world tour was uh was my little sneaky joke is you know what what is a world tour? Like isn't there that whole meme of like it's going to ruin the world tour?

>> Well, we we did we I mean we are we had an opportunity to go to uh Switzerland.

>> Oh turn that down.

>> Yeah. Yeah. I mean I guess we've had a couple like world tour. Not not full tour but like trip international trip.

>> But if we were to go to Europe it'd turn into a tour.

>> Maybe. Yeah.

>> Went to the Middle East it would turn into a tour. Sure.

>> You know you're going all the way over there. Maybe that happens, but not next

there. Maybe that happens, but not next year. We're locking in next year. The

year. We're locking in next year. The

interesting thing is that uh friend of the show, Bryce, said that the uh he was he was he was sort of like framing it as like these guys have realized that like media can be a better business. Yeah.

Yeah.

>> He he text me yesterday. Yeah. And asked

for advice on this uh format of a new podcast and I was like, I'm not watching that. I won't say what it is though.

that. I won't say what it is though.

>> I don't even think it it's not that it's a better business. It's just a better business for Yes. Exactly. Exactly.

Exactly. So, so obviously like no no no shade here but uh it it is just like you know the founder market fit like it is ridiculous to say that media is a better business than asset management. Like

that's just not true. Look at the Ford 400 there. Like it's it's it's all

400 there. Like it's it's it's all industrialists or asset managers. There

are very very few media figures that actually are in the 100red billion plus club. It just doesn't happen. But can

club. It just doesn't happen. But can

you be hugely successful? Absolutely.

Can you be very happy? Absolutely. Is it

a better fit for us? Absolutely. And so

um I would not asset managers will leave and pivot.

>> I consider >> I I enjoy investing in startups.

>> I always have I've invested in >> probably every every few months I got to add another 10.

>> Sure.

>> Uh but uh yeah, some something over over 60 companies. And so I last year

60 companies. And so I last year wandering in the wilderness, you know, trying to figure out how I wanted to spend my life. I considered that, but there's zero. Yeah. That or join a fund,

there's zero. Yeah. That or join a fund, you know, it's I think like being a solo GP is maybe >> uh overrated in a bunch of ways, but uh I there's I I would be 10 10% as happy

or fulfilled doing that even though >> uh there's a career to be built.

>> Cheers.

>> The I wanted to talk ask you about question one second. I want to go back to what you just said about like the the the conversations being very similar and and repeatable. Um I just did this

and repeatable. Um I just did this episode on Bruce Springsteen which I was like very unsure if I was going to put it out. I recorded for like three hours.

it out. I recorded for like three hours.

I edited down to like 1 hour and like 15 minutes. It's the most unusual um

minutes. It's the most unusual um episode of founders that I've probably ever done. The amount of people that

ever done. The amount of people that have now text or sent me messages that like they're crying during it has been like shocking. It wasn't it turned out I

like shocking. It wasn't it turned out I thought I was making a podcast on you know somebody had one of the most uh extreme work ethics that I've ever heard of. That's that was my introduction to

of. That's that was my introduction to him. I didn't know I wasn't like a Bruce

him. I didn't know I wasn't like a Bruce Greenstein fan. I'm a huge Jimmy I fan

Greenstein fan. I'm a huge Jimmy I fan who's really like almost like best friends of Bruce and you know he says one of the hardest working like most extreme people ever and it wind up you

know taking a a very the second half of the book is pretty crazy where you have this guy that like essentially gets everything that he thought he wanted and try almost kills himself and like what

happened there? Why is he doing that?

happened there? Why is he doing that?

And then how did he >> he was 34 when that's happening. He's

almost 80 now. Oh, he looks phenomenal, by the way. It's like, what happened there? And how did he actually get what

there? And how did he actually get what he he mistake he was mistaken on what he thought he wanted once he got what he wanted? It's not what he wanted. He

wanted? It's not what he wanted. He

realized what he actually wanted >> was a sports car, >> but he was No, but he was in but he was incapable of getting that and then he figured out a way. I think the the episode title was like Bruce.

>> He thought he wanted a GT3 RS, but he really wanted a Renport.

>> Is that the one that you said I should drive? I always tell you to get the most

drive? I always tell you to get the most insane cars, >> but this is but this is the point.

There's >> so so funny. Uh David, uh I you you were >> you you were like, "Oh, if I wanted a if I like wanted to buy a Ferrari, it would

be this one." It was a 812 comp >> for like a just a car to keep in California. And I was like, that's so

California. And I was like, that's so you to just pick like the most elite car.

>> His greatest cars, >> the spin-off. When we get any car reviews out, >> hold on. There's a line in Bruce's >> autobiography that I don't even think I put in the episode that I thought was interesting. He's like, "People don't

interesting. He's like, "People don't come to my shows to learn something new." They come to be reminded about

new." They come to be reminded about what they already know is true.

>> Oo, that is great. I love that. Wow.

>> And I think if you look at, again, I think of founders as like church for entrepreneurs. I think a lot of that

entrepreneurs. I think a lot of that like dude, >> people don't think about like what they do that like the the rhythm and the repetition as like that. That's very

interesting.

>> Yeah. So I do think I think again my natural instincts is fewer deeper. So

it's like I talk to the same people over and over again. I don't like there's another line in in the autobiography.

He's like uh I'm fairly insular by nature. I don't let new people into my

nature. I don't let new people into my life casually. I feel the exact same

life casually. I feel the exact same way.

>> And so I I do feel the best the best things in life all of them are come from compounding whether it's relationships, money, >> knowledge, everything comes from compounding. So my instinct to just go

compounding. So my instinct to just go and have the same conversations with, you know, the fewer deeper people that I actually trust and then you meet remarkable people and you add very slowly. Uh

slowly. Uh >> yeah, I think about that the opportunity cost of having a a dinner with somebody that we've never met versus just hanging out and having my favorite conversation,

which is the same one we always have.

>> Um the the other thing about I would say the difference like the quote you just gave around going to a show to remember what you already know. think about when

I discovered founders, one of the most powerful things was learning that certain elements of myself were okay.

Like I'm not the most organized person, right? And so to hear that other people

right? And so to hear that other people that have gone on to do great things, like some of them are hyper organized, like you know, like incredibly dialed and others are just like chaotic and

it's actually learning like what's actually okay is I feel like extremely powerful. We we are listen we may be

powerful. We we are listen we may be like a small percentage of the overall human population but we are not unique.

There have been people that have our same experiences think the same way that we are have our same natural intelligence talent everything else. And

it's just like it's foolish not to to to utilize like their experience and knowledge for your own benefit on how to build a life not a [ __ ] business. A

life. That was one of the craziest things realizations that Bruce Springsteen has in this in this episode where he's like, I thought I was building like work. I want to be a rockstar. I want to do all this other

rockstar. I want to do all this other stuff. He's just like, I got that and I

stuff. He's just like, I got that and I have a shitty life. How do I fix my life? And for him to go through that

life? And for him to go through that was, you know, a pretty intense um like experience. And I think that's why and

experience. And I think that's why and then his dad, I don't want to talk too much about this, but like, you know, he had one of the worst dads that you could possibly have. His dad was a

possibly have. His dad was a misenthrope, had no friends, uh, alcoholic, beat the [ __ ] out of Bruce. I

think he said in the his entire childhood, his dad said less than a thousand words to him.

>> Wow.

>> And then later on he gets diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic. And the amount

paranoid schizophrenic. And the amount of messages there was just like the part about his dad is like that hits way too close to home. It's exact like why?

Because there's people out there that have had that same experience too.

>> Yeah.

What is your favorite book that is not a biography?

>> Really hard, right?

>> Favorite book that's not a biography.

>> So, so examples would be like, you know, 1929 doesn't really have a breakneck by Dan Wang. We we

Dan Wang. We we >> I'm not reading anything new.

>> No, I I know. I'm just giving examples like I'm just looking through like what I've what I've read recently and there's a lot of books that um are that that that you would I would imagine that it would be very hard to make a founders

episode about a you know I mean certainly a work of fiction.

>> No I I think I can make a great founders episode about any book that I really enjoyed like I did last year I did Heruki Mirami's um what I think about when I think about running.

>> Oh okay.

>> And I remember I was in Malibu. This is

why I spend so much time out here cuz I really do believe I do my best work out here. There is something very very

here. There is something very very special about this place.

>> Um, and >> about Hollywood or Malibu?

>> No, not >> Malibu. Um, Hollywood, I come cuz I love

>> Malibu. Um, Hollywood, I come cuz I love you guys. I was whipping through the

you guys. I was whipping through the mountains just now, by the way.

>> I was like, I got to slow down. That's

not a good idea. Um, so I start reading that. Um, I got this idea from Elon and

that. Um, I got this idea from Elon and he's like, you know, he wants to read more books and he realizes like carrying books with him is difficult. So

sometimes he would just read entire books on the Kindle app on his iPhone.

>> And I I started reading, I forgot even how I discovered this. I because I didn't know who who Ricky Makami was before this. Started reading it and I

before this. Started reading it and I think I read the whole entire book on my phone in like a day and a half >> and then I was like this isn't really a founders episode. This is kind of weird.

founders episode. This is kind of weird.

And I'm like no the fact that you couldn't put this down means that it is a founders episode. You are going to make an episode about it. And then the response because you're so intentionally interested and you can transfer your interest to you know podcasting is straight energy transmission for some of

us.

>> Uh you were able to transfer that enthusiasm, that passion for this guy's ideas and and life uh to the audience.

So, I think I can make it on any book that I'm intensely interested in. Uh,

like I've been rereading Freedom's Forge, >> right? I mean, I could make the episode

>> right? I mean, I could make the episode on just Bill Nudson.

>> Yeah, Bill Nen.

>> But I think telling the whole story of, you know, the fact that in in the 1940s, the United States, >> they took what was this this hugely sophisticated manufacturing base that

was just applied to consumer products and on a dime turned it and started building the you know, producing the most war material than any other country in the world. like how they did that is a very fascinating story. But to answer your question, uh favorite book that is

not >> That's so interesting because I I would never put Freedom's Forge in the pipeline of founders episodes and yet I

would 100% listen to a founders episode on Freedom Forge, which is like unmet demand or unknown demand. I don't want to talk too much about

>> podcasting because you know like I I will not shut up about this but like I think one of the most important parts of like if you're going to do this for a long term long term and like this is another thing that Bruce Queen singing I

think was very smart he noticed he just like observed his industry he's like this industry is very transient there's a person that has a hit song maybe a hit album maybe two hit albums but like then they they either

>> get on drugs they die I think the what is it like the 27 club all these young um musicians die and he's like I was built for durability and longevity and so he worked backwards from like what

are these people doing >> and how do I just avoid it's very mungeresque Charlie Mongeresque invert always invert >> and so with with podcasting I think about that a lot I can't say who this

was and Rob I shouldn't even say this Rob put me across from like a I would consider him like a legacy podcaster and he did this at dinner I think he did this on purpose because he knows like what's going to happen and I just start

asking him questions about like his show and like how and he came up in podcasting when like it could be your second, third, fourth, fifth thing that you were doing which is like that those days are done and I remember I didn't even eat that night I don't think I was

like pounding my chopsticks on the table because his answers are like that you're not going to make it man like you're already dead like this isn't going to work. So, uh, the the the point I'm

work. So, uh, the the the point I'm being here is like if you're going to do this long term, I think you have to be like show the audience who you truly are

and therefore they will over time I think people came to founders because it was the books and the biographies and over time they're just like whatever this guy thinks is interesting to read I just want to hear like his insight or

his takeaways from that. You guys are doing a good job with all the personality you have. You're [ __ ] dressed as an elf right now. like you

have this giant, you know, horse behind like the the million little things that you guys do. Even now, I was here probably a month ago and like even the stuff you have hanging up on your walls, I'm like, "Oh, they're just becoming

more and more natural and authentic to to who they are." So, um, I want to answer your question, Lessons of History, Will and Ariel Durant, it's not technically a biography. I would say it's a 100page biography of the human

species. And because I think if you have

species. And because I think if you have one skill set that's going to help you throughout your life is like really understanding that history doesn't repeat, human nature does and you really should study how humans humans react in

very predictable ways when they're exposed to specific stimuli.

>> And I think understanding that >> is is one of the most useful like tools you can have as you go through life.

>> That's fascinating. What what patterns do you see in the founders that have appeared on founders and the news show in terms of how they landed on

uh the thing that defined their life and their work? Someone uh V in the chat

their work? Someone uh V in the chat says, "How does one find their purpose obsession?" But I feel like it's very

obsession?" But I feel like it's very very different across uh but I'm curious if you see any patterns. Somebody came

up to me at that party, that Peter Thiel's party we were all together at a few days ago, and they asked me that question. They're like, "Uh,

question. They're like, "Uh, I forgot the exact way this guy said it, but it was just like, you know, it's obvious that you found your thing, like, and like how do I find my thing?" And

the the story I told him was just like, >> obviously it's internal, like no one can answer that question. I I gave that story from uh Mozart where, you know, this 21-year-old kid comes up to Mozart's like, "How do I write a symphony?" And Mozart's like, "You're

symphony?" And Mozart's like, "You're too young." And Mozart's like, and the

too young." And Mozart's like, and the guy goes, "You were writing symphonies uh younger than I am now." And he's like, "Yeah, but I wasn't going around asking people how to do it." And I just think like all you have to do is like just look how you spend your time.

Actions express priority. Like actions

express priority. You I I don't give a [ __ ] what you say. Just like I see how you spend your time and you I will know what is actually important to you. And

so if you're looking for that thing, you know, just like where are you naturally drawn to? Like this morning I spent like

drawn to? Like this morning I spent like six I don't know. But but at the same time when you were when you were I I feel like there needs to be an openness to

>> like an openness to not like you can't just if you're trying to find your life's work. It's not the something you

life's work. It's not the something you can just decide I I'm I'm going to find my life's work this week. I'm going to when you were 20 it's not like you were like I'm going to be a >> Not everyone can be a pro basketball

player their entire life. And people but more more specifically like when you were 20 it's not like you were thinking well when I'm in my 40s I want to have a business podcast.

>> So what I would say if that kid is 20 find out how old this guy is in the chat. I would say read Paul Graham's how

chat. I would say read Paul Graham's how to do great work that essay. I think

it's 34 episode 314 of founders. Can you

check for me real quick?

>> Um and like >> it's going to one shot it again.

>> It might not. Um like I think >> oneshoted Paul Graham how to do great work.

So >> so hold on real quick. And I think it came down to like you're he's just like how to do great. You're just following what you're intensely curious about.

>> And so like like this morning uh I woke up and essentially I just like read for I don't know four or five straight hours >> and then I was like oh [ __ ] I forgot I

have to go to TPN today and that's why I was driving so fast. And like no one told me like no one's like David you should read for self-develop development. It's just like I like

development. It's just like I like reading. I feel good when I read. It's

reading. I feel good when I read. It's

way better than looking at my goddamn phone. It's outside of like spending

phone. It's outside of like spending time with people I love, like there there's not another activity I like to do. I would put like our relationships,

do. I would put like our relationships, spending time with people I truly care about above that, but in terms of like if I'm by myself, like there's not another thing that I'd rather want to do. Um, and that's just me listening to

do. Um, and that's just me listening to my curiosity.

>> Yeah.

>> I'm going to go ahead.

>> No, no, no. I was just uh Yeah. Yeah.

You continue.

>> Uh, if you could interview anyone uh that is dead, who would it be? Was there

was there any like is there anyone you've studied that you feel like there's this open question >> where no no no text captured it or no interview that they did.

>> Yeah. It's like particularly lost.

>> I mean that that has got to be the case.

I I've had um I had a weird experience last week. Uh and weird in a great way.

last week. Uh and weird in a great way.

>> A ghost of Rockefeller. Ghost of D.

of Rockefeller. Ghost of D.

>> So yeah, the answer would probably be I mean the simplest thing would be like Rockefeller, maybe Steve Jobs, maybe Sam Murray because Sam Murray is just like, you know, such a savage. And I think I have definitely like a wild side to me that um you you know Lulu.

>> Yeah.

>> Like she's she's constantly like you cannot travel anywhere without a crisis comms person next to you. Like you're

going to get yourself in a lot of trouble. And so I think there's like a a

trouble. And so I think there's like a a wildness of Sam Murray that that's very attracted to me if I'm being honest about this. Um, but I I in terms of like

about this. Um, but I I in terms of like it does not come across in the text. So

what I'm trying to do is like obviously with the new show I want to be differentiated, right? I wouldn't be

differentiated, right? I wouldn't be doing it, you know, if if just to be the same as anybody else. Like I find being the same as anybody else disgusting. It

makes me want to vomit. And um so I I'm working on some people that like have literally never done podcast before.

>> Yeah.

>> And I skew to like older killers. Like

>> I'm not interested in the in the in general. I do try to spend time like I

general. I do try to spend time like I do feel I'm in like the middle child where like you get access to all these crazy people have done things for decades and I'm really successful and they're willing to like spend a lot of time with you most of them listen to the

podcast and then I get a lot of information out of these relationships and conversations these dinners and then you know every once in a while identify like a younger founder maybe to spend time with that if you think you can help

them you should but in general I skew way older way like you know somebody that can actually point to a body of work to prove that they are actually like somebody you want to spend time

with. And I had um I spent time with a

with. And I had um I spent time with a 71-year-old guy last week in New York and he sold his company for $60 billion

recently. and uh he's never done a

recently. and uh he's never done a podcast and I did an episode on his uh episode of Founders on him and his

family and the reason he wanted to meet me and the reason that he's now going to do the new show and he trusts me is because there's only one book written about this and he listened to the

podcast. He couldn't believe the

podcast. He couldn't believe the insights that were in it. He asked his son, asked David who he interviewed in the family to get this information and uh the answer was nobody. I read the

book and then I tied it together because like you're the same person that there's been a hundred of you, 200, a thousand of you >> for the past few hundred years. Like

we're not I know we like to feel we're special like we are there's just we're not as unique as we think we are.

>> Um and so I don't think >> you know obviously if you can have conversations with these people you you should be you should do that. One of the reasons that is because like in an hour, we talked for an hour. The amount of

information that guy transferred to me in an hour would be literally imp. You

could give a 25year-old founder, 30-year-old founder weeks and he just could not convey that much knowledge and information that this guy was able to do in an hour. Um, so yeah, if you can have conversations with him, you should. But

I don't feel like I'm ever like missing out. Like the text wasn't enough.

out. Like the text wasn't enough.

>> Well, it's been a fantastic conversation. Thank you so much.

conversation. Thank you so much.

>> Says more swearing, please.

Chad's fans of it. Well, uh, that concludes this episode. Thanks for

having me again, guys. We will be retired, John. Back at 11. No, I do have

retired, John. Back at 11. No, I do have to go. I have to go. Sorry. But, uh, I

to go. I have to go. Sorry. But, uh, I mean, you two could hang out here if you want.

>> This has been a great show. We're in the fourth hour. We're We're almost

fourth hour. We're We're almost >> got I got >> halfway through the fourth hour. Uh, and

we'll be back tomorrow. Yeah,

>> we got two more. Every every day this week has felt like Friday.

>> Thank you.

>> But, uh, thank you for hanging out with us. Thank you for being here. Of course,

us. Thank you for being here. Of course,

>> Apple and add David Senra by David Senra to your podcast player.

>> Thank you.

>> Thank you, folks. See you tomorrow.

Goodbye.