Howie Liu on Airtable's Early Days, Scaling, and AI

Village Global Podcast

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Understanding the Elegant Math Behind Modern Machine Learning 1:14:43

2 gün önce1:14:43

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1:14:43

Artificial intelligence is evolving at an unprecedented pace—what does that mean for the future of technology, venture capital, business, and even our understanding of ourselves? Award-winning journalist and writer Anil Ananthaswamy joins us for our latest episode to discuss his latest book Why Machines Learn: The Elegant Math Behind Modern AI . Anil helps us explore the journey and many breakthroughs that have propelled machine learning from simple perceptrons to the sophisticated algorithms shaping today’s AI revolution, powering GPT and other models. The discussion aims to demystify some of the underlying math that powers modern machine learning to help everyone grasp this technology impacting our lives, even if your last math class was in high school. Anil walks us through the power of scaling laws, the shift from training to inference optimization, and the debate among AI’s pioneers about the road to AGI—should we be concerned, or are we still missing key pieces of the puzzle? The conversation also delves into AI’s philosophical implications—could understanding how machines learn help us better understand ourselves? And what challenges remain before AI systems can truly operate with agency? If you enjoy this episode, please subscribe and leave us a review on your favorite podcast platform. Sign up for our newsletter at techsurgepodcast.com for exclusive insights and updates on upcoming TechSurge Live Summits. Links: Read Why Machines Learn, Anil’s latest book on the math behind AI https://www.amazon.com/Why-Machines-Learn-Elegant-Behind/dp/0593185749 Learn more about Anil Ananthaswamy’s work and writing https://anilananthaswamy.com/ Watch Anil Ananthaswamy’s TED Talk on AI and intelligence https://www.ted.com/speakers/anil_ananthaswamy Discover the MIT Knight Science Journalism Fellowship that shaped Anil’s AI research https://ksj.mit.edu/ Understand the Perceptron, the foundation of neural networks https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perceptron Read about the Perceptron Convergence Theorem and its significance https://www.nature.com/articles/323533a0…

1 yıl önce 1:01:18

MP3•Bölüm sayfası

Howie Liu, founder and CEO of Airtable, was interviewed by Village Global co-founder and partner Ben Casnocha live in downtown San Francisco in front of an audience of Village Global founders and friends of the firm.
Highlights:
- Embracing discomfort is part of the founder's journey. Learning to tolerate and even appreciate this discomfort is important.
- Making decisions when you feel "almost ready" rather than waiting for perfect readiness is often necessary.
- It's crucial to understand the underlying problems customers are trying to solve, not just their feature requests. Founders should resist the temptation to become "feature checklist machines" and instead focus on core problems.
- There's growing fatigue around AI hype in enterprises. Successful AI implementation requires focusing on specific, valuable use cases rather than broad promises.
- Airtable spent 2.5 years building their initial product, focusing on creating a platform rather than just a simple collaboration tool. They balanced building a horizontal platform with targeted use case marketing to appeal to different users.
- It's crucial to understand the context and biases of advice-givers, no matter how successful they are. Having strong conviction in your vision, while being open to feedback, is essential for success.
Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform.
Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup

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#Venture Capital #Tech #Trading #MBA #Village Global #Business

Howie Liu on Airtable's Early Days, Scaling, and AI

Village Global Podcast

264 subscribers

published 1 yıl önce

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MP3•Bölüm sayfası

1062 bölüm

#Venture Capital #Tech #Trading #MBA #Village Global #Business

Tüm bölümler

1
Abhay Parasnis on Creating Moats, AI Strategy, and Selling to Enterprise 47:45

10 gün önce47:45

47:45

Abhay Parasnis is founder and CEO of Typeface, is former CTO/CPO at Adobe, and sits on the board of Dropbox and Schneider Electric. He joined Ben Casnocha, co-founder and partner at Village Global, for a live masterclass for Village Global founders. Takeaways: If you can break into the top tier of the enterprise market, it’s hard to dislodge you. Big platforms like Microsoft, Google, and OpenAI are eager to prove their tech's power. If you position your startup as a prime showcase for their platform, you become a strategic asset. When selling to enterprise, understand the company's macro strategy in the market, but also know what the on-the-ground person needs to close deals. With the rise of agents and agentic automation, even the workflow layer isn’t safe. As these systems gain richer context, they’ll redefine automation in SaaS. Just like today’s platform vs. app debate, tomorrow’s battle will be legacy workflows vs. agents. Success in AI isn’t just about top-tier products—it’s about being a consultative partner to help them with change management. There’s a common fear about embracing a custom data training strategy — it’s expensive, complex, and feels like the domain of big players. But starting narrow and accumulating distinct data early is key. It drives real AI differentiation and builds critical internal muscle in engineering and product. Value-based pricing means customers are less price-sensitive because it ties directly to their top-line business, unlike commodity pricing, which faces constant cost pressure. Instead of charging per word, image, or seat—models that AI disrupts—pricing should align with outcomes, ensuring long-term sustainability. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We'll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Fundraising in AI with Aaron Harris 46:26

18 gün önce46:26

46:26

Aaron Harris was a partner at YC for 7.5 years where he funded Deel, OpenSea, Scale AI, Rappi, Lattice, and others. He also built YC's Series A program where he worked with founders on over 200 Series As and Bs that raised in excess of $3B in capital. He joined Sam Kirschner, VP at Village Global, to give Village Global founders helpful tips on fundraising. Takeaways: Investors bet on stories, not just data. Your job? Tell a story of massive economic opportunity — not just how you fit into the future, but how you create it. Hype lowers the barrier to turn attention into excitement. Fundraising isn't the trophy, even though it's celebrated as such. But if you optimize for raising money, you get great at burning money and miss the real point: building something that lasts through the hype cycles. Think about raising money with terminal value in mind, not just the value of this current round. Raising an A: you'll need to raise about 20% of your company. Series B: 15-20%. Seeds are all over the place. More competition in a round means less dilution; less competition means more dilution. Hype helps reduce dilution. Be aware of dilution on SAFEs so that you don't all of a sudden start arguing about a point of dilution here or there on a given round. AI companies have been getting faster investor movement. The hottest deals land term sheets in 48 hours. Next tier? 1-2 weeks. Beyond that, a 2-6 week grind with unpredictable timing. After 6 weeks, rounds can stretch to 3-4 months where persistence is what leads to success. Understand the market and how investors think by having casual, no-pitch-deck coffee chats. The real signal? Not a follow-up meeting — that's just a VC's job. Look for action: are they willing to spend political capital for you? That’s true interest. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We'll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Hiring Technical Talent with Kathy Copic and Lindsay Pettingill 57:37

1 yıl önce57:37

57:37

Kathy Copic is founder of Fieldwork Partners, where she works closely with early stage companies on scoping technical projects, getting early ML models into production, and helping them hire. She was interviewed by Lindsay Pettingill, Investment Partner at Village Global, during this masterclass for Village Global founders. Takeaways: Maintain at least three interview touchpoints to thoroughly evaluate candidates — rushing the process means missing vital signals about how well candidates understand your business and culture. Write job descriptions that focus on company mission and concrete first-90-day projects rather than generic skill requirements — this attracts candidates who are genuinely excited about your specific opportunity. Look beyond prestigious company names and degrees — strong candidates often demonstrate their passion through side projects, nonprofits, or other entrepreneurial pursuits. Foster interactive interviews where you're comfortable interrupting candidates — their response to dynamic discussion reveals more about their communication style and fit than scripted questions. Structure work trials carefully to benefit both parties — the best candidates are evaluating your team and work environment just as much as you're evaluating them. When competing with large tech companies, emphasize the concrete impact individuals can have in your startup rather than trying to match compensation packages. Build diverse teams by implementing clear interview rubrics, providing guidance on legal considerations, and equipping interviewers with specific talking points about why diversity matters to your company. For references, consider asking peers rather than managers when candidates are currently employed, but use references extensively to validate your assessments. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We'll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Eynat Guez of Papaya Global on Mastering Enterprise Sales and Building Long-Term Partnerships 55:36

1 yıl önce55:36

55:36

Eynat Guez, founder and CEO of Papaya Global, was interviewed by Ben Casnocha, co-founder and partner at Village Global, during this masterclass for Village Global founders. Takeaways: Show up to key meetings as the founder or executive team — don’t just send the sales team. It signals to the client that you’re personally invested and committed to making the deal a success. Avoid being overly optimistic about where prospects stand. Serious signals include active texting, detailed questions about implementation, security questionnaires, and the involvement of additional stakeholders. Be strategic about progressing meetings: PowerPoint to articulate vision, Excel for financials, and Word for legal details. Build strong relationships with junior VCs as well as partners — they can provide introductions, market intelligence, and future opportunities as they advance in their careers. Building relationships with clients shouldn’t stop after the deal closes. Ongoing check-ins help position your company as a long-term partner, not just a vendor. Leaders should periodically dive deep into 2-3 departments or processes each quarter to challenge assumptions and drive innovation. Engage with junior employees or frontline staff for fresh perspectives — their insights are often more candid than those of seasoned executives. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Auren Hoffman and Ben Casnocha on Career Strategy, Undiscovered Talent, Networks, and more 58:01

1 yıl önce58:01

58:01

Auren Hoffman, CEO of SafeGraph and GP of Flex Capital, interviewed Ben Casnocha, Village Global co-founder and partner, on Auren's World of DaaS podcast. They are longtime friends and had a wide-ranging discussion on career strategy, evaluating founders, serendipity, wealth, and much more. We've cross-posted that conversation here. Highlights: The relevance of what you know vs. who you know has been a debate in the career strategy space for decades. Ben believes that the “what you know” is often dependent on the “who you know” because with the advent of the internet, public information is accessible to all but the insights that live in the heads of the smartest people are not shared widely and require a personal relationship with someone to be able to access that information. Talent spotting is about finding value in the unexpected and recognizing the strengths in those who may not fit the typical mold. Sometimes people who have clear and obvious flaws in one area are overlooked by people who can’t see the brilliance beyond that particular flaw. Certain seasons of life are good for maximizing for serendipity and taking random coffee meetings. The key is to know what season of life you are in and whether it’s better in the long-term at that moment to be maximizing for serendipity or not. The pendulum will swing back around at some point. There’s a certain level of wealth where your wealth actually starts to detract from your level of happiness. Sometimes people are better served by aiming for a lower level of wealth in order to maximize for happiness. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Howie Liu on Airtable's Early Days, Scaling, and AI 1:01:18

1 yıl önce1:01:18

1:01:18

Howie Liu, founder and CEO of Airtable, was interviewed by Village Global co-founder and partner Ben Casnocha live in downtown San Francisco in front of an audience of Village Global founders and friends of the firm. Highlights: - Embracing discomfort is part of the founder's journey. Learning to tolerate and even appreciate this discomfort is important. - Making decisions when you feel "almost ready" rather than waiting for perfect readiness is often necessary. - It's crucial to understand the underlying problems customers are trying to solve, not just their feature requests. Founders should resist the temptation to become "feature checklist machines" and instead focus on core problems. - There's growing fatigue around AI hype in enterprises. Successful AI implementation requires focusing on specific, valuable use cases rather than broad promises. - Airtable spent 2.5 years building their initial product, focusing on creating a platform rather than just a simple collaboration tool. They balanced building a horizontal platform with targeted use case marketing to appeal to different users. - It's crucial to understand the context and biases of advice-givers, no matter how successful they are. Having strong conviction in your vision, while being open to feedback, is essential for success. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Guillermo Rauch on AI, Scaling Vercel, and The Future of Web Apps 56:11

1 yıl önce56:11

56:11

Guillermo Rauch is founder and CEO of Vercel, a company that provides the developer tools and cloud infrastructure to build, scale, and secure a faster, more personalized web. He was interviewed by Ben Casnocha, co-founder and general partner at Village Global, an early stage venture capital firm backed by some of the world’s most successful entrepreneurs. Takeaways: - Any modern cloud-native app is a nexus of services that all work together to create a coherent interface for the user. For example, Auth0 handles login, Stripe handles billing, React is used for the interface, among many more services all working in concert. Vercel helps ensure that the user has an amazing experience no matter what services are all working together on the back end. - Guillermo tells the story of open source Unix winning out over proprietary versions of Linux, even though the proprietary versions had an early lead. He suggests that over the long term, open source will win, more often than not, and that the same story will likely play out when it comes to AI models, with open source models winning out in the end. - When it comes to investing, Guillermo loves to bet on someone who has been obsessed with a topic for years and years. He recounts the story of the Auth0 team who had written books and given talks and spent years of their lives just on logging in and logging out. He also says that he prefers a leadership team that lives and breathes a company’s problem space. He says that he's allergic to the idea of a professional leadership team swooping in at a certain stage. - Rauch was born and raised in Argentina. He says that he has a sense of urgency and that tomorrow is not promised that stems from his childhood experience growing up in Argentina. He tells the story of Mark Zuckerberg keeping the Sun Microsystems logo on the back of the Facebook sign at their headquarters when they moved in to cultivate a sense that tomorrow is not promised to anyone. - Guillermo believes in giving his team leads radical ownership of their products. He provides the leads with frameworks that explain clear principles for how they build products at Vercel but beyond that he gives the leads a long leash and a sense of ownership over the product. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Encore: Secrets of Public Speaking and Oral Communication from Renowned Speaking Coach 42:20

1 yıl önce42:20

42:20

Michael Balaoing, founder of Candlelion, joins Village Global co-founder and partner Ben Casnocha on this episode to discuss: - The importance of the acronym WTF (what’s the feeling?) when you’re giving a presentation. - The four roles that you take on as a speaker: captain, pilot, guide, and game show host. - The five questions to ask when seeking feedback on a presentation. - How to keep the audience engaged throughout a talk, not just during the Q&A at the end. - How to bake stories into your presentations and remix your talks for different audiences. - The keys to virtual communication. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Encore: Brad Feld on What Nietzsche Can Teach Entrepreneurs 50:09

1 yıl önce50:09

50:09

Brad Feld (@bfeld), VC at Foundry Group and co-author with Dave Jilk of The Entrepreneur’s Weekly Nietzsche, joined Village Global co-founder and partner Ben Casnocha to discuss: - Common misconceptions about Nietzsche and why being misunderstood makes him an especially interesting philosopher. - What Nietzsche can teach entrepreneurs deciding whether to pivot or persevere. Brad says that founders should view their entrepreneurial journey not in terms of a single company, but as the next 30-50 years of their life. - Why Brad hates the term “passion” and says it’s overused in entrepreneurial circles. - Why to focus more on whether someone’s words and actions line up rather than the strength of their beliefs. - The lessons that Brad has for making decisions among groups today given Nietzsche’s aphorism that “insanity in individuals is rare, but in groups, parties, nations, and epochs it is the rule.” Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
How to Nail Product-Market Fit and Scale a B2B Company with Thejo Kote of Airbase 57:45

1 yıl önce57:45

57:45

Thejo Kote (@thejo) talks to Village partner Ben Casnocha. Thejo is a two-time founder and CEO. His current company, Airbase, is a spend management platform serving companies with 100 and 5,000 employees like Coda, 15Five, Front, Marqueta, CaptivateIQ, Abnormal, and more. Airbase has raised over $200 million, has tens of millions in ARR, and is consistently ranked as a top spend management company by G2. Highlights: - Rather than jumping into building Airbase, he built high-fidelity mockups and went back to prospective customers and asked if they’d buy it to “pre-sell” it. - In B2B, build for a specific, recognizable buyer. You want to sell to a specific role within the org who will be your champion. Ideally this is someone who also has influence within the org. - Select the kinds of customers who aren’t likely to switch in the early days. Team with early customers who actually want to be partners and are motivated by the relationship. Flatter them by asking: “are there any other innovative, forward-thinking leaders you know who I should also talk to?” - 6-8 months later after proving value and showing they could be a good partner, he said “hey, I want to get your feedback on our pricing model. Is this fair for the next set of customers?” 100% of the customers converted when he asked if they were willing to opt in to the pricing structure with a significant discount for their initial partnership. - When hiring salespeople, Thejo focuses more on personality traits rather than prior experience selling to the same segment. Also, if candidates are drawn to the liquid comp at a large, public company, they’re likely going to have a hard time transitioning to a startup. Find people who have been comfortable taking risks. - Airbase is fully remote and Thejo doesn’t think in terms of onshore vs. offshore within the company because that instantly creates a class system. Anyone anywhere in the world is part of their single, remote team, which has the internet as its headquarters. Each member of the team is “equitably inconvenienced” in his words. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.…

1
Encore: Cloudflare Co-Founder Michelle Zatlyn’s Advice on Hiring, Fundraising, Scaling, and more 50:26

1 yıl önce50:26

50:26

Michelle Zatlyn (@zatlyn), co-founder, president, and COO of Cloudflare, joined Village Global co-founder and partner Ben Casnocha for a masterclass with our founders in late 2020. They discussed: - The origin story of Cloudflare, including how the co-founders met, and how Michelle realized that she too could start a company. - Her advice on fundraising after raising more than $300M for Cloudflare, including why you should keep the rest of the VC partnership in mind, and how to show rather than tell in your pitch. - How they found the best talent, including why their blog brought them plenty of inbound interest, and why searching far and wide around the globe for engineers helped them build their team quickly. - Why they don’t use recruiters at Cloudflare. - How to turn a weakness into a strength. - How to process feedback and when it makes sense to ignore it. - Stories of extreme frugality in the early days of the company, including building their own Ikea desks. - How an emotional response by customers helped them know they had product-market fit. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal. Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup…

1
Lessons from the Early Days at Uber and Advice for Founders with Kevin Novak 46:37

1 yıl önce46:37

46:37

We're excited to launch a new EIR program for data science founders in partnership with Rackhouse Ventures, founded by Kevin Novak. Learn more about the program: https://www.villageglobal.vc/rackhouse-village-global-eir-program Kevin Novak (@novakkm), an early Uber employee, was instrumental in developing their data science program and was the creator of surge pricing. Highlights: - Kevin, originally a nuclear physicist, applied his analytical skills to develop Uber's first surge pricing model in three weeks—a task that would typically take six months in academia. - He says that founders shouldn’t wait until they have plenty of data to make decisions — instead, start with first principles thinking while also building a virtuous data cycle by ensuring you are collecting data that will inform future decisions. - He comments that AI might be “overhyped on average” at the moment. The first breakthrough product is essentially an API, which has led to incumbents responding more quickly and more aggressively. Kevin argues that if you are founding a generative AI company, you are effectively making the claim that incumbents won’t be able to respond and implement an LLM themselves. - Kevin cautions founders not to fall in love with any one idea too early. It’s better to hedge your bets and experiment with one or two. Through trial and error, you can eventually decide on one idea that has the potential to be a strong business. - For the Village Global-Rackhouse EIR program, we’re looking for founders with deep passion for founding a company. We don’t require you to have your idea and team established. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.…

1
Encore Episode: John Donahoe’s Lessons on Leadership and Being a Better CEO 54:14

1 yıl önce54:14

54:14

This encore episode is a recording of a special masterclass roundtable session for our founders with John Donahoe. John is CEO of Nike and was previously CEO of ServiceNow and eBay. He is known as one of the most inspirational leaders in Silicon Valley and is a highly sought-after mentor to CEOs including Brian Chesky at Airbnb, Drew Houston at Dropbox, and Ben Silbermann at Pinterest. We’re honored to have him among our small group of world-class executives and collaborators whose time and expertise help power our network of founders at Village Global. He shared advice on when to hire ahead, invest in and train, or replace personnel on your team and gave insight into his most common piece of advice on professional growth when advising CEOs. Quotes From This Episode "When you talk about priorities at an aspirational level, they overlap a lot. People start realizing we're more similar than we're dissimilar." "Adversity never feels fun. I don't seek adversity. But I'm no longer scared of adversity. When it emerges, instead of trying to run from it, I now accept that it is a reality and I say, 'well, at least I'm going to learn and grow.'" "My experience has been that around any issue that involves change, you have roughly 20-25% of people who want to be part of it, no matter what the topic is, you have 25-30% of people who want to fight it, and you have the 50% of people in the middle saying 'which side is going to win?'" "[When someone is let go] The fear is humiliation usually. That's almost a bigger fear than actually leaving the company." "We're never as good or as bad as labels make us out to be." "I would say in general, for every 10 hours of business development conversations, 8 of them are a waste." "I do gratitude practice driving into work every morning. It's proven in brain science that your brain becomes more negative over time. But it's also been proven in brain science that you can counteract that." "The older I get, the more I've made friends with uncertainty. I don't avoid uncertainty. Uncertainty is as present to me today as it was before but I'm a little more comfortable with it today." Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.…

1
Identifying 275M Unreported Genetic Variations To Improve Healthcare with NIH All of Us Program CTO Chris Lunt 49:08

1 yıl önce49:08

49:08

Chris Lunt is a technology executive with more than 25 years of experience building web services and data platforms. He is in his seventh year as the CTO for the NIH's All of Us Research Program. He joined the NIH from GetInsured, where he worked to improve health insurance shopping and enrollment systems. Previously Chris ran VC-backed internet startups, with one IPO. Highlights: - Chris is hopeful about Silicon Valley going back to its roots to create sociological change by uniting people and being thoughtful about what the world should look like. Over the last couple decades it has become more venal. - Chris believes in the power of investing public money to create opportunities. He says that Silicon Valley is largely the story of a public private partnership and that it’s hard to do certain fundamental research in a purely market-based economy. - Chris says that the initiatives around Web3 weren’t grounded in a realistic understanding of human nature and the result was not a good outcome. - Healthcare is one of the most conservative industries but a way to drag it into the future is for the government to mandate change. Health records are currently built for billing purposes rather than for improving health. It’s also not all that long ago that hospitals were using paper records until the Affordable Care Act required that they digitize. - There is a moment coming soon where there is an opportunity to completely reimagine healthcare delivery. A generalist will be able to help a person navigate between various providers and specialists instead of the current fragmented approach. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.…

1
Building Hardware Companies and Choosing Co-Founders with Michael Hochberg 57:04

1 yıl önce57:04

57:04

Michael Hochberg (https://www.linkedin.com/in/hochberg/) is a physicist and a founder of four successful startup companies in semiconductors and telecommunications, including Luxtera, acquired by Cisco in 2019, and Elenion, acquired by Nokia in 2020. He won the highest awards for young scientists in Singapore (NRF Fellowship) and the United States (PECASE), is an author on over 60 patents, and has been involved in the creation of over 30 companies in biotech and applications of silicon photonics. Highlights: - In college Michael would tie together clusters of Dell machines to replicate the performance of supercomputers. - The core of building a successful company in Michael’s view is hiring the best people. The best can solve really hard problems but hiring mediocre people results in even trivial problems being unsolvable. - Silicon photonics chips are replacing things that could previously only be done in silicon. Data centres and telecom systems are now dominated by silicon photonics. - There’s a fundamental difference between co-founders and early employees but that line can often be blurred, often at the peril of the founding team. - Michael says that founders don’t do enough diligence on their co-founders. Companies often last longer than most marriages so it’s important to throughly reference check your co-founders, ask specific and tactical open-ended questions of them, and see them deliver tangible results before you start a company together. - It’s important to be aligned on what success means to you and your co-founders. Two people may have very different definitions of what “a lot of money” means — that could be enough money to buy a house for one person and $100M for another. Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.…

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