EPISODE
00:12:20 hello
01:59:57 Aparna Chennapragada, Microsoft's Chief Product Officer for AI at Work, has a rich background in product development, including leadership roles at Google and Robinhood. In the conversation, she discusses integrating AI into Microsoft's productivity tools, emphasizing the balance between adding AI features and enhancing user experience. She highlights the importance of meeting users where they are, whether through chat interfaces or embedded AI functionalities, to make work more efficient and intuitive.
02:36:08 Richard Socher, a prominent AI researcher and entrepreneur, is the founder and CEO of You.com, an AI-powered search engine. In the conversation, he discusses You.com's recent $100 million funding round, valuing the company at $1.5 billion, and highlights the platform's rapid growth, now handling over a billion API calls monthly. Socher also addresses the evolving landscape of search, emphasizing the shift towards AI-driven models and the importance of accuracy in search results.
02:46:35 Pablo Palafox, co-founder and CEO of HappyRobot, discusses the company's recent $44 million Series B funding led by Base10 Partners, with participation from existing investors like Andreessen Horowitz and Y Combinator. He explains that HappyRobot is building AI workers to automate repetitive tasks in the supply chain industry, such as negotiating freight rates, scheduling shipments, and collecting payments, allowing human teams to focus on strategic and higher-value activities. Palafox highlights that their platform integrates with existing enterprise systems and is already in use by over 70 enterprise customers, including industry leaders like DHL and Ryder.
02:52:08 Will Bryk, co-founder and CEO of Exa, discusses the company's recent $85 million Series B funding round led by Peter Fenton, highlighting Fenton's extensive experience in guiding companies to IPOs and his alignment with Exa's vision. He elaborates on Exa's mission to build a search engine tailored for AI applications, emphasizing the need for AI-specific search infrastructure distinct from traditional human-focused search engines like Google. Bryk also touches on the challenges and strategies involved in developing such a platform, including the acquisition of a GPU cluster to support their research and the importance of training embedding models to enhance search quality.
03:04:38 Charlie Wu, founder and CEO of Orchard Robotics, discusses the company's recent $22 million Series A funding led by Quiet Capital and Shine Capital, which will accelerate the development of AI-powered camera systems for precision crop management. He shares his personal journey, highlighting his family's background in apple farming and his early interest in robotics, leading to the creation of technology that provides farmers with detailed data on fruit count, size, color, and growth rates. Wu emphasizes the transformative impact of their technology on agriculture, enabling farmers to make informed decisions that enhance yield, reduce labor costs, and promote sustainable farming practices.