TechCrunch
How to Go From Zero to a $300M Valuation in Five Months
- Title
- How to Go From Zero to a $300M Valuation in Five Months
- Runtime
- 0:59
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- This founder left his job at Google and raised a $55M pre-seed with a $300M valuation in just five months, even with non-technical VCs.
In this week's episode of Build Mode, co-founder Andrew Dai breaks down how they pulled off Elorian AI's ascent before building a product or landing customers.
- Title
- The founder that left Google and secured a $300M pre-seed valuation in months l Build Mode
- Runtime
- 34:30
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Building an AI startup is one thing. Raising one of the largest seed rounds of the year before launching a product is something else entirely.
In this episode of Build Mode, host and Startup Battlefield lead Isabelle Johannesen sits down with Andrew Dai, founder and CEO of Elorian and former Google DeepMind researcher, to unpack how his company raised a $55 million seed round at a $300 million valuation before generating revenue or releasing a product.
Andrew shares what investors saw in Elorian's vision for visual AI, how he approached fundraising after leaving Google DeepMind, and why choosing the right investors mattered more than maximizing valuation. He also offers practical advice for founders building in AI, explains why today's fundraising environment rewards clear storytelling over technical jargon, and shares what surprised him most as a first-time founder.
Subscribe to Build Mode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you like ...
- Title
- How Elorian AI pulled off a $300M pre-seed valuation with Andrew Dai
- Runtime
- 34:30
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Building an AI startup is one thing. Raising one of the largest seed rounds of the year before launching a product is something else entirely.
In this episode of Build Mode, host and Startup Battlefield lead Isabelle Johannesen sits down with Andrew Dai, founder and CEO of Elorian and former Google DeepMind researcher, to unpack how his company raised a $55 million seed round at a $300 million valuation before generating revenue or releasing a product.
Andrew shares what investors saw in Elorian's vision for visual AI, how he approached fundraising after leaving Google DeepMind, and why choosing the right investors mattered more than maximizing valuation. He also offers practical advice for founders building in AI, explains why today's fundraising environment rewards clear storytelling over technical jargon, and shares what surprised him most as a first-time founder.
They get into:
...
- Title
- Inside Ode with Anthropic, the startup betting AI services are the future of enterprise| Equity
- Runtime
- 31:22
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Can a handful of engineers really do the work of an army of consultants? That’s the bet behind Ode with Anthropic — the joint venture dedicated to embedding forward-deployed engineers in enterprise firms, backed by Anthropic, Blackstone, Hellman & Friedman, Goldman Sachs and others.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan sits down with Ode’s leaders Chris Taylor and Eddie Siegel, who founded Fractional AI, the applied AI services startup that Ode acquired earlier this year to serve as the new venture’s core. The three discuss why so many enterprise AI pilots never make it to production and why they think AI-native services are about to become one of the biggest categories in tech.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:30 Fractional AI becomes "Ode with...
- Title
- When A Down Round Actually Saved a Startup
- Runtime
- 0:35
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Down rounds carry a stigma, but they're not always the end of a startup’s story.
Charles Hudson of Precursor Ventures shares an example of a company that survived a difficult fundraising process involving a down round and investor-friendly terms. It wasn't easy, but making the hard financing decision ultimately gave the company a chance to keep building.
For founders, the lesson is simple: The best fundraising outcome isn't always the highest valuation — it's the one that keeps your business alive.
Get more of Hudson’s advice in the latest Build Mode podcast episode wherever you prefer your pods.
- Title
- These Two Founder Archetypes Are Catching Investors' Eyes
- Runtime
- 0:45
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Do you fit into one of the trendiest founder archetypes?
Fundraising has always been competitive, but today's market is especially tough for first-time founders. In the latest episode of our Build Mode podcast, Charles Hudson of Precursor Ventures breaks down the most popular founder archetypes right now: repeat founders with proven track records and exceptionally young technical founders.
That leaves experienced, first-time founders facing a higher bar, even when they have a compelling business idea. But there’s still hope! Listen and subscribe wherever you get your podcasts.
- Title
- Hugging Face's CEO on why companies are done renting their AI | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 36:58
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Open source AI is booming, according to Hugging Face CEO Clem Delangue. The company has grown into something like a GitHub for AI in recent years, where AI builders can share and download open models and datasets, now used by roughly half the Fortune 500. Delangue has seen the same story play out again and again: companies start out on frontier APIs, but as they scale, the costs push them towards open source models.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan talked to Delangue about why the open vs closed source fight matters in the wake of Anthropic’s halted Fable release, and why he's worried about the possibility that a handful of big companies could end up controlling everything.
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:33 Breaking down open source growth data
04:34 What's driving the open source resurgence
08:47 Who’s using Hugging Face, and how?
10:28 China overtakes the US i...
- Title
- Why Raising Your First Round Is Harder Than Ever l Build Mode
- Runtime
- 40:04
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Raising your first round has always been hard — but in today’s market, the rules are changing fast.
In this episode of Build Mode, our host and Startup Battlefield lead Isabelle Johannesen sits down with Charles Hudson, Founder and Managing Partner of Precursor Ventures, to talk about what early-stage founders need to know before raising their first institutional round.
Charles shares a candid look at how the venture landscape has shifted, why AI is changing what investors pay attention to, and how founders can better navigate fundraising when the old playbooks no longer apply.
They get into:
• Why raising pre-seed and seed funding feels harder right now
• How AI is reshaping venture capital
• What founders should know before choosing an investor
• Why the highest valuation is not always the best deal
• How to build momentum during a fundraise
• Why storytelling and a strong blurb matter more than ever
...
- Title
- You May Care Deeply About Your Startup. The Rest of the World Doesn't
- Runtime
- 0:29
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Nobody has to care: that’s the biggest challenge facing many startups.
Not every startup that struggles for funding is a bad business. Sometimes the metrics are strong, growth is real, and the founders have done everything right.
The problem? Investors believe the biggest returns are happening somewhere else.
In the latest episode of our Build Mode podcast, Charles Hudson of Precursor Ventures explains why great companies can still struggle to raise capital when they're outside the markets VCs are betting on — and why timing and category matter just as much as execution.
- Title
- The New Rules of Early-Stage Fundraising with Charles Hudson
- Runtime
- 40:04
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Raising your first round has always been hard — but in today’s market, the rules are changing fast.
In this episode of Build Mode (https://techcrunch.com/podcasts/build-mode/) , our host and Startup Battlefield (https://techcrunch.com/startup-battlefield/) lead Isabelle Johannesen sits down with Charles Hudson, Founder and Managing Partner of Precursor Ventures (https://precursorvc.com/) , to talk about what early-stage founders need to know before raising their first institutional round.
Charles shares a candid look at how the venture landscape has shifted, why AI is changing what investors pay attention to, and how founders can better navigate fundraising when the old playbooks no longer apply.
They get into:
• Why raising pre-seed and seed funding feels harder right now• How AI is reshaping venture capital• What founders should know before choosing an investor• Wh...
- Title
- Why this CEO thinks video games make better training data than the internet | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 26:19
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- When it comes to achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI), large language models just don’t have what it takes.
Models like ChatGPT and Claude are great at text, but they're less skilled at understanding how things actually move through space and time — an essential skill for producing intelligence that generalizes. That gap, it turns out, might be filled by gaming data. That's the bet behind General Intuition, a Bezos-backed, New York-based startup valued at $2.3 billion that just closed a $320 million round with Coatue, Eric Schmidt, and researchers at MIT and Google DeepMind joining its list of investors.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, General Intuition CEO Pim de Witte joins Rebecca Bellan to dig into why world models trained on gaming data might be the next big leap in physical AI, how the company spun out of gaming platform Medal TV, and where the ethical red lines are when your models could end up being used for defense app...
- Title
- Build Mode: Inside the Fundraise
- Runtime
- 0:56
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Startup fundraising is harder than ever, and Season 3 of Build Mode is here to help. Whether you're raising a seed round, preparing for Series A, pitching venture capital firms, negotiating a term sheet, or exploring alternatives to VC funding, this season is packed with practical advice from founders and investors who have successfully navigated the fundraising journey.
Hosted by TechCrunch Startup Battlefield Editor Isabelle Johannessen, Build Mode is the TechCrunch podcast where founders, investors, and startup operators share honest conversations about what it really takes to build and finance a company. This season features Charles Hudson (Precursor Ventures), Andrew Dai (Elorian), Ashley Tyrner-Dolce (FarmboxRx), Kristina Subbotina (Lexsy AI), Sydney Sykes (NVIDIA), Xavier Chi (Mbodi), Jack Groetzinger (SeatGeek), Sasha Orloff (Puzzle), Everette Taylor (Kickstarter), Manan Mehta (Unshackled Ventures), Julia Hartz (Eventbrite), and more. Together, they c...
- Title
- Inside the Fundraise l Build Mode
- Runtime
- 0:53
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- Startup fundraising is harder than ever, and Season 3 of Build Mode is here to help. Whether you're raising a seed round, preparing for Series A, pitching venture capital firms, negotiating a term sheet, or exploring alternatives to VC funding, this season is packed with practical advice from founders and investors who have successfully navigated the fundraising journey.
Hosted by TechCrunch Startup Battlefield Editor Isabelle Johannessen, Build Mode is the TechCrunch podcast where founders, investors, and startup operators share honest conversations about what it really takes to build and finance a company. This season features Charles Hudson (Precursor Ventures), Andrew Dai (Elorian), Ashley Tyrner-Dolce (FarmboxRx), Kristina Subbotina (Lexsy AI), Sydney Sykes (NVIDIA), Xavier Chi (Mbodi), Jack Groetzinger (SeatGeek), Sasha Orloff (Puzzle), Everette Taylor (Kickstarter), Manan Mehta (Unshackled Ventures), Julia Hartz (Eventbrite), and more. Together, they cover topics including...
- Title
- Autonomous vehicle hype is back, and Humble Robotics is bringing it to freights | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 26:46
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- The autonomous vehicle space is starting to feel like a repeat of the 2016 hype cycle. Travis Kalanick is back building a robotics company, and the talent wars and capital are heating up the same way they did the first time around. The money's flowing back, and it's the people who lived through that first wave who are building the next one.
Humble Robotics founder and CEO Eyal Cohen is one of them. Cohen was at Otto when Uber came calling, later followed Anthony Levandowski to Pronto, and after two decades bouncing between deep tech bets in the Bay Area, his new company came out of stealth in April with $24 million to build a fully autonomous, cabless electric hauler for freight.
Cohen joins Kirsten Korosec on this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast to talk about AV déjà vu and what he's learned from 15 years of building startups across electrification, solar, and robotics.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Sp...
- Title
- HaloBraid's Robotic Assistant Aims to Cut Back on 8B Hours of Braiding
- Runtime
- 2:53
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- For thousands of years, hair braiding has been a manual task, taking up to 12 hours at a stretch, as a stylist weaves patterns into a customer's hair.
And after years of research, a robotics startup launched this week to drastically cut down on that time. Meet HaloBraid, whose first device, set to launch later this year, acts as a braiding assistant for professional stylists.
- Title
- Why So Many Companies Are Now Chasing Neoclouds
- Runtime
- 0:48
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- While OpenAI is busy building its own chips, Groq, SpaceX, and even companies that used to make shoes are racing to lease out compute.
The Equity Podcast crew asks: Are neoclouds the new oil? And how long will the demand last?
- Title
- Everyone from OpenAI to SpaceX is building their own chips | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 36:04
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- OpenAI just shared its plans to spice things up with Jalapeño, its custom inference chip built with Broadcom, joining Google, Apple, and SpaceX in a growing list of companies building their way out of single-supplier risk. The goal is less of a clean break and more of a hedge. Custom silicon means more control, hardware tuned to specific needs, and the kind of performance gains Apple unlocked when it ditched Intel.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O'Kane dig into what the custom chip trend means for the industry and a few deals of the week.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
01:28 OpenAI's Jalapeno chip and the race for custom silicon
07:33 Memory chip crunch and rising costs for consumers
09:1...
- Title
- Best of Build Mode: Think like a VC
- Runtime
- 15:23
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about venture capital. Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit conversations from past seasons to give founders a glimpse behind the VC curtain and a better understanding of what investors are really looking for.
From choosing the right investors to building a differentiated go-to-market strategy, these venture capitalists and founder-turned-investors share hard-earned lessons on fundraising, portfolio dynamics, investor-founder relationships, and what separates the companies that successfully raise their next round from those that don't.
In this episode, you'll hear from:
•
Yuri Sagalov, managing director at General Catalyst (https://pod.link/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vWUZMNjEyNzkzNjQ5NA/episode/YzkyY2ZhZTYtMGNmMS0xMWYx...
- Title
- Best of Build Mode: Scaling Company Culture
- Runtime
- 16:33
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about company culture. Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit some of the most insightful conversations from past seasons to explore how founders intentionally shape culture from day one and why the habits, values, and decisions of leadership have an outsized impact as companies scale.
Guests share lessons on hiring for culture, developing strong leaders, building diverse teams, navigating layoffs with empathy, and creating workplaces where people can do their best work. From early-stage startups to high-growth companies, these founders reveal what they've learned about building cultures that last.
In this episode, you'll hear from:
•
Ian Schmidt, partner & consultant at Trimergence (https://pod.link/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm...
- Title
- Best of Build Mode: The Founder Mistakes That Cost Time, Money, and Growth
- Runtime
- 25:40
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about startup mistakes, hard-earned lessons, and the decisions founders wish they’d made differently.
Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit some of the most insightful conversations from past seasons to explore the missteps that shaped successful companies. Guests share candid stories about chasing product-market fit, making hiring mistakes, navigating investor expectations, managing hypergrowth, building company infrastructure, and learning what really matters in the early days of a startup.
In this episode, you’ll hear from:
•
Deon Nicholas, cofounder & former CEO of Forethought AI and co-founder of Espa Labs (https://pod.link/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vWUZMNjEyNzkzNjQ5NA/episode/N2I0NGM1ZGEtYzA0Ny0xMWYwLWI5YjUtZTcyNmN...
- Title
- Best of Build Mode: Cofounders, Conflict and Compatibility
- Runtime
- 20:24
- Date posted
- 3 months ago
- Description
- This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about effective partnerships, from cofounder relationships and team trust to investor dynamics and leadership communication.
Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit some of the most insightful conversations from past seasons to explore what makes startup partnerships actually work. Guests share candid stories about finding cofounders online, navigating founder breakups, building trust inside fast-growing teams, balancing marriage and business, choosing the right investors, and learning when compatibility matters more than credentials.
In this episode, you’ll hear from:
•
Jasper Carmichael-Jack, cofounder & CEO of Artisan (https://pod.link/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5tZWdhcGhvbmUuZm0vWUZMNjEyNzkzNjQ5NA/episode/MTYwZmViMzgtM2VkNS0xMWYxLWEzMTItY...
- Title
- Is There an AI Bubble? Two Top VCs on Valuations and ARR Inflation | StrictlyVC LA 2026
- Runtime
- 28:17
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Is AI venture capital in a bubble, or are we just in the steepest growth curve anyone's ever seen?
At StrictlyVC Los Angeles 2026, TechCrunch's Editor-in-Chief Connie Loizos sat down with Chung Xu, Partner at Basis Set, and Carter Reum, co-founder of M13, to cut through the noise. They cover...
- Why this cycle is different from cloud and mobile, and why it isn't
- The ARR inflation problem VCs helped create
- How to find defensible companies when OpenAI and Anthropic are coming for every vertical
- What the SpaceX liquidity wave means for LA's tech ecosystem
- Title
- He Dropped Out of MIT at 19 to Build America's Drone Arsenal. It's Working | StrictlyVC LA 2026
- Runtime
- 27:41
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Ethan Thornton started Mach Industries at 16, dropped out of MIT, and is now running six simultaneous defense programs: jet engines, cruise missiles, a surface-to-air missile system, and a new 40-foot VTOL strike aircraft just contracted by the U.S. Navy.
At StrictlyVC Los Angeles 2026, TechCrunch Editor in Chief Connie Loizos sat down with the Mach Industries founder and CEO for a rare on-stage conversation about what it actually takes to build a serious defense hardware company from scratch — and why the U.S. has no choice but to move faster.
- Title
- Shinkei is Changing How Fish Are Caught, Processed and Brought to Your Plate | StrictlyVC LA 2026
- Runtime
- 21:18
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Much of American-caught fish is processed overseas, and often in China, before it comes back to the U.S. Shinkei wants to change that with robotics, computer vision, and a vertically integrated supply chain built from scratch.
At StrictlyVC Los Angeles 2026, TechCrunch Editor in Chief Connie Loizos sat down with Saif Khawaja, founder and CEO of Shinkei, and Delian Asparouhov of Founders Fund to talk about one of the most unexpected bets in venture capital right now.
They cover everything from the Japanese fish-killing technique that became a startup thesis, why American fish is now being imported into Japanese fish markets for the first time ever, and how Founders Fund thinks about contrarian bets in food and agriculture.
- Title
- Is the US government's Anthropic ban accidentally helping the brand? | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 32:23
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Just as last week was ending, the US government forced Anthropic to pull its two newest models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, citing national security concerns after Amazon researchers allegedly found a way to bypass Fable 5's guardrails.
Cybersecurity researchers have since signed an open letter calling the move dangerous, and Anthropic itself noted the same jailbreaks exist in other models. So is this a genuine security concern, or just the latest chapter in a messy relationship between Anthropic and the Trump administration?
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, hosts Anthony Ha, Sean O'Kane, and Rebecca Bellan unpack what the ban means for developers building on Anthropic's platform and for anyone watching the IPO, why it might accidentally be good for the company, and more of the week’s headlines.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @Equity...
- Title
- Why startups should 'be more concerned' about competition in VCs' portfolios l Best of Build Mode
- Runtime
- 15:23
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about venture capital. Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit conversations from past seasons to give founders a glimpse behind the VC curtain and a better understanding of what investors are really looking for.
From choosing the right investors to building a differentiated go-to-market strategy, these venture capitalists and founder-turned-investors share hard-earned lessons on fundraising, portfolio dynamics, investor-founder relationships, and what separates the companies that successfully raise their next round from those that don't.
In this episode, you'll hear from:
Yuri Sagalov, managing director at General Catalyst
Ross Fubini, managing partner at XYZ Venture Capital and Leslie Feinzaig, founder and general partner at Graham & Walker
Paul Irving, partner at GTMfund
Leah Solivan, founder of Ta...
- Title
- NEA’s Tiffany Luck says enterprises are still figuring out their AI ROI | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 33:22
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Tokenmaxxing was the hottest trend in Silicon Valley earlier this year, with CEOs encouraging employees to push AI usage as far as it would go. Then the bill came due. Uber reportedly blew through its annual AI budget in a few months, some companies cut Claude licenses for parts of their org, and Meta killed its internal leaderboard.
This tension between hype and ROI is exactly where NEA partner Tiffany Luck lives these days. She got her start convincing companies that e-commerce was the future, and now she's all in on AI, especially when it comes to the possibilities for "magic moments" in the consumer business.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Luck joins Rebecca Bellan to talk about the future of personal agents, her thoughts on this year's AI IPOs, and how startups are stepping in to help enterprises track return on AI spend.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can foll...
- Title
- Black Founders Had a Great Fundraising Quarter...With a Catch
- Runtime
- 2:39
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- On one hand, US-based, Black-founded startups have already raised $643M, 70% of what was raised in the entirety of last year.
But dig a little deeper into the numbers, and you'll find that in the words of Crunchbase's head of research: "...data has shown a persistent decline in funding to Black-founded companies that outpaces the overall decline in startup funding."
- Title
- SpaceX's IPO Made Elon Musk a Trillionaire...Now What?│Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 19:48
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- The biggest IPO in history dropped this morning on the Nasdaq — a debut so big, our team thought it deserved its own bonus Equity podcast episode.
On this special bonus episode of TechCrunch’s Equity podcast, Senior Reporter Sean O’Kane called up our AI Editor Russell Brandom to help him break down the $2 trillion valuation, Elon Musk becoming the world’s first trillionaire, and what it all means for Anthropic and OpenAI still waiting in the wings.
- Title
- AI's Already Reshaped the Economy. Now We See What Happens Next │ Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 0:37
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- No matter how viable it may be in the long term, AI has already reshaped the economy in expected,and unexpected, ways.
The latest Equity podcast dives right in as we enter the OpenAI and Anthropic IPO frenzy this summer: http://spr.ly/6055B87SCH
- Title
- All the Ways SpaceX Could Change How Tech IPO Landscape │ Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 1:14
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Is the SpaceX IPO going to redefine how much control one person can have over a public company?
And what example does this set for OpenAI and Anthropic's highly anticipated IPOs?
The latest episode of Equity sets the stage for what will be a wild summer for the public markets.
- Title
- SpaceX, Anthropic, and OpenAI’s hot IPO summer | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 33:10
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- The IPO market is back, and it's not the same companies leading the charge. FAANG had a good run, but a new acronym is taking over: MANGOS — Meta (or Microsoft, depending on who you ask), Anthropic, Nvidia, Google, OpenAI, and SpaceX. Half of that bunch is heading to public markets in the same window, and it's a stress test for investors, for valuations, and for what we can even expect from a public tech company in 2026.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, hosts Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O'Kane break down what this IPO moment actually means beyond the headline numbers, and who stands to benefit.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
00:47 Sam Bankman-Fried wants Trump to pardon him
06:33 Waymo snaps up Apple's secret Arizona test track for $220M
...
- Title
- Best of Build Mode: Company Culture by Design, Not Default
- Runtime
- 16:33
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about company culture. Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit some of the most insightful conversations from past seasons to explore how founders intentionally shape culture from day one and why the habits, values, and decisions of leadership have an outsized impact as companies scale.
Guests share lessons on hiring for culture, developing strong leaders, building diverse teams, navigating layoffs with empathy, and creating workplaces where people can do their best work. From early-stage startups to high-growth companies, these founders reveal what they've learned about building cultures that last.
In this episode, you'll hear from:
Ian Schmidt, partner & consultant at Trimergence
Hala Jawani, cofounder & CEO of Rivio
Ayal Yogev, cofounder & CEO of Anjuna
Leah Solivan, founder of TaskRabbit and founder of Precedent VC
...
- Title
- Why Andrew Yang is building instead of waiting for Washington | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 29:07
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Andrew Yang’s 2020 presidential campaign was based on a warning that automation and AI would hollow out the labor market and concentrate wealth in the hands of a few. At the time, ideas like Universal Basic Income felt fringe. Now Dario Amodei, Sam Altman, and Bernie Sanders are all saying versions of the same thing.
An entrepreneur at heart, Yang has found a new way to put money back into the hands of the people — one phone bill at a time. On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan talks to Yang about his startup Noble Mobile, which pays you to use your phone less, ways to combat the “attention economy,” and what startups can do when the government won't move.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
01:15 Being right about AI and jobs (unfortunately)
...
- Title
- Apple's New AI Photo Editing Tools Revealed at WWDC 2026
- Runtime
- 0:57
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Watch Apple’s new Spatial Reframing feature in action, which lets you reposition the angle of a picture after it’s taken, and is another of its AI-focused updates for its Photos app revealed at #WWDC26
- Title
- Apple CEO Tim Cook Gives His Final WWDC Goodbye
- Runtime
- 1:06
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Watch Tim Cook's final #WWDC26 sign-off, as he nears his last day as Apple's CEO after a 15 year run. What will you remember his tenure for the most?
- Title
- Was Siri AI's Rollout at WWDC 2026 Good Enough for the Skeptics?
- Runtime
- 0:49
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Siri first launched in 2010 and became a built-in assistant the next year, with plenty of ups and downs since. With the world shifting to AI-powered chat and interfaces, Apple showed off a new version at #WWDC26.
But is it enough to persuade you to ditch what you’re currently using?
- Title
- Defense Startup Funding is Rising. Now Comes the Hard Part.
- Runtime
- 0:39
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- The influx of funding in defense tech could leave many startups left in the "valley of death" between initial funding and high expectations.
We talked to Anduril's first investor on the harsh realities that set in between prototyping and deployment.
- Title
- The Gap Between What You Pay for AI and What It Actually Costs is an Industry-Wide Problem
- Runtime
- 0:23
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Was ChatGPT's initial pricing based on a model...or a vibe and a guess? With costs rising, the pricing reality is crashing into the expectations set by that $20/month fee.
- Title
- Uber's AI Budget Crisis Is a Warning Sign for Not Just Anthropic
- Runtime
- 1:23
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- The economics of AI are getting harder to ignore. Uber went from over-budget to capping internal AI usage in roughly six weeks, which sparks a bigger question...can AI labs bring costs down fast enough to meet what enterprises and consumers are actually willing to pay?
- Title
- The most interesting startups right now want to get you off your phone | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 33:28
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- While the AI fundraising machine keeps breaking its own records, some founders are building in the other direction.
Mirror founder Brynn Putnam just raised money for Board, a startup focused on bringing people together through in-person games and social experiences. Cyberdeck creators are going viral crafting whimsical DIY computers that literally encourage users to touch grass. Unlike the AI-free browser crowd, this doesn't just feel like backlash, but also people genuinely gravitating toward things that feel a little more human.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O'Kane dig into the week's headlines, from the "together tech" wave to what Anthropic's confidential IPO filing means against the backdrop of Alphabet's $80 billion AI raise, and whether the money is all flowing back to the big guys anyway.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also ...
- Title
- Best of Build Mode: Founder Fails and Fixes
- Runtime
- 25:40
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about startup mistakes, hard-earned lessons, and the decisions founders wish they’d made differently.
Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit some of the most insightful conversations from past seasons to explore the missteps that shaped successful companies. Guests share candid stories about chasing product-market fit, making hiring mistakes, navigating investor expectations, managing hypergrowth, building company infrastructure, and learning what really matters in the early days of a startup.
In this episode, you’ll hear from:
Deon Nicholas, cofounder & former CEO of Forethought AI and co-founder of Espa Labs
Jasper Carmichael-Jack, cofounder & CEO of Artisan
Yuri Sagalov, partner at General Catalyst
Isaiah Granet, cofounder & CEO of Bland
Ayal Yogev, founder & CEO of Anjuna
Sarah Lucena, founder & CEO of Mappa
- Title
- Defense tech is flooded with money, but who's built to last? | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 36:59
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Defense tech is red hot right now. Anduril and Mach Industries just doubled and quadrupled their valuations, respectively, and the U.S. government is proposing a 40% increase in defense budget. A wave of new startups is chasing those government contracts, but according to Ross Fubini, the venture investor who wrote Anduril’s first check, most of them will get lost in the Valley of Death between prototype contract and real production deal.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan asks Fubini — the founder and managing partner of XYZ Venture Capital, built on the Palantir alumni network and now approaching $2B AUM — what separates the survivors from the rest.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
01:11 XYZ VC’s Palantir roots, Anduril investment, and the defense...
- Title
- Waymo's Ojai Minivan: First Impressions
- Runtime
- 1:01
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Get an early tour of Waymo's newest robotaxi, the Ojai minivan 🚐
- Title
- Does your CEO have AI psychosis? Aaron Levie thinks most of them do. | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 37:42
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- The people deciding that AI can replace your job are also the ones least likely to understand what your job truly involves, according to Box founder Aaron Levie, who pointed to this as an example of "AI psychosis.” Indeed, ClickUp recently cut 22% of its workforcefor AI agents, tech layoffs in 2026 are already nearly matching all of 2025, and DuckDuckGo installs are climbing from users who want Google to stop forcing AI into search and just give them links.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Kirsten Korosec, Anthony Ha, and Sean O'Kane dig into what happens when the AI-pilled and the AI-skeptical are both right at the same time, plus three deals worth knowing about and Waymo's new robotaxi hitting the road.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.
Chapters:
00:00 Intro
01:18 Waymo's new Ojai robotaxi ...
- Title
- Runway and HOLYWATER TECH: Two AI Companies Trying to Upend Entertainment | StrictlyVC Athens 2026
- Runtime
- 35:26
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Runway began within art school, with a sparse network and little investor insight into AI video. HOLYWATER TECH started in Kyiv with no venture capital, and a mandate to be profitable from day one.
Seven years later, both have succeeded in disrupting, and putting some level of fear in, creative industries worldwide. At this StrictlyVC Athens 2026 discussion, host and TechCrunch Editor-in-Chief Connie Loizos brought both on stage to get the inside story of how these two breakout companies actually broke out.
Featuring:
Anastasis Germanidis: Co-Founder & Co-CEO, Runway
Anatolii Kasianov: Co-Founder & Co-CEO, HOLYWATER TECH
Recorded live at StrictlyVC Athens 2026, presented in partnership with Endeavor Greece.
- Title
- How to Know Your Idea is Legit: Validation, Failure & Shipping What Sticks | StrictlyVC Athens 2026
- Runtime
- 30:08
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Before you build, how do you know anyone actually wants what you're making? Journalist Ilyana Magra leads an honest conversation at StrictlyVC Athens 2026 with two founders about the messy path from idea to product to real adoption. Each explore the ideas they abandoned, the features they had to walk back, and the frameworks that actually helped lead to success.
Featuring...
Victoria Toli: Co-Founder and President, Finney
Johannes Galatsanos: Co-Founder and CEO, Diffraqtion
Recorded live at StrictlyVC Athens 2026, presented in partnership with Endeavor Greece.
- Title
- Three VC Perspectives on SpaceX, AI Valuation Fever and Where to Bet Next | StrictlyVC Athens 2026
- Runtime
- 31:45
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- What does the SpaceX IPO mean for the startup ecosystem? Is the AI funding frenzy justified, or is it groupthink at scale? At this StrictlyVC event in Athens, host and TechCrunch Editor-in-Chief Connie Loizos sat down with three seasoned investors to break down the state of venture capital, the hunt for white space, and what it actually takes to back a breakout company in 2026.
Featuring...
Ben Blume: Partner, Atomico
Andreas Stavropoulos: Partner, Threshold Ventures
Niko Bonatsos: Founder & General Partner, Verdict Capital
Recorded live at StrictlyVC Athens 2026, presented in partnership with Endeavor Greece.
- Title
- How Great Startup Partnerships Are Built | Best of Build Mode
- Runtime
- 20:24
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- This week on Build Mode, we’re diving back into the archives for a special best-of episode all about effective partnerships, from cofounder relationships and team trust to investor dynamics and leadership communication.
Host Isabelle Johannesen and producer Maggie Nye revisit some of the most insightful conversations from past seasons to explore what makes startup partnerships actually work. Guests share candid stories about finding cofounders online, navigating founder breakups, building trust inside fast-growing teams, balancing marriage and business, choosing the right investors, and learning when compatibility matters more than credentials.
In this episode, you’ll hear from:
Jasper Carmichael-Jack, cofounder & CEO of Artisan
Ian Schmidt, partner & consultant at Trimergence
Hala Jawani and Alessio Trestani, cofounders of Rieo
Leah Solivann, founder of TaskRabbit
Ross Fubini, managing partner at XYZ Venture Capital and Lesli...
- Title
- Google just broke SEO. Here’s what replaces it. | Equity Podcast
- Runtime
- 30:35
- Date posted
- 4 months ago
- Description
- Google I/O made it official: AI-generated answers are now front and center in search, and most brands have almost no visibility into how AI is describing them to their customers. For anyone who has spent years building a strategy around 10 blue links, the rules just changed in a pretty significant way.
On this episode of TechCrunch's Equity podcast, Rebecca Bellan caught up with Matt Thompson, VP of partnerships at Scrunch, a startup positioning itself at the center of the AI search shift, to talk about what Google’s changes mean and marketers and founders should actually do about it.
Subscribe to Equity on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, Overcast, Spotify and all the casts. You also can follow Equity on X and Threads, at @EquityPod.
Chapters
00:00 Intro
01:15 Why Google is going all-in on AI search
03:25 Meet Scrunch
09:00 Personalized agents, shopping, and Google’s advantage
1...
