Startup Project

Brian Bell is the Managing Partner at Team Ignite. Bell has experience in product development in AI at Microsoft, AWS, and startups. Full conversation includes: 🔸Transition from Product Management to full time investing 🔸Investing in YC 🔸Operating an investing Syndicate 🔸Growth hacks to grow your syndicate 🔸Is AngelList loosing its advantage? 🔸Red flags in pitch decks 🔸If money was not an object, what would you be doing? & more. Listen now 👇 Follow Brain on twitter here - https://twitter.com/brianrbell Follow Nataraj on twitter here - https://twitter.com/natarajsindam Follow 100 Days of AI here - https://thestartupproject.io/100-days-of-ai/ Subscribe now 👇 🔸Spotify - https://open.spotify.com/show/3Cx7Q5r9Ow9eikxQjsJjjq 🔸YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs8lGcgpE7JC-alvUhMPk3g 🔸Apple Podcasts - https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/startup-project/id1551300319?uo=4 #startups #angellist #investing

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New episode with Todd Bishop, GeekWire's co-founder.

Todd is a longtime business and technology journalist who reports on subjects including AI, the cloud, startups, and health technology, plus Amazon and Microsoft, in addition to hosting GeekWire's weekly podcast. This is Todd's second appearance on the Startup Project podcast.

In our conversation, we discuss:

🔸 How is a tech business journalist using AI?

🔸 Does AI live up to the hype?

🔸 Covering Big tech's AI strategy as Geekwire Editor

🔸 Amazon's ecommerce AI assistant

🔸Why hasn't Amazon integrated Alexa with an LLM?

🔸Data privacy legislation in AI

🔸Layoffs in tech

🔸TikTok Ban, will it or will it not happen?

🔸Much more

Listen now 👇

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs8lGcgpE7JC-alvUhMPk3g

Lister to Todd's first appearance on the podcast here.

Follow Todd on twitter here - https://twitter.com/intent/user?screen_name=toddbishop

Follow Nataraj on twitter here - https://lnkd.in/gUJ_Gah

Follow 100 Days of AI here - https://lnkd.in/g_8T8_rZ

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In this episode Nataraj talked to Peter Mueller who is the founding partner of Breakwater ventures investing in early stage tech startups in Pacific Northwest and Wester Canadian Startups. The conversation includes: - how to think about angel investing & pre-seed investing? - Seattle pre-seed ecosystem - learnings from Seachange fund - thesis for breakwater - Whats making Western Canada an interesting place to invest? - investing in AI - long tail opportunity in AI & more. Follow peter on twitter here - https://twitter.com/pjsmueller

Follow Nataraj on twitter here - https://twitter.com/natarajsindam

Follow 100 Days of AI here - https://thestartupproject.io/100-days-of-ai/

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In this episode Nataraj spoke to Brendan Rogers Ex Cofounder of Wag, a NASDAQ listed public company. Full conversation includes: - Origin story of WAG - His journey into investing in India - Why he is bullish on Indian startups? - Opinion on different sectors & more To stay in loop for future conversations check out thestartupproject.io For above average opinions on big technology sign up to https://above-average.beehiiv.com/

Follow 100 Days of AI by Nataraj at https://thestartupproject.io/100-days-of-ai/

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Welcome to 50th edition of the Above Average Newsletter. Your bi-weekly source of Above Average takes on the business of big technology written by Nataraj Sindam.

Topic 1: What’s with Direct-to-Consumer Companies?
What’s common among all these companies?
All birdsBrilliant earth groupPelotonRent the runway
They are all public direct to consumer companies whose stock is down ranging from 80 to 95% in last couple of years.
If you are direct to consumer company the best time to go public was in 2021 when the pandemic has fueled an ecommerce spending spree. Once this is over, the markets realized a lot of these direct to consumer companies have no path to profitability and have unsustainable business models.
So what can we learn from what is happening with direct to consumer companies -
When you are willing to spend on high customer acquisition cost (CAC), you can create a short term non profitable direct to consumer company, even when industry dynamics don’t support it. If you spend enough amount of money on Facebook and Google ads you can sell any decent product.
VC money was used to subsidize CAC, that is clear. But that stopped and these companies are not close to profitability and a lot of them are on the verge of bankruptcy. But if I am an investor in such brands the one thing I would look for is that the product innovation should reflect in my customer acquisition cost being low. If you are not able to get very low customer acquisition cost on your product or brand, then technically you are not creating value with your product. Your customer acquisition cost reflects whether the product/brand is actually desired by the customer & if the industry dynamics support it or not.

Topic 2: Where is the AI opportunity?
It’s easy to see big funding rounds in AI for foundation model companies and think AI is all about Fearsome Foursome funding Geoffrey Hinton’s ex-students or ex-open ai employees.
But I think the real opportunity in AI for next couple of years is in the long tail of building specific narrow application that solve small problems that were not possible before. There is treasure trove to be exploited by teams of 1-3 developers to build SaaS applications which can generate millions in revenue.
LLMs are a super power for full stack application developers. If you want to build something and are looking for such ideas feel free to reach out to me.

Topic 3: 100 Days of AI experiments
AI is going to impact us all, so as part of 2024’s first 100 days I am going to spend 1-2 hrs a day learning, experimenting, reading & tinkering with the latest AI models, products & content. You can follow along by following me on Twitter or here on my blog . My goal in this 100 days will be focused on what new things we can build using AI and what to expect from AI in future. The series is also published here on hackernoon .

If you are listening to this and have not subscribed to the newsletter, please go subscribe.

Till next time, stay above average.

Nataraj

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This episode is the audio version of Nataraj's newsletter Above Average.

Welcome to 49th edition of the Above Average Newsletter. Your bi-weekly source of Above Average takes on the businss of big technology written by Nataraj Sindam.

1. Why the new AI Button on Your Keyboard is inevitable?Microsoft is adding a new AI button to your PC keyboard. This is the first time Microsoft changed the PC keyboard in last 30 years. If you are a regular user of ChatGPT or its competitors you will notice your own behavior, that you use it repeatedly and it might get lost in the 10s of chrome tabs you have opened.
You also realize that its a constant companion on your daily work. Microsoft already realized this and jumped head on into creating Copilots for all its products.
The next step in this strategy is to have a dedicated button that will launch bing copilot which uses gpt-4 and is currently free.
The move highlights couple of things:
Copilots are going to an enduring form factor
We will use copilots so often that it requires its own button
Its a great use of Microsoft’s distribution power to create a new user behavior
If this new behavior works its acts as counter to Google search. Your first step for any answer would be to tap that button and start asking the question. A better interface potentially to transition from a search dominant world to answer dominant world.
2. Who is the biggest AI VC in town?As some one who closely works with a venture fund and interacted with lots of investors and invested in 20+ startups its important to note that the unseriousness of ZIRP era was prevalent in VC industry as much as it was in any other industry.
This meant higher valuations that defy the gravity of the business became common. Chasing each others and asking the question “who else is investing” became the most important criteria. Deals closed faster than ever. Crypto as a sector suck more oxygen in the room that it should. Mostly because too much capital was chasing too few deals and in the process new & some old investors lost track of what is important. Its important for a VC to invest in important things in tech.
Now with AI era on us, the biggest investors in AI are not the VC firms but its the fearsome foursome - Microsoft, Google, Amazon & Nvidia.
The amount of investment commitments from these 4 companies has already exceeded $20B with a conservative estimate.
Big tech companies never really invested in crypto like they are investing in AI.
So what’s the take away here - if you think AI hype cycle is similar to crypto hype cycle, you are wrong. AI is an enduring cycle worthy of hype, unlike crypto which was propped up by VCs with out enough depth.
Topic 3 - My Experiments with AI:One of the reason this newsletter is less frequent than usual (from now on it will be twice a month) is because I am working on writing more on AI as part of a series I am calling 100 days of AI. If you are interested in gen AI experiments, ideas & trends follow along here. Here are some posts I have written about AI.
- Design Thinking using Semantic Kernel- Get Insights from YouTube Podcast Video using Open AI’s GPT 4- Build Your Own Chat with Data App
Till next time, stay above average.
Nataraj

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For more unique insights on technology follow Nataraj on Twitter -⁠⁠https://twitter.com/natarajsindam⁠⁠& Instagram -⁠⁠https://www.instagram.com/1nataraj/⁠

What late stage investors got wrong about investing in Startups?

• Confusion in the venture scene, especially with late-stage investments.
• Some firms raising funds for secondaries in startups, but a twist for LP investors: a cautious approach is needed.
• Skepticism about firms claiming expertise in both early and late-stage investments.
• Discussion on the industry mix-up and the need to reconsider how we negotiate prices.
• Emphasizing the importance of aligning return expectations with industry dynamics.
• Concerns about the pricing game not adding up in the long run, even with solid companies.
• Exploration of the industry's potential need for a rethink to optimize returns.
• Join the conversation at thestartupproject.io/nataraj/

#angelinvesting #youtubeshorts #venturecapital #investing #limitedpartners #vc #startups #tigerglobal

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For more unique insights on technology follow Nataraj on Twitter -⁠https://twitter.com/natarajsindam⁠& Instagram -⁠https://www.instagram.com/1nataraj/⁠

Why Rivian will become 2nd Largest EV Player in the U.S?

• Exploring the EV market in the US and the competition between Rivian and Tesla.

• Rivian stands out with a superior product, a more profitable segment, and a less controversial brand than Tesla.
• I predict the future paths of Rivian and Tesla, highlighting the crucial significance of the next three years for their survival and Rivian's growth.

#EV#electric#predictions#technology#tesla#rivian#elonmusk #elon #electricvehicles

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• Over long term YouTube will win over TikTok, Instagram & other video apps.
• Check out the video to see why.

Follow Nataraj on Twitter - https://twitter.com/natarajsindam & Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/1nataraj/

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Nataraj interviewed veteran VC Matt McIlwain of Madrona Venture Group on Startup Project podcast. Matt shared his insights into the state of venture capital and the impacts of AI, drawn from his 20+ years of experience. Some key takeaways: 1. Venture is a "tale of two cities" now - later stage startups are struggling, earlier stage companies embracing AI are thriving 2. Seattle has unmatched talent but lacks local capital - still over-reliant on Silicon Valley VCs 3. Incumbents have the edge currently in leveraging AI due to data, customers, ability to integrate via APIs - but long term, AI-native startups will win out 4. Partnerships forming between big tech and AI startups provide startups with computing resources while allowing tech giants to take an open, marketplace approach to AI I highly recommend tuning in to hear Matt's take on venture capital, AI, and building an enduring company. Available on all major podcast platforms - link in comments!

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