The irony of our systems working so well -- technological, corporate, and yes, even political -- is that we've become too comfortable: matching to others just like us, producing less, taking fewer risks. But isn't the very point of technology to make our lives more comfortable? Yes... until "we" -- whether an entire class, generation, ethnic group, or country like the U.S. -- become a little too complacent. Or so argues Tyler Cowen in his new book, The Complacent Class: The Self-Defeat...
Mar 01, 2017•38 min•Ep. 277
Humans have always wanted to enhance themselves -- from getting nutrition just-right to optimizing their performance, whether in sports or health or work. And food is a big part of all that. But our current systems of food production (and consumption) are far from efficient and sustainable let alone optimizable. That's where a whole new generation of wearable/ bio-feedback, food and nutrition, food production, and performance enhancement/ "nootropics" companies come in. How do these ap...
Feb 28, 2017•20 min•Ep. 276
Imagine, for a moment, an alternative universe: One where Netflix got disrupted by some other streaming-content company that made its DVD rental business irrelevant. But that's just a counterfactual. What happened instead is that Netflix cannibalized (or rather, "hybridized") its own core business to make room for a more strategic one given where the tech was going. Given how rare it is for companies to successfully disrupt themselves like this, Reed Hastings, CEO and co-founder of Net...
Feb 26, 2017•46 min•Ep. 275
Evolution and technology have allowed our human species to manipulate the physical environment around us -- reshaping fields into cities, redirecting rivers to irrigate farms, domesticating wild animals into captive food sources, conquering disease. But now, we're turning that "innovative gaze" inwards: which means the main products of the 21st century will be bodies, brains, and minds. Or so argues Yuval Harari, author of the bestselling book Sapiens: A Brief History of Mankind and of...
Feb 23, 2017•44 min•Ep. 274
It's been nearly 15 years since the Human Genome Project was completed. But "are we there yet" in the golden age of genomics? What did we think we'd have by now, what do we actually have, and what do we really still need to make genomics live up to its promise? Well, one thing we now understand is that our DNA isn't static; in fact, it changes at an absolutely crazy rate. We also need to add more context -- about mutations, about somatic tissue, about phenotypes, about each person's un...
Feb 22, 2017•26 min•Ep. 273
The hardest thing about pivots (major shifts in company/product direction) isn't just the actual pivot. It's the courage to make the decision... and being honest with yourself as a CEO. Especially since, no matter how great the team or board or even customers may be, it's lonely: You're the only one in the position to synthesize the knowledge; nobody else has the data and the insight put together in the same way. And sigh, "pivot" has also become such an overused word, it's certainly l...
Feb 19, 2017•32 min•Ep. 272
The modern enterprise holds all sorts of applications, devices, and workflow needs. How should we be thinking about securing infrastructure -- and identity -- in this context, for entities like major news media outlets or financial institutions such as News Corp or NASDAQ? Well, this episode of the a16z Podcast brings those voices together: Frederic Kerrest, cofounder and COO of Okta; Brad Peterson, CIO of NASDAQ; and Dominic Shine, CIO of News Corp ... in conversation with Ben Horowitz at our r...
Feb 14, 2017•19 min•Ep. 271
Thanks to freeways, cities became something to get through instead of something to get to. Now, as the next transportation revolution -- from rivers to trains to cars to autonomous cars -- promises to change the face of our cities, what happens to car culture, infrastructure, and more? Who owns what, who pays? And what about the design -- and product management -- challenges, whether it's designing for user trust, city adoption, or an ever-moving target thanks to constantly evolving tech? This e...
Feb 08, 2017•36 min•Ep. 270
In the age of the internet -- where information is freely available online, and connections between sellers and buyers of software products are visible on LinkedIn -- do analysts really matter? Do they play a role in decision-making for purchases from smaller vendors like tech startups, especially given the rise of the developer as a buyer? Or what if you're trying to create a new category ... do you need to be on a Gartner Magic Quadrant or Forrester Wave or similar? We answer these questions a...
Feb 01, 2017•31 min•Ep. 269
Once upon a time, Robert Stromberg got a phone call from "Jim" Cameron (aka James Francis Cameron of Terminator and Titanic fame) about a little project called Avatar. Before he knew it, he was responsible for designing the organic world of Pandora, from bioluminescent plants to lush mountaintops. That was when Stromberg realized how much more technology could do, when ready, for creating more such virtual worlds. He'd actually been creating such worlds for ages, from drawing monsters ...
Jan 27, 2017•38 min•Ep. 268
"Punch above your weight" -- If there's one thing public relations (PR) should help startups and founders do, it's that. Unfortunately, some companies are actually punching below their weight when there's a strong company, founder, product ... yet nobody knows about let alone talks about you. Or worse, someone else defines you first. Or you just become a hype machine. So what conversations should you be in? Is it good or bad to do PR before you have a product? And operationally, WHEN i...
Jan 26, 2017•42 min•Ep. 267
The building blocks for VR and AR are finally here -- but the content is just beginning. So everything you'll actually experience and consume in these new mediums over the next few years is being built right now. Formats aren't yet defined or locked down, and the field is bubbling up with experiments in forms, formats and genres, from narrative to games to live events. As we begin to have real time rendered characters and AI-driven environments that you can interact with, the storytelling struct...
Jan 24, 2017•26 min•Ep. 266
How to think about business policy and top-of-mind issues for the tech industry, given a new president? From what agencies matter for startups and VC to what the first 100 days (and next two years!) look like, a16z managing partner Scott Kupor and president and CEO of the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) Bobby Franklin share what happens between elections and when the reality of the Washington process sets in post-inauguration. What are some of the discussions that are happening aroun...
Jan 21, 2017•24 min•Ep. 265
How to think about tech policy and top-of-mind issues for the tech industry, given a new president? From what agencies matter for different tech domains -- e.g., autonomous cars, drones, fintech, healthcare -- to recent staffing moves, the a16z Policy and Regulatory Affairs team shares their views in this episode of the podcast. What happens to tech policy when you have a dominant Republican presence in both Congress and most states, yet a Democratic majority of mayors? Especially when cities (p...
Jan 21, 2017•40 min•Ep. 264
"Mobile-first" (and now too AI-first) has been a mantra of sorts in design, but what does that mean at a company, product management, and competitive level? Especially when someone in company X will always say "we should do what Y did" -- even if they have no idea let alone data why Y did it. And while designing for screens is "like growing a carp in a bathtub" (will inevitably grow to the size of the container), what do design constraints mean in an increasingly sc...
Jan 18, 2017•30 min•Ep. 263
The largest asset class in the United States is owner-occupied real estate, yet options for homeowners accessing this are very binary right now: either own 100% of your home (with a mortgage), or own nothing. And when people do “own”, that ownership is often skewed by debt. Of course, debt works out great for some, given their risk profiles and potential upside (if the house keeps appreciating); but the downside risk and costs are disproportionately borne by the homeowner. And millennials can’t ...
Jan 13, 2017•30 min•Ep. 262
From the significance of Google DeepMind's AlphaGo wins to recent advances in "expert-level artificial intelligence" in playing an imperfect/ asymmetric information game like poker, toys and games have played and continue to play a critical role in advancing machine intelligence. One of the pioneers in this area among others is the Alberta Innovates Centre for Machine Learning -- now the Alberta Machine Intelligence Institute (amii) -- which in 2007 solved the long-standing challenge o...
Jan 11, 2017•27 min•Ep. 261
What (on earth) does it take to get a signal to Pluto? Stanford senior scientist and astronomer Ivan Linscott, part of the team that ran the radio science experiment on the New Horizons probe, shares in conversation with a16z's Frank Chen all the nitty gritty details about their project using Ruse radio transmissions to gather info about Pluto. Listen in on exactly what it really takes to do so -- everything from commandeering old Cold War spy technology and plutonium to completing the entire mi...
Jan 01, 2017•49 min•Ep. 260
As companies expand out from the internet into the rest of the economy — the proverbial bits to atoms — “the business models are becoming more complicated, more interesting, more payment based”, observes Patrick Collison, CEO and co-founder of payments platform Stripe, which enables apps/websites to programmatically move money around. But as such companies become “the operating platform for commerce”, we also have an interesting paradigm where people, not governments, are controlling the commerc...
Dec 31, 2016•27 min•Ep. 259
As people live longer, aging is more top of mind than ever. This is especially true for the "sandwich generation" wedged between caring for aging parents as well as young children at the same time. The fact is, the 65+ year old population (but don't you dare homogenize a multi-decade age group!) will double over just the next 15-20 years. So how does this fit into our current healthcare system? How does it fit current retail experiences, like for buying adult diapers? What are the desi...
Dec 27, 2016•32 min•Ep. 258
"We throw around words like 'crisis' very easily, but this is a global crisis, and it is of historic proportions," says current U.S. Deputy Secretary of State Tony Blinken about the refugee crisis (for which he and his department mobilized a response that significantly accelerated government efforts to assist refugees, as well as engage the tech sector). "People don't realize that before 2011, the number of Syrian refugees was zero," shares Lina Sergie Attar of the non-profit...
Dec 16, 2016•34 min•Ep. 257
Nature is the ultimate complex system, of course — but with today’s technology, it’s now provided us with an “incredible toolkit” of different molecules that material scientists can treat like Legos to make some really interesting products. One of those is a protective layer for fruits and vegetables that extends shelf life and freshness. Because all produce is seasonal, it’s perishable — so there’s a limited geographical radius around which it can travel… whether by land, sea, or air. How does ...
Dec 14, 2016•35 min•Ep. 256
Clearly disruption plays out not just in business but also in politics. Whether it was the Scottish national party, recent election campaigns, or local school boards, people grew and organized communities online all last year through NationBuilder -- which provided a software platform for those otherwise underserved from an established technology perspective (hence the disruption theory reference). Harnessing the energy of communities goes beyond politics though, to all kinds of movements. But w...
Dec 09, 2016•22 min•Ep. 255
"We live in a world where we use millions of variables to predict which ad you're going to click on. Whether or not you deserve to get a loan. What movie you might watch next. But when it comes to our bodies and even serious diseases, we want to reduce things down to just one or two variables." It's insane that we actually collect so little data about our bodies. The modern day physical is downright spartan in what it captures, not to mention that we're using 200-year old tools to capt...
Dec 05, 2016•30 min•Ep. 254
The Industrial Revolution (and period between 1500-1700) was an unprecedented age of technology and economic progress — not unlike today’s, in fact — where we took “quantum leaps” forward in tech by taming electricity, making cheaper steel and refining iron cheaply, automating fiber looms, pumping water out of coal mines, figuring out how to measure longitude at sea, improving the quality of food, preventing smallpox, … even bleaching underwear. But what really triggered the Industrial Revolutio...
Nov 27, 2016•36 min•Ep. 253
“If we have instant delivery for our burgers,” says Zipline CEO and co-founder Keller Rinaudo, “we should have it for our medicine.” So while some people debate whether drone delivery for burritos, beers, and books is a marketing gimmick, one of the most important kinds -- urgent delivery of urgent healthcare -- is happening right now through Zipline’s delivering blood and vaccines to patients and hospitals in Rwanda. The peace dividend of the smartphone (and electric vehicle) wars has yielded c...
Nov 23, 2016•22 min•Ep. 252
You’ve heard the numbers or some statistic like this: By the year 2050, we’ll need to feed 9.7 billion humans on the planet. Our current production and meat-making methods -- growing crops to feed to animals to turn them into food -- can’t keep up … not to mention it’s not very good for the environment. Yet meat is at the center of the plate for most meals, for most people. So how do we go from where we are to where we need to be? Especially since food is fundamentally an emotional experience! Y...
Nov 23, 2016•25 min•Ep. 251
You've heard a version of this story before: Steve Jobs calls some executive out of the blue to come work for him. Only this time the story turns out great ... and the company wasn't Apple. This episode of the a16z Podcast shares some of the journey that former CFO Lawrence Levy went on with Steve Jobs as they took Pixar -- a company then on the verge of failure -- to its IPO and subsequent greatest hits. It's sort of an adventure story but is really more of a quest for product-market fit. How d...
Nov 09, 2016•30 min•Ep. 250
We live in very interesting times, to say the least -- whether it's a shift in how technology is built and adopted today compared to the past; a changing international landscape with leapfrogging players; or an increased cyberattack surface as computing and networking touch everything. So what's next for technology and national security? This episode of the a16z Podcast is based on a conversation that took place last month between Marc Andreessen and Michèle Flournoy -- former Under Secretary of...
Nov 09, 2016•34 min•Ep. 249
In business, as in politics, "the movement is the message" -- whether that "movement" is a product that's taking off grassroots-style in an enterprise, or is a political candidate. In fact, you can think of political campaigns in general as a lot like startups ... only there's no second place in politics! And you can definitely think of business -- and in particular go-to-market strategy -- as a lot like political campaigns: in allocating marketing resources, going up against...
Nov 03, 2016•27 min•Ep. 248
