The a16z Show discusses tech and culture trends, news, and the future – especially as ‘software eats the world’. It features industry experts, business leaders, and other interesting thinkers and voices from around the world. This show is produced by Andreessen Horowitz (aka “a16z”), a Silicon Valley-based venture capital firm. Multiple episodes are released every week; visit a16z.com for more details and to sign up for our newsletters and other content as well!
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Nathan Labenz is one of the clearest voices analyzing where AI is headed, pairing sharp technical analysis with his years of work on The Cognitive Revolution. In this episode, Nathan joins a16z’s Erik Torenberg to ask a pressing question: is AI progress actually slowing down, or are we just getting used to the breakthroughs? They discuss the debate over GPT-5, the state of reasoning and automation, the future of agents and engineering work, and how we can build a positive vision for where AI goe...
From GPT-1 to GPT-5, LLMs have made tremendous progress in modeling human language. But can they go beyond that to make new discoveries and move the needle on scientific progress? We sat down with distinguished Columbia CS professor Vishal Misra to discuss this, plus why chain-of-thought reasoning works so well, what real AGI would look like, and what actually causes hallucinations. Resources: Follow Dr. Misra on X: https://x.com/vishalmisra Follow Martin on X: https://x.com/martin_casado Stay U...
This episode delves into the future of energy, discussing how Base Power aims to provide affordable and reliable electricity through home batteries and grid modernization, using Texas as a case study for competitive energy markets. It also explores the speculative boom in data center build-outs driven by AI and geopolitical challenges in supply chains. The second half shifts focus to Nick Land, examining his complex philosophical ideas, influence on Silicon Valley's intellectual underground, and his connection to the online right, pondering how his
Sam Altman has led OpenAI from its founding as a research nonprofit in 2015 to becoming the most valuable startup in the world ten years later. In this episode, a16z Cofounder Ben Horowitz and General Partner Erik Torenberg sit down with Sam to discuss the core thesis behind OpenAI’s disparate bets, why they released Sora, how they use models internally, the best AI evals, and where we’re going from here. Resources: Follow Sam on X: https://x.com/sama Follow OpenAI on X: https://x.com/openai Lea...
Opendoor is trying to make it easier to buy a home. Kaz Nejatian just joined as CEO to help them succeed. In this episode, a16z General Partners Alex Rampell and Erik Torenberg sit down with Kaz to cover all things real estate and marketplaces. They cover Kaz’s vision for Opendoor, the problem with copying the hedge fund model, how to build through economic downturns, and the importance of ambition and long-term thinking. Resources: Follow Kaz on X: https://x.com/CanadaKaz Follow Alex on X: http...
From high-speed rail to electric cars to batteries to AI, it’s clear that China can operate with incredible speed at massive scale. Can the US still compete? We sat down with Dan Wang, a Research Fellow at the Hoover Institution and the author of “Breakneck: China’s Quest to Engineer the Future” to discuss. Timecodes: 0:00 Introduction 1:36 Lawyers vs. Engineers: Cultural and Economic Differences 4:06 Urban and Rural Life: Comparing Infrastructure 7:20 Barriers to Progress: Regulation and Govern...
Two trends in media have been abundantly clear since 2020: legacy media is dying, and independent media is rising. a16z General Partners Erik Torenberg and Katherine Boyle sit down with Tablet founder and editor-in-chief Alana Newhouse to discuss the great media realignment, why real institutions will outlast the new “internet pirates", Alana’s deeply personal case for gene editing, and how faith, science, and community can coexist without giving in to government referees. Resources: Read Tablet...
Software has fundamentally changed the way we record, store, and share information. Its next act is to fundamentally change the nature of our economy, capturing trillions of dollars of value in the process. In this talk from the 2025 a16z LP Summit, a16z General Partner Alex Rampell discusses the history of filing cabinets and databases, how SaaS pricing moved from seats to outcomes, and how AI agents will accelerate the trend of the last 70 years of software progress. Timecodes: 0:00 Introducti...
Ben, Marc, and Erik Torenberg are joined by Brian Schimpf, Co-Founder & CEO of Anduril, and Chris Power, Founder & CEO of Hadrian. Together, they dig into America’s defense production gap: why the U.S. can out-innovate but not out-produce—and what it will take to turn that around. They discuss why U.S. war games show we run out of munitions in a week, the myth of “exquisite-only” systems, how to rebuild industrial capacity with software-led automation, financing factories like data cente...
Today we’re sharing a feed drop from Cheeky Pint, where Stripe cofounder and president John Collison chats with legends in technology over a pint of Guinness. In this episode, John is joined by a16z cofounder Marc Andreessen and tech investor Charlie Songhurst for a candid conversation about bubbles, downturns, and the psychology of markets. They discuss what makes Silicon Valley so hard to replace, the deep history of the Valley’s ecosystem, and the future of media. From the lessons of the dot-...
Scaling laws took us from GPT-1 to GPT-5 Pro. But in order to crack physics, we’ll need a different approach. In this episode, a16z General Partner Anjney Midha talks to Liam Fedus, former VP of post-training research and co-creator of ChatGPT at OpenAI, and Ekin Dogus Cubuk, former head of materials science and chemistry research at Google DeepMind, on their new startup Periodic Labs and their plan to automate discovery in the hard sciences. Follow Liam on X: https://x.com/LiamFedus Follow Dogu...
Ads pay for the internet—and they’re about to change again. a16z General Partner Erik Torenberg, entrepreneur and author Antonio García Martínez, and Meta CMO Alex Schultz dive into growth and performance marketing, privacy myths, retail media, and the AI future of “audience-of-one” advertising—plus Instagram what-ifs, WhatsApp as a super-app, and how Meta’s feed shifted from social graphs to AI-ranked content. Timecodes: 0:00 Introduction 0:38 Book Inspiration & Positive Perspective on Adve...
Announcing our new show, Monitoring the Situation, hosted by a16z General Partners Erik Torenberg and Katherine Boyle, with guest Eddie Lazzarin, CTO of a16z crypto. In this first episode, we ask how American Dynamism, consumer, games, and crypto all fit together, from Palmer/Oculus to Marc Andreessen’s Techno-Optimist Manifesto, while also exploring crypto × AD values, parenting in the AI era, and how internet subcultures shape the news. Timecodes: 0:00 Introduction 1:25 Tech Coherence: America...
What comes after vibe coding? Maybe vibe researching. OpenAI’s Chief Scientist, Jakub Pachocki, and Chief Research Officer, Mark Chen, join a16z general partners Anjney Midha and Sarah Wang to go deep on GPT-5—how they fused fast replies with long-horizon reasoning, how they measure progress once benchmarks saturate, and why reinforcement learning keeps surprising skeptics. They explore agentic systems (and their stability tradeoffs), coding models that change how software gets made, and the big...
Erik Torenberg, Aaron Levie, Steven Sinofsky, and Martin Casado delve into pressing tech debates, starting with H-1B visa reform and the challenges of the lottery system versus a pricing model. They then explore AI's transformative effect on labor productivity, highlighting how Box generates a third of its code with AI and how startups achieve 10x gains by shifting from code writing to reviewing. The discussion extends to AI's influence on professional and creative work, the rise of AI-native startups, and whether incumbents or newcomers will lead the ongoing AI platform shift, concluding that consumer AI adoption will significantly drive enterprise change.
Dr. Jay Bhattacharya is one of the country’s top medical experts and a 24-year professor of medicine at Stanford. After being censored and deplatformed during COVID for his role in opposing harsh lockdowns, he was appointed Director of the National Institutes of Health by President Trump in 2025. a16z General Partners Erik Torenberg, Vineeta Agarwala, and Jorge Conde join Dr. Bhattacharya to discuss the administration’s role in tackling the autism crisis, how to restore public trust in health au...
Nvidia’s $5 billion investment in Intel is one of the biggest surprises in semiconductors in years. Two longtime rivals are now teaming up, and the ripple effects could reshape AI, cloud, and the global chip race. To make sense of it all, Erik Torenberg is joined by Dylan Patel, chief analyst at SemiAnalysis, joins Sarah Wang, general partner at a16z, and Guido Appenzeller, a16z partner and former CTO of Intel’s Data Center and AI business unit. Together, they dig into what the deal means for Nv...
This episode explores the implications of Charlie Kirk's assassination, prompting a deep discussion on the meaning of martyrdom and courage in modern society. Katherine Boyle and Constantine Kissin reflect on the choice between active truth-telling and societal complacency, emphasizing the need for everyday individuals to bravely voice their beliefs. They also critically examine how distorted rhetoric, like equating words with violence, contributes to a climate where actual violence is justified, urging a powerful reclaiming of civil discourse and the center.
The web is unhealthy, and AI agents are about to rewrite how we shop. In this episode, a16z General Partner Alex Rampell and Partner Justine Moore explore how AI agents will change commerce and the implications for Google’s business model, affiliate marketing, online shopping, and more. Timecodes: 0:00 Introduction 0:12 The Role of AI Agents in Commerce 1:28 Affiliate Marketing & Impulse Buys 4:02 Observing Consumer Behavior & AI 6:08 Dynamic Pricing & E-commerce Trends 7:20 Online v...
OpenAI’s Codex has already shipped hundreds of thousands of pull requests in its first month. But what is it really, and how will coding agents change the future of software? In this episode, General Partner Anjney Midha goes behind the scenes with one of Codex’s product leads- Alexander Embiricos - to unpack its origin story, why its PR success rate is so high, the safety challenges of autonomous agents, and what this all means for developers, students, and the future of coding. Timecodes: 0:00...
Can we make science as fast as software? In this episode, Erik Torenberg talks with Patrick Hsu (cofounder of Arc Institute) and a16z general partner Jorge Conde about Arc’s “virtual cells” moonshot, which uses foundation models to simulate biology and guide experiments. They discuss why research is slow, what an AlphaFold-style moment for cell biology could look like, and how AI might improve drug discovery. The conversation also covers hype versus substance in AI for biology, clinical bottlene...
In this conversation from Lenny’s Podcast, Ben Horowitz joins Lenny to discuss the psychological muscle every founder needs, why hesitation can be fatal for CEOs, when it’s time to replace a founder, and how to normalize failure while building confidence. They also explore the Databricks founding story, investing in Adam Neumann after WeWork, whether AI is in a bubble, where the real opportunities lie, and Ben’s work with the Paid in Full Foundation supporting hip-hop pioneers. The result is a c...
The $13T U.S. mortgage market serves 50M homeowners but still runs on decades-old software. In this episode, a16z GP Angela Strange hosts Tim Mayopoulos (ex-CEO of Fannie Mae and ex-president of Blend), Mike Yu (co-founder and CEO of Vesta), and Andrew Wang (co-founder and CEO of Valon) to unpack why standardization and regulation slow change, and how modern loan-origination and servicing platforms, cleaner data, and AI can cut costs, boost transparency, and reduce errors. They also discuss poli...
Why do some consumer products explode into networks that reshape the internet, while others fade away? Today on the podcast, a16z general partners Anish Acharya and Chris Dixon take on that question. Anish invests in AI-native consumer products and the next wave of consumer tech. Chris is best known for his work in Web3 and network economies, and he’s also led some of a16z’s biggest consumer bets. Together, they cover the history and power of consumer networks, the exponential forces that shape ...
What happens when AI collides with salesmanship, streaming-era sports, and healthcare? In this episode, Erik Torenberg is joined by Mark Cuban, entrepreneur, Dallas Mavericks co-owner, and founder of Cost Plus Drugs. Topics include fiery group chats and how dissent sharpens thinking, the sales playbook of modern politics, and concrete fixes for U.S. healthcare like ending PBM opacity, publishing real prices, and government-backed patient financing. Mark also explains how AI is pushing media from...
Who’s speaking up for startups in Washington, D.C.? In this episode, Matt Perault (Head of AI Policy, a16z) and Collin McCune (Head of Government Affairs, a16z) unpack the “Little Tech Agenda” for AI- why AI rules should regulate harmful use, not model development; how to keep open source open; the roles of the federal government vs states in regulating AI; and how the U.S. can compete globally without shutting out new founders. Timecodes: 0:00 – Introduction 1:12 – Defining the Little Tech Agen...
Stainless founder Alex Rattray joins a16z partner Jennifer Li to talk about the future of APIs, SDKs, and the rise of MCP (Model Context Protocol). Drawing on his experience at Stripe—where he helped redesign API docs and built code-generation systems—Alex explains why the SDK is the API for most developers, and why high-quality, idiomatic libraries are essential not just for humans, but now for AI agents as well. They dive into: The evolution of SDK generation and lessons from building at scale...
Taken from The Oprah Podcast, this special episode brings together Shaka Senghor, a16z cofounder Ben Horowitz, and Oprah Winfrey for a powerful conversation on resilience and transformation. Shaka, a resilience expert, motivational speaker, and bestselling author of Writing My Wrongs , shares his journey from incarceration to redemption along with insights from his new book, How to Be Free. Full of hard-earned wisdom and practical tools, it’s a guide for anyone seeking freedom in their own life....
Is non-consensus investing overrated—or the secret to venture returns? a16z General Partner Erik Torenberg is joined by Martín Casado (General Partner, a16z) and Leo Polovets (General Partner, Humba Ventures) to unpack the debate that lit up venture Twitter/X: should founders and VCs chase consensus, or run from it? They explore what “consensus” really means in practice, how market efficiency shapes venture outcomes, why most companies fail from indigestion, not starvation, and the risks founder...
Jack Altman sits down with Martin Casado, General Partner at a16z, to unpack the shifting dynamics of venture capital and why media matters more than ever. They cover a16z’s evolution from generalists to specialized platforms, the rise of AI infrastructure, and why today’s fiercest battles are often for talent, not market share. Timecodes: 0:00 Introduction 0:27 Importance of Media for VC 3:50 Evolution of a16z 7:00 Specialization 10:32 Value of Distribution 13:16 Staying Power in Infrastructure...
