Summation with Auren Hoffman
- Episodios
- 293
- Se publica
- cada semana
- Último episodio
- 10 Nov 2026
Sobre el podcast
Non-obvious ideas that move the world. Auren Hoffman hosts leaders across tech, business, markets, and government.
Summation is the permanent home for the relentlessly curious.
Auren is CEO of NQB8, GP at Flex Capital, Chairman of Dialog; former CEO of SafeGraph and LiveRamp (NYSE: RAMP).
Episodios 293
OnePay CEO Omer Ismail on fixing money for 150 million Americans
Omer Ismail is the CEO of OnePay, the Walmart-backed fintech that has become one of the largest neobanks in the country, with millions of users, tens of billions of dollars in annualized payments, and a …
Notas del episodio
Omer Ismail is the CEO of OnePay, the Walmart-backed fintech that has become one of the largest neobanks in the country, with millions of users, tens of billions of dollars in annualized payments, and a valuation of around $4 billion. Before OnePay, he spent nearly two decades at Goldman Sachs, where he built and ran Marcus, the firm's consumer bank.
In this episode of Summation, Omer and Auren discuss:
- Why customers asked OnePay to hide their savings from them
- A teen bank account that hands kids a credit score on their 18th birthday
- Giving your AI agent its own bank account with spending limits
- Why experience is overrated, and the candidate who took a 10-hour overnight train to get hired
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Omer Ismail on Linkedin
Vinod Khosla: freeing humanity from “servitude to survival”
Vinod Khosla is one of the most successful and contrarian investors alive, first at Kleiner Perkins and then at Khosla Ventures, where he wrote the first institutional check into OpenAI. Forbes ranked him #1 on …
Notas del episodio
Vinod Khosla is one of the most successful and contrarian investors alive, first at Kleiner Perkins and then at Khosla Ventures, where he wrote the first institutional check into OpenAI. Forbes ranked him #1 on its 2026 Midas List. Vinod previously co-founded Sun Microsystems and took it from zero to a billion dollars in sales in five years.
In this episode of Summation, Vinod and Auren discuss:
- Why 40 years of radical innovation has come from startups, not big companies
- Why he has never once calculated an IRR, including on OpenAI
- Why 70-80% of VCs add negative value, and what "brutal honesty over hypocritical politeness" looks like in a board meeting
- AI capable of doing 80% of jobs, and how to protect the people instead of the jobs
- Why he changed his mind on open source AI, and why "follow your passion" is finally good advice
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Vinod Khosla on X at @vkhosla
Hiring in the AI era: Greenhouse CEO Daniel Chait
Daniel Chait is the co-founder and CEO of Greenhouse, the hiring platform behind thousands of companies. Before Greenhouse, he co-founded Lab49, a technology consultancy for Wall Street. He's also the …
Notas del episodio
Daniel Chait is the co-founder and CEO of Greenhouse, the hiring platform behind thousands of companies. Before Greenhouse, he co-founded Lab49, a technology consultancy for Wall Street. He's also the author of Talent Makers.
In this episode of Summation, Daniel and Auren discuss:
- The AI doom loop
- Why "tell me about a time when" beats "what are your weaknesses,"
- Why HR quality depends on the CEO, and what Netflix got right
- Why "never quit" is bad founder advice
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Daniel Chait on Linkedin
Olo CEO Noah Glass: the right to be known
Noah Glass is the founder and CEO of Olo, the digital commerce platform behind ordering, payments, and loyalty for many of America's biggest restaurant brands. He started Olo in 2005 with ordering by text …
Notas del episodio
Noah Glass is the founder and CEO of Olo, the digital commerce platform behind ordering, payments, and loyalty for many of America's biggest restaurant brands. He started Olo in 2005 with ordering by text message, before the iPhone existed, took it public in 2021, and took it private with Thoma Bravo last year in a roughly $2 billion deal.
In this episode of Summation, Noah and Auren discuss:
- The $65 million sale that collapsed the night before he told his team
- How Five Guys strong-armed point-of-sale companies into opening up to Olo
- Why 75% of restaurant meals are eaten outside the restaurant, and only 10% are delivery
- The right to be known, and why you favorite the salad but reorder the milkshake
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Noah Glass on X at @nhglass
Protege CEO Bobby Samuels on the data nobody has unlocked yet
Bobby Samuels is the co-founder and CEO of Protege, a platform that licenses real-world data from industries like healthcare and media to companies building AI. Protege has raised $65 million from Andreessen …
Notas del episodio
Bobby Samuels is the co-founder and CEO of Protege, a platform that licenses real-world data from industries like healthcare and media to companies building AI. Protege has raised $65 million from Andreessen Horowitz, CRV, and Flex Capital. Before Protege, Bobby led partnerships at LiveRamp and ran Privacy Hub at Datavant.
In this episode of Summation, Bobby and Auren discuss:
- The auction for Spirit Airlines' emails, and what a model learns from a failed airline
- Why synthetic data has been "18 months away" for six years
- Why every data pitch deck with "hedge funds" on the customer slide is wrong
- The genome as the most valuable dataset nobody has unlocked
- Why the smartest buyers are the easiest ones to sell to
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Bobby Samuels on Linkedin
Axios Co-founder Roy Schwartz: why average is worthless now
Roy Schwartz co-founded Axios, the news company known for smart brevity, and helped grow it to a $525 million sale to Cox Enterprises. He's now co-founder and CEO of Axios HQ, an AI-powered internal …
Notas del episodio
Roy Schwartz co-founded Axios, the news company known for smart brevity, and helped grow it to a $525 million sale to Cox Enterprises. He's now co-founder and CEO of Axios HQ, an AI-powered internal communications platform spun out of Axios. He co-wrote Smart Brevity, and his new book is Simplify. Before Axios, he was chief revenue officer of Politico.
In this episode of Summation, Roy and Auren discuss:
- Meeting bankruptcy: wiping every recurring meeting off the calendar twice a year
- AI as a complexity machine and the slop it's adding to every email and deck
- The end of well-rounded, and why AI eats anyone who is average
- Building Axios for influencers instead of casual readers, plus 200 events a year
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Roy Schwartz on LinkedIn
Helion CEO David Kirtley on why fusion finally works
David Kirtley is the co-founder and CEO of Helion Energy, the fusion company. Helion has raised more than $1.5 billion at a $15.5 billion valuation, and Sam Altman is its biggest investor and former chairman …
Notas del episodio
David Kirtley is the co-founder and CEO of Helion Energy, the fusion company. Helion has raised more than $1.5 billion at a $15.5 billion valuation, and Sam Altman is its biggest investor and former chairman. Before fusion, David worked on rocket and space propulsion.
In this episode of Summation, David and Auren discuss:
- Skipping the steam turbine and pulling electricity straight out of a star
- How a Best Buy network card helped make fusion possible
- Regulating a 150 million degree machine like a hospital proton beam
- One cent power, and what happens when AI stops being limited by electricity
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and David Kirtley on X at @Dkirtley
Alex Rampell on why the best companies have hostages, not customers
Alex Rampell is a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, where he leads the firm’s $2.7 billion Apps practice and has driven much of the firm's fintech investing, including Plaid, Mercury, and Opendoor …
Notas del episodio
Alex Rampell is a general partner at Andreessen Horowitz, where he leads the firm’s $2.7 billion Apps practice and has driven much of the firm's fintech investing, including Plaid, Mercury, and Opendoor. Before a16z, Alex co-founded multiple companies including Affirm (NASDAQ:AFRM), FraudEliminator (acquired by McAfee in 2006), Point, TrialPay (acquired by Visa in 2015), TXN (acquired by Envestnet in 2019), and Yub (acquired by Coupons.com in 2013).
In this episode of Summation, Alex and Auren discuss:
- Why Visa is the purest network effect business in the world and why it's still a duopoly
- The reverse Robin Hood hidden inside every rewards credit card
- The "hostages, not customers" test for which software companies survive AI
- What was once payroll becoming payments and the businesses it unlocks
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Alex Rampell on X at @arampell
Life360 founder Chris Hulls on existential amusement and why public markets kill bold bets
Chris Hulls is the co-founder and executive chairman of Life360 ($LIF), the family safety and location-sharing app now worth over $5 billion. He was CEO for 17 years before stepping back last year. Before …
Notas del episodio
Chris Hulls is the co-founder and executive chairman of Life360 ($LIF), the family safety and location-sharing app now worth over $5 billion. He was CEO for 17 years before stepping back last year. Before Life360, he served in the Air Force in Afghanistan.
In this episode of Summation, Chris and Auren discuss:
- Why he took Life360 public in Australia and why he'd never run a public company again
- Why "you want to sound smart, but not interesting" is the secret rule of corporate speak
- Why nobody actually cares about privacy, and what finally scares him about AI
- Why the work of keeping a home never ends, no matter how rich you get
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Chris Hulls on X at @chrishulls
Felicis founder Aydin Senkut: why moats are dead and alive
Aydin Senkut is the founder and managing partner of Felicis, the venture firm he started in 2006, with over $4B under management and early bets on Shopify, Notion, Canva, and Adyen. He was Google's first …
Notas del episodio
Aydin Senkut is the founder and managing partner of Felicis, the venture firm he started in 2006, with over $4B under management and early bets on Shopify, Notion, Canva, and Adyen. He was Google's first product manager and has been on the Forbes Midas list of top investors for 13 years running.
In this episode of Summation, Aydin and Auren discuss:
- Why the best platform companies came from Ottawa, Sydney, and Amsterdam and not Silicon Valley
- How capital became a commodity and people are the only real moat left
- Why the trait he bets on is the willingness to reset your priors
- How defense went from an optional purchase to a matter of survival
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Aydin Senkut on X at @asenkut
Nir Eyal on belief, motivation, and the end of suffering
Nir Eyal is the author of Hooked, which became Silicon Valley's playbook for building habit-forming products, Indistractable, on taking your attention back, and the new book Beyond Belief. He taught at …
Notas del episodio
Nir Eyal is the author of Hooked, which became Silicon Valley's playbook for building habit-forming products, Indistractable, on taking your attention back, and the new book Beyond Belief. He taught at Stanford's Graduate School of Business and is one of the sharpest thinkers on what to do with technology.
In this episode of Summation, Nir and Auren discuss:
- Why to-do lists set you up to feel like a failure and what to do instead
- Why 90% of the time you check your phone, it's an uncomfortable emotion, not a notification
- Why beliefs are tools, not truths, and how swapping one can end your suffering
- Why this is the safest generation of kids in history and still gets a moral panic
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Nir Eyal on X at @nireyal
SecureAuth CEO Geoff Mattson on the coming fraudpocalypse and the death of the password
Geoff Mattson is the CEO of SecureAuth, an identity security company that has raised over $200M and protects more than 50 million identities for enterprises. Before SecureAuth he was CEO of Xage Security. His …
Notas del episodio
Geoff Mattson is the CEO of SecureAuth, an identity security company that has raised over $200M and protects more than 50 million identities for enterprises. Before SecureAuth he was CEO of Xage Security. His work now centers on how you prove an AI agent is who it says it is.
In this episode of Summation, Geoff and Auren discuss:
- Why an AI agent is like an Uber driver who might randomly turn into a psycho killer
- The deepfake fraudpocalypse, and the simplest thing that defends against it
- Why your agent impersonates you instead of working for you and how to fix it
- Why the password is finally, actually dying
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Geoff on Linkedin
Fmr. Senator Cory Gardner: why the AI race is won on boring infrastructure and how China wins by making America hate AI
Cory Gardner is a former U.S. Senator and Congressman from Colorado and was one of the Senate's leading Taiwan and China experts, chairing the Foreign Relations subcommittee on East Asia and authoring the …
Notas del episodio
Cory Gardner is a former U.S. Senator and Congressman from Colorado and was one of the Senate's leading Taiwan and China experts, chairing the Foreign Relations subcommittee on East Asia and authoring the Taipei Act. He is now president and CEO of NCTA, the Internet & Television Association, whose members built the nation's largest broadband platform.
In this episode of Summation, Cory and Auren discuss:
- Why the AI race gets won on spectrum, fiber, and memory chips
- The bottleneck raising the price of your iPhone, PlayStation, and router
- Why an open society is vulnerable to a campaign to turn Americans against AI
- What a China expert thinks about our dependence on chips made off China's coast
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Cory Gardner on X at @CoryGardner
CodeRabbit CEO Harjot Gill on software's new bottleneck and zero to $50m ARR in 2 years
Harjot Gill is the co-founder and CEO of CodeRabbit, the AI code review company that became the most installed AI app on GitHub and GitLab. Over about two years, CodeRabbit went from zero to over $50M in ARR …
Notas del episodio
Harjot Gill is the co-founder and CEO of CodeRabbit, the AI code review company that became the most installed AI app on GitHub and GitLab. Over about two years, CodeRabbit went from zero to over $50M in ARR and a $1B+ valuation. It is his third startup.
In this episode of Summation, Harjot and Auren discuss:
- Why the bottleneck in software just moved from writing code to reviewing it
- Why mature companies now adopt AI first
- Why you should never let a coding agent review its own work
- The playbook that took CodeRabbit from zero to $50M+ in two years
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Harjot Gill on X at @harjotsgill
Moritz Baier-Lentz on why the future of AI runs on video games
Moritz Baier-Lentz is one of the foremost investors in gaming, AI, and frontier technologies—including companies like OpenAI, SpaceX, Palantir, Etched, Decart, and Recursive. He founded Goldman Sachs's …
Notas del episodio
Moritz Baier-Lentz is one of the foremost investors in gaming, AI, and frontier technologies—including companies like OpenAI, SpaceX, Palantir, Etched, Decart, and Recursive. He founded Goldman Sachs's global gaming practice and was previously a partner, IC member, and head of gaming at Lightspeed. Moritz is part of the founding team of General Intuition, an AI research lab training agents on video game data, which has raised a $133M Seed round and a $320M Series A. He is also a senior advisor to OpenAI, McKinsey & Co., and TPG Capital.
In this episode of Summation, Moritz and Auren discuss:
- Why video games are the best data set for the next phase of AI
- The idea that humans only truly learn during play
- Why Germany's fear of risk is cultural
- Getting into Stanford with an essay about Diablo II
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Moritz Baier-Lentz on LinkedIn or his website.
OpenAI Chief Economist Ronnie Chatterji: measuring the greatest technology of our time
Ronnie Chatterji is the Chief Economist at OpenAI, where he leads research on how AI reshapes growth, jobs, and the economy. He is also an economics professor at Duke. He was previously the White House CHIPS …
Notas del episodio
Ronnie Chatterji is the Chief Economist at OpenAI, where he leads research on how AI reshapes growth, jobs, and the economy. He is also an economics professor at Duke. He was previously the White House CHIPS coordinator implementing the $52B CHIPS Act, and before that the chief economist at the US Department of Commerce.
In this episode of Summation, Ronnie and Auren discuss:
- The three things people actually do with ChatGPT
- The 10x jump in people handing their work to AI
- Why the next big leap in AI is adoption and not capability
- The case that AI could cause a population boom
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Ronnie Chatterji on X at @RonnieChatterji
Anthropic’s Felix Rieseberg: why AI wins a Nobel before a Pulitzer
Felix Rieseberg leads engineering for Claude Cowork and Claude Code Desktop at Anthropic. Before that he led desktop and web infrastructure at Notion and built software at Stripe, Slack, and Microsoft. In this …
Notas del episodio
Felix Rieseberg leads engineering for Claude Cowork and Claude Code Desktop at Anthropic. Before that he led desktop and web infrastructure at Notion and built software at Stripe, Slack, and Microsoft.
In this episode of Summation, Felix and Auren discuss:
- The next AI step function: going from solving a problem to owning a responsibility
- Why AI will win many Nobel prizes before it wins a single Pulitzer
- Bringing AI into the physical world, from a $30 coffee-machine display to a Wi-Fi garage opener
- Why "here's what your team can learn from the Navy SEALs" is bad management advice
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Felix Rieseberg on X at @felixrieseberg
Fifth Wall CEO Brendan Wallace: the data center land grab and the most stable asset on earth you still can't buy
Brendan Wallace is the Founder, CEO & CIO of Fifth Wall, the largest investment firm focused on technology for the built environment, with ~$3B in capital, the firm is driving the growth of nearly 170 …
Notas del episodio
Brendan Wallace is the Founder, CEO & CIO of Fifth Wall, the largest investment firm focused on technology for the built environment, with ~$3B in capital, the firm is driving the growth of nearly 170 companies, backing category-defining PropTech leaders such as Opendoor, Procore, Blend, Hippo, and Bilt Rewards. It's supported by ~115 of the world's largest real estate owner-operators including CBRE, Hilton, Hines, Marriott, Public Storage, Related, and Starwood. Before Fifth Wall, Brendan was at Goldman Sachs and Blackstone, and he co-founded Identified (sold to Workday) and Cabify.
In this episode of Summation, Brendan and Auren discuss:
- How remote work protected mediocrity for years
- The data center land grab: powered land, 2037 grid connections, and bring-your-own-solar
- How land is the most stable asset on earth and there's still no way to buy an index of it
- Why "capital-intensive businesses are bad for venture" is no longer true
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Brendan Wallace on X at @BrendanFWallace
Striveworks CEO Jim Rebesco on drone swarms, AI for warfighters, and the end of air superiority
Jim Rebesco is the co-founder and CEO of Striveworks, an AI ops company deployed across the US Army, Navy, and combatant commands. In April, Striveworks announced a $70M enterprise agreement with the Pentagon …
Notas del episodio
Jim Rebesco is the co-founder and CEO of Striveworks, an AI ops company deployed across the US Army, Navy, and combatant commands. In April, Striveworks announced a $70M enterprise agreement with the Pentagon, giving nearly a million defense personnel access to its platform. Jim was previously a partner at Virtu Financial, a pioneering high-frequency trading firm.
In this episode of Summation, Jim and Auren discuss:
- why the real question in AI warfare is who pushes the button
- the case that autonomy favors big nation states, not insurgents
- why it costs $200,000 to procure anything in the Pentagon
- what high-frequency trading and war have in common
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Jim Rebesco on LinkedIn
Short-seller Carson Block: a fugitive CEO, Libyan spies, and $50B fraud
Carson Block is the founder of Muddy Waters Research, one of the defining activist short-selling firms of the last decade and a half. Since 2010, Muddy Waters has published forensic research exposing accounting …
Notas del episodio
Carson Block is the founder of Muddy Waters Research, one of the defining activist short-selling firms of the last decade and a half. Since 2010, Muddy Waters has published forensic research exposing accounting fraud at publicly traded companies across China, Europe, and the US and has been right enough times that 11 companies have been delisted as a result.
In this episode of Summation, Carson and Auren discuss:
- why outright fraud is only 20-25% of Muddy Waters' focus
- the Wirecard saga
- why high-trust countries like Germany are a paradise for criminals
- how the thing that killed Enron is still completely legal
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Carson Block on LinkedIn and on X @muddywatersre
Facet CEO Anders Jones on the biggest heist in finance, how advisors really sell permission, and the great boomer wealth transfer
Anders Jones is the CEO and co-founder of Facet, a fintech company built to bring high-quality, flat-fee financial advice to an underserved market: the mass affluent. Facet has raised over $250M and manages …
Notas del episodio
Anders Jones is the CEO and co-founder of Facet, a fintech company built to bring high-quality, flat-fee financial advice to an underserved market: the mass affluent. Facet has raised over $250M and manages more than $7B. Anders has seen the real finances of tens of thousands of households.
In this episode of Summation, Anders and Auren discuss:
- why the percentage-of-assets fee is the greatest heist in finance
- the retention data showing people stick 3x longer when you help them act, not just advise
- the horizontal wealth transfer to spouses that nobody is planning for
- why most companies should never raise venture capital
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Anders Jones on LinkedIn
Charles Duhigg on the writing AI can't touch, what GLP-1s really do to your brain, and the serendipity tax
Charles Duhigg is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and staff writer at The New Yorker. He is the author of The Power of Habit, Smarter Faster Better, and Supercommunicators. His work focuses on the science …
Notas del episodio
Charles Duhigg is a Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and staff writer at The New Yorker. He is the author of The Power of Habit, Smarter Faster Better, and Supercommunicators. His work focuses on the science of habits, productivity, decision-making, and human connection.
In this episode of Summation, Charles and Auren discuss:
- why producing the words is only 10% of an author's job, and the 90% AI can't do
- what GLP-1s actually do to the brain
- the serendipity tax: why you pay for five dead-end dinners to get the one that changes your life
- the three skills that separate supercommunicators from everyone else
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Charles Duhigg on X at @cduhigg
SignalFire CEO Chris Farmer on why venture funds now last 20 years and the hiring boom behind the layoffs
Chris Farmer is the founder and CEO of SignalFire, an early stage venture firm managing over $3 billion. In this episode of Summation, Chris and Auren discuss:why the time to return 1x has stretched to 9+ years …
Notas del episodio
Chris Farmer is the founder and CEO of SignalFire, an early stage venture firm managing over $3 billion.
In this episode of Summation, Chris and Auren discuss:
- why the time to return 1x has stretched to 9+ years and funds are lasting 20 years
- the engineering hiring boom hiding behind the layoff headlines
- the five functions of a VC firm and the one place data helps the least
- why almost all conventional career advice is now bad
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Chris Farmer on X at @chriswfarmer
GTMnow Podcast | Your First VC Meeting Will Be Agent-to-Agent
This episode is a rebroadcast of Auren's appearance on the GTMnow podcast ---------------------------------------------------Auren Hoffman (Flex Capital) joins the GTMnow podcast to share some of the most …
Notas del episodio
This episode is a rebroadcast of Auren's appearance on the GTMnow podcast
---------------------------------------------------
Auren Hoffman (Flex Capital) joins the GTMnow podcast to share some of the most contrarian takes in tech today, from why AI moats are gone, to why your next VC meeting will be with a bot, to why AI is secretly going to trigger a baby boom.
In this episode:
- Why Auren runs 500+ AI agents to source deals, and what that means for founders raising capital
- The "agent-to-agent" meeting prediction: by end of 2026, first VC conversations will be fully automated
- Why every software moat has been "blown up" and what Salesforce, LinkedIn & DocuSign need to do to survive
- The OpenAI x The Hustle acquisition breakdown: why it's the smartest (and cheapest) distribution play in AI
- Why missing a great deal is 10x more painful than making a bad one, Auren's honest VC mistake framework
- The baby boom thesis: why AI, IVF, self-driving cars & cheaper energy could reverse the fertility decline
- Why companies won't sign yearly SaaS contracts anymore, and what that means for every B2B founder
Auren Hoffman is the founder of NQB8, Flex Capital, SafeGraph, and LiveRamp. He's an early backer of Replit, Perplexity, Rippling, Vercel, Coinbase, Chime, and AppLovin.
Max’s socials:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/maxaltschuler/
Auren’s socials:
https://www.linkedin.com/in/auren/
GTMnow: https://gtmnow.com
Serval CEO Jake Stauch: talent is the only moat left, hiring founders as FDEs, and building a $1B company with your wife and a newborn
Jake Stauch is the co-founder and CEO of Serval, the AI-native enterprise service management platform. Serval was founded in 2024 and has already raised over $125M across rounds led by Redpoint and Sequoia at a …
Notas del episodio
Jake Stauch is the co-founder and CEO of Serval, the AI-native enterprise service management platform. Serval was founded in 2024 and has already raised over $125M across rounds led by Redpoint and Sequoia at a $1B+ valuation. Before Serval, Jake spent five years on the product team at Verkada and earlier founded NeuroPlus, a brain-sensing hardware company that made video games for kids with ADHD.
In this episode of Summation, Jake and Auren discuss:
- Why Anthropic has added more ARR in the past few months than ServiceNow has in the past 20 years
- The "forward deployed engineer" hire and why he recruits future founders instead of solutions engineers
- Why talent density is the only remaining moat in the age of AI
- The Silicon Valley collusion around not poaching each other's employees
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Jake Stauch on X at @jakeserval
Perplexity Chief Business Officer Dmitry Shevelenko on why curiosity is AI’s scarcest resource
Dmitry Shevelenko is Chief Business Officer at Perplexity. He previously co-founded Tortoise, a robotics and commerce automation startup and held business development roles at Uber, LinkedIn, and Meta. He also …
Notas del episodio
Dmitry Shevelenko is Chief Business Officer at Perplexity. He previously co-founded Tortoise, a robotics and commerce automation startup and held business development roles at Uber, LinkedIn, and Meta. He also serves on the board of Lazard.
In this episode of Summation, Dmitry and Auren discuss:
- Why CEOs and executives are Perplexity Computer’s biggest power users and what that says about who wins the AI era
- Scaling Perplexity past $500M ARR with only 34% headcount growth
- The $34.5B Chrome bid and the TikTok bid before it
- Why AI's biggest constraint right now is adoption and not capability
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Dmitry Shevelenko on X at @dmitry140
Fundrise CEO Ben Miller: VCX, Roaring Kitty's revenge, and AI killing the office
Ben Miller is the co-founder and CEO of Fundrise, an alternative asset management platform that gives individual investors access to private real estate, private credit, and venture capital. In March 2026, he …
Notas del episodio
Ben Miller is the co-founder and CEO of Fundrise, an alternative asset management platform that gives individual investors access to private real estate, private credit, and venture capital. In March 2026, he listed the Fundrise Innovation Fund on the NYSE under the ticker VCX, one of the first publicly traded venture capital funds. VCX gives retail investors direct exposure to private companies like Anthropic, OpenAI, Databricks, and SpaceX. The fund manages over $650 million and has over 100,000 individual investors. Ben is a returning Summation guest.
In this episode of Summation, Ben and Auren discuss:
- Why VCX traded up 700% on day one while Bill Ackman's fund traded down the next week
- Why ETFs fall apart for private markets and closed-end funds are the right structure
- How AI will reshape real estate by 2031 and which markets get hit hardest
- The hidden truth that SoHo, Wynwood, and Miami Beach were all built by the same person
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Ben Miller on X at @benmillerise
Six-time CIA Station Chief Ralph Goff on the new doctrine of war
Ralph Goff is a 35-year veteran of the CIA, having served as a six-time Chief of Station across Europe, the Middle East, and Central and South Asia. During his career, he also held the roles of Chief of …
Notas del episodio
Ralph Goff is a 35-year veteran of the CIA, having served as a six-time Chief of Station across Europe, the Middle East, and Central and South Asia. During his career, he also held the roles of Chief of Operations for Europe and Eurasia and Chief of the CIA's National Resources Division. Since leaving government, he advises on national security issues and speaks publicly on intelligence, geopolitics, and great power competition.
In this episode of Summation, Ralph and Auren discuss:
- Why blackmail almost never works in espionage and ideology still does
- Who is actually dying for Putin
- Why China is the biggest winner of the Ukraine war
- How technological surveillance transformed CIA tradecraft
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Ralph Goff on Linkedin
Glenn Youngkin on governing like a CEO, the AI power crisis, and why every operator should run for office
Glenn Youngkin was the 74th Governor of Virginia. Before politics, he spent nearly 25 years at The Carlyle Group, one of the largest private equity firms in the world, where he rose to co-CEO. During his …
Notas del episodio
Glenn Youngkin was the 74th Governor of Virginia. Before politics, he spent nearly 25 years at The Carlyle Group, one of the largest private equity firms in the world, where he rose to co-CEO. During his four-year term, Virginia generated $10B in surplus revenue, delivered $9B in tax relief, attracted $156B in capital investment, and became one of the first states in the country to mandate cell-phone-free classrooms.
In this episode of Summation, Glenn and Auren discuss:
- Why every Virginia state agency got OKRs and how it transformed a 110,000-person government
- Why decommissioning baseload power was one of the dumbest decisions ever made
- How Loudoun County gets more than 25% of its tax base from data centers
- How a startup used AI to cut more Virginia regulations in 7 months than 3 years of manual work
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Glenn Youngkin on X at @GlennYoungkin
Thumbtack CEO Marco Zappacosta on why trades are AI-proof, the trillion-dollar home services market, and why software stopped being a capital asset
Marco Zappacosta is the co-founder and CEO of Thumbtack, the home services marketplace he started in 2008. Thumbtack connects homeowners to 300,000+ local service professionals, with nearly 100M projects …
Notas del episodio
Marco Zappacosta is the co-founder and CEO of Thumbtack, the home services marketplace he started in 2008. Thumbtack connects homeowners to 300,000+ local service professionals, with nearly 100M projects started on the platform.
In this episode of Summation, Marco and Auren discuss:
- Why home services is bigger than groceries but barely any is booked online
- How AI collapsed Thumbtack's product pod sizes
- Why Silicon Valley underrates leadership and overrates management
- The single trait to screen every executive hire for
You can find Auren Hoffman on X at @auren and Marco Zappacosta on X at @mlz
Aquí están los 40 episodios más recientes de 293. Los anteriores están en el feed del podcast.
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