Newcomer Pod

This week on the Newcomer Podcast, we dive into three stories that reveal how tech, politics, and media are colliding in unexpected ways. First, we look at Andreessen Horowitz’s expanding media ambitions, exploring why A16z wants to shape the narrative around everything from defense tech to TikTok. Then, we turn to Trump’s feud with Jimmy Kimmel, which led to Kimmel’s suspension and re-hiring by D...

Check out Nayeema Raza's podcast Smart Girl Dumb Questions: https://linktr.ee/smartgirldumbquestions   We’re at a turning point in public health. From billionaires chasing immortality to the growing influence of AI in medicine, the future of healthcare is being rewritten in real time. In this week’s episode of the Newcomer Podcast, journalist and filmmaker Nayeema Raza joins us to unpack the p...

On this episode of the  Newcomer  podcast, host  Eric Newcomer  is joined by co-host  Nayeema Raza  for conversations with some of the most influential voices in healthcare and venture capital.  Bob Kocher , Partner at Venrock, and  Annie Lamont , Founder and Managing Partner of Oak HC/FT, share their perspectives on business models in healthcare, the rise of AI applications, the promise and pitfa...

Journalist  Nayeema Raza —host of  Smart Girl Dumb Questions —joins  Eric Newcomer  to preview  Deus Ex Medicina , their AI–health–longevity summit happening  Tuesday, Sept 9 (San Francisco) . They discuss the big themes going into the conference: how longevity went mainstream, why precision medicine and novel bio are finally feeling real, and who wins the race to own the patient. Eric and Nayeema...

Former CIA officer and three-term Congressman Will Hurd joins Eric Newcomer , Tom Dotan , and Madeline Renbarger to break down Washington's defense tech boom and tackle the burning question: Is this all just hype? Hurd explains how Ukraine has changed the face of warfare and opened the door for new companies to break into the fold. However, it's one thing to build a prototype, but it's...

Is the AI bubble popping—or just catching its breath? Eric Newcomer and Tom Dotan spar over Nvidia jitters, Sam Altman’s “bubble” dinner, the MIT “95% fail” headline, app-vs-model margins (Cursor, Claude Code), and Chamath’s SPAC-as-casino shtick. Then Eric sits down with Vercel founder/CEO Guillermo Rauch for a fast, idea-dense jam: assistants → agents → multi-agent teams, why GPT-5’s real story...

For this episode, we brought on  Ed Zitron  to make the  bear case  against large language models and walk us through his “Hater’s Guide To The AI Bubble.” In this fiery debate with  Eric Newcomer ,  Tom Dotan , and  Madeline Renbarger , we dig into whether generative AI is the next platform shift or a $500B mirage. From the viral TaskRabbit CAPTCHA myth to SoftBank’s high-stakes bets, we debate t...

GPT-5 has landed! Is it the leap forward OpenAI promised or just an incremental upgrade? Eric Newcomer and Tom Dotan discuss this, how AI capex might be propping up the entire economy, and what Apple’s golden gifts to Trump say about Big Tech’s political bets.

This week on the Newcomer Podcast, we're joined by a very special guest: Danny Rimer , seasoned investor and longtime partner at Index Ventures , for a timely conversation around Figma ’s highly anticipated IPO. Danny takes us behind the scenes of Index’s early bet on Figma and its visionary CEO Dylan Field , sharing how the deal came together and what made the design platform stand out in a c...

Tech leaders unveiled the American AI Action Plan on Wednesday and President Trump signed 3 executive orders with big handouts to AI companies. Madeline returns fresh off of a trip to Washington DC and gives Tom and Eric the lowdown on tech's victory lap at the nation's capital. Plus, even the altruists at Anthropic feel the need to raise Middle East money. Timecodes:01:45 - The All-In podcast mig...

Fresh back from London! In this episode, Eric Newcomer reunites with co-hosts James Wilsterman and Max Child of Volley to dive into the best moments from the Cerebral Valley AI Summit. From buzzy startup founders to incumbent innovators, the London event showcased a rapidly evolving AI landscape. But what stood out most? Eric, James, and Max break down their favorite clips and debate the key quest...

The Newcomer Podcast returns just in time to have Eric, Tom, and Madeline weigh in on Meta's audacious AI hiring spree. The tech giant has enticed researchers from OpenAI, Google DeepMind, and Anthropic with huge paydays in the hopes it can bring its Llama models up to par with the competition. Next up, Ramp's report that companies have stopped purchasing AI tools made a lot of buzz this week, but...

Today on the pod, we're bringing you two of the liveliest panels from the 2025 Cerebral Valley AI Summit, held this week in London. Both panels — “The Autonomous Vehicle Rollout” and “Investing in 2030” — explore one of the major themes from the event: where AI is poised to show up next in our everyday lives, beyond the chatbot. Think voice, devices, and even your car. First up, we'll hear...

We’re officially one week out from the Cerebral Valley AI Summit! On today’s episode, co-hosts James Wilsterman and Max Child of Volley join host Eric Newcomer to preview what’s ahead — from standout speakers to can’t-miss panels and the big ideas that will shape the conversations next week. To kick things off, Eric poses a timely question: What themes are starting to take shape across the partici...

In this second installment of the Cerebral Valley podcast series, co-hosts James Wilsterman and Max Child of Volley join Eric Newcomer for a thought-provoking conversation about the future of AI-generated voice and video — and what it means for our sense of reality. From TikTok trends to the future of Hollywood and podcasting, the trio explores where generative video might take us over the next fi...

The Cerebral Valley AI Summit is right around the corner! To help you navigate the fast-evolving AI landscape ahead of the event, Newcomer Podcast is launching a special four-part series — co-hosted by James Wilsterman and Max Child of Volley . Get insider insights, expert analysis, and fresh perspectives on the trends shaping the future of artificial intelligence. In this first episode, James, Ma...

We're welcoming Bloomberg's Kate Clark to the show this week and diving into her reporting on the rough fundraising environment for any VC that isn't an a16z or GC-style megafund. The only emerging funds that can raise, it seems, are ones that are started by investors who leave these brands. If it weren't for the AI funding bonanza, the situation would look even worse. We each make our predictions...

In this special episode, we feature two interviews recorded live during Newcomer’s Breaking the Bank Summit , a financial technology summit held this week in San Francisco. We’re including two of the most dynamic discussions here, beginning with Gabriel Stengel of Rogo and Jeff Seibert of Digits , followed by an interview with Josh Reeves, CEO of Gusto. The episode kicks off with a breakdown of th...

Eric relays his dispatch from Dimension Capital’s biotech summit in Park City, where the crowd was much more academic than the conferences we usually attend. Biotech stocks aren’t doing great, meanwhile university funding cuts could spell trouble for drug research. Still, people were rosy about AI tools.  We also took a temperature check on the state of fintech, which investors tell us is mixed. E...

How does the AI gold rush look from the helm of a $40-billion software giant? Salesforce co-founder, chair, and CEO  Marc Benioff  joins Eric Newcomer and Tom Dotan for a tour of the next tech boom cycle. The conversation opens with Benioff’s sweeping vision of “Agent Force 2.0,” where large language models paired with reasoning engines mint whole new classes of digital labor, and brands from Gucc...

This week, we kick off by discussing Ben Smith’s bombshell post ”The group chats that changed America,” that exposed the private chats that nudged Silicon Valley’s money crowd into Trump’s orbit.  Then we hop to DC’s Hill-and-Valley Forum, where the mantra was industrial renaissance or bust. The race with China, AI’s essential energy demands, and the need to reshore American manufacturing were the...

We’re back to opining on the state of tech media! A16z has aqui-hired Erik Torenberg and his newsletter Turpentine, while the Technology Brothers with ties to Founders Fund have created a podcasting empire. Eric and Tom reminisce about the original wave of “going direct,” why it failed, and what’s different this time around.  Later on, Madeline shares that crypto VCs are growing frustrated with Pr...

This week, Tom breaks down his scoops on how the big foundation model providers are doing.and much to the chagrin of our resident skeptic, they’re earning lots of real revenue! OpenAI is on track to crack over $12 billion in revenue this year, and Anthropic projects it will double its ARR to $4 billion by the end of the year. But have we hit the AGI moment? Eric relays his o3 experiments as eviden...

We're welcoming special guest Tom Dotan of  Dead Cat  fame  to  the show this week — just in time for the tariff market meltdown. To Silicon Valley's Trump supporters, we hate to say we told you so, but it's hard to imagine how these tariffs on our biggest trading partners will benefit tech and artificial intelligence development in the US. In the second half of the show, Eric intervie...

OpenAI has done it again. The AI giant closed $40 billion in fresh funding (kind of) led by Softbank, We debate the bull and bear case for OpenAI's $300 billion valuation. Eric sticks to his guns from his previous bear case, but Madeline is more optimistic about OpenAI's consumer revenue. We also go over the latest in the Deel/Rippling corporate espionage saga and dig into Eric's reporting on the...