Agentic

89% of all global venture capital in Q1 2026 went to AI companies. Q1 alone nearly matched the prior five quarters of AI deal value combined. George Bandarian, General Partner at Untapped Ventures, presents the full Q2 2026 State of AI + Autonomous Economy- the live data deck from Boston, Toronto, and NY Tech Weeks - covering the venture landscape, frontier model capabilities, enterprise adoption...

George Bandarian, General Partner at Untapped Ventures, brings 10 of his portfolio founders on stage at the 2026 Annual General Meeting in LA — the builders actually making the autonomous economy real across compute, robotics, AI models, longevity, and enterprise agents. These are the stories of the founders in the trenches. In this episode, we go deep into: The Compute Revolution: Why thermodynam...

George Bandarian, General Partner at Untapped Ventures, breaks down the Autonomous Economy thesis - a new economic framework where billions of AI agents and robots execute work end-to-end without human involvement - and why this shift  may dwarf every previous technological revolution, from internet to mobile. What is the Autonomous Economy (AE)? It’s what happens when billions of AI agents and ph...

Andrew Chen, General Partner at a16z speedrun, joins us on Agentic to discuss what actually gets founders accepted into speedrun and why AI might be bigger than mobile, internet, and cloud combined. In this episode, we dive deep into: Speedrun Insider Access - What actually gets founders accepted into a16z's elite accelerator program (hint: it's not what you think) Building in AI - From industrial...

We're at the halfway point of 2025, and AI is evolving faster than ever. In this solo episode, I share Untapped Ventures ’ first Request for Startups. It’s a detailed breakdown of the core areas where we’re actively looking to invest. If you're a founder building in AI or exploring ideas, this is the roadmap for what we want to fund next. I walk through the key themes that reflect our thesis acros...

Is your AI startup built to survive the next wave? In this episode of Agentic, Will Manidis, the co-founder of ScienceIO, shares how he built for resilience from day one developing LLMs for healthcare and the frameworks that helped him scale before the world caught up. He shares how local model training on office gaming PCs laid the unlikely foundation for ScienceIO’s reach across millions in digi...

Most no-code tools give you an MVP. Woz wants to give you a business. On this episode of Agentic, I was joined by Ben Collins and Brad Eckert , co-founders of Woz, an AI platform that lets anyone build real, scalable web and mobile products with zero coding. Think Shopify, but for launching operational SaaS startups. If you’re in the early innings of building something in AI, especially if you’re...

What happens when the former Chief Scientist at Salesforce builds a search engine for enterprises? In this episode, Richard Socher (CEO) and Bryan McCann (CTO) of You.com reveal how they’re reinventing enterprise search and agentic workflows with their latest product, Ari—a deep research assistant that goes far beyond fast facts. We explore: How You.com is going deeper than Google and faster than...

Everyone has opinions about founder equity, funding timelines, and valuations—but Peter Walker holds the data.  In this special live Agentic session, I sat down with Peter, Head of Insights at Carta , to unpack what’s actually happening beneath the surface in early-stage AI startups.  Peter’s team has a privileged vantage point—cap tables, valuations, and hiring data across 45,000 startups and 83%...

I brought Ben Collins of Woz and Dakotah Rice and Tushar Nair of Harper for a special episode of Agentic–our AGM! Ben’s Woz lets non-technical founders build scalable apps with no engineering team—think Shopify for software while Dakotah and Tushar’s Harper quotes 476 complex insurance deals with voice AI, turning family brokerage chaos into a data goldmine.  On the docket: ​Harper’s logged-call a...

As AI races forward, one question looms large—who decides what’s right and wrong? Behind the breakthroughs and multi billion-dollar valuations, a power struggle is unfolding. Big Tech is quietly shaping AI policy in the shadows, and governments are stuck playing catch-up. In this episode, I speak with Wendell Wallach , a foremost expert on AI ethics and governance, to break down the challenges and...

He built AI-powered lunar rovers at NASA. He was in the room when GPT launched. Now, Logan Kilpatrick is helping developers push the boundaries of AI at Google DeepMind. In this episode, Logan shares his front-row view of AI’s most pivotal moments—and how they hint at the next paradigm shifts. We also get into: • inside Open AI on Launch day • how Google DeepMind’s Gemini 2.0 Flash is flipping the...

Bigger AI models dominate the headlines—but what if the real breakthrough lies in making AI smaller? In this episode, I sit down with Ramin Hasani, Alexander Amini, and Daniela Rus—who are at the helm of Liquid AI—to discuss how their approach challenges conventional architectures and unlocks new frontiers for AI deployment. Also on the docket: • Ramin explains how insights from a microscopic worm...

For years, $7.2B in U.S. government-backed neuroperformance research sat untouched—proven cognitive enhancements with no commercial application. David Bach saw the gap. Optios is bridging classified IP with market demand, transforming military-grade neuroscience into real-world performance gains. The upside? Monumental. The imbalance? Even bigger. We dive into: • how declassified DOD research is u...

AI agents will drive the next wave of automation—but only if they stop breaking. In this episode, I’m joined by Alex Reibman , Adam Silverman , and Braelyn Boynton , the powerhouse team behind Agency. Together, they’re tackling the toughest challenges in AI agent development, from failure recovery to debugging and slashing operational costs. In this episode: • Alex reveals why today’s AI agents br...

AI is a platform shift unlike any other, with far-reaching implications for every startup. In my recent webinar with the Founder’s Bay community in Silicon Valley, hosted by Mariane Bekker, I explored why AI should be the core focus for founders aiming to build scalable, high-impact companies. Key takeaways: • there’s hardly an application that AI can’t improve • AI startups are exiting faster—7 y...

The insurance industry has a 400,000 agent shortage. I sat down with Harper 's founders, who use agentic AI to deliver enterprise-grade service at 1/10th the cost. Dakotah Rice and Tushar Nair revealed how they're leveraging the $85B E&S market: • voice AI running quotes to claims • why selling AI tools failed, but becoming a broker worked • how they're hitting software margins in a services busin...

Only 8 companies have shipped AI Agents from production. In this episode of Agentic, I brought together 3 of them, to reveal how they crossed this chasm: 1. Aria Attar (TensorStax) shows how they're tackling the 1:250 data scientist shortage with agents that drop into existing cloud environments. 2. Joe Stolte (Daily.ai), fresh off multiple exits including a $62.5 M acquisition, reveals how they t...

With $90B poured into AI over the past year, where is the focus going to be in 2025? I spoke to four top investors to find out. 1. Yipeng Zhao (Embark Ventures) believes AI offers a one-year head start. Fast GTM wins. Slow movers risk irrelevance. 2. Hari Arul (Khosla Ventures) has stopped backing co-pilots altogether. His take? Human-in-loop models won’t survive past 2026. 3. James Shecter (Fika...

While 92% of Fortune 500s realize the surplus alpha that can be created from leveraging AI, only 25% of SMBs realize the same. I sat with 6 founders who are building Agentic AI solutions: Jacky Wong (Nullify), Aria Attar (TensorStax), Max Ahrens (Maihem), Saurabh Sharma (You.com), Jonas Diezun (Beam AI), and Ashar Rizqi (Bounti.ai). The key highlights from our conversation were: - OpenAI’s functio...

As we transition into agentic models, it’s evident there’s a blend of optimism and caution. In this panel discussion, I was joined by Jon Chu (Khosla Ventures), Pranav Reddy (Conviction), Andrew Brackin (Gradient), Arash Afrakhteh (Pear VC), Alejandra Vergara (Bee Partners), and Nahim Nasser (Georgian) as we explored: • why agentic AI will drive systemic shifts across various industries • the need...

To me, agentic is intent meeting capability—systems that act autonomously, adapt intelligently, and drive purposeful outcomes. Our guests on this episode— Jonathan Corbin , Sami Shalabi , and Eugene Mann —embody that. They're pushing AI agents forward for real-world enterprise use cases with Maven AGI . We discuss: • solving complex challenges with AI agents • empowering enterprises with cutting-e...