Summation with Auren Hoffman

Joe Lonsdale is a co-founder of a number of amazing companies, including Palantir, Addepar and OpenGov, and he’s a cofounder of the University of Austin. He’s also the founder and managing partner of the venture firm 8VC, and he’s invested in some incredible companies, including Oculus, Anduril, Wish and Flexport. In this episode of World of DaaS, Auren and Joe engage in a thought-provoking discus...

Sam Lessin is a GP at Slow Ventures, a former Facebook product manager, and the founder of Drop.io and Fin. He’s also the co-host of an excellent podcast on tech called More or Less .  On this episode of World of DaaS, Sam gives a comprehensive breakdown of the state of venture capital. Auren and Sam discuss the “unicorn factory” for building public companies, the influence of megafunds like Tiger...

Brian Halligan is the co-founder, longtime CEO and now executive chair of Hubspot, a full service platform for marketing, sales and customer service. Hubspot was founded in 2006 and has a market cap of $23B today. Brian coined the term “inbound marketing” and helped give rise to one of the biggest shifts in marketing of the last 20 years.  In this episode of World of DaaS, Brian offers a deep dive...

This episode is a rebroadcast of Auren’s appearance on the MapScaping Podcast .  In this episode, Auren and MapScaping host Daniel O’Donohue go deep on geospatial data. They start by discussing Placekey – an open entity resolution service for places and addresses. Auren gives a breakdown of the complexities involved with address matching, and what that has to do with the dollar, Unix time, and inn...

Sam Corcos is the CEO of Levels , an a16z-backed health tech startup. While Levels’ mission is amazing, what really sets the company apart is how Sam runs it: Levels is highly transparent, asynchronous first, and serious about leveraging delegation for maximum productivity.  In this episode of World of DaaS, Sam gives a master class on the art of virtual assistance and delegation.  Levels uses VAS...

Jeff Lawson is the cofounder and CEO of Twilio, a $10 billion public software communications company. Jeff has an incredible founder story. Prior to Twilio, he co-founded Versity, which he sold for $30 million when he was just 23 years old. He was also the founding CTO of Stubhub and one of the first product managers at AWS. He founded Twilio in 2008.  In this episode, Jeff shares his insights int...

Spencer Kimball is the founder and CEO of Cockroach Labs , a $5 billion company that makes the CockroachDB database used by Netflix, Nubank, Shipt, and many other leading tech companies. Spencer was building and contributing to major open source projects before he graduated from college.  In this episode of World of DaaS, Spencer and Auren do a deep dive on open source companies: How they make mon...

Michael Seibel is a group partner at Y Combinator and the managing director of YC's startup accelerator. He evaluates 1000s of startups a year and sees hundreds go through YC, which means he has better data on startup success than just about anyone in tech. He’s also the cofounder of Twitch.  In this episode, Michael and Auren dive into the startup landscape and the inner workings of Y Combin...

Ben Horowitz is the cofounder and CEO of Andreessen Horowitz, the most influential venture capital firm of the last 20 years. Ben and Andreessen Horowitz (also known as a16z) have invested in some of the biggest companies out there, including AirBnb, Coinbase, Facebook, Instacart, GitHub and Oculus.  Prior to his VC career, Ben founded Opsware/Loudcloud, which was acquired by Hewlett-Packard for $...

Guillermo Rauch is the founder and CEO of Vercel, a cloud platform that powers some of the biggest names on the internet, like Patreon, Ebay, Netflix and Adobe.   Guillermo has an incredible founder story– he began coding at age 10, dropped out of high school and moved from his native Argentina to San Francisco as a teenager. He’s also the creator of several major open source projects and a dual t...

Andrew Ross Sorkin is a financial columnist for the New York Times, a co-anchor of CNBC’s Squawk Box and the founder and editor of DealBook. He’s also the co-creator of the hit-show Billions and the author of the bestselling book Too Big To Fail , on the 2008 financial crisis.  On this episode of World of DaaS, Auren and Andrew dive into the intersecting realms of technology, finance, and data. An...

Peter Thiel is one of the greatest entrepreneurs and investors of his generation. He was the co-founder and CEO of PayPal, the first investor in Facebook, and co-founder of Palantir Technologies . He’s the founder and managing partner of the venture capital firm Founders Fund, and the author of Zero to One , one of the best business books of all time. In this episode, Auren and Peter dive deep on...

Amjad Masad is the founder and CEO of Replit , an online coding environment.  Amjad and Auren discuss what the rise of AI means for coding, developers, and tech companies. Amjad shares his thoughts on consumer vs creator computer culture, why development hasn’t moved to the cloud faster, and why everyone should be able to call themselves a programmer.  They also discuss Amjad’s experience coming f...

Sir Martin Sorrell is the founder of WPP , one of the largest advertising agencies in the world, which he ran for over 30 years. He’s currently the executive chairman of S4 Capital , which is a pure play digital advertising company he founded in 2018.  In this episode, Auren and Martin dive into the fascinating intersection of AI in advertising, the economic impact of Brexit, and the ever-evolving...

Neil Strauss is a 10x New York Times bestselling author and a renowned journalist whose work has appeared in the New York Times , Rolling Stone , and Esquire .   Neil and host Auren Hoffman delve into the intriguing world of charisma, self-improvement, and relationships. Neil explains how anyone can learn to be more charismatic, and what charisma has to do with group dynamics.    The conversation...

Bram Cohen is the creator of BitTorrent, which revolutionized digital entertainment and has been downloaded over two billion times. Today, Bram is the founder and CTO of Chia network, which manages the Chia cryptocurrency. Chia uses a unique proof of space model, in contrast to proof or work or proof of stake models like Bitcoin and Ethereum.  In this episode of World of DaaS, Bram and host Auren...

Bryan Johnson is the founder of the payments processing company Braintree , which sold to Paypal for $800 million in 2012. He’s also the founder of OS Fund , which invests in advancing genomic and biological technology, and Kernel , which is focused on developing brain-machine interfaces. In 2021, he launched Project Blueprint , which aims to slow and reverse the aging process in the human body. H...

Sue Gordon is the former Principal Deputy Director of National Intelligence. She had a 30+ year career with the CIA, as well as serving as Deputy Director of the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency.  Auren and Sue discuss shifting global power dynamics and the nature of modern intelligence in an ever-evolving world. They delve into the realm of cyber defense and Sue gives an overview of the ex...

Ajit Pai is the former Chairman of the Federal Communications Commission, where he served from 2017 to 2021. He’s currently a partner at Searchlight Capital . Auren and Ajit delve into the intricacies of technology regulation, including the nuances of regulating AI and crypto. Ajit outlines the essential triggers for preemptive intervention, and the many unintended consequences of Section 230 and...

Steven Pinker is a linguist, cognitive scientist, and a professor in the Department of Psychology at Harvard. He’s the author of twelve books, including the bestsellers How the Mind Works , Enlightenment Now , and most recently Rationality . Auren and Steven delve into the world of artificial intelligence, cognitive science, and intellectual freedom. Steven brings his perspective from cognitive ps...

Erik Torenberg was the first employee at Product Hunt, and the founder and chairman of On Deck . He’s currently a partner at Village Global and the founder of Turpentine podcast network.   Erik and Auren discuss the startup founder mindset and what it takes to be successful in tech. Erik shares the career strategies and frameworks that have allowed him to found multiple companies and a venture cap...

Jesse is the founder and CEO of Gateway X , a venture studio focused on DTC brands. Previously, he was the co-founder and CEO of Ampush , a digital marketing firm which he bootstrapped to an eight figure exit. Jesse and Auren break down some of the nuances of digital marketing and discuss the state of marketing on the major tech platforms today. They also discuss Red Ventures , “the most impressiv...

Immad Akhund is the CEO of Mercury, a bank for startups. He’s also a multi-time founder and a Dual Threat CEO with over 300+ angel investments.  Auren and Immad discuss the collapse of SVB and how Mercury handled an influx of over $2 billion in deposits. Immad explains some lesser-known structural aspects of the banking system that affect the product and customer experience.  Auren and Immad also...

HRH Prince Turki Al Faisal Al Saud was the head of Saudi Arabia’s General Intelligence Directorate for 24 years. He also served as the Ambassador of Saudi Arabia to the UK, Ireland, and the United States, and he’s the author of The Afghanistan File.  Auren and Prince Turki discuss the complex history of Afghanistan and Middle East geopolitics. Prince Turki shares his thoughts on the mistakes made...

Dmitri Alperovitch is the co-founder and former CTO of CrowdStrike and the founder of Silverado Policy Accelerator.  Dmitri and Auren delve into the complexities of cyber warfare, geopolitics, and their intersections. Dmitri explains the intricacies of the 'vulnerabilities equities process' and the challenges in making software safer.  The conversation also explores the realm of cyber we...