Today is a sad day. We let go of 72 great people who helped build On Deck into what it is today. Our focus in the next few days will be supporting our team – particularly those departing the company. If you’re looking to hire incredibly talented people, DM or email me.

Sony a9III的高光时刻

Not a fan of inspirational videos on social media. But as Jony explains (and I experienced on multiple occasions), one of the secrets to Apple’s success is actually simple: focus.

You were there today!

To say we're pretty excited about tomorrow's guest might be an understatement... @Microsoft CEO @satyanadella will join @adityaag & @rsanghvi on the SPC stage–we can't wait for this one!

If you are in SF and need an inspiration boost may I recommend a Waymo ride. It was 🤯🤯🤯🤯. I would pay s premium to ride in this vs a Uber/lyft.

It seems @Priyasideas was already on the story about kids and self-driving! @Waymo @SuzKP and team: when do we get a higher capacity vehicle? 𝘈𝘴𝘩𝘸𝘪𝘯 𝘓𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘳𝘢𝘯, 𝘢 15-𝘺𝘦𝘢𝘳 𝘷𝘦𝘵𝘦𝘳𝘢𝘯 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘢𝘶𝘵𝘰𝘯𝘰𝘮𝘰𝘶𝘴 𝘷𝘦𝘩𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦 𝘪𝘯𝘥𝘶𝘴𝘵𝘳𝘺, 𝘴𝘢𝘪𝘥 𝘪𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘰𝘮𝘱𝘢𝘯𝘺 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘵𝘰 𝘭𝘢𝘶𝘯𝘤𝘩 𝘢 𝘬𝘪𝘥-𝘧𝘰𝘤𝘶𝘴𝘦𝘥 𝘳𝘪𝘥𝘦 𝘰𝘧𝘧𝘦𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨, 𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘰𝘶𝘭𝘥 𝘴𝘪𝘨𝘯 𝘶𝘱 𝘪𝘯 𝘢 𝘩𝘦𝘢𝘳𝘵𝘣𝘦𝘢𝘵. 𝘏𝘦 𝘢𝘯𝘥 𝘩𝘪𝘴 𝘸𝘪𝘧𝘦 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯 𝘤𝘰𝘯𝘴𝘪𝘥𝘦𝘳𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘳𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦𝘪𝘳 𝘯𝘦𝘸𝘣𝘰𝘳𝘯 𝘩𝘰𝘮𝘦 𝘧𝘳𝘰𝘮 𝘜𝘊𝘚𝘍 𝘩𝘰𝘴𝘱𝘪𝘵𝘢𝘭 𝘪𝘯 𝘢 𝘞𝘢𝘺𝘮𝘰 𝘣𝘶𝘵 𝘸𝘦𝘳𝘦 𝘴𝘵𝘺𝘮𝘪𝘦𝘥 𝘣𝘺 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘤𝘩𝘢𝘭𝘭𝘦𝘯𝘨𝘦 𝘰𝘧 𝘧𝘪𝘵𝘵𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘸𝘩𝘰𝘭𝘦 𝘧𝘢𝘮𝘪𝘭𝘺 𝘪𝘯𝘵𝘰 𝘰𝘯𝘦 𝘷𝘦𝘩𝘪𝘤𝘭𝘦. “𝘞𝘩𝘦𝘯 𝘥𝘰 𝘸𝘦 𝘨𝘦𝘵 𝘢 𝘮𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘷𝘢𝘯 𝘷𝘦𝘳𝘴𝘪𝘰𝘯 𝘰𝘧 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘴?” 𝘓𝘢𝘭𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘳𝘢𝘯 𝘴𝘢𝘪𝘥. “𝘛𝘩𝘢𝘵’𝘴 𝘩𝘰𝘸 𝘮𝘶𝘤𝘩 𝘸𝘦 𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘴𝘵 𝘪𝘵.”

🤯 @rsanghvi In 2015 when you had everyone sitting around your kitchen table, did you imagine this scene outside of @southpkcommons someday? @kanjun @soleio @nikil @klinse @anuraggoel

Sam Altman: "I think there will be multiple $10 billion-plus companies started in India in the next few years." goo.gl/gp8TSt

Everyone says we need more American factories. Ramp data says they may need our help. Ramp economist @arakharazian digs into the slowdown and how America can continue to lead in tech and industry.

1/ YES to YIMBY 2/ But also worth calling out in practice one way YIMBY is being hacked in SF by developers is the following: — Buy and tear down an old house — Design a 2 unit “house” — Claim it is for affordability — Get fast-tracked bc of “new unit” — Combine the 2 units into McMansion Attached from actual documentation of active case today: 1400 sq ft home being torn down to build 5700 sq ft “2 unit” which is obviously not 2 units. But SF Planning Dept hands’ are tied. 3/ We need YIMBY with more iterative guidelines to prevent hacks like this. Otherwise we end up back at square one. Intent is there, but policy gets bastardized.

Here’s 1 big difference btwn traditional startup funding and ICO’s. Founders of failed startups shouldn’t come away financially enriched.

BUT, I am learning from folks on the ground in Ukraine — including an amazing startup founder — that at the unit level, situation is far from rosy. Especially relating to: 1. Internal corruption (Ukraine), and 2. Electronic warfare (Russian)

Vice President JD Vance Attends the American Compass Fifth Anniversary Gala nitter.app/i/broadcasts/1gqxvjXzk…

JUST IN - Putin to Tucker Carlson on @elonmusk: "There's no stopping Elon Musk" .. "I think he's a smart person"

4/ Non-HW-first founders spend most of their time on Hardware. See: Purple / Lavender

YouTube is one of the best things about growing up in today's age. Kids can see how soy sauce is made, how dishwashers work, or tour Lake Baikal. But these are rare gems in an ocean of garbage. Here are some great YouTube channels for creative and curious children: 🧵

The pace at which we develop and build #hardware drives how fast we can deploy new tech. Several factors will accelerate progress toward this future incl: - Generative AI - Agile robotics - A changing macro environment More here: bit.ly/4cBkTu0

Zelensky posts a video with top aides + his prime minister, apparently from above ground in Kyiv. “We are all here, our soldiers are here … we are defending our independence”

Databricks outbids Snowflake and Confluent on Tabular, the open-core company behind Apache Iceberg that we covered before. The competition in the modern data stack is still red hot. Quite a surprise to see Tabular exiting so quickly, previously I thought they are of great potential, albeit with monetization challenges. This is a super aggressive move from Databricks because clearly $SNOW and $CFLT are better buyers with clearer synergies. This is more of a defensive strategy for Databricks because it already owns Delta Lake. But as we've analyzed last Feb, it is not going well vs. Iceberg who is destined to become the industry standard, and Delta Universal Format doesn't help that much. The listed goal is to bring in better interoperability between Iceberg and Delta Lake. This is weird because if everything goes well, they should centralize on Delta Lake only, and if it is SNOW or CFLT buying it, they can further supercharge the Iceberg capabilities rather than maintaining two routes. $1bn+ price tag is quite expensive for this purpose. So it seems like Databricks is seeing a huge threat and pressure from Iceberg because it is a true open and flexible standard vs. Delta Lake. Also, this doesn't look like a sound capital allocation strategy, also MosaicML at the benefit of the hindsight isn't of that high ROI. This makes me worry about Databricks' operating efficiency and capital allocation strategy, especially for future public stockholders. But I do think Databricks is better off by buying Tabular, it is just that this is quite expensive as a defensive move. Would be interesting to track what's their next move. Maybe part of the reason why SNOW didn't chase Tabular deal that aggressively is because they have already announced Polaris Catalog and making it open-source. That is killing Tabular's open-core business, and also threatening Databricks' Unity Catalog that is not open-source, and was leveraged as a hook to keep Delta Lake open in surface but close for enterprise usage. For this round 2 of open-source play, it looks like SNOW has played it better and targeting Databricks' pain point. But it is continuously evolving so Databricks will possibly fight back too.

Excited to announce I’ll be doing a fireside + Q&A on “founder psychology” with 2 of my favorite founders, @Alicebentinck and @ashwinl, in SF on April 17 (1 month from today)! For founders, funders, and the friends and family who put up with them. :D Claim your spot below:

+1 The unwritten story is how @Waymo and robotaxis are going to transform PARENTING: Imagine having kids picked up at school and chauffeured to football and ballet class and back home?

MBS: I believe the Middle East will be the new Europe. In 5 years, Saudi Arabia will be a completely different country.

Electronic warfare at scale. Topic to track: GPS jamming out of Kallingrad, Russia nitter.app/auonsson/status/177521… GPS jamming 12,000 km south of Kallingrad in Cyprus in Mediterranean nitter.app/rhatr/status/177575250… GPS jamming near the Persian Gulf nitter.app/warintel4u/status/1775… Impacting commercial flts over Baltics nitter.app/newscientist/status/17… Ukrainian drones using optical navigation nitter.app/david_hambling/status/…

🇪🇺 Let's talk eu/acc! 🔴 LIVE - Chat @ rfc.to 🎉 nitter.app/i/broadcasts/1ynKOywnP…

During the first rescue mission of his career, Rescue Swimmer Scott Ruskan directly saved 165 individuals. The Department of Homeland Security applauds the 65 Aircrew members for their heroism and bravery, including Lt. Ian Hopper, Lt. Blair Ogujiofor, and Flight Mechanic Seth Reeves. The men and women of the @USCG are American heroes.

Huawei is literally becoming the Apple, Nvidia, AWS, Android, HP, IBM, and Cisco of China. I guess why not have multiple national champions be the same company?

BillionToOne has grown from zero to a $100m annual run rate in only 4 years since product launch 🚀 Don't ever say deep tech startups can't grow fast!

0. US is vulnerable via Arctic 1. Canadian Arctic policy to date* has been weak 2. US has leverage to negotiate w Canada 3. DJT starts negotiating with the outlandish (*) submarines and icebreaker commitments by Canadian govt is inadequate

Supply chain efficiency & resilience. It’s generally much better for things to be produced closer to the point of consumption. There are also about 200,000 factories in the US that only operate at 50%-60% capacity because of a lack of access to labor.

.@AliceBentinck kicks off @join_ef demo day in San Francisco with the legendary @vkhosla

Ben Horowitz Bill Ackman Cameron Winklevoss Doug Leone Elon Musk Eoghan McCabe Ken Howery Kyle Samani Marc Andreessen Jacob Helberg Joe Lonsdale Palmer Luckey Peter Thiel Shaun Maguire Trevor Traina Tushar Jain Tyler Winklevoss Come on in, the water’s warm.

Excited to work with @navierboat! Gets people around much faster + reduces car commuting/congestion/emissions/etc. (Yes, they had us at "electric flying boat".) bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

Best year ever in startup world for...down rounds. This used to be something no one really spoke about and now down makes up 20% of all the rounds. Good = that company is still alive. Bad = sucks to go through, lots of stress. But hey, FB took a down round once.

Every smart person I know is getting into hardware right now

We will be publishing our deep dive on the U.S. defense industry at the end of this month, covering everything from what the Department of Defense spends money on to how warfare is conducted on the battlefield today. Like our previous deep dives, we will build from the ground up, assuming no prior knowledge about the U.S. defense industry. Here's what we'll cover: How is the Department of Defense organized? How many military bases do we have worldwide? What is the history of warfare since the Industrial Revolution?

I am sorry to report this: But Apple Maps is now in many cases superior to Google Maps. Cleaner design, more details, better navigation (path and UI), less wtf. Sorry. 😔

As a US-based VC investing in industrials, my take (admittedly controversial) from @daveclark85 data: TLDR: Redomicile European startups to US until Europe gets their act together. Better for Founders and investors. Ecosystem will benefit upon exit. Founders today can't wait for EU. 1/ Private company value for identical startup in Europe < US -- across stages, no disagreement 2/ Founders in Europe are equally good technically (if not better in certain sectors) 3/ Find "undervalued" European startups and frame as a US-based one (incorporation, HQ, etc.) 4/ Leave R&D in Europe with high quality, low churn talent 5/ Growth capital from US and outside Europe 6/ Exit options to either US or European conglomerates or stock exchanges -- US startups have reduced network for exit options

🏘️ The home buying process is broken and archaic. @zownhomes makes it easier, especially for the working class and first-time buyers. fastcompany.com/91343034/thi…

Saw 1st hand today how inferior technology can gradually become standard if a General advocates for it based on incomplete data

8b/ “If they start coming in, they won’t be any more competent than Korean and Japanese cars,” Lutz said. “They would probably take share from other Asian brands because the vehicles will be more Asian in character. They’re not going to get much market share.”

The best #deeptech businesses don’t go to the market with a #deeptech label

One person I’d like to have a drink with: Mark Carney . The OG. Skilled public servant. 🇬🇧 🇨🇦 In SV, we sometimes forget the critical role of ppl like Carney. Aside from his long list of accomplishments, he had this to say:

“Anybody just focusing on investing in Europe is missing out on 80%+ of the value created. VC is hard at the best of times. Ruling yourself out of a high proportion of the best companies isn't going to make it any easier.” linkedin.com/posts/david-cla…

Hardware / software founders: I’m seeing this consistently in market now. Most sw only SaaS VCs do not fully grok (yet): 1. How long hardware takes to mature 2. Once traction rips, company is 🚀 If you have product in market in a growing market and raised during ZIRP, DMs open

The topic on Infinite ML pod today is Collaborative Robots. We have @BradPorter_ on the show to talk about it. He's the founder and CEO of Collaborative Robotics where they are building robots that will seamlessly blend into our surroundings. They've raised over $140M in funding from @sequoia, @khoslaventures, @generalcatalyst, @Lux_Capital, and others. He was previously the CTO of @scale_AI. Prior to that, he was the VP of Robotics at @amazon. We cover a range of topics including: - Building Blocks in Robotics - Architecture of a Cobot - Safety in Industrial Settings - Sensors in Cobots - Power Consumption and Optimization - Zonal Compute Architecture - AI Models for Task Planning - Reasoning and Human Interaction - Simulation to Real-World Deployment - Multi-Robot Coordination - Technological Breakthroughs in Robotics

Paul loves to talk about Bitcoin, BCash and cars. His wife works for CNBC and as marketing manager has control over certain Twitter accounts. So what happens when Someone who is executive director of the Bitcoin Cash fund, takes over control of @CNBCFastMoney twitter account?

The earth has experienced 5 mass extinctions where life was sustained under the oceans. Isn’t that a better bet than the moon or Mars if we one day need to take refuge?

Why are there no tech Laureates? I'd vote for Elon.

Jony Ive on what Steve Jobs taught him about focus:

Building Detection is one click away. We designed GIS solutions to be like an e-commerce experience: app.skyfi.com/analytics/buil…

Hardtech founders be like “i’m living the dream, so blessed” and then proceed to post “product” pics that are indistinguishable from high school level hobby engineering

Marco Rubio: "If we stay on the road we are on right now - in less than 10 years, virtually everything that matters to us in life will depend on whether China allows us to have it or not." "Everything from blood pressure medicine to what movies we get to watch, and everything in between. They dominate the critical mineral industry. Even those who want more EVs - those batteries depend on China." "If we don't change course - we will live in a world where much of what matters on a daily basis, from our security to our health - will be dependent on whether the Chinese allow us to have it or not."🌎

I tried to write about it, tricky because it’s very much an apprentice field. I have suspicions that that’s intentional actually. While not the technical paper I’d write (the field changes a lot even yearly), I did publish a few principles about how to “ship” HW. A live database of tech capabilities would be AMAZING for new people in the field but I fear there’s very little incentive alignment in industry because time to ship is so competitive and sometimes existential to whether you sell a lot of product. FWIW: review.firstround.com/six-st…

Yeah, unfortunately vision prompting has been a tough nut to crack. We've found it's very challenging to improve Claude's actual "vision" through just text prompts, but we can of course improve its reasoning and thought process once it extracts info from an image. In general, I think vision is still in its early days, although 3.5 Sonnet is noticeably better than older models.

Back from a 4 day retreat in the mountains. I was a bit nervous that it would be very "Silicon Valley", but it was a really wonderful trip. Some things that surprised me:

InfraBridge Pours Millions Into Remote Forklift, Yard Truck Tech Company Phantom Auto forbes.com/sites/edgarsten/2… via @forbes @PhantomAuto_ @WeAreConGlobal #technology #logistics

"Oh we don't want much, just a 77% pay increase and a contractual ban on all automation, forever, at all US ports." The Longshormen's Union is a vampire squid on our economy, and their pending strike will absolutely increase the cost of everything from cars to asparagus: "150,000 pounds of asparagus will fly in from Peru that would usually arrive by ocean, to avoid the risk of the vegetables getting stuck at sea and rotting. Air freight is 4X more expensive, and will add about 50 cents a pound to the cost of asparagus." US ports are already about HALF as efficient as leading international ports, because the Longshoremen have been blocking efforts to implement automation for years. The cost of that inefficiency is passed along to consumers every day. And the union is now striking to make it even worse. This is rent seeking of the worst kind, a regressive tax on low income consumers (who spend the highest portion of their earnings on goods impacted by these costs), and we should absolutely not tolerate it.

I’ve seen the drafts of the deal before it went public It has shifted from a cash grab - “pay us $500 billion for past and 200% repayment on future aid” - to joint investment and co-ownership But no security guarantees Ukraine should sign, but It is getting screwed 1/

I am shocked that the company that invented the EV, but quit when it got hard and missed out on hundreds of billions of revenue and market cap, also gave up on self-driving cars.