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Guillermo Rauch is one of the most prolific coders of this generation. But he doesn't think of himself as a coder anymore. Coding, he says, is a specific skill that AI is becoming great at. Instead, he thinks the future of coding is more holistic, full-stack engineers who can ideate, design, and execute all together. Guillermo is the founder and CEO of Vercel, the creator of NextJS, and SocketIO. We spent an hour talking about the future of software development in an AI world—and the meta-skills that are essential for the coders of today to master—in order to use tomorrow's tools to their fullest extent. Here are a few takeaways: One of the most important keys to his success is taste—and developing taste is all about paying better attention to everything you experience day to day. He's great at recognizing bleeding-edge technologies with extremely practical applications but that have bad user experiences. If you can learn to recognize those and build with them, you might build the next NextJs or SocketIO. He's already seeing enterprises use Vercel's AI coding copilot v0 to replace all of their programming—they just send v0 demos back and forth to iterate on new prototypes. Why prototype cultures are becoming common in AI—and the benefits of written cultures like Amazon vs. prototype cultures like Apple for different kinds of companies. For developers building frameworks, always put the product first; a framework in isolation without a “customer zero” is never going to be a good tool. The theory of “recursive founder mode”—if you want to build a scalable business, you have to scale yourself by creating an atmosphere that nurtures talent and ambition. AI tools are shifting software toward consumption-based billing models, making us capital allocators who decide how much compute the AI consumes. The future of AI is agents with the taste, knowledge, and tools to perform specialized tasks. If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It's usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:33 How to spot trends early: 00:03:18 Why you should be your own customer: 00:07:34 How to create an ecosystem of talent and ambition: 00:14:55 Why Guillermo doesn't identify as a coder: 00:17:29 AI is gearing us toward an allocation economy: 00:20:50 How Vercel's copilot compares with other coding agents: 00:28:34 Guillermo's advice on having better taste: 00:40:35 The future of AI agents is specialized: 00:42:46 How AI startups can compete with big tech: 00:47:50 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Guillermo Rauch: @rauchg Vercel: https://vercel.com/ Our episode with Nabeel Hyatt: "
The Twenty Minute VC: Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Nabeel Hyatt is a General Partner @ Spark Capital, one of the leading firms of the last decade with portfolio companies including Twitter, Anthropic, Coinbase, Affirm, Discord, Deel and more. In Todays Show with Nabeel Hyatt We Discuss: 1. The Rules of Investing: What have been Nabeel's biggest lessons on price sensitivity? When did he not pay up and with the benefit of hindsight, wish he had of paid up? How important is ownership to Nabeel and Spark? How does Nabeel think about reserve investing and doubling down? Why does Nabeel not engage in secondary markets? How does Nabeel think about when is the right time to sell? Why does Nabeel think the majority of market sizing is total BS? 2. The Venture Landscape: Run by Principles and Broken: Why does Nabeel believe this generation of AI investing will require a different mindset to the one that made VCs successful over the last decade? Why does Nabeel believe that venture is currently run by principals and associates? Why is that such a problem? Why does Nabeel believe that the majority of venture firms today are dead but do not know it yet? What does Nabeel believe happens to the mega multi-stage firms who have raised billions and billions? 3. How to Win the VC Game in a World of AI: Infrastructure, models, apps: where does Nabeel believe the most value will accrue in the next decade of AI investing? What does Nabeel mean when he says there are three categories of AI apps today? Where does Nabeel believe the most valuable will be built? Does Nabeel believe Deepseek hurt or helped the future for Anthropic? How could Anthropic be a $100BN company from this point? What does no one see about the next 10 years of AI that everyone should see?
Nabeel Hyatt is looking for the “Japanese toilets” of AI—products that delight users in unexpected ways. As a partner at Spark Capital, that investment philosophy has paid off. Despite making only 1-2 investments a year, he's picked some of the biggest winners in AI so far: Descript, Cruise, and Granola. We spent an hour unpacking: How much “leash” top products give to AI agents—and why that matters How he spots remarkable AI products Why “sensitivity” is one of the most important traits of top founders The huge opportunities for AI products to help users explore new “possibility spaces” How Nabeel is actually using AI tools like ChatGPT, Claude, and AI code editor Windsurf in his life If you found this episode interesting, please like, subscribe, comment, and share! Want even more? Sign up for Every to unlock our ultimate guide to prompting ChatGPT here: https://every.ck.page/ultimate-guide-to-prompting-chatgpt. It's usually only for paying subscribers, but you can get it here for free. To hear more from Dan Shipper: Subscribe to Every: https://every.to/subscribe Follow him on X: https://twitter.com/danshipper Timestamps: Introduction: 00:01:32 Why Nabeel doesn't invest in more than two companies per year: 00:01:50 Why the words you use to describe your business matter: 00:06:49 What a product with soul looks like: 00:13:45 Patterns in the remarkable founders Nabeel has invested in: 00:16:48 How Nabeel evaluates popular coding agents: 00:24:12 AI has broadened the horizons of what Nabeel can do: 00:32:29 How funding models are changing as AI makes it cheaper to build software: 00:36:28 Nabeel's framework for when to trust an LLM: 00:45:43 Guide AI to provide context (and not just quick answers): 00:55:39 Links to resources mentioned in the episode: Nabeel Hyatt: @nabeel, https://nabeelhyatt.com/ Spark Capital: https://www.sparkcapital.com/ The piece Chris Pedregal wrote for Every: How to Build a Truly Useful AI Product Chris Pedregal on AI & I:
This week, Nabeel Hyatt (GP at Spark Capital) joins us to discuss: Our version of a 2023 Wrapped: Tech Edition. Nabeel reflects on what he looks for in founders to bet on. Next, we perform a growth model breakdown on Midjouney's unconventional success. (Starts at 39:12) Finally, we discuss the viral SEO Heist and its implications for Google's future. (Starts at 1:24:50) For a full episode summary, exclusive Youtube clips, and more, please join our newsletter at UnsolicitedFeedback.co!
We're re-releasing some of the best episodes from the podcast this summer.Sarah Tavel (@sarahtavel), partner at Benchmark, and Nabeel Hyatt (@nabeel), partner at Spark Capital, joined Erik on this episode.They discussed:- Why they love investing in marketplaces and the evolution of marketplaces over the last decade.- Why the wave of Uber For X startups didn't take off.- How they evaluate marketplaces, and why founders get confused about “which race they're running” when creating a marketplace startup.- Where they're excited about seeing more marketplaces and which spaces they advise founders to avoid.- The impact of SoftBank and their analysis of the current crop of public marketplace companies.- Common mistakes they see founders making in marketplace startups.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.
Nabeel Hyatt (@nabeel), investor at Spark Capital, joins Erik on this episode. It was recorded as part of an On Deck Angels event. They discuss:- His path to becoming an investor.- Why he likens being a VC to being a middle manager at a large conglomerate company.- How he thinks about frameworks for investing.- How to quickly get up to speed on spaces that are new to you as an investor.- Why there are so few hardware companies at scale and why he’s investing in the space.- Why he’s long on online communities.- Why gaming pioneers so many new business models.- Thoughts on his anti-portfolio.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at www.villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Want to get updates from us? Subscribe to get a peek inside the Village. We’ll send you reading recommendations, exclusive event invites, and commentary on the latest happenings in Silicon Valley. www.villageglobal.vc/signup
Sarah Tavel (@sarahtavel), partner at Benchmark, and Nabeel Hyatt (@nabeel), partner at Spark Capital, join Erik on this episode.They discuss:- Why they love investing in marketplaces and the evolution of marketplaces over the last decade.- Why the wave of Uber For X startups didn’t take off.- How they evaluate marketplaces, and why founders get confused about “which race they’re running” when creating a marketplace startup.- Where they’re excited about seeing more marketplaces and which spaces they advise founders to avoid.- The impact of SoftBank and their analysis of the current crop of public marketplace companies.- Common mistakes they see founders making in marketplace startups.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.
Sarah Tavel (@sarahtavel), partner at Benchmark, and Nabeel Hyatt (@nabeel), partner at Spark Capital, join Erik on this episode.They discuss:- Why they love investing in marketplaces and the evolution of marketplaces over the last decade.- Why the wave of Uber For X startups didn’t take off.- How they evaluate marketplaces, and why founders get confused about “which race they’re running” when creating a marketplace startup.- Where they’re excited about seeing more marketplaces and which spaces they advise founders to avoid.- The impact of SoftBank and their analysis of the current crop of public marketplace companies.- Common mistakes they see founders making in marketplace startups.Thanks for listening — if you like what you hear, please review us on your favorite podcast platform. Check us out on the web at villageglobal.vc or get in touch with us on Twitter @villageglobal.Venture Stories is brought to you by Village Global, is hosted by co-founder and partner, Erik Torenberg and is produced by Brett Bolkowy.
The Daily Marketer is a podcast about pushing through the noise, swimming through the water, and breaking through the surface. Marketing is about compounding breakthroughs; not about customers, but about human nature & what gets us to make a move. We recently mentioned the most vital marketing metrics to track, but one in particular, DAU/MAU, should be given some serious TLC. Do the same people come visit your app or e-commerce site daily? Once a month? The answer could save your startup. Show Notes a16z Podcast on "The Basics of Growth (Part 1)": https://a16z.com/2018/08/08/growth-user-acquisition/ Nabeel Hyatt on DAU/MAU: https://techcrunch.com/2009/10/29/how-to-measure-the-true-stickiness-and-success-of-a-facebook-app/ Episode in blog format: https://jakubkubicka.com/dau-mau/
A podcast by Bijan Sabet and Nabeel Hyatt, partners at Spark Capital. Recorded: December 13, 2017: Show summary: Bitcoin Frenzy, Tech company morality, the iMac Pro, and startup hard decisions
The Twenty Minute VC: Venture Capital | Startup Funding | The Pitch
Nabeel Hyatt is a venture partner at Spark Capital where he invests in entrepreneurs using that rare combination of design and technology to transform markets. He is currently on the board of Spark Capital’s investments in Cruise (acquired by General Motors), Fig, Harmonix, Postmates, Proletariat, and Thalmic Labs. Nabeel was previously cofounder and CEO of Conduit Labs, which was sold to Zynga in 2010, where he then became General Manager up through the IPO. Prior to that he was variously cofounder, head of product, and CEO at a variety of hardware and software companies including MIT Media Lab spin-out Ambient Devices, Teamtalk (BSkyB), and Interphase. In Today’s Episode You Will Learn: 1.) How did Nabeel make his way into the world of VC? 2.) What are the biggest lessons Nabeel can apply from his time in the trenches to being a VC at Spark? How has his investment strategy and decision making changed over time? 3.) What were the biggest takeaways for Nabeel as an observer and investor in Oculus? 4.) What is the story behind Spark's investment in Cruise (recently acquired by GM)? How did Nabeel come to meet Kyle and the team? What was the product like? How did it evolve? 5.) What does Cruise’s acquisition mean for the autonomous car industry? What are the inherent challenges for the industry as a whole? How will they be overcome and what timeline are you placing on the industry to come into fruition? Items Mentioned In Today’s Episode: Nabeel’s Fave Blog: AVC Nabeel’s Most Recent Investment: Fig As always you can follow The Twenty Minute VC, Harry and Nabeel on Twitter here! If you would like to see a more colourful side to Harry with many a mojito session, you can follow him on Instagram here! The Twenty Minute VC is brought to you by Leesa, the Warby Parker or TOMS shoes of the mattress industry. Lees have done away with the terrible mattress showroom buying experience by creating a luxury premium foam mattress that is order completely online and ships for free to your doorstep. The 10 inch mattress comes in all sizes and is engineered with 3 unique foam layers for a universal, adaptive feel, including 2 inches of memory foam and 2 inches of a really cool latex foam called Avena, design to keep you cool. All Leesa mattresses are 100% US or UK made and for every 10 mattresses they sell, they donate one to a shelter. Go to Leesa.com/VC and enter the promo code VC75 to get $75 off!
A podcast by Bijan Sabet and Nabeel Hyatt, partners at Spark Capital. In todays show, we were joined by special guest and our friend, Fred Wilson. Notes: Show notes: -questions from Twitter, including how Fred started investing in social media, & YC's recent move to recommend exercising options from 90 days to 10 years -Fred's post, "The New Entertainment Bundlers", avc.com/2016/03/the-new-entertainment-bundlers/ -Chris Dixon's, "What's Next In Computing?", cdixon/what-s-next-in-computing-e54b870b80cc#.fyzb9ebw7">medium.com/@cdixon/what-s-next…870b80cc#.fyzb9ebw7 -Why haven't we seen a new breakout consumer app -AI -Steph Curry vs Michael Jordan