This YC Startup Exposes the AI Secrets the Top 1% Don’t Share
The Lobster Talks Podcast by Lobster Capital
Outro
Hosts wrap up, thank Dexter, and invite listeners to subscribe and follow future episodes and resources.
AI won’t live in chat. The future is headless agents doing real work — and calling humans only when it matters. Dexter Horthy, cofounder of HumanLayer, explains how agent-driven software actually ships.
In this fast, tactical deep-dive, we unpack HumanLayer’s origin story (from failed data tools to paid customers in a week), why frameworks lag real production apps, and the workflow that lets AI agents ship in complex codebases. We cover research-plan-implement loops, context engineering, team process, and how “specs become the new code.”
You’ll learn
- How HumanLayer emerged from a SQL “janitor” agent that needed human approvals
- The YC grind as a solo founder and closing first revenue in a week
- Why horizontal AI dev tools are hard — and how top 1% teams actually build
- Context engineering 101: research → plan → implement, and why it beats vibe coding
- How to review plans, not code, to scale quality across a team
Where headless agents win first — and why culture, not models, is the bottleneck.
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Cold Open
00:21 Welcome to Lobster Talks
00:47 Guest Introduction and Background
01:12 Early Startup Journey
01:35 Building the AI Agent
02:18 Challenges and Pivots
03:52 Solo Founder Experience
05:28 The Importance of Data Tools
11:20 YC Experience and Revenue
13:59 Building for the 1% vs. 99%
23:50 Exploring New Ideas
25:18 Exploring Cloud Code SDK
25:34 Building Experiments with Claude
26:05 Challenges and Learnings
26:49 Insights from AI Engineering Talks
28:22 The Future of Coding with AI
30:22 Context Engineering and Workflow
32:19 Product Development and Customization
38:22 Scaling AI in Teams
48:10 Exciting Future Prospects
50:42 Conclusion and Farewell
📌 Watch now and subscribe for more smart, fast, founder-first interviews.
Show Notes & Resources:
• 14min Youtube video on wielding coding agents: https://hlyr.dev/ace
• Blog post version - https://github.com/humanlayer/advanced-context-engineering-for-coding-agents/blob/main/ace-fca.md
• Sign up for codelayer beta: https://humanlayer.dev/code
🎧 Listen on the go:
Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/1u1JyRKH8JYFjhBkvTUOAP
Apple: https://apple.co/4cZ8RMm
My other YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/@GJarrosson
The AI-powered Podcast Player
