Model commoditization and API economics

Immad Akhund and Raj Suri reunite for a one-on-one conversation covering the biggest tech shifts of 2025, from Mercury's public launch of Personal Banking to the quieting of AGI doom discussions. This wide-ranging episode explores why self-driving cars may matter more than AGI, how vibe coding is changing software development, and the strategic decisions founders make when everyone else disagrees.

What you'll learn:

Why Immad launched Mercury Personal despite investor and team skepticism—and the founder lesson about following conviction

How Mercury Personal brings business-grade financial controls to personal banking (collaboration features, automatic categorization, 3.5% savings rates)

The existential threat facing OpenAI and Anthropic as AI models commoditize and Google leverages distribution advantages

Raj's vibe coding experiment: Building a full-stack app with Postgres backend using just prompts (and why Replit won)

Why Tribe is rejecting the $30/user ad model to build a premium, ad-free group chat platform

The retention metrics showing Tribe's product-market fit (20-40% six-month retention with minimal marketing)

How AI hype shifted from AGI doom conversations to practical commercial applications in 2025

Why self-driving technology (Waymo, Tesla FSD) represents a more immediate transformation than AGI

The best and worst of 2025: renewed tech energy vs. immigration scapegoating and Doge's failure to deliver government efficiency

Why supply constraints (chips, power) signal AI demand is real, not a bubble

In this episode, we cover:

(00:00) AGI conversations cooling down in 2025

(01:50) Mercury Personal launch after year-long waitlist

(02:42) Business-grade controls for personal banking

(04:30) 3.5% savings rates and Treasury/Invest products

(06:15) Following founder conviction despite opposition

(07:33) Balancing product shipping with polish

(08:26) OpenAI's Code Red and focus strategy

(09:23) Google's distribution advantage vs. OpenAI

(10:33) The API commoditization threat to Anthropic

(12:34) Why ad economics dominate the internet

(14:58) Facebook's $30/user vs. subscription models

(17:22) Tribe's progress: retention, AI features, monetization plans

(21:42) Vibe coding experiment: Replit vs. Lovable vs. Wix

(26:31) Why Replit might own the vibe coding market

(28:05) Enterprise use cases for AI-generated apps

(33:26) 2025's best: renewed tech energy and deregulation

(34:51) 2025's worst: immigration scapegoating and Doge's failure

(40:48) Self-driving breakthrough: Waymo and Tesla FSD

(42:31) Why AGI talk has quieted down

(43:43) Supply constraints proving AI demand is real