[Un]Churned – The No. 1 Podcast for Customer Retention The Ex-Google PM Who Spent 14+ Years Building AI Agents ft. Jacob Bank (Relay.app)
Oct 29, 2025
Jacob Bank, the founder and CEO of Relay.app and a former Google product leader, dives deep into the world of AI agents. With over 14 years of experience, he discusses how agents will soon handle nearly all tasks on computers. Jacob distinguishes between workflows and agents, stressing the importance of context over complex prompts. He highlights why small businesses adopt AI faster than larger enterprises and predicts that everyone will need to become an agent manager, focusing on training and supervising these digital teammates.
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Democratizing Agent Building
- Relay.app enables non-engineers to build AI-powered workflows and agents without coding.
- The platform targets semi-technical roles and real-world SMBs to democratize agent use.
From Stanford Research To Google
- Jacob dropped out of his PhD to start Timeful, an AI calendar assistant that automated scheduling priorities.
- Timeful was acquired by Google and Jacob later led Gmail and Calendar product teams there.
Long Early Struggle Before AI Tipping Point
- Relay.app took two and a half years to land its first paying customer, making early days brutal.
- The arrival of ChatGPT in 2022 dramatically accelerated customer readiness and product adoption.