Crossing the Valley Ep. 65: Pryzm's Quest to Help DOW Pass an Audit
Dec 17, 2025
Nick LaRovere, CEO of Pryzm and former Palantir engineer, discusses transforming government procurement with innovative technology. He shares insights on the company's evolution from basic document processing to dynamic mapping tools that visualize relationships and influences. Nick reflects on early lessons of humility in customer engagement and the significance of the Orion constellations feature for targeted analyses. He also highlights upcoming growth plans, optimism for bipartisan acquisition reform, and the importance of staying mission-focused to drive federal innovation.
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Origin Story: Kill PDFs And Excel
- Nick LaRovere and co-founders began Prism to eliminate PDFs and Excel spreadsheets after seeing procurement pain points while at Palantir and Lockheed Martin.
- They built OCR and document pipelines as the initial product to extract structured data from long government documents.
Ship Early And Partner With Customers
- Get in front of customers early and treat them as partners when building for government markets.
- Iterate with customer feedback so requirements favor your product by the time an RFP appears.
Hustling To Early Commercial Traction
- Prism pivoted to commercial sales because government sales cycles were long and they needed revenue quickly.
- The founders cold-emailed, attended conferences weekly, and landed small early customers to build traction.
