Startup Europe — The Sifted Podcast The days of making easy money from coding are over, says former Stripe UK CTO turned founder Emma Burrows
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Jul 10, 2025 Emma Burrows, cofounder and CTO of Portia AI, was previously the UK CTO at Stripe. She discusses the rise of AI agents and their potential to reshape the workforce, warning about risks to junior engineering roles. Burrows reflects on her transition from corporate life to founding a startup and the significance of female representation in tech. She also critiques hustle culture and its negative impacts on well-being, while sharing insights on angel investing and the importance of regulation in fostering innovation in AI.
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Portia AI's Unique Security Focus
- The key gap Portia AI addresses is the secure connection and authorization layer for AI agents accessing software.
- This layer must respect privacy and security while enabling large language model integration.
Complexity of AI Agent Reliability
- AI agents require a new approach due to reliance on probabilistic large language models.
- The challenge is making agents production ready with reliable, secure deployment unlike typical software.
Automated Refund Agent Example
- Portia offers an AI agent that automates refund processing using company policy, customer data, and payment systems.
- The agent reads emails, assesses policy compliance, processes refunds, and responds to customers automatically.