“When I was ten or twelve, I thought wouldn't it be great if I found myself participating in the birth of a technology at that right time when that technology is being born. Drone technology for me is this. It is extremely challenging but fascinating to participate in the birth of a new industry.” While the delivery by drone of pizza to your high-rise window may still be far off, listen in while Andreas talks about the challenges that drone delivery is solving today. The episode covers how Matternet has been able to find its niche delivering time-critical medical products and how Matternet is thinking about expanding in the future.  Andreas also shares advice for entrepreneurs especially in learning how to build and scale a hardware startup.

“Someone who leads large teams needs to spend a material amount of time and energy to understand what the world of AI, machine learning and natural language processing mean because it’s a muscle you need to have…  If you are a student, you need to think about not only how AI helps you but how you influence where AI is going.” Join Spandana Bhattacharya and Javier Torres on Wharton Tech Toks as they talk to Sam Allen, EVP and Global Chief Operating Officer for Tableau at Salesforce. Sam is in his 8th year at Salesforce, with previous roles as EVP, COO for Salesforce.org, SVP, COO of Global Marketing and VP, Corporate Development and Head of M&A Integration. Listen in to learn more about Tableau’s mission, how Tableau is integrating AI, Sam’s views on responsible AI and his leadership advice for young professionals and entrepreneurs in tech. 

“We want clients to use our service in whatever way that’s best for you, your needs, your unique exposure to styling. In the longer term, we want to build a better way to shop that will change the retail paradigm and to become the blueprint for the industry to follow. ” Join Spandana Bhattacharya and Cynthia Zhou on Wharton Tech Toks as they talk to Janiece Okpobiri, Director of Product and Growth at Stitch Fix. At Stitch Fix, Janiece focuses on client onboarding and loyalty. Prior to Stitch Fix, Janiece was a senior PM on the Customer and Loyalty team at Abercrombie & Fitch and also held roles at Hilton. Listen in to learn more about Janiece’s product management philosophy, her perspective on how to build customer loyalty in retail, and her insights on how to build a successful career in product management.

“The worst thing you can do in your start-up journey is being paranoid that someone is going to steal your idea. Most startups will fail because of their own doing and not because someone stole their idea. For a startup it’s important to be out there, talk to people and learn what the applications are, and listen - if someone is using the product then probably they are going to be using it in a way you might not have anticipated or for reasons you might not have anticipated.” Join Spandana Bhattacharya and Javier Torres on Wharton Tech Toks as they talk to Roel Peeters, a serial entrepreneur with over 25 years of startup experience, who’s currently the co-founder and CEO of Roost. Roel is also a co-inventor of low-power Wi-Fi Personal Area Networks (PAN) technology and successfully created a worldwide standard known as “Wi-Fi Direct”. Listen in to learn more about Roel’s entrepreneurial journey, nuances of innovating for tech hardware versus software, and the VC landscape for tech hardware. Roel also shares practical tips on how to decide whether to become an entrepreneur, identify product-market fit, hire the first few employees, refine GTM strategy, and build and sell a successful tech start-up.

“We know that AI is going to be a key differentiator in products and services, you are seeing this already in everyday life whether it is autocomplete of a search or it is within Gmail where over time it learns the words that you use and auto completes your sentences. So AI is already all around us in our everyday lives. Our principle is we want to make sure that all of our customers and users have the best technology that we can possibly provide but also there is a level of trust and assurance and they feel very safe using products and services where AI is playing a larger part” Join Spandana Bhattacharya and Javier Torres on Wharton Tech Toks as they talk to Will Grannis, VP and CTO of Google Cloud. Prior to this, he was the founding CEO of Google Public Sector Cloud, and the founder and managing director of the Office of the CTO at Google. Listen in to learn more about his career, Google Cloud, Google Public Sector, and the future of AI

“During the highs of the 2020-2021 era, a lot of companies were encouraged to grow at any cost. We’ve always been much more oriented around trying to grow but making sure you are thinking about your profitability and building a sustainable business.” Join Spandana Bhattacharya and Javier Torres on Wharton Tech Toks as they talk to AJ Jangalapalli, Principal on the Discover team at Thoma Bravo. Listen in to learn more about Thoma Bravo’s investments in Mailgun and Greenphire, the recent tech market pullback, enterprise software industry and value creation initiatives.

Join Spandana Bhattacharya and Javier Torres as they talk to Melissa Nguyen, the Regional Director for Vendor Performance Management for Google Customer Solutions Americas. Melissa has also held various positions in startups and private equity across East and Southeast Asia. By now I am sure you have, at some point, been surprised by how well targeted ads know you. Maybe you searched for a product once (or maybe just thought about it) and now that product is everywhere. Join us while we talk to Melissa about the nexus of merchant empowerment and consumer protection. Having worked for Google in Southeast Asia and the United States, Melissa also dives deep into the difference between mobile users and the rise of “shoppertainment.” Melissa also shares her advice to entrepreneurs and how to innovate within startups versus within large companies.

Join Spandana Bhattacharya and Emma Robinson as they talk to Sandeep Lodha, an entrepreneur and the current CEO of Gaana, India's largest commercial music streaming service. Sandeep shares more about his entrepreneurial journey starting and scaling Weddingz.in, and learnings he brought over to Gaana. Considering expanding your musical horizons? Tune in to learn about the unique aspects of the Indian market, and how Gaana successfully competes with global streaming giants, while balancing growth with profitability.

Professor Gad Allon, an operations management expert, discusses scaling start-ups in challenging macro environments, the future of robotics in industries, the impact of the gig economy on employment, and the benefits of tapping into global talent.

Join Spandana Bhattacharya and Javier Torres as they talk to Cem Kansu, Vice President of Product Management at Duolingo. Cem is a fellow Whartonite, graduating with an MBA in 2016 who worked at Google prior to school. We’re sure by now you’ve seen their funny, ubiquitous green owl mascot (if not, check out Duo on TikTok), but Duolingo’s mission to develop the best education in the world and make it universally available is no joke. Boasting over 100 courses in 40 distinct languages, including High Valyrian and Klingon, the leading global edtech platform has been downloaded more than 500 million times and is the world’s most popular way to learn languages. Duolingo uses a data-driven, mobile-first approach to help the ~1.8 billion people in the world learning a foreign language do so in a new, efficient and convenient way. In this episode, we talk to Cem about monetization, Duolingo’s approach to experimentation, and their diversification to math learning. During Cem’s time, Duolingo went from $0 to $300 million in revenue, and we delve into what went into the decision to launch the subscription model. We also talk about the >500 A/B tests that are run each quarter and how these are used to drive growth. Lastly, we dive into the exciting launches of Duolingo’s new math and literacy apps, a crucial part of the company’s strategy to diversify.