Tech Today with Eric Tarczynski

Today, Kyle Harrison, general partner at Contrary, joins the podcast to talk about the early-stage venture bear market and why it’s being masked by the AI hype cycle. While valuations for seed and Series A rounds have remained relatively stable, the number of rounds has plummeted, and Kyle argues that the true state of venture is far worse than it appears.Next, the discussion turns to why capital destruction is overdue, how AI has warped investor incentives, and why many great companies are struggling to get attention despite solid fundamentals. Kyle and Eric also discuss the graduation rate from seed to Series A, the role of liquidity at later stages, and how the value chain of capital shapes what gets funded.Finally, the episode covered Klarna’s pivot back to human support, Figma’s new “vibe-coding” AI feature, Waymo’s safety study results, OpenAI’s corporate governance reversal, and Fidji Simo’s appointment as head of applications at OpenAI.

A few years ago, all eyes were on Big Tech when it came to startup acquisitions. But with regulatory pressure mounting, a new cohort of acquirers has emerged: mid-sized, AI-native companies like Databricks, Datadog, and OpenAI.In this episode, Alex Konrad of Upstarts Media joins Eric to break down the new wave of $100M–$1B deals — from Databricks’ pending $1B acquisition of Neon to Datadog’s Eppo pickup and OpenAI’s pursuit of Windsurf. They unpack the strategic motives behind these deals, what they signal about the current state of the market, and why companies that once would've been IPO-bound are now attractive targets.We also covered Stripe’s new AI foundation model, Apple moving away from Google search, Amazon’s new touch-sensitive robot, and OpenAI’s quiet meetings with the FDA.

Jacob Kimmel, co-founder and President of NewLimit, joins us to talk about the company’s newly announced $130 million Series B and its ambitious plan to develop reprogramming-based medicines that can reverse cellular aging.We explore how NewLimit’s therapies use mRNA to deliver transcription factors that restore liver cells to a younger state, why the company is targeting alcohol-related liver disease first, and how advances in single-cell sequencing and AI made this work possible. Jacob also shares how NewLimit is expanding into the immune and endothelial systems—and what that could mean for extending human healthspan.We also covered OpenAI’s acquisition of Windsurf, DoorDash’s Deliveroo and SevenRooms deals, Legora’s new raise in legal AI, and Uber’s $700M push into Turkey’s delivery market.

Cloud seeding isn’t new, but Rainmaker is giving it a second life. On today’s episode, Augustus Doricko, founder and CEO of Rainmaker, joins Eric to explain how his company uses drones, radar, and remote sensing to make it rain on command. Augustus outlines how Rainmaker's technology solves the attribution problem that has long haunted cloud seeding, and why their $25M Series A marks the beginning of a new infrastructure layer for the American West. We also discuss the company’s long-term ambition: building programmable weather systems to green deserts, stabilize water supply for agriculture and industry, and compete with China's state-run weather engineering programs.Finally, we covered 11x’s CEO transition, OpenAI’s decision to remain under nonprofit control, Databricks’ possible $1B acquisition of Neon, and Anduril’s newest buy and portable edge computing system.

Apple just got slammed by a federal judge for willfully violating an injunction in its antitrust fight with Epic Games. Patrick McGee, longtime Apple reporter at the Financial Times and author of the upcoming book Apple in China, joins to unpack how the case unfolded, why Epic’s move was both strategic and symbolic, and what this moment means for the future of the App Store.We zoom out to discuss Apple’s broader challenges—from its tightening entanglement with China to the slow progress in decoupling its supply chain. Patrick explains why Apple may be far more reliant on China than it admits, and why India isn’t a simple replacement. Plus, a preview of what’s to come when his book releases on May 13.We also covered Apple’s AI coding partnership with Anthropic, EToro’s IPO timing, Fivetran acquiring Census, and Tim Cook’s comments on Trump’s new tariffs.

Most AI apps still feel clunky, generic, or oddly off-tone. Pete Koomen thinks he knows why — and he’s calling it the “horseless carriage” problem. Just like early cars mimicked carriages, today’s AI products too often copy outdated software models instead of rethinking from first principles.Pete, a General Partner at Y Combinator and co-founder of Optimizely, joins us to break down his viral essay AI Horseless Carriages. We talk about why editable system prompts are critical, how app design is holding AI back, and why user-controlled agents could unlock far more powerful workflows than today’s one-size-fits-all experiences.We also covered WhatsApp’s 3B user milestone, Mach Industries’ new funding round, a major App Store ruling against Apple, and Anthropic’s Claude integrations.

Rick Song, co-founder and CEO of Persona, joins us after announcing the company’s $200 million Series D. In this episode, Rick breaks down what it means to build the verified identity layer of the internet — not just verifying who someone is, but verifying who an AI agent is acting on behalf of, and what their intent is.We explore how identity has evolved from static credentials to something continuous and contextual, how AI is raising the stakes for online trust, and why Rick believes the future of identity must be privacy-preserving and user-controlled. He also shares how Persona scaled from an idea at Square and Dropbox to powering hundreds of millions of verifications per year.We also covered Meta’s trillion-dollar AI forecast, Anthropic’s proposed changes to chip export rules, Microsoft’s capacity warning, and Glean’s new funding round at a $7 billion valuation.

Sid Malladi, co-founder and CEO of Nuvo, joins us on the day of the company’s public launch to talk about the future of B2B trade infrastructure. Backed by $45M from Sequoia, Founders Fund, and Spark, Nuvo aims to replace the outdated pen-and-paper systems that still dominate the $11 trillion U.S. trade economy.Sid explains why the problem isn’t just software—it’s a lack of shared infrastructure across businesses. He walks us through the scaling challenges, the platform Nuvo is building, and why he compares Nuvo’s roadmap to early Facebook: first connect businesses, then build layers of coordination like payments, underwriting, and automation on top.We also covered supply chain resilience, vendor adaptation in the face of tariffs, and how Nuvo’s viral trade graph might one day power millions of relationships between buyers and sellers.

In today’s episode, Jon Gegenheimer, Global Co-Head of Tech M&A at Jefferies, joins us to break down how the Trump administration’s new tariffs have frozen the tech M&A market almost overnight. We dive into why the year started with optimism, how quickly the landscape shifted in April, and why buyers and sellers are now stuck in a tense waiting game.Jon also shares his advice for founders and boards navigating this uncertainty—and why companies need to be prepared to move fast if the market reopens later this year.We also covered Neuralink’s latest breakthrough, OpenAI’s new push into shopping and search, Huawei’s plan to compete with Nvidia, and Hugging Face’s robotics expansion.

Today, Kyle Harrison, general partner at Contrary, sits down with Sean Hunt, co-founder and CTO of Solugen, to talk about how the company is reinventing chemical manufacturing from first principles. Sean explains why traditional chemical supply chains are fragile and carbon-intensive — and how Solugen’s modular, carbon-negative Bioforge model could reshape industrial production.We discuss the dynamics driving demand for domestic chemicals, how tariffs are creating new opportunities, why reusing abandoned infrastructure is critical for scaling manufacturing, and how Solugen thinks about licensing its technology in the future.We also covered Discord’s CEO transition, Flow’s latest funding round, Elon Musk’s $20 billion xAI fundraising talks, and Apple’s push to manufacture more iPhones in India.