Tech Today with Eric Tarczynski

Replit founding engineer Gian Segato joins us to talk about his viral new essay, Agency Is Eating the World, and the shift toward high-agency individuals building and scaling software alone. He explains why today’s AI “agents” aren’t truly agentic, why taste is downstream of iteration, and how generalists are now empowered to compete with specialists across industries.We also discuss the end of credentialism, how AI collapses years of specialization into days of effort, and why this is only the beginning of a larger economic shift — one that stretches from barbershops writing code to billion-dollar solo startups.We also covered ChatGPT Search's rapid EU growth and looming regulatory status, YC-backed Theseus and its GPS-free drone tech for Special Operations, OpenAI’s massive spend on making ChatGPT more polite, and Slate Auto’s $25K EV that can change shape ahead of its public reveal.

Bhavin Shah, founder and CEO of Moveworks, joins us after announcing the company’s acquisition by ServiceNow last month. Moveworks was one of the first enterprise AI startups to bet on conversational interfaces and AI agents — years before ChatGPT made that idea mainstream. In this episode, Bhavin walks us through the origin story, how they made the gutsy call to rewrite their entire architecture around agentic reasoning, and how that decision set the stage for their nearly $3 billion exit.We also talk about what it really takes to build AI that works in the enterprise: connectors, context windows, multilingual models, and the hard truth of procurement cycles. Bhavin shares lessons from navigating two black swan events — COVID and the generative AI boom — and why conviction, speed, and creative destruction were key to Moveworks’ success.We also covered Bill Gates’ prediction that AI will replace doctors and teachers, Strava’s acquisition of AI running coach Runna, OpenAI’s potential $3 billion acquisition of Windsurf (formerly Codeium), and Figma’s confidential IPO filing.

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Nicholas Harris, CEO and co-founder of Lightmatter, joins us to talk about the company's latest product launches: the Passage M1000 and the L200, two breakthroughs in photonic interconnect technology that could reshape how we scale AI infrastructure.We also discussed the limits of traditional electrical interconnects, why data movement — not compute — is the real bottleneck in AI training, and how Lightmatter is building a full-stack photonics platform for the next era of massive, energy-intensive AI models.Finally, we discussed Base Power’s $200 million Series B to build a distributed residential battery network, OpenAI’s launch of a new benchmarking program following controversy around Meta’s Llama 4, Andreessen Horowitz’s plans to raise a $20 billion growth-stage AI fund, and Anthropic’s launch of a new $200/month “Max” subscription tier for power users.

Today, John Arnold—philanthropist and co-chair of Arnold Ventures—joins us to break down the real barriers facing next-gen nuclear energy. In a space filled with big promises and long timelines, John makes the case for why fusion and small modular reactors (SMRs) won't succeed without serious government intervention.We talked about: • Why non-binding agreements in nuclear can be misleading• The funding “valley of death” facing fusion startups• How a milestone-based public-private model — modeled on NASA’s COTS program — could unlock progressWe also covered OpenAI’s updated release roadmap for o3 and GPT-5, the extended deadline for a TikTok sale, new agentic capabilities in Microsoft Copilot, and Midjourney’s first new image model in nearly a year.

On Monday March 31, Runway, a generative video startup, launhced its most advanced AI video generation model to date, Gen-4. Today, Runway co-founder and CEO Cristóbal Valenzuela joins us to talk about the Gen-4 release, the evolution of Runways product over time, the future of video generation and storytelling, and how Runway is building an “infinite dream machine that can do whatever you want.”We also cover OpenAI’s new $40 billion fundraise, Amazon’s new AI agent, a16z’s talks to invest in TikTok, and Circle’s upcoming IPO. 

On Wednesday, former Forbes senior editor Alex Konrad launched a new tech media company covering startups. Today, Alex joins us to talk about his new company. We covered a lot of ground including why media coverage of startup stories is demand, whether the narrative of media vs. tech being adversarial is accurate, how Alex wants Upstarts to serve as a bridge to the startup world, and why the energy in the startup ecosystem from AI makes it a uniquely interesting time to be in startups right now. We also covered Mercury’s $300 million Series C, Terrestrial Energy’s SPAC, Rivian’s new micromobility company, and Grok’s integration with Telegram. 

On Tuesday, Emergence Capital announced it had raised a $1 billion Fund VII. Today, Emergence Capital general partner Jake Saper joins the podcast to talk about Emergence’s focus on B2B software and plans for the future. He also describes his point of view on how the venture industry has evolved and why it’s both the scariest and most exciting time to be in VC. Finally, we talk about what will happen to SaaS post-AI and why Jake thinks people will continue to buy software.Finally, we cover the resurgence of the IPO market with StubHub and eToro recently filing to go public. We also covered Google’s new Gemini 2.5 model and OpenAI’s launch of image generation in ChatGPT.

On March 6, President Trump signed an executive order establishing both a strategic bitcoin reserve and digital asset stockpile, which the administration says is meant to position “the United States asa. leader among nations in government digital asset strategy.” Today, Anthony Pompliano, founder & CEO of Professional Capital Management, joins us to unpack the significance of this move, discussing the geopolitical game theory behind Bitcoin adoption, how tech and politics are increasingly intertwined, and why governments are now competing for digital assets. He also explores potential methods for the US to expand its Bitcoin holdings, the shifting attitude toward crypto in Washington, and what all this might mean going forward. Finally, we discuss Dario Amodei’s warning about Chinese IP theft, OpenAI’s push to ban DeepSeek from the US and its new creative writing model, and the upcoming rollout of Community Notes on Meta.

This week, voice AI startup Cartesia raised a $64 million Series A at an undisclosed valuation, led by Kleiner Perkins.Today, Cartesia CEO Karan Goel joins us to talk about the vision behind Cartesia’s voice products. Karan also spoke about the origins of Cartesia, the importance of latency, the unrealized potential of voice AI and why it will be the way that we interface with the robots of tomorrow, and how Cartesia hopes to contribute to the next big step in AI by building a AI brain that can interface more directly with the world.Lastly, we covered Hinge Health’s upcoming IPO, Dario Amodei’s predictions about AI coding, Niantic’s sale of its game division, and cybersecurity startup Pantera’s $60 million Series D.