Cascade

Nelson Chu is founder and CEO of Percent—a capital markets platform bringing transparency, liquidity, and standardisation to private credit.Nelson’s path started with a $1,000 “experiment fund” from his dad and early side hustles in design. After stints at Merrill Lynch and BlackRock, he left corporate life behind, built a consulting firm that helped raise over $1B, and used that momentum to launch Percent.What began as a short-duration credit platform with $500 minimums has evolved into the infrastructure behind over $1.5B in transactions—now positioning itself to power the future of a $25T market.We talked about Nelson’s journey from design to finance, how art influences his thinking, and what it takes to earn trust in a space that’s opaque by design. We also dug into Percent’s tech, regulatory approach, and long-term plan to bring public-market efficiency to private credit.Learn more about Nelson and his company below:linkedin.com/in/nelson-chu/percent.com/

Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz is the co-founder and CEO of Chapter—the most consumer-aligned Medicare guidance platform in the U.S., built to radically improve how seniors navigate retirement.He grew up hearing stories of his family’s journey across borders and generations—from Havana to Rochester, New York. That early exposure to resilience, migration, and responsibility shaped everything that came next—from studying at Cambridge to working at Palantir, where he learned how to navigate complex, regulated systems.Then came a turning point: watching his own family struggle to make sense of Medicare. That experience sparked a question that would drive the next chapter of his life—what if there were a better way to help people age with clarity, trust, and dignity?With Chapter, Cobi is building just that. Backed by industry leaders and growing 4x year-over-year, it’s the only Medicare brokerage invited to testify before Congress. And it’s setting a new standard—where incentives are aligned, ethics are built into the product, and seniors are treated not as leads, but as people.We talked about the broken state of Medicare, the hidden incentive structures shaping the industry, why most startups underestimate the power of distribution, and how Chapter is quietly laying the foundation for a more human future of retirement.Learn more about Cobi and his company below:linkedin.com/in/cobibgantz/askchapter.org/

Zac Townsend, the co-founder of Meanwhile—a life insurer where everything runs on Bitcoin: premiums, payouts, and reserves.Zac grew up watching his father work as a postal clerk by day and study for his BA, MA, and PhD by night. That early exposure to discipline, sacrifice, and long-term ambition shaped everything that came next—from studying finance not to join Wall Street, but to understand how the system worked, to working in civic tech under Cory Booker, where he was tasked with figuring out why people in West Newark didn’t have bank accounts.That question sparked a decade-long journey into financial infrastructure: first at Stripe, then co-founding Standard Treasury—an early banking-as-a-service startup later acquired by SVB.Now, with Meanwhile, Zac is going even deeper. Backed by Sam Altman and licensed in Bermuda, he’s building a Bitcoin-native life insurer designed to protect families in places where inflation makes traditional savings impossible—like Nigeria, Argentina, and even parts of the U.S.It’s simple: customers pay in Bitcoin, receive payouts in Bitcoin, and hold policies that grow in value—not lose it.We talked about his life as a founder and father, why traditional life insurance is broken, what most entrepreneurs get wrong about focus, and how Meanwhile could help lay the foundation for a Bitcoin-based financial system.Learn more and Zac and his company below:linkedin.com/in/zactownsend/meanwhile.bm/

Matthias Wagner is the founder of Flux, a collaborative, AI-native hardware design platform. But to call it that almost undersells it. What Flux is really doing is dragging hardware into the modern age—giving engineers the same creative velocity that software teams have enjoyed for decades.The status quo in hardware design? Obsolete. Legacy PCB tools that haven’t changed since the ‘80s. No collaboration. No browser access. Locked behind $20,000 licenses. Engineers emailing project files. No GitHub, no Figma, no AI.Matthias saw the absurdity firsthand.In 2019, he left Meta—where he’d worked on Moments, AR/VR, and Oculus Quest—and took a summer off to build electronics for Burning Man. That’s when it hit him: this shouldn’t be this hard. Designing a basic board was painful. Tools were ancient. Workflows felt frozen in time.So he started Flux.He didn’t just want to modernize PCB design—he wanted to rethink it from first principles. Make it multiplayer. Make it programmable. Build it for the web. And inject AI into the workflows engineers hate most: routing traces, sourcing components, catching errors. Today, Flux is used by thousands—from African farmers building smart irrigation systems to world-class engineering teams shipping real hardware.But here’s what makes Matthias different: he’s not chasing enterprise contracts. He’s not building for committees. He’s building for the individual. The 12-year-old with an idea. The kid who wants to build their own iPhone, not just an app. The founder in Nairobi who can’t afford $20K software but can learn online and make something real.His worldview is equal parts sci-fi optimism and Burning Man pragmatism. He talks about LEGOs as foundational infrastructure. He sees Star Wars as a blueprint for the future (where a kid in a desert can build a sentient robot). And he believes the next industrial revolution won’t be driven by centralized R&D—but by distributed, AI-augmented creativity.Flux isn’t just Figma-for-PCBs. It’s Figma and GitHub and OpenAI—for hardware.And he’s not stopping.The roadmap? Even more automation. Even less friction. A world where hardware engineers can work with AI agents just like software devs do—except they’re not just writing code, they’re creating physical things. Devices. Machines. Systems.And the philosophy underneath it all? Simple: the future is obvious if you’re willing to unlearn the past.This one stuck with me. Matthias isn’t loud. He’s not trying to be a hype machine. He’s just building—calmly, relentlessly—toward a future where anyone, anywhere, can create the physical tools they need to change their world.And honestly? He might actually pull it off.Learn more about Matthias and his company below:linkedin.com/in/matthias-wagner-5220b047/flux.ai/

Micha Benoliel's not just building a crypto network—he’s chasing a decades-long dream to make global connectivity free, sovereign, and owned by the people.His company, Nodle, turns every smartphone into a low-energy base station—quietly building one of the largest decentralized wireless networks on the planet. No cables. No towers. No telecom monopolies. Just phones, sensors, and incentives.But to really get Micha’s story, you have to go back.He’s been hacking communications for 20+ years. In 2004, he helped Skype connect to mobile and landlines before anyone thought that was possible. By 2012, he was building mesh networks at Burning Man to help people message each other without cell service. That prototype became FireChat—a peer-to-peer messaging app that would go viral during the Hong Kong Umbrella Movement. No internet required. Just phones bouncing Bluetooth signals.10 million people used it. And then? He got pushed out of his own company.He didn’t stop.Now with Nodle, he’s picking up where he left off—this time with crypto and edge tech. Phones become infrastructure. Users get paid in tokens just for participating. Enterprises already use it to recover stolen vehicles in Europe, track motorcycles in Africa, and monitor drivers for insurance underwriting.And he’s just getting started.What’s coming next? Messaging. Stablecoin payments. And AI agents. Yes—Micha’s building a wallet where you can earn, message, and eventually ask AI to handle your crypto interactions for you. He’s already shipped an AI-powered photography coach in Nodle’s camera app, and he’s building more into the core wallet experience.The longer you talk to him, the more it clicks: Micha isn’t just building an app—he’s laying down the rails for a sovereign communication and financial layer, where billions of people can earn, transact, and connect—without middlemen.He’s done it without paid installs. Without hype. Just product, persistence, and deep conviction.This one stuck with me. In a world of overfunded noise, Micha’s quietly building something foundational. Not just for crypto. For infrastructure. For freedom.And if he’s right—one day, your phone won’t just be a screen in your pocket. It’ll be your node, your wallet, your ID, your bank—and your link to a new kind of network: open, global, and owned by you.Learn more about Micha and his company below:linkedin.com/in/michabenoliel/nodle.com/

Zach Lloyd's reinventing how every developer on Earth talks to a computer—and he might actually pull it off.Right now, half a million devs use his company, Warp, a modern AI-powered terminal. But it’s what’s under the hood—and how he thinks about building—that sets him apart.He’s lived many lives: law school dropout, philosophy major, musician, NASA systems analyst, principal engineer at Google. At Google, he scaled Sheets through 40x growth and helped shape the real-time collaboration model we now take for granted. Then he left. Why? He wanted to fix something most people wouldn’t touch: the terminal.That blinking black box you see hackers using in movies? Developers still use it—the exact same interface—to build and deploy the internet. It’s powerful, but brutal. No mouse support. Cryptic errors. Zero collaboration. And no one dared change it. Too much risk of breaking things. No obvious business model. Total founder graveyard.Zach saw an opportunity.He calls it “building the bridge”—making Warp 100% backwards-compatible, so devs could bring their scripts, habits, and workflows—but layered with modern UX and AI. Clickable outputs. Instant command suggestions. Error correction. It’s like putting a co-pilot inside the terminal.And now, Warp is going full-on AI agent mode. Zach’s vision? Developers won’t type commands. They’ll just tell their computer what to do. Deploy the backend. Debug the crash. Set up the dev environment. And Warp will just do it—autonomously, with memory, and context from your entire team’s knowledge base (Warp Drive).He’s not naive about the competition either. He knows he’s in one of the most high-velocity races in tech right now—AI dev tools. But he’s betting on deep product quality, performance (they rewrote everything in Rust), and speed. Internally, they ship fast and joke in Slack with a hashtag: #warpspeed.Also—his fundraising journey is wild. Didn’t pitch dozens of VCs. Didn’t need to. Dylan Field (Figma) led his Series A. Sequoia led his Series B. Sam Altman, Benioff, Elad Gil, Jeff Weiner—some of the sharpest minds in tech are already behind him.And the endgame? Warp becomes the interface where devs orchestrate AI agents to build software. He doesn’t want to replace developers—he wants to amplify them. Let AI handle the toil, so humans can focus on the fun, creative parts of building.This one hit different. Zach’s not chasing hype—he’s quietly building one of the most foundational tools in the new stack. And if he’s right, in a few years, we won’t be typing commands. We’ll just say what we want—and Warp will make it real.Learn more about Zach and his company below:linkedin.com/in/zachlloyd/warp.dev/

Alberto Rizzoli’s story isn’t just about AI—it’s about four generations of high-stakes bets, wild successes, and brutal collapses.His great-grandfather was an orphan who hustled his way into building Europe’s second-largest media empire. His grandfather took it even further—bought AC Milan, won the first Champions League, then lost everything on a newspaper gamble. His father rebuilt in film, won two Oscars, then went bankrupt when Alberto was 19. Tax police literally rolled up and took the carpets.Instead of running from that chaos, he embraced it. Left Google at 18 to start building. Now, he’s the co-founder of V7, an AI company automating the back-office of every major industry—already powering one-third of FDA-approved AI models.We chatted about his wild family history, why every great civilisation pulls ideas from elsewhere, and why he believes AI is about to replace SaaS entirely.Learn more about Alberto and his company below:linkedin.com/in/albertorizzoli/v7labs.com/

Eric Wollberg is truely 1 of 1At 12, he had his first lucid dream—woke up equal parts awestruck and terrified. That moment sent him down a rabbit hole that never stopped. Years later, he was in Jerusalem, working for the Israeli government’s venture arm, reading theology, and realising something wild: every prophet—Muhammad, Buddha, Abraham—received their visions in dreams. What if that wasn’t a coincidence? What if everyone could access that same power?That question turned into Prophetic—a neurotech company using transcranial ultrasound to induce lucidity in REM sleep. But before that, he got a front-row seat to another moonshot: PraxisAs the first employee, he helped build the early community from the ground up—throwing salons, cultivating demand, and watching Dryden Brown move mountains to turn an impossible idea into a movement. He saw firsthand what it meant to create something out of nothing, how to weaponise belief, and how to build against the odds. That experience gave him the blueprint for what came next.When he finally took the leap to start Prophetic, it was brutal. At one point, he had just $1,700 left in the bank—the day before his wedding. Prayed for the first time in years. 60 seconds later, an investor wired $25K. The funding kept coming—he raised $1.4M—but instead of blowing $348K on an ultrasound machine, they built their own. Now they have 50+ transducers on the wall instead of one.The tech is straight out of sci-fi—EEG + AI in a closed-loop system that actively steers pulses to modulate consciousness. Started with single-element transducers, now moving to multi-element, unlocking pulse steering at an entirely new level. Basically a particle accelerator for consciousness.And then there’s his theory: Qualia Takeoff. Humans are wired to chase more profound experiences—lucid dreaming is the next frontier. He thinks it could be the key to catching up with AI before we become the equivalent of dogs staring at something beyond our comprehension.Left the convo thinking about power laws, agency, and how people who dream with intent tend to bend reality in their favour. His belief? If you can control your dreams, why wouldn’t you do the same with your waking life?Learn more about Eric and his company below:linkedin.com/in/eric-wollberg/prophetic.com/

Rob Biederman is the founder and MP of Asymmetric Capital Partners—a venture firm taking a contrarian approach to backing B2B technology companies, roll-ups, and under-the-radar market opportunities.Asymmetric launched in 2020 with a $105M debut fund, built on Rob’s vision of avoiding venture hype and instead investing in companies with long-term durability, strong customer value, and scalable economics. They’ve already backed 29 companies, many of which are profitable or on track for significant exits, and they’re pioneering a roll-up strategy, consolidating cash-flowing businesses and transforming them through proprietary technology.Before launching Asymmetric, Rob built a career spanning finance, private equity, and entrepreneurship. He started at Goldman Sachs, moved into private equity at Bain Capital, and then took the leap into founding Catalant Technologies, a company that started as a Harvard Business School project and scaled into a 120,000-member expert marketplace.We talked about why most VCs misunderstand venture cycles, how Asymmetric is capitalizing on overlooked sectors, the shift toward AI-enabled industries, and what it takes to build a truly differentiated fund—plus, why Rob believes the next billion-dollar company will come from a “boring” sector most VCs are ignoring.Learn more about Rob and his fund below:acp.vc/linkedin.com/in/robertdukebiederman/

Nirman Dave is the co-founder and CEO of Zams—an AI platform that’s transforming how businesses integrate AI into their workflows.Nirman’s journey began in a small town in Gujarat, India, where he first discovered his love for coding. With no formal training, he taught himself through YouTube videos, and by 17, he had already built 200 apps with over a million downloads .With a deep interest in behavioral economics, he found himself asking a bigger question—could AI predict irrational human behavior?That question led him to create Zams, inspired by Zero Age Main Sequence—the moment a star is born—where AI goes beyond predictions to build agents that act, adapt, and transform businesses at scale.Today, Zams works with Fortune 200 companies and enterprises generating hundreds of millions in revenue, helping them automate processes, optimize decisions, and fundamentally reshape how they operate.We talked about risk-taking, breaking into enterprise AI, hiring at speed, and the exponential curve of AI adoption—plus, why Nirman thinks the biggest AI opportunities might just be in education and law.Learn more about Nirman and his company below:zams.comlinkedin.com/in/nirmandave/