
Crazy Until It's Not: Startups, Venture Capital & Big Ideas
Digital JPEGs selling for millions of dollars; machines that turn thin air into food; people buying a McDonald's with Bitcoin; an AI program that can replace illustrators; psychedelics being prescribed by doctors. What do these ideas have in common? They were all completely crazy notions until, one day, before most people had even heard of them, they were part of our world. So what’s next? “Crazy until it’s not” is a podcast by firstminute capital where we talk with tech visionaries about their predictions for the future — ideas that may seem crazy today but could be part of daily life tomorrow. We ask each guest to come onto the show with one big, bold and non-obvious vision for the next five years as a jumping-off point for debate about how the world will be tomorrow. Previous guests on the firstminute capital podcast include Tony Blair, David Bonderman, Roelof Boetha, Max & Nellie Levchin, Jeff Immelt, Rio Ferdinand, Sir Hermann Hauser, Nico Rosberg and Niklas Zennstrom.
Latest episodes

May 13, 2024 • 47min
All human brains will be connected to the internet | Saturnin Pugnet | Worldcoin | firstminute capital
🔗 Humans, Connected: The Age of the Exocortex🌐 Imagine a world where you’re seamlessly connected to the internet, not through screens and keyboards, but directly through your brain.Our minds are already a marvel of evolution, with three layers:Reptilian Brain: The ancient core responsible for keeping us alive by regulating basic functions like breathing.Mammalian (Limbic) Brain: The “monkey brain,” managing emotions like fear and excitement.Neocortex: Our human layer, dedicated to logic, reason, and creativity.✨ Enter the Exocortex—a revolutionary fourth layer. Soon, we’ll be able to read and write information directly to our brains, allowing seamless integration with the internet. 🧠Imagine this: You’re able to remember scenes from a movie you've never seen before because your Exocortex looked it up and now it feels as real as any personal memory.🎥 Your imagination becomes your reality.📚 Forgot what you read in a book? Your Exocortex retrieves it in an instant.🌍 Curious about global events? The Exocortex brings you firsthand insights as if you were there.The boundaries between “you” and the world’s knowledge will blur. The Exocortex won’t just connect us to the internet; it will be the internet.The future isn’t just at our fingertips—it’s in our minds.🔌 Are you ready for the Exocortex era?#Exocortex #FutureOfHumanity #NeuralInterface #Neurotech #Innovation #DigitalTransformation

Mar 27, 2024 • 36min
We can engineer biology | Stef van Grieken | founder of Cradle | firstminute capital
DNA is an alien programming language - that can be learned That's the mind blowing idea of Stef van Grieken, the founder of Cradle, which is unlocking the keys to human biology.What does he mean here?Well, DNA was not designed like most languages, but it evolved, and so it's hard to understand and harder to engineer. But what if, similarly to how we have learned natural language, we might be able to engineer organic chemistry?That's exciting because most of the things around us are biology, including ourselves. So if we could tweak that or engineer that then that could open up a really exciting future. Imagine the possibilities if we could engineer life itself to solve global challenges, from health to sustainability!

Jan 13, 2024 • 41min
Product beats tech | Mehdi Ghissassi | Head of Product & Deepmind | firstminute capital
In the global AI race, product will matter more than tech. That's the prediction from Mehdi Ghissassi, the Head of Product & Deepmind Check out the latest episode of "Crazy Until It's Not" to discover more about why it's the builders who bring AI tech to life that will conqueror the world.

Dec 11, 2023 • 29min
Buildings will be grown | Tim Fu | Studio Tim Fu | firstminute capital
In the future, buildings will be grown not builtThat's the prediction from Tim Fu, the Generative AI architect and founder of Studio Tim Fu. We're already well on our way, with advances in synthetic biology. But there is so much further to go. Check out the latest episode of "Crazy Until It's Not" to discovery the future of biology.

Nov 27, 2023 • 34min
We will program our biology | Dr Mark Kotter | bit.bio | firstminute capital
In the future we will be able to program biology. That's the prediction from Dr Mark Kotter, the founder of three synth bio companies bit.bio, clock.bio and Meatable.We're already well on our way, with the ability to perform feats like turning bacteria into lightbulbs. But there is so much further to go. Check out the latest episode of "Crazy Until It's Not" to discovery the future of biology.

Jul 17, 2023 • 35min
All content will be AI powered | Nina Schick | The Era of Generative AI | firstminute capital
Guest Nina Schick, AI expert and author, discusses the future of AI-generated and AI-assisted media. They explore the impact of generative AI on content creation, deep fakes, and the ethical considerations surrounding AI-dominated media. The podcast also touches on the integration of AI in various fields, automation's effects on job markets, and navigating deep fakes in politics.

Jun 30, 2023 • 40min
We will have LLM-powered implants in our skulls | Julien Simon | Hugging Face | firstminute capital
What’s next in Generative AI? Could it be LLM-powered implants in our skulls directing us everywhere? That’s something that Julien Simon from Hugging Face (a platform with over 120k open-source machine learning models) expects to see in his lifetime.“A lot of tech innovation is just reading science fiction books and just inventing stuff that makes it happen…” he says.One sci-fi innovation that has not happened yet is the Babel Fish from Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy translating all languages in real-time.“We might be getting close to that… the next step is a skull or each implant that gives you access to the all-seeing and all-knowing chatbot."“I can just whisper ‘Is there a good pizza place 5 minutes from here?’ and I can hear it in my head: ‘oh yeah, take a left and then a right’”. Would you like this future?Also on a show a discussion on the difference between "useful stuff” and “fancy stuff” when it comes to Generative AI and how we should leave the big tech companies to it when competing to build the largest models.

Jun 3, 2023 • 29min
Call centres will no longer exist | Nikola Mrkšić | PolyAI | firstminute capital
Society needs to brace itself. Tens of millions of people around the world work in call centres - but the latest advances in Generative AI and synthetic voice are set to make around 🤯🤯 🤯 80% of their jobs redundant 🤯 🤯 🤯 .That's according to Nikola Mrkšić, the founder of PolyAI, a machine learning platform that buildings chatbots or voice-based agents for call centres.In this episode of Crazy Until It's Not, we talk about the story behind PlolyAI and Nikola himself. And we also talk about what it means for society if so many jobs are getting automated.

May 9, 2023 • 32min
Machines will be truly creative | Jonas Andrulis | Aleph Alpha | firstminute capital
Welcome back to Crazy Until It's Not, a podcast about big ideas and the amazing people behind them. Every episode we bring on a new guest who has a prediction for the future, which on the face of it, sounds a little bit crazy. I'm your host, Michael Stothard, an early-stage tech investor at firstminute capital.And today I'm joined by Jonas Andrulis, the Founder and CEO of Aleph Alpha, the generative A.I. Company from Heidelberg, which has built a generative A.I. model that is going up against the likes of Open AI.Listen to this episode if you want to know about:- How generative AI is changing the world.- Can Europe compete? - The fractal nature of time- How creativity will be done by machines.

Mar 20, 2023 • 3min
There will be 8-10 Tesla-sized climate companies built in the next decade | David Helgason | Unity | firstminute capital
We are going to see 10 Tesla-sized companies springing up in the coming years tacking big issues in climate. That’s 10 new companies with a market cap of over $520bn 🏢💪🏻♻️That’s the big idea of David Helgason, the founder of Unity Technologies, one of the world’s two largest game engine companies, who is now a prominent climate investor through his fund Foobar.David spoke to us last autumn about the advancements he’s seeing in sustainability and his journey as a founder and investor. David Helgason is the Founder of Unity Technologies, one of the world’s two largest game engine companies.
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