
S3
Weekly interviews with the innovators of our time I record directly after filming our weekly documentary episode.
Latest episodes

Sep 27, 2024 • 51min
The Economics of Supersonic Flight | Interview with Boom Supersonic CEO Blake Scholl
Sitdown interview with Blake Scholl 3 days after filming Boom Supersonic's 3rd flight test.

Sep 16, 2024 • 1h 11min
Reimagining The Future of Water Transport & Shipping | Interview with Valo Team
Interview with the @ridevalo team where we go in depth on hydrofoiling, reimagining mass transport logistics, and being a great team member at a deep tech startup.

Sep 11, 2024 • 1h 13min
Chasing Immortality with Humanoid Robots | Eric Jang, S3 Episode 54
While filming with Neo in my apartment I sat down with VP of AI @ericjang11 to learn about 1X's approach to robot intelligence and his his curiosity around immortality.
0:00 Intro
1:27 1X Overview
2:12 Eric's Origin
5:15 Why humanoids?
11:30 Supercomputers & deep learning
12:45 World models
14:21 Neuromorphic computing
14:40 Immortality
20:15 Robotics at Google
21:35 Skepticism of humanoids
27: 00 Joining 1X
31:20 Benefits of LLMs
33:50 Training models
35:30 Tele-op to autonomous
43:30 Data quality vs. quantity
47:00 How to train your robot
50:50 Data sponge
53:30 The 1X team
54:45 Safety
57:45 A lab in the cloud
59:26 Bio advancements
1:03:54 How does your brain work
1:06:14 Conway’s law
1:08:45 Eric’s favorite sci-fi
1:10:50 Life philosophy

Sep 1, 2024 • 1h 14min
Episode 53: We'll Build 100,000 Humanoids by 2027 | Bernt Bornich
After filming our S3 with 1X (https://youtu.be/2ccPTpDq05A) I sat down with Founder &CEO Bernt Bornich to go deeper on 1X's truly ambitious manufacturing plans.
If you'd like to support our work, and look like a million bucks, you can buy our first ever S3 Episode Tee here for 7 days only: https://saturdaystartupstories.myshopify.com/products/s3-episode-53-tee-1x-technologies
0:00 Intro
1:16 Why humanoids?
5:40 AI transfer of knowledge
8:40 Power of scale
9:50 Heritage of Eve
11:50 Tendron drives
18:35 Letting robots experiment
22:00 Designing for safety
25:07 Intelligence diversity
27:45 Moravec’s paradox
32:50 Difficulty of reasoning
35:40 Training models & data
40:40 Humanoid ecosystem
42:50 You can’t retrofit cost
46:30 10x every year
56:30 Hire for who you are
57:50 Be nice
1:00:00 Trust your intuition
1:05:50 2040
1:07:50 Bernt’s favorite Sci-Fi
1:09:09 Individualism
1:12:00 Life philosophy

Jul 25, 2024 • 1h 8min
How to Raise $750M & Build a Space Company | John Gedmark
Astranis just announced a new round of funding, led by A16z, to build more satellites! I sat down with John Gedmark, CEO of Astranis, to talk about how they'll use this $200M of capital and the future of building in America and space 🇺🇸🛰️🛰️
0:00 I used to work here
1:02 Mission of Astranis
3:54 GEO? (Sci-fi)
8:43 Childhood to college
14:30 Silicon Valley for space?
19:14 Founding Commercial Spaceflight Federation
22:07 Why GEO is hard
24:42 Meeting Ryan, CTO
28:18 COVID story
32:40 Early days
35:53 How to raise $750M
47:08 Astranis + US Government
51:15 Manufacturing learnings
53:40 US vs China
58:16 War in space
1:01:18 Astranis longterm vision
1:03:58 Why?
1:05:28 Current life philosophy
1:06:20 1 year of S3

Jul 18, 2024 • 45min
Ex-SpaceX Astronaut Trainee to Energy-tech Founder | Brad Hartwig
Interview with CEO and cofounder of Arbor Energy, Brad Hartwig for Episode 51 of S³
From training to be an astronaut, leading him to founding Arbor — how we'll soon build faster than regulatory can keep up with and how we can fix it.

Jul 13, 2024 • 1h 13min
The ex SpaceX & Zipline engineers building a mirror satellite constellation | Ben Nowack & Tristan Semmelhack
I sat down for an extended interview with cofounders @4TristanS @bennbuilds to talk in depth about @reflectorbital — If you're building for new space, in high school/college, or trying to figure out what to build, you should watch this!

Jun 30, 2024 • 26min
He Used to 3D Print Rockets, Now He's Building Robots | Ed Mehr
From working at Google, Microsoft, early at SpaceX and Relativity, Ed Mehr has always been forward-thinking about the future of manufacturing. Now, he's building it at Machina Labs — I sat down with him to learn more after filming Episode 49 of S³.

Jun 18, 2024 • 34min
Launching SpaceX's 1st Rockets to a Nuclear Startup | Doug Bernauer
From launching SpaceX's 1st rockets, to realizing the need for mobile-nuclear reactors, and founding Radiant — here's my interview with CEO and Cofounder of Radiant, Doug Bernauer for Episode 38 of S³

Jun 14, 2024 • 35min
S³-47 Cradle Foudners: A Tractable Approach to Reversible Cryopreservation
Interview with Laura Demming & Hunter Davis for Episode 47 of S³ featuring Cradle
0:00 What is Cradle?
2:18 Laura & Hunter’s backgrounds
9:39 Timeline to reversible cry
13:04 Next milestone
15:33 Sci-fi inpsiration
18:35 3 Body Problem
21:10 More builders
24:38 How do you think?
29:39 Getting people into bio
31:25 Where in the future would you go?
32:55 Current life philosophy