Code Story | Startup Podcast for CTOs, CEOs and Technical Founders

Alex Olivier lives in London, England, and has been a tech since the early days. In fact, his Dad awarded him an old linux box - from which, he built a Harry Potter website. Five years after he deployed said website, his site was getting 3 million visitors a month, and gained him success and access to red carpet events and interviewing the cast. He studied computer science, eventually going to work for Microsoft, before getting into the startup world. Outside of tech, he is a Dad to a 2 year old daughter - so he doesn't have much free time. But when he does, he enjoys cycling and skiing. 

In several prior companies, Alex built, and built, and re-built, solutions around application permissions. Each time he did so, he found himself annoyed that he had to create this type of solution again. He and his co-founders decided to set out and create a company around an authorization management platform. 

This is the creation story of Cerbos. 

Links

https://www.cerbos.dev/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexolivier/

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Charles Maddock is a Swedish engineer, who has been a developer since he was young. Being heavily influenced by Minecraft and building his own empires, he learned Java when he was 11. In high school, he built his first AI agents, and quickly headed into startups after graduation. Outside of tech, he enjoys long distance running, finding it to be meditative. He also enjoys camping, which he states that often he leaves from the office and goes to the woods to camp, only to return for work the following week from the campsite. When it comes to food, he says he's gone deep in the search... for making the perfect hummus. 

Last year, Charles and his co-founder noticed that although AI was experiencing a boom, most everyday digital work was still happening inside of browser windows. They set out to create something to connect the AI agentic world and the web, with the goal of creating the most natural environment for agentic AI. 

This is the creation story of Strawberry Browser.

Links

https://strawberrybrowser.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/charles-maddock-31798418b/

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Yash Sinha hates losing even more than he wants to win, as the saying goes. He was born and raised in India, growing up in Delhi and competing in sports like Cricket. He's always been intellectually curious, always looking to the next step - which both of these things led him into entrepreneurship, of which he has started several businesses. Outside of tech, he likes to read fantasy and science fiction, as he enjoys the world building of this genre. 

Yash and his co-founders realized that in order for robotics to work, foundational models needed to exist for robotic manipulation. Since hardware was no longer a bottleneck, he and his team focused on building models and deploying bots centered around human level dexterity. 

This is the creation story of Intelligence Factory. 

Links

https://www.intelligence-factory.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/yash-sinha-556b411b3/

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Leo Fan grew up in China, performing his undergrad and masters within the country. Eventually, he came to the states to get his PhD from Cornell. Prior to his current venture, his experience has been in academia, and research in computer science. But outside of tech, he's a gamer. In fact, he was pretty good at it, almost entering professional eSports during his undergrad days, playing Counterstrike and Warcraft. Besides that, he enjoys playing tennis and basketball, and eating some good Chinese food or tacos. 

In his engineering days, Leo discovered a very powerful system for crypto, with powerful properties to enable it to be so. Once he figured out that this type of model can scale crypto systems, he wanted to build the first full stack compute network - to own the growth of on-chain compute. 

This is the creation story of Cysic. 

Links

https://cysic.xyz/

https://leofanxiong.github.io/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/leofanxiong/

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Pooja Brown grew up in India, and now lives in San Francisco. Her family ran manufacturing factories that made fertilizer and medicine - IE real products, real customers, and real consequences when a batch didn't ship. She grew up learning that a product was not done until it was in the customers hands. She came stateside for university, and never left San Francisco. She's held leadership positions in many companies, some notable names being Stitch Fix and Docusign. Outside of tech, she is married with 2 daughters. She notes that in all her years in tech, home is the one place she can't automate. 

In 2019, Tribe made a bet that every company would become an AI company. In the summer of 2026, Pooja joined the company during the point of hyper growth, when AI is booming but businesses are still trying to catch up and implement. She stepped in to help lead the charge and build transformational AI systems for the enterprise. 

This is Pooja's creation story at Tribe AI. 

Links

https://www.tribe.ai/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/pgarg/

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Brian McKeown is 24 years old, and was born and raised in Dallas, TX. He attended Texas A&M University in College Station, and was heavily involved in rec athletics. Post college, he worked a year or so before getting invited on the rocket ship he has been apart of in manufacturing, and moving to Chattanooga. Outside of tech, he loves being outdoors and in the mountains. He finds the Tennessee area great for hiking and community, which is a bit different than what he grew up with in Texas. 

In his prior role, which was more of an old school company, Brian was referred to an opportunity by one of his mentors in college. The founders of his current venture had proven market fit for their product, but needed talented engineers to create a repeatable platform, built on top of a playbook for what works, to deploy in manufacturing plants across the US. 

This is the creation story of Harmony AI. 

Links

https://www.tryharmony.ai/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/brian-mckeown-49b225229

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Jeff Emalaba has a background that has morphed into risk mitigation over the years. He has a professional background in options trading, risk management and auditing, along with over two decades of real estate investment. Jeff is also a licensed agent in North Carolina. Outside of tech and professional life, he enjoys reading and spending time with his family, taking vacations when time allows. 

Years ago, Jeff invested $11k of his own money into a property. As it turned out, the investment opportunity had hidden foundation and structural defects. It was this experience that led him to look for a solution that analyzed hidden risks, appraisals, and property data - to be the Carfax for real estate. 

This is the creation story of InvestFusion. 

Links

https://www.investfusion.co/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/jeff-emalaba/

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NEWS: Mogul Secures Oversubscribed $15.5M Series A Led by Draper Associates to Scale Its AI-Driven Real Estate Investing Platform

Alex Blackwood grew up in different areas of New Jersey and Connecticut. He had a transformational experience at boarding school in South Jersey, and eventually went to Georgetown on a rowing scholarship. Post college, he went to Goldman Sachs doing conventional investment banking, and eventually private equity. Outside of tech, he is married and loves to play and watch golf. He enjoys reading business books and science fiction. He notes that he can't do e-readers - he has to have the physical book in his hand, which helps his attention and retention. 

In 2021, Alex bought his first single family rental after getting his real estate license. He notes that the process of buying this was pretty terrible, with 10+ different people scraping fees from the process. During his "garden time" - IE month off from investment banking - he put together a thesis and pitched his now co-founder, on a fractional ownership platform for real estate. 

This is the creation story of Mogul. 

Links

https://www.mogul.club/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/alex-blackwood-a3996a135/

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Today, we have a special episode of the Code Story podcast. Joining us today is Caitlinn McMinn, Executive Director at TechFW. TechFW is a nonprofit startup incubator in Fort Worth, TX. The group is here to prove that the next generation of world-changing companies begins right in the heart of Cowtown. In our conversation today, Caitlinn is going to elaborate on the incubators story and model, illuminating how the team supports local entrepreneurs through opportunity and community. 

Questions:

• TechFW operates on a 100% equity-free model for founders. In an incubator landscape where equity stakes are standard, why is retaining equity so vital for early-stage tech founders, and how does that alter the relationship between TechFW and its entrepreneurs?
• TechFW has been fostering innovation in North Texas since 1998. Looking back over more than two decades, how has the Fort Worth startup landscape evolved, and what core principles have allowed TechFW to remain a constant anchor for local founders?
• People talk about 'entrepreneurial ecosystems' all the time, but what does a thriving ecosystem actually look like on the ground in a city like Fort Worth, and what is its most fragile component?
• TechFW recently partnered with Texas Woman’s University to launch ThinkLab OnDemand, alongside close ties with local institutions like UNT Health Science Center and Texas A&M Fort Worth. How do university partnerships feed the innovation pipeline, and what advice do you have for regions trying to bridge academia and entrepreneurship?
• Through Cowtown Angels, TechFW bridges early-stage founders with local angel investors. How do you cultivate an angel investor community that is willing to back early-stage, high-risk tech ventures right here in North Texas?
• Through ThinkLab, you help founders test viability early. What is the single biggest misconception first-time founders have when transitioning an idea into a validated business model?
• Startups often move fast and break things, but scaling on top of weak processes can be fatal. In the FastForward program, how do you help founders balance aggressive growth with operational rigor?
• Founder isolation is real. How does TechFW build peer-to-peer community so founders don't feel like they're navigating the journey entirely alone?
• Your career spans finance, sales enablement, HR systems, and operations consulting before stepping into the Executive Director role at TechFW. How does having that 360-degree operational background shape how you diagnose what a startup actually needs versus what they think they need?
• Running an innovation hub requires balancing the needs of founders, community donors, corporate sponsors, and board members. How do you keep 'founder-first' as the North Star while managing those stakeholder dynamics?
• Fort Worth and the broader DFW metroplex are seeing massive economic growth. What unique advantages does Fort Worth offer tech startups compared to traditional hubs like Silicon Valley or Austin?
• As technology evolves rapidly—from AI to biotech and manufacturing—how is TechFW expanding access so underrepresented founders and non-traditional entrepreneurs can participate in the tech economy?
• If an ecosystem builder or civic leader in another mid-sized city was listening today and wanted to spark a tech community from scratch, what is the very first step they should take?

Links

https://www.techfortworth.org/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/caitlin-mcminn/

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David Moore started day trading when he was 16, along with his brother. By the age of 19, he had a 7 figure portfolio, indicating some solid success. He did some angel investing, and then moved into entrepreneurship, starting a few companies. But eventually, got into a sales role that led to his current venture. Outside of tech, he loves music, and in particular, is really enjoying 15th century classical music. He has a lazy French bulldog, enjoys Italian food, and finds himself either reading Octavian literature, or - his bible. 

David got into a sales job for a friend of his, and in doing so, build some tools using AI to help in the business. When he shared these ideas, and eventually was replaced by an offshore resource, he and his brother took off to build their own thing - a solution to help your business score leads. 

This is the creation story of Stalex. 

Links

https://stalex.ai/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/stalexai/

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