Hans Swildens started Industry Ventures in 2000, and this is his first podcast since selling it to Goldman Sachs in 2026.

Hans has been buying venture secondaries longer than almost anyone, and the combined business is one of the largest VC portfolios in the world: 525 firms, 1,600 funds, and over $22B in capital commitments.

We get into why he sold to Goldman, the barbell market quietly killing middle-stage venture, how VC's are manufacturing their own exits, why most seed funds without a real angle have 5 years left, the LP base that's a completely different species every fund cycle, how he started Industry by acquiring funds at 99% discounts during the Dot Com Collapse, the day he passed on a multi-billion-dollar data center, and why the secondary market may eventually be multiples the size of the primary market.

Thank you to Zach Coelius, Will Quist, Emily Zheng, and Andrea McGee for help brainstorming topics for the conversation.

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, Amplitude, and Merge for supporting this episode.

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APR https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Merge: Every model. One API. Total control. Check out Merge’s Agent Handler. merge.dev/turner

Timestamps:

(0:00) Inside Goldman’s $22B venture bet

(7:57) 1,600 funds over 525 firms

(11:11) Why scale lets you “see the cube”

(14:17) Most humbling lesson in 26 years

(16:19) Three types of Seed funds

(18:47) LP's evolve every fund cycle

(22:00) VC is a sales game

(24:38) A strong CRM is non-negotiable

(29:06) Buying secondaries during the Dot Com Collapse

(31:33) Triangulating opinions across GP’s, founders, and LP’s

(37:22) Seed without differentiation doesn’t work

(42:16) Biggest mistakes by first-time GP’s

(44:31) Buying Enron’s VC portfolio at a 99% discount

(50:15) Entrepreneurial finance is underappreciated

(52:15) Why asset managers are acquiring venture firms

(58:47) Why it’s hard to start venture programs

(1:03:20) Secondaries: $250M to $150B market in 25 years

(1:08:06) Continuation funds & debt structured secondaries

(1:12:02) “Secondaries might be multiples bigger than primaries”

(1:19:52) How to structure secondary transactions

(1:26:00) What happens after SpaceX, OpenAI, Anthropic IPO’s

(1:30:35) How Seed survives the asset manager era

(1:35:16) How to manufacture liquidity

(1:41:41) How AI is impacting secondary markets

Referenced

Industry Ventures: https://www.industryventures.com/

How Big Is The Secondary Market for Venture Capital?: https://www.industryventures.com/insight/2023-2025e-how-big-is-the-secondary-market-for-venture-capital/

Exploring the Growth of Venture Secondaries: https://www.chronograph.pe/exploring-the-growth-of-venture-secondaries/

Pitchbook’s US Secondaries Market Watch: https://pitchbook.com/news/reports/2025-annual-us-vc-secondary-market-watch

Follow Hans

Twitter: https://x.com/HansSwildens

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/hansswildens

Follow Turner

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak

Subscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week: https://www.thespl.it/

Charles Hudson started Precursor Ventures in 2015, and helped create pre-seed as a category.

Ten years and hundreds of Day 0 checks later, few investors have backed as many first-time founders, making him the perfect person to talk through the state of the category today.

We talk about why this is the hardest moment for pre-seed/seed investing he can remember, why sitting out of bubbles can be more dangerous than joining, how he hands his junior team real money to make their own bets, and urgency and “the last $250k effect”.

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, Amplitude, and Merge for supporting this episode.

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APY https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Merge: Every modal. One API. Total control. Check out Merge’s Agent Handler. merge.dev/turner

Timestamps:

(0:00) Is Pre-Seed dead?

(4:15) Do round names matter anymore?

(12:27) Multi-stage signaling risk doesn’t exist

(16:42) Smart LP’s love multi-stage funds

(22:03) Is the traditional Seed model broken?

(26:31) Velocity of capital deployment drives all incentives

(30:30) How to compete with megafunds at early stage

(34:24) Megafunds have Seed funds in a vice-grip

(38:34) “The best Series A’s are all expensive"

(39:33) Are we doing 2021 all over again?

(41:53) It’s safer to participate in bubbles than sit out

(47:35) Price you pay is everything

(50:22) The system incentivizes an addiction to consensus

(55:22) High valuation + high CapEx grows AUM

(59:56) How Precursor actually invests today

(1:01:32) Precursor’s Principal investor program

(1:05:56) Deciding when to selling your winners

(1:10:53) Raising as a pre-consensus founder

(1:12:39) What Charles looks for in founders

(1:17:20) What it’s actually like to start a fund

(1:20:56) Misconceptions of first-time fund managers

(1:26:22) 300+ LP meetings to raise Precursor Fund 1

(1:29:24) The single tweak to his pitch that raised the fund

(1:31:54) Precursor’s evolution over time

(1:34:57) The second desert of venture capital

(1:37:34) The last $250k effect

Referenced

Precursor: https://precursorvc.com/

a16z’s State of Markets report https://x.com/TurnerNovak/status/2015830796393742599?s=20

Follow Charles

Twitter: https://x.com/chudson

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chudson

Charles Substack: https://chudson.substack.com/

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LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak

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Dan Teran is the co-founder Gutter Capital, a concentrated seed fund in NYC, and Elbow Grease, the accelerator that puts 15 startups in one building and helps build their teams for them.

Gutter just announced a $75M Fund III and opened applications for the second Elbow Grease batch (apply below by July 31st)

We get into starting an accelerator when there’s already a hundred of them, why Gutter prefers very concentrated portfolios, what it was actually like selling Managed by Q to WeWork, why raising a fund turned out to be harder than selling a company, why he thinks startups should form a board and use OKR’s from day one, and the time he went big-wave surfing with Adam Neumann and Laird Hamilton.

Thank you to James Gettinger, Satya Patel, Abhinav Kapur, and JT White for help brainstorming topics for the conversation.

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, Amplitude, and Merge for supporting this episode.

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APY https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Merge: Every modal. One API. Total control. Check out Merge’s Agent Handler. merge.dev/turner

Timestamps:

(0:00) Elbow Grease: NYC’s new accelerator

(7:39) Building a small, hands-on, in-person experience

(13:39) Recruiting 100 people into portfolio companies

(16:25) Portfolio concentration makes investors more helpful

(24:58) Why raising Fund 1 was so hard

(28:08) Advice for new fund managers

(30:30) “Hiring today is as competitive as ever”

(32:23) Selling Managed By Q to WeWork

(35:23) “Never raise too much money”

(39:43) Almost buying his company back from WeWork in Feb 2020

(43:50) Starting Gutter Capital in the depths of COVID

(49:34) Funding angel investing with gambling proceeds

(52:39) Behind the name “Gutter Capital”

(54:49) “Raising a fund is like getting punched in the face”

(59:03) Writing long LP letters

(1:06:45) Investing in real world problems

(1:09:48) What a Gutter founder looks like

(1:12:46) How Gutter makes new investments

(1:18:41) Importance of customer calls at pre-seed

(1:21:59) Evolution of NYC tech over last 15 years

(1:26:15) Why you should form a board at Seed

(1:28:29) How to run a Seed stage board meeting

(1:34:04) Sharing carry with portfolio founders

(1:35:56) The best founders need lots of help

(1:39:30) Big wave surfing with Adam Neumann and Laird Hamilton

Referenced

Apply to Elbow Grease: https://forms.gutter.cc/eg0002-application

Elbow Grease: https://elbowgrease.cc/

Gutter Capital: https://www.gutter.cc/

WeWork Acquires Managed By Q: https://techcrunch.com/2019/04/03/wework-acquires-managed-by-q/

Follow Dan

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danteran/

Follow Turner

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak

Subscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week: https://www.thespl.it/

Sam Blond is the Co-founder and CEO of Monaco, the revenue engine for startups.

Sam is one of the best sales operators in tech. He spent four years as CRO at Brex, where he helped scale it to a ~$12B valuation, ran sales at Zenefits before that, and got his start at EchoSign.

If there’s a modern GTM playbook, Sam helped write it. Our conversation walks through how AI has rewritten a big chunk of it. But most importantly, we talk about what hasn’t changed.

We get into the sales work AI is now better at than humans, and why Sam thinks 90% of startups misdiagnose their bottleneck as conversion when it’s really demand gen.

He explains why he doesn’t measure early brand marketing at all and trusts anecdotes over attribution, walks through the full Monaco launch playbook including the Super Bowl box-truck story, and shares a rev-ops insight from Brex, including how they figured out a specific ICP converted at 4x the rate of another.

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, Amplitude, and Merge for supporting this episode.

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APY https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Merge: Every modal. One API. Total control. Check out Merge’s Agent Handler. merge.dev/turner

Timestamps:

(0:00) Scaling Brex to $12B

(1:14) How AI speeds up prospecting and TAM building

(5:19) Using AI to get more leverage

(9:15) Incubating Monaco at Founders Fund

(12:56) Innovator’s dilemma in AI

(15:57) Why AI companies build full platforms, not wedge products

(23:30) Revenue is just a math equation

(27:18) Two ways AI increases conversion rates

(36:56) AI will never replace spending time with customers

(39:46) Don’t measure the impact of brand marketing

(49:03) Your marketing must be different (and hard)

(58:39) Customer discovery calls and working with design partners

(1:03:03) The zero to 100 launch

(1:11:00) Monaco’s launch playbook

(1:19:00) Send gifts that are unique and social

(1:22:17) Naming your company

(1:28:04) Founders should send early outbound

(1:32:38) How multi-channel augments AI outbound

(1:39:42) Using intent signals and outreach timing to increase conversions

(1:43:28) Two common ways founders mess up when scaling revenue

(1:50:22) Monaco’s Forward Deployed AE's

Referenced

Try Monaco: https://www.monaco.com/

Careers at Monaco: https://jobs.ashbyhq.com/monaco

Sam’s launch post: https://x.com/samdblond/status/2026420015793320129?s=20

Follow Sam

Twitter: https://x.com/samdblond

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/sam-blond-791026b/

Follow Turner

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak

Subscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week: https://www.thespl.it/

Nuno Goncalves Pedro is the Founder and Managing Partner at Chamaeleon. He won't describe it this way, but I'd call Chamaeleon something like "The RenTech of VC."

Chamaeleon is built around its proprietary data platform, Mantis, which borrows tools like factor analysis from public-market investors and operates more like a quant hedge fund than a traditional venture firm.

We talk through a bunch of data that cuts against the common narrative in venture, including why repeat founders aren't always the safer bet, why sub-$100m funds catch the majority of fund-returning deals, and why 10x might be a better target than 100x.

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, Amplitude, and Merge for supporting this episode.

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APY https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Merge: Every modal. One API. Total control. Check out Merge’s Agent Handler. merge.dev/turner

Timestamps:

(1:00) When 1st time founders outperform serial entrepreneurs

(8:05) Mantis: factor-driven quant model for VC

(18:33) Why most VC’s are not data-driven

(22:28) Top 1% VC fund performance

(27:41) Early customer sentiment stronger success indicator than PMF or Team

(34:09) Importance of co-investors on performance

(39:42) Sub-$100M funds capture 70% of fund-returning deals each year

(43:53) The Neolab AI bubble

(52:16) Marketing games that VC’s play

(55:22) Most investors are not high conviction

(56:43) Startups not raising for at least 3 years are 5x less likely to succeed. 10x less likely at 5 years.

(1:00:19) Emerging managers have lowest LP interest in the last 15 years

(1:11:19) LP capital is much less concentrated than in 2011

(1:16:28) The importance of remaining relevant

(1:21:01) You must lean into your unique edge as an investor

(1:23:18) Pros/Cons of an alumni network venture strategy

(1:28:29) Specialist funds outperform generalists (with a catch)

(1:35:22) The data says go for 10x, not 100x returns

(1:41:41) Should you start or join a VC firm today?

(1:48:07) Nuno’s collection of 270+ phones

(1:53:16) Racing cars (and winning championships)

Referenced

Chamaeleon: https://www.chamaeleon.vc/

Tech Deciphered Podcast https://decipheredshow.com/

Say It With Charts: https://www.amazon.com/Say-Charts-Executives-Visual-Communication/dp/007136997X

How To Lie With Charts: https://www.amazon.com/How-Charts-Gerald-Everett-Jones/dp/1419651439

Redmagic Phone: https://redmagic.gg/

ASUS Rog phone: https://rog.asus.com/phones/rog-phone-model/

Follow Nuno

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ngpedro/

Follow Turner

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak

Subscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week: https://www.thespl.it/

I just attended Allocate’s Beyond Summit in Deer Valley Utah. It was a peek into what the top VC's and LP’s are thinking about right now.

Allocate asked me to record an episode of the show, live from the conference.

So I asked everyone “What’s your hottest take on the VC market today?”

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, and Amplitude for supporting this episode

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APY https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Timestamps:

(1:22) Seed investing is dead (Tripp Jones, Uncork)

(5:56) Seed is not dead (Bryan Rosenblatt, Sandlot)

(13:19) Most consensus era of VC ever (Nate Williams, Union)

(18:02) Taking the Power Law Pill (Pratyush Buddiga, Susa Ventures)

(29:15) The 2nd-time founder premium is dead (Matt Cohen, Ripple Ventures)

(32:46) AI will crush intelligence labor (Clark Cheng, Merrimac)

(42:25) New deep tech investors will lose their shirts (Sunil Nagaraj, Ubiquity Ventures)

(46:39) ChatGPT for robotics is still 15 years away (Sungjoon Cho, Fortitude Ventures)

(52:07) The app layer ARR reckoning (Josh Christensen, Mercato)

(58:30) The AI bubble will pop in Q2/Q3 (Amias Gerety, QED)

(1:08:22) Most individuals do VC wrong (Jon Oberheide)

(1:15:25) Allocators have become too allocator-y (Dan Feder, University of Michigan)

(1:20:55) LP’s should value information, not just returns (Ben Ivey, Marshall Street)

(1:24:09) Upcoming litigation of Russian doll SPVs (Asher Siddiqui, Song United)

(1:30:13) Why retail needs private market access (Sarah Pinto Peyronel, Robinhood Ventures)

Referenced

https://beyondsummit.allocate.co/

Tripp Jones, Uncork Capital

Twitter: https://x.com/thistrippjones

Bryan Rosenblatt, Sandlot

Twitter: https://x.com/BRosenblatt4

Nate Williams, Union

Twitter: https://x.com/naywilliams

Pratyush Buddiga, Susa Ventures

Twitter: https://x.com/pratyushbuddiga

Matt Cohen, Ripple Ventures

Twitter: https://x.com/mattybcohen

Clark Cheng, Merrimac

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/clark-cheng-cfa-frm-caia-a411535

Sunil Nagaraj, Ubiquity Ventures

Twitter: https://x.com/sunilnagaraj

Sungjoon Cho, Fortitude Ventures

Twitter: https://x.com/josungjoon

Josh Christensen, Mercato

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshjdmba/

Amias Gerety, QED

Twitter: https://x.com/amiasmg

Jon Oberheide

Twitter: https://x.com/jonoberheide

Dan Feder, Michigan

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/danfeder

Ben Ivey, Marshall Street

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benivey

Asher Siddiqui, Song United

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashersiddiqui

Sarah Pinto Peyronel, Robinhood Ventures

Twitter: https://x.com/SPintoPeyronel

*This podcast is produced by Allocate for informational and educational purposes only and is intended for institutional, accredited, and qualified investors. Nothing discussed constitutes an offer to sell or solicitation to purchase any security or advisory service, and nothing should be construed as legal, tax, or investment advice. Any offering will be made only pursuant to applicable confidential offering documents.

Views expressed by participants are their own and subject to change. Any discussion of target returns, projected outcomes, IRRs, MOICs, or other performance metrics is hypothetical and illustrative only and should not be relied upon as an indication of future performance.

Investments in private funds are speculative, illiquid, and involve substantial risk, including possible loss of the entire investment. Past performance is not indicative of future results.

Certain guests may have financial or other interests in the opportunities discussed. Allocate Management Company, LLC is an SEC-registered investment adviser. Registration does not imply any level of skill, training, or SEC endorsement. Please consult your own advisors before making any investment decision.*

Alfred Wallforss is the Co-founder of Listen Labs, the AI customer research company.

Companies like Microsoft use Listen to run AI-powered customer interviews, and Alfred talks about how they first landed them as a customer at a pitch competition.

We talk why startups should pursue enterprise customers early on, why 85% of survey answers are random clicks, how AI is changing the $140B market research industry, leveraging VC’s for customer intros, how to stand out when recruiting as a startup, and hiring for obsession.

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, and Amplitude for supporting this episode

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APY https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Timestamps:

(0:14) Listen: AI customer research tool

(7:30) Fraud is a big problem in customer research

(9:06) The $140B customer survey industry

(12:08) Why running customer surveys is so hard

(16:03) AGI will never replace humans

(18:25) Surveys vs interviews

(21:13) Importance of emotion in data collection

(22:54) Using AI interviews to get product feedback

(26:15) Building digital twins creates better data

(32:22) Outperforming generic AI tools

(34:17) Sweetgreen’s Max Protein Bowl

(36:09) Jevon’s Paradox in customer research

(40:37) Quantitative vs qualitative

(42:38) Landing Microsoft as an early customer

(44:50) Targeting enterprise customers from day 1

(48:05) Building a VC customer intro leaderboard

(51:53) Recruiting with billboard games

(57:20) Hiring for obsession

(1:02:07) Alfred’s favorite movies

(1:03:53) Listen’s custom agent harness

(1:06:24) Velocity Fellowship for Swedes moving to SF

(1:08:34) Growing up with entrepreneurial older brother

(1:09:46) No shoes in the office

Referenced

Try Listen: https://listenlabs.ai/

Careers at Listen: https://listenlabs.ai/careers

Sweetgreen protein bowls: https://listenlabs.ai/case-studies/sweetgreen

Toni Erdmann: https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4048272/

Episode with Erik @ Modal: https://www.thespl.it/p/building-ai-native-infrastructure

Follow Alfred

Twitter: https://x.com/itsalfredw

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/wahlforss

Follow Turner

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak

Subscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week: https://www.thespl.it/

Tomasz Tunguz is the Founder and General Partner of Theory Ventures.

We talk about today’s “all out sprint” in AI, Anthropic’s strategy, the three layers of AI business models, how AI compares to prior technologies, where to invest in AI today, and what Theory looks for in new investments.

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, and Amplitude for supporting this episode

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APY https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Timestamps:

(0:42) The “all out sprint” in AI today

(1:40) Why GPU prices are up 116% in six weeks

(6:34) AI infra end-state: “We’ll over build”

(9:12) Tokenmaxxing, and why AI needs to get more efficient

(15:48) AI models will resemble pharma more than software

(19:52) Why Anthropic still trades at a discount

(25:42) Anthropic’s strategy: commoditize the compliments

(30:29) Why OpenClaw is so strategic for OpenAI

(34:08) The three layers of AI business models

(38:18) Where to invest in AI today

(45:49) Who will survive SaaSpocalypse?

(52:15) Comparing AI’s impact to historical technology cycles

(57:34) How new technology historically impacts jobs

(1:05:58) Where AI is underrated today

(1:10:41) How people are actually buying AI products

(1:14:06) Why Theory’s investing in ads, inference, and email

(1:16:24) 2026 IPO pipeline, how VC has changed over 20 years

(1:20:56) What Theory looks for in new investments

(1:22:32) Starting Theory Ventures in 2022

(1:25:39) Running a monte carlo analysis to determine portfolio construction

(1:27:54) Tomasz personal AI projects

Referenced

Theory Ventures: https://theoryvc.com/

Tomasz Blog: https://tomtunguz.com/

Follow Tomasz

Twitter: https://x.com/ttunguz

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/tomasztunguz

Follow Turner

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak

Subscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week: https://www.thespl.it/

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Ali Partovi is the Co-founder and CEO of Neo.

Neo started in 2017 as a network for the top college students. Neo is a “people-first” investor, a thesis it developed missing out on early investments in PayPal and Google at three employees.

Neo has since invested in the Seed rounds of Cursor and Kalshi, and Ali shares everything he’s learned about spotting outlier talent, how to hire the best people, how computer science is the best business education, and why the best entrepreneurs start young.

Special thanks to Hadi Partovi, Fuzzy Khosrowshahi, Alan Shusterman, and Claire Shorall for their help brainstorming topics for Ali.

Thank you to Numeral, Flex, and Amplitude for supporting this episode

Numeral: The end-to-end platform for sales tax and compliance https://www.numeral.com

Flex: Get premium banking and a net 60 day credit card at 0% APY https://home.flex.one/referral/bananacapital

Amplitude: AI analytics, all you have to do is ask https://www.amplitude.com

Timestamps:

(0:09) Neo’s two 10x funds

(2:19) Missing PayPal led to Neo

(9:32) Not investing in Google at 3 employees

(11:31) Backing Facebook despite the idea

(13:01) Starting Neo to help top college students

(17:21) How to identify outlier talent

(24:38) Neo’s coding test

(27:41) Bootstrapping the first cohort of Neo Scholars

(34:58) How Cognition President Russel Kaplan changed Neo forever

(39:21) Starting Neo after talking to Steph Curry

(46:42) Launching [Code.org](http://Code.org) to teach 20M kids to code

(59:38) Is coding still relevant in 2026?

(1:03:43) How to hire outlier talent

(1:07:25) Why you should aggressively apply for one job

(1:11:09) Neo Residency: $750k uncapped

(1:19:51) Growing up in Iran during the revolution

(1:26:03) Impact of the immigrant mentality

(1:29:15) Most entrepreneurial roots start very young

(1:39:18) Lessons investing in Cursor + Kalshi seed rounds

(1:50:27) Confession: a podcast about failure

(1:52:36) Fucking up a $50m deal by lying to Steve Jobs

Referenced

Neo: https://neo.com/

Neo Scholars Application: https://neo.com/scholars

Neo Residency: https://neo.com/residency

Code.org: https://code.org/

Lying to Steve Jobs: https://x.com/apartovi/status/1447251334814523392

Losing a deal with Yahoo: https://x.com/apartovi/status/1449856639331340289

Follow Ali

Twitter: https://x.com/apartovi

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/apartovi/

Follow Turner

Twitter: https://twitter.com/TurnerNovak

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/turnernovak

Subscribe to my newsletter to get every episode + the transcript in your inbox every week: https://www.thespl.it/