Casey Winters, Pinterest, gives a crash course in growing a startup (or, WTF is growth?)

In episode 626 of This Week in Startups, Jason sits down with Zapier CEO and co-founder Wade Foster. Through the lens both of their experiences with Zapier – Jason as a user and Wade as a founder – they discuss the origins of Zapier, how Wade and his fellow co-founders have navigated the tricky waters of incubators and raising capital in the past five years, and the future of the company. They also spend time talking about the power of automation, the future of work, and managing distributed teams. Read below for some of the highlights from the episode.

Jason talks to founders of two very different, emerging markets: solar energy and artisanal mixers. His first guest is Jonah Greenberger, whose company Bright is bringing affordable solar power installation to developing countries. It’s a great conversation about the state of solar, both in the US and abroad, and the power of brand ambassadors and providing an entirely new career opportunity to hundreds of students in Mexico. Next up is Jennie Ripps, the creator of the first tea cocktail mixer, Owl’s Brew.

In episode 624 of This Week in Startups, Intercom cofounder Des Traynor returns to the LAUNCH Incubator with another powerhouse talk. “Thinking Through the Funnel,” Des leads founders through different issues they should consider when trying to acquire users. Des lays a foundation by saying that most companies have no difficulty getting their first hundred, thousand, or sometimes even million users; it’s keeping those users that is the truly challenging task for companies. Read on for a quick walkthrough of the four main steps of getting — and keeping — users.

Scheduling a simple coffee meeting can take days and countless emails to complete, but Dennis Mortensen wants to change all that -- and more. In episode 623 of “This Week in Startups,” the founder of x.ai show us his AI assistant, which sets meetings for you like an actual human. He also shares his thoughts on Siri, Echo, the Danish tax system, his vision for x.ai’s AI assistants conquering other tasks, and the future of artificial intelligence.

In episode 622 of This Week in Startups, Jason sits down with Alec Ross, author of The Industries of the Future to discuss technology, employment, and the future of the United States economy (as well as the world). Their conversation ranges from Alec's experiences working as Senior Advisor for Innovation for Hillary Clinton when she was Secretary of State, to how unemployment rates in the U.S. differ from elsewhere, to robots and technology replacing jobs in the future.

Science rules! Rowbots transforms agriculture with robotic farming & Experiment.com crowdfunds cutting-edge research

Sprig co-founder & CEO Gagan Biyani scales sustainable, on-demand healthy food up to the next level

On episode 619 of This Week in Startups, Jason sits down for another News Roundtable, with Molly Wood from Marketplace, and Nellie Bowles from The Guardian. Through the course of conversation, they touch on some of the hottest issues in startups and Silicon Valley news: ongoing developments from Theranos, the competitiveness of incubators like Y Combinator, room for improvement at both LinkedIn and Yahoo, and how San Francisco is faring as the Super Bowl approaches. Here are some of the highlights from their conversation.

Today Jason sits down with Brock Pierce, Managing Partner at Blockchain Capital and Chairman of the Bitcoin Foundation. Together, they discuss blockchain protocol, bitcoin mining and scalability, innovative use cases, and the future of cryptocurrency. Throughout the episode, Jason asks Brock important questions about the technology and future of Bitcoin and blockchain; these answers provide insight into the cryptocurrency industry as a whole, and the huge potential it will have to change the world.