Martin, co-founder and CEO of Bench, is building "Cursor for hardware engineering" to bring AI assistance to rocket builders, roboticists, and physical product developers. Connecting from San Francisco during a Valley exploration trip, he discusses raising a £1M+ seed round led by Superseed while evaluating whether to split operations between London and US markets. Having founded his university's hyperloop team before meeting Imperial rocket-building co-founder Rayhan, he explains why hardware development has lagged behind software in AI adoption and his vision for automating complex engineering workflows across multiple file types and simulation platforms.

Harry, Software Engineer and Labour Digital Committee Member, dissects the UK government's innovation strategy through the Number 10 Innovation Fellowship program and sovereign AI ambitions. Having witnessed the fellowship's evolution from Dominic Cummings' 2020 "misfits and weirdos" initiative, he reveals how the government is achieving dramatic efficiency gains through AI-powered tools like Extract, which reduces planning document digitization from 2 hours to 3 minutes with 98% accuracy, and Parlaks, which analyzes parliamentary debates to predict policy reception and identify potential supporters. He explains the fellowship's "tour of duty" model that attracts private sector talent with £80-200k salaries for 6-month to 2-year commitments, positioning it as an alternative to traditional government efficiency approaches. Harry breaks down the UK's sovereign AI stack challenges, from the Isambard supercomputer's 100,000 Nvidia H100 GPUs to the geopolitical risks of hardware dependencies, emphasizing how Nvidia's export controls have become a foreign policy tool as the US shifts from "petrodollar to technodollar" dominance while the UK seeks to balance innovation with strategic autonomy in an increasingly fragmented global AI landscape.

Zara Paul, CEO of Bigged and Dragons' Den alumna, is building a "performance marketing operating system" that combines human creativity with AI automation for paid social campaigns. After bootstrapping her first company, Choppity, to £150K ARR (currently in due diligence for sale), she pivoted to solve Meta's Andromeda algorithm changes that now favour creative variants over audience targeting. Working alongside her CTO/ husband, Aaron & CMO, Luke, she explains their "sales in public" strategy targeting brands like Huel while preparing for SF through The Residency's Delta Chapter One

Carolina Lopez (Caro), technical recruiter at Vercel, explains the complexities of hiring cloud infrastructure engineers for a 650-person company building the future of web development. Based in New York and recruiting globally across SF, NYC, Berlin, London, and Amsterdam, she breaks down Vercel's values-based interview process and the importance of understanding both technical depth and strategic impact. The conversation reveals how CEO Guillermo Rauch conducts weekly customer interviews visible to all employees, her philosophy on "thinking like an owner" for career development, and why she uses unconventional platforms like X and GitHub to source top-tier talent.

Kenneth Thomas, principal at Back Future VC and co-host of "The Mergers" podcast, dials in from New York to discuss early-stage B2B SaaS investing and the upcoming SaaStock Dublin conference featuring a £1M winner-take-all pitch competition. Having moved from banking to FinTech to venture capital, he explains his fund's solo GP structure advantages and thesis on founder-market fit, while criticising VCs who make commitments without capital backing. The conversation covers European versus American storytelling approaches, the role of domain expertise in early-stage investing, and his podcast's focus on unconventional routes into and out of finance.

Tim Zaal, Video Lead at VEED transitioning to Corum AI, reveals the "SaaS content mafia" playbook that built Veed Studio to 150K subscribers. In this breaking news segment, he announces his move to a hardware-software AI company focused on home security, bringing his content expertise to a new vertical. He breaks down the difference between YouTube's intentional viewing versus TikTok's algorithmic discovery, explains why authentic storytelling trumps generated content, and shares his philosophy on making tech videos emotionally resonant through real-world use cases rather than feature demonstrations.

Wenmiao Yu, Cofounder & Director of Business Development at Quantum Dice and host of "Low to Grow" podcast, discusses building quantum random number generation technology as one of five co-founders in this Oxford spinout. With a chemistry background and £2M pre-seed funding, she explains why their DISC (Device Independent Self Certification) protocol is crucial as quantum computing advances threaten current cryptographic systems. The conversation covers the UK's strong quantum ecosystem, the challenges of selling deep tech, and her philosophy on maintaining emotional boundaries between personal identity and startup success while building what she calls "the foundation" of future encryption systems.

Ash Turner, Influencer Marketing Manager at Synthesia, breaks down the company's creator strategy across LinkedIn's evolving B2B landscape. Having transitioned from LinkedIn's creator development team, he reveals how Synthesia builds long-term partnerships with niche creators rather than one-off campaigns, moving creators through funnel stages while leveraging their "Around the Globe" campaign that connected five creators across different languages to showcase AI dubbing capabilities. He emphasizes natural partnership alignment over forced collaborations and explains how Synthesia's approach differs from traditional platforms by focusing on creators who aren't full-time content makers but have built trusted audiences in specialized fields like L&D.

TODAY ON VENTURES5 hours of StreamingBringing you the latest on what is happening in the landscape of technology. Jump in the chatFeed us your thoughts & questions - It's LIVE. 12:00: Ash Turner, Influencer Marketing Manager - Synthesia12:30: Wenmiao Yu, Cofounder & Dir. Business Development - Quantum Dice, Host - Low to Grow13:00: David Spickett, Founder & Ceo - TheCarCrowd13:30: Tim Zaal, Video Lead - VEED.IO14:00: Kenneth Kashif Thomas, Principal - BackFuture, Host - The Mergers14:30: Carolina Lopez, Engineering Talent - Vercel15:00: Harry Moy - Labour Digital15:30: Zara Anita Paul, CEO - Bigged16:00: Martin Bielicki, CEO - BenchFollow us on YouTube & LinkedIn to watch DM - if you want to appear on the show or sponsor it Today 11:30LFG 🚀 🚀

Chris J Smith, director at Gold Studios, provides creator economy insights as YouTube surpasses traditional TV among under-25s per fresh Ofcom data. Managing talent while expanding into new WeWork office, he discusses format innovations like Bryson DeChambeau's "Break 50" with Adam Sandler, explains taking digital content to live events, and argues brands must develop entertainment channels over traditional advertising.