@istoica05 and his research colleagues at UC Berkeley have played a pivotal role in shaping both distributed systems and AI ecosystem through research, open source projects and entrepreneurship! Ion and his students created Apache Spark, Ray, vLLM, and SGLang, amongst others. And I am sure the best is yet to come!

I don't think it's very widely known how big of a role @istoica05 and the research community at UC Berkeley have played in shaping technology through research and open source. For just a few recent examples of foundational open source technologies, Ion and his students created Apache Spark, Ray, vLLM, and SGLang. Many companies rely on these projects. For anyone skeptical of the role academia can play in driving progress, spend some time with this group. You can feel it.

Another awesome Stanford PHD @FoundationCap happy hour with my partners @vassallo @joannezchen and @ashugarg! Thank you to everyone who came out!!!

We’ve seen 3 distinct waves of app-layer AI startups since ChatGPT was released, each with more competition and consolidation. We’ve just entered wave #3 and the competitive dynamics are shifting in interesting ways:

Major model providers like OpenAI and Anthropic have evolved from infrastructure companies into full‑stack product companies. Think about that power dynamic for a moment. These providers have a direct line of sight to which prompts drive the most usage and which features gain traction + they have a panoramic view of the entire AI ecosystem. When they spot something working well they can just build it themselves. How do you build an enduring app‑layer AI startup when the very platform you rely on might become your competitor? @JayaGup10 and I found the most resilient teams focus on 5 strategies 👇

Our portco @Kombaico is launching the first AI agent for Frontend development. They have achieved 30-60% performance gain over SOTA Gemini & Claude models coupled with generic agents & MCPs, in real-world frontend tasks. Try it out - generous free tier!

@deepigoyal: Incredible endeavor and so excited to see you and other Indian founders lead the charge!

🚨 Zomato founder Deepinder Goyal wants to build India’s first jet engine from scratch in Bengaluru.

@JWMarriott and @MarriottBonvoy pulled a bait-and-switch. Booked a nonrefundable room well in advance—only to be downgraded to a Springfield Suites because they overbooked. No warning. No compensation. Just arrogance and zero accountability. Been a loyal JW customer since 96, but I am done- never again! #Bonvoyed

Building a startup is a privilege. Doing it with our team, our customers, and our investors is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Thank you @ashugarg , @JayaGup10 and the @FoundationCap team for the confidence and the opportunity to build fearlessly. The rules for how we build and support software are changing, and we're about to rewrite the book! Game on :)