This Week in Startups

What we’ll learn from Anthropic’s $2-$3T IPO | E2325

This Week In Startups is made possible by: PayPal Open CLA Odoo Today’s show: *Anthropic is likely headed for the largest IPO in history. A reported 2-3 trillion October debut would blow past SpaceX’s recent record. Jason breaks down why the. numbers matter less than what they’ll reveal about the entire AI economy. Then, chats with a pair of founders: one who’s selling subscription water filtration systems that will keep microplastics out of your brain (and other body parts), and another who’s building the AI software that powers automated solar panel installation. Guests Sami...

These robots could cut delivery costs by 80% | Next Unicorns

This Week in Startups

These robots could cut delivery costs by 80% | Next Unicorns This Week In Startups is made possible by: Squarespace Northwest Registered Agent Agree Today’s show: *Cytronic built a robotics-first fulfillment network, packing and shipping orders for cents instead of dollars, from small, city-adjacent micro-warehouses. Alex chats with CEO and co-founder Kevin Gibbon about how he can build a fulfillment warehouse for $1.2 million, and why it costs Amazon 50M-100M. PLUS Eyebot delivers low-cost doctor-reviewed eyeglass prescriptions following 90-second vision tests, conducted...

Zuck’s AI manifesto is a data center PR masterclass | E2323

This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Every.io NetSuite YSecurity Today’s show: *Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg published a 6,500 word essay about the future of AI, and Jason thinks it’s his smartest PR move in years. The thinkpiece, “The Future is for Everyone: The Path to a Positive AI Future,” arrives alongside a new open-weight Meta model — Muse Glimmer — and the promise of an open-weight version of Muse Spark 1.2 to come. Zuckerberg’s clearly pitching an “abundance” narrative, promising the American public untold benefits from AI technology — everything from a...

How AI splits startups into winners and losers | E2322

This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: DigitalOcean Sentry Lightfield Today’s show: A hedge fund just blew up shorting SaaS stocks. In turns out, the software companies that went all in on AI are bouncing back. Figma’s CEO — still riding high on strong revenue — forfeited roughly $46 million in stock awards to ease investor nerves. Twilio posted its strongest quarter in years. Airbnb’s CEO credits AI as the single biggest factor in the company’s incredible turnaround. Jason and Lon break down what’s separating the winners this earnings season from the companies that are...

Airtable’s 80% off value crash: VCs explain why it’s still a win | E2321

This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Vanta Agree Odoo Today’s show: *Airtable just sold for $2.25 billion, an 81% drop from its peak of $11.7 billion. On this week’s TWiST VC Roundtable, Aditya Agarwal (South Park Commons), Niko Bonatsos (Verdict Capital), and Rick Heitzmann (FirstMark Capital) break down why the venture world sees this as a good outcome, not a financial disaster. By declining the deal, would Airtable’s team have just been delaying the inevitable? Is the fact that they reached $400M+ ARR on its own a reason to celebrate? Find out why our investor panel prefers...

How Bespoke faked AI until it actually worked (w/ Akemi Tsunagawa) | E2320

This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Odoo Quo Northwest Registered Agent Today’s show: *Before Bespoke’s “travel concierge” chatbot could actually hold a conversation, founder/CEO Akemi Tsunagawa and her team quietly answered customers themselves. That “fake it till you make it” strategy paid off. Bespoke landed Narita Airport as a customer based on the strength of their “chatbot” answers, and now the team runs three companies, and is expanding into shipyard robots. In the fourth and final edition of TWiST Tokyo for Summer ‘26, Jason and Akemi discuss her thesis:...

Why AI has no taste and how to fix it (w/ Thais Castello Branco) | E2319

This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: YSecurity MongoDB Odoo Today’s show: AI models can solve PhD-level math equations and code an app in minutes… So why does everything they design look like identical slop? Thais Castello Branco, founder of Taste Labs, raised $18.5M in seed funding to teach frontier models about aesthetics and outputting quality content. She talks to Jason and Lon about why even frontier models regress to the mean on subjective tasks, how paid “TasteMakers” can improve output quality, and whether AI accelerates or destroys the half-life of “what’s...

Banning Chinese robots isn’t regulatory capture | E2318

This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Northwest Registered Agent- Odoo - MongoDB - Today’s show: The FCC’s decision to ban Chinese humanoid robots over security concerns is a boon to American startups, which now face a narrower competitive market. But where should we draw the line on security over competition? Menlo Ventures’ Deedy Das, Weisburd Pierce’s David Weisburd, Plexo Capital’s Lo Toney, and LAUNCH’s Jason Calcanis broke down how they differentiate between legitimate security concerns and purported regulatory capture. Today’s venture capital roundtable also...

While other cultivated meat companies are collapsing, this one turned a profit | E2317

This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Every.io MongoDB Agree Today’s show: *Most lab-grown meat companies have already gone under. It’s expensive to produce, and there’s little demand from real-world consumers. But Tokyo’s IntegriCulture is still standing after selling their proprietary serum to cosmetics companies. On Episode 3 of TWiST from Tokyo, Jason sits down with Dr. Yuki Hanyu, an Oxford-trained chemist who started a DIY meat movement out of a comic convention and turned it into Japan’s first cell-cultured protein company. PLUS why the cultivated meat market stalled...

Why quantum has been “10 years away” for 30 years | E2316

This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: PayPal Open DigitalOcean Rippling Today’s show: *For three decades now, we’ve been told that breakthroughs in quantum computing are right around the corner. So why hasn’t anything materialized? On TWiST in Tokyo, Jason sits down with Yaqumo CEO Kazuhiro Nakashoji and discusses what needed to change (like better algorithms and hardware), and why we may finally be nearing quantum’s big moment. Find out why quantum machines are so error-prone, explore the unusual international quantum supply chain, and get a heads-up about the...

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This Week In Startups is made possible by:

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PayPal Open
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Today’s show:

*Jason spent $11 building out PodMeme, an AI tool that tracks down the best segments from top podcasts about a specific topic, then stitches them together into a single stream. His post laying out how he did it, featuring a simple screenshot of the product, got all the way to 1.1M views in just a few days.

It’s a simple fact: builders love to see what other people are building, and growing your new project “in public,” sharing your journey on social media, is a great way to develop buzz around your product before it even exists.

Today’s guest Thibault “Tibo” Louis-Lucas walks us through how he grew products like Tweet Hunter and Taplio on his social media account, using social media buzz and a focus on tools for creators to very quickly expand to over $1M ARR.

PLUS why Apple would only sue OpenAI if they knew they had them dead to rights… why Uber and Waymo are fighting over DC robotaxis… Jason’s response to the public backlash against surveillance startup Flock Safety… and the guys remember iconic New Zealand actor Sam Neill.

Guest:

Tibo Louis-Lucas on X: https://x.com/tibo_maker

Revid.ai: https://www.revid.ai/

Tweet Hunter: https://tweethunter.io/

Taplio: https://taplio.com/

Relevant Links:

Lemlist: https://www.lemlist.com/

GRIN influencer marketing: https://grin.co/

TechCrunch: “Apple Sues OpenAI”: https://techcrunch.com/2026/07/10/apple-sues-openai-over-alleged-trade-secret-theft/

We Must Act Now statement: https://www.wemustactnow.ai/

TechCrunch: “Uber’s Robotaxi Lobbying Effort”: https://techcrunch.com/2026/07/13/ubers-robotaxi-lobbying-effort-has-put-it-on-a-collision-course-with-waymo/

DC Autonomous Vehicle Deployment Authorization Amendment of 2026: https://www.billtrack50.com/billdetail/2003462

DoorDash: Meet Dot: https://about.doordash.com/en-us/dot

Flock Safety: https://www.flocksafety.com/

DeFlock: https://deflock.org/

Gigazine: Flock accuses Deflock of being a “terrorist org”: https://gigazine.net/gsc_news/en/20260209-flock-ceo-deflock/#gsc.tab=0

Unifi AI Security Systems: https://ui.com/physical-security

Jason’s PodMeme post: https://x.com/Jason/status/2076231055443440105

Jason responds to Justine Bateman: https://x.com/Jason/status/2076326740050206959

NYT Sam Neill obituary: https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/13/movies/sam-neill-dead.html

“Possession” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aLXW-oVbTxE

FanEdit: https://fanedit.org/forums/news-publisher/

“Manhunter” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cLqHlg2fAnE

HBO “The Man Will Burn” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRhUYPtp6Ao

Timestamps:

0:00 There's no air conditioning in Paris
7:27 Tibo Maker's "ship 1 product a week" challenge
9:24 The power of building products in public
10:59 Quo (formerly OpenPhone) - Quo gives you a clean, modern way to handle every customer call, text, and thread all in one place. Try it free at https://quo.com/TWiST
12:04 Excitement for JCal's "PodMeme" set-up
15:40 Compounding an audience and enlisting influencers
19:13 Your follower count is not important any more
20:59 PayPal - Built for payments, growth, and agentic. Paypal Open, built for all business. Visit https://paypalopen.com to get started
22:28 How Tibo got banned on LinkedIn twice
28:48 Apple sues OpenAI
30:59 Northwest Registered Agent - Get more when you start your business with Northwest. In 10 clicks and 10 minutes, you can form your company and walk away with a real business identity — Learn more at https://northwestregisteredagent.com/twist
38:44 How OpenAI should have handled the New York Times
45:10 DC's new robotaxi bill
52:06 Managing the AV and delivery-bot transition
53:23 Economists warn of AI job displacement
1:07:00 How Jason would fix Flock's messaging
1:17:26 Remembering Sam Neill
1:23:05 Lon's Dream AI edit
1:26:35 HBO's Burning Man docuseries