01:18:08 · Jordi Hays, John Coogan
[01:18:08] S0: The kill switch. [01:18:09] S1: The kill switch, which is something like every... I think, like, Bernie Sanders has literally asked for that. And, like, many other people have been like, we need an AI kill switch. And and the labs have said that there is, like, effectively a nuclear football, that there's a device that can, you know, take everything offline. But I think every company wants an AI kill switch. So good good market positioning, good branding. You know, people are rebranding compute... Data centers to compute campuses. Our buddy over at now the Atlantic, Mike Isaac, wants to use the term... Doesn't wanna use data centers. He doesn't wanna use compute campuses. He wants to call them data bases. The base for all the data. I like that. I'm still supercomputer camp, but... [01:18:56] S0: Yeah. We we... We've had the perfect name for decades, the supercomputer. [01:19:00] S1: I know. The supercomputer. It just sounds so good, and it even fits with, like, the new the new super intelligence push. The other news... There there... There's a bunch of OpenAI news here. They hired Dan Driscoll, former TBPN guest. [01:19:15] S0: Boom. [01:19:15] S1: We got him. US army secretary. [01:19:16] S0: This guy's deeper than I thought.
01:19:16 · Jordi Hays, John Coogan
[01:19:16] S0: This guy's deeper than I thought. [01:19:18] S1: I I I really enjoyed talking to Dan Driscoll when he came on the show. It was a very funny moment for us because it was like, we were just having fun on our show. There was like, now we're talking to the secretary of the navy or the army. Army. Oh, the army. And, yeah. The the reactions that day, there were some quote. It was being like, TBPN's talking to head of the army? Like... Because it it it had turned from, like, Us just purely joking around to, like, us joking around with, like, our friends. And, obviously, we had some very successful founders and venture capitalists on, but it was still, like, very, very, very lighthearted and and pretty low stakes interviews. Just people yapping about their their takes in the market business. And then this one was, like, so so good to see him hopping in.
01:20:02 · Jordi Hays
[01:20:02] S0: SpaceX Yeah. Has introduced Starfall, which enables affordable routine access to a microgravity environment, providing unique opportunities for manufacturing scientific research and testing in low Earth orbit. SpaceX says Starfall for biomedical research, developing advanced biomaterials, medical implants, stem cell, organoids, and replacement tissues. Tyler, you would wanna... You were looking at developing some stem cell organoids, so I'm sure that's exciting for you. Pharmaceutical discovery, growing more uniform protein and drug crystals and microgravity to accelerate drug and materials science manufacturing next gen materials and semiconductors using the vacuum and microgravity environment of space. So I always thought with Varda, like the sort of like debate around Varda since the very beginning was that like, okay, incredible incredible team, like very very unique sort of like market that they're going after. Always questions or it was like so difficult for people to even believe that like this was super necessary and and next like what would the end market even be? It just it seems so like experimental and sci fi that it was almost like it was hard to... It was much harder to get behind than like the typical like manufacturing startup which is just like we make widgets and we're gonna sell this many this year and we're gonna hopefully sell more next year and many many more in you know, a decade, right? And I always, in the back of my mind, was like, well, I don't know what this market turns into, but at least like this feels like very complimentary to SpaceX and it doesn't seem like something SpaceX is gonna do. Yeah. And turns out turns out they are gonna go compete in this category. But if anything, it just feels like incredibly validating to Varda because SpaceX just wouldn't do this unless it was like they saw it as like a a massive, you know, opportunity. Right? That was gonna be a very important part of the overall space economy. So although Varda now has some real competition, again, this just feels like a huge, like, vote of confidence in the business and the and the overall market opportunity. So, pretty pretty
01:22:24 · John Coogan, Jordi Hays
[01:22:24] S1: cool to see. That come out of it. Like, one is, is this something that can be somewhat complementary to Varda in the sense that I I... It's unclear if SpaceX is building just the launch trajectory, the launch capacity to send something up and bring it back. Like, that is a different workflow that Varda had to build. And then Varda also had to build a capsule for doing the biomedical research and has real bunch of deep partnerships with bio companies. So there is a world where they wind up working together in some capacity. And then also we've just seen time and time again, companies not wanting to dual source for... Or single source [01:22:59] S0: Yeah. [01:22:59] S1: Intelligence, Frontier Labs, or, launch capacity. And so Rocket Rocket Labs going, and ASTS is still, you know, trading really high because there's just this expectation that not not everyone is gonna be signing up for Starlink because some of them are gonna say, I want an alternative. I wanna be able to dual source. I wanna have some negotiating leverage. So overall, exciting to see it... The whole market, like, really heat up. And and, yeah, total validation that the thesis was something that was... That that was interesting and viable, and that there would be real demand behind because SpaceX wouldn't be going after it unless there was serious demand. Let me tell everyone about console. Console builds AI agents that automate 70% of IT, HR, and finance support, giving employees into resolution for access requests and password resets.
01:22:59 · John Coogan, Jordi Hays, Harley Finkelstein
[01:22:59] S1: Intelligence, Frontier Labs, or, launch capacity. And so Rocket Rocket Labs going, and ASTS is still, you know, trading really high because there's just this expectation that not not everyone is gonna be signing up for Starlink because some of them are gonna say, I want an alternative. I wanna be able to dual source. I wanna have some negotiating leverage. So overall, exciting to see it... The whole market, like, really heat up. And and, yeah, total validation that the thesis was something that was... That that was interesting and viable, and that there would be real demand behind because SpaceX wouldn't be going after it unless there was serious demand. Let me tell everyone about console. Console builds AI agents that automate 70% of IT, HR, and finance support, giving employees into resolution for access requests and password resets. [01:23:46] S0: Something going on in in politics today, John? [01:23:51] S1: What's that? [01:23:53] S0: I don't know. I just... I keep seeing random posts about... I don't know. A lot of a lot of blue and red. [01:24:00] S1: No. I I meant what what's politics? [01:24:02] S0: Oh, yeah. Yeah. [01:24:04] S1: I mean, that that might be my need [01:24:06] S0: to say that for another episode. The TBPN deep dive. Yeah. [01:24:10] S4: Explains you the history. [01:24:11] S0: It's not not on any policy or politicians, but just the history of politics. [01:24:17] S4: The concept.
01:24:17 · Harley Finkelstein, John Coogan
[01:24:17] S4: The concept. [01:24:18] S1: Where does it come from? Let's start with Rome, Greece, democracy. Yeah. Get out there, vote, do whatever you gotta do on on, election day. And, there's there's some good Nate Silver, podcast going around. He was on Odd Lots breaking down poll... Polling and, and, prediction markets are fitting together today and some of his thinking on the the benefits of each of them and where some of them break down, but it's all interesting. We'll we'll have a bunch of updates tomorrow, I'm sure, as as the polls roll in. Although some of the some of the, elections could be, like, takes time to count the votes, so maybe go ongoing all week. But there are plenty of shows where you can go get updates on what's happening with the midterms, so go check it out. Yesterday, we were at the New York Stock Exchange. Let me tell you about the New York Stock Exchange. Wanna change the world, raise capital at the New York Stock Exchange. Let's do it. Don't... Yeah. Get your mind off the midterms. Go IPO at the New York Stock Exchange. That's... If you're frustrated with the political climate, just take your company public. It's easy. Great. I want your take on this on this font. Are you are you a fan of this font? They're calling it the new Comic Sans. This speaks to me. As a Doritos American, this is me. But what do you think? Is this is this going in your repertoire for brand building?