· David Senra, Alexandr Wang
[00:00:00] S0: Why? [00:00:00] S1: Mark obviously has an insane calendar and has a bajillion different things to deal with. And he's also very good at prioritization. He will spend a lot of time on the things that are really, really important, in some ways, too much time on the things that are really, really important. The only way he's able to do that and be a good dad and be a good partner and all this other stuff is to just ruthlessly prioritize. I had spoken to him a few times kind of after that and had gotten his advice as a founder to get advice from Mark Zuckerberg, obviously a really big deal. And I actually remember at that time, I would ask him a question on WhatsApp, and then he would write these really long responses, and I was really confused. I was like, "How does he have time to write these really long responses?" But now I realize he is just really fast and rigorous at writing. So, a lot of WhatsApp messages, he'll write a very rigorous, long response very quickly. It's a very impressive skill of his. [00:00:00] S0: Gives you a sneak peek into what's going on in his mind. [00:00:00] S1: Yeah. [00:00:00] S0: Fair.
· David Senra, Alexandr Wang
[00:00:00] S0: Fair. [00:00:00] S1: Yeah, there's racing. Meta was an important customer of Scale, and I would say prior to this instance, maybe we spoke once every six months or so. Maybe that was the cadence of our interactions. And then, yeah, I think he had called, and I think it was actually not obvious at first what the endpoint was going to be, because the first conversation was just like, this was after Llama 4, and it was kind of just asking, "What do you think we should be doing?" [00:00:00] S0: Why is that an important point, that this conversation is happening after Llama 4? [00:00:00] S1: Llama 4 was not on the trajectory that Meta wanted as a company. It definitely was, I think, internally speaking, a disappointment. And it was also at a time where AI was clearly becoming just increasingly, increasingly important. It was clear that AI was going to be really critical to the future of Meta. So yeah, the first few conversations, we spoke on the phone, and he was just sort of asking for advice on, "What do you think we should be doing? What do you think we should be focused on?" [00:00:00] S0: This is what I've heard about him privately, that he has this insane... It's not a board of directors, like a Meta board, although there's some people on the board that he also does this with, but he's got this group of world-class entrepreneurs around him. And I've spoken to some of them, like, "You don't understand. He asks for advice constantly." [00:00:00] S1: Yeah.
· Alexandr Wang, David Senra
[00:00:00] S1: Yeah. [00:00:00] S0: He's hitting us up. He's like, "Here's what's going on in my life or in the work. What would you do?" And then he'll do that over and over and over again. [00:00:00] S1: Yeah, I think this is quite an impressive trait. [00:00:00] S0: Yes. [00:00:00] S1: Because it takes humility, obviously, to continue doing that even after all the incredible things that he's been able to accomplish. The whole timeline from when he first reached out to when we announced the deal was five, six weeks. It was pretty quick. [00:00:00] S0: Another thing that world-class entrepreneurs have in common. We had Jonathan Ross, the founder of Groq, on this podcast. The first time we ever spoke- Publicly about the 20 billion dollars deal he did with NVIDIA, was on the show. And he's like, "From the time first call from Jensen to the money's in my bank account was three weeks." [00:00:00] S1: Yeah. That's amazing. I just had lots of ideas on what I'd be doing if I were in his shoes on how I would be thinking about Meta's AI strategy. One of the first things I said was what I said earlier, which is like, "Hey, I actually think because Meta is heritage-wise focused on things that people want to do is actually one of the most specially placed companies with this incredible shift to AI." I had lots and lots of ideas that I sort of sent his way, and then that was kind of this conversation happening in parallel with this like, "Oh, yeah, maybe we should potentially consider if there's a way to work together."
· Alexandr Wang, David Senra
[00:00:00] S1: Yeah. That's amazing. I just had lots of ideas on what I'd be doing if I were in his shoes on how I would be thinking about Meta's AI strategy. One of the first things I said was what I said earlier, which is like, "Hey, I actually think because Meta is heritage-wise focused on things that people want to do is actually one of the most specially placed companies with this incredible shift to AI." I had lots and lots of ideas that I sort of sent his way, and then that was kind of this conversation happening in parallel with this like, "Oh, yeah, maybe we should potentially consider if there's a way to work together." [00:00:00] S0: So when he says that, what do you think? Because this was not predictable to you. [00:00:00] S1: Not predictable, no. The whole thing was like a really crazy sequence. At the time, I was just like, "Oh, that's nice, but there's no way that-" [00:00:00] S0: But you know what that means when they say that, right? They want to buy you. It's always the same thing, but they say, it's like, "Oh, we got to find a way to work together." [00:00:00] S1: Yeah, I don't think I'd had that kind of coaching at the time. One thing that I explicitly felt at the time was like, yeah, it probably doesn't make that much sense even. I think I personally was like, "Yeah, maybe he's teasing it or throwing it out there, but does it even make that much sense?" [00:00:00] S0: Why wouldn't you think it makes sense? [00:00:00] S1: I mean, obviously, a deal ended up happening, so what do I know? But-
· Alexandr Wang, David Senra
[00:00:00] S1: I mean, obviously, a deal ended up happening, so what do I know? But- [00:00:00] S0: No, but back then. We know what happened, but I'm very curious to your thinking as you're going and experiencing this. The fact that you said, "Oh, yeah, you said this, but that doesn't make sense." Why wouldn't it make sense? [00:00:00] S1: Taking a step back, obviously the iconic Meta acquisitions have been Instagram and WhatsApp, and these were very clear product logic-driven decisions. Scale is a deep enterprise, government sales, an entirely different kind of business from Meta. And so the logic that I had thought at the time would have made sense is if Meta wanted to get into those things, then I think maybe that's the industrial logic that would have made sense. But this wasn't that, because I think Mark clearly was predominantly interested in getting the Llama program or his overall AI program onto- [00:00:00] S0: He wanted talent. [00:00:00] S1: Yeah, he wanted talent. It was kind of shrouded and unclear the whole time, a lot of the way. [00:00:00] S0: When did it become clear? After the money hit the account? [00:00:00] S1: When we started talking numbers, I was like, "Oh, wow. Okay. All right." That's when things became more clear. [00:00:00] S0: Yeah, at first you're like, "Oh, this doesn't make sense." Then you guys keep talking, and then how fast did he convince you this is a good path for you?
· David Senra, Alexandr Wang
[00:00:00] S0: Yeah, at first you're like, "Oh, this doesn't make sense." Then you guys keep talking, and then how fast did he convince you this is a good path for you? [00:00:00] S1: There was a part of it which was like, "Wow, this is a really fascinating deal construct." We ultimately landed on this deal where Meta invested, owns 49% of Scale. Scale continues. Myself and a few people joined Meta. What I was kind of incredulous about at the time was like, it's such a weird kind of deal, but is one that I think genuinely kind of was this very interesting win-win-win-win, so to speak. There's a win for the shareholders of Scale, because all shareholders of Scale got a great deal, benefited a lot. Scale continues, and I truly believe the best days of Scale are ahead of it. [00:00:00] S0: My question to you is, or what I'm personally interested in is, okay, he can explain this to you and you come around to that perspective in one phone call? Is this just like, "Wait, wait, Mark, I got to think. This is so fucking crazy. I got to think about this for a few days." Explain this process as much as you can.