· 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.
· David Senra, Alexandr Wang
[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. [00:00:00] S1: Many weeks of being like, "This is insane. Is this even real? Does this make any sense? If it does make sense, how do I feel about it?" The predominant emotion was more like, "This is kind of insane." And then as I thought more about like, "Oh, I actually have to make a decision of whether or not I do this." That was in and of itself, there were a lot of conversations there with the people at Scale, with our investors. There were a lot of interesting conversations on that side. I mean, it's obviously really hard to let go of or give up your baby. [00:00:00] S0: Because you worked on Scale for how long? How many years? [00:00:00] S1: Yeah, nine years from founding until the- [00:00:00] S0: And you're still young. You're not even 30 yet. [00:00:00] S1: Yeah. [00:00:00] S0: So this is like a third of your life.
· David Senra, Alexandr Wang
[00:00:00] S0: So this is like a third of your life. [00:00:00] S1: There was something that Paul Graham said for a long time, which is like, "If you think of your company as your life's work, you will operate differently." I did really genuinely think of Scale as my life's work for the whole time that I was working on it. That was a tough emotional process. And then I think what ultimately got me was a combination of, "Wow, this is a win-win-win-win." It's a good deal for all parties. And also just this, I saw the potential of what could happen at Meta. And this is a point at which I think Meta on AI certainly looked like damaged goods in many ways and was maybe not the most appealing place to work on AI. But I think that kind of triggered my entrepreneur side where I was like- [00:00:00] S0: Because you can essentially rebuild it. It's like a refounding of the lab. [00:00:00] S1: Yeah. I think this is one of the things that ended up being kind of fascinating, which is because it was clear that there was so much work to do, it really cleared the way for me to be able to kind of build a lot of stuff up from scratch, set up the right principles, build the right culture. It created the conditions for us to build something amazing.