This Week in Startups

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Odoo: https://Odoo.com/twist Sentry: https://sentry.io/twist Stripe: https://stripe.com/startups Plaud: https://Plaud.ai/twist Today’s show: Democrats swept the midterms, and a lot of their candidates ran explicitly against AI data centers. Then on Thursday, the Nasdaq fell 5%. But fear not: Jason says the panic is overblown. Back in August, he predicted that the anti-data center rhetoric on the campaign trail would transform into cutting a deal once the voters were counted. On TWiST, Jason and Lon discuss the route to compromise that could define the next year of AI discourse. Find out why Jason still gives President Trump an A+ on AI, even as he lost touch with the country’s mood on other issues. Plus we’re checking out some highlights from the archive, as the show followed the decline of Trump 2.0 in real time, and Jason explains his simple method for staying informed and in touch with everyday reality. (Talk to lots of different people!) Plus: OpenAI’s post-election pledge, Anthropic’s first content licensing deal, Apple cuts engineer AI budgets, Lon’s latest This Week in AI demo, and the guys get mega-hyped for “Godzilla Minus Zero.” Relevant Links Voters rebuff data centers in every ballot measure except one (CNBC): https://www.cnbc.com/2026/11/04/data-center-ballot-measures-2026-midterm.html Hinojosa's call for a data center moratorium until the legislature acts (campaign): https://ginafortexas.com/2026/07/new-hinojosa-calls-on-greg-abbott-to-put-moratorium-on-data-centers-until-a-legislative-session-that-puts-texans-first/ Talarico defeats Ken Paxton (Texas Tribune): https://www.texastribune.org/2026/11/03/texas-ken-paxton-james-talarico-us-senate-elections-2026/ Microsoft pulls out of its UK data center deal with Nscale (Computing): https://computing.co.uk/news/2026/ai/microsoft-exits-nscale-deal-ipo-at-risk Gavin Baker on TX data center rules: https://x.com/GavinSBaker/status/2118420042283102604 California's billionaire tax (Prop 40) goes down (Bloomberg): https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-11-05/california-voters-poised-to-reject-first-ever-billionaire-tax TWiST E2113 w/ Steven Borrelli of Cuts: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_qxDoJvzSiY TWiST E2332 w/ Jason’s data center prediction: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojSmG6xHCdI OpenAI pledges to pay for its data centers' power and halt NDAs (CNBC): https://www.cnbc.com/2026/11/05/openai-to-pay-for-data-center-power-after-election-shows-ai-concern.html Anthropic strikes its first licensing deal, with the AP, for election coverage (Adweek): https://www.adweek.com/media/anthropic-licensing-deal-ap-election/ The New York Times v. OpenAI discovery fight (Bloomberg Law): https://news.bloomberglaw.com/ip-law/new-york-times-wants-access-to-top-openai-executives-documents Apple's first touchscreen MacBook Pro, from $2,899 (Tom's Guide): https://www.tomsguide.com/computing/macbooks/apple-reveals-oled-touchscreen-macbook-pro Lon’s Plaud demo post: https://www.thisweekinai.ai/p/record-your-ideas-with-plaud-then Plaud MCP for ChatGPT and Claude: https://in.plaud.ai/blogs/news/plaud-mcp-for-chatgpt-and-claude Terry Black's Barbecue: https://terryblacksbbq.com P. Terry's: https://www.pterrys.com Torchy's Tacos: https://torchystacos.com Velvet Taco: https://www.velvettaco.com ”Godzilla Minus Zero” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pu0pH5BuCPM “Hope” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mYRc2Gl7geY “Dark Matter” Season 2 trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zhB6_1UbR7s “House of the Dragon” Season 3 trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JlMjgqduVw Timestamps: 0:00 Jason’s initial take on the Blue Wave 6:40 The data center pause was about appeasing voters 10:55 Odoo - The all-in-one business platform. Your first app is free! Get started today at https://Odoo.com/twist 11:56 Corruption, Iran, and the cost of living brought down Republicans 16:18 How the Cuts CEO shifted Jason’s tariff take 21:12 Sentry - New users can get $240 in free credits when they go to https://sentry.io/twist and use the code TWIST26 29:06 Plaud - If your work depends on conversations - interviews, meetings, calls - you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://Plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off! 29:15 Lon’s Plaud Agent demo 33:40 Stripe - Stripe Startups offers early-stage, venture-backed startups access to Stripe fee credits and more. Apply today on https://stripe.com/startups. 34:48 Leadership is repetition 40:19 Why AI labs should revenue share with publishers 50:16 Pricing out the new touchscreen MacBook Pro 56:46 Income taxes, capital gains, and margin loans 1:01:17 Godzilla returns in “Minus Zero” Subscribe to our newsletters on Substack: TWiST: https://twistartups.substack.com/ TWiAI: https://www.thisweekinai.ai/ TWiVC: https://thisweekinvc.substack.com/ Subscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Every: https://every.io/ Vanta: https://www.vanta.com/twist G2i: https://g2i.co/twist Plaud: https://plaud.ai/twist Fintrx: https://www.fintrx.com/ Today’s show: Democrats took the House and Senate, and overnight trading suggested a huge market drop. But in the morning, the markets went another way, and D.A. Wallach thinks he knows why. A Congress that can’t get anything done can’t do anything BAD, like start a war or a tariff fight. The only thing markets hate than gridlock is uncertainty. On the first post-midterm This Week in VC roundtable, Jason is joined by Wallach (Time BioVentures), Elana Gold (Two Roads Capital), and Tomasz Tunguz (Theory Ventures). Together, they work out what a split government could mean for tech and venture. Data centers are now a political target for both parties. 2027 might be the last major window for big M&A. Plus, D.A. worries that an intergenerational war could be brewing, between the people who own AI’s upside, and the young workers who fear getting replaced. Plus thoughts on Cava’s 22% layoffs, Sequoia shutting down its Scouts and Arc program, the SPV “boiler room,” and more. Guests D.A. Wallach on X: https://x.com/dawallach Time BioVentures: https://www.timebioventures.com/ Elana Gold on X: https://x.com/ItsElanaGold Two Roads Capital: https://tworoads.vc/ Tomasz Tunguz on X: https://x.com/ttunguz Theory Ventures: https://theoryvc.com/ Relevant Links: NBC exit poll: 56% say AI and data centers were a crucial or major factor (DCD): https://www.datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/nbc-exit-poll-56-say-ai-data-centers-were-a-crucial-or-major-factor-in-congressional-vote-decision/ How AI backlash shaped the 2026 midterms (TIME): https://time.com/article/2026/11/04/midterm-elections-results-ai-industry-data-centers/ Musk on chips outrunning electricity in 2026, with Elon's reply: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2117649850644705591 Panthalassa raises $140M for wave-powered AI compute at sea (Tom's Hardware): https://tomshardware.com/tech-industry/artificial-intelligence/palantir-co-founder-peter-thiel-backs-usd140m-wave-powered-ai-data-center-startup-panthalassa-aims-to-run-offshore-compute-nodes-using-ocean-energy Marvell to buy Lumentum in a $115B deal (The Next Web): https://thenextweb.com/news/marvell-lumentum-acquisition-115bn-all-stock San Francisco mourns bodega cat killed by a Waymo (CBS SF): https://www.cbsnews.com/sanfrancisco/news/sf-mission-district-mourns-store-cat-killed-by-waymo Meta launches $115M program to train workers for data center jobs (Axios): https://www.axios.com/2026/06/08/meta-data-center-workforce-academy-job-guarantee Keep track of the value you're getting from AI (TWiST): https://twistartups.substack.com/p/keep-track-of-the-value-youre-getting-da4 Meta's Muse hits 10.9M downloads (Yahoo Finance): https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/article/metas-muse-ai-agent-hits-109-million-downloads-as-chatgpt-slides-25-153532560.html Curbie (Revere Robotics): https://www.revererobotics.com/ Canva lays off over 1,200 people amid slowing growth (TechCrunch): https://techcrunch.com/2026/11/04/canva-lays-off-over-1200-people-amid-slowing-growth/ Ollama raises $65M as it nears 9M developers (Startup Fortune): https://startupfortune.com/ollama-raises-65-million-as-it-grows-to-nearly-9-million-developers/ Sequoia hits rewind, undoing 20 years of expansion (TechCrunch): https://techcrunch.com/2026/11/04/sequoia-hits-rewind-undoing-20-years-of-expansion/ "The Sequoia of Tomorrow" (Sequoia): https://x.com/sequoia/status/2117961312143855764 Travis Kalanick's Atoms raises $1.7B (TechCrunch): https://techcrunch.com/2026/07/22/travis-kalanicks-robotics-company-raises-1-7b-led-by-a16z/ Vast: https://www.vastspace.com SEC accredited investor exam could expand private-market access (CNBC): https://www.cnbc.com/2026/10/01/sec-accredited-investor-exam-private-markets.html General Compute raises a $100M Series A (DCD): https://datacenterdynamics.com/en/news/neocloud-general-compute-raises-100m-in-series-a-funding-round Hyperliquid CEO Jeff Yan on democratizing pre-IPO access (Motley Fool): https://www.fool.com/investing/2026/10/19/hyperliquid-ceo-jeff-yan-says-perpetual-futures-ma/ Kalshi Perps: https://kalshi.com/perps Aalo Atomics: https://www.aalo.com Exowatt: https://www.exowatt.com Timestamps: 0:00 The Blue Wave: Dems take Congress 0:10 Plaud: If your work depends on conversations - interviews, meetings, calls - you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off! 6:42 What a split gov’t means for defense tech 9:21 Is 2027 the last big window for tech M&A? 11:04 Every.io: For all of your incorporation, banking, payroll, benefits, accounting, taxes or other back-office administration needs, visit https://every.io. 13:44 Are anti-robotaxi laws coming? 18:51 The need for positive AI stories 24:12 Vanta - Get $1000 off your SOC 2 at https://www.vanta.com/twist 25:59 How AI can make voters smarter 31:22 Self-driving and the future of car insurance 40:17 G2i has been recruiting software engineers for over a decade. Go to https://g2i.co/twist to find out how G2i vets engineers, and can help you hire them in days, not weeks. 45:00 Jason’s $12K Mac Studio 50:12 Sequoia retires its Scouts and Arc programs 58:21 Jason’s barbell: Zipline, Atoms, and Vast 1:01:19 When VC firms go public 1:08:42 Scrap the accredited investor rule 1:14:26 Hyperliquid and permissionless synthetic markets 1:17:17 Kalshi perps and Anthropic price discovery Subscribe to our newsletters on Substack: TWiST: https://twistartups.substack.com/ TWiAI: https://www.thisweekinai.ai/ TWiVC: https://thisweekinvc.substack.com/ Subscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp Follow Jason: X: https://twitter.com/Jason LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasoncalacanis Check out all our partner offers: https://partners.launch.co/ Great TWIST interviews: Will Guidara, Eoghan McCabe, Steve Huffman, Brian Chesky, Bob Moesta, Aaron Levie, Sophia Amoruso, Reid Hoffman, Frank Slootman, Billy McFarland Follow TWiST: Twitter: https://twitter.com/TWiStartups YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/thisweekin Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisweekinstartups TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thisweekinstartups Substack: https://twistartups.substack.com

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Paper: https://getpaper.ai/twist G2i: https://G2i.co/twist Northwest Registered Agent: https://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twistdomain Plaud: https://Plaud.ai/twist Today’s show: Odyssey co-founder and CEO Oliver Cameron builds simulated worlds for a living, so we asked him the obvious question: are we all living in one, right now? He says he’s 90% certain that, yes, we are. To help make the case (and show off their world model technology), Oliver’s team dropped a simulated fruit fly brain into an AI world, that’s being rendered and created in real time. So far, on X, 6.2 million people have watched the virtual fly navigate an imaginary world. On TWiST, we’re digging into how world models learn about physics, gravity, and causality just by watching videos, what make Odyssey-3 an ideal trainig ground for AI agents, and why a world model only renders the parts of the world that are currently being experienced. It’s a peek inside the technology that may, one day, allow us to enslave people in The Matrix and turn them into batteries. Or train self-driving cars more effectively! One of those. Plus: SpaceX throttles Grok Bot over unsustainably high costs, but Jason says it’s worth every penny. And will OpenAI’s suggested name change from data centers to “compute campuses,” and Meta’s efforts to improve El Paso, help turn around American attitudes? Or is blasting them into space the only remaining viable option? Guest Oliver Cameron on X: https://x.com/olivercameron Odyssey: https://odyssey.systems/ Relevant Links The fruit fly brain flying inside Odyssey-3 (6.2M views): https://x.com/odysseyml/status/2111589148146749616 Meet Odyssey-3, Odyssey's foundation world model: https://odyssey.systems/meet-odyssey-3 FlyWire: https://flywire.ai/ Nick Bostrom, "Are You Living in a Computer Simulation?”: https://simulation-argument.com/simulation.pdf Do we live in a simulation? Chances are about 50-50 (Scientific American): https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/do-we-live-in-a-simulation-chances-are-about-50-50/ "Beyond Perception: Proposing Our Reality as an ASI Alignment Simulation" (Ali Eslami, IPI Letters): https://ipipublishing.org/index.php/ipil/article/view/350 The double-slit experiment explained (Royal Institution, Jim Al-Khalili): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9tKncAdlHQ “A Glitch in the Matrix” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=au8eT79WUJ0 Elon Musk throttles Grok Bot limits over "unsustainably high" costs (TechCrunch): https://techcrunch.com/2026/11/02/elon-musk-throttles-grok-bot-limits-due-to-unsustainably-high-costs/ Elon's post: "The cost of serving Grok Bot was unsustainably high relative to revenue”: https://x.com/elonmusk/status/2116992258520064397 Jason's post: "< $40k a year on tokens… getting $2m+ in value": https://x.com/Jason/status/2117126320962351277 Grok Bot: https://x.ai/bot Plaud Web: https://web.plaud.ai Founder University Japan: https://japan.founder.university/ Most Americans say AI is bad for society and oppose more data centers (ABC/WaPo/Ipsos): https://abc7ny.com/story/most-americans-say-ai-is-bad-society-oppose-more-data-centers-abcpostipsos-poll/19964027/ Chris Lehane's memo: AI will be the issue in 2028 (TNW): https://thenextweb.com/news/chris-lehane-memo-openai-2028-ai-election Meta touts El Paso water and grid pledges as council weighs incentives (KFOX): https://kfoxtv.com/news/local/meta-touts-10b-el-paso-data-center-water-and-grid-pledges-as-council-weighs-incentives UT Austin's Texas Advance Commitment (free tuition under $100K): https://admissions.utexas.edu/cost-aid/financial-aid/texas-advance-commitment/ Andrej Karpathy's HackerTube post: https://x.com/karpathy/status/2116957135661945283 Jason's "Unsponsored" Chrome extension for Amazon: https://x.com/Jason/status/2116380861167714594 Google's first data center satellite is online and writing poetry (TechCrunch): https://techcrunch.com/2026/10/30/googles-first-data-center-satellite-is-online-and-writing-poetry/ What is low Earth orbit? (Universe Today): https://www.universetoday.com/articles/what-is-low-earth-orbit Timestamps: 0:00 Grok Bot users are at their limit 3:36 How Jason and LAUNCH get $2M+ in value out of AI 5:46 Jason’s Grok-made jacket lookbook 10:35 Paper is the legal backbone for thousands of startup founders and fund managers - including Jason. Use https://getpaper.ai/twist to get your cap table free for a year - or two years if you're leaving Carta. 14:12 Everything changed in AI over the last 90 days 20:41 G2i has been recruiting software engineers for over a decade. Go to https://g2i.co/twist to find out how G2i vets engineers, and can help you hire them in days, not weeks. 22:06 Plaud: If your work depends on conversations - interviews, meetings, calls - you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off! 22:37 Wiring our Plaud into our Grok Bot 23:24 Odyssey’s fruit fly video zooms to 6.2M views 27:32 All About Simulation Theory 34:34 Got a new business idea? Northwest Registered Agent helps you bring it to life. Get a free domain, email, phone number, and more - with no purchase required! Learn more at https://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twistdomain 38:33 What is the double slit experiment? 40:47 How to teach a robot about physics 50:01 OpenAI’s plan to make Americans love data centers 56:53 Meta’s El Paso data center pitch 1:02:26 AI companies should overfund local schools 1:06:27 Karpathy’s HackerTube project 1:13:02 Google’s first space data center goes online 1:17:51 How much room is there in low Earth orbit? Subscribe to our newsletters on Substack: TWiST: https://twistartups.substack.com/ TWiAI: https://www.thisweekinai.ai/ TWiVC: https://thisweekinvc.substack.com/ Subscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp Follow Lon: X: https://x.com/lons Follow Jason: X: https://twitter.com/Jason LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasoncalacanis Thank you to our partners: Paper is the legal backbone for thousands of startup founders and fund managers - including Jason. Use https://getpaper.ai/twist to get your cap table free for a year - or two years if you're leaving Carta. G2i has been recruiting software engineers for over a decade. Go to G2i.co/twist to find out how G2i vets engineers, and can help you hire them in days, not weeks. Got a new business idea? Northwest Registered Agent helps you bring it to life. Get a free domain, email, phone number, and more - with no purchase required! Learn more at https://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twistdomain Plaud: If your work depends on conversations — interviews, meetings, calls — you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://Plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off! Check out all our partner offers: https://partners.launch.co/ Great TWIST interviews: Will Guidara, Eoghan McCabe, Steve Huffman, Brian Chesky, Bob Moesta, Aaron Levie, Sophia Amoruso, Reid Hoffman, Frank Slootman, Billy McFarland Follow TWiST: Twitter: https://twitter.com/TWiStartups YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/thisweekin Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisweekinstartups TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thisweekinstartups Substack: https://twistartups.substack.com

This Week In Startups is made possible by: Stripe: https://stripe.com/startups Rippling: https://rippling.ai/twist Northwest Registered Agent: https://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twistdomain Plaud: https://plaud.ai/twist Today’s show: Binance lost an estimated $6.3 billion in the biggest crypto hack ever, and Jason proposes a radical solution. The entire tech industry should stop shipping new features for one month a year, and do nothing but patch. (Call it No App November?) On a busy Friday show, Jason and Lon dig into the. Binance breach and look back at Jason’s prescient 2021 warning about leaving your money in crypto exchanges. (He recommends spreading your wealth around various different banks!) Plus, why he’s giving CZ credit for backstopping customer losses out of his own fortune. Plus, DoorDash’s $17B acquisition of Instacart… Did DoorDash overpay? And is this happening now to avoid the harsher regulatory climate should Democrats regain power in the midterms? Then we’ve got Hermetiq co-founder and CEO Jake Newfield, who has twice won the LAUNCH Accelerator’s pitch competition. Hear the celebrated two-minute pitch for an AI build engineer, and find out why Jason thinks having a “lighthouse customer” makes such a huge difference. Finally, we’re awarding the Grand Prize in our $5K bounty competition to create Jason’s Annotated app, and remembering the legendary film and TV actor Sir Patrick Stewart. Guest Jake Newfield on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jakenewfield/ Hermetiq: https://www.hermetiq.com/ Bazel: https://bazel.build Apply to the LAUNCH Accelerator: https://www.launch.co/apply Relevant Links Binance links the $6.3B theft to a compromised DevOps laptop (BleepingComputer): https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/binance-links-63-billion-crypto-theft-to-compromised-devops-laptop/ The 1978 Lufthansa heist (History.com): https://www.history.com/articles/1978-lufthansa-heist-jfk-henry-hill-goodfellas Trump pardons Binance founder Changpeng Zhao (KWTX/AP): https://www.kwtx.com/2025/10/23/trump-pardons-binance-founder-changpeng-zhao CrowdStrike: https://www.crowdstrike.com/en-us/ Palo Alto Networks: https://www.paloaltonetworks.com/ Grant Cardone challenges Jason to $1M Bitcoin bet: https://www.thestreet.com/crypto/markets/grant-cardone-challenges-bitcoin-bear-to-1-million-bet DoorDash to acquire Instacart for $17B (TechCrunch): https://techcrunch.com/2026/10/29/doordash-to-acquire-instacart-for-17b/ Economic Liberties calls on the FTC to block the deal: https://www.economicliberties.us/press-release/economic-liberties-calls-on-ftc-to-block-doordash-instacart-merger/ Central Market, H-E-B's upscale banner, expands home delivery (Supermarket News): https://www.supermarketnews.com/foodservice-retail/central-market-expands-curbside-and-home-delivery People are using AI to make their smart TVs dumb again (TechCrunch): https://techcrunch.com/2026/10/19/people-are-using-ai-to-make-their-smart-tvs-dumb-again/ TWiST $5K Bounties: https://bounty.thisweekinstartups.com/ Founder University: https://founder.university/ Founder University x Japan: https://japan.founder.university/ Inside.com domain auction: https://inside.com/ Yank Sing: https://yanksing.com/ Cafe du Monde coffee and chicory: https://shop.cafedumonde.com/product/coffee-beignets/cafe-du-monde-coffee-and-chicory Patrick Stewart, "Star Trek" and "X-Men" actor, dead at 86 (CNN): https://www.cnn.com/2026/10/29/entertainment/patrick-stewart-death “Time Squared” (Star Trek: TNG S2E13): https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Time_Squared_(episode) “Green Room” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8XSARX3DQg “X-Men: Days of Future Past” trailer: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pK2zYHWDZKo Timestamps: 0:00 The largest crypto hack or theft in history 5:45 Jason gives CZ credit for backstopping losses 7:34 Jason’s cybersecurity proposals 11:48 Stripe Startups - Stripe Startups offers early-stage, venture-backed startups access to Stripe fee credits and more. Apply today on https://stripe.com/startups. 14:49 DoorDash buys Instacart for $17B 18:48 Is DoorDash overpaying? 24:28 Thanks to our partners at Rippling! Head to https://rippling.ai/twist and get the only AI built to give you full visibility across your startup and take complex actions across your entire business. 26:26 Vibecoding your smart TV 27:20 Plaud: If your work depends on conversations - interviews, meetings, calls - you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off! 30:04 Jake Newfield (Hermetiq) gives a perfect pitch 34:13 Got a new business idea? Northwest Registered Agent helps you bring it to life. Get a free domain, email, phone number, and more - with no purchase required! - Learn more at https://www.northwestregisteredagent.com/twistdomain 37:12 Lead with your lighthouse customer 43:14 The Cafe Du Monde branding lesson 51:10 The Annotated Bounty finals begin 1:04:00 Jason announces the grand prize winner 1:07:34 RIP Sir Patrick Stewart Subscribe to our newsletters on Substack: TWiST: https://twistartups.substack.com/ TWiAI: https://www.thisweekinai.ai/ TWiVC: https://thisweekinvc.substack.com/ Subscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp Follow Lon: X: https://x.com/lons Follow Jason: X: https://twitter.com/Jason LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasoncalacanis Great TWIST interviews: Will Guidara, Eoghan McCabe, Steve Huffman, Brian Chesky, Bob Moesta, Aaron Levie, Sophia Amoruso, Reid Hoffman, Frank Slootman, Billy McFarland Follow TWiST: Twitter: https://twitter.com/TWiStartups YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/thisweekin Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thisweekinstartups TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@thisweekinstartups Substack: https://twistartups.substack.com

This Week In Startups is made possible by: PayPal: https://paypal.com/business The Conservation Fund: https://www.conservationfund.org/ Hostinger: https://hostinger.com/twist Plaud: https://plaud.ai/twist Today’s show: Anthropic’s S-1 is here, and finally, we can start to develop a real understanding for the AI economy and whether the numbers add up. Anthropic shows an operating profit, a mostly non-cash $80.7 billion loss, and customers spending a shocking 9x what they were spending on intelligence just one year ago. Is this the greatest business in history? Is AI now as addictive to enterprises as cigarettes once were to impressionable teens? On this week’s VC Roundtable, Jason Calacanis is joined by D.A. Wallach (Time BioVentures), Dave McClure (Practical Venture Capital), and Ben Black (Akkadian Ventures / Powerlaw Corp.) to seek some answers. They dig into the numbers, including that wild 900% net revenue retention, and consider how retail investors will consider the convertible-note charge behind their $80B loss. Plus they’ll debate whether Anthropic’s founders are really true believers driven by religious fervor, and if so, whether they’re destined to be out-competed by “rabid capitalists.” Guests D.A. Wallach on X: https://x.com/dawallach Time BioVentures: https://www.timebioventures.com/ Dave McClure on X: https://x.com/davemcclure Practical Venture Capital: https://practicalvc.com/ Trading Places podcast: https://www.youtube.com/@PracticalVentureCapital Ben Black on LinkedIn: https://linkedin.com/in/benblack Akkadian Ventures: https://akkadian.vc/ Powerlaw Corp: https://pwrl.com Relevant Links Anthropic’s S-1, by the numbers (Fortune): https://fortune.com/2026/10/27/anthropic-s1-ipo-filing-financials-profits/ 900% NRR and an $80.7B loss that mostly ins’t (HackerNoon): https://hackernoon.com/anthropics-s-1-shows-163b-in-half-year-revenue-a-900percent-nrr-and-an-807b-loss-that-mostly-isnt Tickertrends: https://tickertrends.io/ Replit makes OpenAI its default (TechCrunch): https://techcrunch.com/2026/10/17/replit-is-no-longer-working-with-anthropic-ceo-says/ Dario Amodei warns that rivals’ spending could risk bankruptcy (Fortune): https://fortune.com/2026/02/14/anthropic-ceo-dario-amodei-spending-capex-risk-ai-revenue-forecasts-bankruptcy Machines of Loving Grace (Dario Amodei): https://www.darioamodei.com/essay/machines-of-loving-grace Palantir CTO Shyam Sankar says AI researchers are taking up smoking (Fortune): https://fortune.com/2026/10/13/palantir-cto-shyam-sankar-ai-researchers-smoking-cigarettes-cure-cancer-artificial-general-intelligence-silicon-valley-mass-psychosis-effective-altruism/ Microsoft offers its first-ever voluntary buyouts (TechSpot): https://www.techspot.com/news/112174-microsoft-offers-voluntary-buyouts-thousands-us-workers-ai.html Canva ranks among the top consumer AI apps (SmartCompany): https://www.smartcompany.com.au/artificial-intelligence/canva-new-ai-consumer-web-app-ranking-andreesen-horowitz/ SpaceX Q3: Musk says it could rent out its AI compute several times over (Constellation Research): https://www.constellationr.com/insights/news/spacexs-q3-musk-says-it-could-rent-out-its-ai-compute-several-times-over Jason’s 2026 “Bitcoin is Dead” post: https://x.com/Jason/status/2114956980674605075 Jason to Michael Saylor: "there are better places to invest your money”: https://x.com/Jason/status/2115274438979756346 Timestamps: 0:00 Anthropic files its public S-1 4:58 Anthropic vs. OpenAI revenue run rates 9:20 PayPal is built for all businesses. Get started at https://paypal.com/business 10:02 “The greatest business in the history of capitalism” 11:58 Is intelligence the new tobacco? 18:08 The “meat sack constraint” 20:36 Thanks to our partner, The Conservation Fund! Learn more at https://www.conservationfund.org/ 22:13 Plaud: If your work depends on conversations - interviews, meetings, calls - you need a Plaud NotePin S. You can check it out at https://plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off! 24:32 The Who Has the Most Subscribers Challenge 28:08 Is Apple waiting out the AI race on purpose 30:22 Hostinger: The all-in-one platform for domains, websites, email, and marketing. Go to https://hostinger.com/twist and use the code TWIST for an additional 10% off Black Friday and Cyber Monday 34:19 Is Canva an AI company? 39:08 True Believers who still want to make money 48:21 The $72.4B convertible-note charge, explained 51:03 How long does AI compute stay useful? 58:19 Jason’s monthly “Bitcoin is Dead” post 1:04:41 Alicorns are unicorns with pegasus wings 1:09:58 Subscribe to the TWiST Newsletter! Subscribe to the TWiST500 newsletter: https://ticker.thisweekinstartups.com Check out the TWIST500: https://www.twist500.com Subscribe to This Week in Startups on Apple: https://rb.gy/v19fcp Follow Lon: X: https://x.com/lons Follow Jason: X: https://twitter.com/Jason LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasoncalacanis Thank you to our partners: PayPal is built for all businesses. Get started at https://paypal.com/business The Conservation Fund: Thanks to our partner, The Conservation Fund! 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