Intro

Today’s show:

Cerebras just jacked its IPO range to $150–$160 a share, OpenAI bought a consulting firm to seed its $4 billion private-equity joint venture, and a startup in Oakland is electrolyzing magnesium out of seawater for one-third the going price. Alex Wilhelm and Jason Calacanis go deep with AI21 co-CEO Ori Goshen on why model orchestration, not bigger LLMs, will decide who wins enterprise AI.

The crew also covered the decline of OpenClaw, TikTok's new £3.99 ad-free tier, more entries in the live-show sidebar bounty, and had time for a little Off Duty before signing off.

Guest Links:

Ori Goshen on LinkedIn

AI21

Alex Grant on LinkedIn

Magrathea Metals

Timestamps:

0:00 Ori Goshen, CEO of AI21 joins the show

1:20 Plaud: If your work depends on conversations — interviews, meetings, calls — you need a Plaud NotePin. You can check it out at https://Plaud.ai/twist and use code TWIST for 10% off!

5:14 Why enterprises care about token cost optimization

6:01 Jamba as open-weight; Maestro as proprietary orchestration

10:08 LinkedIn Jobs - Hire right, the first time. Post your first job and get $100 off towards your job post at https://LinkedIn.com/twist

12:56 AI21 customer roster: FNAC, US tech giants, Israeli companies

19:01 Alex Grant, CEO of Magrathea Metals joins to discuss pulling magnesium from seawater

20:03 Live video of the Oakland pilot electrolyzer

20:10 Deel - Founders scale faster on Deel. Set up payroll for any country in minutes, hire anyone anywhere, get visas handled fast, and get back to building. Visit https://deel.com/twist to learn more.

22:01 Magnesium as a "gateway metal" for aluminum, defense, aerospace

23:20 TETRA joint venture & the Evergreen Project in Arkansas

23:38 Series A close, JV economics: $3,000/ton vs. $7,000/ton market

29:10 Sidebar bounty update: Glass Sidebar (Oliver Choy) demo

30:47 Netsuite - Get the free business guide Demystifying AI at https://netsuite.com/twist

31:47 Sidebar bounty update: Sidecast (Patrick Hughes) demo

36:09 Reducing scope to "real-time fact checker only" for final round

37:24 Ro.co: Ro's insurance checker will let you know if your coverage includes GLP-1s for FREE. Go to https://Ro.co/Twist for your free insurance check.

39:07 Cerebras IPO: $115–$125 → $150–$160 per share

44:19 Will OpenAI's compute commitments to Cerebras actually get funded?

49:19 Fervo Energy IPO — venture-backed geothermal company going public

49:40 OpenAI Deployment Company + Tomoro acquisition explained

53:51 Anthropic's parallel $1.5B PE joint venture with Blackstone & Goldman

56:05 Why Jason thinks these PE spinouts are convoluted financial engineering

56:40 OpenClaw's decline + competition from Cowork, Perplexity, Grok

1:04:22 TikTok's £3.99 ad-free subscription launches in the UK

1:09:09 Knicks sweep 76ers — Jason's playoff predictions

1:11:24 Off-duty: "There Is No Antimemetics Division" by qntm

1:13:25 Off-duty: Fall of Civilizations podcast by Paul Cooper

1:16:37 States' rights, federalism, housing supply & closing thoughts

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 Alex:

X: https://x.com/alex

LinkedIn: ⁠https://www.linkedin.com/in/alexwilhelm

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

Check out Jason’s suite of newsletters: https://substack.com/@calacanis

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