Colorado Innovators: Mike Conover, Founder and CEO of Brightwave

In this episode of The Bear Roars, Dan Caruso sits down with Mike Conover, founder and CEO of Brightwave, for an in-depth conversation about artificial intelligence, investing, and the hidden structures that shape our world.Mike begins by sharing his academic roots in complexity and network science at Indiana University, where he studied how information, disease, and influence spread across interconnected systems. From modeling airline networks and pandemics to analyzing early social media polarization, he explains how understanding complex systems led him into machine learning and ultimately into building AI products.The conversation turns to the launch of ChatGPT and why it surprised even experts. Mike explains the breakthrough moments that made generative AI feel different from previous waves of technology, breaking down concepts like gradient descent, model training, and the emergence of autonomous AI agents in practical terms. He shares what it was like staying up late experimenting with early models and realizing the world had shifted.Dan and Mike then dive into Brightwave, the AI-powered research platform built for investment professionals. Mike explains how AI agents can analyze massive data rooms, connect details across documents, surface long-tail risks, and generate structured outputs such as financial models. They discuss how these systems augment human judgment rather than replace it, helping investors move faster and think more comprehensively while still relying on experience and context.Learn more about Brightwave: https://brightwave.ioOrder Dan’s Book – Bandwidth: The Untold Story of Ambition, Deception, and Innovation that Shaped the Internet Age and Dot-Com Boom: dan-caruso.com/bookListen to Dan's Song Stretch: https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/dancaruso/stretchCheck out music by Jason Mendelson (Jace Allen): https://www.youtube.com/@jaceallen To nominate a founder or yourself as a future guest speaker, email: contact@loudbearproductions.com