Bricks And Bytes NVIDIA GTC: AI Costs Drop 99%, Demand for Trades Surges, and a Payroll Startup Raises $10M in 3 Weeks
Mar 27, 2026
Anna Berger, founder and CEO of Trade, builds a construction back-office OS focused on payroll and field-to-finance workflows. She discusses closing $10M in three weeks and why narrow labor accounting and compliance matter. Conversations cover collapsing AI token costs, rising demand for skilled trades like electricians, and how AI changes engineering workflows and payroll automation.
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Token Costs Collapsed Nearly Two Orders Of Magnitude
- CoreWeave reported token costs for a million tokens fell from $32 to $0.09, implying huge reductions in inference expense and wider AI accessibility.
- That cost collapse enables many more builders to launch AI products because compute becomes affordable.
AI Models Are Specializing For Specific Tasks
- Models are trending toward specialization rather than pure commoditization, with different models better suited for different tasks.
- Perplexity's CEO bets AI will operate as an OS that runs objectives for small businesses, turning solo founders into high-output operators.
AI Adoption Is Increasing Engineer Job Openings
- Demand for software engineering roles rose after initial ChatGPT disruption because enterprises need engineers to build AI infrastructure.
- The hosts note job openings hit a multi-year high as companies prepare data pipelines and MLOps to leverage AI.