This Week in Startups

Ori Goshen, co-CEO of AI21, an enterprise AI leader building Maestro orchestration and the Jamba model family. Alex Grant, founder and CEO of Magrathea Metals, commercializing magnesium from seawater with a pilot electrolyzer. They discuss model orchestration vs bigger LLMs, Maestro and Jamba tradeoffs, magnesium-from-seawater pilot results, drying/IP innovations, and U.S. onshoring economics.

Jose Caldera, founder of Yanez, builds biometric-based personhood proofs to verify unique humans. David Moscatelli, CEO of Go Abacus, sells on-prem AI appliances for regulated industries. They discuss on-prem AI hardware and deployment, privacy-preserving biometrics and decentralized stress-testing, and how incentive-driven miners help harden identity systems.

Larry Covert of Oxcart Ventures, a defense-tech investor, joins Mike Granoff of Maniv, a mobility-focused VC, and Michael Eisenberg of Aleph, an Israeli startup backer. They spar over whether venture capital is breaking apart. They dig into AI revenue illusions, energy limits on compute, the chip war, defense-tech consolidation, allied supply chains, and why Tel Aviv could rise as a tech market.

Ankur Nagpal, Teachable founder and AngelList investor, unpacks USVC and why a $500 minimum could open venture-style investing to more people. He digs into fees, liquidity, portfolio mix, and the billion-dollar cap. Jon Durbin, a Chutes backend developer, joins to explore decentralized AI compute, secure GPU networks, trusted hardware, and the economics behind permissionless infrastructure.

Christian van der Henst, Platzi co-founder and startup community builder, unveils Valerie, an AI running a real vending machine. He dives into trusts, pricing chaos, inventory snafus, and why payments and permits still need humans. Robert Myers, Manifold Labs CEO building confidential AI compute, breaks down Targon, Bittensor, and the booming market for distributed GPU power.

Joaquín Cuenca Abela, Magnific co-founder and CEO, previously built Panoramio before its Google acquisition, joins for a fast tour of AI video marketing. He walks through making a post-apocalyptic ad in 24 hours. They cover prompt-based storyboarding, cheaper creative production, Hollywood’s shift toward AI, and the push toward hyper-localized ads.

A skeptical deep dive into a beanie that claims to turn thoughts into text without surgery. The conversation circles huge startup ambition, investor conviction, and the privacy fears of mind-reading tech. It also jumps into creator community tactics, parasocial risks, live AI sidebars for streams, and a new bounty for annotation tools.

China’s move to block Meta’s Manus deal takes center stage, with big questions around AI sovereignty and rising US-China tension. There’s also a fresh look at the OpenAI-Microsoft reset and what it means for cloud power. Then the conversation turns dark with a shocking self-driving car video and fears of a robotaxi backlash.

A $500 venture fund sparks a fight over who should get access to startup investing. A shocking Polymarket scandal turns a military mission into a high-stakes wager. Then the conversation swerves into media outrage over shoplifting, political violence, and where commentary crosses the line. It wraps with talk about teaching kids money and investing early.

Will Edwards, founder of Firehawk Aerospace, joins Maruchi Kim, a former Apple engineer and wearable AI researcher. They dig into 3D-printed rocket propellant, scaling missile production, and why defense startups are in a high-stakes race. Then it shifts to camera-equipped earbuds, subtle visual AI, translation, safety, accessibility, and a possible app ecosystem for wearable intelligence.