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The IPO Comeback: Why Tech Giants Are Finally Going Public | All-In Liquidity IPO Panel

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The IPO Comeback: Why Tech Giants Are Finally Going Public | All-In Liquidity IPO Panel

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862 segments

0:00

Hey, 2026 could be an all-time [music]

0:03

record for IPOs.

0:04

>> The AI IPO of the year so far. That

0:08

company is Cerebras.

0:09

>> Cerebras Systems founder and CEO Andrew

0:11

Bubman. We are participating [music] in

0:13

something extraordinary on everything we

0:15

do. We are the fastest bar none.

0:17

>> Well, Marshall is the co-founder and CEO

0:19

of Planet [music] Labs.

0:21

>> Space and AI are really um a match made

0:24

in heaven. They're getting married. In

0:25

fact, just like Google figured out how

0:28

to index the internet and make it

0:29

searchable, we are indexing the earth

0:32

and making it searchable. [music] He's

0:33

got his glasses, the famous red glasses.

0:35

Brad Gersner is here, founder and CEO of

0:37

Autoimmet [music] Capital, a leading

0:39

tech investment firm.

0:40

>> I believe that the wave is the biggest

0:42

wave in the history of technology,

0:43

[music] will be incredibly beneficial

0:45

for America. I'm rooting for all of them

0:47

because I'm rooting for America. Ladies

0:50

and gentlemen, please welcome Brad

0:53

Gersonner, Will Marshall, and Andrew

0:56

Feldman.

1:00

[music]

1:01

>> On the couch, we switch on the couch.

1:05

>> Nice to see you, my friend.

1:07

>> Hey, [music] big boy.

1:09

>> Nice to see you.

1:09

>> Last last time I saw you, we were in

1:11

Davos.

1:12

>> Yes,

1:12

>> we were in Davos causing another drop.

1:15

Another JL. Do you hear that little

1:16

Davos?

1:17

>> We were just, you know, it was preipo.

1:19

We're chopping it up

1:20

>> with Davos.

1:21

>> We're in Davos.

1:22

>> Hanging out at Davos.

1:23

>> Well, no. Listen, I was Everybody knows

1:25

the story. I'm supposed to go on my

1:27

yearly Japan ski trip. Sax calls me

1:29

>> with Tucker.

1:30

>> Yeah. Well, anyway, we don't drop that

1:32

name, but [laughter] I'll pick it up for

1:34

you. Put it over here.

1:35

>> Tucker. Anyway, so I cancel on Tucker. I

1:37

cancel because Sax calls me. He says,

1:39

"Listen, Pus needs you, the world's

1:41

greatest moderator in Davos." I said,

1:43

"No problem."

1:44

>> I said, "Saxs, POTUS, and Davos." So I

1:48

said, "When?" He says, "In 3 days." I

1:51

say, "You got it." I go and they give me

1:53

a badge. And it's like the special green

1:55

badge and they buzz you through the

1:58

security and I look at the monitor and

2:00

it says Jason McCabe Calacanis with

2:03

Donald J. Trump.

2:05

>> Oh wow. How did you feel?

2:08

>> I thought it was hilarious. [laughter]

2:10

So then I went and we did a great

2:12

interview there and we did like six or

2:14

seven of these great all-in interviews

2:16

and it was fun.

2:16

>> Let's start this because uh the two of

2:19

you guys run two of the most interesting

2:22

and consequential newly public companies

2:24

in the stock market. Andrew Feland is

2:26

the founder and CEO of Cerebrus. Will

2:27

Marshall is the founder and CEO of

2:28

Planet Labs. But you are also the

2:30

insight and a gateway for all of us to

2:32

understand these two big trends. One is

2:35

in AI silicon, the other one is in space

2:38

data centers. I think it would be a

2:39

really interesting thing to

2:41

>> and emerging.

2:42

>> And emerging. Yeah. Um but let's just

2:45

take one step back. Uh you just heard

2:48

the last conversation about being

2:50

public, going public early. Let's just

2:52

talk about that cuz I'm just very

2:53

curious. How's it been? It's been 3

2:55

weeks or so for you. It's been about a

2:57

year and a half or two years for you. Uh

3:00

>> it's more fresh.

3:01

>> Was it Was it everything that you

3:02

thought it would be? Like

3:04

>> what's clear so far is I need to upgrade

3:07

my namerop game. I mean that that was a

3:09

tour to force. [laughter]

3:11

>> But by the way, you were you were in

3:13

Davos with

3:13

>> J. I was I was there but that um uh

3:17

>> tour [laughter] to force

3:20

uh look I I I think you do all this work

3:23

and I I think it's really difficult to

3:26

to overestimate the amount of garbage

3:28

that's involved in in going public. the

3:31

number of meetings where you you look on

3:35

the the Zoom and there are 130 attendees

3:38

and the amount of times you review these

3:41

documents and the commas move and and

3:43

just no value added. You go there and

3:47

you have this enormous event and the

3:51

next morning you've sold no more stuff.

3:53

your engineering projects have made no

3:55

progress since the day you weren't

3:57

public. And you go back to work and um

4:02

you you have some new constituents that

4:04

that you have to to to address and

4:07

communicate with, but the core parts of

4:10

your business, you have more money in

4:11

the bank. Um but not a damn thing

4:15

changes in the important parts of your

4:18

business. um if you still if you need

4:21

new supply or if your relationships with

4:23

your vendors are bad, they're still bad.

4:25

If they're good, they're still good. And

4:27

and so I I think what what we've seen is

4:31

um you your employees have a party,

4:34

everybody's really excited, and you put

4:36

your head back down, you high five, and

4:38

you go back to work. Can

4:39

>> can I can I just give a little context

4:41

and then I want to hear from Will. You

4:43

know, if if I can, Andrew, you know, we

4:45

were investors in Cerebrus. I was on the

4:47

board a year earlier where we were

4:49

trying to go public. Um, and you know,

4:53

aside from just being a warrior who

4:55

weathered a decade worth of storms that

4:58

would have taken out any normal human

5:00

being, the path to going public for

5:03

Cerebras was a particularly challenging

5:05

one. One of their investors was the UAE.

5:08

So there was questions about CPHAS, you

5:12

know, in in the prior under the Biden

5:14

administration challenging to get

5:15

public. My observation outside looking

5:18

in is everything was really hard until

5:23

it got really easy like n 9 and a half

5:26

years of really hard and then 12 months

5:29

you know of of of really easy where

5:31

everybody wanted to get in.

5:33

>> They priced the IPO at 185 which was up

5:36

the range was taken up two times. Okay.

5:39

The stock opened at $320 a share I

5:43

think. Today it's at 230 bucks a share,

5:46

5060 billion dollars in market cap for a

5:49

business like you know and andrew is

5:52

just one of these people. Let's let's

5:53

get back to work and build But my

5:55

my just add-on question to that is from

5:58

an employee morale perspective like

6:00

distraction perspective etc. has the

6:04

last 3 weeks you got a lot more capital

6:06

you got a lot more profile presumably

6:08

it's easier to sell to enterprise

6:09

customers today. net net if you were

6:12

advising me if I was in a similar

6:14

position would you say go public?

6:17

>> I I I think the first thing is a lot of

6:19

people asked us about how we got the

6:22

timing right.

6:23

>> Right.

6:23

>> And I I think the answer is by getting

6:25

it wrong for a decade. I mean that's

6:27

really the right way to get timing

6:29

right. Um I I think um first I we we

6:34

we've been at this for for more than a

6:36

decade and and we we brought everybody

6:39

who'd been with the company more than

6:41

nine years to share and we brought their

6:42

families. [snorts] And first I learned

6:45

that engineers owned ties. I didn't

6:46

actually know that. [laughter] Um and

6:49

they didn't die when they wore them. And

6:51

second I was surprised at how big a deal

6:54

it was for them and their family. they

6:56

they were really proud in a way that

6:59

sort of their parents [clears throat]

7:00

might have heard of it or uh that that

7:03

somehow this was like a a bar mitzvah or

7:06

kinera or something.

7:08

>> Um

7:09

>> and then you you had these sort of the

7:11

the children of immigrants, one of our

7:14

uh one of our leaders, her father,

7:17

Chinese immigrants said, "I thought it

7:19

would have happened faster."

7:22

[laughter]

7:23

>> Right. And but I I think um we are sort

7:29

of by nature

7:31

uh

7:33

sort of in the uh in the trenches

7:37

people. And so um we we love solving

7:41

hard problems. And so when when we had

7:43

this excitement, everybody went and they

7:45

were so excited and we had a party and

7:47

um I I think it it gave external

7:50

validation. And then everybody turned

7:52

around and said, "Now what are we now

7:54

back to work?" And and so I I I think um

7:59

>> and so you you started off kind of bang

8:02

right out of the gates. Will you had a

8:04

little bit different experience in terms

8:05

of you know the entry to the public

8:08

markets, but over the last 12 months

8:10

your stock has gone from five bucks a

8:13

share to 50 bucks a share, some 10x move

8:15

in the public markets. So talk us

8:17

through the other side of this where you

8:19

come public, nobody really notices until

8:21

they notice.

8:22

>> Well, we were one of the first space

8:24

stocks and and I think people just had

8:26

no idea what earth is going on in space,

8:29

how it was changing everything and they

8:31

were just like what the heck is that?

8:33

And and but but you know, I have similar

8:36

opinions. I mean, in the end, you've

8:37

just got to get on with executing the

8:39

business. uh the going public gives you

8:41

access to liquidity uh for early

8:44

shareholders whether that's the employ

8:46

early employees or early investors and

8:48

that's great it gives you cash for the

8:51

company that's great and I do think um

8:54

it helps your business as well because

8:57

the maturing event gives you more

8:59

credibility to various customers and for

9:02

us we work with biggest agricultural

9:04

customers big governments civil

9:06

governments defense and intelligence all

9:08

of those sort of actors they want to

9:09

know you're going to be around.

9:10

>> Exactly.

9:11

>> And not going to disappear. I mean, we

9:12

have countries that are fully dependent

9:14

on us giving them information. They

9:16

don't want to just disappear. So, they

9:18

really care that we're going to be

9:19

around and and being a public company

9:21

gives you the kind of force in the world

9:23

that people go, "Okay, you're here to

9:24

stay and you have access to capital if

9:27

you need it and so on, right? It's

9:28

legitimizing

9:29

>> and you know, you you know where the

9:31

stock is at any one day. You know, we're

9:33

not focused on that dayto-day. We're

9:35

focused on how we build long-term value

9:37

for our shareholders, right? And um you

9:41

know the market is I think started to

9:42

really understand where space is going,

9:44

why it is changing the the the world.

9:47

You know people forget how space is part

9:50

of your everyday life. Every time you

9:51

use a phone you're using communications

9:54

using satellites or GPS using satellites

9:57

or satellite data in some way or another

9:59

that's sort of integrated in your lives.

10:01

you may not realize it um but it's just

10:05

booming now there's there's a

10:07

>> and the the story's changed as well

10:09

obviously with SpaceX going public but

10:11

has the framing of

10:14

planet gone from like a data source for

10:17

people who need data from space and maps

10:18

to hey this is a tool to accomplish

10:21

tasks and military like post Andrew's

10:25

success like you probably would have

10:27

been bucketed into Andrew as a military

10:30

tech company. So is that framing what's

10:33

driving a lot of

10:33

>> I think it's a bit more nuance than

10:34

that. I mean firstly for the audience's

10:36

benefit what planet does we have

10:38

satellites doing earth imaging. We have

10:39

the largest earth imaging fleet about

10:41

200 satellites. They image the entire

10:43

earth every day. So think of it like the

10:45

Google uh satellite lay on Google maps

10:48

that you can look at except it's today's

10:50

date rather than 3 years old and we have

10:52

every day going back. So it's a time

10:54

series analysis of everything going on

10:56

on the earth. That's useful for farmers.

10:58

It's useful for energy companies. It's

11:01

useful for civil governments, flooding

11:03

and fires. It's useful for security

11:06

applications like you're getting at. And

11:08

it's a wide variety of use cases. Um, I

11:11

think that where we're seeing this is

11:13

that AI is now enabling the it's

11:18

basically reducing the barrier to entry

11:20

so that more people can get access to

11:22

this, right? And uh, you know, there's a

11:24

lot more to say on that, but AI is only

11:26

as good as the data it's trained upon.

11:28

percentage is military. I'm curious.

11:30

Sorry.

11:30

>> What percentage of revenue customer bas

11:34

um uh security is part of the initial

11:36

thing that we said we would do um out of

11:39

the gate, but it's true there's a bigger

11:41

fraction today than perhaps we would

11:43

have guessed. Um but the needs of the

11:45

geopolitical situation right now demand

11:48

what we're doing. Um you know, just as

11:50

an example, what this does is enable

11:52

them to see threats around the corner.

11:54

>> Yes. and then uh you know give them

11:57

weeks or months advanced warning of

11:59

things and then that enables them to

12:00

more likely do things that stop

12:02

conflict. So we believe this is you know

12:05

really better for the world.

12:06

>> Are you reticent to be perceived as a

12:09

military company?

12:10

>> Not really. I but I wouldn't say we're

12:12

limited to being perceived like that,

12:14

right? um we we are helping farmers, we

12:16

are helping uh you know uh energy

12:19

companies, civil governments, we work

12:21

with NASA, we work with what have you

12:24

and and so um it's a it's a bigger it's

12:27

a bigger play than that but back to the

12:28

space uh piece of it what has changed

12:31

obviously rocket costs have come down

12:35

about four or 5x over the last uh 10

12:37

years which has helped tremendously but

12:40

a thing that people don't know that is

12:42

actually perhaps more important is that

12:44

we've had a miniaturization of

12:46

satellites. So that the same satellite

12:48

that used to cost a billion dollars and

12:50

weigh 20 tons now cost a few kg or a few

12:54

tens or hundreds of kg

12:56

>> and can do just as much stuff if not

12:58

more. It's it's the same as the sort of

13:00

mainframe computer to desktop revol

13:03

computer revolution for space and it's

13:05

unlocking just like mainframes to

13:07

desktops unlock loads of applications.

13:10

This is unlocking loads of applications

13:12

and it's so both go in combo the launch

13:15

cost coming down and this

13:16

>> let's build let's build on this. So I

13:18

think I I'd like first you maybe take a

13:20

few minutes and then I I want to talk to

13:22

Andrew the same question. Both of you

13:24

guys are at the foot of what are

13:26

probably huge secular trends in

13:29

technology. How I would frame this is we

13:32

are rebuilding the data processing

13:35

infrastructure that has existed on the

13:38

earth in the sky.

13:40

And first you do the satellites, but I

13:43

would love for you to explain

13:44

space-based data centers because I think

13:46

everybody's hearing about that.

13:48

>> Are they really viable? What are they?

13:49

How will they work? etc. And then

13:51

Andrew, this is the rebirth of silicon.

13:54

We're going to find the next version of

13:56

Moore's law, which I think is more

13:58

timebounded, not transistor density

14:00

bounded. We now hear a lot about domain

14:03

specific architectures. we hear I mean

14:06

your chip was just a complete

14:07

transformation in terms of the design

14:10

principles that you know like at Grock

14:12

we took a very different approach

14:14

Nvidia's taken a very different approach

14:16

you took a big pizza shaped die and said

14:18

it yolo this is it and you were

14:20

right just explain where we're going in

14:23

silicon so maybe will you start and then

14:25

Andrew you start

14:26

>> I mean what we're seeing firstly in

14:28

space is is all these new applications

14:30

based on data and AI so you know we

14:33

we're collecting vastly more data about

14:35

the planet. And with SpaceX and Starlink

14:38

and One Webb, they're they're

14:40

transporting far more data around the

14:42

planet. As you say, we're sort of

14:43

changing um uh the nature of data using

14:46

satellites. And that's basically doing

14:49

what was once the province of

14:50

governments only and giving everyone

14:52

else access to uh satellite

14:53

capabilities. And that's going to I I

14:55

mean I I estimate there's a 75 to$100

14:58

billion market just on Earth

14:59

observation. this kind of data we

15:01

collect and AI on top of that unleashing

15:04

all that application. So that's the

15:05

near-term thing. Applying large language

15:07

models to earth imagery data, unlocking

15:10

agriculture, you know, um energy, civil

15:14

government applications, permitting, you

15:16

name it. This is going to make

15:17

everything more efficient. Um and then

15:21

where we're going is indeed space is is

15:25

we did a study with uh our partners at

15:28

Google about eight or nine years ago uh

15:30

looking at what are the costs of data

15:32

centers on the ground, what are the

15:33

costs that it would take to put them in

15:35

space and when might it make sense to uh

15:38

do it non-aterrestrially.

15:40

And we figured out that when launch

15:42

costs come down to about $200 to $300 a

15:44

kilogram um uh it would be cheaper, just

15:48

simply cheaper to put the data centers

15:50

in space. Now we're about $1,000 a

15:52

kilogram, just over that in right today.

15:55

Uh but that's come down about 10x in the

15:57

last 10 years. Um on the current

16:00

trajectory with Starship in particular,

16:02

I would expect it the launch cost come

16:04

down there in 2 to 3 years. Elon might

16:07

say it's next week, but at least

16:10

realistically a couple of years. So

16:11

we're not far away from it literally

16:13

just being cheaper. Then in addition and

16:16

the intuition there that is that helps

16:18

people understand that is you would

16:20

naturally use solar panels for doing uh

16:23

the the data centers are a power

16:25

problem. It's a power game and you would

16:27

normally use solar panels. That's the

16:29

cheapest way to get a watt uh today by

16:31

far. But you you don't want intermittent

16:34

power. So then you have to have

16:35

batteries or you then you have to have

16:36

gas or then you have to have nuclear and

16:39

then it gets really expensive. Um in

16:42

space you can put a solar panel in a

16:44

suns synchronous uh dawn dusk orbit

16:46

where you're 24/7 looking at the sun. So

16:49

you can have a solar panel that collects

16:51

and gathers five times more energy per

16:55

solar panel than on the ground and you

16:57

don't have to have batteries or anything

16:58

else. Uh so the infrastructure for

17:01

comput in space is literally just solar

17:03

panels and the chips and then the RF

17:06

signals up and down. So it's actually

17:09

really quite simple. It was just a

17:10

question of when it's going to be

17:11

cheaper to launch all those solar panels

17:13

and chips into space than putting on the

17:16

ground. And it turns out that's going to

17:17

be in a few years. So we're partnering

17:19

uh with Google to launch some of their

17:21

TPUs into space. We've already launched

17:23

Nvidia's uh uh some of Nvidia's GPUs

17:27

into space. We're launching Google's

17:28

TPUs into space on an early test.

17:31

There's lots of technology to figure

17:33

out.

17:34

>> Let's have a conversation. Um, but it's

17:37

an early it's early days, but I think no

17:40

question within 10 years most compute

17:43

will be putting in space, which to give

17:46

you a sense is a lot of money,

17:48

[laughter]

17:48

like trillions, and um will be bigger

17:52

than any of the other space businesses

17:54

today. comes Earth imaging. This is why

17:57

we're getting into this.

17:58

>> Do you believe this? Do you believe

18:00

sending data centers to space makes more

18:02

sense or is it just the regular

18:05

>> Can you have him explain the business

18:06

first and then

18:07

>> Oh, yeah, of course. Yeah. So, I think

18:09

they're, you know, with all due respect,

18:11

one or two hard problems still left be

18:14

beyond putting putting GPUs in in in

18:17

space right now. I I think um we we

18:21

we're not super good yet at

18:25

building the clusters in space necessary

18:28

for the communication

18:30

>> between

18:30

>> between Exactly. between

18:33

>> We're not good at doing it on the

18:34

ground.

18:34

>> We're not good at doing it on the

18:35

ground. We're really not good at doing

18:36

it in space. I I think this is an

18:38

extraordinarily important and

18:39

interesting problem and one we should be

18:41

spending money and attacking. I've got

18:43

it in a slightly different time frame,

18:45

but one that certainly will occur. And

18:48

the the hard part is is it is it one of

18:51

those problems where uh the last 10% is

18:55

80% of the time.

18:57

>> Now, self-driving was a problem like

18:58

that, right? Where the last 10% proved

19:01

to be a decade's worth of work and just

19:04

now we're over the hump. And we don't

19:06

know yet, but I think the interesting

19:08

work they're doing uh at Planet is

19:10

really important. And I think the

19:12

fundamental driver to experiment to even

19:14

get insight into whether I'm right or

19:16

not is to get down the cost of launch

19:19

vehicles. Then you can start doing

19:21

experiments and getting it wrong and

19:23

fixing it and figuring it out. And until

19:26

then it was unpaid.

19:27

>> For the foreseeable future, you're going

19:28

to be terrestrial. explain your business

19:30

and how you made these critical

19:32

decisions that kind of took you on a

19:35

different path and you know you versus

19:37

Nvidia versus AMD and what you think the

19:39

future of AI silicon looks like. I I I I

19:42

think there were two parts your your

19:44

first question was around sort of the

19:48

rise of silicon in general and I I think

19:50

what AI did and it's it's rarely sort of

19:53

framed this way but it allowed computers

19:56

to address a class of problems that

19:58

before AI computers were bad at.

20:02

We were bad at images for almost the

20:05

entire history of compute. We could

20:07

store them and that's about it. We were

20:10

bad at language. We could store it but

20:12

that's about it. We could transform

20:15

numbers. We were magical with numbers.

20:18

And what AI did starting in about 2015

20:22

16 is it opened the door the aperture to

20:25

say maybe we could use computers on

20:27

images.

20:29

All right. Maybe we could find insight

20:31

in images. Maybe not only could we store

20:34

language but we could generate it. All

20:37

right. maybe we could understand it

20:40

rather than storing it and regurgitating

20:42

it. And what this did is it it opened up

20:46

sort of to compute

20:48

huge areas that were previously

20:50

foreclosed and at the same time we were

20:53

adding to those areas. we were taking

20:55

vastly more images,

20:57

all right, terrestrially

21:00

in satellites. And what this did is it

21:02

it simultaneously opened up this entire

21:05

area and allowed compute to attack it.

21:09

And this is what's underpinning both

21:10

Nvidia's growth and and sort of all the

21:12

growth you're hearing about in in AI

21:15

compute is as a as a processor builder

21:18

as a hardware builder suddenly our tools

21:22

could attack more and different parts of

21:25

knowledge

21:27

and and that was sort of the first part

21:29

to to to answer your question. Now how

21:32

you do that there are lots of different

21:34

strategies tons of different ways to

21:35

skin cats. What we saw in 2015 were

21:40

several things. First, we saw that AI

21:43

would be an enormous consumer of

21:46

compute.

21:48

All right. And historically for computer

21:50

architects,

21:52

new workloads were the opportunity for

21:55

share to change,

21:57

right? Share changed when the rise of

22:00

graphics emerged and you got the

22:01

dedicated GPU. That's how Nvidia was

22:03

born. Share changed when cell phone

22:06

compute emerged and Intel and AMD who

22:09

had fabs and the best architects got

22:11

zero share and it all moved to ARM.

22:14

Right? Share changed in the late '9s

22:17

when Nortell and all these companies

22:19

we've forgotten about couldn't build

22:22

chips and couldn't do uh uh data

22:25

networking and and what you got with

22:28

Cisco and Juniper and Arist and this

22:30

collection of new companies. So we knew

22:32

that um this new problem

22:37

would present an opportunity for massive

22:40

change.

22:41

So we saw that we we made two bets. Um

22:45

the first was dedicated silicon would be

22:47

the answer. The second was it couldn't

22:51

look like a GPU.

22:54

And our view as computer architects is

22:57

if you want to be 20 times better than

22:59

somebody, right? Your architecture can't

23:01

look like them,

23:03

right? It it it can't. They have they

23:07

have enjoyed and and eaten all the

23:08

lowhanging fruit. So, if you build a

23:11

GPU, the odds that you're better than

23:12

Nvidia in our view are approximately

23:14

zero. That led us to a fundamentally

23:16

different architecture. All right. The

23:19

hard part here, the hard part is moving

23:23

data from memory to compute.

23:26

>> This is the fundamental problem in AI.

23:30

And we solved it with a way that that

23:33

very few others had even attempted,

23:35

which was to build a very big chip and

23:37

to put memory right next to compute. And

23:40

by building a big chip, a chip the size

23:42

of a dinner plate, whereas most chips

23:44

are the size of a postage stamp, we

23:47

could use a different type of memory.

23:50

And by using a different type of memory,

23:51

a memory that was vastly faster, we

23:54

opened up all sorts of opportunity.

23:57

So when OpenAI uses us, we're 15 or 18

24:00

times faster than a GPU.

24:03

That means your answers are delivered

24:06

more quickly. It means your engagement

24:08

with with the AI is more enjoyable. It

24:11

means you can use the AI to solve harder

24:13

problems and not wait.

24:16

And the way to think about this is sort

24:17

of to ask yourself the the counter

24:20

factual question. How big is the market

24:22

for slow search today?

24:25

Right. Right. Is zero. How big is the

24:28

market for dialup? It's zero. H how long

24:32

do you wait for a website to resolve

24:34

before you click away? 3 seconds, 5

24:37

seconds. You will not wait for AI. We

24:40

have to deliver it to you in a in in

24:43

real time. And that's what we saw.

24:46

That's what we built.

24:47

>> So the panel's on going public. A lot of

24:49

LPs in the room. They need to get

24:51

liquid. I'm curious about the journey

24:53

for your investors. Yeah.

24:56

>> Okay. So, well, you guys went public

24:57

what year?

24:58

>> Uh 2021.

24:59

>> 2021 by way of a spa.

25:01

>> Correct.

25:02

>> Okay. And your VCs were who?

25:06

>> Um Drake Professor Jverson was one of

25:09

the earliest Capricorn. Um Peter Te's

25:12

founders fund. Then we got uh Yuri

25:15

Milner's DST.

25:17

>> Okay. So your your investors come in,

25:19

you go public at 2 billion via a spa.

25:24

>> Now we're four years later. Really, it

25:26

wasn't until year three or four that 90%

25:29

of the value was created. Okay. So did

25:33

those early investors capture this 90%

25:37

move? Did they stay in it?

25:38

>> Most of them did. Yeah, most of them

25:40

did, which is really smart on their

25:42

part. Obviously, I think they should

25:44

hold on even more. Uh, if I didn't think

25:47

that, you should.

25:48

>> I'm a little bit self-interested.

25:50

>> What's interesting about this is

25:51

>> No, but really they did. And and I mean,

25:53

Google hasn't sold a share. They're our

25:55

largest single investor. Um, uh,

25:58

Capricorn didn't until very recently.

26:00

So, basically, most of them stayed

26:02

really well in and they got all of that

26:04

upside. And good for them. And the

26:07

reason I think this is so important

26:09

>> is that there are a lot of LPs in this

26:10

room

26:11

>> who they're like when a company goes

26:12

public give us the shares.

26:14

>> No no

26:15

>> give us give us the shares. This is a

26:16

counter example right? This happened to

26:19

us in 10 years ago. We invested

26:22

preipo at a billion dollars. We

26:24

distributed the shares I think at three

26:26

or four billion and then it went to 50

26:29

billion over you know the course of the

26:30

next 24 months. And we had people who

26:32

called us who said well why didn't you

26:34

hold on to the shares? And we're like

26:35

because you're pounding on us, right, to

26:37

distribute to the shares. So you're an

26:38

example. Now

26:40

>> in your case, Andrew,

26:43

>> you have an innovation, right? You're

26:45

just now uh public. So all of your

26:49

investors are still under lockup like

26:51

like Altimeter, but you guys have

26:53

innovated with the banks on what I call

26:55

a dribble lockup. So over 6 months the

26:58

shares can be dribbled out according to

27:01

a bunch of performance hurdles which

27:03

SpaceX is going to have a very similar

27:05

>> when did we start this process of the of

27:08

the dribble

27:08

>> the dribble [laughter]

27:11

>> concept you started it years ago but

27:13

>> yes

27:13

>> but u we're all of that with respect to

27:16

the lockup I think this is the the most

27:19

innovative and I think SpaceX is going

27:21

to have a very similar innovation but

27:23

Andrew for your investors if you were

27:25

talking to ILPs right in the room.

27:28

Should Alimter be distributing the

27:30

shares when they come out of lock? How

27:33

do you think about you know your VCs

27:36

holding on to the shares kind of post

27:38

lock?

27:39

>> Well, I I I think historically more

27:40

money's made after IPO than before.

27:43

>> Yeah.

27:43

>> I I I think every single study shows

27:46

that uh there is more money to be made

27:50

both in percentage and in in what we

27:52

care about which is absolute.

27:54

>> Yes. and and and so uh the amount of

27:57

money that it's possible to put to work

27:59

in most venture companies is very

28:01

modest. I mean there are two or three or

28:02

five outliers but for the most part you

28:05

can only put a relatively little bit of

28:06

money to work. Um by the time we get

28:09

public there's a lot more money there if

28:11

things are going well and the

28:12

opportunity to make vastly more is after

28:15

IPO not before. Hey, if I could just add

28:18

on that, one interesting question is

28:20

what's going to happen with SpaceX on

28:22

this because you know a lot of the value

28:25

is is in the future, right? But I mean

28:28

most of the big tech companies went

28:30

public at a few billion,

28:32

>> not a few trillion. Like there's a lot

28:34

of zeros in between those, right? And

28:36

you got all this upside afterwards. Now,

28:39

for the equivalent liftoff, SpaceX would

28:41

have to be aiming at quadrillion

28:44

valuations. Now, I know Elon has those

28:47

sort of ambitions, but you really have

28:48

to believe in that uh to get, you know,

28:51

>> this is this is kind of the point I'm

28:53

getting to, right? We have three mega

28:55

IPOs, you know, we keep talking about

28:58

that are multi- trillion.

28:59

>> Yeah.

29:00

>> All of that value acrewed to private

29:02

market investors.

29:03

>> Planet Labs is a great example of

29:07

venture capital in the public markets

29:09

where the 10X has occurred in the public

29:12

markets. We're all advocates of these

29:14

companies coming public sooner. Had

29:16

Andrew had his way, he would have been

29:18

public 18 months ago, probably at $10

29:21

billion rather than $50 billion. And

29:23

that 5x over the course of the last two

29:26

years would have gone to public market

29:27

investors. So go ahead.

29:29

>> Way better to be lucky than good.

29:31

>> Yeah.

29:33

>> So, so I think that I hear a lot of

29:36

people thinking that anthropic open AI

29:38

and SpaceX are the new normal. I

29:41

actually think the public markets may be

29:43

shifting back in this direction and a

29:45

lot of the companies in our portfolios

29:47

are now thinking about going public at a

29:49

billion or three billion or 5 billion.

29:52

>> We had this period of a decade where

29:54

Andrees was really pushing stay private

29:56

forever and I see the pendulum swinging

29:59

back to companies are like man I want to

30:02

be like Planet Labs and get public,

30:04

>> right? and and have to play in the big

30:06

leagues and do it in the public markets

30:08

like

30:09

>> here's what I'll say maybe just like to

30:10

the two of you guys both of you guys

30:12

have had enormous pressure because

30:14

there's visible competition that's

30:16

always sort of in your periphery

30:19

but I do think that getting public

30:21

sooner having the scrutiny of public

30:24

markets having the scrutiny of having to

30:25

deliver sharpens the focus it steel

30:29

sharpens steel iron sharpens iron

30:31

>> and I think innovation tends to get

30:33

better And so the idea that you allow

30:36

everybody to participate but you also

30:38

put yourself in the spotlight to me is

30:40

where great things happen.

30:41

>> I agree.

30:42

>> Um and so anyways I just wanted to say

30:44

to both of you um just as we wrap you

30:48

guys are an incredible testament to

30:49

entrepreneurship both of you. I mean

30:51

we've been talking literally since day

30:53

one me and Andrew because we went in

30:55

different paths and then we kind of

30:57

recon converged and then Will same with

30:59

you.

30:59

>> I'm happy it worked out for you Jimoth.

31:01

>> Well it's worked out for both of us so

31:02

it's [laughter] fine. Um you guys are

31:04

incredible testament to entrepreneurship

31:06

and uh I just want to say thank you for

31:08

everything you guys are doing and the

31:09

next few years are going to be really

31:10

spicy.

31:11

>> Yeah, if I could just spend a 30 seconds

31:13

on the next few years because I think

31:14

it's going to be so exciting with um as

31:17

I mentioned AI and space merging

31:19

together. We're going to see a take off

31:20

our applications. I like to say like all

31:23

the cool stuff that we're doing on the

31:25

with LLMs now is really based on just

31:28

the text of the internet being absorbed

31:30

into these models which is incredibly

31:32

powerful already but they don't know

31:35

about the real world. I call them

31:36

blind to you know they don't know about

31:38

that farm field that flood that security

31:40

situation around the corner. If you give

31:43

them real world data, then they can

31:45

answer real world problems. And that's

31:47

going to open up gazillions of

31:49

applications for these uh AI models. I

31:52

call them instead of having large

31:53

language models, large earth models or

31:56

uh instead of AI, planetary intelligence

31:59

where you have planetary sensing systems

32:00

in space, planetary compute systems in

32:03

space. And we can disagree or agree on

32:06

on exact time frame, but I think it's

32:07

going to happen. and and then that's

32:10

going to enable a huge economy. So, it's

32:13

an exciting time in the next few years.

32:15

>> Will Andrew, thank you guys very much.

32:17

Well done. [applause]

32:18

>> Thanks, guys. Okay. [music]

32:22

Thanks, buddy. Appreciate you. Really

32:24

appreciate it. Great seeing you,

32:25

brother. Congrats.

Interactive Summary

This video features a discussion with the founders of Cerebras Systems and Planet Labs about their experiences going public, the challenges of scaling tech companies, and the future of AI silicon and space-based data infrastructure. The conversation highlights the transition from private to public markets, the critical importance of long-term execution, and the transformative potential of merging real-world spatial data with AI.

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