Maureen Heymans

🍜Anybody up for some ramen? I am excited to share that I am back in the garage, building again (it’s actually a house in the Berkeley Hills). We are taking the wraps off of Supercog AI, a new startup focused on solving Application Integration using LLM powered agents. My co-founder in this new venture is a great friend of mine (and a former co-founder partner), Alex Osborne. Alex and I have worked around the application integration space for a long time, and we are unrealistically excited about applying the GenAI stack to this problem. Not many people relish the task to get some bits to move from system A to system B. But it’s a critical job to be done, and that’s led to a lot of brittle scripts, a myriad of inflexible “no code” tools, and a lot of hand crafted SQL. But the power of the Large Language Model, trained on a huge corpus of information, offers a remarkable tool to solve this problem. The LLM you use today already knows the APIs of hundreds of popular systems. It knows the SQL dialects of every major database. It understands the semantics and data schemas of many popular SaaS systems. It understands much of the specific domain in which your business operates. I like to call the AI revolution “the last platform shift”. That may turn out to be hyperbole, but I definitely believe we are in the very early stages of seeing what this new stack can enable. I know we are hardly the first folks to claim that “amazing stuff is coming!”. But this is why Alex and I have decided to focus on a real and hard problem. If we can prove that LLMs can power a new way to solve this problem, it will be the first successful *new* approach in 15 years.. We will have much more to share about this new platform soon. In the meantime, if you’re interested in getting a peek - or even better if you have application or data integration tasks that you would like some help with - please reach out because we want to help. #genai #startups #backinthegarage

163

37 Comments

🚀 San Francisco: Still the Undisputed Tech Capital of the World Despite headlines suggesting otherwise, new research from SignalFire reveals that San Francisco's tech scene is not just alive—it's thriving. Here's why SF remains the epicenter of innovation: 📊 Key Findings: - SF dominates in tech talent and capital concentration - The Bay Area has more big-tech engineers than the next 10 markets combined - SF, East Bay, and Silicon Valley have more top startup engineers and VC-backed startups than Seattle, New York, and Austin combined - 26% of seed or Series A rounds from top VCs are in SF, with numbers rising since 2022 🧠 AI Boom: San Francisco's lead is even more pronounced in AI, cementing its position as the "epicenter of the new AI gold rush." 💼 Startup Haven: Y Combinator startups increasingly choose SF as their home base, especially in AI. 🌉 Why SF? - Unparalleled concentration of tech talent - Proximity to VCs, clients, and other entrepreneurs - Resurgence of in-person networking and collaboration 💡 The Big Picture: While other cities are growing their tech sectors, SF's lead "looks unlikely to be challenged any time soon." The city's tech ecosystem creates a flywheel effect that continues to attract talent and capital. https://lnkd.in/gCnPCBRU

22

1 Comment

The afternoon Keynote @ Stripe Sessions was Fireside Chat between Patrick Collison (CEO of Stripe) and Jensen Huang (CEO of NVIDIA). Patrick was an excellent moderator — asked Jensen really probing, nuanced questions that Jensen answered with his usual sharp wit and unique (and impressively well rationalized) perspective. A couple of quotes among many that stuck with me: - “Current CPU installed market is $1 trillion of hardware, all of which will be upgraded to GPUs over the next 5 years. And I would estimate about another $1 trillion will be spent on top of that during the same time period as companies try to do more with AI. Add those together — and I think at least $2 trillion will be spent on GPUs in the next 5 years.” - “I like to go after Zero-Billion Dollar Markets — nonexistent markets that I envision & can rationalize well, but will be very hard, expensive & time-consuming to achieve.”

1

AI leaders have a crucial chance to address risks now and strengthen governance practices before playing catch-up to regulations, notes Kjell Carlsson, Ph.D. of Domino Data Lab. In a recent VentureBeat article, he shares his perspective on California's AI bill veto and why proactive governance is key to the future of AI innovation. Learn more about this addressing this opportunity: https://gag.gl/4WCTkP #AI #AIGovernance #AIInnovation #DataScience

1

This resonated with me today: "“One flaw of designers (as people) is pretending faster is always better and quick always equals efficient. A fast pace can feel good and productive short-term, but there are many long-term consequences: losing productivity, overlooking important things, and undermining diversity. It is not efficient to move so fast that we exhaust ourselves, overlook the obvious, or break everything along the way, yet we often make that assumption.” It's from Assembling Tomorrow and I highly recommend the book. https://lnkd.in/gK43NueY

3

1 Comment

I recently came across a Facebook post from a small restaurant chain in the Bay Area that piqued my interest. The chain's owner has recognized the strategic value of AI in their operations. Cost-effective and accessible AI solutions for small-scale industries hold great promise. In this instance, the ability to effectively handle 47 calls during peak hours while achieving a favorable return on investment represents a significant success. Additionally, ensuring an excellent customer experience for the diverse population served is of paramount importance in this scenario. #ai #aiml #genai

6

1 Comment

My end-of-the-year reading? LLM Reliability by Rush Shahani. I've recently started a new job working on search at Causaly. Causaly is a platform for research in the life sciences domain. A bit different from my most recent experience focused largely on building out search for areas like e-commerce and media. Perhaps the biggest difference is how important precision is in this new domain. With e-commerce search, if a user is looking for sporty shoes and gets a result or two for socks, well, it's not that bad. But a biomedical scientist doing research trying to find a cure for the diseases that plague humanity can't afford to get inaccurate information. At Causaly, we use LLMs for a lot. Our users search through natural language and we translate those questions into queries. We summarize research papers individually and as a group. We let scientists ask questions about that research. We do a lot of work to make sure we're returning accurate answers, and there's always more we can do, and ways to increase our efficiency. Shahani's book goes in depth on how to approach these problems. Solutions like red-teaming, monitoring platforms, and human evaluation techniques. It also talks about techniques to minimize hallucinations and leveraging RAG to ground responses. The book is in early release and is still just about 1/3 complete, but I'm already learning things I'll be taking back to my job. And it looks like this will be my start-of-the-year reading, as well. https://lnkd.in/eFZfJSyp

30

3 Comments

It was great to hear Robert Wong Julie Willem Angie McAllister, Ph.D. and Markus Kunesch on the recent episode of the @Ed-Technical podcast -- the first of a three-part series about how we're applying Google AI to our work in education and learning: https://lnkd.in/e7hQi6a2. This episode delves deep into LearnLM, how we're making Gemini tuned for pedagogy and how we're integrating this technology into our mainstream products to improve learning outcomes, and evolve how people learn on Google products. It explains inspiring new product ideas, and the steps we take across the company to understand and enhance the journey of learning in a responsible and innovative way. #LearnLM #AI #Education #Google

64

While in San Francisco this week I had the opportunity to do a Waymo ride and see personally what the technology and AI can do in something as simple as an Uber type ride. After a 25 mins ride in the heart of San Francisco I can say as a techie how impactful the experience is. And as a Data and AI leader how incredible the implementation of this technology is to consume the information from all the sensors and process them in real time to deliver a flawless ride. From reacting to a light change from green to yellow , to a person opening a parked car door on the side of the road, navigating multiple stop signs and even yielding to pedestrians on a cross walk the algorithm showed quick and effective response to all events delivering a sometimes better than human ride. And these types of high performing models are just the beginning. The AI revolution, especially in the real physical world business applications, will enable us to marry information from thousands of physical sensors, allowing AI models to feel the reality of the physical world and act on it, delivering activities we today need to perform as humans. Autonomous driving is something that we have been working on for a long time now.But now that I experience it myself, I can personally see a future where we don't necessarily need to drive anywhere ourselves anymore. But this is just the beginning. - - Connect 🤝 Abdul Rahim Roni Follow 👉 Abdul Rahim Roni Notification: Press the 🔔 icon Follow Abdul Rahim Roni for more content like this. _________ If you like this and want to get more AI tools, tutorials and news, join Cool Tech Gadgets - my newsletter that helps you get smarter about Microsoft and AI and technology: https:👉 https://cooltech99.com/ - -  #innovation #digital #ai #AI #robot #robotics #squid #tech #robotforhuman #technology #innovattion #Robots #Robot #datascience #google #ibm #ai #generatieveai #programming #developer #chatgpt #aws #learning #repost #reshare #smartcities #sustainability #data #python #sql #dataanalytics #project #learning #machinelearning #datascience #AI #artificialintelligence #aiwarfare #aibattletested #python #jobs #work #sql #resume #powerbi #projects #dataanatana #technology #innovation #robotics #AI #ai #artificialintelligence #ChatGPT #AI #Microsoft #Google #excelskills #excel #dataanalysis #freelyanalysis #project #management #data #analysis

2

With the progress of Waymo and the Tesla event yesterday, something I wrote about in 2021 could become true as soon as 2027. In some industries (like ride sharing), marketplaces are just an intermediary step to aggregate independent suppliers. Ultimately, companies will figure out how to provide the service themselves at scale, and we'll have a few very large "super-suppliers". But in other industries (like e-commerce) where the consumer values creativity, consolidated suppliers won't be able to provide all of the new and interesting things that customers want, and we'll still need independent suppliers. Those industries will stay in marketplace mode much longer.

187

25 Comments

Shout out to Thomas Culhane, a student at UC Berkeley that is helping to bring real-time device data into Hotter Times this summer. He has already made some fantastic improvements to the site, and I'm excited to see what else he can achieve. Our vision is to realize the UN's dream of protecting everyone with an early warning system. Hotter Times will be the public-facing site for the Climate Adaptation Data Platform, where sensor data is transformed into personalized climate risk alerts. When you install a device, the data will immediately become visible on the site and anyone can view active climate risks tied to that device. https://hottertimes.com #climatechange #climateadaptation #reducesuffering #extremeweather #climateaction #iot #datascience

21

India is not just catching up in the AI race; we're innovating and leading in ways that are uniquely ours. The Economic Times recently highlighted how our approach to Generative AI goes beyond just Large Language Models (LLMs), addressing the specific challenges and opportunities within our diverse market. Rahul Agarwalla, Managing Partner at SenseAI Ventures, shared his invaluable insights into this AI revolution. His leadership and vision are truly driving innovation in the field, and it's an honour to be part of this journey with him. For anyone interested in the developments in AI and how India is making its mark on the global stage, this is a must-read.

45

3 Comments

On a new episode of “Reinventing Customer Experience,” Arun Shastri and Gopi Vikranth talk to Robert C. Wolcott, co-author of “Proximity,” about how the need for proximity will transform business, society and the human experience. Learn how technology, data and AI are driving personalized experiences and new opportunities across industries: https://bit.ly/4e9A4Li #FutureofWork #Innovation #Technology #CustomerExperience #ProximityBook #ZSpodcast

7

Instacart is a market leader when it comes to leveraging AI tools to boost productivity at work. I had an amazing conversation with JJ Zhuang, Instacart’s Chief Architect, who has shepherded over 50 AI-driven initiatives to market across the org. We explored what catapulted Instacart to the forefront of AI integration, supporting radically diverse use cases across various functional areas. One striking insight (echoed by Ethan Mollick and others elsewhere) is that you often don't need specialized tools for specialized work. Frontier models like GPT-4 can seamlessly adapt to a wide range of functions and use cases. They're not just for engineers; they're incredibly versatile tools used by marketing, comms, and legal teams. From generating code to proofreading and ideation, GPT-4 empowers every department to leverage AI for enhanced productivity and innovation. By integrating LLM’s like GPT-4 into their workflows, teams can streamline processes, automate repetitive tasks, and unlock bandwidth for new creative possibilities. How can you harness the power of AI in your own work to boost productivity? Share your thoughts below 👇 Want to hear more insights from JJ? Check out the full podcast episode by clicking the link in the comments.

8

2 Comments

Founder Dadagiri: The challenge with Founders who "just can't let go". I keep sharing Microsoft's incredible story. I saw Steve Ballmer and met Satya Nadella, and they were as different as Neebu ka achaar and Boondi ka Ladoos. (Ballmer was Achaar). But they (Ballmer and Gates) let Nadella do his thing; boy, what he did was magical! Enter Howard Schultz, the founder and genius of Starbucks. Via WSJ “Howard Schultz, the legendary entrepreneur who turned a local coffee chain into a global icon, was meeting Laxman Narasimhan, the man who would succeed him as Starbucks CEO in a month. Shultz had recently watched a New York Giants practice and was inspired by how football teams manage their time and structure their work by unit—offence, defence, and special teams. He told Laxman that the same principle could be applied to Starbucks’s systems, which Schultz had spent nearly a year analysing in search of ways to improve service. Narasimhan wasn’t buying it. “That’s a football team. We are a company,” he said. “If you don’t like it, that's fine; it’s your company,” Schultz said, laughing, as Narasimhan chuckled.” It seems that the spirit is not working. "It all exploded into public view Sunday night when Schultz wrote a LinkedIn post that read like an open letter to shareholders criticizing how Narasimhan and his senior leaders were running the business" See link - https://lnkd.in/dx3ebFgP I read the post, and these statements sounded terrible. See #Dhandhekibaat (DKB) comments inserted in the flow "There is a natural tendency to try to do too much too soon. " "Don’t try to do everything at once." "Leaders must model both humility and confidence as they work to restore trust and increase performance across the organization." DKB - It sounds like he is preaching to some B'School kids. The Humility and Confidence point sounds horrible "Over the past five days, I have been asked by people inside and outside the company for my thoughts on what should be done. The stores require a maniacal focus on the customer experience through the eyes of a merchant. The answer does not lie in data but in the stores." DKB - therein lies the bullying. WHY answer these questions and give side views? Instead, say, "I am sure Laxman and the team are on top of it" (And send your gyaan privately to Lax). Learning: As a founder, it's impossible to let go. Only the rarest manage to achieve Microsoft's magic. As they say, "Love means never having to say sorry". #Dhandhekibaat "Letting go means never having to say ANYTHING" :) Do you agree? Article Link in comments

85

8 Comments

As an engineer, AI co-pilots are a major tool to boost productivity. They come with the same caveats though as copy-pasting code from StackOverflow. You still need to understand what you're writing to ensure you've got the right answer. But as Catherine Huang mentions, AI is a fantastic tool to get more done quickly and go from 0 to 1 (especially when it's embedded into your editor).

14

📣 Calling all the #emergingtech #founders and #builders out there. Do you ever worry that when the #regulators knock, they'll completely misunderstand what you're building? Do you feel like the headlines about your industry is more gossip than tech, but you're the one paying the price? Let's #disrupt this! 🚀 I've been working tirelessly to create a summit that will train you so you can lead the narrative, and stop playing defense. Join us at University of California, Berkeley on May 13th for TECHVocacy 2024: Emerging Tech Advocacy Summit! What makes this summit so different? No long winded panels to talk about the problem or to talk about the tech (#ai #crypto #web3 #av #socialmedia). We have 🔵 Experts to deliver lightning talks that will SHOW (not tell) how to talk about your emerging and disruptive tech with policymakers/regulators 🔵 Real-time media training demos Co-hosted by Berkeley Center for Law and Business Berkeley Haas Entrepreneurship Berkeley Center for Responsible Decentralized Intelligence with support from Berkeley Space Center. Admission is free, but registration is limited! Sign up soon!

32

4 Comments

You MUST see this. TL;DR We've reached a true breakthrough in clinical AI, developing CARE1 - the world's first clinical foundation model with an application submitted to FDA review. Truthfully this is just the tip of the iceberg, we've used a fraction of our data and two years from now we'll see these as the first baby steps. You can read more about it here: https://lnkd.in/drhPYTtX Shameless plug - this recent breakthrough is just one example of the impactful work our teams do every day. We're looking for highly experienced algorithmic experts, both ICs and tech leads, to join us and take a pivotal role in this and other high impact projects. Feel free to reach out to me directly. This is first and foremost thanks to the amazing team working on this effort - Itay Katzir the mastermind who's been planning this for years building paradigm after paradigm to enable this. From the algorithmic engine, through NLP, through scalable training pipelines and more. Ariel Persiko - truly a one man algo team, the exact person you want on this type of breakthrough project. Dor Alon - AI Infrastructure expert, built components that were critical to this endavour. And of course some of our amazing leaders who were deeply involved in invaluable strategic guidance - Uri Goren, Ronny Levanda, Tamar Lin. Not less than that - I think this is a true lesson of how good founders really move the needle even at a 450 person company. Elad Walach our CEO was maybe the first person who started pushing strongly for us to invest in this, and Michael B. Braginsky our legendary CTO who continues to amaze me even after 8 years with his ability to inspire us with unachievable goals which we are then able to achieve.

61

1 Comment

COZY + 🧭 RESPONSIBLE AI: The esteemed 🧑‍🍳 William Bartholomew joins me in the Cozy AI Kitchen https://lnkd.in/eupSaUDb to share how public policy intersect with the AI-sphere on a new content safety filtering episode. We quickly delve into responsible AI, featuring insights from a former developer turned public policy expert on responsible AI. HT 🧑‍🍳 Ross Heise 🧑‍🍳 Matt Scholz --- 🚀 Takeaways for Developers from Cozy AI Kitchen with William Bartholomew 🌍 1️⃣ Evaluating LLMs: Use tools like Azure AI Foundry for groundedness, coherence, and safety checks. 2️⃣ Why It Matters: Safe AI = ethical AI. 3️⃣ Regulations Are Coming: Global AI laws are evolving fast. 4️⃣ Get Ahead: Learn responsible AI principles and apply them throughout your development lifecycle. 5️⃣ AI Is Here to Stay: Generative and agentic AI are the future—embrace them responsibly. Big thanks to William for being our AI compass and sharing actionable insights! --- THIS episode 📺 ▶️: https://lnkd.in/eupSaUDb  Read more on Responsible AI: https://msft.it/6058oMeoE Continue learning with the AI Learning Hub: https://msft.it/6059oMeo1 All Cozy AI Kitchen episodes: https://msft.it/6050oMeoG Cozy AI Kitchen repo: https://msft.it/6051oMeoH

76

4 Comments