Mustafa Furniturewala

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

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Thanks again for having me at #SUGJaipur. The recording of my talk: "XM Cloud Components - what's new?!" is up on their #youtube and available here: https://lnkd.in/dkVbARfP

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Re-posting one of my less popular / unorthodox views. Weekly 1:1s are hacks to get around the lack of proper team communication setups, and they weaken individual resilience. Adhoc 1:1s are fine for providing spot feedback, but they should be rare. Career growth 1:1s are great, but they should happen once in 3-6 months. Project check-ins / questions should be discussed in 5-10 minutes on slack. A design whiteboarding meeting between two engineers is fantastic, but it's not a 1:1. Weekly 30 minute 1:1s are unhealthy and an unnecessary time-sink, stop using them to communicate with your reports. https://lnkd.in/ehr_e2Xv

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Goldcast's startup journey has perfectly mapped the last 4 crazy years of SaaS. Palash Soni and his cofounders first started the company in 2021 to build great, customizable virtual event solutions for enterprise marketers. While their business kept growing past the pandemic, it was clear that overall spend was shifting back to IRL events fast. However, video consumption continued to rise and quickly became the best way to build your brand and an audience in software - if you knew how to operationalize video marketing. Goldcast's product evolution from a virtual events platform to an AI-native video marketing solution has been incredible to watch. The company had its best quarter yet, adding customers like OpenAI and Coupa Software and I couldn't be more proud. Here's Palash talking about their product evolution and the future of video marketing in an AI-native world.

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🚀 Introducing Katamari: The Secure Meta-Cloud for Real-Time Application Development 🌐 In today’s fast-paced tech landscape, we need more than just conventional cloud solutions. That's why I developed Katamari—a secure meta-cloud platform that enables real-time application development with unmatched flexibility and performance. Key Features: Platform-Agnostic: Katamari works seamlessly on any infrastructure, offering scalability without the complexity. Simplified Architecture: By eliminating glue code and optimizing for real-time data, Katamari significantly reduces latency, allowing faster development cycles. Event-Driven: Katamari’s event-driven approach enables low-latency, real-time processing, making it perfect for modern, dynamic applications. Security First: With integrated identity and access management, Katamari ensures your data and applications remain secure while meeting compliance needs. From databases and pipelines to message queues and UI frameworks, Katamari is the foundation for developers looking to build the future of real-time applications across industries like IoT, finance, and SaaS. 🔧 Let’s Build It. GitHub Repository: https://lnkd.in/gFAVg2sa #MetaCloud #RealTimeDevelopment #SecureCloud #EventDriven #TechInnovation #Katamari

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I was thinking about this famous proverb, or saying: “The messenger is as important as the message.” I think that these days, or as Havel suggested, in post-totalitarian system, this proverb doesn't seem correct any more. People started giving more importance to the messengers, and decides about the message based on the “merit” of the messengers—no matter if the message is a stinking shit. For example, if the messenger is their superior then the message must be valuable, important, and worth propagating; if the message is from some celebrity, especially techno-celebrity, then the message is important and valuable; if the messenger is famous, rich, and has worldly success, then the message must be valuable and important etc. Let’s look at it in another perspective; take messengers in the religious context. I’ll use Islam (as that is the religion I know a good deal about, comparatively) to explain this. To us, Muslims, Prophet Muhammad(s.a.w.) is very important, and we also love him and consider him very important, indeed; but, we don’t heed his message—we pretend to heed, but we don't, like... it’s not as important. And this is not a new phenomenon, there are many fabricated Ahadith (sayings) in the name of prophet Muhammad(s.a.w.), just because whoever fabricated those knew that people will take it in the name of the messenger. BTW, this is not something peculiar to Islam only, but any religion, I would argue. In the case of religion, we love the messengers, hold them dear and in reverence; but, we don’t even try to live their message, let alone live their message.

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Unfortunately OpenAI o1 isn't "reasoning" or "thinking" as we humans define it. OpenAI has (intentionally?) muddied the UI/UX waters by introducing verbs like "thinking" / "analysing" etc. to encourage users to anthropomorphize what is going on behind the scenes. o1 is more like iterative prompt generation, and then doing next token prediction for each prompt using an agent. So, yes — it may generate better answers in some contexts, especially the ones where RLHF has been used on its chain-of-though processes (prompt generation), like maths and programming, but its likely to fall into many of the same general traps as next token prediction. The structure and sequence of tokens doesn't *generally* allow you to infer logic. Syntax is not semantics, and the jury is still out on what level of semantic generalisation LLMs can encode, to say nothing of their implementations of algorithms for logical inference and search. #LLM #OpenAI #o1

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🚀 Curious about how we scale Disney+ Hotstar's infrastructure to handle millions of concurrent users? In my latest blog, I dive into the journey of optimizing core infrastructure components, tackling challenges head-on, and redefining our approach to scalability and reliability. This journey has been truly transformative! 📈 Not only did this transformation improve performance, but it also set the stage for future growth. Check it out and explore the insights that shaped our success! A special thanks to Harsh Mittal Karthik Vijayaraju and Anil Kumar A. for your invaluable contributions, guidance, and support in writing this tech blog. Disney+ Hotstar #infrastructure #engineering #devops #scaling #cloud

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At the heart of PreProd OpnSrc, there is a vision and a mission to make foundational learning at ZERO cost Please visit the post below and the page at PreProd Opnsrc for more information PreProd Corp PreProd Emulet PreProd Consult Krishnav Dave

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I am excited to share the latest blog, co-authored by myself, Junhwi Kim and Vyas Sekar, detailing how we managed to successfully localized and improved LLM by combining Fine-Tuning and RAG. https://lnkd.in/gKDkgGPq

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We are excited to back Morphing Machines. As Dr. Ranjani, CTO and co-founder says: “For the first time in India and globally, we have a processor that is truly runtime reconfigurable, catering to emerging workloads.” While Nvidia’s growth and high valuation are driven by robust demand for “infra-compute” in high-performance GPUs, spurred by Gen AI, there is a distinct need for innovative solutions tailored to a new wave of reactive applications. Enter Morphing Machines. It addresses this demand with its unique product designed for next-gen telecom, autonomous vehicles, collaborative robots, avionics, and online data analytics. This product is specifically engineered to handle heterogeneous workloads and diverse tasks with varying performance demands simultaneously, ensuring a high level of scalability. As we move from an institutionally-backed research team at IISC to productization, Golden Sparrow is collaborating with Speciale Invest and others to support Deepak Shapeti, who joined as CEO three years ago after earning his Masters at Stanford. He brings not only technical expertise but also the business acumen necessary to guide the product to commercial success. Venkat Raju Afreed Faizan Anand Rao Ritik Singh Michael Marmor

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Building products as an **#indiehacker** is challenging - not just technically, but emotionally too. I recently witnessed this firsthand through Jun's (https://x.com/shenjun1995) journey after he left the Amazon AWS team in Beijing. Jun's story is a testament to the resilience required in the indie maker world: 1. He let go of a side project he'd worked on for six months, following my advice to pivot. 2. Instead of rushing into new ideas, he embraced core #indiehacker practices:   - Validating before coding   - Marketing from day one The results? Jun made his first internet dollar in April 2024. His reaction? Tears of joy and a savvy marketing move: "I'm recording my emotional response for Twitter. It'll get traction!" That's when I knew: Jun had truly become a **#solopreneur**. A month later, Jun shared his rollercoaster ride: - Excitement led to creating 10+ articles about his product (https://lnkd.in/ewU56z3w). The harsh result? Zero conversions. - After a brief struggle, he pivoted again. With no prior experience, he created a promo video. The outcome? Traction and returning customers! - Next challenge: Reddit posts led to constant bans. Another setback to navigate. TL;DR: The #indiehacker journey is an emotional rollercoaster. Remember: - There's no single magic decision that solves everything. - Success isn't a jackpot; it's a series of correct choices accumulating to critical mass. - Manage your emotional energy to keep building those fractions of success. To all the #indiemakers out there: Keep pushing forward. Your "overnight success" might be just around the corner! #entrepreneurship #startuplife #buildinpublic

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A few years back, when Nakul was starting Audacious Ventures, I asked him, "Who do you invest in?" His answer was, " Force of nature founders." He expands on this answer in the article. Nakul is one of the best early-stage investors in the Valley, an investor and board member at People.ai.

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Engineers are experiencing a seismic shift driven by market volatility, the rise of GenAI, and new approaches to quantifying engineering impact. But there's a disconnect between business leaders and the engineers building their products. 𝗔𝗰𝗰𝗼𝗿𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘁𝗼 𝘁𝗵𝗲 𝗦𝘁𝗮𝘁𝗲 𝗼𝗳 𝗘𝗻𝗴𝗶𝗻𝗲𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝘀𝘁𝘂𝗱𝘆 𝗯𝘆 Jellyfish 🔗 https://bit.ly/3Vt3lcO 📉 71% of execs at large enterprises believe productivity decreased, while only 40% of engineers agree. 🤷‍♂️ 43% of engineers feel that leadership at their company is out of the loop regarding engineering challenges, compared to 92% of executives 😩 46% of engineers report their teams are experiencing burnout, compared to 34% of executives. This chasm between perception and reality can breed mistrust, misalignment, and missed opportunities. 𝗪𝗵𝗶𝗹𝗲 𝗱𝗲𝗳𝗶𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗰𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗿 𝗺𝗲𝘁𝗿𝗶𝗰𝘀 𝗶𝘀 𝗰𝗿𝘂𝗰𝗶𝗮𝗹, 𝗲𝗺𝗼𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗶𝗻𝘁𝗲𝗹𝗹𝗶𝗴𝗲𝗻𝘁 𝗹𝗲𝗮𝗱𝗲𝗿𝘀 𝗰𝗮𝗻: ✨ Foster psychological safety for open dialogue 🤝 Build trust through active listening and empathy 💡 Inspire teams by painting a compelling vision 🧭 Provide clarity amidst ambiguity and change By complementing hard metrics with soft skills, leaders can create an environment where engineers thrive and innovation flourishes. 𝗛𝗮𝘃𝗲 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗲𝘅𝗽𝗲𝗿𝗶𝗲𝗻𝗰𝗲𝗱 𝘁𝗵𝗶𝘀 𝗱𝗶𝘀𝗰𝗼𝗻𝗻𝗲𝗰𝘁 𝘄𝗶𝘁𝗵𝗶𝗻 𝘆𝗼𝘂𝗿 𝗼𝗿𝗴𝗮𝗻𝗶𝘇𝗮𝘁𝗶𝗼𝗻? #Leadership #EmotionalIntelligence #Engineering

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Shreyas Doshi on annual planning: We sped 6 weeks planning. We go into January super excited! And then, inevitably, the first week of February, 3 key client features come up and, by the end of Q1, the plan is completely thrown out. So then, I ask “well, why are we doing planning for 6 weeks?” And someone really smart says something like “the plan is useless, but the act of planning is powerful”. And everyone nods their head because it sounds smart but no one has a clue what it means. YES 😂😂😂 The solution: spent 3 days refining a simple, clear product strategy. Everything that comes up can run through that filter. If it’s not aligned, don’t do it. If it is, consider prioritizing it. The result: You stay fluid & dynamic without sacrificing your north star.

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YugabyteDB ❤️ Apache Airflow: check out this talk at the Airflow Summit by Amit Chauhan.

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For those of you building RAG: next week (May 21) we're hosting a webinar with MongoDB that will help optimize those apps--

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