June 5, 2025 • 37 mins
Watch Carol and Tim LIVE every day on YouTube: http://bit.ly/3vTiACF.
President Donald Trump proposed ending Elon Musk’s government contracts and subsidies, escalating the war of words between the world’s richest man and the president he helped elect.
“The easiest way to save money in our Budget, Billions and Billions of Dollars, is to terminate Elon’s Governmental Subsidies and Contracts. I was always surprised that Biden didn’t do it!” Trump posted on his social media site Thursday.
Trump’s threat strikes at a main source of the billionaire’s wealth. Musk’s Tesla Inc. and Space Exploration Technologies Corp. have benefited from federal contracts and subsidies. Ending contracts with Musk’s companies could prove legally and practically unwieldy, given they are deeply intertwined with US space and defense operations.
Total revenue for SpaceX and Tesla from federal unclassified contracts since fiscal year 2000 is $22.5 billion, according to Bloomberg Government data. Tesla’s shares fell as much as 18% on Thursday, extending earlier losses after Trump floated ending Musk’s federal relationships.
“Go ahead, make my day,” Musk posted on X in response to Trump’s threat. The Tesla chief then alleged that Trump’s name appears in the files related to the late New York financier Jeffrey Epstein, who was accused of sex trafficking underage girls and later died by suicide while in federal detention.
“Time to drop the really big bomb: @realDonaldTrump is in the Epstein files. That is the real reason they have not been made public. Have a nice day, DJT!” Musk wrote. The White House declined to comment on the Epstein accusation.
Today's show features interviews from the Bloomberg Technology Summit in San Francisco:
- RJ Scaringe, Founder and CEO of Rivian
- Bloomberg Technology Co-Host Ed Ludlow
- Peggy Johnson, CEO of Agility Robotics
- Ashley Mayer, Co-Founder & General Partner, Coalition Operators and Helen Min, Venture Partner, True Ventures
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
This is Bloomberg business Week, Daily reporting from the magazine
that helps global leaders stay ahead with insight on the people, companies,
and trends shaping today's complex economy. Plus global business finance
and tech news as it happens. The Bloomberg Business Weekdaily
Podcast with Carol Masser and Tim Steneveek on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
All right, we've got a really great guest. We want
to get right to. Marja Sparrange is with us. He's,
of course, head of the sixteen billion dollar marketcap automaker.
We're talking about Rivian. We talk about this company all
the time with us at Bloomberg Tech sumit here in
San Francisco, and we have Ed Ludlow, a member of
our team cost of Bloomberg Technology, who knows this company
so well. Hey, one thing I want to start with
(00:53):
Rja is there's a lot going on today. The bromance
in the White House between Elon and Donald Trump. It
seems like it's over.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
And it's not going well.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
So I'm just curious have you been able to kind
of win market share or anything as a result of
kind of Elon's position at doge and and I'm just
curious how it might play out here.
Speaker 5 (01:16):
Yeah, I mean I think I can testimony.
Speaker 6 (01:19):
Yeah, I think in general it's the thing has been
surprising is just how politicize a lot of things have become,
so electric vehicles become politicized. Specific brands within the electric
vehicles paced to politicized. And so what we've tried to
do as a brand, really really focused on is to
focus on what we stand for, the products, the ratchcotes
and and you know, there's a famous Michael Jordan quote
(01:41):
which is we have Republicans, you know, he said Republicans
and Democrats both by Nikes. And it's the same thing
with Rivian. So I'll go to Rivian events. I was
just in New York yesterday, and yeah, there's it's such
a beautiful mix of backgrounds, perspectives, cultures that are drawn
to what we're building as a brand. Right and we're
about to launch what we call it Hard Too, which
(02:01):
the lower price vehicle starts at forty five thousand dollars,
and that product will even you know, you can broaden
the aperture even more.
Speaker 7 (02:08):
And so I think, well, Kars asking is if there's
net positive effect for you from this environment on sales.
Speaker 5 (02:17):
I think that's what she was asking.
Speaker 7 (02:18):
I think you will benefiting from this environment.
Speaker 4 (02:21):
Test some movement. Have you benefited from it?
Speaker 6 (02:24):
I think there are a lot of customers that are
looking for brand that they want to connect with, so
that we're seeing that for sure.
Speaker 8 (02:29):
Sort of on that Thinking about the politics of this
rare earth, I mean, you and the team have been
really clear that you've been working to educate the Trump
administration when it comes to the complexity throround processing rare
earth here in the US. We did hear from the
President earlier today after a call with President Chiji and Pang.
He said there should no longer be any questions respecting
the complexity of rare Earth's products. Are you still concerned
(02:51):
about accessibility to rare earth?
Speaker 6 (02:53):
Well, first, I'd say I appreciate that the administration recognizes
this is an issue that's important, and I think that
we've done a lot of work and spent a lot
of time with with administration on this topic. I think
this is perhaps one of the biggest topics surrounding, you know,
the trade tensions with China. It's it's well, it's well
(03:14):
documented that a vast majority of the world's processing for
these rare metals happens in China. So this is something
that you know, we're going to continue to be very
focused on, continue to have concerns about until we.
Speaker 9 (03:26):
Start to see it really move. What's your backup n.
Speaker 6 (03:30):
Which we have many backup playing you can't get access
to these rarer ifs for some reason ro an extended
period of time, which are essential in making evs and batteries.
Speaker 9 (03:38):
What do you do?
Speaker 6 (03:39):
So what we've we've done, we've spent time on over
the last several months, is to build alternative supply chains.
But they're not they're not elegant because they're not set
up for scale, and and and a lot of people
beyond us are also trying to build these alternative supply chains.
So I think, you know, the hope is that in
(03:59):
the short to medium term we see this open back up,
and I think in the long term we're probably going
to see both investment into building earth capacity outside of
China and then innovation to remove.
Speaker 9 (04:10):
Rare earths from products.
Speaker 6 (04:11):
You know, so if you take in an electric vehicle,
the reason this is so important is the motors use
permanent magnets and then permanent magnets have earth metals, you know,
things like dysprosium and all those things on the periodic
table that you forget area. Yeah, but those those earth
metals are needed in the magnets. But you can create
electro magnet to power the rotor. You know, the rotors
(04:33):
is spinning part of the motor. But then you've got
to get powered to the rotors so that you can
do it with a brush. You could do it with induction.
So it's a more complex motor product, but it does
remove the complexity of global trade.
Speaker 9 (04:44):
Around the area.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
Is that a little time away, Yeah, it's.
Speaker 6 (04:47):
Not gonna it's you can't flip your design over overnight.
But I would say I think a lot of the
auto industry is going to start finding innovative ways that
are perhaps maybe a little more expensive, that reduce the
reliance on people.
Speaker 7 (05:00):
Wonder how nimble you are there, Like, do you remember
when we first met seven years ago with respect your
suppliers really wouldn't engage with you because of scale. So
if you have had to pivot a little bit because
of policy, particularly for planning for our two, have you
been able to a get your expires to listen to
you and be effect to change what's changed.
Speaker 6 (05:22):
I mean, yeah, we've talked about the slide. I mean,
our relationship with suppliers, a leverage we have with those
supliers is so much stronger today with our two and
what's to come than what we had, you know, in
twenty nineteen or twenty twenty, even twenty eighteen. But I'd
say the thing that's really helpful for us in our too.
So it's not as if this is a surprise we saw,
(05:45):
you know, if you're going into summer of last year,
we saw some of these tensions already rising between the
United States and China, and that was as we were
planning for and sourcing our two. So we contemplated and
in many ways anticipated a lot of these situations right
now with in terms of tariffs, in terms of trade
restriction is happening.
Speaker 9 (06:03):
So in the medium to long term, it's we're pretty
well covered.
Speaker 6 (06:07):
In the short to medium term, you know, if things
get shut off, that's really challenging. And so that's where
I think the rare challenge is that if if this
this happens where it's off, it just creates a lot
of pressure on a very thin non China supply chain.
Speaker 7 (06:21):
I still think there's a lot of interest in Rivian.
What I hear is there's also a lot of interest
in also your your micro mobility spin off. Would you
consider it kind of de risking yourselves a little bit
by allowing outside investors to write you a check into
that venture and then get you some capital, or de
risk your own balance sheet in that respect.
Speaker 6 (06:41):
So we spun this micromability uh portion of Rivian out
and we actually raised outside capitals. We brought okay, we
brought one hundred and five million dollars in at the
start of the.
Speaker 9 (06:51):
Year, which is from a clips which is from a Clipse.
Speaker 6 (06:55):
Exactly right, and so it's now independently financed from Ribbon
and it's you know, it's a really exciting set of products.
We're to show those products in the fall.
Speaker 7 (07:02):
But we'd the venture to look at even further outside
happy toil to get going a little bit.
Speaker 6 (07:06):
We could, yeah, we could, but we're really happy with
where it is. It's it's it's exciting to build a
new business with the strength of all the Rivian technologies.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
That is starting right, I say thirty seconds at the
end to wrap up our So with everything that's going
on from the administration kind of push back. It feels
like it gets alternative energy and ebs. Do you think
it's a real setback or things will keep moving and
forgive me, it's just about thirty.
Speaker 6 (07:29):
S thirty seconds, all right, go Look, I think I
think there's a lot of noise in the short term,
but the end state is still really clear. The world's
going to electrify, We're going to move towards sustainable, carbon
neutral transportation, and the countries and the businesses that focus
on the future of state are the ones that are
(07:49):
going to be participants in the long term. And so
you know, we talk about this often with demonstration, which
is the importance of US companies having technical leadership, production
capacity around these these these and make sure we're there.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
You did it, Thurdy, Thank you so much. Great way
for us to wrap up this hour. Urgie Scars, thank
you of course at Rivian and of course our Ed Ludlow.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
You are listening to the Bloomberg Business Weekdaily Podcast. Catch
us live weekday afternoons from two to five pm Eastern
Listen on Apple CarPlay and the Android Auto with the
Bloomberg Business app, or watch us live on YouTube.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
All right, folks got to say that one of the
things we are talking about a lot today is kind
of the back and forth that's going on between President
Trump and Elon Musk. It's a battle on social media,
and I will just say it's almost hard to keep
up with the amount of tweets that are going back
and forth. What we do know, and what we know
the Bloomberg universe cares about is that Tesla shares are
(08:44):
now down about sixteen percent. Now, one of the key
things is the President has basically said one of the
ways to save money is cut back on the contracts
that are given to all of the entities that are
within the Elon Musk universe. I will say, here's one
tweet Elon Musk saying, ask you, is it time to
create a new political party in America that actually represents
the eighty percent in the middle?
Speaker 4 (09:04):
Yes or no?
Speaker 3 (09:05):
So he's putting out a little poll. There's a lot
of back and forth, and you could certainly find it
on the Bloomberg. We wanted to get to our own
ed Ludlow to talk a little bit about kind of
this back and forth of two that seems so intertwined
and so getting along. Yeah, and all of a sudden,
it feels very different.
Speaker 8 (09:20):
So I think for me, there was this realization over
the weekend that Jared Eisagman wasn't going to be running
NASAU and to a lot of people, and you reported on.
Speaker 9 (09:30):
This a lot over the last few months, to a
lot of.
Speaker 8 (09:32):
People in the industry in Silicon Valley but also who
are in the space industry, said this is a really
good nomination.
Speaker 9 (09:39):
Yeah, regardless of.
Speaker 8 (09:40):
What his history has been, he knows what to do
when it comes to space. He's been to space, he
has a relationship with Elon, he has relationship with SpaceX.
He knows this, he knows the industry.
Speaker 4 (09:50):
Makes sense.
Speaker 9 (09:50):
It was pulled over the weekend. Yeah, was at the
beginning of the end of porlation.
Speaker 7 (09:53):
I think we should go through all of Elon's public
and private companies and explain why this is happening and
why is having so quickly. But Yeah, what we were
told by sources is that Sergio Gore, an official within
the White House, waited until musk Stage tenure had ended.
What has happened in the last few hours is the
President has said that Musk left DOGE because he was
(10:14):
asked by the President to leave.
Speaker 5 (10:16):
I'm tallying all of this. We wait time.
Speaker 8 (10:19):
He had to leave at a certain point because the
designation as a special government, which.
Speaker 7 (10:23):
Is kepped at a certain number of days. Anyway, but
we're just going off what is said publically by the
President of the United States when Musk left Doge Sergio Gore.
This official, as our sources explained to us and others
within the White House basically who are not fans of
Elon Musk, saw Jared Isaacman as being closely associated with
(10:43):
Elon Musk, we can get into that, and moved to
influence the President.
Speaker 5 (10:47):
To cancel that nomination.
Speaker 7 (10:49):
The White House is officially saying that and citing Jared
Isaacman's historic affiliation with the Democratic Party as well as
donations to him. Right, that's a SpaceX relationship we're talking about.
Speaker 8 (11:02):
And we should note that there have been other people
within the Trump administration, and indeed President Trump himself who
in the past has donated the Democrats as well. Sure,
he talked about that when he ran for president.
Speaker 7 (11:12):
Jarediseman went to space twice. He funded those activities himself,
but through a financial transaction with SpaceX.
Speaker 5 (11:20):
We should talk about Tesla, which is the public.
Speaker 7 (11:22):
Proxy for what's happening. What you need to know is
that SpaceX since the year two thousand, Tesla is down
and I think at one point the session was down
eighteen percent, on track for his biggest drop intra day
in four years.
Speaker 5 (11:36):
Like that serious stuff. SpaceX and Tesla over the last twenty.
Speaker 7 (11:39):
Five years have had about twenty five billion dollars in
government subsidies, grant contracts, including in SpaceX's contexts with the
defense apparatus of this country.
Speaker 5 (11:50):
And what the President has.
Speaker 7 (11:51):
Said, I've got the quote, if you allow me to
pull it on, is the easiest way to save money
in our budget, billions and billions of dollars, is to
terminate Elong's governmental sub that he's in contracts.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
I was always surprised that Biden didn't do it.
Speaker 8 (12:03):
Well, and on the question to you, maybe Biden didn't
do it because SpaceX was the only game out there.
Speaker 7 (12:08):
SpaceX is the only game out there commercially in so
far as it dominates the vast majority of payload human
and non human from Earth into space. And I go
back to the point that it is not just grants
that NASA issues for development, but contracts with the defense
apparatus of this country.
Speaker 9 (12:23):
Could point your backs. Rocket Lab step in right now.
Is it an opportunity?
Speaker 7 (12:28):
Honestly, they are increasing the cadence of their launch. But
the point is is that when you are a contractor
that serves the government, there are regulatory and contractual baselines,
itar rules, all of these things you have to satisfy.
Speaker 5 (12:44):
Elon as you guys, you and I have talked about
this over many years.
Speaker 7 (12:48):
He has security clearance as part of his role as
the chief executive officer of SpaceX.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
This is so fast moving.
Speaker 7 (12:54):
All I'm doing is summarizing what the President is said today,
which is the reason Testa's down is a the association
there is now a negative association of Elon Musk with
the president. Previously that relationship supported the stop. In the
private company's context, the President is saying that he's going
to rip up the contracts that company has with America.
Speaker 5 (13:14):
This is what's happening in real time. Sorry, no, I
think you know.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
It's just amazing kind of how the narrative that the relationship.
Thinking that it would be good for EVS right initially,
and it would be good potentially for everything that Elon touches,
and we're seeing it's not necessarily played.
Speaker 7 (13:28):
So I reported last Fridays that Elon Musk and some
of his staff have themselves been phoning lawmakers in this
country to lobby on the passage of two pieces of
legislation that are going through Congress on autonomous driving, to
have language and content that those bills helped Tesla with
its longer.
Speaker 5 (13:46):
Term ambition.
Speaker 7 (13:49):
To have a future where they have a robataxi service.
Speaker 5 (13:52):
This is also happening in the background.
Speaker 8 (13:53):
Look, it's a little bit of a political question ed,
but bear with me because there's a connection to Silicon
Valley here. Elon Musk in the months leading into up
to the election was really able to gather support of
a lot of folks who traditionally supported Democrats, some folks.
Speaker 9 (14:08):
Such as Musk, previously supports exactly.
Speaker 8 (14:11):
So you know markin Dresen, for example, who's been pro
Trump lately, David Sachs, who serves as AI, and cryptos
are there's a splintering happening right here, and I'm wondering
if there aren't going to be repercussions that go beyond
Elon Musk and start to affect a different contingency.
Speaker 7 (14:28):
I believe that also in the last twelve hours. At
some point, Elon Musk has also posted that he was
very helpful to the president.
Speaker 5 (14:35):
In the campaign.
Speaker 7 (14:36):
Oh yeah, in getting that non traditional Trump base to
vote for the president said, I'm just saying.
Speaker 8 (14:45):
You know, mus No, you're right. He absolutely said this
in the last few hours. Trump wouldn't have won without me.
And he also said that Democrats would have controlled the
Senate if he didn't get behind Republicans. I guess we're
really seeing the power in how this place.
Speaker 7 (15:00):
Yeah, and look to Elon Musk's credit, he has been
consistent in saying I cannot influence the president on policy.
Speaker 5 (15:08):
So let's take for example, tariffs.
Speaker 7 (15:09):
Elon Musk was pretty clear on the last earning school
he does not believe in the level of tariffs at
the Trump with ministration at that time we're trying to
put in place because of course, if you're an auto
maker and you're moving products across borders in that subject
to tariffs, that's not good for your top nor bottom line.
Speaker 5 (15:27):
But he has said that I don't agree with the
president on everything. What has changed.
Speaker 7 (15:30):
If you're listening to this program and tuning in for
the first time, there are posts on social media in
both directions where the President of the United States, his
relationship with Elon Musk has rapidly deteriorated in a matter
of hours.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
Start now down just under fourteen just twenty second.
Speaker 5 (15:47):
To get in trouble with TV are going to.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Yeah, there's put more pressure on Elon.
Speaker 7 (15:50):
Of course, it puts more pressure on Elon because Elon
is the CEO of a public company, in several private
companies that lead fields in America, in the world.
Speaker 9 (15:58):
Yeah, all right, there go go, Thank you.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
For all of us.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
He's in demand. He's in demand. Our at Ludlow of course,
co host of Bloomberg Technology.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week Daily podcast. Listen live
each weekday starting at two pm Eastern on Apple car
Play and the Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app.
You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our
flagship New York station, Just Say Alexa played Bloomberg eleven
thirty robots.
Speaker 8 (16:27):
And warehouses doing repetitive tasks that humans now do, but
doing them better and not getting injured.
Speaker 9 (16:32):
Carold.
Speaker 8 (16:32):
It sounds like the stuff of the future, but Agility
Robotics is one of the few companies that's doing this
right now.
Speaker 3 (16:38):
Yeah, they really are.
Speaker 4 (16:39):
Check us out.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
It's got five foot nine inch robots working at a
warehouse containing products made by spanks, has technology and testing
at Amazon dot Com facilities, and that really makes Agility
really one of the few humanoid bought companies with machines
currently performing useful task for customers. If you are wondering
if it's happening, folks, it's happening.
Speaker 8 (16:58):
Heyst the former CEO of be ong Men Reality Tech
for Magically if she's senior roles at Microsoft in the
Qualcom She joins us here in San Francisco at the
Bloomberg Tech Summit.
Speaker 9 (17:06):
Welcome.
Speaker 8 (17:07):
It's been reported that companies are testing digit you're humanoid robot.
Speaker 9 (17:11):
It's what we're talking about.
Speaker 8 (17:12):
When will it go beyond testing though to actually scale?
Speaker 9 (17:15):
Apparently they're only.
Speaker 8 (17:16):
About one hundred of these that are out in the
field right now.
Speaker 4 (17:19):
Well, we have gone beyond testing.
Speaker 10 (17:20):
We are actually commercially deployed as of one year ago
today actually in GXO facilities, which is a third party
logistics provider who sends spanks out.
Speaker 9 (17:31):
You don't, mister Jacobs, Well, at this point we do.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
We do.
Speaker 9 (17:35):
So how many are out there in the field.
Speaker 10 (17:38):
Right now, there's a handful of them, but they're getting
ready to more hundred oh total. We only have about
one hundred out in the field that the company has made,
but at GXO we have a handful of those, but
they're looking at next steps on how to scale that
beyond that facility.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Peggy, is it all about logistics at least for the
beginning and for a long time, Like, I'm just curious
how this explodes.
Speaker 10 (18:01):
Yeah, that was the right entry point for a couple
of reasons. One is the robot is capable of doing
that today.
Speaker 4 (18:08):
It was made for work.
Speaker 10 (18:09):
It can pick up heavy containers even if things are
rolling around in it and still be stable and set
it down. It can move things from A to B
over and over and over again. Logistics happens to be
an area where there's a huge labor gap. These are
challenging jobs, very physically.
Speaker 4 (18:30):
Challenging. They have.
Speaker 10 (18:33):
Repetition, they're a little bit mind numbing. They're just hard jobs,
cause a lot of injuries and things. Hard to fill
these jobs. So because of that demand, we are able
to bring our robots in.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
How expensive are they and how quickly? Does that kind
of makes sense?
Speaker 4 (18:49):
Answer?
Speaker 3 (18:51):
That's true, vacation times, maintenance, they don't fight with each other.
Speaker 9 (19:01):
You haven't seen terminator.
Speaker 3 (19:05):
No, Seriously, how much do they cost and like for
a company? How quickly does it make sense?
Speaker 4 (19:09):
Yeah?
Speaker 10 (19:09):
Right now we talk about them in the range very
low volume of say a luxury vehicle, but that's coming
down very very quickly.
Speaker 4 (19:17):
With volume.
Speaker 10 (19:18):
We believe we have line of sight to about twenty
five K thirty K for these industrial robots.
Speaker 4 (19:25):
We'll be in that environment for a while.
Speaker 10 (19:29):
Now before say we get into the homes, where I
think the price is going to have to come down
much much further.
Speaker 8 (19:35):
The big risk that by the way, we're speaking with
Peggy Johnson, COO Agility Robotics. If it's getting a little
loud for folks, it's just because it's lunchtime and we
got a lot of folks lining up behind us. Peggy,
the sort of golden goose of this stuff is working
alongside humans in a way that's not at a risk
to the health of the humans, where a robot's not
going to like bump them and hurt them.
Speaker 9 (19:56):
How do you do that?
Speaker 8 (19:57):
Because that seems to be something that is challenging.
Speaker 10 (20:01):
It is super challenging human right now exactly. They have
to today work inside of a work selle, which are
these gates that go up about waist high. It keeps
humans back because its case robots, yeah right, because they're
very hard, they're very curious. Humans want to get in
there and see them.
Speaker 4 (20:21):
So it keeps humans back.
Speaker 10 (20:23):
But the robots themselves are human sized, and sometimes they fall,
they trip, or you know, things just like humans do.
Speaker 4 (20:32):
And so you have.
Speaker 10 (20:33):
To be able to handle those situations in a very
controlled manner. Sometimes they're carrying fifty pounds of weight. That
has to be something that you bring the robot down
in a very controlled way so that no one gets hurt.
We don't want an arm coming around.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
How do you do that?
Speaker 10 (20:50):
Super challenging. We figured it out at Agility and we'll
be demoing that before the end of the year. It's
called cooperative safety. We be around humans.
Speaker 8 (21:00):
So one thing that I've learned over the last few
months is that China is doing this really, really well.
We have reports that there's a higher density of robots
for human on Chinese factory floors than.
Speaker 9 (21:11):
Here in the US, and then here in Japan.
Speaker 8 (21:13):
A source feature in a Bloomberg story just a couple
of weeks ago said there are fifty or sixty companies
in China he thinks working on humanoid development.
Speaker 9 (21:20):
Now are we behind?
Speaker 4 (21:23):
I would say yes and no.
Speaker 10 (21:25):
They do have a plecora of robots out there. Some
of what is termed humanoids aren't actually. I mean humanoids
usually have two arms, two legs ahead. Some of them
are simple robot arms and things like that. So if
we separate those out and say just what are the
humanoids doing, there's very few that we see doing real
heavy industrial work. Oftentimes it's very lightweight. It's only a
(21:51):
handful of skills. I think from an innovation standpoint, the
US is still ahead of China in this hysteria.
Speaker 3 (21:59):
Okay, wait a minute, So because I think we think
about like the automation part that China has done really
really very well. But you're saying with humanoids, you think
the US is ahead.
Speaker 4 (22:10):
I think we are still ahead.
Speaker 10 (22:12):
We have not seen first of all, safety incorporated in
their humanoids. You must have safe humanoids. You cannot let
them out at a work selle where the big markets
are without that. You need an e stop, for instance,
an emergency stop on the back.
Speaker 4 (22:26):
You need to hit that if something goes wrong. It's
just like an electronic bing. Can I get one for this?
Speaker 9 (22:32):
They do have that in the World Robot, the best
selling children's book. Well they do.
Speaker 4 (22:35):
Okay, see they're ahead, They are ahead.
Speaker 3 (22:37):
So I am curious about oversight though, like yeah, is
like what is the capacity for someone to go in
and affect a program? Like how does it work? Are
once a humanoid is out there?
Speaker 4 (22:49):
Are they completely independent? Or is there some over like
how does Yeah? So a couple of things.
Speaker 10 (22:54):
We are actually working with US government on the standards
for humanoids none exist right now.
Speaker 4 (23:00):
They need to work with on that.
Speaker 10 (23:02):
We work with a group called A three and they
then input the results of that into folks like oh ship.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
Part of defense?
Speaker 9 (23:10):
Would it go under David.
Speaker 10 (23:14):
And crypt It will probably cross paths with David at point?
Speaker 3 (23:18):
All right, so continue, right, So.
Speaker 4 (23:20):
You need you need that.
Speaker 10 (23:22):
But we've taken safety seriously from day one because of
the power in these machines.
Speaker 4 (23:28):
You have to take it seriously.
Speaker 10 (23:30):
If if a program, if something should happen, you don't
want an arm to fling around and knock you over
and do perhaps more damage. So that and also the
data on it has to stay very protected. Just like
anything in a corporate IT infrastructure, you've got to keep
the data protected.
Speaker 4 (23:49):
So we think of all of those things elimination.
Speaker 3 (23:52):
Are they using data from the cloud? Do they have
their own like on site.
Speaker 4 (23:55):
On premise both.
Speaker 10 (23:57):
We have quite a bit of compute on the compute
the robot itself, and we're also connected to the cloud.
We need to step into an enterprise environment, so we
have to plug into their warehouse management systems. We have
to talk to the other types of robots like autonomous
mobile carts and conveyor belts. Those are all types of
automation and we have to talk to all of those
(24:19):
in order to work safely in that environment. And by
the way, to take over those tasks that they can't
find humans for.
Speaker 4 (24:26):
We have to be able to plug in as if
it was a human.
Speaker 8 (24:28):
You're not the only one here in the US who's
working on this. I don't know if he's on. Brett
Adcock from jan RAI was here. They're also working on humanoids.
How does your robot differ from Gratz?
Speaker 10 (24:38):
Well, we're here today with our robot who will walk
autonomously onto the stage today and upon my input, will
execute on my commands.
Speaker 4 (24:51):
So that's one big difference, and it.
Speaker 8 (24:52):
Sounds like the figure AI robot does not do that.
Speaker 10 (24:55):
At this point, I haven't seen it, Okay, possibly has
anyone seen it?
Speaker 4 (25:00):
I don't know. Okay, I couldn't you care?
Speaker 9 (25:02):
Ask Brett, Well, we could do Carol. Do you remember
that show many years ago?
Speaker 8 (25:06):
This is like when I was a kid Battle Bots,
where they had like remote control cars robots that would
like violently attack each other.
Speaker 9 (25:14):
I could see like a little cage match.
Speaker 3 (25:17):
Between actually that you've seen some video over in China.
Speaker 4 (25:20):
Yeah, robots kind of.
Speaker 8 (25:22):
Agility, digit and like a figure AI robots.
Speaker 10 (25:25):
We actually have really taken a stand that we would
never arm our general purpose robots.
Speaker 4 (25:33):
We they do average us.
Speaker 10 (25:35):
We first and foremost have to have trust with the humans,
so we won't.
Speaker 9 (25:39):
Just that we have to. This is the fact that
you have to say that I think is the story.
Speaker 3 (25:43):
No, it is a story Like I'm thinking. We just
talked about drones in terms of yeah, it's impacting warfare,
and I just think about all this stuff getting into
the wrong hands, like how do we control that.
Speaker 10 (25:54):
Well, we've already seen some of that out of China.
You see armed humanoids in videos and things I think
the US has to have a response to that obviously,
and that they should have that kind of tech. My
point is our current general purpose robots are not meant
for that at all, and because we need to build
(26:15):
trust in the environs.
Speaker 8 (26:17):
Will you never will will you rule out ever using
your robots for security place?
Speaker 4 (26:21):
I mean, we'd never rule that out.
Speaker 10 (26:23):
I just want to make it very clear that what
we have today is not meant for that.
Speaker 4 (26:27):
And you do see videos of.
Speaker 10 (26:30):
That coming out of general purpose robots in China.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
Yeah, I will say that is terrifying.
Speaker 8 (26:35):
What we've read startups are doing trials in China from
sorting garbage, delivery medicines, and nursing homes.
Speaker 9 (26:41):
You're thinking about using these for elder care.
Speaker 8 (26:44):
But also patrolling the streets alongside police officers and on
the other hand, guiding.
Speaker 9 (26:48):
Museum for US.
Speaker 10 (26:49):
Yeah, those are all great use cases. I think it
is because you're putting a human in harm's way every
time a policeman walks out onto the street. I think
better to have a robot. I think it doesn't have
to be armed.
Speaker 4 (27:04):
It doesn't.
Speaker 10 (27:05):
Yeah, in a hazardous situation there's been some sort of
nuclear problem, send a robot in don't you know send
in humans?
Speaker 3 (27:14):
I want to ask you. City recently projected that the
market for the machinis, humanoids and related services will search
to about seven trillion by twenty fifty, and the world
could be populated by six hundred and forty eight million
human like bots by that What might that world look like?
Speaker 5 (27:28):
Take us there?
Speaker 10 (27:29):
Well, I think that world doesn't happen first until their safety.
So we have to show that these robots can be
side by side with humans in.
Speaker 4 (27:37):
A very safe manner. But then you should think of
it as a tool.
Speaker 10 (27:42):
And the same way farmers used to plow fields with
oxen and now they have machines that do it. This
will be a tool that will give you choice. Some
people might want to use their robot to cook. You
might enjoy cooking. You say no, just do the laundry
for me. So that or you should think of. But
it is giving you choice.
Speaker 4 (28:01):
To take manual labor off your head.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
So we could have every household has their own humanoid.
I'm wind to do like tasks like it'll be affordable.
Speaker 8 (28:08):
I would say two hours a night, right, it's like
meat like stuff that I do every day.
Speaker 3 (28:13):
Up, I mean you can see every household having absolutely yeah, yeah.
Speaker 8 (28:17):
Before we let you go funding. How you're thinking about
the business the information reported just a couple months ago
in March. When you're raising four hundred million dollars at
a pre investment valuation at one point seventy five million dollars,
can you give us an update?
Speaker 9 (28:28):
Has that round closed?
Speaker 10 (28:30):
That is ongoing and we have the funds will be
used to make our next generation robot, which is going
to be awesome. It's going to have a ten to
one work to charge ratio on batteries, which means one
hundred minutes of work ten minutes of charge. It's back
out around the floor again.
Speaker 4 (28:48):
It can take full shifts.
Speaker 8 (28:50):
It's got many more rounds just ten seconds? How many
more rounds of financing de courses?
Speaker 4 (28:53):
I think this is it?
Speaker 9 (28:55):
All right? Cool stuff did in less than ten seconds.
Speaker 5 (28:59):
I love it.
Speaker 3 (28:59):
I love it, Peggy, such cool stuff.
Speaker 4 (29:01):
So glad we could get some time with Thanks for
having me.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
Thank you for being here, Peggy Johnson, CEO of Agility Robotics.
Speaker 2 (29:06):
You are listening to the Bloomberg Business Weekdaily Podcast. Catch
us live weekday afternoons from two to five pm Eastern
Listen on Apple CarPlay and the Android Auto with the
Bloomberg Business app, or watch us live on YouTube.
Speaker 3 (29:20):
Hey listen very much to a part of our world today.
We've got a podcast. Everybody's got a podcast. Great Chat, though,
is a new one that debuted I think about three
months ago. Episodes include conversations that can kind of go
in a lot of places, lls AI AI, maybe taking
our jobs, the best place to do, a startup that's
as likely to be heard as our courting eggs Forever
(29:42):
twenty one's demise, and also views on.
Speaker 8 (29:44):
The new code We've got with us here at the
Bloomberg Tech twenty five. Ashley Mayor, co host of the
Great Chat podcast, actually a co founder and general partner
at the early venture firm Coalition Operators. Last night, she
was joined by her co host Ellen men, who a
venture partner at True Ventures and also has done time
Carol had plaid drop Box and the company formerly known
(30:04):
as Spacebook.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
Tell us about this podcast, because my understanding, I think
it was a LinkedIn post that you guys talked about.
Speaker 4 (30:09):
I think you did that.
Speaker 3 (30:10):
It was like a feisty dinner and all of a sudden,
here we got to a podcast. Tell us about what
you guys were thinking in the mission here.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
Yeah, I mean, be careful before you go to a
dinner with a group of friends, because you might end
up starting a podcast. The five of us had a
dinner at Last Ball. It was a fun, feisty conversation
about the tech industry, and we joked at that dinner,
you know, maybe we should have a podcast. There are
so many podcasts that are you know, more news driven,
(30:38):
more informational, have guests, but we sort of thought that
maybe a more conversational, conversational format was good. And so
that podcast turned into a group chat, and that group
chat turned into a podcast, and Great Chat was born.
Speaker 3 (30:50):
Can I say it almost felt like Sex and the
City for the tech world a little bit, because you
guys will cover a lot of what's going on in
the world more generally, but then you'll talk about, you know,
some executive moving to Meadow or something, and you kind
of get into the nitty gritty of it.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
Sex and the City for nerds maybe, yeah. And I
think what we try to do is demystify a lot
of the headlines everyone seeing. I mean, the five of
us have worked in tech our whole careers, as investors, operators, founders.
My co host Sally has been in media herself, and
so we try to break down like the biggest headlines,
the biggest topics in tech and make them accessible, especially
(31:26):
to a younger generation of people coming into this industry.
Speaker 8 (31:29):
You guys are venture capitalists, so you understand that things
need to make money eventually. Yes, we're in a world
where anyone can do a podcast, so there's a big
difference between sort of the caller daddies and Joe Rogan's
of the world and then the newer entrants that don't
necessarily have the traction. Is this right now making money
as the goal for it to make money?
Speaker 1 (31:50):
No, not currently, although you know, never say never. We're
very much in scrappy mode. We're really doing this from
a place that we saw a gap in the ecosystem
and if I'm gonna be a little feisty here myself,
we found one of the few areas of white space
in tech commentary, which is the we're all women. And
we felt like a lot of the biggest voices in
the tech industry were very loud, very prominent, often billionaire men,
(32:14):
and we thought maybe we could bring a different a
different line you're not.
Speaker 8 (32:17):
Saying any names, but I know, I think I know
who you're talking about.
Speaker 4 (32:20):
There may be a podcast.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
It's a group of four men who are very loud
and sad.
Speaker 9 (32:25):
I did watch Sounds like Me Loud on HBO. I
don't know if you watch Mountainhead. I'm just throwing it
onto fun fact.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I worked for one of those podcast hosts back in
the day.
Speaker 9 (32:36):
What did you learn?
Speaker 1 (32:38):
Well, I learned the power of narrative and the stories
we tell each other and ourselves about our industry determine
who gets funded, who gets the benefit of doubt, where
top talent goes, and this stuff really matters.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
But it's so indicative of how many conversations have we
had about women in tech and specifically female founded companies
just fighting for capital and to get recognized. Why is
that still a problem and how can you guys use
your format in your platform to maybe help that.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Yeah, and also as venture capitalists in your own right totally,
And I mean I'm an emerging fund manager myself. I
have to raise money for my fund, and so it's
very much a thing.
Speaker 4 (33:16):
Listen.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I think just having examples of people who are maybe underrepresented,
who are visible, who are doing the thing and putting
ourselves out there. I mean, we're very much in this
like anti DEI era, which which comes with both I
think some negative implications for how people and are focusing
their their time and efforts. But at the end of
(33:39):
the day, you know, we all get to put our
chips on the table and build things ourselves and elevate
other people who are doing it.
Speaker 3 (33:47):
Actually, just push back against Ei. I push back against women,
push back against anyone who maybe isn't just a white
male born in America. That's kind of how it feels
right now. Yeah, with your platform, are you afraid to
speak at against that? I mean, because I think there
is a lot of fear among leaders about you know,
the White House either hearing something and not liking it.
(34:07):
So tell me about that, and how does it make
it also harder for you guys to raise money?
Speaker 5 (34:12):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (34:12):
I mean I am at a small fund. Yeah, and
so I'm not too worried about President Trump watching this
interview and coming at me and listen. I think at
the end of the day, my job as an investor
is to fund the very best founders I can find.
I do super early stage investing, So it really is
a bet On the founder. I don't have a diversity mandate.
(34:35):
We never have a coalition, but we have very diverse networks,
the diverse pipeline of deals, and so we have a
diverse portfolio. And in an ideal world, that's how it
works in my opinion, right versus having to have dedicated
programs specifics leaves the dollars going to you know, early
stage fund founders. I think that you know, as the
(34:55):
venture eco system divers size the pool of founders who
get capital of life.
Speaker 8 (35:00):
I want to talk to you a little bit about
what's exciting you in the tech space right now before
we do that. Carol you did mention and Ashley you
mentioned it too that the president going after different folks.
I should bring everyone an update in the sort of
relationship between Elon Musk and President Trump. The President putting
out on true social quote Elon was wearing thin.
Speaker 9 (35:18):
I asked him to leave.
Speaker 8 (35:20):
I took away his ev mandate that forced everyone to
buy electric cars that nobody else wanted, that he knew
for months I was going to do, and he just
went crazy. So just a little bit of an update
back and forth between the President and it.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
Is so over it does feel.
Speaker 9 (35:33):
You know, we're going to talk to r J.
Speaker 8 (35:34):
Skerriinch from Ribban in just a minute, so see if
he has any commentary about that, Ashley, before we let
you go curious about what's exciting to you out there.
We're not an in ecosystem in technology where venture capitalists
are throwing money at, like you know, at based games
or food delivery apps or that sort of thing. Right now,
A lot of it's going into robotics, a lot of
it's going into AI.
Speaker 9 (35:55):
Where are you seeing the money go?
Speaker 1 (35:57):
I mean excited about a lot of the macrunchs that
other people are. I have a partner who is actively
building a company in the AI space called Triai. We
see incredible aideal flow from her, and she also sort
of really has a real time pulse on what the
biggest AI platforms are doing, how enterprises are adopting. I
have another partner who runs city Block Health, which is
(36:18):
a massive healthcare startup. We're seeing incredible breakthroughs in the
healthcare ecosystem, especially the intersection of health and AI. But
at the highest level, I think there's never been a
better time to be an emerging investor and an early
stage investor. Because so many things are changing about the
world right From a technological perspective, a platform shift is
(36:38):
really changing everything. From a regulatory perspective, I mean, it's
a little bit of a wild West, but change is
generally good for early stage startups. Culturally and from a
media perspective, the way startups build their brands, go to market,
find their customers is changing, and so that for me
is so exciting. These moments of change are where the
most opportunity comes from.
Speaker 3 (36:58):
So ten seconds in a world where everything feels so uncertain,
you feel pretty confident.
Speaker 4 (37:03):
I feel good.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
I mean, I think if you've built your career in
the startup ecosystem, your purpose built for change. And there's
never been a bigger period of change than the one
we're in right now.
Speaker 3 (37:12):
Ashley bay Or she is co founder and general partner
of the early venture firm Coalition Operators, and she, along
with helenman Or, co hosts at the Grade chat pot Yam.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week Daily podcast, available on Apple, Spotify,
and anywhere else you get your podcasts. Listen live weekday
afternoons from two to five pm Eastern on Bloomberg dot com.
The iHeartRadio app tune In, and the Bloomberg Business App.
You can also watch us live every weekday on YouTube
(37:41):
and always on the Bloomberg terminal
Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, radio News.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
This is Bloomberg business Week, Daily reporting from the magazine
that helps global leaders stay ahead with insight on the people, companies,
and trends shaping today's complex economy. Plus global business finance
and tech news as it happens. The Bloomberg Business Weekdaily
Podcast with Carol Masser and Tim Steneveek on Bloomberg Radio.
Speaker 3 (00:32):
All right, we've got a really great guest. We want
to get right to. Marja Sparrange is with us. He's,
of course, head of the sixteen billion dollar marketcap automaker.
We're talking about Rivian. We talk about this company all
the time with us at Bloomberg Tech sumit here in
San Francisco, and we have Ed Ludlow, a member of
our team cost of Bloomberg Technology, who knows this company
so well. Hey, one thing I want to start with
(00:53):
Rja is there's a lot going on today. The bromance
in the White House between Elon and Donald Trump. It
seems like it's over.
Speaker 4 (01:02):
And it's not going well.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
So I'm just curious have you been able to kind
of win market share or anything as a result of
kind of Elon's position at doge and and I'm just
curious how it might play out here.
Speaker 5 (01:16):
Yeah, I mean I think I can testimony.
Speaker 6 (01:19):
Yeah, I think in general it's the thing has been
surprising is just how politicize a lot of things have become,
so electric vehicles become politicized. Specific brands within the electric
vehicles paced to politicized. And so what we've tried to
do as a brand, really really focused on is to
focus on what we stand for, the products, the ratchcotes
and and you know, there's a famous Michael Jordan quote
(01:41):
which is we have Republicans, you know, he said Republicans
and Democrats both by Nikes. And it's the same thing
with Rivian. So I'll go to Rivian events. I was
just in New York yesterday, and yeah, there's it's such
a beautiful mix of backgrounds, perspectives, cultures that are drawn
to what we're building as a brand. Right and we're
about to launch what we call it Hard Too, which
(02:01):
the lower price vehicle starts at forty five thousand dollars,
and that product will even you know, you can broaden
the aperture even more.
Speaker 7 (02:08):
And so I think, well, Kars asking is if there's
net positive effect for you from this environment on sales.
Speaker 5 (02:17):
I think that's what she was asking.
Speaker 7 (02:18):
I think you will benefiting from this environment.
Speaker 4 (02:21):
Test some movement. Have you benefited from it?
Speaker 6 (02:24):
I think there are a lot of customers that are
looking for brand that they want to connect with, so
that we're seeing that for sure.
Speaker 8 (02:29):
Sort of on that Thinking about the politics of this
rare earth, I mean, you and the team have been
really clear that you've been working to educate the Trump
administration when it comes to the complexity throround processing rare
earth here in the US. We did hear from the
President earlier today after a call with President Chiji and Pang.
He said there should no longer be any questions respecting
the complexity of rare Earth's products. Are you still concerned
(02:51):
about accessibility to rare earth?
Speaker 6 (02:53):
Well, first, I'd say I appreciate that the administration recognizes
this is an issue that's important, and I think that
we've done a lot of work and spent a lot
of time with with administration on this topic. I think
this is perhaps one of the biggest topics surrounding, you know,
the trade tensions with China. It's it's well, it's well
(03:14):
documented that a vast majority of the world's processing for
these rare metals happens in China. So this is something
that you know, we're going to continue to be very
focused on, continue to have concerns about until we.
Speaker 9 (03:26):
Start to see it really move. What's your backup n.
Speaker 6 (03:30):
Which we have many backup playing you can't get access
to these rarer ifs for some reason ro an extended
period of time, which are essential in making evs and batteries.
Speaker 9 (03:38):
What do you do?
Speaker 6 (03:39):
So what we've we've done, we've spent time on over
the last several months, is to build alternative supply chains.
But they're not they're not elegant because they're not set
up for scale, and and and a lot of people
beyond us are also trying to build these alternative supply chains.
So I think, you know, the hope is that in
(03:59):
the short to medium term we see this open back up,
and I think in the long term we're probably going
to see both investment into building earth capacity outside of
China and then innovation to remove.
Speaker 9 (04:10):
Rare earths from products.
Speaker 6 (04:11):
You know, so if you take in an electric vehicle,
the reason this is so important is the motors use
permanent magnets and then permanent magnets have earth metals, you know,
things like dysprosium and all those things on the periodic
table that you forget area. Yeah, but those those earth
metals are needed in the magnets. But you can create
electro magnet to power the rotor. You know, the rotors
(04:33):
is spinning part of the motor. But then you've got
to get powered to the rotors so that you can
do it with a brush. You could do it with induction.
So it's a more complex motor product, but it does
remove the complexity of global trade.
Speaker 9 (04:44):
Around the area.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
Is that a little time away, Yeah, it's.
Speaker 6 (04:47):
Not gonna it's you can't flip your design over overnight.
But I would say I think a lot of the
auto industry is going to start finding innovative ways that
are perhaps maybe a little more expensive, that reduce the
reliance on people.
Speaker 7 (05:00):
Wonder how nimble you are there, Like, do you remember
when we first met seven years ago with respect your
suppliers really wouldn't engage with you because of scale. So
if you have had to pivot a little bit because
of policy, particularly for planning for our two, have you
been able to a get your expires to listen to
you and be effect to change what's changed.
Speaker 6 (05:22):
I mean, yeah, we've talked about the slide. I mean,
our relationship with suppliers, a leverage we have with those
supliers is so much stronger today with our two and
what's to come than what we had, you know, in
twenty nineteen or twenty twenty, even twenty eighteen. But I'd
say the thing that's really helpful for us in our too.
So it's not as if this is a surprise we saw,
(05:45):
you know, if you're going into summer of last year,
we saw some of these tensions already rising between the
United States and China, and that was as we were
planning for and sourcing our two. So we contemplated and
in many ways anticipated a lot of these situations right
now with in terms of tariffs, in terms of trade
restriction is happening.
Speaker 9 (06:03):
So in the medium to long term, it's we're pretty
well covered.
Speaker 6 (06:07):
In the short to medium term, you know, if things
get shut off, that's really challenging. And so that's where
I think the rare challenge is that if if this
this happens where it's off, it just creates a lot
of pressure on a very thin non China supply chain.
Speaker 7 (06:21):
I still think there's a lot of interest in Rivian.
What I hear is there's also a lot of interest
in also your your micro mobility spin off. Would you
consider it kind of de risking yourselves a little bit
by allowing outside investors to write you a check into
that venture and then get you some capital, or de
risk your own balance sheet in that respect.
Speaker 6 (06:41):
So we spun this micromability uh portion of Rivian out
and we actually raised outside capitals. We brought okay, we
brought one hundred and five million dollars in at the
start of the.
Speaker 9 (06:51):
Year, which is from a clips which is from a Clipse.
Speaker 6 (06:55):
Exactly right, and so it's now independently financed from Ribbon
and it's you know, it's a really exciting set of products.
We're to show those products in the fall.
Speaker 7 (07:02):
But we'd the venture to look at even further outside
happy toil to get going a little bit.
Speaker 6 (07:06):
We could, yeah, we could, but we're really happy with
where it is. It's it's it's exciting to build a
new business with the strength of all the Rivian technologies.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
That is starting right, I say thirty seconds at the
end to wrap up our So with everything that's going
on from the administration kind of push back. It feels
like it gets alternative energy and ebs. Do you think
it's a real setback or things will keep moving and
forgive me, it's just about thirty.
Speaker 6 (07:29):
S thirty seconds, all right, go Look, I think I
think there's a lot of noise in the short term,
but the end state is still really clear. The world's
going to electrify, We're going to move towards sustainable, carbon
neutral transportation, and the countries and the businesses that focus
on the future of state are the ones that are
(07:49):
going to be participants in the long term. And so
you know, we talk about this often with demonstration, which
is the importance of US companies having technical leadership, production
capacity around these these these and make sure we're there.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
You did it, Thurdy, Thank you so much. Great way
for us to wrap up this hour. Urgie Scars, thank
you of course at Rivian and of course our Ed Ludlow.
Speaker 2 (08:08):
You are listening to the Bloomberg Business Weekdaily Podcast. Catch
us live weekday afternoons from two to five pm Eastern
Listen on Apple CarPlay and the Android Auto with the
Bloomberg Business app, or watch us live on YouTube.
Speaker 3 (08:22):
All right, folks got to say that one of the
things we are talking about a lot today is kind
of the back and forth that's going on between President
Trump and Elon Musk. It's a battle on social media,
and I will just say it's almost hard to keep
up with the amount of tweets that are going back
and forth. What we do know, and what we know
the Bloomberg universe cares about is that Tesla shares are
(08:44):
now down about sixteen percent. Now, one of the key
things is the President has basically said one of the
ways to save money is cut back on the contracts
that are given to all of the entities that are
within the Elon Musk universe. I will say, here's one
tweet Elon Musk saying, ask you, is it time to
create a new political party in America that actually represents
the eighty percent in the middle?
Speaker 4 (09:04):
Yes or no?
Speaker 3 (09:05):
So he's putting out a little poll. There's a lot
of back and forth, and you could certainly find it
on the Bloomberg. We wanted to get to our own
ed Ludlow to talk a little bit about kind of
this back and forth of two that seems so intertwined
and so getting along. Yeah, and all of a sudden,
it feels very different.
Speaker 8 (09:20):
So I think for me, there was this realization over
the weekend that Jared Eisagman wasn't going to be running
NASAU and to a lot of people, and you reported on.
Speaker 9 (09:30):
This a lot over the last few months, to a
lot of.
Speaker 8 (09:32):
People in the industry in Silicon Valley but also who
are in the space industry, said this is a really
good nomination.
Speaker 9 (09:39):
Yeah, regardless of.
Speaker 8 (09:40):
What his history has been, he knows what to do
when it comes to space. He's been to space, he
has a relationship with Elon, he has relationship with SpaceX.
He knows this, he knows the industry.
Speaker 4 (09:50):
Makes sense.
Speaker 9 (09:50):
It was pulled over the weekend. Yeah, was at the
beginning of the end of porlation.
Speaker 7 (09:53):
I think we should go through all of Elon's public
and private companies and explain why this is happening and
why is having so quickly. But Yeah, what we were
told by sources is that Sergio Gore, an official within
the White House, waited until musk Stage tenure had ended.
What has happened in the last few hours is the
President has said that Musk left DOGE because he was
(10:14):
asked by the President to leave.
Speaker 5 (10:16):
I'm tallying all of this. We wait time.
Speaker 8 (10:19):
He had to leave at a certain point because the
designation as a special government, which.
Speaker 7 (10:23):
Is kepped at a certain number of days. Anyway, but
we're just going off what is said publically by the
President of the United States when Musk left Doge Sergio Gore.
This official, as our sources explained to us and others
within the White House basically who are not fans of
Elon Musk, saw Jared Isaacman as being closely associated with
(10:43):
Elon Musk, we can get into that, and moved to
influence the President.
Speaker 5 (10:47):
To cancel that nomination.
Speaker 7 (10:49):
The White House is officially saying that and citing Jared
Isaacman's historic affiliation with the Democratic Party as well as
donations to him. Right, that's a SpaceX relationship we're talking about.
Speaker 8 (11:02):
And we should note that there have been other people
within the Trump administration, and indeed President Trump himself who
in the past has donated the Democrats as well. Sure,
he talked about that when he ran for president.
Speaker 7 (11:12):
Jarediseman went to space twice. He funded those activities himself,
but through a financial transaction with SpaceX.
Speaker 5 (11:20):
We should talk about Tesla, which is the public.
Speaker 7 (11:22):
Proxy for what's happening. What you need to know is
that SpaceX since the year two thousand, Tesla is down
and I think at one point the session was down
eighteen percent, on track for his biggest drop intra day
in four years.
Speaker 5 (11:36):
Like that serious stuff. SpaceX and Tesla over the last twenty.
Speaker 7 (11:39):
Five years have had about twenty five billion dollars in
government subsidies, grant contracts, including in SpaceX's contexts with the
defense apparatus of this country.
Speaker 5 (11:50):
And what the President has.
Speaker 7 (11:51):
Said, I've got the quote, if you allow me to
pull it on, is the easiest way to save money
in our budget, billions and billions of dollars, is to
terminate Elong's governmental sub that he's in contracts.
Speaker 5 (12:01):
I was always surprised that Biden didn't do it.
Speaker 8 (12:03):
Well, and on the question to you, maybe Biden didn't
do it because SpaceX was the only game out there.
Speaker 7 (12:08):
SpaceX is the only game out there commercially in so
far as it dominates the vast majority of payload human
and non human from Earth into space. And I go
back to the point that it is not just grants
that NASA issues for development, but contracts with the defense
apparatus of this country.
Speaker 9 (12:23):
Could point your backs. Rocket Lab step in right now.
Is it an opportunity?
Speaker 7 (12:28):
Honestly, they are increasing the cadence of their launch. But
the point is is that when you are a contractor
that serves the government, there are regulatory and contractual baselines,
itar rules, all of these things you have to satisfy.
Speaker 5 (12:44):
Elon as you guys, you and I have talked about
this over many years.
Speaker 7 (12:48):
He has security clearance as part of his role as
the chief executive officer of SpaceX.
Speaker 5 (12:53):
This is so fast moving.
Speaker 7 (12:54):
All I'm doing is summarizing what the President is said today,
which is the reason Testa's down is a the association
there is now a negative association of Elon Musk with
the president. Previously that relationship supported the stop. In the
private company's context, the President is saying that he's going
to rip up the contracts that company has with America.
Speaker 5 (13:14):
This is what's happening in real time. Sorry, no, I
think you know.
Speaker 3 (13:17):
It's just amazing kind of how the narrative that the relationship.
Thinking that it would be good for EVS right initially,
and it would be good potentially for everything that Elon touches,
and we're seeing it's not necessarily played.
Speaker 7 (13:28):
So I reported last Fridays that Elon Musk and some
of his staff have themselves been phoning lawmakers in this
country to lobby on the passage of two pieces of
legislation that are going through Congress on autonomous driving, to
have language and content that those bills helped Tesla with
its longer.
Speaker 5 (13:46):
Term ambition.
Speaker 7 (13:49):
To have a future where they have a robataxi service.
Speaker 5 (13:52):
This is also happening in the background.
Speaker 8 (13:53):
Look, it's a little bit of a political question ed,
but bear with me because there's a connection to Silicon
Valley here. Elon Musk in the months leading into up
to the election was really able to gather support of
a lot of folks who traditionally supported Democrats, some folks.
Speaker 9 (14:08):
Such as Musk, previously supports exactly.
Speaker 8 (14:11):
So you know markin Dresen, for example, who's been pro
Trump lately, David Sachs, who serves as AI, and cryptos
are there's a splintering happening right here, and I'm wondering
if there aren't going to be repercussions that go beyond
Elon Musk and start to affect a different contingency.
Speaker 7 (14:28):
I believe that also in the last twelve hours. At
some point, Elon Musk has also posted that he was
very helpful to the president.
Speaker 5 (14:35):
In the campaign.
Speaker 7 (14:36):
Oh yeah, in getting that non traditional Trump base to
vote for the president said, I'm just saying.
Speaker 8 (14:45):
You know, mus No, you're right. He absolutely said this
in the last few hours. Trump wouldn't have won without me.
And he also said that Democrats would have controlled the
Senate if he didn't get behind Republicans. I guess we're
really seeing the power in how this place.
Speaker 7 (15:00):
Yeah, and look to Elon Musk's credit, he has been
consistent in saying I cannot influence the president on policy.
Speaker 5 (15:08):
So let's take for example, tariffs.
Speaker 7 (15:09):
Elon Musk was pretty clear on the last earning school
he does not believe in the level of tariffs at
the Trump with ministration at that time we're trying to
put in place because of course, if you're an auto
maker and you're moving products across borders in that subject
to tariffs, that's not good for your top nor bottom line.
Speaker 5 (15:27):
But he has said that I don't agree with the
president on everything. What has changed.
Speaker 7 (15:30):
If you're listening to this program and tuning in for
the first time, there are posts on social media in
both directions where the President of the United States, his
relationship with Elon Musk has rapidly deteriorated in a matter
of hours.
Speaker 3 (15:43):
Start now down just under fourteen just twenty second.
Speaker 5 (15:47):
To get in trouble with TV are going to.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Yeah, there's put more pressure on Elon.
Speaker 7 (15:50):
Of course, it puts more pressure on Elon because Elon
is the CEO of a public company, in several private
companies that lead fields in America, in the world.
Speaker 9 (15:58):
Yeah, all right, there go go, Thank you.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
For all of us.
Speaker 3 (16:02):
He's in demand. He's in demand. Our at Ludlow of course,
co host of Bloomberg Technology.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week Daily podcast. Listen live
each weekday starting at two pm Eastern on Apple car
Play and the Android Auto with the Bloomberg Business app.
You can also listen live on Amazon Alexa from our
flagship New York station, Just Say Alexa played Bloomberg eleven
thirty robots.
Speaker 8 (16:27):
And warehouses doing repetitive tasks that humans now do, but
doing them better and not getting injured.
Speaker 9 (16:32):
Carold.
Speaker 8 (16:32):
It sounds like the stuff of the future, but Agility
Robotics is one of the few companies that's doing this
right now.
Speaker 3 (16:38):
Yeah, they really are.
Speaker 4 (16:39):
Check us out.
Speaker 3 (16:40):
It's got five foot nine inch robots working at a
warehouse containing products made by spanks, has technology and testing
at Amazon dot Com facilities, and that really makes Agility
really one of the few humanoid bought companies with machines
currently performing useful task for customers. If you are wondering
if it's happening, folks, it's happening.
Speaker 8 (16:58):
Heyst the former CEO of be ong Men Reality Tech
for Magically if she's senior roles at Microsoft in the
Qualcom She joins us here in San Francisco at the
Bloomberg Tech Summit.
Speaker 9 (17:06):
Welcome.
Speaker 8 (17:07):
It's been reported that companies are testing digit you're humanoid robot.
Speaker 9 (17:11):
It's what we're talking about.
Speaker 8 (17:12):
When will it go beyond testing though to actually scale?
Speaker 9 (17:15):
Apparently they're only.
Speaker 8 (17:16):
About one hundred of these that are out in the
field right now.
Speaker 4 (17:19):
Well, we have gone beyond testing.
Speaker 10 (17:20):
We are actually commercially deployed as of one year ago
today actually in GXO facilities, which is a third party
logistics provider who sends spanks out.
Speaker 9 (17:31):
You don't, mister Jacobs, Well, at this point we do.
Speaker 3 (17:34):
We do.
Speaker 9 (17:35):
So how many are out there in the field.
Speaker 10 (17:38):
Right now, there's a handful of them, but they're getting
ready to more hundred oh total. We only have about
one hundred out in the field that the company has made,
but at GXO we have a handful of those, but
they're looking at next steps on how to scale that
beyond that facility.
Speaker 3 (17:55):
Peggy, is it all about logistics at least for the
beginning and for a long time, Like, I'm just curious
how this explodes.
Speaker 10 (18:01):
Yeah, that was the right entry point for a couple
of reasons. One is the robot is capable of doing
that today.
Speaker 4 (18:08):
It was made for work.
Speaker 10 (18:09):
It can pick up heavy containers even if things are
rolling around in it and still be stable and set
it down. It can move things from A to B
over and over and over again. Logistics happens to be
an area where there's a huge labor gap. These are
challenging jobs, very physically.
Speaker 4 (18:30):
Challenging. They have.
Speaker 10 (18:33):
Repetition, they're a little bit mind numbing. They're just hard jobs,
cause a lot of injuries and things. Hard to fill
these jobs. So because of that demand, we are able
to bring our robots in.
Speaker 3 (18:46):
How expensive are they and how quickly? Does that kind
of makes sense?
Speaker 4 (18:49):
Answer?
Speaker 3 (18:51):
That's true, vacation times, maintenance, they don't fight with each other.
Speaker 9 (19:01):
You haven't seen terminator.
Speaker 3 (19:05):
No, Seriously, how much do they cost and like for
a company? How quickly does it make sense?
Speaker 4 (19:09):
Yeah?
Speaker 10 (19:09):
Right now we talk about them in the range very
low volume of say a luxury vehicle, but that's coming
down very very quickly.
Speaker 4 (19:17):
With volume.
Speaker 10 (19:18):
We believe we have line of sight to about twenty
five K thirty K for these industrial robots.
Speaker 4 (19:25):
We'll be in that environment for a while.
Speaker 10 (19:29):
Now before say we get into the homes, where I
think the price is going to have to come down
much much further.
Speaker 8 (19:35):
The big risk that by the way, we're speaking with
Peggy Johnson, COO Agility Robotics. If it's getting a little
loud for folks, it's just because it's lunchtime and we
got a lot of folks lining up behind us. Peggy,
the sort of golden goose of this stuff is working
alongside humans in a way that's not at a risk
to the health of the humans, where a robot's not
going to like bump them and hurt them.
Speaker 9 (19:56):
How do you do that?
Speaker 8 (19:57):
Because that seems to be something that is challenging.
Speaker 10 (20:01):
It is super challenging human right now exactly. They have
to today work inside of a work selle, which are
these gates that go up about waist high. It keeps
humans back because its case robots, yeah right, because they're
very hard, they're very curious. Humans want to get in
there and see them.
Speaker 4 (20:21):
So it keeps humans back.
Speaker 10 (20:23):
But the robots themselves are human sized, and sometimes they fall,
they trip, or you know, things just like humans do.
Speaker 4 (20:32):
And so you have.
Speaker 10 (20:33):
To be able to handle those situations in a very
controlled manner. Sometimes they're carrying fifty pounds of weight. That
has to be something that you bring the robot down
in a very controlled way so that no one gets hurt.
We don't want an arm coming around.
Speaker 4 (20:49):
How do you do that?
Speaker 10 (20:50):
Super challenging. We figured it out at Agility and we'll
be demoing that before the end of the year. It's
called cooperative safety. We be around humans.
Speaker 8 (21:00):
So one thing that I've learned over the last few
months is that China is doing this really, really well.
We have reports that there's a higher density of robots
for human on Chinese factory floors than.
Speaker 9 (21:11):
Here in the US, and then here in Japan.
Speaker 8 (21:13):
A source feature in a Bloomberg story just a couple
of weeks ago said there are fifty or sixty companies
in China he thinks working on humanoid development.
Speaker 9 (21:20):
Now are we behind?
Speaker 4 (21:23):
I would say yes and no.
Speaker 10 (21:25):
They do have a plecora of robots out there. Some
of what is termed humanoids aren't actually. I mean humanoids
usually have two arms, two legs ahead. Some of them
are simple robot arms and things like that. So if
we separate those out and say just what are the
humanoids doing, there's very few that we see doing real
heavy industrial work. Oftentimes it's very lightweight. It's only a
(21:51):
handful of skills. I think from an innovation standpoint, the
US is still ahead of China in this hysteria.
Speaker 3 (21:59):
Okay, wait a minute, So because I think we think
about like the automation part that China has done really
really very well. But you're saying with humanoids, you think
the US is ahead.
Speaker 4 (22:10):
I think we are still ahead.
Speaker 10 (22:12):
We have not seen first of all, safety incorporated in
their humanoids. You must have safe humanoids. You cannot let
them out at a work selle where the big markets
are without that. You need an e stop, for instance,
an emergency stop on the back.
Speaker 4 (22:26):
You need to hit that if something goes wrong. It's
just like an electronic bing. Can I get one for this?
Speaker 9 (22:32):
They do have that in the World Robot, the best
selling children's book. Well they do.
Speaker 4 (22:35):
Okay, see they're ahead, They are ahead.
Speaker 3 (22:37):
So I am curious about oversight though, like yeah, is
like what is the capacity for someone to go in
and affect a program? Like how does it work? Are
once a humanoid is out there?
Speaker 4 (22:49):
Are they completely independent? Or is there some over like
how does Yeah? So a couple of things.
Speaker 10 (22:54):
We are actually working with US government on the standards
for humanoids none exist right now.
Speaker 4 (23:00):
They need to work with on that.
Speaker 10 (23:02):
We work with a group called A three and they
then input the results of that into folks like oh ship.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
Part of defense?
Speaker 9 (23:10):
Would it go under David.
Speaker 10 (23:14):
And crypt It will probably cross paths with David at point?
Speaker 3 (23:18):
All right, so continue, right, So.
Speaker 4 (23:20):
You need you need that.
Speaker 10 (23:22):
But we've taken safety seriously from day one because of
the power in these machines.
Speaker 4 (23:28):
You have to take it seriously.
Speaker 10 (23:30):
If if a program, if something should happen, you don't
want an arm to fling around and knock you over
and do perhaps more damage. So that and also the
data on it has to stay very protected. Just like
anything in a corporate IT infrastructure, you've got to keep
the data protected.
Speaker 4 (23:49):
So we think of all of those things elimination.
Speaker 3 (23:52):
Are they using data from the cloud? Do they have
their own like on site.
Speaker 4 (23:55):
On premise both.
Speaker 10 (23:57):
We have quite a bit of compute on the compute
the robot itself, and we're also connected to the cloud.
We need to step into an enterprise environment, so we
have to plug into their warehouse management systems. We have
to talk to the other types of robots like autonomous
mobile carts and conveyor belts. Those are all types of
automation and we have to talk to all of those
(24:19):
in order to work safely in that environment. And by
the way, to take over those tasks that they can't
find humans for.
Speaker 4 (24:26):
We have to be able to plug in as if
it was a human.
Speaker 8 (24:28):
You're not the only one here in the US who's
working on this. I don't know if he's on. Brett
Adcock from jan RAI was here. They're also working on humanoids.
How does your robot differ from Gratz?
Speaker 10 (24:38):
Well, we're here today with our robot who will walk
autonomously onto the stage today and upon my input, will
execute on my commands.
Speaker 4 (24:51):
So that's one big difference, and it.
Speaker 8 (24:52):
Sounds like the figure AI robot does not do that.
Speaker 10 (24:55):
At this point, I haven't seen it, Okay, possibly has
anyone seen it?
Speaker 4 (25:00):
I don't know. Okay, I couldn't you care?
Speaker 9 (25:02):
Ask Brett, Well, we could do Carol. Do you remember
that show many years ago?
Speaker 8 (25:06):
This is like when I was a kid Battle Bots,
where they had like remote control cars robots that would
like violently attack each other.
Speaker 9 (25:14):
I could see like a little cage match.
Speaker 3 (25:17):
Between actually that you've seen some video over in China.
Speaker 4 (25:20):
Yeah, robots kind of.
Speaker 8 (25:22):
Agility, digit and like a figure AI robots.
Speaker 10 (25:25):
We actually have really taken a stand that we would
never arm our general purpose robots.
Speaker 4 (25:33):
We they do average us.
Speaker 10 (25:35):
We first and foremost have to have trust with the humans,
so we won't.
Speaker 9 (25:39):
Just that we have to. This is the fact that
you have to say that I think is the story.
Speaker 3 (25:43):
No, it is a story Like I'm thinking. We just
talked about drones in terms of yeah, it's impacting warfare,
and I just think about all this stuff getting into
the wrong hands, like how do we control that.
Speaker 10 (25:54):
Well, we've already seen some of that out of China.
You see armed humanoids in videos and things I think
the US has to have a response to that obviously,
and that they should have that kind of tech. My
point is our current general purpose robots are not meant
for that at all, and because we need to build
(26:15):
trust in the environs.
Speaker 8 (26:17):
Will you never will will you rule out ever using
your robots for security place?
Speaker 4 (26:21):
I mean, we'd never rule that out.
Speaker 10 (26:23):
I just want to make it very clear that what
we have today is not meant for that.
Speaker 4 (26:27):
And you do see videos of.
Speaker 10 (26:30):
That coming out of general purpose robots in China.
Speaker 4 (26:33):
Yeah, I will say that is terrifying.
Speaker 8 (26:35):
What we've read startups are doing trials in China from
sorting garbage, delivery medicines, and nursing homes.
Speaker 9 (26:41):
You're thinking about using these for elder care.
Speaker 8 (26:44):
But also patrolling the streets alongside police officers and on
the other hand, guiding.
Speaker 9 (26:48):
Museum for US.
Speaker 10 (26:49):
Yeah, those are all great use cases. I think it
is because you're putting a human in harm's way every
time a policeman walks out onto the street. I think
better to have a robot. I think it doesn't have
to be armed.
Speaker 4 (27:04):
It doesn't.
Speaker 10 (27:05):
Yeah, in a hazardous situation there's been some sort of
nuclear problem, send a robot in don't you know send
in humans?
Speaker 3 (27:14):
I want to ask you. City recently projected that the
market for the machinis, humanoids and related services will search
to about seven trillion by twenty fifty, and the world
could be populated by six hundred and forty eight million
human like bots by that What might that world look like?
Speaker 5 (27:28):
Take us there?
Speaker 10 (27:29):
Well, I think that world doesn't happen first until their safety.
So we have to show that these robots can be
side by side with humans in.
Speaker 4 (27:37):
A very safe manner. But then you should think of
it as a tool.
Speaker 10 (27:42):
And the same way farmers used to plow fields with
oxen and now they have machines that do it. This
will be a tool that will give you choice. Some
people might want to use their robot to cook. You
might enjoy cooking. You say no, just do the laundry
for me. So that or you should think of. But
it is giving you choice.
Speaker 4 (28:01):
To take manual labor off your head.
Speaker 3 (28:02):
So we could have every household has their own humanoid.
I'm wind to do like tasks like it'll be affordable.
Speaker 8 (28:08):
I would say two hours a night, right, it's like
meat like stuff that I do every day.
Speaker 3 (28:13):
Up, I mean you can see every household having absolutely yeah, yeah.
Speaker 8 (28:17):
Before we let you go funding. How you're thinking about
the business the information reported just a couple months ago
in March. When you're raising four hundred million dollars at
a pre investment valuation at one point seventy five million dollars,
can you give us an update?
Speaker 9 (28:28):
Has that round closed?
Speaker 10 (28:30):
That is ongoing and we have the funds will be
used to make our next generation robot, which is going
to be awesome. It's going to have a ten to
one work to charge ratio on batteries, which means one
hundred minutes of work ten minutes of charge. It's back
out around the floor again.
Speaker 4 (28:48):
It can take full shifts.
Speaker 8 (28:50):
It's got many more rounds just ten seconds? How many
more rounds of financing de courses?
Speaker 4 (28:53):
I think this is it?
Speaker 9 (28:55):
All right? Cool stuff did in less than ten seconds.
Speaker 5 (28:59):
I love it.
Speaker 3 (28:59):
I love it, Peggy, such cool stuff.
Speaker 4 (29:01):
So glad we could get some time with Thanks for
having me.
Speaker 3 (29:03):
Thank you for being here, Peggy Johnson, CEO of Agility Robotics.
Speaker 2 (29:06):
You are listening to the Bloomberg Business Weekdaily Podcast. Catch
us live weekday afternoons from two to five pm Eastern
Listen on Apple CarPlay and the Android Auto with the
Bloomberg Business app, or watch us live on YouTube.
Speaker 3 (29:20):
Hey listen very much to a part of our world today.
We've got a podcast. Everybody's got a podcast. Great Chat, though,
is a new one that debuted I think about three
months ago. Episodes include conversations that can kind of go
in a lot of places, lls AI AI, maybe taking
our jobs, the best place to do, a startup that's
as likely to be heard as our courting eggs Forever
(29:42):
twenty one's demise, and also views on.
Speaker 8 (29:44):
The new code We've got with us here at the
Bloomberg Tech twenty five. Ashley Mayor, co host of the
Great Chat podcast, actually a co founder and general partner
at the early venture firm Coalition Operators. Last night, she
was joined by her co host Ellen men, who a
venture partner at True Ventures and also has done time
Carol had plaid drop Box and the company formerly known
(30:04):
as Spacebook.
Speaker 3 (30:05):
Tell us about this podcast, because my understanding, I think
it was a LinkedIn post that you guys talked about.
Speaker 4 (30:09):
I think you did that.
Speaker 3 (30:10):
It was like a feisty dinner and all of a sudden,
here we got to a podcast. Tell us about what
you guys were thinking in the mission here.
Speaker 1 (30:16):
Yeah, I mean, be careful before you go to a
dinner with a group of friends, because you might end
up starting a podcast. The five of us had a
dinner at Last Ball. It was a fun, feisty conversation
about the tech industry, and we joked at that dinner,
you know, maybe we should have a podcast. There are
so many podcasts that are you know, more news driven,
(30:38):
more informational, have guests, but we sort of thought that
maybe a more conversational, conversational format was good. And so
that podcast turned into a group chat, and that group
chat turned into a podcast, and Great Chat was born.
Speaker 3 (30:50):
Can I say it almost felt like Sex and the
City for the tech world a little bit, because you
guys will cover a lot of what's going on in
the world more generally, but then you'll talk about, you know,
some executive moving to Meadow or something, and you kind
of get into the nitty gritty of it.
Speaker 1 (31:05):
Sex and the City for nerds maybe, yeah. And I
think what we try to do is demystify a lot
of the headlines everyone seeing. I mean, the five of
us have worked in tech our whole careers, as investors, operators, founders.
My co host Sally has been in media herself, and
so we try to break down like the biggest headlines,
the biggest topics in tech and make them accessible, especially
(31:26):
to a younger generation of people coming into this industry.
Speaker 8 (31:29):
You guys are venture capitalists, so you understand that things
need to make money eventually. Yes, we're in a world
where anyone can do a podcast, so there's a big
difference between sort of the caller daddies and Joe Rogan's
of the world and then the newer entrants that don't
necessarily have the traction. Is this right now making money
as the goal for it to make money?
Speaker 1 (31:50):
No, not currently, although you know, never say never. We're
very much in scrappy mode. We're really doing this from
a place that we saw a gap in the ecosystem
and if I'm gonna be a little feisty here myself,
we found one of the few areas of white space
in tech commentary, which is the we're all women. And
we felt like a lot of the biggest voices in
the tech industry were very loud, very prominent, often billionaire men,
(32:14):
and we thought maybe we could bring a different a
different line you're not.
Speaker 8 (32:17):
Saying any names, but I know, I think I know
who you're talking about.
Speaker 4 (32:20):
There may be a podcast.
Speaker 1 (32:21):
It's a group of four men who are very loud
and sad.
Speaker 9 (32:25):
I did watch Sounds like Me Loud on HBO. I
don't know if you watch Mountainhead. I'm just throwing it
onto fun fact.
Speaker 1 (32:32):
I worked for one of those podcast hosts back in
the day.
Speaker 9 (32:36):
What did you learn?
Speaker 1 (32:38):
Well, I learned the power of narrative and the stories
we tell each other and ourselves about our industry determine
who gets funded, who gets the benefit of doubt, where
top talent goes, and this stuff really matters.
Speaker 3 (32:49):
But it's so indicative of how many conversations have we
had about women in tech and specifically female founded companies
just fighting for capital and to get recognized. Why is
that still a problem and how can you guys use
your format in your platform to maybe help that.
Speaker 1 (33:06):
Yeah, and also as venture capitalists in your own right totally,
And I mean I'm an emerging fund manager myself. I
have to raise money for my fund, and so it's
very much a thing.
Speaker 4 (33:16):
Listen.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I think just having examples of people who are maybe underrepresented,
who are visible, who are doing the thing and putting
ourselves out there. I mean, we're very much in this
like anti DEI era, which which comes with both I
think some negative implications for how people and are focusing
their their time and efforts. But at the end of
(33:39):
the day, you know, we all get to put our
chips on the table and build things ourselves and elevate
other people who are doing it.
Speaker 3 (33:47):
Actually, just push back against Ei. I push back against women,
push back against anyone who maybe isn't just a white
male born in America. That's kind of how it feels
right now. Yeah, with your platform, are you afraid to
speak at against that? I mean, because I think there
is a lot of fear among leaders about you know,
the White House either hearing something and not liking it.
(34:07):
So tell me about that, and how does it make
it also harder for you guys to raise money?
Speaker 5 (34:12):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (34:12):
I mean I am at a small fund. Yeah, and
so I'm not too worried about President Trump watching this
interview and coming at me and listen. I think at
the end of the day, my job as an investor
is to fund the very best founders I can find.
I do super early stage investing, So it really is
a bet On the founder. I don't have a diversity mandate.
(34:35):
We never have a coalition, but we have very diverse networks,
the diverse pipeline of deals, and so we have a
diverse portfolio. And in an ideal world, that's how it
works in my opinion, right versus having to have dedicated
programs specifics leaves the dollars going to you know, early
stage fund founders. I think that you know, as the
(34:55):
venture eco system divers size the pool of founders who
get capital of life.
Speaker 8 (35:00):
I want to talk to you a little bit about
what's exciting you in the tech space right now before
we do that. Carol you did mention and Ashley you
mentioned it too that the president going after different folks.
I should bring everyone an update in the sort of
relationship between Elon Musk and President Trump. The President putting
out on true social quote Elon was wearing thin.
Speaker 9 (35:18):
I asked him to leave.
Speaker 8 (35:20):
I took away his ev mandate that forced everyone to
buy electric cars that nobody else wanted, that he knew
for months I was going to do, and he just
went crazy. So just a little bit of an update
back and forth between the President and it.
Speaker 3 (35:30):
Is so over it does feel.
Speaker 9 (35:33):
You know, we're going to talk to r J.
Speaker 8 (35:34):
Skerriinch from Ribban in just a minute, so see if
he has any commentary about that, Ashley, before we let
you go curious about what's exciting to you out there.
We're not an in ecosystem in technology where venture capitalists
are throwing money at, like you know, at based games
or food delivery apps or that sort of thing. Right now,
A lot of it's going into robotics, a lot of
it's going into AI.
Speaker 9 (35:55):
Where are you seeing the money go?
Speaker 1 (35:57):
I mean excited about a lot of the macrunchs that
other people are. I have a partner who is actively
building a company in the AI space called Triai. We
see incredible aideal flow from her, and she also sort
of really has a real time pulse on what the
biggest AI platforms are doing, how enterprises are adopting. I
have another partner who runs city Block Health, which is
(36:18):
a massive healthcare startup. We're seeing incredible breakthroughs in the
healthcare ecosystem, especially the intersection of health and AI. But
at the highest level, I think there's never been a
better time to be an emerging investor and an early
stage investor. Because so many things are changing about the
world right From a technological perspective, a platform shift is
(36:38):
really changing everything. From a regulatory perspective, I mean, it's
a little bit of a wild West, but change is
generally good for early stage startups. Culturally and from a
media perspective, the way startups build their brands, go to market,
find their customers is changing, and so that for me
is so exciting. These moments of change are where the
most opportunity comes from.
Speaker 3 (36:58):
So ten seconds in a world where everything feels so uncertain,
you feel pretty confident.
Speaker 4 (37:03):
I feel good.
Speaker 1 (37:03):
I mean, I think if you've built your career in
the startup ecosystem, your purpose built for change. And there's
never been a bigger period of change than the one
we're in right now.
Speaker 3 (37:12):
Ashley bay Or she is co founder and general partner
of the early venture firm Coalition Operators, and she, along
with helenman Or, co hosts at the Grade chat pot Yam.
Speaker 2 (37:21):
This is the Bloomberg Business Week Daily podcast, available on Apple, Spotify,
and anywhere else you get your podcasts. Listen live weekday
afternoons from two to five pm Eastern on Bloomberg dot com.
The iHeartRadio app tune In, and the Bloomberg Business App.
You can also watch us live every weekday on YouTube
(37:41):
and always on the Bloomberg terminal
Hosts And Creators
Tim Stenovec
Carol Massar
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
24/7 News: The Latest
The latest news in 4 minutes updated every hour, every day.