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October 8, 2024 49 mins

In this week’s Pathfinder pod, we bring in Karthik Gollapudi, CEO, and Austin Spiegel, CTO, of Sift, as they dive into the company's mission to build software tools for complex machines, with a focus on telemetry solutions. Sift’s platform enables end-to-end data ingestion, real-time analysis, and visualization, helping companies streamline the testing and operation of intricate hardware systems, such as spacecraft and rockets.

Karthik and Austin share the story behind Sift’s founding and highlight the key role telemetry plays in improving safety and efficiency for hardware engineers. 

We also cover:

  • How SIFT automates data review and reduces testing time
  • The challenges of managing large data volumes in aerospace and beyond
  • How the company helps engineers identify anomalies and prevent failures
  • The importance of real-time insights for complex hardware systems
  • Their recent funding round led by Google Ventures

And much more...

 

• Chapters •

00:00 - Intro

00:31 - What is Sift building?

04:18 - Origins

07:30 - Austin at Riot Games

10:52 - Product walkthrough

13:19 - Why is data ingestion so difficult?

19:30 - What is a company doing if they're not using Sift?

22:05 - How do you make sure that there's no data loss?

24:50 - What does a user experience look like?

27:44 - What does the demand look like for real-time telemetry?

28:57 - Competition

29:43 - Revenue model

31:56 - How Sift's tools help their customers

36:46 - What's next for Sift?

39:04 - What keeps you up at night?

44:56 - Long-term view

45:54 - Companies to be excited for

 

• Show notes •

Sift’s website — siftstack.com/

Sift’s socials — https://x.com/SiftStack

Mo's socials — https://twitter.com/itsmoislam

Payload’s socials — https://twitter.com/payloadspace / https://www.linkedin.com/company/payloadspace

Pathfinder archive — Watch: https://www.youtube.com/@payloadspace

Pathfinder archive — Listen: https://pod.payloadspace.com/episodes
 

• About us •

Pathfinder is brought to you by Payload, a modern space media brand built from the ground up for a new age of space exploration and commercialization. We deliver need-to-know news and insights daily to 19,000+ commercial, civil, and military space leaders. Payload is read by decision-makers at every leading new space company, along with c-suite leaders at all of the aerospace & defense primes. We’re also read on Capitol Hill, in the Pentagon, and at space agencies around the world.

Payload began as a weekly email sent to a few friends and coworkers. Today, we’re a team distributed across four time zones and two continents, publishing five media properties across multiple platforms:

1) Payload, our flagship daily newsletter, sends M-F @ 9am Eastern

2) Pathfinder publishes weekly on Tuesday mornings (pod.payloadspace.com)

3) Polaris, our weekly policy briefing, publishes weekly on Tuesdays

4) Payload Research, our weekly research and analysis piece,  comes out on Wednesdays

You can sign up for all of our publications here: https://payloadspace.com/subscribe/

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