"World of DaaS"
Conversations with the leaders building the future. Auren Hoffman deep dives with CEOs, investors, and innovators to explore how great companies scale, where technology is headed, and the big ideas driving change. Auren is CEO of NQB8, GP at Flex Capital, and former CEO of SafeGraph and LiveRamp.
Episodes
Cobi Blumenfeld-Gantz is the co-founder and CEO of Chapter, an AI-powered Medicare navigation platform valued at $1.5 billion that helps seniors navigate coverage and enrollment.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Cobi and Auren discuss:
- Why medicare fraud costs over $100 billion annually
- How 24,000 medicare plans create impossible choices for seniors
- Why government tech keeps failing with Accenture contracts
- Provider network data ac...
Hans Swildens is a partner and Head of Industry Ventures at Goldman Sachs. Industry Ventures is one of the pioneers in the secondary market for venture capital, managing several billion in assets across LP stakes, direct secondaries, and primary fund investments. In October of 2025, Goldman Sachs announced they were acquiring Industry Ventures in a deal worth over $900 million dollars.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Hans and Aur...
Glenn Hubbard is Dean Emeritus and Russell L. Carson Professor of Finance and Economics at Columbia Business School. He served as Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers under President George W. Bush from 2001 to 2003 and was Deputy Assistant Secretary for Tax Policy at the U.S. Treasury. He has served on the boards of BlackRock, ADP, MetLife, and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Glenn an...
Omar Tawakol is the CEO and founder of Rembrand, an AI-powered virtual product placement company. He founded BlueKai, a data management platform acquired by Oracle for $400M+ in 2014, and Voicera, an AI meeting assistant acquired by Cisco in 2019. He currently serves on the board of The Trade Desk and as a General Partner at super{set}.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Omar and Auren discuss:
- Why virtual billboards work better t...
This episode is a rebroadcast of Auren's appearance on the We the Builders podcast.
We The Builders: https://twitter.com/WeThe_Builders
Host Suffiyan Malik: https://twitter.com/suffiyanmalikk
Substack: https://wethebuilders.us
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This week I sat down with Auren Hoffman founder, builder, prolific investor, and one of the most connected peo...
Craig Fuller is the founder and CEO of FreightWaves, a freight media company, and SONAR, a supply chain data platform. He’s also the founder of Firecrown, which owns more than 50 publications across aviation, marine, and supply chain sectors, and he recently released his first book, Moving the World: How the Supply Chain’s Evolution Affects Us All.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Craig and Auren discuss:
- How FreightWaves predi...
Tanay Kothari is the co-founder and CEO of Wispr Flow, a voice-first AI assistant that recently raised $56 million in Series A funding.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Tanay and Auren discuss:
- Why Apple and Google's dictation tools fail
- What AI-first devices will actually look like
- Pivoting from hardware to software
- Voice replacing nearly three-quarters of keyboard usage
Microsoft is investing $17.5 billion to turn India into a global AI powerhouse — from training 20 million workers to building new data infrastructure. We break down what this means for the future of AI talent, innovation, and digital sovereignty.
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Vinicius Vacanti is the co-founder and CEO of YipitData, an alternative data intelligence platform that analyzes billions of consumer data points daily for institutional investors and corporations. The company reached unicorn status with a $475 million Series E from Carlyle Group in 2021.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Vin and Auren discuss:
- Why hedge funds dominate data usage versus corporations
- How AI is transforming data pro...
This week’s World of DaaS LM Brief: MIT’s new research reveals how large language models can be fooled by their own grammar. By prioritizing sentence structure over sense, these systems risk producing confident but misleading outputs—and even ignoring built-in safety rules.
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Patrick McGee is the author of Apple in China, which was named one of the most notable books of the year by the New York Times and the Washington Post. The book is a deeply reported investigation into how Apple and China built each other over 25 years—and what that means for technology, supply chains, and geopolitics. Patrick has been a reporter with the Financial Times since 2013.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Patrick and Auren...
Dave Morin is co-founder and managing partner of Offline Ventures, a venture fund and studio backed by Apple as anchor investor. He was an early employee at Facebook, then founded the mobile social network Path.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Dave and Auren discuss:
- Why Meta's AI ads work while Netflix, Amazon, and Spotify fail at recommendations
- How Offline runs its venture fund/studio hybrid
- Parasocial relationships and t...
This week’s World of DaaS LM Brief highlights a Forbes piece on enterprise AI infrastructure, where the author examines why data pipelines, not the models themselves, are becoming the real bottleneck.
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Azeem Azhar is the founder of Exponential View, a newsletter and research platform on emerging technology read by over 130,000 executives and policymakers globally, and author of the bestselling book The Exponential Age.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Azeem and Auren discuss:
- Diagnosing an AI bubble
- Data centers driving 33% of US GDP growth
- Whether energy will constrain AI before capital does
- Circular financing in AI and funding ...
This week’s World of DaaS LM Brief highlights Auren Hoffman’s latest piece, where he explores how emotion—not information—drives behavior across platforms, politics, and AI systems. The piece examines why algorithms amplify strong emotional signals, how “love” consistently outperforms “hate” in outcomes, and what this means for builders designing the next generation of data-driven products.
Listen to this short podcast summary, powe...
Eric Simons is the CEO and co-founder of StackBlitz, the company behind Bolt.new, which reached $40 million ARR in five months after launching in October 2024. Bolt.new is an AI-powered platform that allows anyone to build, edit, and deploy full-stack web applications directly in the browser.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Eric and Auren discuss:
- The explosive growth from $0 to $40M ARR
- Pioneering usage-based pricing for AI too...
This week’s World of DaaS LM Brief explores our latest roundtable, where data leaders discussed the evolving challenges of retaining and expanding enterprise customers in an increasingly competitive data economy. The conversation explored how companies are mitigating churn, proving ROI, and deepening customer value in the era of AI.
Listen to this short podcast summary, powered by NotebookLM.
Garrett Langley is the co-founder and CEO of Flock Safety, an Atlanta-based public safety technology company recently valued at $7.5 billion. Flock manufactures hardware like license plate recognition cameras, drones, and gunshot detection systems, as well as software used by thousands of communities and law enforcement agencies across the U.S.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Garrett and Auren discuss:
- The broken state of law e...
This week’s World of DaaS LM Brief explores Auren Hoffman’s latest Substack post, 46ers, 55ers, 81ers, and today - a fascinating look at how generational ambition and the rise of AI are shaping the next wave of builders. Auren draws parallels between past innovation eras and the new generation driving today’s tech transformation.
Listen to this short podcast summary, powered by NotebookLM.
Mark Ein is the founder, chairman and CEO of Venturehouse Group and has been involved in the founding or early stages of six companies worth over $1 billion. He also served as Chairman of the President's Export Council, is Executive Chairman of Kastle Systems, owns the DC Open, and was a key partner in the $6.05 billion acquisition of the Washington Commanders.
In this episode of World of DaaS, Mark and Auren discuss:
- Cross-...
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