David Cahn

Partner at Sequoia

[Flapping Airplanes @flappyairplanes]

(1/5) Great to be at @sequoia to give a sneak peek of one of our research directions!

TL;DR one path to data-efficiency may be to “abuse GPUs like they’ve never been abused before”

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Great talk at AI Ascent from @flappyairplanes on why the future is data efficient.

Ben Spector: "We bought the whole GPU, so we're damn well going to use the whole GPU."

[Sequoia Capital @sequoia]

@amspector100 and @bfspector of @flappyairplanes at AI Ascent 2026: The big AI wins so far (search, coding) happen to be the most data-rich problems on earth. Almost everything else is data-poor.

Unlocking the rest of the economy will depend on drastically better data efficiency.

00:00 Introduction
00:33 Meet the Founders
01:14 Not an Airplane Company
01:44 Talk Outline and Thesis
01:57 Why Data Efficiency Matters
02:46 The Long Tail of Low Data
03:28 Compute Scales Easier Than Data
04:20 Data Moats and Competition
05:16 Systems Plus Algorithms Approach
06:25 GPU Primitives and Closing

[Astrocade @PlayAstrocade]

Spotted: @DavidCahn6 asking how many GPUs went into making our new game.
XOXO.

[Astrocade @PlayAstrocade]

Can you spot @sequoia partners and other GOATS in this silicon valley sim game? 👀

The funniest (or best) startup pitch gets a 15min chat with @DavidCahn6 ;)
(post ss of your pitch in the comments below)

Play now: https://t.co/EkzSP5qgV5

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

"Games can be serious business, and the history of Silicon Valley tells us as much. The rise of Atari was one of venture capital’s first great wins, and let’s not forget that GPUs (which even Nvidia can’t get enough of) were originally built for video games."

[FORTUNE @FortuneMagazine]

“If you ask ‘how many of you want to create games’, 80% will say they want to create a game," said Ali Sadeghian, Astrocade cofounder. "But if you ask ‘how many of you have made a game,’ only one or two people will raise their hands... This makes it possible." https://t.co/RSy69jz91t

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

@jamesfly @PlayAstrocade @sequoia Too good, I was coding and gaming long before I was blogging :)

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Congrats @_amirabs and @sadeghian_ali on the Series B! Insane grit from you and your entire team grinding to PMF for years. Now the traction is taking off.

Rare to see a team stick together for this long from initial idea through takeoff.

[Astrocade @PlayAstrocade]

We raised $56M to help build the next era of interactive entertainment. Series B led by @sequoia, Series A led by Sea.

Astrocade lets anyone create games with AI, play them with friends, and share them with millions.

But this isn’t about replacing creativity. It’s about giving more people the tool to bring their taste, humor, stories, and craft to life.

Today, the fun goes public.

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

@PlayAstrocade Playable version: https://t.co/IuH1ffvgLX

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Five months ago, @PlayAstrocade users were playing 6M games / month (up from 0 a few months earlier).

Today, they are at 140M plays / month and 5M MAU.

In case anyone is curious why it's exploding, here's a game we vibe coded:

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Full post: https://t.co/NTxwwaGMQ0

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

New Substack in honor of big Mag7 earnings day.

We are in a hyper-reactive and hyperbolic market. This is a psychological defense mechanism against inherent uncertainty.

But we're not in a temporarily uncertain moment. Yesterday's certainty was the real mirage.

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

https://t.co/0BEYAGiRPg

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

We're going to see a lot of cyber innovation in next 1-2 years coming off of these new capabilities.

MOAK is the most compelling demo of what's coming next. Necessity is the mother of innovation.

[yair saban @YairS17728]

#Anthropic got it wrong.

The public models already grant attackers the upper hand. This is why we created #MOAK - to prove that the exploitation risk is no longer theoretical.

AI-powered instant exploitation of 1-days is now the rational move for every threat actor. We are expecting "Spray & Pray" attacks to hit within an hour of publication, and this won't be limited to nation-states.

While #Glasswing focuses on maintainers, it lacks the robust support required by enterprises. In the long run, these tools might make the world safer, but in the short term, currently available models enable a "Wild West" scenario.

I believe that the next two years will be brutal for enterprises. AI-powered attackers are significantly more vicious.

To the defenders reading this - we’re entering a dangerous era - you must step up your patching game.
You’ve got to check the website, the link is in the first comment.

To be continued.

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

https://t.co/Aimdeieian

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Just finished The Infinity Machine from @scmallaby.

Sebastian wrote the definitive books on hedge funds and venture capital, and has done it again on AI.

A legendary founder story with real detail on how we got here technically.

Also full of great anecdotes:

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Congrats to @winstonweinberg and the Harvey team. Epic to see the scaling of PMF in one of the most important AI markets.

[Winston Weinberg @winstonweinberg]

Excited to announce our latest funding round at an $11B valuation led by GIC and @sequoia with participation from @a16z, @coatuemgmt, @conviction, @eladgil, @EvanticCapital, and @kleinerperkins.

Thank you to our customers, team, investors, and everyone else who has helped along the way.

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

@kiwicopple @supabase "Our growth rate right now is as fast as it was during YC." Wow. Congrats @kiwicopple, @AntWilson and the whole team.

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Full post: https://t.co/NU0Gwy78p6

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Once someone does something that once seemed impossible — immigrating to a new country, becoming the best in the world at something, or starting a company everyone thinks is absurd — the next inconceivable thing becomes easier.

Doing the inconceivable compounds.

[David Cahn @DavidCahn6]

Newest essay explores inconceivable startups, how founders balance divergent & convergent thinking in company building, and how people can train themselves to see the inconceivable.