We go deep on the evolution of work, hyper-personalized software stacks, and what it takes to build for speed today.
One of the sharpest conversations we've had on the show!💡
He sold his first startup to @Google. Helped build what became Google Workspace. Now he's reimagining organizational productivity.
New 8Spotlight with Wayne Crosby (@wcrosby), founder & CEO of OrgOrg (YC S24) 🎧
https://t.co/37a7wkHO1d
Kugel Audio
KugelAudio is building on-prem enterprise text-to-speech for Europe, supporting 25+ languages with the latency and data sovereignty that EU enterprises require.
There is no try with @ycombinator's P26 batch. The drops keep coming, the ideas keep getting sharper, and the signal is getting louder by the week.
Here are 5 companies that caught our eye this week:
Archer
Archer is building instant payouts for work and incentives, letting businesses design commission and referral programs in natural language and pay recipients in stablecoins.
Congratulations to the @mastra team on their $22M Series A!
Mastra is building a developer-first platform to create, deploy, and scale AI agents and workflows, bringing structure and reliability to production AI.
Excited for the journey ahead! 🚀🚀
We are thrilled to partner with @sygaldry_tech on this journey to revolutionise AI infrastructure!
With $139M raised and a focus on quantum-driven performance and efficiency, they’re tackling one of the biggest challenges in AI today. 🚀
Today we're pleased to share that Sygaldry has raised $139M to build quantum-accelerated AI servers for AI data centers, delivering more compute per watt. We're hiring brilliant, curious, kind, and collaborative scientists, engineers, and more.
https://t.co/gyddDh5UUT
From bold pivots to viral growth—how do you build something people can���t put down?
We dive into the grind of scaling AI, what keeps users hooked for hours, and the vision for the “Entertainment Machine.”
If you’re into consumer AI & the future of entertainment - this is for you.
We’re back with another episode of 8Spotlight🎙️
This time, we sit down with co-founders Gabriel Birnbaum, Eric Meier and founding engineer Tammo Ronke, the team behind Y/n- one of the fastest-growing AI consumer apps redefining interactive storytelling.
https://t.co/8F1OnHZLe6
Thrilled to see @Lio_Technology (fka AskLio) announce its $30 million Series A led by @a16z!
Lio is building the first multi agent system for enterprise procurement, automating sourcing, negotiations, and end-to-end contract management.
Big things ahead🚀
Announcing Lio's $30M Series A, led by Andreessen Horowitz!
Procurement still operates like an administrative back-office function: rigid software, manual workflows and endless headcount. Enterprises spend over $180 billion annually on procurement talent and roughly $10 billion on procurement software, yet the problem persists. More software hasn't solved it. More hiring won't either.
Introducing @Lio_Technology (formerly askLio) the world's first multi-agent system for procurement. Our virtual workforce is already deployed at some of the world's largest enterprises, taking over the manual work that buries buyers, shared service centers, and BPOs today. But Lio doesn't just do the same job - it does work that was never humanly possible: renegotiating every contract, sourcing across every category, and preparing as well as analyzing every negotiation, all at once.
Lio's AI agents operate on top of existing procurement software and ERPs - no rip-and-replace - autonomously executing workflows end to end.
The results speak for themselves:
- 95% adoption rate
- 85% reduction in manual work
- 10% incremental savings
- 100% customer retention
Lio isn't a dashboard or a copilot. It's the execution layer for enterprise procurement. As one Head of Procurement put it:
"Lio is a cheaper, more scalable, and faster-to-onboard alternative to outsourcing."
Lio’s agents are already managing billions of dollars in enterprise spend across dozens of Global 2000 and Fortune 500 companies – from manufacturers to reinsurers to huge industrial conglomerates.
This raise accelerates our US expansion and the growth of our agent ecosystem as we build the infrastructure powering AI-driven procurement.
A huge thank you to our incredible team, customers, and advisors. Proud to have outstanding investors on board: the round was led by @a16z - special thanks to @seema_amble - with participation from SV Angel, @HarryStebbings, @ycombinator, and a group of leading procurement executives and successful founders.
Additional thanks to @BKRoberts, @arampell, @jamdac, @zephratic and @t_blom.
Whether as an enterprise partner or a new team member — join our mission now!
General Astronautics
General Astronautics is building autonomous robots for microgravity labs, automating orbital experiments so research in space no longer depends on scarce astronaut time.
Every @ycombinator batch tells a story.
Thousands of founders apply. A small group gets in. And the ones who do? They're usually building something the rest of us will be talking about in the coming years.🚀
Here's what caught our eye this week:
Carson
Carson is building an AI agent that creates custom interfaces for knowledge work transforming research, email, and slides into secure, task-specific workspaces.