Amin Mirzadegan

[Ole Lehmann @itsolelehmann]

this is just the most ridiculous AI application i've ever seen lol

a Peter Thiel-backed startup that makes AI collars for cows is now worth $2 billion

and the more I read about it the cooler it gets. here's how it works:

every cow wears a solar-powered collar that talks to a network of radio towers and an app on the farmer's phone

instead of building physical fences, the farmer draws the fence on a map in the app, and the collar keeps each cow inside that invisible line using GPS

when a cow drifts toward the edge, the collar plays a sound to steer her, and a gentle vibration tells her which way to go.

it's like how a car beeps as you back up toward a wall

the cows learn the cues in a few days

so now a rancher can move an entire herd to fresh grass by sliding the fence on a map, without driving out to open a single gate

and that same collar is reading each cow's body the whole time.

it takes five readings per second on every animal, so the AI can catch a cow that's sick, injured, ready to breed, or about to give birth before a person would ever notice walking the field

so it's basically like WHOOP for cows too lol

and they gave the AI behind it the perfect name: the Cowgorithm

it's been trained on more than 7 billion hours of real cow behavior, which is why Halter calls the data its real asset and moat.

they know what a normal cow looks like better than anyone, so they can flag the odd one out instantly

it's already on more than 1M cattle across New Zealand, Australia, and a bunch of US states.

California even used it on public land to graze cattle in patterns that clear dry brush and slow down wildfires

costs about $5 to $8 per cow per month

a job that used to mean barbed wire, gates, and driving the fields all day is now mostly 1 person on their phone

[Eric Glyman @eglyman]

Today, Ramp raised $750M at a $44B valuation.

Last time we grew this fast, we were 1/20th the size.

For 2000 years, business was built on two pillars. Today, a third: intelligence.

It’s your least governed cost. It’s also your single greatest opportunity.

[Cognition @cognition]

1/ We’ve raised over $1B at a $26B valuation, led by @Lux_Capital, @generalcatalyst, and @8vc.

Our enterprise usage has grown >10x since the start of this year, and our run-rate revenue grew to $492 M.

We launched Devin two years ago as the first AI software engineer. Since then, cloud agents have gone from niche to mainstream, and today they are the fastest growing way to create software.

[Joubin Mirzadegan @Joubinmir]

Excited to share @RoadrunnerAI has raised $27M in funding across a $5.2M seed led by @mamoonha at @kleinerperkins and a $22M Series A led by @traestephens at @foundersfund.

We started the company in August - and the business has basically been happening to us since we incorporated.

Building AI agents for the enterprise to run one of their most important production systems is not for the faint of heart. But the pain around CPQ is very real, and we’ve been overwhelmed by demand from companies looking for a better way forward.

Our ability to serve more customers in pursuit of building a generational company is almost entirely bottlenecked by our ability to hire the top 1% of talent. If you're interested in joining us, reach out!

Thanks to @agarfinks and @FortuneMagazine for covering part of the story! Link to article in comments!

[Sam Blond @samdblond]

We're announcing our $50M Series B led by Benchmark. Founders Fund and Human Capital are tripling down in the round.

We gave Benchmark a sneak preview of our upcoming GA release. They saw the future of sales. We had a term sheet 2 hours later.

The future of sales is Monaco.

[Sawyer Merritt @SawyerMerritt]

This deserves more attention, because it’s a really cool @Starlink use case.

They’re using collars on cattle that connect to Starlink satellites in space, allowing ranchers to create and adjust a “virtual fence” in real time right from their phone in the middle of nowhere. You don't need to be close to a radio tower anymore. Literally no-one has done this before.

[Scott Nolan @ScottNolan]

Japan is one of America’s closest allies and is turning its nuclear reactors back on. The goal: 20% of the grid by 2030.

As we restore US enrichment and meet domestic demand, with the support of @EximBankUS we are ready to help Japan secure the fuel it needs.

[Sawyer Merritt @SawyerMerritt]

Halter announced today the launch of direct-to-satellite connectivity using SpaceX's @Starlink for its smart cattle collars, a world-first that removes the need for cell towers or on-ranch infrastructure.

"Using Starlink enables ranchers to manage cattle anywhere they can see the sky. Combined with a suite of new tools for reproduction, animal behavior, and precision pasture management, the release significantly expands what is possible for cattle ranch management.

Beef ranchers in remote and rugged regions that were limited by connectivity can now turn to virtual fencing to run more productive and sustainable operations - at a time when they face rising fuel costs, labor shortages, and an aging workforce pressures."

Halter’s internal modeling estimates direct-to-satellite capability expands coverage of the U.S beef cattle market by 2.5x. Until now, Halter’s solar-powered, GPS-enabled collars relied on Halter’s proprietary long-range radio towers. With direct-to-satellite, the collars can communicate via Starlink, eliminating ground infrastructure entirely.

[James Riney🐠Coral Capital @james_riney]

Scott Nolan (@ScottNolan ) was employee ~30 at SpaceX. He spent over a decade at Founders Fund backing Anduril, Radiant, and Crusoe Energy. In 2023, he went looking for a company enriching uranium domestically. There was none. So he started General Matter (@generalmatter ).

The U.S. once produced 86% of the world's enriched uranium. By 2013 it was zero. Russia filled the gap. China is scaling fast. Meanwhile, every advanced reactor company in America was hitting the same wall: no domestic fuel supply.

General Matter is changing that. $900M DOE contract. First facility in Paducah, Kentucky, the exact site where the U.S. last enriched uranium. And just weeks ago in Tokyo, a $2.4B EXIM financing deal to supply Japanese utilities.

Why is this important to Japan? Because 70% of Japan's oil passes through the Strait of Hormuz. Because Japan currently imports all its enriched uranium from Europe. Because Japan has been burned by energy dependency in 1941, the 1970s, and right now.

One pellet of enriched uranium contains as much energy as 100 barrels of oil. You can stockpile it for years. The energy density alone makes nuclear the most defensible base load option for an import-dependent economy.

I sat down with Scott over sushi in Tokyo to talk about all of this. Enjoy.

(00:00) Intro
(01:17) The $2.4B EXIM Deal
(04:43) Why General Matter Had to Be Started
(11:51) The Uranium Supply Chain
(15:40) SpaceX and Nuclear: The Parallel
(19:54) Japan's Energy Security
(25:58) Safety Myths and Next-Gen Reactors
(31:10) Enrichment Economics
(37:18) The SpaceX Approach to Cheaper Enrichment
(46:43) Japan Supply Chain Partnership
(56:50) Why Peter Thiel Joined the Board
(01:02:10) Founders Fund on Japan
(01:09:02) Definite Optimism and the Anduril Playbook
(01:13:10) General Matter's Culture
(01:15:27) Five-Year Scaling Plan

[david friedberg @friedberg]

at @ohalo, we got the nuts ..

[John Coogan @johncoogan]

TBPN has been acquired by OpenAI!

The show is staying the same and we’ll continue to go live at 11am pacific every weekday.

This is a full circle moment for me as I’ve worked with @sama for well over a decade. He funded my first company in 2013. Then helped us fix a serious logjam during a critical funding round a few years later. When I took my second company through YC, he was president at the time, and then when I joined Founders Fund, the first deal I saw in motion was the post-ChatGPT round in late 2022. And as we started growing TBPN last year, he was the very first lab lead to join the show.

Thank you to everyone that has been a part of TBPN until now. The last year has been the most fun and rewarding part of my career and we’re excited to have more resources than ever going forward.

[Sam Blond @samdblond]

$100,000 cash prize founder poker tournament. No entry fee.

Announcing The Monaco Invitational, presented by @MonacoGTM .

This will be the largest founder poker tournament (and party) of all time.

In addition to giving away $100,000 to the winners in the free to play tournament, we'll have celebrity guests, an incredible food and beverage program, and the coolest venue in San Francisco. This will be the event that sets the gold standard for startup events.

Invitations are reserved for Monaco customers, anyone who refers a Monaco customer, and friends of the firm. Know a founder who should be there? Tag them in the comments.

Check out more details in the invitation on tournament rules and eligibility.

[Sam Blond @samdblond]

We just launched Monaco. Here’s the exact playbook we used. I hope it's helpful to other founders and startups:

1. The launch video: most launch videos I see orient around some stressed out person at their desk or some philosophical approach to company building. Do not do this.

[Cognition @cognition]

Introducing Devin 2.2 – the autonomous agent that can test with computer use, self-verify, and auto-fix its work. Try it for free!

We’ve also overhauled Devin from the ground up:

- 3x faster startup
- fully redesigned interface
- computer use + virtual desktop

...and hundreds more UX and functionality improvements.

[Sam Blond @samdblond]

We're launching Monaco today.

Monaco automates customer acquisition and revenue growth for startups.

The platform disrupting sales with AI has finally arrived.

[your host, alicia @sharedalbums]

14 dinners got me everything I ever wanted in this world.

This is a love letter to everyone who came to a Family Meal in the last 12 months. You took a chance on someone who wasn’t the traditional fit for this community, walked into dinners blind (a hidden guest list and no guarantee of what you’d get out of it) and gave me the one thing in this world you can’t buy back: your time.

Growing up I was drawn to lot of startup movies/shows (The Social Network, Silicon Valley) and all I ever wanted as someone 10,000 miles away from where all of that was happening, was to be in it.

In the restaurant industry, family meal is a moment when bartenders, servers, cooks, dishwashers eat together and get to know each other outside of service. Too often as founders, researchers, investors, engineers, you’re expected to always have the right answers, be “impressive” and in a constant state of being “on.” In a world where everything is so transactional, Family Meal was created to take you off your proverbial line and give everyone a break from the performance.

For 14 dinners I’ve kept Family Meals sponsor-free to keep the intention behind it all pure. I didn’t want homework from anyone to deliver insights, founders, or potential recruits on a platter. In our world, money is a commodity and protecting what makes these dinners feel genuine is a price I’d happily pay. I think it has served us well.

And through this experiment I’ve found some of the most non-transactional, inspiring, and quietly brilliant people that put me in awe everyday.

14 dinners got me everything I ever wanted in this world, and it has been a great pleasure being your host.

Season 2 starts in 2026.

your host,
alicia

[Patrick OShaughnessy @patrick_oshag]

More than half of the people I’ve seen try Fortell’s hearing aids started to cry

Absolutely incredible technology that will change the lives of millions of people with hearing loss now and in the future

[Ramp Labs @RampLabs]

Today, we’re launching Ramp Sheets, the AI spreadsheet editor built to 10x finance teams, operators, and founders.

Ramp Sheets plans, executes, and formats automatically. It’s already being used to model budgets, forecast revenue, and reconcile financial statements.

[Eric Glyman @eglyman]

Today, Ramp raised another $300M at a $32B valuation.

In the past year our revenue has doubled to over $1B, growing 10x faster than the median public SaaS.

We all know money talks — we're teaching it to think.

Getting big no longer means getting slow.

[TBPN @tbpn]

Data centers need tradesman, and fast.

“HVAC technicians or plumbers are what data centers need for cooling, or [even] standing it up... It takes years to get trained for these jobs, probably for longer than I went to Stanford."

From our conversation with @melisatokmak: