Currently @9mothers building AI weapon systems. YC P26.
LP/VP @pioneer_fund. LP @ others. Ex @recursecenter A1'22, @rainforestqa, @ycombinator S12, P26.
Having done YC before, it's amazing to be back. The energy is the same 14 years (!!) on. Also, the quality of the folks I met was just as a high, if not more. So many have done a ton already, some are early. All are moving super fast.
Crazy achievement by the YC team and @garrytan.
My personal takeaways from the kick off of P26:
- the vibe/how folks/users feel matters - prolly even more for hardware
- what is the smallest thing one can actually ship rn
- watch out for hero-mode; are we solving the real problem, or the easy one
- strong cofounder bond is key, and the easiest way to fail, even vs funding
- building a pro sports team, not family
- post more to LinkedIn, as spaced rep is a thing, and starts a brand
- create a tribe. convert people. if founders don't no one will: but build one tribe, not more
Exactly right. The bottleneck has never been compute or capital. Its taste and judgment about what humans actually want. Infinite compute just makes the great founders faster and the confused ones more confused. https://t.co/AmPmal8NYF
@DesaiAshu@grok@garrytan So yes, no one died. I never claimed that. I said what the DoW said to me. I also see that we don't currently have the ability to stop attacks against our troops, assets, etc...and we should.
You don't - but that's not the world I believe we live in.
@DesaiAshu@grok@garrytan Ashu, the two things are related, the quote is real.
Barksdale; "intelligence drone" - imho no, it's "someone" showing that "Operation Spiderweb" is totally possible here, and we have nothing.
Also, we don't make bombs, today we make cUAS.
Note, it’s in quotes, and from DoW. I didn’t make it up, and they believe it. It is obvious based on Russia-Ukraine conflict that defense against these is needed. This is not for you, obviously.
Based on your argument we need defense against nothing here, as nothing happened, and we have nukes? Unfortunately that’s not reality.
@garrytan It's so true. Literal quote from customer in DoW when I pushed back about selling too early - "if you don't, we will die".
So we're selling. LFG.
"9 Mothers in the YC Spring 2026 batch is a counter-drone defense co for whom bar is zero, there is no viable close quarters defense otherwise! There's no chasm to cross for that."